IMMIGRANT
By now, we are all familiar with the problems faced by America relative to illegal immigration. But, there was a time, early in the 20th century,
when immigration was welcome and sought after, with many square miles to fill. Just about all you needed to do in order to be an immigrant was was to be healthy enough to remain vertical. If you saw the beginning of "The Godfather Part 2" you got a pretty clear picture of Ellis Island. In Poland and Russia Jews were were confined to "shtetles" ( Little States) within or nearby a city. Unless they were either professional men, land owners,or shopkeepers who dealt in necessities (butchers, bakers, food suppliers , etc.) they were so poor that many of them literally starved to death.This is about my Grandfather on my mother's side.
My Grandpa, Manus (Mike) Sherman, his wife and daughter live just outside of Lublin the 4th largest city in Poland in what we call today the Ukraine. He was a non commissioned officer in the Polish army., from which he defected at the outset of World War 1.He changed his name in order to keep from getting caught.and his passport wouldn't sound any alarms because he stole the I.D. off of a dead soldier. It's about this part where I tell you a couple apochryphal stories that circulated among immigrants.There were dozens of themand here are just two: Jews hated the army. In those days, they had good reason to. They had no loyalty to the repressive country in which they lived and they were treated even worse in the army than they were as civilians.
At Ellis Island many of the men, especially those from Germanywho were fleeing the Kaiser's conscription were loathe to give their real names, and on one day they decided to all say "Ich fergessen" (I forgot.) The closest to that in the ears of a minimally educated official, was "Ed Ferguson." That day a hundred or so Ed Fergusons passed through Ell Island. Here's another one:: Before going on permanent AWOL many would steal the wallets of the dead soldiers, not for the money, but for the I.D.Hence our new family name on my mother's side became Shermann, the second n getting dropped when Grandpa got ajob.Another great incentive was that Ford was paying $5 a dayand once the rumor was confirmedyou couldn't hold back half of Europe from immigration. $5 was a month's income in Poland.
"Mike" had a few bucks saved up from many years of manual labor so he traveled to Detroit, where he got a job in construction, building the Rackham Memorial Building, a Marble palace in the cultural center which also contained the Institute of Arts and the Main Library, also marble clad masterpieces.During this time my mother developed rickets from malnutrition so, her mom sent her to live with her parents who owned a small farm. For the first time in her young life, she was able to eat decent food and lots of fresh vegetables and eventually she grew strong but never achieved what should have been her full height.Grandpa told me that he couldn't believe his good fortune. To be able to live a life that Americans took for granted. He got hired at Ford making more money than he ever imagined.Enough to pay rent, clothes, food, and even some to save.He loved Amerca and learned English as quickly as he could so he could become a citizen. By his accent some would call him Russian(same as A.R.'s). "I can tell by your accent tht you are Russian." His back would stiffen up and he'd look the person in the eye and say, "Not Russian, American!" While he was proud to be an American , he still retained some old country habits. He drank only Corby's whiskey when indulging because it was the cheapest rotgut. He also like Slivovitz, a very potent plum brandy. It was said that after uncorking the bottle, the fumes alone would make you drunk. He loved caviar. Not that expensive blsck stuff that you daintilly put on crackers, but the orange fish eggs that you could smell 2 blocks awa when he opened the jar.And that's the difference between 1920 and 2018. Every family had its own stories of coming to America. I have just skimmed the surface. I have had the good fortune of being 1st or 2nd generation depending on which side you look at. As I was growing up, I heard various aunts uncles and, of course, parentstell me how lucky I was to be born in America.They were right.
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when immigration was welcome and sought after, with many square miles to fill. Just about all you needed to do in order to be an immigrant was was to be healthy enough to remain vertical. If you saw the beginning of "The Godfather Part 2" you got a pretty clear picture of Ellis Island. In Poland and Russia Jews were were confined to "shtetles" ( Little States) within or nearby a city. Unless they were either professional men, land owners,or shopkeepers who dealt in necessities (butchers, bakers, food suppliers , etc.) they were so poor that many of them literally starved to death.This is about my Grandfather on my mother's side.
My Grandpa, Manus (Mike) Sherman, his wife and daughter live just outside of Lublin the 4th largest city in Poland in what we call today the Ukraine. He was a non commissioned officer in the Polish army., from which he defected at the outset of World War 1.He changed his name in order to keep from getting caught.and his passport wouldn't sound any alarms because he stole the I.D. off of a dead soldier. It's about this part where I tell you a couple apochryphal stories that circulated among immigrants.There were dozens of themand here are just two: Jews hated the army. In those days, they had good reason to. They had no loyalty to the repressive country in which they lived and they were treated even worse in the army than they were as civilians.
At Ellis Island many of the men, especially those from Germanywho were fleeing the Kaiser's conscription were loathe to give their real names, and on one day they decided to all say "Ich fergessen" (I forgot.) The closest to that in the ears of a minimally educated official, was "Ed Ferguson." That day a hundred or so Ed Fergusons passed through Ell Island. Here's another one:: Before going on permanent AWOL many would steal the wallets of the dead soldiers, not for the money, but for the I.D.Hence our new family name on my mother's side became Shermann, the second n getting dropped when Grandpa got ajob.Another great incentive was that Ford was paying $5 a dayand once the rumor was confirmedyou couldn't hold back half of Europe from immigration. $5 was a month's income in Poland.
"Mike" had a few bucks saved up from many years of manual labor so he traveled to Detroit, where he got a job in construction, building the Rackham Memorial Building, a Marble palace in the cultural center which also contained the Institute of Arts and the Main Library, also marble clad masterpieces.During this time my mother developed rickets from malnutrition so, her mom sent her to live with her parents who owned a small farm. For the first time in her young life, she was able to eat decent food and lots of fresh vegetables and eventually she grew strong but never achieved what should have been her full height.Grandpa told me that he couldn't believe his good fortune. To be able to live a life that Americans took for granted. He got hired at Ford making more money than he ever imagined.Enough to pay rent, clothes, food, and even some to save.He loved Amerca and learned English as quickly as he could so he could become a citizen. By his accent some would call him Russian(same as A.R.'s). "I can tell by your accent tht you are Russian." His back would stiffen up and he'd look the person in the eye and say, "Not Russian, American!" While he was proud to be an American , he still retained some old country habits. He drank only Corby's whiskey when indulging because it was the cheapest rotgut. He also like Slivovitz, a very potent plum brandy. It was said that after uncorking the bottle, the fumes alone would make you drunk. He loved caviar. Not that expensive blsck stuff that you daintilly put on crackers, but the orange fish eggs that you could smell 2 blocks awa when he opened the jar.And that's the difference between 1920 and 2018. Every family had its own stories of coming to America. I have just skimmed the surface. I have had the good fortune of being 1st or 2nd generation depending on which side you look at. As I was growing up, I heard various aunts uncles and, of course, parentstell me how lucky I was to be born in America.They were right.
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Never forget the axiom: "People get the government they deserve."
Best regards.
Maritimus
so much true!!
We have a farm in town trying to get approval for Halal (sp?) slaughtering. I’m inclined to support it, as it is similar to kosher butchering, and we have a very old private slaughterhouse in town already, which I love. Seems like everyone but the neighbors is ok with it, but it will fail. Not sure if I should view this as intrusion into their private farm, or a ridiculous religious nonsense to go the way of the dodo.
We can all sit more easily at dinner with most Catholics, but I wager the positions reversed if sitting with a modern Muslim in Dubai vs a catholic during the inquisition.
Details change, based on circumstance, but the basics are the basics.
That is different from what the religion espouses in its teachings.
Those who are Catholic are free to live by their beliefs and not have abortions. They just can't prevent others from getting one.
Nor is it correct, Catholics are not free, they have orders, and the hierarchy apply those orders to all when they have the power.
If they don't obey, they are punished by excommunication or ostracism.
Millions of Catholics have abortions or get divorced and their fellow Catholics treat them just the same.
Sure, some freak out and get all pompous but most are not nearly as judgmental as you propose.
Quite different from the Middle Ages.
For themselves only, it would be "ok" only politically, in the sense that they have a political right to not do it, but it is not "ok" in any other way. Accepting a duty to deny one's own happiness and accepting dogma in place of reason are not "ok"; they are self destructive.
No belief is "dependent upon on any secular court for support or approval"; everything you believe to be true is a personal decision. Only your own mind can choose whether or not accept or reject a personal belief. But a religious belief is based on faith, whether or not following authoritarian dictates of duty; and faith versus "dependent upon on any secular court for support or approval" is a false alternative: it leaves out reason. That is not "ok".
I was glad when the US Supreme Court struck down a lot of the draconian restrictions in Texas that were, as you describe, meant to stop by force people from getting an abortion.
The second statement you did not comment on is more fundamental than the politics: It is not "ok" to adopt self-destructive beliefs even with a political right to do so. Not only is it self-destructive, it has consequences for all social interactions including politics.
That particular people calling themselves Catholic Christians have done something morally reprehensible doesn't mean they all are nor that the religion itself is.
The faith itself is based on Christ's teachings and there is nothing about "force against women, preying on ignorance and social inertia".
Whether anyone believes in or follows the teachings of Christ is a different matter. You make a statement about what Catholicism is, as a religion. That is a false statement.
You might as well state that Objectivists are Thieves! Why? Because once upon a time you knew of one that was.
It is given as an example of an emphasis on the individual - "love yourself" and then from that starting point "love your neighbor as you love yourself". Not that you must love your neighbor no matter what, but rather, make up your own mind based on your individual viewpoint. Sounds pretty damn close to Value for Value.
This in response to a number of comments pontifically stating that Christianity has nothing to do with respect for the individual. All or nothing statements rarely are wise.
Today it still institutionalizes forcing women into slavery against their will in child birth, based on dogma, not science.
Most recently, the Vatican has endorsed socialism and essentially communism, supporting fiscal slavery for all, in a pathetic, last gasp to maintain its numbers among the poor in South America. The hypocrisy of the Vatican calling out corporations as evil for seeking money is a bitter comedy.
Little could be more orthogonal to Objectivism.
Such primitive otherworldly, anti-reason, anti-pursuit of happiness in life is the opposite of Ayn Rand's philosophy and the opposite of the heroic characters in Atlas Shrugged. It was the basis of the entire later elaboration of Church dogma when the original primitive mysticism was formulated by Augustine as a philosophy that entrenched the misery of the Dark Ages for over a thousand years.
One says, Yo Christ dude, you're powerful, get us out of here.
The other says to the first, Shut up, Christ has done nothing to be crucified for; and says the two criminals deserve to be up there because of their personal deeds. He then asks Christ to remember him; then Christ states that he will be in Heaven with him in a few minutes.
It would be more correct to say that nothing it propounds is true or worthwhile. That it exists at all is an affront to human rights and reason.
Voices of reason did have a lot to do with the reformation period. Take a look at the link for one particular reference.
"Whoever wants to be a christian must tear the eyes out of his reason."
“We are not masters of our actions; from the beginning to the end, we are slaves.”
“Free will after the fall is nothing but a word.”
“Man must completely despair of himself in order to become fit to obtain the grace of Christ."
“By nature, all of us are liars born of original sin in blindness.”
“Cursed and condemned is every kind of life lived and sought for selfish profit and good. Cursed are all works not done in love, but they are done in love when they are directed wholeheartedly not toward selfish pleasure, profit, honor and welfare, but toward the profit, honor and welfare of others.”
“Fear and trust God. God has commanded that you should honor the government. Even if you despise the government for other reasons, you dare not do so any longer because of the word of God.”
Revolting in a power struggle against the rituals and corruption of the papacy in favor of self-despair, self-denunciation, anti-reason, and direct mystic communing with the supernatural is not the voice of reason.
Martin Luther was a totalitarian jackass like any other.
That he argued for his Individual Right to interpret things when wanting to separate from the Pope's authority and then turns around and tells his minions that they have no Individual Right is pure hypocrisy.
None of that supports the right of the individual to use his rational mind in guiding choices and actions here on earth, which is reflected in his statist politics of German nationalism and Protestant persecution of dissenters as bad as or worse than the Catholics.
The positive outcome of his 'freedom of conscience' was an unintended consequence. His own draconian Protestant theology worse than Augustine was impossible to live by, nor did you have to because all that mattered was faith. It was so contradictory and unsystematic that there was no dogma to adhere to. Multiple sects developed with no standard to choose one over another. It all made a Catholic-like monopoly impossible. This nihilism, despite the statism, ultimately left an intellectual vacuum, leaving room for a philosophy of reason and real individualism in the Enlightenment.
Whether or not the preventing a farm from seeking its slaughtering operation is intrusion into a private farm depends on the physical affects, including odor. If it would physical harm the neighbors they have every right to oppose it. The ridiculous religious nonsense motivating it is irrelevant and not grounds to interfere.
It seems to me that a root of these problems is not evaluating people as individual human beings as such. Trying to evaluate their character, their intelligence, skills and productivity, rather then guessing their ethnicity, or disparaging their accent in English, color of the skin etc.
I am continuously surprised how frequently people blame, for somebody's lack of success, all sorts of irrelevant things rather than the lack of knowledge and of the ability to understand.
Best regards.
Maritimus
This came to mind.
How would Bernhardt Goetz fair in today's MSM?
They have no need to keep quite about it, they are in charge, the sheep are cowed, see the Rochdale/Rotherham etc scandal of sexual assault and slavery of women and sub teen girls, thousands! It took years to come out, girls complained, to parents, teachers, welfare agencies, police, etc. but no one would take action to stop it.
Completely irrelevant to a Mexican claiming asylum from an "oppressive" Mexican government.
The USA accepts in the most legal immigrants of any country on earth. We are an immigrant welcoming country.
But the current issue is dominated by illegal immigrants Knowingly coming in.
If that could be stopped then the issues of legal immigration could be addressed logically.
The hopeless bureaucracy obstructing immigration through expensive legal fees, arbitrary race-based quotas (now against Europeans), and long artificial delays create an incentive for illegal immigration. Almost no one is talking about that. Most of what we hear is the false alternative of 'open borders' versus protectionism.
Immigration should be addressed logically now through ending both current artificial obstructions against normal people and the open border anarchy allowing all kinds of criminals, gangs and welfare seekers. That would end a lot of the sympathy towards illegals -- except for those who want illegal immigration to provide entitlements to third worlders at our expense.
And current "protectionist limits", as you describe them, are the most generous in the entire world. More legal immigrants are welcomed into the USA than any other country on earth.
The problematic issue is differentiating between legal immigration and non-legal entry/residency.
Please see: https://www.galtsgulchonline.com/post...
Many people criticize him for being against "immigration". That is untrue. He doesn't make himself clear quite often but he is against illegal immigration and for immigration.
If he truly hated immigrants, then he never would have married one. Definitely relevant, in my opinion.
His wife didn't marry him "by right", but he doesn't even think in terms of rights. It is easy for him to bounce around claiming he isn't opposed to immigration while showing his general hostility and statist protectionism. The repeated claims that he "married an immigrant" is not an answer to criticism of his policies, let alone protectionist conservatives.
No. It is a response to relentless accusations of Trump being Xenophobe along with every other phobe and ist.
Not to be underestimated.
Who would that policy serve if not the nation.
I did not say there "is no national interest", but it is not the vague, collectivist catch-all rationalization as commonly used, which you can read a few lines above your supposition to the contrary: "There are valid specific national interests, such as defense when properly defined; an unqualified generality "national interest" used to control people is not valid."
As Ayn Rand put it:
"There is no such thing as “the public interest” except as the sum of the interests of individual men. And the basic, common interest of all men—all rational men—is freedom. Freedom is the first requirement of “the public interest”—not what men do when they are free, but that they are free. All their achievements rest on that foundation—and cannot exist without it.
"The principles of a free, non-coercive social system are the only form of “the public interest.” -- from “The Fascist New Frontier”, Ford Hall Forum 1962, anthologized in The Ayn Rand Column.
and
"A nation, like any other group, is only a number of individuals and can have no rights other than the rights of its individual citizens. A free nation—a nation that recognizes, respects and protects the individual rights of its citizens—has a right to its territorial integrity, its social system and its form of government. The government of such a nation is not the ruler, but the servant or agent of its citizens and has no rights other than the rights delegated to it by the citizens for a specific, delimited task (the task of protecting them from physical force, derived from their right of self-defense) . . . .
"Such a nation has a right to its sovereignty (derived from the rights of its citizens) and a right to demand that its sovereignty be respected by all other nations." -- from “Collectivized ‘Rights’” in The Virtue of Selfishness http://anthemfoundation.org/for-profe...
and on immigration in particular, when Ayn Rand was asked at the Ford Hall Forum in 1973 about the conservative protectionist position on immigration -- “What is your attitude toward immigration? Doesn’t open immigration have a negative effect on a country’s standard of living?” -- she answered:
"You don’t know my conception of self-interest. No one has the right to pursue his self-interest by law or by force, which is what you’re suggesting. You want to forbid immigration on the grounds that it lowers your standard of living — which isn’t true, though if it were true, you’d still have no right to close the borders. You’re not entitled to any 'self-interest' that injures others, especially when you can’t prove that open immigration affects your self-interest. You can’t claim that anything others may do — for example, simply through competition — is against your self-interest. But above all, aren’t you dropping a personal context? How could I advocate restricting immigration when I wouldn’t be alive today if our borders had been closed?"
Purists have a problem with that technique. Some see Trump as lying. Instead, I think he's giving various people what they need to hear. You and I only hear the public version. Kim gets the public adoration he craves. He also gets, secretly, the admonition that we are not blowing his socks off with that "button that works."
An "all-in" mentality and goal orientation is not a weakness. The threat is is nationalistic collectivist economics and disregard for the rights of the individual.
Mark Levin does not represent all Conservatives. If he rails against legal immigrants then he is a jackass.
Levin is an example of a conservative who insists he not anti immigration even with his protectionism and hostility; he wants "legal immigration" to mean government-granted privilege based on a collectivist standard of what is good for the "nation" and "economy". He is an example of why one can't equate "anti-immigrant" with "no immigration".
Protectionism is already in place with restrictive conditions and quotas on H1B visas, and conservatives are clamoring for more restrictions. That is part of the anti-immigration mentality.
I gave a respectful reply.
Just want to clarify since my reply is directly below the posting.
However, my post was immediately below so some might assume that it was me. Just wanted to clarify.
Thanks for the heads up to all about the inappropriate downvote.
That I disagree with what I believe to be an exaggerated sentiment in the post does not mean that I am against the posting.
I respect anyone's thoughtful commentary on this site.
The Unionists calls for "protecting jobs" is faulty Economics and usually refers to tariff policy rather than immigration. I agree "protecting jobs" is counter to any logical Objectivist viewpoint.
And "all over the conservative movement" is an example of broad generalization statements that I find faulty. They are not all the same, especially about ignorant calls for protecting jobs. For example, Rand Paul is quite different than other "Conservatives".
I encourage you to watch Dinesh D'Souza's call out of fraudulent people claiming to be the "Right" or "Conservative" when they are anything but:
https://www.dineshdsouza.com/films/de...
This clarified a number of things for me. One being that all Conservatives are most certainly not the same. Some, Richard Spencer for example, are Fascist Leftists or wolves in sheep's clothing. But watch the movie and decide for yourself.
That is one of the primary points that I have been trying to get across. A generalized term shouldn't be used to disparage a large swath of humanity.
But, is it not true that the Conservative that you mean, and I assume Ayn Rand as well, is not the same as the common broad-based usage of the typical politician or newscaster?
My Grandmother died during the Flue epidemic and My Father and his sisters were separated for a while; my father shipped off to a rich estate and taught landscaping...something he taught me as a kid.
Ayn Rand gave reasons for her principles; they did not come from "shaded attitudes". Your own love for your son is more than "shading" your attitude towards all abortion. A potential life is not a life. "A life is a life no matter how Rand thinks of it" makes no sense: The potential is not the actual. Her personal choice to not become a mother was not the explanation of the moral right not to and was not an irrational personal relationship. One has the right to make many choices of what values to pursue in life. Any choice made is not a denunciation of others' different choices for their own lives. Her choice to not have children says nothing about your choice to have your son and be glad you did, and your choice says nothing about hers or anyone else's not to have children, let alone a moral status of that choice as not liking abortion as such.
The value of life does not mean we should make as many of them as we can. Ayn Rand emphasized the value of a woman's life to herself. That is the source of the moral right to have an abortion, if necessary, for a woman who does not want to have children or have more children and whose personal values would be destroyed by taking on the unwanted responsibility.
glitch in the machine.
But I do find Herb's story moving. And I am very much troubled by the difficulties of (legitimate) immigrants. Although I gave Trump my vote, it wasn't out of xenophonbia, or a great enthusiasm for his proposed Wall. It was to keep Hilliary Clinton's Socialistic policies from being enacted.
Trump did recently grant presidential pardons to two ranchers in the Hammond family who were savagely persecuted and imprisoned through an irrational application of "anti-terrorism" laws under the Obama administration. That is something that Trump did that is very, very good, but almost no one is talking about it and the public has no idea what happened and why.
The Hammond pardon is a really great move.No media publication, even Fox spoke of it, A shame.
Hammonds from Oregon and Uranium 1 from SerialBrain2 (http://youtube.com)
Posted by $ Dobrien 1 month ago
And
The Hammonds pardon and Uranium 1 a message to Kate. (youtu.be)
Posted by $ Dobrien 4 weeks, 1 day ago to History
Comment | Edit | Delete
Speculations about personal motivations and "prickly" name-calling are not superior recognition of anything. I don't know what email you are talking about. I did not email you.
ing with you, and leaves you free to try to succeed, and that is your opportunity.
That was not the initial purpose of your posting.
'I do not understand'?
Very interesting comments from everyone tho' I am flummoxed by down-voting of some comments by ewv.
Now I m going to piggyback on your thread by giving another story (not personal, from the net)-
-- --
1961, London Airport Heathrow
Two people arrive after a long flight, Man woman, husband wife. No particular education or skills.
In his pocket the man has a £1 note. They quickly find work in factories and driving buses.
After a few years, they move to Bristol. They take a small shop in Stapleton Road - a poor and rough area.
They live in a small two-room flat above the shop.
The shop sells womens' clothes, the woman is now a seamstress.
The people who know the man call him Mr Night and Day-
the shop seldom closes, he never seems to sleep. They work. There are five sons.
The man tells his boys at the time when there were many big strikes-
"If they want to earn more, why don't they work harder?".
Now, one of the sons is a financial adviser. Another is a property tycoon.
Another, after a commended career in the navy, is Senior Superintendent of a police district.
The oldest died this year, he was head of a big supermarket chain.
The second son-
At school, the careers adviser told him "Stapleton Road kids don't go to University"
He went to university. Studied economics and politics.
On graduation, he went for interviews in the City. He said "I could see that my face did not fit".
He got a job with Chase Manhattan in New York. Did very well.
Then went to Deutsche Bank when after a few years he became MD of their Singapore office.
When he left, his salary was about £2.5 million a year.
Noted by colleagues for brain and energy and being good to work with.
He left Deutsche Bank, returned to UK, entered politics, elected to Parliament.
Admires Margaret Thatcher and Ayn Rand, a staunch supporter of Israel, supports Brexit.
Describes Momentum, the cult behind Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, as neo-fascist.
Current job- Home Secretary, responsible for the Home Office - police, security, immigration.
Birth place – Rochdale.
Hair color – none, head and face clean shaven.
Religion- “I do not practice any religion”.
Appearance - trim.
Skin color – brown.
Original nationality and religion of parents - Pakistan, Islam
Name - Sajid Javid
-- --
When Ayn Rand was asked at the Ford Hall Forum in 1973 about the conservative protectionist position on immigration -- “What is your attitude toward immigration? Doesn’t open immigration have a negative effect on a country’s standard of living?” -- she answered:
"You don’t know my conception of self-interest. No one has the right to pursue his self-interest by law or by force, which is what you’re suggesting. You want to forbid immigration on the grounds that it lowers your standard of living — which isn’t true, though if it were true, you’d still have no right to close the borders. You’re not entitled to any 'self-interest' that injures others, especially when you can’t prove that open immigration affects your self-interest. You can’t claim that anything others may do — for example, simply through competition — is against your self-interest. But above all, aren’t you dropping a personal context? How could I advocate restricting immigration when I wouldn’t be alive today if our borders had been closed?"
That has been cited on this forum several times. The protectionists reject the rights of the individual as based on the nature of human beings, replacing that with a forced tribalist affinity.
Rand was obviously struggling with the problem that no society that allows open immigration can maintain it's philosophical culture. The philosophies that the newcomers bring can overwhelm those of the founders.
Ayn Rand was not "obviously struggling" with immigration. She was not "struggling" at all. The response she gave was very clear. It was in response to the conservative position on protection, not invasion.
And even there she realized it had to be secret, otherwise the surrounding people would decide on what was an "appropriate" tax rate and gather it by force. The fact that such an artificial societal structure was necessary indicates a struggle with the concept -- at least to me.
The biggest issue I see as I read in Rand's writing is the unwillingness to accept the reality of force. It can be morally wrong for the majority to decide to take your stuff, but if there are enough of them, they can do it. They may develop some philosophical basis to justify it in their own minds but in the end it's because they have to force to make it happen.
The purpose of the Valley for the plot in Atlas Shrugged was to illustrate how rational people interact with each other unencumbered by statism and altruism, not to describe or promote a utopian society, let alone feudalism. Ayn Rand did not struggle with that concept and she had no "unwillingness to accept the reality of force."
The political consequences of the use of force by those who rejected reason are vividly described in the novel and elsewhere in her writing. It is why she advocated over and over the necessity of a philosophical revolution of reason and individualism to reverse the decline of this country into statism. It is a principle that a-philosophical libertarians and conservatives still do not grasp.
While I agree with the problems of the use of force, the reality is that it exists as a means of human interaction. You can promote a philosophy that rejects the initiation of force, but someone who does not accept your philosophy can do so.
Any state built upon a common philosophy is vulnerable to the dilution of that philosophy via unlimited immigration of people who do not share it. And once they become the majority they will decide that it's time for a new deal.
The biggest problem today leading to further statism is the philosophy held by the country's own citizens.
Thank you for this interesting discussion. I wanted to interject that I did not read the Gulch or anything else in AS as a model of a society. It was all unhealthy things that come from collectivism. I see the Gulch as a fascinating idea. I think about it when looking down from planes flying over mountainous regions. But I do not think it was a model for society.
Shrugged. But if you create a new nation whose laws have a similar justice, you cannot guarantee the moral choices that will be made by the people who will be born there afterward.
Maybe I'm not looking far enough into the future. It is comforting to believe that rationality will eventually prevail.But, at present, I have difficulty seeing it.
there should be no question that a nation can and should control its borders, does not Rand say something on those lines? It is not just standard-of-living self-interest, it is survival.
Apart from that, if there are rules, people should be judged on character and results. This is what the story of Sajid Javid shows. The UK would have lost a truly outstanding immigrant if it had followed the usual stereotypes.
Flummoxed= mystified. Those posts could maybe be disagreed with but were sensible and argued from an Objectivist position. I suppose that some here use downvotes to mean- do not like it, don't like your face, whereas a downvote should follow a deliberate mis-statement, something evil, or really bad spelling.
As for normal immigration, the story of Sajid Javid shows an exceptional case. One doesn't have to be exceptional to have rights, and exceptional people can't be predicted in advance.
The conservative trolls shouldn't mystify you; it has no logic but they're emotionally lashing out with no distinction made between "evil" and "me don't like".
I don't think that we can practically say "y'all come", but it's a debatable position. I think our current system of it being very hard to immigrate here legally, but if you break the law you will probably get away with it is an unhealthy policy that builds an underclass and excludes people with skills that would cause them to rise "above the radar".
As all industrialized societies are experiencing population decline, nations will compete for immigrants. I think they are neither "evil" and have no "dislike" for them. I just think we should not have a system to get bus-boys and farm workers that excludes software engineers.
Of course that's not the whole population, that's just the population of that generation which has to support the aging larger group.
There are lots of nations with very low rates. The U..S. is at 1.8 which is decreasing but our population is being stabilized by immigration. Eventually the nations with birth rates over 2 will drop as well.
The world's population will peak at about 2050 with an estimated 10 billion (I think more like 9.5) and then begin to decline. Eventually we'll have to do something about it but not for a long time.
It promotes competition.Competition is good and as the old saying goes, "the cream always rises to the top." We all know that all immigration is not good. There's lots of trash seeking to come in, and an orderly, well vetted system put in place is certainly needed, but killed by libs and Trump is right, we need fewer libs because for whatever reason they are so partisan as to vote against their own self interest.
My father's parents came from Ireland in the 1880's. He 'escaped' because he was a Catholic in northern Ireland and one of the trouble makers. He settled in St. Louis at first. Grandma's family had a 'farm' in county Limerick and her father managed to bring them to St. Louis also where she and Grandpa met. BTW, the farm was about the size of a normal middle class lawn (maybe 100x200) and the family numbered 8 so it was hard to make a living.
As a youngster I romanticized about St. Paddy's day, etc., but when I ask my father about being Irish, he said we were Americans. End of discussion.
At the time my grandparents came over (1880s) help wanted signs in New York said "No Irish Need Apply" which may explain how they came to St. Louis. Looks like there has always been some group that was discriminated against ;-)
So, if you were one of them (and you obviously are not), you'd be afraid to correspond with an Irish devil and that suits me just fine ;-)
I also have concerns about PP and the potential
Ethical abuses. https://www.breitbart.com/big-governm...
Yet, your logic that "as you love yourself" indicates, implies or would result that an individual has no value is backwards. Every person that I know considers love to be a positive sentiment. Love yourself is an indication of self worth, not lack of it.
And the neighbor comes second. Love AS you love yourself. So, if the neighbor is doing things of which you do not love, then no need to love the neighbor for those things. It is not all or nothing.
Religious doctrine has repeated over and over the depravity of man. No one here said that loving one's own life is wrong or that love isn't a "positive sentiment" -- when selectively granted. A commandment to unconditionally love others, beginning with a supernatural deity, destroys the concepts of love, value, and self-worth. The religious injunction to love others does not say you can base it on what others do. A duty to love neighbors and enemies is the opposite. To try to salvage love as a "positive sentiment" based on the religion by ignoring the contradictions in the name of "it's not all or nothing" is logically hopeless.
You seem to be trying to find good, modern secular values of individualism in religion as a source, regardless of all the contradictions. It isn't there. What proper common virtues today often associated with religion are the result of better thinking over time, not religion, and are contradicted and undermined by religious faith and mysticism throughout its history. They are not a result of religion and its essence, they evolved over time from people who were often otherwise religious at a time when religion dominated, but who were slowly climbing out of it. If they hadn't we would still be in the Dark Ages.
Those who are still inconsistent followers who think of the Church as representing an ideal even if not followed, would be freed from their guilt and the irrational influences in their lives if they would simply throw it all off and see it for what it is, making room for a rational philosophy that would improve their lives.
Should they be allowed to be teachers in public schools? Judges? Able to vote? Should their children be taken away, for the kids "protection"?
How far and how strong is your blanket condemnation?
PS Someone else brought up the issue of religion regarding immigration, not I.
Opposing and arguing against wrong ideas, whether or not they are religious, does not mean government "banning" people who hold them.
Others don't exactly hate it, but see it as an entitlement to be paid for showing up (except for "family leave") whether or not there is a connection between what they do and what they are paid. Most of the "jobs" rhetoric in politics now is based on the false premise that businesses and profits are justified supposedly only if they "provide jobs". That was a major theme of the Fabian Socialists, has been taken over and spouted with self-righteous demagoguery by Democrats, and is pandered to by Republicans. "Providing jobs" is one of the loud Trump themes while ignoring productivity and the rights of business owners.
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