: :
: : : Don: The difference is substantial. The buisness down the street isn't going to have some sturmtruppen break in my door. The government might. I don't have to buy what the buisness sells or give them money if I don't want their product. Not so with the government. : : Where on Earth do you get such cosy notions from?
: Don: I don't find government's near monoply on force at all cozy.
: : Exxon, Shell, Chevron, BP, Mobil, Total and Dragon Oil have all funded death squads of one sort or another in the last 5 years; either off their own backs (like BP)
: Don: BP?
: : or in cahoots with repressive governments like that of Colombia or Nigeria.
: Don: You are blaming private enterprise for the violence carried out by governments?
: : Where repressive regimes use lethal force against their own people they generally use something produced by Ooerlikon, Matra Marconi, BAe, Colt, McDonnell-Douglas, Hughes and similar companies. As long as there is money to be made from death and war, companies will cater to it.
: Don: Yes, companies will make what governments buy. Yet it is the government that uses the products to kill. It is interesting that communist nations--without the evils of private corporations--have also made weapons, and have exported them to places like Cuba, who in turn used them to murder and create unrest throughout Central America. But you *approve* of this violence, so it doesn't count, does it?
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$That's a beaut! Governments use products that they bought from a corporation for the repression of it's citizens so that makes the corporation responsible. Extend that chain of logic and you've also got to blame the ordinary citizen who buys any other product from that corporation, like a bag of potatoe chips, or a jar of guacomole. So I guess that I'm responsible for the death squads in El Salvador because I'm eating some pretzels.
Problem; When embargoes are put in place as for instance Cuba, then the rational is that Cuba's peoples are suffering because American corporations don't do business with Cuba. Again, the Capitalist is to blame.
In Communist circles this passes as thought.
