What is your favourite economic/political system

[purplepong]

Post your answer and why you chose it. I'm the mood for some rational argument and cordial debate here. :D

[dwarfthrower]

Libertarianism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism)... the reasons as to why being already detailed in the 72 post dissertation on the subject entitled "Dwarfthrower - Your political stance. Why? (http://www.zgeek.com/forum/showthread.php?t=72042)".

[Dundasbro]

Anarchist, because humans are fascinating creatures and I would love to see the interactions that take place without government intervention and the like. Not that I think it is the best, but it would be interesting to view and study. I expect it might become something like the internet, except with real bodily harm instead of computer harm.

[Marchpig]

Anarchist, because humans are fascinating creatures and I would love to see the interactions that take place without government intervention and the like. Not that I think it is the best, but it would be interesting to view and study. I expect it might become something like the internet, except with real bodily harm instead of computer harm.

I'm ready, 65 acres, goats, sheep, vegie patch, fruit tree's, .303 Lee-Enfield, 30/30 Marlin, I'm ready. (Is someone playin' on the banjo?)

[Dundasbro]

Think of it, there would be 4chan style mob-judgement, people without arms or survival skill would hire the services of those who did (think about it, anti-virus programs and such), people would band together in groups, some open to all and some open to members only (websites). I love thinking of the internet as the perfect anarchist society, with no bodily harm.

[wenches.inc]

geeze purple, I pity your girlfriends in the future if you ever say you're in the mood for some sex...20 seconds ain't gonna satisfy them!

[and3w]

Systems are all bad.

[purplepong]

Think of it, there would be 4chan style mob-judgement, people without arms or survival skill would hire the services of those who did (think about it, anti-virus programs and such), people would band together in groups, some open to all and some open to members only (websites). I love thinking of the internet as the perfect anarchist society, with no bodily harm.

Dude I have never read the words "4chan" and "perfect" used within a mile of each other before. Think of the people that post loli fucking everywhere, and those who force memes, commiting crimes against /b/. Without a leader or legislation, only the strong and powerful would survive. Morally fucking wrong. Economically unreliable.

Your shot.

[Dundasbro]

Dude I have never read the words "4chan" and "perfect" used within a mile of each other before. Think of the people that post loli fucking everywhere, and those who force memes, commiting crimes against /b/. Without a leader or legislation, only the strong and powerful would survive. Morally fucking wrong. Economically unreliable.

Your shot.

But completely fascinating. I never said I wanted to bring morals or economics into it, i'm just stating what I would find most interesting, which as a result would be my favourite. Imagine how different sections of life would function without a governing body, yes, chaos is a possible result but if a defacto process arose for dealing with all these different things, I would be very interested to see how it operated.

[purplepong]

But completely fascinating. I never said I wanted to bring morals or economics into it, i'm just stating what I would find most interesting, which as a result would be my favourite. Imagine how different sections of life would function without a governing body, yes, chaos is a possible result but if a defacto process arose for dealing with all these different things, I would be very interested to see how it operated.

True. I think perhaps a good example of anarchism in practice is anonymous. No rules, no leaders, and yet they have managed to perform countless raids on websites and Scifag orgs. But there are those among them that are criminals and fools and arseholes. These people of course constitute the infamous Internet Hate Machine. The Internet Hate Machine (http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/INTERNET_HATE_MACHINE) would of course be fearsome if it existed in real life, and the only way to protect yourself from it would be to buy a dog (http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/Buy_A_Dog). Thus it would be unfair to those who did not own dogs, putting them at risk :D

[beowulf437]

Any 'pure' system is destin for failure in that humans aren't wired that way. People often due things that are contrary to their own self interests and contrary to the interest of their communities. People also seldom plan for anything beyond the immediate and are often stymied when something they have done causes an unforseen problem.

I know there are those of you who say "What? People will always do what's in their own best interest." People smoke, drink, gamble and do drugs which adversly effects their health and finances. People vandalize public property sometimes to the point of rendering it unusable. How many times have any of you heard of some one losing their job for stealing when what they stole doesn't even constitute what they would make in a year, month, or sometimes even a week.

Pure communism doesn't work because if something belongs to everyone it belongs to no one. People just don't give a damn if there is no reward or personal gain so things tend to fall apart after the first generation.

Pure capitalism doesn't work because of greed. People will cut corners, lie, intentionally overcharge, and misrepresent in order to make money. A most famous case of this was the Ford Pinto. Ford knew there was a problem that could be fixed for about $35 a car, but that would be $35 million a year, and they thought they would only lose $5 million a year in law suits.

Anarchy doesn't work period. Just look at Somalia or Afganistan if you don't beleive me. Any time you get three people together one will become the leader. Then there are those religious cults and odd ball political groups that try to force their will onto everyone anyway.

For any political system to work there must be a balance of freedom and control, reward and cost. Systems that lean too far one way or the other tend to get into trouble.

Stating that I feel that our current economic and political models are obsolete and are rapidly losing their effectiveness. Even our current political divisions run counter to what is best for the people as a whole. Most borders and subdivisions therein were decided on comprimise with no thought beyond immediate gain. Many political divisions have left states that are currently becoming economically or socially unviable.

Economic models that depend on constant and ever increasing growth also run counter to what is best for everybody. For such a system to work there must be an unlimited pool of resources and an unlimited increase in population.

[purplepong]

For any political system to work there must be a balance of freedom and control, reward and cost. Systems that lean too far one way or the other tend to get into trouble.

Hmm but there have been examples of perfectly balanced governments in the past, and they didn't work. Look at the Weimar Republic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weimar_Republic). Every party tried to acheive their own goals and the result was that nothing ever got done.

[Dundasbro]

Hmm but there have been examples of perfectly balanced governments in the past, and they didn't work. Look at the Weimar Republic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weimar_Republic). Every party tried to acheive their own goals and the result was that nothing ever got done.

The Great Depression and war debt contributed greatly to the failings of the Weimar Republic. I don't see how the Weimar Republic's parties attempting to achieve their own goals is any different to any modern Western democracy.

[and3w]

A perfectly balanced government get's nothing done - look at most of post-war Italy.

I was looking for a post (I thought in 'Jokes) that had a really good list of the different political systems and what they really mean, but I can't find it...anyone else know the one I mean?

[Dundasbro]

A perfectly balanced government get's nothing done - look at most of post-war Italy.

I was looking for a post (I thought in 'Jokes) that had a really good list of the different political systems and what they really mean, but I can't find it...anyone else know the one I mean?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You_have_two_cows

http://politicalhumor.about.com/library/jokes/bljokecowspolitics.htm

[dwarfthrower]

I was looking for a post (I thought in 'Jokes) that had a really good list of the different political systems and what they really mean, but I can't find it...anyone else know the one I mean?

WORLD IDEOLOGIES EXPLAINED BY REFERENCE TO COWS

FEUDALISM
You have two cows. Your lord takes some of the milk.

SOCIALISM
You have two cows. The government takes them and puts them in a barn
with everyone else's cows. You have to take care of all the cows. The
government gives you a glass of milk.

FASCISM
You have two cows. The government takes both, hires you to take care of
them, and sells you the milk.

PURE COMMUNISM
You share two cows with your neighbors. You and your neighbors bicker
about who has the most "ability" and who has the most "need". Meanwhile,
no one works, no one gets any milk, and the cows drop dead of
starvation.

RUSSIAN COMMUNISM
You have two cows. You have to take care of them, but the government
takes all the milk. You steal back as much milk as you can and sell it
on the black market.

PERESTROIKA
You have two cows. You have to take care of them, but the Mafia takes
all the milk. You steal back as much milk as you can and sell it on the
"free" market.

CAMBODIAN COMMUNISM
You have two cows. The government takes both and shoots you.

DICTATORSHIP
You have two cows. The government takes both and drafts you.

PURE DEMOCRACY
You have two cows. Your neighbors decide who gets the milk.

REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY
You have two cows. Your neighbors pick someone to tell you who gets the
milk.

BUREAUCRACY
You have two cows. At first the government regulates what you can feed
them and when you can milk them. Then it pays you not to milk them. Then
it takes both, shoots one, milks the other and pours the milk down the
drain. Then it requires you to fill out forms accounting for the
missing cows.

CAPITALISM
You don't have any cows. The bank will not lend you money to buy cows,
because you don't have any cows to put up as collateral.

PURE ANARCHY
You have two cows. Either you sell the milk at a fair price or your
neighbors try to take the cows and kill you.

ANARCHO-CAPITALISM
You have two cows. You sell one and buy a bull.

SURREALISM
You have two giraffes. The government requires you to take harmonica
lessons.

OLYMPICS-ISM
You have two cows, one American, one Chinese. With the help of trilling
violins and state of the art montage photography, John Tesh narrates the
moving tale of how the American cow overcame the agony of growing up in
a suburb with (gasp) divorced parents, then mentions in passing that the
Chinese cow was beaten every day by a tyrannical farmer and watched its
parents butchered before its eyes. The American cow wins the
competition, severely spraining an udder in a gritty performance, and
gets a multi-million dollar contract to endorse Wheaties. The Chinese
cow is led out of the arena and shot by Chinese government officials,
though no one ever hears about it. McDonald's buys the meat and serves
it hot and fast at its Beijing restaurant.

AMERICAN CORPORATE CAPITALISM
Both cows are bloated with toxic steroids. They are set out to graze on
privatized public parks, release massive amounts of flatulence that
destroys the ozone layer, die from excess ultraviolet light, and are
processed into meat-like products that look great as a result of clever
and unprincipled marketing strategies. When you mortgage your
artificially devalued farm at high interest rates in order to buy meat,
you consume the poisoned material and develop terminal illnesses because
there is no health care plan to treat you. The corporate management uses
your purchase price to acquire THEIR meat from cows raised "naturally"
on tree-free rain forest land outside of the country where labor and
resources are cheap.

BRITISH REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY
Both cows are mad

http://www-formal.stanford.edu/selene/cows.html

[dwarfthrower]

A much more expansive list of cow-centric ideologies:
http://uncyclopedia.org/wiki/You_have_two_cows/17

[and3w]

That's the one, cheers G

[and3w]

BUREAUCRACY
You have two cows. At first the government regulates what you can feed
them and when you can milk them. Then it pays you not to milk them. Then
it takes both, shoots one, milks the other and pours the milk down the
drain. Then it requires you to fill out forms accounting for the
missing cows.

Then it taxes you what the shot cost

[purplepong]

I love this one from uncyclopedia:
Soviet Russia
Two cows have you.

[purplepong]

The Great Depression and war debt contributed greatly to the failings of the Weimar Republic. I don't see how the Weimar Republic's parties attempting to achieve their own goals is any different to any modern Western democracy.

All of the parties had pretty much equal power, which was about zero. The result was
1.no decisions got agreed on
2.the people got pissed off
3.the people looked for more decisive leadership
4.???
5.Hitler!

[Hit And Rum]

Its the fuckin gubment eh! Those fuckas take ma shit and dont gimme nuffin back eh!

[beowulf437]

Hmm but there have been examples of perfectly balanced governments in the past, and they didn't work. Look at the Weimar Republic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weimar_Republic). Every party tried to acheive their own goals and the result was that nothing ever got done.

Did I say perfectly balanced? No, I didn't think I did. Besides, I don't think understood what I meant by balanced, a bunch of idiots sitting around saying "Mine, mine, mine," and "gimme, gimme, gimme," isn't all that balanced. The Weimar republic failed in part because the government was unable to exercise the necessary amount of control over its own situation.

Sure if'n you really want to get something done nothing beats a despotism. A despotism has all kinds of control that other types of governmets just can't muster. Look at North Korea, they got the bomb while their people were starving.

So let's examine a balance between freedom an control. Did the Weimar Republic have that? To put it in different terms let's talk about transportation. Railroads are all control. Trains follow strict time tables and can only go to specific places. Which is fine for serving the most number of people but are inconvienent if'n you want to go somewhere diferent or go at a different time. An empty parking lot would be all freedom you could go anywhere on the lot at any speed at any time, as long as there aren't too many others on the lot. A road system is a comprimise between control and freedom. You can go when and where you want, and even change your mind halfway to your destination, but you still have traffic laws and conventions that you must follow.

Rewards and cost are another thing that must balance. A system too heavy to bear in resources, finances, or lives will either have to change or collapse. A system that gives too much away soon becomes worthless.

[marantz]

SURREALISM
You have two giraffes. The government requires you to take harmonica
lessons.not a political system but funny as fuck !

[purplepong]

Ingsoc: You have one cow. You have always had one cow.
Lol.