pfft
Actually, it's much easier to buy a local candidate, because they generally have less money to begin with, and you're competing with fewer special interests.JohnG@lt wrote:
As for people being bought in public office, good luck trying to do that at the local level.
Well yeah... people do shop around. Urban sprawl is the net effect.JohnG@lt wrote:
And you're right, town lines are arbitrary. People should be able to 'shop around' locally for the best deal and attach themself to whatever town offers them the best deal. That's a pain in the ass though and would make infrastructure a nightmare. Much easier to just have them move within the border of the town.
My argument is that most people have always been dumb, but that's beside the point.JohnG@lt wrote:
Look, the only roles a government has historically played, and why governments were formed in the first place, has been for common defense against enemies. The secondary, and just as important, offshoot was in the creation of a justice system to keep people from killing, stealing, defrauding etc each other. Add to this the need for consistent coinage to ease commerce and you fulfill the only three functions that government was created to do. Everything else has been plopped down in its realm over the past century and a half and it's all needless junk. Generation after generation, people keep trying to dump more and more of their own personal responsibilities onto the shoulders of others. "Oh no, I didn't read the fine print and my credit card company ripped me off" 'Oh, I know! Let's create a Consumer Affairs bureau to make sure that no more morons are taken advantage of!' I mean really. All this trash needs to be cleaned out and we need to get back to basics. Allowing people to dump their burdens has made them lazy, helpless and dumb.
I think we've gone far astray of the OP, but if we're being consistent in this view that anyone who's not a criminal should be able to come and go as they please, then that means that we need to make citizenship as simple as buying a license. A lot of the developing world would love to live here, and those pesky quotas are one of the reasons why there aren't a lot more of them here already.
In short, if you want things to be completely open, then you should be ok with our population increasing dramatically in a short period of time.
That's not what I meant, John. What I mean is... in terms of serfdom, borders have no relevance. We're all slaves to money, unless you live in a society that is based on something else like just surviving in the wilderness.JohnG@lt wrote:
Yeah, multinational corporations really hold me by the balls Jesus H Christ, you're as rife with conspiracy theories and off your rocker as much as ATG.Turquoise wrote:
Serfdom is a matter of perspective. Serfdom knows no bounds in an age of multinational corporations. You're never truly free, unless you live on an island cut off from the rest of humanity. You'll always have one master or another to answer to.JohnG@lt wrote:
Used in any other way, it is simply a tool to bind people to the land in the manner of serfs.
Otherwise, serfdom applies in varying degrees to each and every one of us.