STer

Why do people assume that all humans have the same "good" or "evil" nature? Could it not be that some people's nature is generally "good" and some people's nature is generally "evil"?

The main point of the thread when I started it came from the fact that I am pretty sure Stefan has said that the disparity of power between parent and child is the greatest in the world. A parent has even more power over a helpless child than the state has over its population. So that logic you stated in the line above would lead one to believe it is easier to abuse parental power than state power and less likely for parental power to be restrained than state power. If greater disparity = greater chance of abuse, then parental power would be more likely to be abused according to what Stefan said. Or is Stefan wrong when he says that the parent's power over the child is the greatest disparity? Or am I mistaken and he never said it? I can't remember exactly where I heard him say it, but I'm pretty confident I did and that, when I did, I understood why he said that. Perhaps it was during the Joe Rogan interview that he said it? I imagine it's the kind of thing that he might have said multiple times when explaining how wrong violence against children is. People keep misunderstanding this point. A government may have the monopoly on being allowed to initiate violence. That doesn't mean they have to use violence. Just that they are allowed to if they choose to (within particular limits depending on the situation). I think this is why people keep misunderstanding when some of us say that a government can be based on voluntaryism. They equate "monopoly on being allowed to use force" with "being required to use force". So they then conclude that unless it uses violence, it isn't a government. I found this comment fascinating given the recent hubbub about Peter Joseph's "structural violence" concept. Here you seem to label putting future generations into debt as a form of violence. Yet nobody is actually initiating force against those currently not-yet-existing beings. Perhaps this is a bridge between the two views? On this forum, every time any idea of violence beyond physical attack, threat, or fraud is mentioned, people get very upset and say it's manipulative. They want the word "violence" defined as narrowly as possible. But what do you call stealing from unborn future generations? Can you call it violent? If not, what do you call it? Surely it is as bad, if not worse, than many forms of violence, whatever you want to call it. And yet, clearly it isn't quite the same as attacking a living being or stealing from their house. When those future generations are born, and they suffer due to the debts laid upon them before their birth, even though nobody may have directly committed a violent act against them in person, might this be a reasonable idea of what someone like PJ might call "structural violence" that we could agree on? They may never have been directly attacked by a person in their life, but they suffer the violence - or whatever word you prefer to use - of the structure into which they were born, which has sucked their wealth out of them. Sorry I wasn't specific, but I agree, and I was talking about the concentration of power to use violence all along in my example. If you look at what I mentioned - adults always having power over kids and bigger, stronger adults always potentially having power over some other adults - I'm referring to the ability to use force. That is what Stefan says we should not allow to be concentrated. And so, I am simply pointing out that just as anarchists want decentralization of that power to use force by the government, there have been many, many societies that also decentralized the power adults in the community, including parents, have to use force in an isolated way against children. Someone said the government uses force in every action they do. I simply pointed out a couple where they don't. You can say they use force to take your taxes. But the fact that they give you a refund if you overpay says something. It says there are limits to how far they are willing or able to go. That's all I was pointing out. They don't just use violence nonstop in every single action they do. There are limits and boundaries to it. There are even cases where the government gets sued by a citizen and the court - another branch of government - finds for the citizen against the government. So I'm just pointing out that this is more complex than just "government uses violence nonstop 24-7 to the ultimate maximum capability." You have to remember that the people in government are themselves citizens also. They may work for the government, but they also can be potential targets of the government. So most people have mixed feelings in this. Their families may not be in the government at all. So they may go to work for the government in the morning, and at night be suing the government for mistreating a family member. It's not as black and white as people sometimes make it. Those in government are vastly outnumbered yes. But even if large numbers came to see them as illegitimate, that still wouldn't mean anything unless those large numbers were willing and able to do anything about it. They not only would have to question the legitimacy but be willing to do something about it and have a strategy to do something about it. Those are pretty big steps. I think the view that politicians are a bunch of lying bums is cliche. It's almost a given. Everyone knows that. When Jay Leno jokes about what bums they are everyone laughs because they all know that. But that's a far cry from caring enough to turn off the TV and do anything about it. It's not just about numbers, but about commitment level. I often wonder something along these lines too. Once you cross the line from railing against the entities that represent your projected childhood wounds to no longer doing so, then what? What drives people when they are so healthy they no longer have this "railing against" going on?

Frankly, I'm not even sure what I'm saying (referring to things I said, not things you project onto what I said) that you actually disagree with. How about, if you disagree with something I said, quote exactly what I said and then point out your disagreement. Because what you have done so far, in the main, is take things I've said, then make up some additional thing I didn't say and argue against that straw man.From what I can tell your main argument is "The protection and storage of food didn't have to lead to the state." And my response is "Where did I say it had to? I simply said it did."One of the most frustrating parts of this forum is that among a lot of very intelligent, thoughtful people are some that are so rageful about the state that they will project onto almost any thread and just start ranting about how horrible the state is, even when you didn't say anything to draw that argument.Go back through my posts in this thread. If you can find a place I said "The state had to emerge and nothing else could have happened." or "The state is a wonderful boon to humanity and the greatest thing since sliced bread" I'd be happy to see it. Otherwise, you are arguing a straw man.From now on, please respond only to things I actually say and not things you extrapolate from what I say on your own. As for countries causing famine in other countries, you say "without direct violent meddling" as if that doesn't happen. How about all of colonialism?

The development of the state is not just tangentially related to agriculture and storage. It emerged directly from them as part of the very same movement - one toward food being locked up and owned in order for there to be the possibility of food security. Your analogies continue to be flawed. Copyright law was not developed to protect the very existence of the mass-produced books to avoid a scarcity issue. People didn't say "We are often running out of books, so, in order to assure there will always be enough books, we are going to use copyright." The correct analogy there would be if there were paper shortages that led to periods where books couldn't be made, so storehouses were set up where people accumulated the materials to make books and then needed them to be guarded, leading to book material guards and administrators. These guards and administrators would be the analogy of what the state developed out of. It is not agriculture alone that protects against famines. Unless you have proper storage and guarding of the food, it will not be there when you need it. It is the guarding and protection function over the food that I think developed into the state. First of all, I thought this was "the largest philosophical conversation in the world," a philosophy forum, not a "libertarian forum." If it is a "libertarian forum" then it should be advertised openly as such. I certainly realize most people here are anarchists or at least libertarians, which is fine. But the forum is put forth as just plain old unbiased philosophy. OK so you admit that the state may have reduced famine compared to what would have happened had the state never come along. But you believe that now, were the state to go away, due to other factors, famine would be lower without the state than with it. That's a legitimate stance to take. I have a reply to that. But first, am I understanding this stance correctly? I think it's misleading to ask where the famines occur since, when states cause famines, it's often a state causing a famine in another country, not necessarily in its own country. We live in a global world when it comes to food and how it is distributed and administered. It's kind of like how when you talk about guns people point out that places with strict gun laws often have higher gun crime. But so what? As long as the laws differ in the neighboring states, guns can just flow in from there. So I just don't see a one-to-one correlation between type of government and famine in that particular country. Some of the worst issues in Africa came from meddling by other states, not their own (although plenty do come from their own states too, don't get me wrong). I didn't conflate the state and civilization as the same thing. I said they emerged as part of the same forces, the same movements. Your tendency to misread what I'm saying and project connections that I was careful not to make, using very precise language, makes me read certain things about you, as well.

Complete with some of the usual passionate comments underneath: Spanking young kids leads to aggression later

If how much restraint you show has everything to do with how much restraint your parents showed, then howcome there are so many abused children that end up on these forums promoting non-aggression? Doesn't that show it doesn't have "everything" to do with the parents and has a lot to do with other factors too? If you're saying the mechanism is that, as the population is raised peacefully, they simply will refuse to take government jobs or run for office, I don't see how this works. As everyone here keeps pointing out, the government uses force. And they claim the government cannot restrain itself from using force. Therefore, will it not use force to make people participate, just as when there is a draft? I see that you ignored the entire point that "voluntary government" or "voluntary whatchamcallit" are the same discussion. Your attempt to keep focusing on the semantics, even when the semantics don't matter, is keeping us off the topic of whether an involuntary government can transition to a voluntary entity, whatever you want to call it. Forget the question "Can a government become voluntary and still be a government?" Instead, the question is "Can a government become voluntary, even if, having done so, it takes on another name?" I see, so you see peaceful parenting as just preparing people so as not to set up a new government when the existing ones collapse due to economics. You don't see peaceful parenting bringing about the dissolution of the governments though. I understand. The issue here isn't power but monopoly of power. Adults will always have power over children. Frankly, some adults will always have power over other adults, even if simply because some of them are bigger and stronger and could use it. What we try to avoid is allowing too much power to concentrate too centrally. That is why Stefan says that it is too dangerous to have an entity like the state with too much concentrated power. Surely he isn't under any illusion that without a state nobody would have any power over anyone. It's simply that when it's not so concentrated it's not as big of a catastrophe in his view. Similarly, spreading power over children amongst 100 adults is far different than concentrating it amongst 1 or 2. Government can do plenty of things without using force. For example, when you pay more than you owe in taxes, the government sends you back a refund. It doesn't use force to keep the extra taxes. And it doesn't use force to give you back the extra. It may threaten force to get the taxes it does keep, but it doesn't use it to refund the extra. It just sends you your refund. The government has a volunteer military right now and many people volunteer. It doesn't use force to get those people to enlist as it currently stands. Now I'm not saying once they are in they don't use force in their job in the military. But military recruitment, currently, doesn't use force. I could continue listing example after example. It's too easy when you give an extreme statement like "government can't even do anything without initiating force." Or did I misunderstand what you mean by that? Because certainly governments don't use force in every single specific thing they do. And, no matter how much you and many others may dislike government, there are also many people who are generally ok with it and willingly go along with it without any force necessary. The threat of force may always be there in a general sense, but some people go along even without it because they actually want there to be a government and see it as beneficial. "because the government can't exist without people accepting violence as a way to solve social problems." If the government can only exist if people accept violence, then are you actually saying the government cannot force people and the people are the ones in control? Isn't the idea of violence that it allows you to force someone to do something regardless of whether they accept violence as legitimate or not? You seem to be saying violence only works against those who think violence is legitimate, which I think is false. Violence works against anyone who is too weak to protect themselves against it, whether they accept it as legitimate or not.

It is a false dichotomy to talk as if the options are "nuclear family with one or two parents" vs. "kids survive on their own." Nuclear families of the sort we have today didn't even exist for 99% of human history. What anarchists really want is decentralization of power so that no small group ever has too much of it. Well that's how raising of children was done for hundreds of thousands of years. More decentralized with influence and input and constant presence of an entire tribe of biologically-related extended family, not one or two parents in a closed up house with the kids behind closed doors, out of witness of everyone else most of the time. Do you still not understand that not having an example of something doesn't show it to be impossible? Things often happen in the world that haven't happened before. I can just hear you saying: "Ok, then show me a machine that is able to carry humans in the air" to disprove flight 150 years ago "Ok, then show me a machine that can help me do my taxes, word process and play video games" to disprove computers 200 years ago I can go on and on. The entire concept that someone has to give an already existing example of something to show it is possible is so fallacious it undermines any rationality. This part below was meant to be a new post: I have one more question that seems to me pretty important. Stefans' idea, which most people at FDR seem to agree with, is that when parents raise their kids peacefully, this will then lead to the dissolution of governments. But I don't think I've ever heard how one exactly leads to the other in practice. OK so we have a government now, which people here believe is inherently violent and oppressive and cannot possibly be otherwise. So then parents parent peacefully, so up comes a generation of people who do not approve of violence and oppression. Somehow, apparently, their disapproval ends up culminating in there being no government? If government cannot restrain itself, then what is the mechanism that translates the values of this more peaceful generation into the non-existence of government? Because the way I'm seeing it, the government is still there as they come up, and if you are saying it is not possible for government to wind down its oppression, then how does it dissolve?

Thanks, Nathan. Yes I think you accurately understood my question. If government is non-restraint, then how do you explain that some governments are more oppressive and others less so? How do you explain that some governments, even in the same country at various times, have higher taxes or lower taxes, or harsher penalties for crimes or more lenient penalties for crimes? And why is it that everyone so far in this thread that answered has agreed that Bob can in fact restrain himself in his government job to some extent (even if they also wish he'd go further and leave it)? As I said in my last post, if you want to argue that once those in government restrain themselves to a certain point it's no longer a government, fine. It's a semantic issue. If you want to change the term you use for it past a certain point of restraint go ahead. The question doesn't change. It is just reworded from "Could a government of oppression transition to a government based on choice?" to "Could a government of oppression transition to a whatchamacallit based on choice?" The structure of the discussion changes none, just the term. Power, as I'm defining it, has to do with the disparity in ability to control. A peaceful parent still has that greater power to control. They may not use it, but they have it. Just as I have the power to lift a book, even if I choose not to do it. Power is a potential you have, whether you apply it or not. Both parents and governments have power. You are also oversimplifying because you keep saying that if parents use power, the child will grow into an adult who looks to government to solve problems, yet this entire board is filled with people whose parents used power and are adults who do not look to the government to solve problems. Clearly this is more complicated than you are laying it out as. Governments are the institutionalization of a monopoly on being allowed to use force. Just as parents are allowed to use force over their kids (pretty much the only example of where someone is allowed to initiate force against someone else that I can think of, which makes this contrast pretty interesting). Already pointed out the irrelevance of your definition of government. Involuntary government ==> voluntary government or... Involuntary government ==> voluntary whatchamacallit It doesn't matter if you change the name once it becomes voluntary. What matters is can one transition to the other. This is literally false that to prove something can be a certain way you have to give a concrete example where it was for so many reasons. And it's the same false logic that other people use to tell anarchists that anarchism is impossible. Just as you say "you have to show me a voluntary government or else that proves voluntary government can't exist" they say "You have to show me a working modern anarchist society or else that means working modern anarchist societies can't exist." This entire idea that if you don't have an example of something that proves it is impossible is massively flawed. I could point out so many other flaws in it but hopefully you get the point.

I agree with this. But this whole argument is really a distraction in this thread. If you (not you, Flake, but others here) believe that once they allow someone to opt-out, it is no longer a "government" but now has some other name indicating its leadership over those that remain, then great. So what? The word "government", the label we're using, is not the issue. The structure itself is the issue. There can be an entity, whatever you choose to call it, that provides the leadership a government provides to those who want it but allows others to leave. Call it whatever you choose to call it but it is a possibility.

No. It would be like if I said modern governments emerged directly from structures designed to promote writing and came about in order to protect literacy-promoting structures. The relationship is a lot deeper than just something like using writing. The reason states emerged isn't just tangentially involving famine-reduction, but directly rooted in famine-reduction strategies. I thought we already agreed on this. Then there is a second issue, which I think is better looked at separately from the first. You point out that modern states have sometimes caused famines. I don't dispute this may be the case. But are you arguing that states have made famine worse overall than it was before civilization? If so, then measuring that requires looking at famine as a whole in relation to population, not just pointing out cases where states caused famines. Giving examples where states caused famine can show that they don't suppress famine to zero. But it doesn't prove that famine is higher in our modern world full of states than it would otherwise be.

I didn't say states were set up specifically to avoid famine. I said states emerged out of developments focused on avoiding famine. Once food storage comes about, there comes the desire to set up entities to guard that stored food. So then you start having the separation into the class that owns and guards the food and the rest of the population. I think this is part of the genesis of how complex civilization and states develop. The author, Daniel Quinn, basically defines civilized cultures as the ones that lock food away because doing that is so seminal in the beginnings of these separations of classes and growth of complex social structures. I am sure that there are cases where modern states play a role in the emergence of particular cases of famine in particular places. But to really have a fair assessment, the question would be whether more or less of a proportion of the population (note: proportion, not absolute numbers) experiences famine more or less often in the modern world than they did pre-civilization.

wdiaz03, It might be important to consider that at 9 years old a lot of kids are just exploring identities. We all know, or maybe even were, kids who between 9 and 12 wanted to be a fireman, an astronaut, an archaeologist and maybe five other things. Perhaps it isn't wise to get too dogmatically focused on this "video game designer" identity. It may just be something he's playing with in his mind and he shouldn't be held to everything he explores as if it's a contract. Also keep in mind that sometimes kids' exploring process is non-linear. Maybe he thinks he wants to be a video game designer, that leads him to play video games and learn about them, and from there he learns some other thing from a game that sends him in a new direction and to the next identity to try on for size. And finally, don't forget that at 9 years old it's perfectly natural to do some things just for play. I think the trend of parents scheduling their kids with one formal activity after another, as if they're in some training program for life, rather than letting them have some downtime is really unhealthy. Of course, it's just about balance. If he's playing video games all day nonstop, that's not healthy either. But I'd say try to give the kid some breathing room to just be a kid and just provide healthy boundaries and ideas for other activities, as well. On one hand, you want kids' childhoods to help prepare them for adulthood. On the other hand, you want them to actually have a childhood where they can just be children while they are children so that once they are adults, they aren't constantly trying to get back a childhood they missed out on. Just my thoughts. If any of it helps, I'm glad. Whatever doesn't fit, disregard.

LifeIsBrief, How ironic that in our other thread we're talking about whether someone in a government position can restrain his exercise of power and then I come in this thread and you just posted this about a film focused on a person in a government position using his power to try to help children. Not to start any other discussion. Just a funny coincidence.

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding, but I feel like you just contradicted yourself. You agreed that agriculture was used to avoid food scarcity and the settlements that formed were to help protect those scarcity-avoidance entities. This was the origin of states, which are just extensions of that to protect the scarcity-avoidance entities on a larger scale. So the entire development of states revolved around trying to keep in place a way of protecting against being vulnerable to famine. You seemed to have just agreed with that as the history. But then you say the rise of states was not an anti-famine measure? I'm sure I'm missing something so feel free to correct me.

Thank you for addressing the gradualism issue head on. I didn't say it's catastrophism. Making changes to assert less power within your current job is gradual change. Changing jobs to one that offers less power to assert is somewhat less gradual. You seem to be saying that changes made to restrain power within a job that offers too much power are meaningless. You seem to be saying that if Bob stays in his job, but restrains his power, that is worthless to you. You also seem to ignore that if Bob quits the job, he will probably be replaced by someone who restrains themselves even less so you will get a net worsening of the situation, not a net benefit. The tricky thing about it is that, while you may prefer the position not to exist at all, as long as it does exist, it would be better for someone like Bob to be in that position than someone else.

Then explain to me why people started using agriculture and setting up more permanent settlements? It's a lot more work to set up agriculture. I've always learned that this was primarily done to protect against famine. If you disagree, then please explain what the reason for doing all the intensive work of setting up agriculture, food storage mechanisms, etc. was. I've always learned that complex governments arose out of the need for a hierarchy to protect the newly stored food and other resources. All of this storage was set up because people did not want to be vulnerable to famine the way they were while being nomadic. If I'm wrong, please correct me. But do so by explaining how that telling of history is wrong. Just saying "Yeah well here is an example where there is a state and it caused a famine somewhere," as you said "doesn't prove much." States could very well have been set up as anti-famine mechanisms and still led to famines as side effects of other things they do at times. I didn't say "States successfully eliminated all famine." I just said "States originally developed out of measures driven by the desire to avoid famine."

I don't think you understand what gradualism means. Anyway thanks for your views.

Well I've now repeated ad nauseam that I never asked if he is "peaceful" or "moral" in an absolute way, only if he can make a step in the right direction. And, you just ignored completely, twice in a row, the issue of gradualism vs. instant absolute change, even after I explicitly tried to bring your attention back to it. So I think I'm done responding to you. You're talking to yourself and not addressing the things I say in my responses to you. It's like talking to a monologue. If you decide you'd like to discuss the gradualism vs. instant absolute change and address that head on, I'd be interested. But it seems like you prefer to keep talking about things I've never mentioned or raised. Nothing I say seems to get you on topic.

So my response was about gradual steps in the right direction vs. the expectation of instant absolute change. Then you reply with no reference to that at all just sort of repeating your anti-government commentary. Is this a dialogue or are you just now and then referencing things I say in the course of a general anti-government monologue? If the latter, then there isn't really any reason for me to continue responding to you. You're just repeating the same thing over and over which is "government is bad and Bob shouldn't do government." There are about 100 threads right now where you can go just generally bash government. Does this have to be another? I'd like your thoughts on my post regarding gradual steps in the right direction vs. the expectation of instant absolute change, if you are willing.

I find this somewhat confusing. You are basically saying states are the cause of famine. I agree that states may be involved in why some places have famine currently. But to say states are the cause of famine overall seems to reverse history to me. My understanding of the rise of civilization is that a main driving reason people set up agriculture, which led to more complex city-states, in the first place was precisely because such structures allowed them to store food and thus be far less vulnerable to famines. Weren't famines far more of a problem before civilization than after? The way I've learned it, you could almost say that the rise of city-states was an anti-famine measure.

The goal of people who wish to improve children's experience is to stop abuse. Yet if I ask "Can an abusive parent learn to restrain themselves and become less abusive?" I don't think anyone would think that's a horrifying question or somehow saying abuse is ok unless they are going out of their way to twist things. I think it's a crucial question. Unless you live in a fantasy world where people change instantly from one extreme to the other, people who are currently doing terrible things will have to restrain themselves and every bit of improvement is important. So if the system is as it is and you find it unacceptable, but Bob starts to use his power in a less abusive way, and you don't consider that something to celebrate, but something horrifying, I really don't know how you expect change to happen. I do think your response helps me understand why you keep throwing in these tangents though. It's almost like you're saying "Yes he can restrain himself, but gradualism is meaningless to me, only complete and total change all at once is acceptable." That topic is relevant here. Bob's restraint is an example of gradual change, a step in the right direction. But you seem eager to shoot down any idea of there being value in such gradual steps. You seem to say that unless Bob and anyone in his position immediately resigns his job to go work at the supermarket, any steps toward restraint are worthless.

I actually meant you could put the link to the Mr. Rogers video in the About section under your video on YouTube. Cool to put it here in the thread too, though. Yeah I was just generalizing about the values I think are most common on FDR. It's not an absolute thing. I do think even most anti-government folks would find Mr. Rogers' message in his talk valuable and realize he's just working the system that he's in. I feel like on the forum, you more often post little quips and things so I saw your jokester side mostly and didn't see as much of the other sides of you. The video just shows more of the whole of you, that's all, which is perfect since it's literally about showing other sides of you.

So I just posted: "My question was not "Is he violating the NAP?" so why is it relevant to say that? Why is there a seeming compulsion to answer questions I'm explicitly not asking? This is becoming more interesting to me than the original question." And your response is: "Bob's government job is paid for with tax money which is taken by force. Simple. It doesn't matter that Bob isn't doing it himself. Money is being stolen by someone and ends up in Bob's pocket. Clear violation of the NAP." So you answered the exact thing I had just said was not what I'm asking. I also said: "Beyond this I'm going to say this is a distraction. The question of whether a government as a whole could be non-abusive is for a separate thread and not relevant to this one." Then you spend the rest of your response addressing that part that I just said is a distraction and for a separate thread. It makes me wonder if you're even reading my responses before responding back? >>"He can claim to be "restraining his use of force", but he would restrain it more, by working at a diner, and be more peaceful and moral too." That sentence at least addresses my question, though it is misleading because that wouldn't be restraining his power as a government worker, since he wouldn't have it anymore. That would be abdicating the power, not restraining it within his role as government worker, which was my question. But at least that was on topic to what I'm asking. Again, I don't understand why there are all these other sentences responding to things not only not asked, but that I've repeatedly said "I'm not asking that." I think I made quite clear that I'm not asking "Is Bob totally peaceful?" or "Is everything Bob is doing moral?" yet again there seems to be a compulsion to answer those questions even after I point out that I'm not asking them - and even after I've specifically asked why there is this compulsion in the first place. What is going on with that? Why the need over and over to spend one sentence answering my question and then four times as many answering something I keep saying I'm not asking? Yet another response that only responds to the part I have repeatedly said is both a distraction and not relevant to my question. Am I the only one that finds this a strange pattern? I have multiple times been as specific as to say "This is what I'm asking, and this is what I'm not asking." Yet people almost 95% of the time keep answering the thing I said I'm not asking about and most have not even addressed the thing I am asking about. I'm starting to find this a fascinating phenomenon and I'm quite curious what is behind it. It gets even more confusing each time I point out that it's happening and, in response to that, it just happens again. My question was "Can Bob, in his role as government worker, restrain his exercise of power?" Not "Is everything Bob does great?" Not "Is Bob totally peaceful?" Not "Hey guys, is government a good thing or bad thing?" Yet people continue to answer these questions in addition to answering the one I asked, if they even answer the one I actually asked at all. At least one or two people have finally given some answer directly to what I asked, though still with all these other answers added on for some reason.

Interesting how different it is seeing someone from the forum talking on video vs. just imagining them from text. Right when you mentioned Mr. Rogers, I was going to suggest you watch that video of him testifying to receive funding. Then seconds later you mentioned it. Maybe you should put the link to it under that video for those who want to see it. It's a classic. Though, this being FDR, it may cause some inner conflict since on one hand he is trying to get government funding, but on the other he is trying to get it to help children. It's like the thing people at FDR are most against being used for the thing people at FDR are most for Anyway, I enjoyed hearing this story, Stephen. Also I had to do it:

Yes I understand the argument about artificial scarcity. But I think a bridge can be better built just focusing on the concept of waste. I don't see how anyone can morally defend waste. So it could be a way to bring people together.