anoncowherd's comments

>> we have on the one side a dollar that has endured as a value store and medium of exchange for hundreds of years, and which has proven remarkably resilient (valuable) by any objective measure throughout the worst economic implosion since the Great Depression (which the dollar also survived)

There's something you're overlooking though: the dollar was backed by gold until 1971, and that's where our problems really started mounting.

Krugman's rants can be safely ignored. He either genuinely thinks that the solution to problems created by printing and borrowing way too much money is.. printing and borrowing shitloads more money, or he doesn't actually think that and is a government shill instead.

Either way, he's not to be trusted.

>> BitCoin looks like it was designed as a weapon intended to damage central banking and money issuing banks, with a Libertarian political agenda in mind—to damage states ability to collect tax and monitor their citizens financial transactions

So? Damaging States' ability to forcefully confiscate everyone's wealth is a distinctly good thing, here in the real world.

I wonder if the ever-vigilant FTC has noticed anything shady about what Wall Street has been doing for years now.

It seems he just wanted to draw a parallel between two "manias". I have no idea what will happen to Bitcoin, but it sure does look like a mania. I do see the benefits too, of course.

Most Bitcoins are purchased as a speculation, expecting their value to go way up. It's possible that the gold rush is already over, but it's also possible it's only beginning.

>> Let's see who laughs in 5 years

Hah :P

It's nice to see yet another sane person on HN, by the way.

>> We have to find a way to give the President the power he needs to protect us, while making sure he does not abuse that power.

Now if only he was interested in "protecting us". What you're suggesting is that we need to give a fox the power to protect the hen house, and to ensure it won't abuse that power. What do you think will happen? It's not about the president either, by the way. He's just a puppet for The Powers That Shouldn't Be.

>> But what has really changed?

Not much. The only positive change here is that people are now widely aware that they're being spied on in everything they do online, so now there's less resistance to "conspiracy theories" (ie. "reality"). On the other hand, that very same awareness serves to advance "the chilling effect", so it's unclear if it's even a net positive.

Other than that, everything keeps changing for the worse, of course. The police are increasingly militarized, secret courts keep doing their thing, and people keep losing their liberties. The only possible "solution" to this insanity is spreading awareness of the fact that governments are inherently immoral. They're based on taxation, and taxation itself is based on coercion. The way it works is that people are punished for attempting to keep their property. Does it make sense to punish you for keeping your computer? No? -Okay then, does it make sense to punish you for keeping your money? .. Well no. No it doesn't. Yet, that's exactly how taxation is forced upon everyone. If you do not pay taxes, you will be punished for attempting to keep your property. Something is wrong here.

The only way to "solve" the problem is to spread awareness of it. Political authority is the idea that a small group of people "has the right" to impose their will on everyone else.

In reality though, they obviously do not. Everyone has the exact same rights (and they don't include coercing other people), and you can't delegate rights you do not have. But the belief in political authority is the root cause of practically all problems in today's world. Once the "Authority Religion" unravels, so does mankind's enslavement: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngpsJKQR_ZE

>> There's little evidence the true motivation was to defeat terrorism

It was never about terrorism. In fact, governments like terrorism because it gives them an excuse to grab more power and strip people of their liberties. The surveillance is about control, power and maintaining it. It's meant to be used against the general populace.

"I played a central role in setting up this all-encompassing surveillance, but now that it's been in operation for years, I realize it could be used for naughty things. It's time to blow the whistle on this!"

Binney's case is interesting, to say the least.

.. or he's doing Image Management.

Heyyy, if torture was "regulated" by Congress, The President and his military commanders, I guess it would be alright?

Don't worry about the "inequality", they've always been spying on US citizens too, and still are!

In fact, US citizens are their priority, because they're the ones the US government needs to control and keep in check to maintain their power.

I'm not sure what your point is supposed to be, but I suspect you don't actually have one.

You didn't even give the Mises Institute a chance to educate you. If you listen to their in-depth videos on the fundamental "mechanics" of economics, but find yourself disagreeing with what they say, you're pretty much just refusing to hear anything, or simply not very bright.

They're not "fanatic", they're just explaining how economics works, in very clear terms, and in a way that obviously corresponds to reality (because it's all based on the way humans actually behave).

>> pointing to that site to learn about economics is like referring to Glenn Beck's site to learn about President Obama

So where do you learn about Obama? -The mainstream media? How's that "change you can believe in" going? -Oh well, I guess stripping away your civil liberties counts as "change", right?

>> Obviously, most economists have some ideology, but I think you should try to learn from people are are at least not so fanatic.

Nah, I'm fine learning from people who are actually talking about how economics works here in the real world. You just keep on keeping on.

Funny how whenever a company gets enough bad publicity to actually hurt their bottom line, suddenly their customer service runs a bit smoother.

>> It looks like as we were performing server upgrades last week a handful of jobs didn't run as normal

Oh? Did that also cause some kind of downtime in your customer service operations, considering you sure took your sweet time in getting back to him? Funny how the front page of Hacker News makes things run a bit smoother, huh?

>> Minarcho-capitalism has only one moral rule

You just made up a new political philosophy there.

>> It has no considerations of the virtues its system inculcates in people

The virtues "its system" inculcates in people? Look, we're all brainwashed into the cult of statism while growing up, and I've spent my time arguing against sanity too. But you have to draw the line somewhere, and start seeing reason when it's presented to you.

Freedom is not a "system". It's just the absence of coercion. If you want to call waking people up into reality, and trying to get them to be consistent and rational in their thinking "inculcation", then be my guest. But that changes nothing about the nature of the world we actually live in.

>> nor for their utilitarian well-being. It only acknowledges one rule as being a moral factor. Ever.

Even if we all adhere to the NAP, which we're actually naturally inclined to do automatically (because it's not like people walk around wanting to hurt anyone) we're still free to use our common sense whenever the need arises.

In other words, the NAP is not some all-encompassing, universal moral absolute that rules out any and all considerations for what might be the right thing to do in some specific situation.

>> Meaning: go ahead and eat puppies or kick people in debtors' prisons, because you're still obeying the One Rule of not violating private property.

Your brain is working pretty fucking hard in avoiding having to accept reason and reality. As I said, I've had to go through that phase too. But try and get past it already. Let Larken Rose be your therapist: http://www.youtube.com/user/LarkenRose/videos - he's awesome.

>> you can't structure an entire society on one moral rule that corresponds to nothing else in any other form of ethics or morals

But "don't hurt anyone" is a pretty good moral rule, don't you think? -That's basically what the NAP says.

>> That's not how the economy works (international trade is different from local trade, you're not taking employment into account etc.), but for now let's just say that some think a regulated currency is better and some don't

Feel free to tell me why what I described there does not correspond to reality in any meaningful way. If you can't, then maybe you should reconsider your position on "regulated" currencies.

Also, you should investigate http://mises.org - they'll tell you all you need to know about economics. You'll find out that governments are always only a net loss on any economy.

At least it's amusing :)