tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post5414385252793749995..comments2024-03-27T07:18:39.229-05:00Comments on In Medias Res: Christian Democratic Communities and Teleological States: A Response to God's EconomyUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post-41548666387448727842010-04-02T16:08:50.740-05:002010-04-02T16:08:50.740-05:00"[T]he major alternative to God in the modern..."[T]he major alternative to God in the modern world can be conceived, and often has been conceived, as a political order. Such an order claims complete independence of any natural or divine influence in its judgment about what is to be done in the political order, which looks to nothing higher than itself. This deformed regime then claims to be able by itself to make men happy in this world, which, in its own way, is itself a divine claim". --James SchallAloysiushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13858618410784962169noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post-17527673935474814262010-04-01T06:33:19.338-05:002010-04-01T06:33:19.338-05:00I said the rule of law and consent of the govern.
...I said the rule of law <i>and</i> consent of the govern.<br /><br />I gave you credit to understand that property rights, as with the the other articulated unalienable rights of our bill of rights, are givens. As such they are part of the rule of law. Guess i overestimated you.<br /><br />My qualification was a <i>free</i> people, not communist serfs.<br /><br />All the intelligent quite understand that that there are those who wish to enslave and those who wish to be enslaved.<br /><br />I suggest that you read what I write. You imagine that you are having a deep insight here; in fact, you are myopically indulging is sophistry and sophomoric "philosophizing". I can guarantee that they issues have been hashed out well before you were born and by wiser people than ye.<br /><br />As for Daly's "argument" that there matters were "more complicated", he here is be putting forward a self-serving and specious interpretation, and it is nothing more than an interpretation, he offers no argumentation that is either necessary or sufficient to prove his "case". His stance is purely polemical. He in fact is not making an "argument" at all. He is having one.<br /><br />Certainly, as a practical matter, there was not enough wealth to redistribute in any meaningful sense, nor was it in fact meaningfully "redistributed".<br />Daly's actually projects a false simplicity on the issue rather can calling forth a more "complicated truth". This is common in "Collectivists" who imagine the word is a matter of opinion, will and belief rather than the brute practical business that is actually is and strictly limited by the nature of the world and mankind (and please, let us stop calling them "communitarians", this is just a dodge, they are essentially communists).<br /><br />Historically, he completely avoids The Terror and, more importantly, the Napoleonic and the Bourbon eras. France replaced one set of aristocrats with another, and so it is to this day. Capitalism merely increase the wealth so that those below might have their slavery purchased at top dollar.<br /><br />So economically add historically, he is off in a disconnected fantasy land cut off from reality.<br /><br />It is the great unleashing of economic freedom, particularly <i>outside of France</i>, carried in the vessel of capitalism and protected by property right that gave us the great wealth of the 19th century.<br /><br />We have just about depleted this capital and undone their great achievement.<br /><br />You can thank "communitarians" of various stripes for that.<br /><br />It will be deeply difficult to put the wealth back once it is gone, and then we will see Collectivists for what they are: Thieves and tyrants.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post-41152667046083843012010-03-31T22:43:40.920-05:002010-03-31T22:43:40.920-05:00Did you assume that I have read Daly? I have barel...Did you assume that I have read Daly? I have barely read your post. I was responding to the discussion of Bush's faith based initiatives. I agree with anonymous (but I am not anonymous I always post with my nom de blog) . We only need voluntary charity. The American people are (or were) good enough to voluntarily take care of others and they would and could do it without so much of our impoverishing government statist policies.Aloysiushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13858618410784962169noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post-18297877537511837782010-03-31T12:13:55.721-05:002010-03-31T12:13:55.721-05:00Aloysius,
Daly may or may not agree with your dep...Aloysius,<br /><br />Daly may or may not agree with your depiction of the federal government as a strangling octopus, but leave that aside: what about Daly's question regarding who--in a world in which (for better <i>and</i> for worse) medieval security has been sundered, and individuals are left to conquer or be conquered as they may--is going to care for the poor? The churches alone, acting charitably, are in Daly's view still incapable of providing much more that a small percentage of the total welfare which Christian compassion demands. Do you disagree with this numbers? Or do you disagree that such ought to be end-goal of welfare policy (whether church or state) at all?<br /><br />Trapnel,<br /><br />Thanks; Adam's response over at Front Porch Republic, the one I linked to, touches on a lot of important theoretical concerns.<br /><br />Anonymous #1,<br /><br /><i>The state is there to protect the liberty of all through the exercise of the rule of law and the consent of the governed.</i><br /><br />And what if the governed give their consent to a redistributionist policy which acknowledges the existence of more than just a "negative" liberty? What if they agree that liberty has a "positive" element to it as well--that the poor ought to be fed, ought to be protected from economic exploitation and misfortune, ought to be empowered to participate in their communities as individuals who do not live in fear of the next downsizing? Would any of that violate the "rule of law"?<br /><br />Anonymous #2 (or are you the same person?),<br /><br /><i>It was capitalism and trade that cured the ills of the Ancien Regime, not the tyranny of The Republic of France.</i><br /><br />Daly's history (which, really, you ought to read) suggests that the story is a little more complicated than that.Russell Arben Foxhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03366800726360134194noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post-58866819731143545112010-03-31T10:42:53.716-05:002010-03-31T10:42:53.716-05:00Oh, and this is pure Collectivist bunk:
The argum...Oh, and this is pure Collectivist bunk:<br /><i><br />The argument, from that point on, was and has been a continuing legal, political, and economic tug-of-war, with one side--the side taken by both advocates of a secularist state and supporters of an untrammeled capitalist market--seeing politically organized charitable and church groups as their common enemy,<br /></i><br /><br />Free Markets, which is the <i>actual</i> bogey man lurking behind the communist code phrase "untrammeled capitalist markets" are and have been, to the extent that they were ever "untrammeled", the greatest boon to both welfare of the individual and society. Moreover, it has been the source of the greatest charity. It was capitalism and trade that cured the ills of the Acien Regime, not the tyranny of The Republic of France.<br /><br />Beyond that, the best was to save someone from poverty is to give them a job.<br /><br />This puerile notion that capitalists are somehow the enemy of charity and the church is pure Marxist fantasy and projection.<br /><br />They are the enemies of theft, sloth and would be aristocrats would would rule over them in the name of "Charity", "Society", "The General Welfare" or "the Common Good".<br /><br />The enemies of free markets and capitalism are the enemies of freedom, liberty, progress and prosperity. They are enemies of the dignity of the individual.<br /><br />Human dignity must be focused on the individual for no decent society can be based on anything other than the free association of individuals. To assert otherwise is to claim that man is incapable of being anything but a slave.<br /><br />Free markets for free men.<br /><br />The church would be better served to tend to men's souls. Free men and women, through their free association, which certainly can include religious association, can tend to the welfare of the needy.<br /><br />This is how it was through most of the history of the USA. <br /><br />We need to return to it.<br /><br />The society of the Free is a bulwark against tyrannical government and properly should have ascendancy over it. <br /><br />Collectivism in its various political forms--Fascism, Communism, Socialism, but to name a few--is destructive to society and deadly to the individual. If its dominance obtains long enough, political collectivism destroys society altogether.<br /><br />We should treat with it no longer.<br /><br />Social Justice? Any reasonable definition for such a thing would mean that the productive keep the fruits of their labor and do with it as they will.<br /><br />There is little wisdom or virtue in "the collective". It is in fact an abstraction created by tyrants. God create man in his image, not political parties or factionsAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post-21088363600426208872010-03-31T10:08:06.999-05:002010-03-31T10:08:06.999-05:00There is no such thing as "The Caring State&q...There is no such thing as "The Caring State", nor should there be.<br /><br />Little can be found that is more inimical to liberty, prosperity and sound government. This leads to tyranny, to a hell on earth.<br /><br />This is none of the State's business. The state is there to protect the liberty of all through the exercise of the rule of law and the consent of the governed.<br /><br />It has no more right to tend to the welfare of the individual than it does to manage industries or dictate "economic policy". These matters are properly in the spheres of the individual and society.<br /><br />This is a path that, famously, is paved with good intentions, and we all know where this path will take us in the end.<br /><br />The GOP's mistake, perhaps a fatal one to this nation, was not to defund the Left when it had a change.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post-28154715051513555512010-03-31T09:00:39.104-05:002010-03-31T09:00:39.104-05:00A great response--this really gets to the heart of...A great response--this really gets to the heart of the matter. 'Spheres of justice--political or metaphysical?', to be glib.X.Trapnelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16331820913539099727noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post-82854608503639680482010-03-31T08:16:48.186-05:002010-03-31T08:16:48.186-05:00This is one (of many) points of disagreement I had...This is one (of many) points of disagreement I had with the Bush administration. We don't need any church-state partnerships for social welfare--just church based. The Federal government is an octopus that will wrap its tentacles around you and never let go. The embrace is fatal.Aloysiushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13858618410784962169noreply@blogger.com