Can we stop with the Paul Krugman posts already?

[JDPriestly]

93. Why do you think that middle class people work? To be able to provide for their families,

that's why? That has always been the first priority for everyone.

Only those who don't have children or responsibilities that are associated with having children can't understand that fact. It's love that grows a business and kicks the economy into gear.

It's biological. And it is no coincidence that your best working years are also your biologically reproductive years. The same energy that builds a family builds a business. Some businessmen become overly focused on just making money. That is a neurosis not a healthy, constructive way to build a business.

I would like to remind all DUers that, contrary to the teachings of the right-wing and corporations, the right to private property is not "natural." The right to private property exists by force. If someone steals something from you, you can only get it back by persuasion or by force.

Who or what enforces property rights in our country? The police who are controlled by the government.

In feudal societies, a hierarchical structure of nobility and everybody else controls the government and owns the property. The nobility enforces its own property rights.

Our government is democratic meaning that the people as a whole control it (supposedly). Thus, it is the people as a whole through the government that enforces property rights. Any property you think you own, you own only because the government is willing to enforce your right to that property.

Corporations understand this. That is why they work so hard to control the government. A system in which corporations and businesses control the government and its enforcement capacity including its police power and military, is called "fascist." The NAZIs were a form of fascism.

So, when you work for something and think you own it, ask yourself how you will enforce your ownership rights.

The answer is that you will support a government that enforces your ownership rights and protects them on your behalf.

We think we own businesses and build them and create them. But we can only do that if the government protects our right to own, build and create them.

The Republicans and conservatives in general want to use the government to protect the property and other rights of the rich -- of those who have won the biggest prizes in the game to acquire property.

In feudal societies, the rich, the owners, wisely provided work, shelter and food to those in need. They claimed to do it as a religious obligation. They did it because they feared going to Hell if they didn't. Hell for the rich is no property rights. If the rich fail to take care of the poor, the rich will lose their property rights. That is because when the rich fail to take care of the poor, fail to share, the poor take from the rich. But the only way the rich can enforce their rights is through brute force. The rich, even in a feudal society, need enough physical support from the poor and middle class to be able to enforce their property rights.

So next time that someone tells you that they don't want to pay higher taxes to support people who don't work, ask him whether paying higher taxes to support the poor and the jobless is really such a high price to pay for domestic tranquility that secures the majority of his property rights.

That's what it boils down to. You refuse to share with others; you run a huge risk of losing what you have. The survival of the fittest bit that so appeals to libertarians is not so appealing when you think that a society in which only the "fittest" can survive becomes very brutal very quickly. Ayn Rand is a fraud. She never understood social interaction. I have wondered whether perhaps she was extremely autistic.