[ExI] Privacy vs the future

[samantha]

 On 9/7/10 3:01 AM, BillK wrote:
> On 9/7/10, samantha wrote:
> <snip>
>> Transparency alone is
>> (a)very unlikely in that those in power (government) claim more
>> rights to monitor everything about us than they allow us regarding their own
>> actions and
>> (b) just transparency will not stop massive persecution of
>> victimless crimes and other abuses and
>> (c) full transparency with no
>> safeguards would be the end of any discretion and most competition.
>>
>>
>
> The discussion about transparency in society is a distraction.
>
> What sort of society do you want?
> The wealth gap in the US is now such that the top 1% own nearly
> everything and the middle-class is being destroyed. One simplification
> is that your pension funds have been ruined while the financiers get
> million-dollar bonuses for 'managing' your funds.
>
> If the mass of the population have nothing much left worth stealing,
> the rulers don't really care whether they watch each other or mug each
> other or kill each other. So long as they are kept quiet enough that
> they don't upset the super-rich regal lifestyles.
> (Bring on the X-factor and the ball games!).

Well, I would like to say that this sort of classist talk has no place
in a free market or a free country.  But then I remember that we have
neither.  But it is not the "rich" that are the enemy.  It is the
government that produced the economic conditions we have now by
expanding without limit, making credit really really cheap, and
insisting banks make mortgages with people that could not afford them
with government tacitly or implicitly guaranteeing them.   Yes there
were various private parties that took advantage of the mess.  But they
were not its creators.  Before they could buy favors their had to be a
bloated government with runaway power to produce favors to sell.   If
you want out of this mess do not play the old "soak the rich" theme
while giving the true enemy of your well being , the government, even
more power over even more of the economy.  If you want a viable economic
future start demanding separation of government and economy. 

> You can have as much 'freedom' as you like so long as you don't mind
> being poor and don't rock the boat.
>
BS.  That is not how it is today at all.  You know it. I know it.  
Freedom is not having half of all you earned taken away.   Freedom is
not being threatened with prison or thrown into one for crimes that
aren't crimes at all.  

- samantha