Myth of the Tyranny of the Majority


SoAMadDeathWish

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The only obvious answer is that A will pick the option with the lower tax and the guaranteed state sponsored parasitism.

Exactly. Though I think you meant to say B?

No , it is obvious from the example that A accepts state sponsored benefits , so to maximize profit A would make that choice.
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No , it is obvious from the example that A accepts state sponsored benefits , so to maximize profit A would make that choice.

Well, possibly, but that choice was not available to A. But even if it was, A does not necessarily make that choice. It depends on the balance of taxes to benefits that each country offers. If that balance is higher for A in his home country despite the higher tax rate, then A will not move.

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The first is crony capitalism; the second is fascism--or even worse.

--Brant

false alternatives

OL as the Augean Stables

Brant,

Isn't it cool when the only choice is between two evils? And that's discussed as if the good did not exist, but that choice was the good instead?

:)

Let 'em work it out. Digging through this stuff is messy and they are certainly proving that point.

Still, it makes you want to go into central planning, hand down decrees and just kill off those who disagree.

:)

Michael

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No , it is obvious from the example that A accepts state sponsored benefits , so to maximize profit A would make that choice.

Well, possibly, but that choice was not available to A. But even if it was, A does not necessarily make that choice. It depends on the balance of taxes to benefits that each country offers. If that balance is higher for A in his home country despite the higher tax rate, then A will not move.

Why? Because you are making up the parameters in this scenario, or based on a theory of? Sorry these answers are just not obvious to me, perhaps I am missing something.
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The first is crony capitalism; the second is fascism--or even worse.

--Brant

false alternatives

OL as the Augean Stables

Brant,

Isn't it cool when the only choice is between two evils? And that's discussed as if the good did not exist, but that choice was the good instead?

:)

Let 'em work it out. Digging through this stuff is messy and they are certainly proving that point.

Still, it makes you want to go into central planning, hand down decrees and just kill off those who disagree.

:)

Michael

I tried jobsearch.com, but can't find an online application for philosopher king, not even a mention of the qualifications

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Well, possibly, but that choice was not available to A. But even if it was, A does not necessarily make that choice. It depends on the balance of taxes to benefits that each country offers. If that balance is higher for A in his home country despite the higher tax rate, then A will not move.

Why? Because you are making up the parameters in this scenario, or based on a theory of? Sorry these answers are just not obvious to me, perhaps I am missing something.

Why what? It's not clear to me what it is that you're asking.

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The second option is the better one.

Wrong. Fallacious dichotomy.

Try taking a course on argumentation.

I am feeling charitable today. I'll save you the time that it would take you to find it:

false dilemma (false dichotomy)

“Were we designed or are we simply the end result of an ancient mud puddle struck by lightning?” --example of a false dilemma from a press release for "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed"

The false dilemma (or false dichotomy) is a fallacy of reasoning that omits consideration of all reasonable alternatives. Sometimes called the either-or fallacy, one poses what looks like a true dilemma--I must pick one or the other--when, in fact, there are other viable alternatives. (There can be false trilemmas, etc.)

For example, if someone were to demonstrate apparent psychic abilities, one would commit the fallacy of false dilemma if one were to reason: Either she's a fraud or she is truly psychic, and she's not a fraud; so, she must be truly psychic

There is at least one other possible explanation for her apparent psychic abilities: She genuinely thinks she's psychic but she's not. A Sylvia Browne, a John Edward, or a James Van Praagh may appear to some people to have psychic abilities, but they need not be frauds if they are not truly psychic. They may be frauds, but they may genuinely believe they are in contact with another dimension of reality. In other words, they may be deluded. This does not mean that they are mentally ill, but their false beliefs may be so deeply embedded in their personalities that no amount of evidence or argument could convince them of their errors.

I even took the example from The Skeptic's Dictionary rather than a work on Rhetoric, Persauaion, or, Argumentation...

A,...

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Well, possibly, but that choice was not available to A. But even if it was, A does not necessarily make that choice. It depends on the balance of taxes to benefits that each country offers. If that balance is higher for A in his home country despite the higher tax rate, then A will not move.

Why? Because you are making up the parameters in this scenario, or based on a theory of? Sorry these answers are just not obvious to me, perhaps I am missing something.

Why what? It's not clear to me what it is that you're asking.

My overall point is that I see your arguments/scenarios from a game theory perspective. A scenario is constructed with rigid parameters, which is then used to show "how" the actions of participants would play out as defined by the parameters while at the same claiming that those same actions would be played out in reality in the same fashion . Human nature , volition can not be parametered "out" when trying to explain how humans will react to given situations. The scenarios are unrealistic because too much is lost in their construction, for the sake of the construction. Take B as an example, you say he is productive even given a statist environment. In reality I would presume such a person to operate with a high or even higher degree of rationality than his peers. Would he not reason that state interference in the economy could be a possible net drain on his future productivity and seek to avoid even short term gain of such interference? Wouldn't it be reasonable to assume that B would eschew all state interference and move where he thinks there will be less of it? Not if you set parameters such that that is not an option, yet claim we are considering human nature and seeing it played out by B's actions, just let's ignore the parameters that are set by subjective standards and pretend they reflect objective reality.
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My overall point is that I see your arguments/scenarios from a game theory perspective. A scenario is constructed with rigid parameters, which is then used to show "how" the actions of participants would play out as defined by the parameters while at the same claiming that those same actions would be played out in reality in the same fashion . Human nature , volition can not be parametered "out" when trying to explain how humans will react to given situations. The scenarios are unrealistic because too much is lost in their construction, for the sake of the construction.

The advantage of modeling human behavior in this way is that it forces us to make our definitions, assumptions, and reasoning explicit, so if we've made an unrealistic assumption or if there is an error in our reasoning, anyone could take a look and find out where we made a mistake. Then, we can either fix the error or change an unreasonable assumption and take our analyses from there. If, as you say, too much is lost in their construction, then we can always ask what this missing factor is and add it in if it is relevant. Furthermore, the models are realistic to the extent that they actually explain reality. If they predict that a person will take a certain action, and in reality the person does take that action, then the model works and that is evidence for it. If the person doesn't take that action in reality, then the model is wrong, and we have to make a new one that takes into account the new data. This way, our understanding of politics can gradually become more and more accurate.

The problem with not doing things this way and relying on our intuition alone is that, too often, in political discourse, people make all sorts of assumptions that are never made clear and often switch back and forth between mutually contradictory ones (often without even realizing that they're doing that). It's never quite clear where the mistakes are made nor how to fix them, and conclusions are reached prematurely merely because they appear to be satisfying (although they are often nonsensical or simply false). People often use different definitions for the same words and they end up just talking past each other. Disagreements are never resolved and the same arguments are repeated over and over again. The discussion never goes anywhere.

Take B as an example, you say he is productive even given a statist environment. In reality I would presume such a person to operate with a high or even higher degree of rationality than his peers. Would he not reason that state interference in the economy could be a possible net drain on his future productivity and seek to avoid even short term gain of such interference? Wouldn't it be reasonable to assume that B would eschew all state interference and move where he thinks there will be less of it? Not if you set parameters such that that is not an option, yet claim we are considering human nature and seeing it played out by B's actions, just let's ignore the parameters that are set by subjective standards and pretend they reflect objective reality.

B would indeed reason that it would be better to eschew all state interference if and only if he thinks that it is a) possible and b) better for him. However, is it possible for there to exist a state which does not interfere in the economy? I say no. But Francisco and others argue otherwise. This is the contested claim. If we were to assume that it is true in the course of proving that it is true, that would just be circular reasoning.

Note that, in reality, only states which do interfere in the economy exist. So B cannot choose to eschew all state interference because there simply aren't any states which don't interfere in the economy to which he could move. That's why I didn't include that as an option.

I charge that it is my opponent's implicit models of reality that are unrealistic. They assume (unjustifiably) that just about any set of political institutions is possible, and so all that politics has to do is to identify the ideal form of government and then find some way to make that ideal a reality.

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I don't want to say.

--Brant

trying to come up with something polite

show some care for and knowledge of a philosophy of freedom instead of all this trite A and B crap, but since you like it go read an expert, Isabel Paterson, The God of the Machine, who was a great Randian influence

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I'm not sure modeling human behavior is the way to determine moral principles of politics. Modeling is fine for deterministic behavior like theorizing what happens when you detonate a nuclear device, but I do not think that methodology is transferable to study human behavior.

One of my biggest take aways from Von Mises was the idea that economic study was about history, when can look at the data of past action and manipulate the data however we wish, the mistake would be to think that describes human action in the future. A good grounding for speculation but that is really all you have and it's best not to lose sight of that idea.

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Just out of curiosity, where would you guys say I fit on the political spectrum or compass? What ideology do you think most faithfully represents my views?

75% or more a behavioral fascist/statist...

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I'm not sure modeling human behavior is the way to determine moral principles of politics. Modeling is fine for deterministic behavior like theorizing what happens when you detonate a nuclear device, but I do not think that methodology is transferable to study human behavior.

One of my biggest take aways from Von Mises was the idea that economic study was about history, when can look at the data of past action and manipulate the data however we wish, the mistake would be to think that describes human action in the future. A good grounding for speculation but that is really all you have and it's best not to lose sight of that idea.

I don't model human behavior in order to determine moral principles of politics. I model human behavior in order to predict politics.

While I would agree that one cannot simply extrapolate past events into the future, when a model is supported by the data, one can say that it can predict human action in the future.

Just out of curiosity, where would you guys say I fit on the political spectrum or compass? What ideology do you think most faithfully represents my views?

75% or more a behavioral fascist/statist...

From the wikipedia fascism page:

Gaetano Mosca in his work The Ruling Class (1896) developed the theory that claims that in all societies an "organized minority" will dominate and rule over the "disorganized majority".[70][71] Mosca claims that there are only two classes in society, "the governing" (the organized minority) and "the governed" (the disorganized majority).[72] He claims that the organized nature of the organized minority makes it irresistible to any individual of the disorganized majority.[72]

This is exactly what I said!

Some critics[who?] of Italian fascism have said that much of the ideology was merely a by-product of unprincipled opportunism by Mussolini, and that he changed his political stances merely to bolster his personal ambitions while he disguised them as being purposeful to the public.[227]Richard Washburn Child, the American ambassador to Italy who worked with Mussolini and became a friend and admirer of him, defended Mussolini's opportunistic behaviour, writing: "Opportunist is a term of reproach used to brand men who fit themselves to conditions for the reasons of self-interest. Mussolini, as I have learned to know him, is an opportunist in the sense that he believed that mankind itself must be fitted to changing conditions rather than to fixed theories, no matter how many hopes and prayers have been expended on theories and programmes."[228] Child quoted Mussolini as saying, "The sanctity of an ism is not in the ism; it has no sanctity beyond its power to do, to work, to succeed in practice. It may have succeeded yesterday and fail to-morrow. Failed yesterday and succeed to-morrow. The machine first of all must run!".[228]

Which is also what I said:

In contrast, the first thing I do is try to figure out what society is actually like and then to explain why it is the way it is. Once I've done that, I try to predict what will most likely happen in the future. Then I look at what options are realistically available to me, and I try to plan my life around the things I know I can't change. Finally, I try to look at what I and other people might change by getting organized and working towards realistically achievable goals. In short, I'm a relentless pursuer of realistic improvements to my own situation, rather than a proselytizer of lofty ideals.

I'm a fascist! :laugh: (sort of)

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I'm a fascist! :laugh: (sort of)

Hey, self realization is a wonderful event.

Wear it proudly.

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Objectivism might be many things to many people, but I can't imagine anyone denying it is a moral defense of capitalism, or ignoring that fact.

I don't like to speak for Objectivism, but once in a while it's good to remember something basic.

Objectivism is not a mental discipline for predicting events.

It is a system of thinking for a person to embrace the heroism to make events happen that others predict would not and could never happen.

Michael

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First of all, as evil as slavery is, it did not figure prominently in Icelandic society. In Viking Age Iceland, Jesse Byock points out that slavery was simply not economical in the higher latitudes: "In Iceland with its mixed economy of coastal hunting, gathering and fishing, and inland livestock farming, the efficient use of slave labor was not possible."

More importantly, the existence of slavery in Iceland is completely irrelevant to the point I made in Post #15l: the non-coercive creation and enforcement of law in that country. The Icelandic people were able to develop and live under a legal system that did not require forcible financing. Slavery had nothing to do with that system.

The existence of slavery proves that not everyone was a thingmenn, which is the actual claim I was defending. More importantly, I also said that even the thingmenn had to pay a tax by the 1100's which supports my argument rather than yours.

My argument is that states will tax the populace for political reasons (which I've explained before). Just because the state might be funded through entirely non-coercive means does not mean that it will be. States are not the same thing as shoe stores. The Iceland example supports my theory perfectly because, although a proto-state could be funded through entirely voluntary means, once the ball of statism starts rolling, it doesn't stop. We see this same scenario played out in the emergence of the first civilizations. Before the first city-states emerged in Mesopotamia, society was organized into chiefdoms and lineages that did not have the power to tax (as far as anyone knows anyway). When the first states were organized, however, pretty much immediately afterward, taxes and social stratification showed up as well.

Obviously, you and I are using different systems of logic. The fact that a small fraction of the Icelandic population was unfree does not in the least change the fact that the system of justice and defense that existed there was freely and contractually financed. To illustrate: in 2011 the number of U.S. murder victims was 12,664. Thus, those 12,664 were effectively denied the right to vote in 2012. But only someone dysfunctionally concerned with non-essentials would claim that the statistic proves that the U.S. does not allow its citizens to vote.

It was not until the late 12th century that an Icelandic state with its attendant taxation emerged. But under my system of logic, which I admit is quaintly Hellenistic, a later event does not have the power to remove an earlier event from its place on history's timeline. Iceland once had no taxation. The arrival of taxation later on does not and cannot alter that fact.

In 1984, the government of Oceania is able to delete from the historical record (in the form of newspaper articles) its earlier promise of no reduction in chocolate rations. But the power to delete records in the present does not mean the power to delete events from the past.

If majorities did not matter, the Communist Party would still be in power in Poland, Hungary and East Germany.

Can you go into more detail here? I don't see how that works.

If majorities did not matter, communists authorities in Poland in 1988 could have ignored the wishes of the masses and merrily gone on with business as usual. They might have found it difficult to move around, however. Anti-government unions had shut down nearly every major industry and the streets were jammed with angry protestors.

Try to keep up with the thread, or else don't comment. In response to your suggestion that people will seek the state that gives the most loot, I wrote Post #151, "Will some non-productive people shop around for the state that gives them the most benefits? Sure. We see that now in certain Western democracies. On the other hand, productive people will undoubtedly shop for a state that robs them the least. In this context, I have hope for the free nation movement. Will the moochers be stronger than the producers? In the long run, no, due to what's called a 'brain drain.'"

Your non sequitur was, "There are no inherently 'productive' or 'non-productive' people. A person is productive or unproductive to the extent that he chooses to be. A person could be a producer one day and a looter the next and then go back to being a producer the day after that. Anyone can produce with one hand and steal with the other. In fact, most people do."

I then pointed out that your observation about inherent productivity is of no relevance to my point that productive people will move to where they are less looted. It is fruitless for a state to attract thousands of new parasites if the productive people there flee the tax burden in large numbers. I never made the claim that there has to be a no tax state for overtaxed people to escape to.

Perhaps I should have been more clear.

I did indeed say that there are no inherently "productive" or "parasitic" people. This means that any talk of what "productive" people might do is meaningless. For some purposes, we might make an assumption that this or that person is always productive or some other person is always parasitic. But in this case, such an assumption would be an over-simplification, because people choose to be productive and/or parasitic depending on their circumstances (which, in the real world, are highly variable).

So, for example, let's say that A and B are two owners of two companies in a country with a high tax burden. Suppose that A has good lobbyists and friends in the government, and derives many benefits from the state, whereas B does not and must mainly rely on his own productivity. Additionally, B has the opportunity to move his business to one of two countries. One with a lower tax rate, where he can't influence the government, and another with the same lower tax rate but where he can influence the government. B will obviously choose the latter, and, therefore, that country, rather than attracting a "producer", just gets another "parasite". So we see that, just because B was productive under one set of circumstances, does not mean that he will remain that way under another set.

Okay so B will prey upon more productive people in his new homeland. And the victims of his parasitism will either put up with it because they believe that parasitism (like slavery or child marriages or non-suffrage for women or bleeding sick people to cure them) is an "unfortunate reality." Or they will treat B to the Ceaușescu special. Or they will follow the unmistakable flow of the brain drain.

I suppose your point is that Switzerland's national defense does not work. Yet you have several hundred years of historical fact contradicting you.

Why would I say that?

I can't come up with one good reason. Therefore we must agree that an effective military force for national defense can be decentralized.

Then go to it. The ballot is secret, and a more plausible strategy would be one that starts with present realities.

Alright. Let's say that everyone except A is envious and derive just as much utility from having A lose $1 as they do from gaining an additional $1. What this means is that, all else being equal, they like having more money rather than less, but they also like it more when A has 1 of his dollars taken away. Their payoff, Vp, from a tax bill with tax rate r is then given by:

Vp = (r(1 - l) * 1,000,000) / N + 500,000 - (1 - r)(1 - l)1,000,000,

where N is the number of people in the society and l is A's leisure choice as defined in the OP.

Things might seem hopeless for A here, because if the tax rate is set to 100%, all the envious parasites will receive a payoff of $500,000 and A will have no money with which to bribe them. And A can never produce more than $500,000 so it seems like he will never be able to get out of this jam. But we have to dig a bit deeper.

It turns out that the envious parasites can get a payoff higher than $500,000 while A retains some of his money with a tax rate that is less than 100%. :blink: It seems impossible, but it's actually quite interesting how it all works out. ^_^

If we maximize the payoff function of the envious parasites, we get that the payoff maximizing tax rate is given by

r = (2 + 2N - Sqrt(N^2 + 3N + 2)) / (N + 1). (note that this rate approaches but is never equal to 100% regardless of how high N is)

Let's go back to the original example with just A, B, and C. Here, there are only 3 people, so N = 3. Here, the tax rate that B and C would like the most is 88.2%, according to the above equation. We can get A's leisure choice for that tax rate which turns out to be l = 1/(2 - r) = 1/(2 - 0.882) = 0.894. Plugging l, r, and N into the envious parasites' payoff function we see that their payoff with a tax rate of 88.2% is:

Vp (0.882) = (0.882(1-0.894)*1,000,000)/3 + 500,000 - (1-0.882)(1-0.894)*1,000,000 = $518,576.

You might ask, where is all this extra money coming from? There is no extra money. This function is merely a payoff function. When A loses $1 to taxes, the envious parasite interprets this as an increase in utility form gaining $1/N but also as an increase in utility of A losing $1 to taxes, i.e. he gains $1/N + $1.

Now we need to look at how much money each person would actually hold if the bill were to pass. Using the equations from the OP, A would have only $43,499.70, while each parasite would have $31,038.50.

Now, all A has to do is make the following offer, "If anyone proposes a tax bill, and the bill succeeds, then I will give an additional dollar to the one who didn't propose it." Since each of the envious parasites would like to be the one to get the additional dollar, neither of them wants to be the one to propose the bill. Therefore, the bill is never proposed, and A never has to pay anyone anything.

This is a beautiful scheme, because, as we know, in the real world, although hate is a powerful force, every person would rather make an extra dollar than see someone he hates be harmed or thwarted in his ambitions. Just ask anyone on this forum if he wouldn't rather have an extra buck from Soros than see Hillary defeated in the next election.

Then the solution is, as I have said, to de-fang and de-claw the state so that it is not a weapon of special interests.

Let me see if I have this right. Corporate (political) power is an unfortunate reality that isn't going away any time soon.

How do you know this? Where is the expiration date written on corporate power's label? What crystal ball are you looking into?

People in Eastern Europe in the late 1970's had no inkling that the Berlin Wall would come down within ten years. Not even the CIA predicted it.

Yet you write with apparent certainty that there can be no fundamental change in crony capitalism in the foreseeable future. How would you know?

It's not that there are no feasible alternatives to crony capitalism (though, none of them are any better). It's that laissez-faire isn't one of them.

But if you are certain that "there can be no fundamental change in crony capitalism in the foreseeable future," how would you know that a non-laissez-faire alternative would be feasible?

Do you see into the future beyond the part of it that's not foreseeable?

Again, we must be using different systems of logic.

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Just out of curiosity, where would you guys say I fit on the political spectrum or compass? What ideology do you think most faithfully represents my views?

I guess it depends on who you want to point guns at, those who break the laws of a society or those who make up the society.

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"A person is productive or unproductive *to the extent he chooses to be*". [Francisco]

This is surprising. FF, have you come over to free will?

I am flattered that you are taking the time to read my posts, but the quotation above is misattributed. Here it is in its original context: http://www.objectivistliving.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=14223&p=206003

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Thank you. Yes, one of this days I would like to spend a serious amount of time with The Complete Sagas of Icelanders.

You might also try Burial Rites by Hannah Kent. It's a fictionalized account of the last days of the last person to be executed in Iceland. There's a great deal of historical accuracy to the extent that details are available, and it's a beautifully written depiction of Icelandic culture in the early 1800s.

What a coincidence that you should mention Burial Rites. I ordered it from Amazon earlier this year.

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Additionally, B has the opportunity to move his business to one of two countries. One with a lower tax rate, where he can't influence the government, and another with the same lower tax rate but where he can influence the government. B will obviously choose the latter, and, therefore, that country, rather than attracting a "producer", just gets another "parasite". So we see that, just because B was productive under one set of circumstances, does not mean that he will remain that way under another set.

So obviously, this B is a moron. That is, if he beleives that he'd be the only person able to influence the government.

If B were not a moron, and were actually a producer, he'd obviously pick the country where a] nobody could influence the government, including him, and b] that government was largely tasked with scraping barnacles off of navigation bouys and painting the lines fairly down the middle of the streets, so what petty low life criminal would want to influence that right sized government to begin with? It has been properly castrated/neutered. It is staffd by honorable plumbers, not patermalistic megalomaniac emperor wannabees.

Your calculus of 'obviously' isn't even close. What fool would willingly subject himself to a] a government that sells iself and b] that has conseqeunces when it does so?

I'd say the 'obvious' answer is to castrate/neuter this thing until the 'obvious' inevitability is beat down into the cracks and crevices of petty criminality, appropriate for scumbags like LBJ or Nixon. They can argue over whose brother in law gets the order for the yellow paint in the dark all they want, then go count their stolen money in their trailers.

Or, we can fund the splendor that is DC and its suburbs with these same scum parasites.

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JFK's America, a nation of 180million, gave JFK 100B at the peak of the Cold War. That population and inflation adjusts to maybe $1400B today, unless you take into account gains in productivity over 50 years, in which that would be less than $1400B/yr today.

Our federal overhead is today at $4000B/yr. (JFK's $100B is adjusted to $1400B for the comparison.)

Over half of JFK's budget was for defense. We're not spending anywhere near $2000B/yr on defense.

JFK's economies roared. Ours are flat on their back, in spite of the over $2500B in federal 'stimulus' above and beyond JFK's America and his roaring economies.

Feel stimulated yet?

Where is this 'austerity' that fool Krugman keeps mumbling about? What austerity? It was JFK's economies that roared.

The Austere Economies.

Now I rememember: Eisenhower and JFK were followed by those scumbags LBJ and Nixon, and it the nation has been circling the toilet ever since...

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