Speaking of unpopular taxes: I have to say, if this tax was on military arms deals, I don't see how you could morally oppose it, especially if the gathered revenue was ringfenced for humanitarian aid programs.
Not another apologist for government????? I can morally oppose this just as passionately as I morally oppose every other cockeyed scheme that governments come up with to supposedly "help" their victims -- oops, I mean subjects -- no that's not right either, we're "constituents." Most of the problems on this planet that can be blamed on homo sapiens rather than Mother Nature are perpetrated by our two most evil institutions: government and religion. The reason that we have so many regions of famine in the Third World -- really the reason there is a Third World at all -- is that for centuries the governments of the more prosperous and technologically advanced nations have been meddling in the affairs of the poorer nations instead of letting them find their own way. They deposed their leaders, destroyed their native cultures, ripped off their natural resources, and as a last parting shot when the Age of Empire was drawing to a close, they drew a bunch of arbitrary lines across those regions and pretended that they defined new nations. These lines divided ethnic groups into multiple pieces so they couldn't regroup and try to rebuild their cultures. They scrambled pieces of various ethnic groups together in the same artificial country so they would never be able to agree on anything except hating each other and their former colonists. And what a surprise, places like Afghanistan and Vietnam and Uganda and Nicaragua have a per capita GDP of a few hundred dollars in a good year, no resources to exploit, no infrastructure, and no ethnic cohesiveness to use as a spiritual resource to pull themselves up with. And now those very same governments -- well of course not the same ones, the U.S. is nothing like the British Empire, is it? -- come along and say we've got the answer to your problems. Everything governments do turns to shit. If you don't know that yet you're lucky. I was once young and naive too. You'll get over it. I'm surprised that more people weren't woken up from their dream state by all the insane commotion in Iraq. All governments do is help themselves to the fruits of their citizens' labor, divide it up among their employees and their campaign contributors and their other friends and relations, and then give back a tiny bit in some clever ceremonial way to distract us from wondering why it's such a tiny fraction of what they took away. "You can never do just one thing." Governments try to disprove that universal truth every day, and the results range from humorous to lethal. A tax on guns to buy food for the world's starving people. What a noble idea. The problem is that the reason those people are starving has nothing to do with economics. The world's private charities could collect enough food to feed the entire planet. They could even collect enough money to solve the problem nobody talks about: who's gonna pay the cost of shipping that food halfway around the world. Shipping food to Bangla Desh costs almost as much as producing it. The reason is that their own countries are so poorly run, and in many cases downright corrupt, that no matter what we do, the food never gets to the hungry people. It goes into warehouses run by mobsters or priests or bureaucrats on the take, and they sell it to somebody who will take it to a more prosperous country and sell it at a profit. If you don't believe me, ask anybody who's old enough to remember the Famine in Ethiopia. We were shipping food to them by the ton. I personally collected several hundred bucks at the office and sent it to World Vision International, one of the absolutely most honorable and trustworthy charities in North America, and I know they spent it on food and sent the food to Ethiopia. Then we start seeing photos in the newspaper of trucks full of food driving AWAY from Ethiopia. The government people were selling the food to neighboring countries and using the money to improve their own lifestyle. Governments suck. The only good thing to do with them is to find every possible way to limit their power so they only can suck small time instead of big time. Handing them the power to -- supposedly -- solve both the hunger problem and the arms problem at the same time is NOT the way to create a more honest, efficient, intelligent and compassionate government. You might as well give it to the Mafia. At least they are better money managers and you always know where you stand with them.
At least they are better money managers and you always know where you stand with them. yes ,they take your money ,but they´ll never give it back to you ! and you always know where you stand with them Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! :bugeye: ah ,almost forgot the tax on arms ....... yes ,that´s really a clever move Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Fraggle, That was eleven paragraphs of completely irrelevant text. Care to give a comment on the original topic? Regarding the closest approact to a comment, the assertion that the meddling in third world affairs by first world countries causes most, if not all, the problems of the third world, please note that the tax is on arms sales, and the vast majority of arms manufacturers are in First world countries. So effectively, this is a tax on first world countries, on products they normally sell to third world countries (and which go on to cause huge amounts of suffering and to exacerbate the problems of the third world in the process), and the cash from the taxes is destined for the third world. So basicly, you're wrong. It's a damn good idea.
Hes saying that sending them food does nothing but keep the tyrants in power by funding them. And this is just a feel good law.
Salty, Hmmm. So we shouldn't try to cure the problems of famine by sending food, but by what, invading everyone and effecting regieme change across more than half the planet? I think it's being well-established by the current state of Afghanistan and Iraq that the US solution doesn't work. There are hidden catches to this tax idea, but Fraggle didn't hit on them. (Specifically, there's a medium-term problem where the tax increases the differential in military strength between countries with arms companies and those without - assuming the tax is on the international arms trade and not on the intranational arms trade, and a long-term problem where every country with an army funds it's own arms industry heavily and the world becomes a much, much less pleasant place...). Of course, if the tax was applied properly (ie. on all arms deals, from the factory door, including to the army of the host country), it would have a long-term effect of limiting arms sales far, far, far more effectively than sanctions or embargos. And by extension, that limits arms research and makes a decent stab at disrupting the control of the military-industrial complex. But, it's a long-term solution so it's hard to sell.
Versus sending them food like Somalia. That didn't do alot of good. Like you say Invading and setting up a goverment isint a short term answer either. Life sucked right after WWII in germany also. Well then this only strengthens the tyrants power by making it so he (who already has guns) is the only one with them. A rogue goverment can also make more by itself it dosent take a genious to put together an AK-47. Alot of deals are not all that legal. (i.e. Saddam's silk worm) Invading and starting up a capatlist industrial society is a quick solution but giving people food and taxing guns is?
Correct. Because the country you just invaded was a capitalist industrial secular society - and because you're talking about taxing all arms sales, everywhere. That means taking on the largest, most powerful complex in the world today and hitting them where it hurts - the wallet - in a long-term way.
Saddam didn't really have a free market. Ohh so your trying to get ride of military spending. What about countries that don't care? Like China they produce weapons I doubt they give woopty doo about the G8's tax on guns. So this will only make a unequal share of weapons.
Except as soon as those Chinese weapons leave the country, theyget taxed. Sounds OK, no need to couple it to food programs, what you need is long term revolution programs in countries, and fudning for the little guy to do what they do. I am amzed how people say that more guns is the solution to things. Whereas the experience with most places near flashpoint is that you inject guns, people go ah ha, i have a gun, im powerful and then they start a war. PLus of ocurse, who control gvts? Rich people, thats who. How did htey get rich? ill leave you to answer that one.
Salty, Saddam didn't have a free market? Crap. Back up that assertion if you can. As to the rest of your post, it's daft. Of bloody course the G8 can't impose a tax on china, they can't impost a tax on anyone bar themselves - but they can push it through the WTO or the UN.
In 1972 he nationalized the oil industry. Something a capatalist naiton shouldnt do. With what places? Ottoman empire, Soviet Union, China, 1930s germany, cambodia, Guatamala Uganada and almost 1940s United States? If the rich are in power wouldnt you feel better if you were armed?
Salty, Many industries are nationalised in many capitalist economies - public transport, telecommunications, gas, electricity, water, etc., etc., etc. (Just look at the UK for a good example - though some of those nationalised industries have since been privatised, with exceptionally awful results.) And if the rich are in power, I'd feel better with a legal means to defend myself. Your standard self-defence situation is against someone acting illegally, not a Waco standoff.
Those are Socialist characteristics not capatalist. Whats legal is controled by the goverment. If the goverment is being a meany your not going to have a lot legal deffense.
And if you can show me a purely capitalist nation, you win. If your government is that oppressive, a rifle isn't going to do you much good, not realistic.
Where is it written that capitalist nations shoudlnt have some nationalised stuff? Besides havnt capitalists often been the first ones round asking for subsidies, in fact didnt the early american railway companies do it?
It isn't written anywhere, and in fact it's been written that a purely capitalist state would never work, because it would be too inhumane a place to live.
