on Mon, Oct 22, 2001 at 05:39:08PM -0400, Declan McCullagh (declan@well.com) wrote:
Now if only some handy, self-effacing volunteer would come along and repost your ill-formatted message wrapped at 72 columns, perhaps with a severe admonition about the proper forms of netiquette, my day would be complete.
That's wishful thinking, Declan. After, all, this is a capatilist society. What's in it for me? [1] | Steve Furlong wrote: | | > Then let them. A self-sufficient subsistence farmer won't be bothered by | > the trade his neighbors are carrying out. [1] His farm can be a | > neolithic bubble as the world progresses. | | What? You're talking nonsense here. Of course they make part of their | living selling crops --- what's all the bs about "forging his own | metals" etc. Total straw man arguement. The point was that they aren't | "starving" for one thing, and, if it were up to them, they'd stay put. | | Look, I'll try to explain it in terms that perhaps even a city boy like | you can understand. You don't have to go to the 3rd world, just go talk | to small american family farmers. There are thousands of them out there | who simply don't care that they aren't making lots of money -- the | important thing is that they can keep their farms and do their own | thing. What's wrong with that? | | You know what destroyed the small family farm in this country? Education | -- ag schools and the county extension agent. Funded, for the most part, | by large chemical companies. The old story of the country bumpkin | getting conned by the city-slicker salesman. Kids went off to ag school, | came home and told Dad to do things the "modern" way, factory farming | with modern chemicals -- sure, go into debt, buy all those new tractors | and fancy equipment and we'll be rich. | | And then, of course, that little trick the Fed Reserve and the banks | pulled back in the 70's with manipulating the economy so that rural land | prices went thru the roof, farmers who had been mortgage free for | generations got duped into borrowing money on their land to buy that | fancy new equipment that the ag schools and extension agents told them | they needed, then bingo -- the Fed played some more tricks, land values | dropped back down, and a whole lot of farmers lost their land. | | Is that what you call free-market economics? I call it fascism -- state | and industry working in concert to whipsaw the masses and get more | control over peoples lives. People who were very free and independant | are suddenly wage slaves in the city because they listened to the | "experts" from industry and government. And got duped. | | I know one heck of a lot of people who much prefer living in rural | "poverty" to living in a city making big bucks. Although my wife and I | have been making a whole lot more money in recent years than we ever | thought we would, and live in a big fancy house in the city, we consider | it a serious mistake. Money isn't everything. We were one heck of a lot | happier when we earned about $4000.00 a year. We will soon rectify | that. Why make a bunch money and feed the fascist machine? | | One of my favorite cartoons was one of Snuffy Smith and his wife --- she | says "Pa, the world is passing us by." Snuffy replies, "It sure better!" | Damn straight! | | "Tune in, turn on, and drop out." Now that's real free market economics. | | > | > | > If he _isn't_ self-sufficient, then he does care about the trade going | > on around him. That's been the case forever, and new trade always | > disrupts someone who was making his living with the way things were. | > | > And if he wants to make use of metal tools, then he'll have to exchange | > as best he can for them. But, again, he's not self-sufficient, unless he | > can dig and forge his own metals. Complaining that the world isn't the | > way it was for Grandpa shouldn't get a sympathetic ear from anyone who | > uses metals, plastics, or medicine, or who eats fresh produce out of | > season. | > | > [1] Assuming they don't pollute him out of raising his crops or | > livestock, tax or regulate his farm out of existence. | > | > -- | > Steve Furlong Computer Condottiere Have GNU, Will Travel | > 617-670-3793 | > | > "Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly | > while bad people will find a way around the laws." -- Plato | | -- | Harmon Seaver, MLIS | CyberShamanix | Work 920-203-9633 | Home 920-233-5820 | hseaver@cybershamanix.com | http://www.cybershamanix.com/resume.html ---------------------------------------- Notes: 1. Gratuitous abuse from Tim May, of course. Back to the cornfield. -- Karsten M. Self <kmself@ix.netcom.com> http://kmself.home.netcom.com/ What part of "Gestalt" don't you understand? Home of the brave http://gestalt-system.sourceforge.net/ Land of the free Free Dmitry! Boycott Adobe! Repeal the DMCA! http://www.freesklyarov.org Geek for Hire http://kmself.home.netcom.com/resume.html