[ExI] Deficit spending and never admitting you were wrong

[William Flynn Wallace]

* I also think all drugs, gambling, and prostitution should be legal.
 Dylan*

*I used to think exactly the same thing with regards to drugs.  I still
think it about gambling and prostitution.  But over the years I have come
to realize that total access to drugs - antibiotics, for example, which
would ruin their effectiveness asap - is not a good idea for everyone and
maybe not for anyone.  I hope I don't lose my libertarian standing here,
but people are just too weak. These are powerful drugs, like Fentanyl.  You
would not destroy society but you would have drug 'prisons' (treatment
centers) far larger than the ones for criminals.  I dealt with my own
problems but most simply cannot, it seems.  Our laws now protect everyone.
People, many, many, I don't know how many, need to be protected from
themselves.  If I were a real hardnose I could just say "If they want to
kill themselves that is none of my business."  But it is.  It takes big tax
dollars to deal with addiction and it would increase by more than one order
of magnitude with total access.  And there would be tremendous side
effects. What would happen to the families, mates and children of the
addicted?  More tax dollars for sure.  I would legalize pot but that's
about all I can think of right now.   bill w*

On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 5:19 PM John Clark via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

> On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 1:57 PM Dylan Distasio via extropy-chat <
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
>
>> > *my original point is when they go to unwind that balance sheet, they
>> can't create more bonds than they have to sell, so they may be left holding
>> the bag on some portion of it if bond values fall in the interim. *
>>
>
> First of all I think it's going to be a long time before the Fed even
> wants to unwind its balance sheet and we have plenty of things to worry
> about before then. And besides, selling bonds is not the only tool they
> have, they can also reduce their balance sheet by just stop reinvesting in
> maturing government securities.
>
> >> Unlike Trump supporters I'm still strongly in favor of Free Trade. I
>>> see nothing inherently evil in corporate monopolies especially high tech
>>> ones, but I do see something inherently evil in tariffs. I like bitcoin and
>>> encryption in general. I think women should have the right to do what they
>>> want with their bodies and everybody should have the right to end their
>>> life if they choose to. I think all drugs should be legal and gambling and
>>> prostitution too.
>>>
>>
>>
> *> In the interest of pointing out where our beliefs do and do not
>> intersect, I see nothing evil in tariffs whatsoever, and am fully in favor
>> of free trade INTRA-nation state.  I am no longer in favor of unrestrained
>> trade amongst nation states,*
>>
>
> How times have changed. When I first joined the list Free Trade was a core
> belief that virtually defined what a libertarian was, at least for economic
> issues as opposed to social questions. In fact most libertarians, including
> me, weren't even in favor of nation states existing much less wanted
> economic warfare between them. I'm no longer quite that radical, I still
> think if we were starting from scratch we could do better by organizing
> things along pure free market principles, but I have come to realize as a
> practical matter it's far too late to go down that path now, and we'll
> never get rid of nation states before the technological singularity. The
> mere existence of the Fed means we've already accepted that we've strayed
> from the pure Free Market, so I can't get all hot and bothered when they
> try to do something to help during a simultaneous biological and economic
> catastrophe.
>
> *> That said, I am a fan of cryptocurrencies and a huge supporter of
>> strong encryption.   I also think women should be able to do whatever they
>> want with their own bodies, along with everyone else including ending their
>> own. I also think all drugs, gambling, and prostitution should be legal.
>> See, besides an interest in transhumanism, telescopes, and traversing the
>> universe, we actually do have some other things in common!*
>>
>
> Yeah but other than that....
>
> John K Clark
>
> _______________________________________________
> extropy-chat mailing list
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org
> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20200527/ffb979e1/attachment.htm>