We're deep in a thread here, so I probably shouldn't be sending us yet deeper, but i'd like to respond...: 'Pot' is not harmless, nor is heroin. I believe they should both be legalized. It is not the drug that ought to be attacked, but the behavior, i.e. drunkenness does not absolve one from responsibility when driving or dating. What causes the state concern is that, in an atmosphere where we are forced to support the excesses of the irresponsible, an unemployable crack user is a significant expense. My point is that the Left is contradictory on this subject, as in most others, dependant on political expediency.
1) Very little is "harmless". Water can kill you in large quantities, as can fat, sugar, carrots, etc. Yes, marijuana is psychotropic. So is caffeine. marijuana is far LESS dangerous, hwoever, than alcohol or tobacco.
2) You make much of pointing out the inconsistencies of the left. My listing inconsistencies of teh right would be little mroe than pointless ad hominems, so i will refrain, but i cxan't resist pointing out one hypocrisy on thsi sisue of 'personal responsibility".
when the military in Uruguay overthrew the governmnet, they proceeded to suppress dissent and hold teh greatedst number of political prisoners, relative to population, in the world. torture and murder became commonplace. Their excuse was cracking down on the Tupamaro urban guerillas, whow ere both popular and relatively bloodless. Who did the conservative establishment in this country blame for teh military's repression? Why the Tupamaros, of course. Apparently they thought that the soldiers of Uruguay had such itchy, uncontrollable trigger fingers that they couldn't restrain themselves when given teh slightest provocation. Of course blaming the Tupamaros for teh criems of the military is, to quote HGenry Kissinger, "like blaming American bombing raids fro teh Holocaust" - or for that matter like blaming Pol Pot's Genocide on president Nixon. So much for individual responsibility.
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: : Nobody I know advocates this. (DC: Andrea Dworkin states that heterosexual sex is rape. Is she a conservative, perchance?)
She's an extreme feminist. I'm a state socialist. What's the connection?
: What we do believe is that the government should not be in the business of regulating family structure, because family composition varies from culture to culture. What's wrong with fathers paying child support, by the way? (DC: What's wrong with mothers paying child support, by the way? Is the so-called 'sexual revolution' and the meteoric rise in single motherhood entirely unconnected?)
Sweden has 50% of their births illegitimate- i don't notice an epidemic of Swedish social pathology, do you?
:And the social workers I know would resent your implication of being "well paid" (DC: So would the teachers. It does not make it untrue).
Do you ahve any evidence that social workers are very well paid? Relative to who? Can I see it? Seriously. This would really be enlightening for all of us to see, I think. How much are they getting paid, exactly?
: our society seems to ahve mroe than enough to devote to weapons of war, but when it comes to funding social spending, suddenly the coffers seem to dry up (DC: This country seems to have enough money to pay for what taxes are raised for, but when it comes to supporting left-wing schemes, it seems to dry up. Which is of course a patent falsehood).
Um, I believe welfare is being cut? Isn't that true?
: : No nation ought to have nuclear weapodn- not india, not China, not America. And exactly when has teh US defended a Communist state from fascist aggression? (DC: World War II would seem to qualify - oops, my mistake. "State capitalism". Of course at the time the Communist party in the U.S. didn't seem to think so …)
No, that's accurate. Stalin, as loathsome and un-communist his state was, was still clsoe enough to a vague, bastardized notion of socialism to render it infintely superior to Hitler. However, you've harmed your own case here. You've implicitly recognized what teh Left asserts, that teh war was a war between fascism and socialism. Since fascism was roundly defeated, teh implication is clear...
:if my memory serves me, they INSTIGATED the fascist aggression in Nicaragua, Chile, Mozambique, Guatemala, etc (DC: What? The insurgents? - oops … 'patriotic fighters for the people', as it were. Someone should tell the people).
Sorry, I didn't get the reference.
:As for genocides, exactly what are you refrring to? (DC: The 'Great Leap Forward' comes to mind. Etc.)
Yes, but I don't defend the GLF, nor do many Communists.
:Cambodia was not Communist (DC: Pol Pot was an industrialist),
Pol Pot said something like "I am not an Indochinese Communist".
:Nicaragua, never committed any genocide (DC: Commandante Zero was a mite confused, I suppose),
Who is Zero? The sources I ahve seen show that Nicaragua treated its native population better than almsot any state in teh hemisphere. For God's sake, man, tehy gave the Miskitos, who amde up less than a quuarter of teh population of Zelaya, a degree of autonomy virtually unprecedented in teh Americas.
:and although teh Vietnamese certainly did go overboard with their reprisals after the war(!), these actions were mroe likely the outgrowth of the regrettable human instinct for revenge than of any Communist program (DC: And the invasion of Laos and Cambodia? Twenty years of brutal 'revenge'? And, since they seem to be on unusually agreeable terms with the old Khmer Rouge nowadays, who was this 'revenge' directed against? Couldn't have been the 'bourgeois' - old P.P. had pretty much finished that lot come '79).
If it's OK for NATO to invade Kosovo to throw out a genocidal dictator, the same precedent must be extended to Vietnam. Vietnam's invasion fulfilled a responsibility that no one else wanted to take on- ridding teh world of a genocidal murderer. And since when are teh Vietnamese and the KR allies? Pol Pot till his dying day continued to hate the Vietnamese. If you're talking about Hun Sen, hje abandoned the KR long ago.
final note- no, I don't thing firebreaks in yellowstone woudl have been a good idea. As long as tehy didn't kill any people, fires shouldn't be interfered with. LKots of trees acn't reproduce without forest fires.
None.
