I have studied all of the isms, the governments practicing them and all of the great religions as well as minor ones in quite some depth but I don’t feel the need to debate them at all. They are what they are.

I am quite sure that your venues are different than mine. I like the ones I have and they have provided me with an interesting look and interaction with people and agencies in many countries. You take your venues and I’ll take mine. That doesn’t make mine anymore important than yours or yours more important than mine. They just are.

We do agree on solutions to problems. As a scientist I identify the problem and look for knowledge and techniques that can be useful to address the problem. A scientist who takes a technique and looks for a problem that can be addressed with that technique is usually a weak scientist. Along with that is a truism in science….nature is conservative. When addressing a scientific problem….start with that premise. Works pretty well in other areas as well.

someone of you who think you are true capitalists, give me an answer to that, please!

someone in a previous post quoted Locke as implying that the government should not do for the people what the people can do for themselves…I posed that to William F. Buckley once when he made that same assertion during a debate with JK Galbraith at Texas A&M University…Texas A&M is a state supported university but the first universities were not state supported and there are numerous universities all over the US which are supported, not by taxpayers, but by private contributions…so I asked Buckley why taxpayers had to pay for all the state colleges and universities when it is perfectly clear that the people could have and have supported private colleges & universities, thank you very much? He choked and waffled and stammered and stuttered a little bit and never answered the question…So, to the capitalist purist, I suppose we can pick and choose, according to our own proclivites, what we can allow capitalism to do and what it can’t do…the point is that right wingers in religion, economics and politics just can’t gut it up….they continuously want to pick and choose and condemn anyone who doesn’t see fit to pick and choose exactly as they, the so’called “purists” pick and choose..in other words, they want it both ways…and that ain’t gonna happen!!!!!! On one hand they condemn the liberals for wanting to give the struggling middle class a “progressive” tax break and on the other hand, they want to give extra profitable companies every tax break known to man, woman and child and maybe even maggots….in other words, it is okay to redistribute the wealth from the poor and middle classes to the rich but it a travesty to take a dime from the rich and give it to the poor and middle class….I call that forked tongued and convoluted logic and certainly hypocritical and intellectually bankrupt…but that tendency is typical of rigid ideologues on both ends of the spectrum..

Well, genes, it was you who intimated that you might be in my same age bracket in your first post to me and matt…I am only 66…and in my life I have given significantly through my own foundation and church to projects which help the old, the sick, the poor, dependent children, the environment, wildlife habitat, medical research, assistance to those who need financial help to go to college, etc…

Regarding the debate, you come across with glittering generalities rather than dollars and cents facts and figures to argue your points….go back and read some of your posts….and reagarding farming, well, I am a rancher who grows feed crops as well as cattle…and I do watch the rain…sometimes it comes at the wrong time for me and sometimes is comes at the right time..sometimes it doesn’t even come at all…..Oh, and regarding the length of time you have observed the world, I will only say that time is significant but context is also significant…and I will venture to say that I have observed life from significantly more venues that you have…and i will be happy to compare those with yours…but you can’t make stuff up..you have to tell the truth….regarding economics, we all practice one kind of economics or another, even those of you who haven’t studied it…but, knowing why economic conditions are what they are or are not requires some understanding of economic principles…it is one thing to live through, say, a depression, and quite another to grasp the factors which may or may not have caused the depression…so, I will recommend some worthwhile books for you…as I did for matt…TODAYS ISMS by Ebenstein…THE REVOLT OF THE MASSES by Jose Ortega y Gassett…SPOKESMEN FOR GOD by Edith Hamilton….WHITE COLLAR & THE POWER ELITE by C. Wright Mills….just to mention a few…but i am sure you are not really interested in expanding your thought base because you are sure that there is one answer for all questions…a reactionary answer….so you won’t bother to even look at those books, much less expend the intellectual effort to read them…and that won’t do in the real, complex world we live in today…that is why I am a pragmatist rather than a liberal, conservative, radical or reactionary….I look for solutions that fit the problem rather than a problem to fit that one answer ideologues always seem to have… rigid ideology is a barrier to finding solutions because it presupposes the solution rather than the intellectually honest approach…..that is, matching the unique solution to the unique problem…and all political, economic, social issues are, in and of themselves unique & seeking whatever soltuon that will work rather than implying that there is a conservative solution to all problems..or, in the case of the other isms, a liberal answer to all questions or a reactionary answer or a radical answer….sometimes, there may be a combination of the isms that may solve a probelm….but, for certain, no doctor prescribes the same pill or procedure to every malady he faces in a days work in his clinic…nor does a teacher provide the same answer to every question posed by his/her students…but ideologues can’t do that..and that is why narrow ideology is a barrier to problem solving….and if that is a venomous response to you, so be it…

“Socialism is the philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance and the gospel of envy.” — Winston Churchill, 1948

“The recurrence of periods of depression and mass unemployment has discredited capitalism in the opinion of injudicious people. Yet these events are not the outcome of the operation of the free market. They are on the contrary the result of well-intentioned but ill-advised government interference with the market.” — Ludwig von Mises

“Collectivism doesn’t work because it’s based on a faulty economic premise. There is no such thing as a person’s ‘fair share’ of wealth. The gross national product is not a pizza that must be carefully divided because if I get too many slices, you have to eat the box. The economy is expandable and, in any practical sense, limitless.”
— P.J. O’Rourke

“The people cannot delegate to government the power to do anything which would be an unlawful for them to do themselves.”
John Locke

“A society that puts equality ahead of freedom will end up with neither.”
Milton Friedman

“No man can have a right to impose an unchosen obligation, an unrewarded duty or an involuntary servitude on another man.” Ayn Rand

“When the government fears the people, it is liberty. When the people fear the government, it is tyranny.”
Thomas Paine

“Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom.”
Albert Einstein

“Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.”
George Bernard Shaw

I see you are back. Sorry you don’t appreciate my flapdoodle. I don’t appreciate your venom. You are right, I have never studied economics, just practiced economics. But as a scientist, I do know about actual cloud seeding. Doesn’t work very well in practice, doesn’t result in much rain. However, if I am a farmer, I watch the weather and make the most of what rain comes if I want to be successful. How much have you done to help the poor?

You missed the mark….I am not in my 60s, try 70’s. There is a lot to be said about watching the world for so long. Now you are really starting to sound like a true Obama fan…..they are soooo good at spewing hate on the web. One of the reasons I will not be voting for him. He inspires more hatred than kindness. … and now we begin to see the real Harley. I’m disappointed.

I am very serious about the issues but I don’t think you want a real debate. You only want everyone to buy your scenarios and spew venom when they don’t or they question them. I look at the issues and evaluate them based on good old common sense, life experience, and ethics after I have looked at all sides. There is no perfect system. Republicans and Democrates both have their achilles heel. So do you and so do I.

So long Harley, try to look at life a little more pleasantly and objectively.

I love it that we have giant corporations. That isn’t the issue and genes, you know it. The issue is that you both screech about capitalism and against socialism but you seem to support socialism when it comes to taking care of the giant corps who don’t really need the help and you disdain any kind of similar welfare when it comes to helping the working poor become consumers who have the capability of buying the goods and services produced by the giant corporations…which leads me to believe, genes, that you have never really studied economics and you have no idea what seeding the clouds means…so quit with the ridiculously oiversimplified crap, OK! Debate like an educated adult rather than a brainwashed child….in her 60’s…If you can’t get serious about the issues, don’t waste my time or yours with the flapdoodle you are spewing….or, I guess, you have degenerated into your second childhood somewhat early…I have several companies…significantly successful and large in the fields of endeavor…I use the tax laws to legally minimize my tax liabilities as an individual and as a corporatist but i don’t ask for any personal or corporate welfare..I don’t need it and most of the giant corporations which are beneficiaries of federal government largesse don’t need it either…