UCrawford, I cannot imagine that you are responding to my post, but I’d like you to confirm my supposition.

If you recognize the abuses of the Bush administration, but still seriously believe that the old socialist chestnut about how “government would work if only the ‘right’ people were placed in charge” then there’s not really a point in debating either the broad theoretical issues or the dirty specifics because you’re obviously not paying attention to the realities of how government fails.

…What I am rejecting is the notion that society has no right to take resources from individuals for communal projects such as roads, disease prevention, flood protection, or war… the abuse of the public will exemplified by Mr. Bush…

One follows the other. It just so happens Dubya’s in charge now. It could be any one else. Why does society have such a right, and is that the most effective way to achieve societal goals?

Nor am I defending the abuse of the public will exemplified by Mr. Bush. So far, this discussion has been on a highly abstract plane. Let’s resolve the broad theoretical issue before we get into the dirty specifics.

Actually our society has survived for the last 40 years without conscription and appears in no danger of collapsing because of Iraq or the War on Terror.

As for “society”, you rightly note that the Iraq was was wrong, yet under your standard others would be forced to fight in it under your idea of societal “good”. You’re honestly saying that you don’t recognize that the “will of society” is often just an excuse for a self-interested decision by a group of individual leaders, and conscription is just their way to force their decision on everyone who doesn’t want to go along? Iraq’s been opposed by a majority of Americans for awhile now, yet the president still claims that the majority of Americans see this war as being in their interest. You seriously want to give him the power to reinstate the draft?

You imply very strongly that the people simply got sick of the status quo.

Yet without the resources poured into the arms race, the soviet union might be alive and kicking today.

I don’t work for Ron Paul. He is not the center of my universe.

I’ll publish whatever interests me on whatever schedule suits me, thank you very much.

If this bothers you, you are quite welcome to go read something else and ignore my writings.

Good day.

Either an enterprise has enough backing to support it or it does not. If it does, then it will go ahead even if not everyone who benefits is in the list of supporters, simply because it has the support needed.

When A decides that he wants do do X, but B is not sufficiently interested to help pay for it, forcing B to pay for it anyway is a crime. B obviously wants to spend his time and resources on accomplishing something else, perhaps Y. If A to points a gun at B and forces him to forego Y so that A can enjoy the benefits of X, then A is injuring B for A’s own benefit.

When you claim that ‘society’ is making a decision, you are wrong. There is no ‘society’ to decide. Only a bunch of people who have decided to be A’s preying on a bunch of people who want to be B’s.

Before accusing me of lying, you might want to actually pay attention to what I wrote.

The thesis of my post was that the Soviet Union collapsed without having been attacked militarily.

They collapsed because the population stopped listening to the Soviet leaders. As the standards of living between the Soviet Union and the outside world increasingly diverged, as the leaders’ claims and promises became less and less credible the populace became less and less willing to obey orders.

You could call Rock and Roll, foreign radio and television broadcasts interference if you want, but that has nothing to do with inter-state warfare.

Next time you might want to read the post instead of just scanning it quickly.

Let me rephrase that: the benefits of a war are enjoyed by all members of society. Those benefits may not be evenly distributed (some people benefit more than others), and the costs are certainly not distributed evenly.

I will certainly not defend the war in Iraq — I opposed it from the very beginning (even dismissing the early rumors of Mr. Bush’s plans to go to war with the comment that he could not possibly be that stupid.) I am defending the principle that a society can chose to go to war by majority vote and then rightly impose the consequences of that choice upon the minority.