Steve Gagne

All fine and dandy in a free marketplace. But when you have oligarchic NGO's acting as conspiracies in restraint of trade, specifically health insurance companies, you have market distortions on the order of socialistic government interference. You want fair, free health care, that is, a health care system that is not coerced? Outlaw health insurance. Otherwise it's just another kind of class warfare, another instance of one gang or another battling for possession of the law (as well as for all the goodies).

The Dr. Ron Paul Revolution 2008 presidential campaign continues to pull ahead....Dr. Paul pulled second in the Utah GOP straw poll a few days ago (behind only Mitt Romney)...Dr. Paul has pulled second in the L.A.Times Presidential Preference Poll in the last few days (behind only Fred Thompson)...the $5-million marked in fundraising is passed (with no debt incurred)...the juggernaut continues... Dr. Ron Paul -- Hope For America. Be part of it. ===================================================== List of Current Active Links to (Florida) Campaign-Related Material. Feel Free to Add, Correct, Redistribute. Main website: http://www.ronpaul2008.com Position Papers: http://www.ronpaul2008.com/issues http://www.ronpaullibrary.org Central Grassroots Organizing: http://ronpaul.meetup.com Local Florida Grassroots Organizing: http://ronpaul.meetup.com/107 National & Florida Yahoo Groups: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RonPaul2008 http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FL4RonPaul Communications: http://www.ronpaul2008.com/contact http://ronpaul.meetup.com/boards http://ronpaulnetwork.info/forum http://www.ronpaulforums.com Campaigner Support Items: http://www.cafepress.com/RonPaul_2008 http://www.libertytalk.com/liberty_card.php http://www.ronpaulpresident2008.com/?gclid...CFSCTWAodyzBzdg http://www.cafepress.com/aynscloset/2770801 http://www.printfection.com/promo/two_dollar_tees.php Some Friends & Supporters: http://www.ronpaulrevolution.com http://www.ronpaulhq.com/index.php http://www.kenchapmans.info/politics http://www.grannywarriors.com http://www.conservativetimes.org http://libertarianchristians.org/index.html Florida Voter & Republican Organizations: http://election.dos.state.fl.us/regtovote/regform.shtml http://www.rpof.org/action/volunteer http://www.rpof.org/events/presidency_IV_application.php http://fl.rlc.org http://www.rlc.org http://www.gop.com

Phil Thank you for your synopsis of the last 40 years of Objectivist history. As one who respects Objectivism without embracing it completely, I have to agree that the pure ugliness of the "I'M IN CHARGE HERE" attitudes is a great incentive for non-true believers to stay away. All the adjoining posts were also quite interesting (especially Jonathan's "socialist advocacy" post ). Also apropos Michael's first post, I think his comment about comparing a movement to a religion was more dead-on than anyone else here has been willing to acknowledge, at least in terms of recognizing patterns of human behaviour within organizations. First of all, moo. Mooo. MOOOOO! Herd of cows? OF COURSE I'VE HEARD OF COWS. But aside from the herd mentality that you get in a religious cult, there is a book which addresses the problems of fractionation that you addressed entitled Historical Drift: Must My Church Die? by Arnold L. Cook (with the foreword by K. Neill Foster). The book is subtitled "Dimming Vision, Shifting Values, Fading Passion: How to Detect, Diagnose, and Reverse the Trends." The link is to the Amazon page with a review of the book. Though some might find the religious terminology a turn-off (if not completely obtuse) I can still recommend it as a symbolic parallel of the very problems that Objectivism has encountered -- because people are people, and patterns of human behaviour can be reproduced in disparate communities (no matter what they profess) -- because they are human.

Well considering he's 74 that shouldn't be a concern too much longer. Who's going to be the intellectual heir to the "intellectual heir-head"?

As a novelist, she wrote the finest pulp fiction i ever saw. Gawd I love her pulp fiction. As the director of the AS movie has observed, it has "moments." It really makes her stories powerful. But nowadays talent is not appreciated; her talents at stylization would most likely end up being wasted in the field of pornography. As a philosopher, no matter how brilliant, her concepts were flawed, immediately from her dismissal of Kant as the historical destroyer of reaon onward. Kant himself was an intellectual "fence" -- a "receiver of stolen goods" in the the sense of philosophical "stolen concepts", as are all philosophers since that era. The primary, unrecognized philosophical bandit, to whom we owe it all, was the Anglican priest John Wesley, the founder of Methodism. Until the time of John Wesley, even the most skeptical of philosophers honored some form of Christian principles, even if only in the breach. THE fundamental principle of "natural law theory" (the basis of the "Enlightenment") was the concept that man was a creature of an OBJECTIVE, FIXED, UNCHANGEABLE nature. Along comes missionary Anglican priest John Wesley, failing as an evangelist in Georgia and the Carolinas, getting his ass shot off by Indians, running back to England. He started the Methodist movement, in defiance to his superiors in the Anglican church, and started writing sermons and preaching. The substance of his preaching was that man is NOT a creature of a FIXED NATURE, but comes "closer to God" or perfection by an infinite number of small steps. This is known as the "infinite perfectibility of man". I related this idea during a talk about secularism and faith I called, "Is Our Faith Imaginary?", at a conference of Christian ministers a few years ago; please note how many other ideas this inspired.

Yes, Dr. Bob. but not in the lifetime of of our species. Who knows if the the next evolutionary step will even be sentient in a sense that we could understand? Ah well, untill then, all honor to the shards! And obeisance to their Lord!

Actually, interstellar travel has been part of the conception of the US space program from the beginning. Ion engines have been around since the 50's. But it took scifi to flesh out some of the ideas: "For the World Is Hollow, and I Have Touched the Sky" From the official website My old man had his own semi-humorous take on it. That we originated at planet Hephaestus, then we "hephaformed' Mars; our forbears blew up Hephaestus (now know as the asteroid belt); while a remnant settled Mars. Then we "ariformed" earth, and when our forbears settled here, they created an ecologic disaster of previously unknown proportions on Mars, requiring abandonment of that planet. Now we're discussing climate shifts and getting ready to "terraform' Venus, and looking at only a remnant surviving to do it. After Venus, where would we go? That's where the interstellar thing comes in. Not only does NASA have files on hollow earthlike artificial environments, but also for ISS-style docking capabilbies, as well as ship "clusters" -- a mothership (with an artificial earthlike environment) with a ring of isolated orbiting satellite ships for specialized functions (power, observation, science/medicine, etc.) All in all, a fun topic to think about.

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article...ives/article.do

Steve, I can't guess where you're going with this. We have very different understanding of constitutional law. Are you saying that you wish it to be so, that law = social contract? or rather in the current state, law = social contract? Maybe you're thinking of some political society other than the United States? W. Okay, what I am doing is chucking all the social-contract "theorists" out the window. I am not arguing for or against it, but saying that the description of a"social contract" is just that -- "descriptive", not "proscriptive", -- i.e., it is a description of how people behave in society. And I can not conceive of ANYONE asserting the opposite, "Awww gee whiz, Steve, people DON'T have any behaviour in society." Like, what could that possibly mean? Of course they do! We need a common basis for communication here. And what I meant was that the social contract is precisely that -- the common basis for communication. The sum of one's understandings of language and behaviour. The total of one's expectations, actions, and responses, in one's social interactions. Like language, these tend to change over time (even the meanings of written documents are subject to "entropy"). In most societies, the written law is part of this. And there are no rules in reality that say it has to be a suicide pact or that it can't be renegotiated. So, I guess i am agreeing with SaulOhio, that just because the public discussion may be about "the social contract", it doesn't mean that those who believe in freedom have to sit this one out. In fact, engagement may be critical to helping build the type of rational society you or I would want to live in. Steve p.s. I do not readily approve of the UCC quasi-contract, it sends the wrong message. But it's there, poisoning people's minds into thinking it's okay to force people to do things involuntarily. It's one of those things I think we should "renegotiate." Of course, considering Directive 10-289, also known as "National Security and Homeland Security Presidential Directive NSPD-51/HSPD-20", it may all be a moot point anyway. As I've noted elsewhere, when life imitates art, it can get scary.

Strictly speaking, no, of course not. But the law itself holds a didactic ("normative") role in society; teaching the rules of a particular society's "social contract", and revealing its intents, so that people can learn to comply with it rather than running afoul at every turn. And rules of human intercourse, no matter how specialized, tend to diffuse over time and be applied into areas they weren't intended for.

Michael Man that was harsh. You two got a history? I just downloaded the pdf file and read the premises for the report, concerning this "vast" group of nominal muslims. I will be looking for evidence (numbers) to validate these premises as I read it. But the topic I brought up about demographics impinges on the same territory, and is working from a different premise: Granted, there are muslims of good will. More so amongst the Sufi and Sunni, than the Shi'ite and Wahhabi. And perhaps the comparison to cold-war methodologies are helpful. But are we talking about trying to negotiate with children here? Is that who will have their fingers on the button? [Note: edited due to lost attribution. By-line originally inserted in "quote' directive but not functioning; added at end of passage.]

In common law there is your basic contract -- offer, acceptance, agreement, exchange of valid consideration -- but there is something else under the UCC called a "quasi-contract". A quasi-contract does not need to involve all the elements of contract in order to be enforceable. Rather, it need only be shown that a party has received some benefit in order to place the full burden of specific compliance (read: involuntary servitude) on that party, whether or not he has agreed to any "implied exchange" or "implied duty." This is touched on by Howard Freeman.

I've already sent letters to the U.S. senators from my state (Florida -- Martinez & Nelson), as well as President Bush, asking them to shelve this monstrosity. since it's not time yet time to use bullets against public officials, I wrote the letters in the other language they would understand: Spanish.

Ah yes. The lovable Phelps family. For a bunch of so-called "Bible-Believing" Baptists, they really should read their Scripture better. For ***EACH*** passage in Scripture condemning "fags" (homosexuality, not FAQ'S), there are ***FOUR*** condemning this ABOMINATION, this HORRENDOUS crime. But I see no mention of it on their web sites. <more>

Looks like this new "comprehensive" bill has a lot more "gotchas" than even we expected. It's so comprehensive that it even requires the IRS to be involved, not just with the illegals. You won't even be able to hire a kid to mow your lawn without giving the kid your SSN & getting a verified work history from him for the last five years -- verified, of course , against a grand IRS employment database. Then you'll have to wait 10 days for a response from the IRS to hire him. You'll have to keep the records like they were your personal income tax records, for 3 years. This is getting worse and worse and worse.... http://www.raleighchronicle.com/2007051707.html

Ron Paul hasn't flipflopped on anything. How come he trounces everyone in the online polls, but the msm/print polls don't mention him? Granted, there's probably some "ballot stuffing" going on in the Dr. Paul camp, but who are the msm pollsters asking? Each other? "Gee, Mr. Fellow Traveller, what republican would YOU like to see lose against Hillary?" "Well, of course, Rosalito, I'd choose Giuliani. Why, I suppose you would like to see us tromp 'Sleeper Cell' McCain?" "Gee, I guess that puts the poll at 50-50 between Giuliani and McCain." "I guess you're right." RUDY'S LAST CHANCE:

Hey. There's no groupthink happening here, is there. The primary difference between tragedy and black comedy can be characterized by the difference between the movie 'Fail Safe" and the movie "Dr. Strangelove". That is, the former sees a disastrous series of events, as the accidental if inevitable result of things out of man's control; whereas the latter sees the same disastrous series of events as the result of man's deliberate, insane stupidity. Seems to me with you all talking shit about the dead man, if you believed what you were saying you would put it under the Humour topic (as in black comedy) rather than under Rants. I mean, you're asserting crap about a "theocracy"; there are over 30,000 different xian denominations, which one gets to take up the mantle of state religion? I mean, really. They can't even get it together long enough to agree on ANYTHING, even their own assertions about "who is GOD?" These are the people you're demonizing as a bunch of statist pigs who are going to ruin our lives?.... LP is more likely to start an o-ist "state religion" a-la L. Ron Hubbard's admonition, than a bunch of air-headed xian preachers. Can you give me 98 cents change back from my buck?

'Give me but for where to stand, and I will move the earth.". Archimedes, Greek inventor, mathematician, & physicist (287 BC - 212 BC) "Do not talk to me of Archimedes' lever. He was an absent-minded person with a mathematical imagination. Mathematics commands my respect, but I have no use for engines. Give me the right word and the right accent and I will move the world." Joseph Conrad, Preface to "A Personal Record" "Young Archimedes, you are disturbing my class with all your nonsense. Go stand in the corner." Archimedes' Teacher

This is supposed to be a "List of Things Objectivists Should Boycott"? Did you mean, like, individually? Or, like, as a group?

A Catalogue of Emancipated Minor Law in the U.S., from the Cornell University Law School, Legal Information Institute. Copyright notice for the Cornell University Law School, Legal Information Institute.

Excellent.

Bob I didn't see any literature. What I saw was an electric motor with enhanced antifriction bearings, with a funny-looking blower tube on it and no power supply, running and putting out large quantities of cold air. No battery. No fossil fuels. No backup. I'm not a physicist so I couldn't provide anything like the math it took to make it work. But when I asked about it, I was told it didn't take any esoteric theories like "nonlinear transport of electric current" or "Vander Waal's Forces" to explain it. More just principles of advanced fluid dynamics and basic high school chemistry. steve

The French version of that cure is a beret and a quart of Courvoisier.

Well, technically well-made, but talk about a malevolent universe! I took my family. We all walked out depressed and disgusted. The only redeeming feature of the story was a conversation about it I had afterwards with one of my teenage sons (the lazy one who wants to quit school & work at McDonald's for the rest of his life...what a waste....). "So, Arthur, what did you think about the movie?" "I dunno. Kinda boring. Stupid, really." "Do you understand what it was about?" "No." "What was the point of it?" "Dunno." "Well what happened to everyone?" "They died." "So what was the point of it?" "Dunno." "Well, the guy who made it seemed to say, 'Life sucks and then you die.'" "Oh." "How did I know that?" "Dunno." "Because I learned how to understand the "theme" and *plot* to a story. Where did I learn that?" "Dunno." "In english classes, when I read the stories and analyzed them, and took part in what the teacher was trying to teach!" "Oh." Now this kid, who had been trying for a "Failure of the Year" award, went back into his english classes after that, buckled down, and raised his grades from an F to a B. Not too shabby. But I still thought the theme and plot of the story SUCKED.