US Postal not seeing value to sponsorship... why?

Shayne Wissler

"Tom Paterson" <dustoyevsky@aol.comnospam> wrote in message
news:20040501230638.22947.00000604@mb-m16.aol.com...
> >From: "Shayne Wissler"
>
> >No, what I am saying is that your reading comprehension is not up to this
> >thread. Not only did I not advocate extortion, but I specifically pointed
> >out that governments can be funded >without it.
>
> How do you get money out of people without the threat of force?

Clearly one can--businessmen do it all the time. You don't buy a bike
because there's a gun pointed to your head. You do it because someone
creative has appealed to your self-interest.

In the case of the government, it is quite possible to appeal to
self-interest. To borrow an example from Ayn Rand: Note all of the massive
financial transactions that are backed by the government. From simple checks
at the grocery store to multi-billion dollar transactions, none would be
possible without the civil courts. The risk of non-payment would be too
great. The government could offer a deal: pay a percentage of each
transaction to the government as insurance, and if you do you have the right
to access the courts in the case of fraud/dispute. If you don't you're on
your own. No businessman in his right mind would refuse to pay.

> Especially government-funding-size chunks? --TP

The massively bloated government we have today could never be funded without
pointing guns to people's heads. But remove the fat and it would be quite
possible to have a moral government. (And create a moral government and you
will need less of even the essential parts of it: for instance, an immoral
government sets a bad example thereby helping to create even more
criminals).


Shayne Wissler

Tom Kunich

"Floyd L. Davidson" <floyd@barrow.com> wrote in message
news:87fzajg3q4.fld@barrow.com...
> "Tom Kunich" <cyclintom@yahoo.com> wrote:
> >"Floyd L. Davidson" <floyd@barrow.com> wrote in message
> >news:8765bggcu5.fld@barrow.com...
> >>
> >> Actually your telephone service has decreased in cost and
> >> increased in functionality (the later by a few orders of
> >> magnitude) over the past 2-3 decades.
> >
> >Perhaps you could outline that to someone who once owned an interconnect
> >company because I don't see telephone company supplied answering
machines,
> >call forwarding and caller ID as increases in functionality. And my basic
> >phone bill is three times what it was before deregulation.
>
> So your phone bill hasn't changed at all, considering inflation.
> Yet I'll bet you *use* it a lot more. You can also send data at
> rates many times the 110 baud that was common once. You can
> send a FAX too, with equipment costing less than $100 instead of
> several thousands. You can call from you car if you break down
> on the way home. You can take a satellite phone to almost
> anywhere too. And have 10 or 20 party conference calls.

Excuse me but all of those services were available before the phone company
was broken up. And they were available from private companies. As for the
cost of this stuff - the price reduction in phone equipment had absolutely
NOTHING to do with the break up of the phone company and everything to do
with increasing integration of electronics. Moreover, the phone company
would presently have competition from Cell Phones and Internet Phones both
of which circumvent the monopoly on land lines that the phone company
enjoyed.

The phone company was broken up in 1982. The inflation since that time was
about 91%. Explain how my tripled local line charge quantitatively equates
to being cheaper.

> Not to mention that today a trans-continental telephone
> conversation with Grandma sounds just exactly the same as if she
> were in the house next door.

When was it that you think that T1 was invented?

> The list could go on and on...

Since it is bogus I suppose that you could write anything at all. But since
I was designing telephone switches for awhile and later installing them
commercially I think that I have some idea of the business.

Tom Kunich

"Tom Paterson" <dustoyevsky@aol.comnospam> wrote in message
news:20040501230638.22947.00000604@mb-m16.aol.com...
> >From: "Shayne Wissler"
>
> >No, what I am saying is that your reading comprehension is not up to this
> >thread. Not only did I not advocate extortion, but I specifically pointed
> >out that governments can be funded >without it.
>
> How do you get money out of people without the threat of force? Especially
> government-funding-size chunks? --TP

I don't think that Shayne classifies the threat of legalized incarceration,
"debtors prisons" if you like, as extortion.

But in fact the government wouldn't do that since it is politically
dangerous. Instead they sieze all of your property and sell it off to their
friends at bargain basement rates leaving only enough to pay the tax bill
owing.

Tom Kunich

"Shayne Wissler" <thalesNOSPAM000@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:vZZkc.11247$0H1.1198887@attbi_s54...
>
> To borrow an example from Ayn Rand:

Ahh, I should have known it. A high school student who discovered "Atlas
Shrugged" and thinks that it answers all of the philosophical questions
relating to economic questions.

Here's a clue Shayne - that book bores anyone with half a brain to tears. If
you haven't seen the holes in the logical by the end of the third chapter
you shouldn't be writing, you should be having your brain rejuvenated.

Shayne Wissler

"Tom Kunich" <cyclintom@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:UM_kc.2455$Hs1.432@newsread2.news.pas.earthlink.net...
> "Shayne Wissler" <thalesNOSPAM000@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:vZZkc.11247$0H1.1198887@attbi_s54...
> >
> > To borrow an example from Ayn Rand:
>
> Ahh, I should have known it. A high school student who discovered "Atlas
> Shrugged" and thinks that it answers all of the philosophical questions
> relating to economic questions.
>
> Here's a clue Shayne - that book bores anyone with half a brain to tears.
If
> you haven't seen the holes in the logical by the end of the third chapter
> you shouldn't be writing, you should be having your brain rejuvenated.

On the contrary, it's your pathetic ad hominem that bores to tears. That you
actually think you're intelligent while parroting everything the majority
thinks is just too funny though.


Shayne Wissler

Floyd L. Davidson

"Tom Kunich" <cyclintom@yahoo.com> wrote:
>"Floyd L. Davidson" <floyd@barrow.com> wrote:
>> "Tom Kunich" <cyclintom@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> >"Floyd L. Davidson" <floyd@barrow.com> wrote:
>>
>> >> Actually your telephone service has decreased in cost and
>> >> increased in functionality (the later by a few orders of
>> >> magnitude) over the past 2-3 decades.
^^^^^^^^^^^

See that? What I said was the last 20 to 30 years. That is,
basically what has happened since 1970. And notice there isn't
a word there about divestiture, though the dates do happen to
bracket the fact of divestiture.

>> >Perhaps you could outline that to someone who once owned an interconnect
>> >company because I don't see telephone company supplied answering machines,
>> >call forwarding and caller ID as increases in functionality. And my basic
>> >phone bill is three times what it was before deregulation.
>>
>> So your phone bill hasn't changed at all, considering inflation.
>> Yet I'll bet you *use* it a lot more. You can also send data at
>> rates many times the 110 baud that was common once. You can
>> send a FAX too, with equipment costing less than $100 instead of
>> several thousands. You can call from you car if you break down
>> on the way home. You can take a satellite phone to almost
>> anywhere too. And have 10 or 20 party conference calls.
>
>Excuse me but all of those services were available before the phone company
>was broken up. And they were available from private companies. As for the

You are excused. And your point is tossed. First, I said
nothing about the break up of the Bell System, and secondly
those were *not* available at reasonable price, and in some
cases simply didn't exist at all.

In the 1960's you could not buy digital services faster than 56
kbps, and a Bell 303 to do that cost a small fortune (and came in
a rack too!)

The only "FAX" machine available was called a "Flexowriter", if
I remember right, and was thousands of dollars.

The closest equivalent of a cell phone was a "mobile phone" in
your car, and again only the very wealthy needed to even look.

Satellite phones of course did not exist at all. The average
satellite earth station was costing about $1 /million/ dollars
to build, and wasn't exactly portable.

As I said, over the past 20-30 years the price has dropped,
considering inflation; and the functionality has increased by
orders of magnitude.

And even though I didn't explicitly tie that to the break up of
the Bell System, it is a fact that our ability to make use of
new technology at the pace we have been since 1984 has indeed
been enhanced by divestiture.

The most obvious place where that is true is in the area of
digital switching. Nortel (then known as Northern Telecom Inc.)
was unable to sell switching systems to ATT (there is one
DMS-200 switch in the entire ATT domestic long distance network
today, which is otherwise made of of something like 136 4E
switches). But local telephone companies flocked to Nortel, to
the tune of about a 40% market penetration. Given that for most
of the late 1970's and up until about 1990 Nortel's DMS digital
switches were technically (just slightly) more advanced than the
equivalents from ATT, it seems very likely that without that
competition the innovation from even ATT would have lagged far
behind what actually took place. (Nortel, for example, came out
with the first fully digital switching system, where even the
switching fabric itself was solid state digital devices rather
than mechanical relays.)

>cost of this stuff - the price reduction in phone equipment had absolutely
>NOTHING to do with the break up of the phone company and everything to do
>with increasing integration of electronics.

That has no significance to my original statement, but the fact
is you are mostly correct, but not totally. The cost reductions
are as you state. The fact that we *have* the use of that
technology is probably very much tied to divestiture. Even as
it was, in 1984 getting anyone steeped in the Bell System way of
doing business to purchase a switching system that had a life
expectancy of less than 15 years was nearly impossible! Nortel,
for example, would not even tell them that it was just a big
computer system. They *insisted* is was "maintenance free", and
therefore would not discuss maintenance methods (such as
networking auxiliary administrative computers to the switching
system) _unless_ the telephone company demanded it... meaning
most telco managers had no idea that such a thing could be done,
and if advised of it reacted exactly like the Pointy Haired Boss
in a Dilbert cartoon (which Scott Adams, Dilbert's creator,
designed based on his work as an ISDN software engineer for
PacBell).

I thought *my* supervisors and managers were recalcitrant PHB's
until I went to a maintenance school on DMS switching systems,
and found out that just /executing/ a shell script on a switch
was a *firing offense* in most telephone companies! (I was
working on an Autovon switch at the time, and had implemented a
shell program to do automatic trunk testing, because that
functionality was not part of the Autovon feature package. Most
companies would have fired me for doing that.)

>Moreover, the phone company
>would presently have competition from Cell Phones and Internet Phones both
>of which circumvent the monopoly on land lines that the phone company
>enjoyed.

Neither of them could have begun by circumventing the monopoly.
If the monopoly had stayed in place, they would have been delayed
for years.

Cell phones and dialup ISPs both interface with the PSTN, and
would have been impossible for a 3rd party to implement prior to
the Carterphone decision. The degree to which they indeed have
been able to circumvent the establishment is *because* of
Carterphone and eventually Judge Green's Modified Final Judgment
breaking up Ma Bell. And the reason circumventing was necessary
was simply that Bell System "telephone company" style
management, which was rampant within the industry (and still is
to a much lesser degree) simply could not adapt.

There is one really good example which demonstrates that. ISDN
is a high speed digital protocol that was available in the
middle 1980's. It would have, say in 1985, provided 64 or 128
Kbps digital connectivity in place of the newly emerging 2400
bps modems. What did the telephone companies say? "Who's going
to pay for implementation? There is no market!" (Telco's had
no idea what a BBS was, never mind knowing what The Internet
might be!)

Hence the telcom industry did not implement ISDN (It Still Does
Nothing), except on a narrow basis for the Federal Telephone
System (a remote National Park Service office in Nome Alaska had
ISDN that a business in New York City couldn't get!).

But other people did see a market. The *modem* *industry* spent
millions on R&D, came up with ways to implement the existing
v.32 standard at an affordable price; then spent more millions
(and made even more millions) developing v.34 and the v.90
modems. In addition the TV Cable industry realized they had a
way to deliver high speed digital services, and also developed a
hugely profitable Internet delivery system. Everyone but the
telephone companies got a slice of that pie!

And today, It Still Does Nothing. "Who's going to pay for the
implementation?" Everyone got a piece of that pie except the
telephone industry.

The reason that happened is simply that the upper levels of
telephone company management were filled with people who
learned, and were very capable, in a world where long distance
message traffic paid the bills. Jerking telco management away
from people who were successful in an ATT Long Lines environment
took decades (see the history of how many CEO's ATT had back in
the late 1990's! That is *exactly* what they were doing.).

>The phone company was broken up in 1982. The inflation since that time was

1984, to be pedantic.

>about 91%. Explain how my tripled local line charge quantitatively equates
>to being cheaper.

I said tripled over 30 years. Go back a bit farther... pre-1974.

>> Not to mention that today a trans-continental telephone
>> conversation with Grandma sounds just exactly the same as if she
>> were in the house next door.
>
>When was it that you think that T1 was invented?

The late 1930's as a matter of fact. But that is insignificant.
The import of the concept wasn't understood until Claude Shannon
published his work on a mathematical theory of information in
the late 1940's. And even then there was no way to implement
it. Bell Labs was just discovering solid state electronics, and
it was not until the 1960's that T1 carrier systems were put
into service. Of course, T1 carrier *didn't* accomplish the
above noted "next door" effect for long distance for another
couple of decades.

Fiber optics, using T1, was actually what brought on that effect!

>> The list could go on and on...
>
>Since it is bogus I suppose that you could write anything at all. But since
>I was designing telephone switches for awhile and later installing them
>commercially I think that I have some idea of the business.

It sounds to me like you were, and still are, part of the
problem. You don't seem to have a balanced understanding of the
history, and I can imagine you saying "Who's going to pay for
it? There is no market!", not just for ISDN, but for almost
everything... ;-)

--
Floyd L. Davidson <http://web.newsguy.com/floyd_davidson>
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska) floyd@barrow.com

Floyd L. Davidson

"Shayne Wissler" <thalesNOSPAM000@yahoo.com> wrote:
>"Floyd L. Davidson" <floyd@barrow.com> wrote in message
>news:878ygbg1on.fld@barrow.com...
>> "Shayne Wissler" <thalesNOSPAM000@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> >"Floyd L. Davidson" <floyd@barrow.com> wrote in message
>> >news:871xm4gc6r.fld@barrow.com...
>> >
>> >> Why aren't *you* paying your own way, instead of extorting money
>> >> from others!
>> >
>> >Since I'm opposed to extortion and have said that already, then all I can
>> >say is: if you can't really follow a thread, then perhaps you shouldn't post
>> >on it.
>>
>> So what are saying is that it is okay for you to be a hypocrite, and
>> damned nasty of me to point it out.
>
>No, what I am saying is that your reading comprehension is not up to this

Saying it doesn't make it true, but it does tell us about your
integrity.

>thread. Not only did I not advocate extortion, but I specifically pointed
>out that governments can be funded without it.

It seems you *define* anything that doesn't serve you, as paid
for with "extortion", as opposed to anything that you benefit
from.

Of course, I see you are quoting from Ayn Rand in another
article, so I don't imagine there is much point in discussing
anything more complex than what could be understood by a child
in the 6th or 7th grade.

--
Floyd L. Davidson <http://web.newsguy.com/floyd_davidson>
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska) floyd@barrow.com

Shayne Wissler

"Floyd L. Davidson" <floyd@barrow.com> wrote in message
news:87zn8re57t.fld@barrow.com...

> >No, what I am saying is that your reading comprehension is not up to this
>
> Saying it doesn't make it true, but it does tell us about your
> integrity.

You're not a hypocrite. You're a parody of a hypocrite.

> >thread. Not only did I not advocate extortion, but I specifically pointed
> >out that governments can be funded without it.
>
> It seems you *define* anything that doesn't serve you, as paid
> for with "extortion", as opposed to anything that you benefit
> from.

"Saying it doesn't make it true." Nowhere have I advocated anything like
what you advocate. I advocate a total ban of the initiation of force by
everyone, including the government. I advocate it without reservation or
contradiction.

It is at least a little amusing to see what a socialist gets morally
self-righteous about in these conversations. In the face of their raping of
their neighbor for government resources, it is interesting that the biggest
"sin" they can comprehend and get self-righteous about is hypocrisy. They
don't care that someone is committing extortion, what they care about is
whether they admit to it. It's as if by owning up to it it makes you less
guilty somehow. Quite sick.


Shayne Wissler

Sam

"Tom Paterson" <dustoyevsky@aol.comnospam> wrote in message
news:20040501230638.22947.00000604@mb-m16.aol.com...
> >From: "Shayne Wissler"
>
> >No, what I am saying is that your reading comprehension is not up to this
> >thread. Not only did I not advocate extortion, but I specifically pointed
> >out that governments can be funded >without it.
>
> How do you get money out of people without the threat of force? Especially
> government-funding-size chunks? --TP
>
>
>
Charities are able to do it

Shayne Wissler

"Sam" <marathonman@mindspring.com> wrote in message
news:%q9lc.3120$V97.1267@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net...
>
> "Tom Paterson" <dustoyevsky@aol.comnospam> wrote in message
> news:20040501230638.22947.00000604@mb-m16.aol.com...
> > >From: "Shayne Wissler"
> >
> > >No, what I am saying is that your reading comprehension is not up to
this
> > >thread. Not only did I not advocate extortion, but I specifically
pointed
> > >out that governments can be funded >without it.
> >
> > How do you get money out of people without the threat of force?
Especially
> > government-funding-size chunks? --TP
> >
> >
> >
> Charities are able to do it

Funny how the bleeding-hearts are the ones quickest to pull out the guns
when faced with the problem of funding their ideals.


Shayne Wissler

Tom Paterson

>From: "Shayne Wissler"

>> How do you get money out of people without the threat of force?
>
>Clearly one can--businessmen do it all the time. You don't buy a bike
>because there's a gun pointed to your head. You do it because someone
>creative has appealed to your >self-interest.

I'm talking about a third of your income being taken. Buying a bike is not
related.

>In the case of the government, it is quite possible to appeal to
>self-interest. To borrow an example from >Ayn Rand:

Oh shit, now I remember, you're the Rand guy. She's an idiot.



> Note all of the massive
>financial transactions that are backed by the government. From simple checks
>at the grocery store to multi-billion dollar transactions, none would be
>possible without the civil courts. The risk of non-payment would be too
>great.

"RISK"? Because you'd get sued, go to jail (cops with guns). Not to mention the
hefty "bad check" charges. Force is used ("gun to the head" rhetoric beloved by
right wingers who don't want to pay their taxes).

Tell us how the "government" (US, State, Local, whatever) can make people pay
their taxes without the threat of jail (cops with guns). Get to the point and
leave Ayn Rand the hell out of the discussion, PLEASE. Thanks!


>The government could offer a deal: pay a percentage of each
>transaction to the government as insurance, and if you do you have the right
>to access the courts in the case of fraud/dispute. If you don't you're on
>your own.

We're not supposed to be able to buy and sell our rights in this country. It's
a basic protection I for one don't want to give up. Further, what would that
percentage skyrocket to, Shayne? Then you'd have a whole lot of people getting
screwed every day without even the hope of going to court for redress. Stinky
idea.

>The massively bloated government we have today could never be funded without
>pointing guns to people's heads. But remove the fat and it would be quite
>possible to have a moral government.

Don't try to get around me by changing the conditions. The question was asked
in the real, here and now world. Moral government? Ho ho ho. Dreamer. Beyond
dreamer.

>an immoral
>government sets a bad example thereby helping to create even more
>criminals).

The government is composed of criminals, Shayne. Unless you think there's
nothing wrong with peddling influence (cash in, favorable legislation out).
--TP

Shayne Wissler

"Tom Paterson" <dustoyevsky@aol.comnospam> wrote in message
news:20040502150558.09674.00000490@mb-m02.aol.com...

> Tell us how the "government" (US, State, Local, whatever) can make people
pay
> their taxes without the threat of jail (cops with guns). Get to the point
and
> leave Ayn Rand the hell out of the discussion, PLEASE. Thanks!

Seems that you were so flustered by the name "Ayn Rand" that you failed to
follow the example.

> >The government could offer a deal: pay a percentage of each
> >transaction to the government as insurance, and if you do you have the
right
> >to access the courts in the case of fraud/dispute. If you don't you're on
> >your own.
>
> We're not supposed to be able to buy and sell our rights in this country.
It's

Since you have no idea of what a "right" even is, this is just so much
wind...

> a basic protection I for one don't want to give up.

I think by "basic protection" you mean that my labor is converted into food
for your stomach.

> Further, what would that
> percentage skyrocket to, Shayne? Then you'd have a whole lot of people
getting
> screwed every day without even the hope of going to court for redress.
Stinky
> idea.

The only people who would get "screwed" were the morons who didn't pay.
Perhaps you imagine yourself as one of them. That would explain your
inability to see how it could work (I would have admitted up front that a
country that predominantly consists of morons cannot have a reasonable
government--"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a civilization,
it expects what it never was and never will be.")

> >The massively bloated government we have today could never be funded
without
> >pointing guns to people's heads. But remove the fat and it would be quite
> >possible to have a moral government.
>
> Don't try to get around me by changing the conditions. The question was
asked
> in the real, here and now world.

I already told you: the only way to fund the kind of socialist, bloated
government you wish to keep is to do what you do now: point guns at your
neighbor's head and demand that he pay for them. You can't have your cake
and eat it too.

> Moral government? Ho ho ho. Dreamer. Beyond
> dreamer.

Unfortunately a dream is all it is at this point. On the other hand, most
progress is made by dreamers who are also doers. Those who merely do are
just ballast, maintaining the dreams of yesterday.

> >an immoral
> >government sets a bad example thereby helping to create even more
> >criminals).
>
> The government is composed of criminals, Shayne. Unless you think there's
> nothing wrong with peddling influence (cash in, favorable legislation
out).

Well if you had admitted earlier that you were a zealous cynic then I would
not have wasted my time with you.


Shayne Wissler

Tom Paterson

>From: "Shayne Wissler"

>Seems that you were so flustered by the name "Ayn Rand" that you failed to
>follow the example.

I asked *you* to leave her the hell out of the discussion. The idea is that you
would do your own thinking.

>Since you have no idea of what a "right" even is, this is just so much
>wind...

Life, liberty, pursuit of happiness. Not my "idea" but good, very good.
"Pursuit of happiness" means, among other, the ability to enter into
enforceable business contracts where there is no "sell your protection under
law" clause.

>I think by "basic protection" you mean that my labor is converted into food
>for your stomach.

I think your labor is converted into food for your stomach. Plus a roof over
your head, clothing, transportation, etc.

I won't ask you to testify against yourself or anything (irony intended), but I
could bring up examples of using the "public money" such as attending public
school, driving on the streets, drinking decent water out of the tap,
low-interest student loans (getting warm there, Shayne?), attending Community
College or a State University. Or are you going to tell me that you've paid for
your life every step of the way so far?

>The only people who would get "screwed" >were the morons who didn't pay.

Wrong. As I said, you'd have people being forced to buy their rights, which
would mean that some would be forced to give them up. Those who couldn't pony
up would be cast into outer darkness. Maybe a public defender amounts to the
same thing sometimes, I'll give you that.

>Perhaps you imagine yourself as one of >them.

Oooh, someone whose personal thought guru is Ayn Rand didn't have the guts to
insult me directly. Fucking impressive, Shayne! Here, like this: Shayne! You
are a dork!

See? Not so hard. Ayn would be proud! Manly bare-knucks typing! She'd be all
quivery.

> That would explain your
>inability to see how it could work (I would have admitted up front that a
>country that predominantly consists of morons (snip)

Well, at least I don't believe in Ayn Rand. That's a hopeful start. Even my
high school English teacher had to do a little excusing for Ayn Rand. And that
was not too long after the Cuban Missle thing, just to put a little historical
context in there for you. "Hysterical/historical" fits Rand rants (Red Scare,
Sputnik, etc.). IMHO, of course.

(S.W.):
>> >an immoral
>> >government sets a bad example thereby helping to create even more
>> >criminals).

(Moi):
>> The government is composed of criminals, Shayne. Unless you think there's
>> nothing wrong with peddling influence (cash in, favorable legislation
>out).

(S.W.):
>Well if you had admitted earlier that you were a zealous cynic then I would
>not have wasted my time with you.

Cynic? Nope. Realist. Check out the reversal in life fortunes for Tom (The
Hammer) Delay and his doorkeeper "assistant" brother, for instance, post
election to public office as compared to running a failed extermination biz in
Houston (where no bug biz should ever fail). Well, it didn't really fail,
exactly. --TP

Shayne Wissler

"Tom Paterson" <dustoyevsky@aol.comnospam> wrote in message
news:20040502213924.25970.00000759@mb-m29.aol.com...
> >From: "Shayne Wissler"
>
> >Seems that you were so flustered by the name "Ayn Rand" that you failed
to
> >follow the example.
>
> I asked *you* to leave her the hell out of the discussion. The idea is
that you
> would do your own thinking.

The idea is that you are flustered. It's hard to explain your lack of logic
otherwise (clearly, it is not a failure to think to recognize a good idea
that someone else came up with).

> >Since you have no idea of what a "right" even is, this is just so much
> >wind...
>
> Life, liberty, pursuit of happiness. Not my "idea" but good, very good.
> "Pursuit of happiness" means, among other, the ability to enter into
> enforceable business contracts where there is no "sell your protection
under
> law" clause.

"Pursuit of happiness" means your right to pursue, without being hindered by
others (e.g., without having a yoke around your neck in the form of massive
taxes).

> I won't ask you to testify against yourself or anything (irony intended),
but I
> could bring up examples of using the "public money" such as attending
public
> school, driving on the streets, drinking decent water out of the tap,
> low-interest student loans (getting warm there, Shayne?), attending
Community
> College or a State University. Or are you going to tell me that you've
paid for
> your life every step of the way so far?

Your ignorance and lack of logic does not warrant your arrogant attitude
here. You presume that because someone drives on government-funded roads
then that somehow makes up for the fact that the government uses extortion
to get the funds. A total non-sequitor.

> >The only people who would get "screwed" >were the morons who didn't pay.
>
> Wrong. As I said, you'd have people being forced to buy their rights,
which

Wrong. Rights are not granted or paid for.

> would mean that some would be forced to give them up. Those who couldn't
pony
> up would be cast into outer darkness. Maybe a public defender amounts to
the
> same thing sometimes, I'll give you that.

"Outer darkness"? Where'd that phrase come from?

But again, you're just flustered and intimidated by Ayn Rand and haven't
followed the example.

> >Perhaps you imagine yourself as one of >them.
>
> Oooh, someone whose personal thought guru is Ayn Rand didn't have the guts
to
> insult me directly. Fucking impressive, Shayne! Here, like this: Shayne!
You
> are a dork!

You call that an insult? You even had time to think about that one before
pressing "Send", and that's the best you could come up with? Why should I
bother insulting a man who keeps falling flat on his face?


Shayne Wissler