cjet79
Anarcho Capitalist on moral grounds
Libertarian Minarchist on economic grounds
User ID: 124
cjet79
8hr ago
Domestic shipping is no longer essential, we made it that way through the Jones act. While every other form of transportation has gotten cheaper, faster, and more plentiful domestic shipping has gotten worse in all those ways.
In a counterfactual world where the Jones act never existed I'd bet that domestic shipping would look incredibly important. There are some very useful navigable waterways in the US and for the century or two prior to the Jones act they were absolutely essential to commerce.
However, we live in clown world reality, where a transportation method that has served humanity for millenia is denied to the US because of bad economic thinking.
cjet79
13hr ago
I am against retaliatory tariffs. They are in fact shooting yourself in the foot.
1930s was the last time everyone went all in all retaliatory tariffs and it basically wrecked the world economy.
There are always economists in favor of bad ideas. They still can't even agree on the minimum wage.
What you'll find with economists that support bad economic policies is that they'll point to a paper or theory that justifies it in a very convoluted way. There are papers out there that justify minimum wage and tariffs, but they require a perfect set of market conditions and a government run exactly to the specifications of these same economists.
The most famous example of protective industrial policy in the US is the Jones act. It is stronger than a tariff because it represents an absolute ban on foreign products in certain categories. It has been a total failure. The US has instead just crippled its domestic shipping, impoverished its own people, and all it has to show for it is a sclerotic ship building industry.
Other countries like Brazil and India have also been trying to industrial policy themselves into success for a few decades. They've also only managed to further impoverish their people.
There is no cognitive dissonance. Just bad economic policy that we will trick ourselves into every few decades.
cjet79
1d ago
Most democracies integrate the soldiers into the government so it's not necessary.
US government agencies have preferential hiring of veterans. They have large bureaucratic organizations that hoover up former soldiers.
The other ones end up getting elected.
No where did I suggest they'd need to stage a coup.
cjet79
2d ago
By what mechanism? Is your position that cadres of veterans will stage a coup?
Generally by the methods available. If there only path to control is a violent coup, then ya. I think it much more likely that they will just have a degree of legitimacy and experience with the bureaucracy of government that will give them an advantage in attaining positions in governance.
They will also be more difficult to intimidate and suppress. There is a large amount of ground to cover before a violent coup takes place. It could just be that some of them are a little crazier and willing to engage in terrorist acts or intimidation acts against the best of their political opponents.
The European governments will not have much difficulty in conscripting young men. There will be lots of wailing and gnashing of teeth, but they can definitely get away with it.
The problem for those governments will be when veterans of war return home. Carrying out violence is a durable skill set, and it is a pretty rare skill set in the west. The United States maintains the equivalent of a full time domestic army in the form of police, and even trains a small amount of them in full on domestic war techniques (SWAT teams).
Meanwhile in Britain they can send female officers to go arrest YouTubers for posting videos of their dog giving Nazi salutes.
Civilization is always held together by people being unwilling to commit coordinated violence. This can be accomplished a few different ways:
- Barely anyone is skilled in violence, and thus most violence is easy to quash with any level of coordination. The modern European approach.
- The most violent are in charge. And they must constantly and indiscriminately wield that violence to field off contenders, the moment a more aggressive and more violent faction arises they will take over. The third world banana republic approach (and most of history).
- Multiple different groups that can wield coordinated violence are at a detente. They've agreed to some rules of conflict and they stick to those rules to avoid escalation into all out war. The American approach (and how most Empires operated)
Europe has mostly forgotten how to wage war, and how to pacify the men returning home from war. The US has kept the skill set depressingly fresh. Whoever comes home from the war will end up controlling the governments of Europe.
This type of thing might be the best they can hope for: https://www.warhistoryonline.com/featured/battle-of-athens.html But the worst will look more like Russia in 1917.
Edit oops meant to post this in response to @jeroboam below, but still mostly relevant to Ukraine war stuff and Europe getting engaged.
cjet79
4d ago
This is a bit over the line of too antagonistic. Especially the accusation of lying.
This is a warning, cool off a bit.
cjet79
4d ago
I have a personal peeve against people putting words in my mouth. Would like it was clear I said things, or if I was quoted.
Given that I wrote out a longer response about my beliefs I'd appreciate an in-depth response to anything other than the 1st point.
cjet79
5d ago
I don't remember bringing up any of those arguments actually. Did you just tag me because I'm one of the only pro-immigration people around here?
I'll be clear about what I believe:
- Ethnic tension is a sad and mostly inevitable result of different races living in proximity. Without a uniting set of circumstances or things to kick off high tensions it will generally simmer at a low background temperature.
- Middle class immigration is the most desirable immigration and it's currently the most difficult. There is an anarcho-tyranny situation where you either need to be rich enough to ignore laws, or poor enough to make enforcement against a mass number of you difficult. This is similar to the homeless situation where city governments can easily enforce any number of regulations on law abiding City residents, but can't get law ignoring drug addicts off the street.
- Lots of negative side effects are part of the previous point. It is possible and relatively straightforward for western countries to ban immigration of law abiding and economically beneficial immigration. They seem to have done it accidentally over the last few decades just through increasingly onerous bureaucratic requirements.
cjet79
6d ago
I enjoyed that series, but I've almost never recommended it. There is a level of autism on display that is truly mind boggling.
Book 4 was my definite favorite. Book 5 was a setting I didn't really know, but still enjoyed heavily. Book 6 I couldn't keep reading after finishing two others in a row.
cjet79
6d ago
I listen to a bunch of American standups do comedy podcasts, Tim Dillon, Stavros Halkias, Are you Garbage, Joe Rogan, Two bears on cave, etc.
I admittedly don't play many triple A games either. The indie games I play tend to be from all over. Canada, Sweden, and Poland are some of the recent ones in my library. I honestly thought they were American before I went and looked them up to be sure.
I am often reading things on Royalroad, which is owned by amazon. English is the main successful language on the website. Its hard to know what nationality many of the authors are. I think based on the ratings of many stories, that non first language english speakers do real badly. I'll sometimes go read Xianxia translations, but I almost prefer objectively shitty American stories to good translated stories.
For music I basically just listen to pop and rock. Sometimes British bands are good, but mostly its American super pop groups I'm listening to.
The one real area of american growth in culture is youtube. And I'm behind on those trends, but that is me getting old.
cjet79
6d ago
There was a conservative business approach to immigrants of "they are cheap labor". So yeah there was a pro-immigration consensus for a long time. But it was a bi-party consensus.
cjet79
7d ago
American culture always dies and is reborn with each new generation. That is part of why it is great. It doesn't have to stay the same century after century like other stale cultures. Opera and Ballet is dead, but singing and dancing aren't. When I hear "american culture is dead" its like hearing that "no one listens to music" or "no one makes music anymore". A specific time period of American culture might no longer be in active production, but expecting or requiring that feels very old world and anti-american to me.
I find the doomsaying equally absurd. If american culture isn't dominant and ascendant then what the hell am I watching, listening to, and reading all the time? As an American I usually have to go inconveniently out of my way just to consume foreign art.
cjet79
7d ago
I specifically claimed that there are enclaves where people don't assimilate. Often it is in cities. Your response: "poppycock [exactly what I just said]"
Honestly if you hadn't included the "poppycock" or the "no thank you" I would have thought you were just pointlessly agreeing with what I said.
The rural enclaves all end up speaking exclusively American English within a generation or two. They all heavily consume American culture. Many of them volunteer for the military at higher rates.
The urban enclaves I have a sense of "who gives a shit". They stay in a city and live out their lives in a weird half-in-half-out state. And their kids slowly abandon them to the wider much better culture and economy that is all around them. They have all the vibrancy and threat of a museum.
cjet79
7d ago
All weak cultures that have barely survived the dominance and ascendancy of US culture. They have barely survived by keeping out all foreign borns, and then just copying the parts of our culture that they can. I don't want to emulate such weak cultures.
cjet79
7d ago
See my girl scouts comment.
I think there is a reason the "anti-immigration is racist" argument has lived on for so long. Ultimately it feels like no metric is ever good enough to convince anyone when there are just too many brown people by their approximation.
I went to George Mason, I've lived in the area for over a decade. My parents grew up in Northern Virginia (but neither stayed there). I grew up in a slightly rural area of Virginia. I only really know the English language. Aside from the area not being as white as where I grew up it still feels very American to me. I've been to India and multiple countries in Europe, so I know what a foreign country feels like. There is a discomfort in not knowing the language, in missing so many of the basic cultural understandings of everyone around you, and of not having the grounding feeling of knowing people around you. Its a feeling, I acknowledge you can feel differently about things. But if we are just gonna go on vibes, then I'm telling you where my vibe is at.
So its not just "your" backyard. Its at best "our" backyard. Though I don't claim any form of ownership over the area despite having lived here and had parents that have grown up here. That is one of my ongoing frustration with anti-immigration viewpoints and woke viewpoints. You don't solely own the common spaces. You don't own the right to determine who and what is acceptable there. So much of what they said is kind of status jockeying to be like "well I am the ultimate american, so i should get more say in how the common spaces look" or "i am the ultimate oppressed victim, so i should get more say in how the common spaces look".
cjet79
7d ago
I ain't gotta "acknowledge" anything. And y'all ain't my family. Most Americans are immigrants and descendants of immigrants. And that was true 63 years ago as well.
If there is to be a cutoff point I select the civil war. Not because I want to say people coming afterwards are unwelcome, but because people coming afterwards shouldn't think of themselves as the "founding stock". If America is to be a blood and soil nation it is not for the whites it is for the English, their descendants, the descendants of the Dutch in New York, and the descendants of the enslaved.
cjet79
7d ago
Go live in a treehouse in the woods and own all the land around you. Why should you get to dictate who is in public spaces? Strangers are a necessary part of civilization. People with foreign cultures, beliefs, and genes are a natural consequence of an expansive market that can provide nearly anything.
cjet79
7d ago
Ah ya I did mix up the motte and bailey.
Anyways most of the US was settled by 1870, some parts were a little more filled in, and they were done by 1900. That's why I like civil war as a good cutoff. Plus the civil war shaped the nation just as heavily as the revolutionary war.
We have above us an example of a more American person than most actual Americans.
My ancestors founded this country, and it was based on an idea, not blood. A bunch of nationalist and monarch loving central Europeans started coming over in the 1900's and started trying to make it all about blood. If it's blood then the English, the Dutch, and the descendants of slaves can stay and everyone else can fuck off.
A bunch of them even think that fighting in European and Asian wars (aka every 20th century war) should grant them special consideration. Yuck.
cjet79
7d ago
Count Canada too and central America is basically a rounding error.
I have been to India. Some of it looked better than Northern Virginia. At least the area I was working in when I was there.
Much of it was worse. But that's why I said middle class immigrants are great.
My daughter is in public school, less than half the kids in her class are white. She is also in girl scouts. It's about 1/3 each of White, Indian, and Hispanic. In both cases it's been fine. In the case of girl scouts I can't imagine a more American organization for little girls to join.
There are enclaves out there where people don't assimilate. Usually it's in New York in the neighborhood of Little [country name].
cjet79
7d ago
Then we need to sell off all the parks. And I don't need to tell you who does most of the farming.
cjet79
7d ago
I remember having this same discussion of illegal vs legal immigration 2 decades ago during the Bush years. Back then I was in a high school debate class, and I had all the studies lined up and arguments together about why immigration is good. And once I finished my opening remarks they said "oh we are only talking about how we don't want illegal immigration". My rebuttal of "well then my side is arguing for making all immigration legal". They didn't like that and insisted I needed to argue for illegal immigration.
And no the left did not completely dominate the media landscape back then.
cjet79
7d ago
Those problems exist without immigration. They are in fact active policy choices on the part of cities and universities respectively.
cjet79
7d ago
America is one of the least dense countries in the world. It is a net exporter of food. The US is about three times larger than India in size.
"The country has limited space" is only true in the trite and meaningless sense that it is not actually infinite. But it is certainly not running out of space or even getting all that tight.
The lifeboat metaphor is the ultimate "their is a fixed pie of resources" perspective. And if I believed that "fixed pie" story to be true I'd agree on immigration restrictions. But it's objectively not true and I'd have to lobotomize all the parts of my brain that know anything about economics to believe it.
I don't think it is winning that matters as much as having a worthy opponent. Charles De Gaulle was pretty popular in France, despite the French getting their buts kicked during the war. Hitler took over Germany after experience in WWI where Germany lost.
War is one of the few areas where governments are stressed with competitive pressures. But not all wars are equal. Trying to stomp out an insurgency is different from fighting another world superpower.
A war between Russia and most of Europe would forge a military class in Europe with an ability to get things done. The current managerial and bureaucratic class that runs Europe at a lazy slow clip would end up being replaced or ousted over time, whatever rules of competition they setup in hopes of giving themselves an advantage they'd still get beaten. The average views of the people in charge would drift much closer to the views of veterans and officers from the conflict.
On the margin Europe is generally soft and a little socialist. I think they'd drift more towards hard and fascist. How much they'd drift in that direction would depend on the level of their involvement.
The costs of doing this seem horrific, I'd hope Europe and Russia don't get into a major war. It just seems predictable where things might go if they do, and it seems like the current political class would be bringing about their own future defeats.
Its important to remember that governments throughout history have always been controlled by those who wage war for them. Rome gave land and power to their soldiers. The feudal era was marked with feudal armies raised by lords and reliant on highly trained knights. The era of nationalism has been marked with a shift towards democracy and rule by the people, since it is large armies of men that won conflicts.
The World Wars and the wars since have been marked with the need for massive logistics and manufacturing capabilities. The Political-Managerial-Class has been in charge of and control of those resources, and they've taken political power. There is still a need for a tip of the spear that applies the weight of manufacturing upon the enemy. That tip of the spear has always been ground down into a fine meat paste for the last century. But the men willing to create that meat paste, and order around the unpasted meat are not a permanent class. The creation of that officer group will be what changes Europe, and the type of men that become in charge.
I'd also point out that just because someone is not a Veteran, doesn't mean they aren't representing those interests. Bad-mouthing veterans has been political suicide for as long as I have been alive. I think the Democrats have tended to rely more on military experience in their politicians just so they can field off accusations of "you hate veterans".
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