Yes but having character and being a character are two different things. Here Stormin Norman is just being a character. Why does he not also mention Iraq and Afghanistan. Clinton waged a very successful air only war against the genocidal Serbs while his Republican critics insisted on ground troops in Kosovo. Bush was asleep at the wheel in 2001 ignoring the advice of terrorist experts and the FBI. He and his Russian speaking, classical piano playing "National Securtiy Adviser" Condi Rice were trying to resurrect a cold war with the Russsians. After all a cold war with Russia was always a winner for Republican politics and thus he and she ignored the real war that was going on with Arab terrorsts. Characters all!

PS: Chitty be aware that you are not dealing with many sincere commentators on this site. In the quote just above they praise the quote and concept of studying "great men". I mention Joseph of the Bible and they laugh at him. But their ignorance of economics is complete if they don't understand that societies and cultures, tribes and groups from time immemorial unto this present day plan and horde and subsidise and incentivize and use any method possible to store up foods against starvation. Morality is not part of this equation.

So wonderful to have Chitty and Judith on board. Taxes are terrible just ask Robin Hood and King John but that is the manner world wide in which governments earn their keep. There is nothing immoral or mean about taxing the rich. It is just because that is where the money is. Republicans subsidise the rich with tax cuts so that they will put money into their campagin confers. The economy we need now is higher taxes on the rich who are not spending it anyway since they have locked it up into Governiment Bonds and are collecting a nice interest subsidiy from the government war bonds while are youth are dying in war. So tax them and most of them really don't mind (ask Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, they don't mind) and cut the taxes on the middle class who will spend the money and this economy will boom. The proof of this is of course he bipartisan stipend we have just been given. Can you image the top 2% spending their $600 dollar checks. If you want to learn about where the money is in this country check out the SOI Statistics on Income published annually by the IRS and google Responsiblewealth.com to learn what the super rich think about the 10 trillion dollar republican debt. Conservatives by ass!

Wow!Wow!Wow! Chitty. Hip hip hooray for your great intelligent answer. The answer to all of your questions can be handled by Archer, he knows everything. And what he dosen't know he refuses to research. Like I mean how hard is it to Google information about national subsidies. The only thing Archer knows is that he is an individual and is against the group. He even says that the individuals opionion and rights are just as valid as the groups. How would you like to go to a dinner party with him and nine others when nine people want to go one way and he wants to go the other and insists that his opinion is just as valid as the others. His basic phiolosopy is government by the spoiled brat approach. But alas his delemmna is not new. People through history and for that matter people from the time of their birth until matured struggle with the me (individual) versus the us (group) delemna. At maturity however those who still do not have a strong enough sense of self or individuality are incapable of joining with others in groups. The fully developed healthy and balanced personaltiy has no such problem. Some examples of the former are first Kierkegaard the Danish writer and philosopher. He was so disoriented about who he was that he had the word INDIVIDUAL engraved on his headstone. We all have bouts of this confuse like Thoreau who had to escape from the great mass of men. People like Archer are prone to stand on a street corner and yell to the passing hordes and traffic at the top of his voice, "I AM AN INDIVIDUAL'" all the time being too ignorant and/or conceited to recognize that the hordes are all individuals also. It is a shallow person that sees others as groups and not as individuals just like themselves. This psychological dementia is what enables mad men like Hitler to do the things they did. Ken subsidies are not immoral. Cities and states throughout this Union will give incentives and tax breaks etcetera to companies to build plants etcetera. I stand for a lot of things Archer but mostly for The Truth. From the time I first met you on this site you stated your desire to be different just for the sake of being different. Your lack of a sense of self and individuality drives yout to try to stand for something in order to give you a sense of identity that you do not have. I am truly sorry for you! Unlike you Chitty these guys will fall for any "red meat" they see on this site and use it for their deranged diatribes. The other day there was a cute quote about "being either complaisant towards the earth and doing nothing or going with your inclinations". I commented on how a person could have inclinations to serve and protect the earth. Archer attacked me as having a collectivist sentiment.

I am not sure I proved his point Warren. Government influence into national economies is as old as the Prime Minister of Egypt Joseph who got the job because he saved the Egyptians from starvation. Governments intervene in ag markets all over the world. Agriculture is complex and way beyond me. From the news about France, Japan, China and India are foreign friends are beating the hell out of us by using the tool of Government Subsidies. So I only gave one star because I think the quote is overly simplistic. (By the way Warren, I meant to congratulate you for your daughters college graduation.)

Ken my great-great grandfather was born in 1843 and was named Martin Van Buren Reidling. He died on 2/16/1913 exactly 30 years before my birth in 1943. I don't know how great Martin was but I think he was well liked.

Don't know what times he is referring to but I heard on the news several days ago that the French and Japanese subsidize their farmers to the tune of 50% and 30%. We only subsidize ours to about 23%. Also heard that a big part of the current oil problem is that China and India subsidize the price so that their people can buy it cheaper and thus they are moving from bicycles and scooters into autos. If they had to pay our prices their demand would go down, supply would go up and price would come down. The Chinesse and Indian governments get the money to subsidize from the junk they sell to us. So we are moving from cars into scooters. I don't know aout incentives or subsidies but isn't it interesting that the Fench, Japanesse, Chineese and Indian subsidies are helping them and ruining us.

Eric I read Eisenhowers chronilce of his days in Fort Meade, Maryland and his convoy across the continent in the early '20's and what a chore that trip was. When he saw the Autobahn he was convinced there had to be a better way, thus the Interstate System.

A true rugged individualist would never bother himself with this or any other site. I said Archer that you are a self-proclaimed rugged individualist not a real one. I have had to learn a new vocabulary or try to decipher the socio-politico babble of you and several others on this site. In my prior life I have never heard the term collective used except in my understanding of what the Soviet Union tried to do with agriculture. (Not unlike the reorganization of farming in our country where family farms disappear into large corporate farms, although I grant the Soviet model may have been coercive,) In any event I looked up the word "collective" and it means group. Now it is a misreading of American History to think that the nation was built by individuals acting alone. The Mayflower did not come over with a pilgrim but with pilgrims, Mass. and Harvarrd were not started by a puritan but by the Puritans. Pennsylvania was not settled by a Quaker but by the Quakers. I have spoken before here of vogue-isms which includes twisting language to suit your current purpose no matter how deceitful or devious it is. Thus in America there are collectives or groups (it is a fundamental and identyfing mark of American culture-this free association of individuals) and there are states or provinces. BUT LET US BE CLEAR. No such entity called "THE STATE" or "THE COLLECTIVE" exists. It is just a lieterary fiction created by socio-politico Trekkie Types set up as a staw man in order to have something to knock down or get mad at. People that have to have something to get mad at have a psychological disorder in my opinion. Now as far as governments telling us how much carbon we can emit yes it may very well happen. Hell in California the state government tells people state wide when they can or cannot burn refuse or lawn waste. I have lived in jurisdictions that tell you when you can water your lawn or that you can not wash your car. Now the SELF-PROCLAIMED rugged individualist would not put up with any of these restrictions, he would use as much water as he damn well pleases. The issue in acting alone or in concert with others is simply will we hang alone or together and will it be in the short run or the long run. (A true rugged individualist has tremendous respect for the environment and the manner in which he and the group use it and abuse it.) Archer thinks I am a smart aleck because I state truth and facts that upset his groupie-trekkie apple cart. We need to be thankful daily for the groups (collectives) that have and are making this country great. I recommend two to y'all. They promote generally a policy of zero immigration for the time being and educating and encouraging people to have not more than two children. These org. are called Zero Population Growth (ZPG) an Negative Population Growth NPG).

I have reread this yes again. It is very high minded and if you analyse it backward it is just a restatement of the Golden Rule or of Jeffersons idea of "self-government". If we trust ourselves to do right and be moral then fairness should be to extend the same trust to others until they cross you. This is the essence of a truly free and self-respecting people.

Ken the first things totalitarians do is to stop the people from forming groups or collectives. Thus to prevent the rise of totalitarianism I think we must promote the collectives or groups. Totalitarians really don't want people talking to each other.

Archer is an obvious "Rugged Individualist Society of America" groupie with no opionions or ability to think on his own, and not even the sense to know what an oxymoron it is to be in such an organization. It is similar to the Ayn Rand Society which is composed of hangers on who glorify righteious capitalists and their skyscrapers never really doing anything of interest or individuality on their own. These types of groupies can best be compared to the Trekkies, those folks who gather every couple of years with their delusions that Star Trek is reality. Alll of these types need to get real lives and thought processes. When you state a truth or fact that does not fit into Archers groupie persona he calls you a smart aleck.Now the right of association and to join groups or as Archer calls them "collectives" is a basic American right and anyone on this site interested in LIBERTY should come to the defense of that right. My only argument is with the oxymoronic mentality of so called or self-described, or self-proclaimed (lying to themselves) "rugged individualists" who are really just groupies themselves.

What does the phrase "collectivist meaning" mean does anyone know? You've got your numbers wrong Archer. Saints are those that follow their "good intentions" and inclinations. What good intention can come from polluting the earth other than the good of short term profit?

Does this fly in the face of a recent quote that complained about good intentions that may bring another some dubious pleasure. This writer seems to be saying that it is better to follow your inclinations and "good intentions" than to do nothing at all. A good quote for the Global Warming Protagonists to ponder. Saint Al Gore said and I paraphrase "The naysayers will hem and haw, deny and distort, and be reactionary right up to the bitter end." They are thus the complaisant class which will committ the ultimate folly of destroying the environment and mankind. On the other hand the sensitive, good intentioned who follow their inclinations and common sense of what can be easily seen in the world around them (forgetting for a moment the overwhelming evidence and documentation of the scientifc community) may make some mistakes or follies. I prefer the mistakes of the good intentioned to the follies of the complaisant. Law encompasses a reasonable person approach in analysing criminal or civil action against a defendant. I don't think the global warming naysayers are reasonable and time will tell whether or not they are criminal or at least lacking "good intentions" and prone to commit the greater folly "out of complaisance to the world" .

I agree with Logan about the twinkie part except to add that we need philosophical twinkis (if not the real kind) and poetry sometimes. They tell us things in transcendental ways that surpasses thinking and understanding. Like this one, "You are a child of the universe and you have a right to be here." Y'all have a good day.

God prefers obedience over confession and forgiveness although forgiveness is one of His main virtues. Virtue is better then forced compliance. However I sense some basic truth in this quote. Children learn to be in terror of a slap on the hand. I would hazard a bet that their are some people who hesitate murder because of the fear or terror of what will happen to them in return. He loses me in the latter part of his quote.

By putting our thoughts into words and actions we become more aware of them and they may strength and grow and change.

So we have a conscience after all. She ain't saying anything new or profound here.

Essential support and encouragement of what? Society! The statement appears to intend to be a universal one thus we could restate it thusly "OUR society needs to know what only WE can tell it". Thusly we all must be "mad". I agree with this statement. This is the essence of democracy and a free market, where what each of us tell society and the market what we want. The compilation of the individual inputs creates the whole.

Peope who say that mankind has no impact on his environment are looney.They obviously have never been to places like LA. My argument is with the mentality that can not see this. If the whole world were an LA or coal fired industrial England of the Victorian age etcetera where the hell would we be. Just a sincere admittance of the fact would be helpful. Archer says he is a skeptic. Skepticism is born of ignorance. Educated folk weigh the evidence and balance the pros and cons and make considered decisions.

How is my nihilistic enemy today Archer. For a life changing read to learn how we today have been influenced by the middle ages read "Wanining of the Middle Ages" by Huizinga. I don't think you search for truth Archer, you can not search for truth when you have your head in the sand. Having total disregard for others who have studied issues, science etc and snearing down your nose at institutions of higher learning is not searching for truth. It is ignorance.

Of course, all that we are and all that we think is the culmination of the thinking of milleniums of others. Us mortals come and go but the opinions of others (especially those written in books) and the thoughts that we share now and pass on will go on forever. (Carlton who put you up to your non-global warming bandwagon or did you figure it all out by yourself and are you suggesting that just one person came up with global warming and whispered it to someone else etcetera until we got to where we are now. If so you intentionally choose to ignore the studies of hundreds of scientists in hundreds of countries. Why would you do this? What motivates you to do this?)

Interesting.

Yeah what a lousy way to live!

Sometimes Ken it may be better to do something with good intentions than to do nothing at all. Take the immigration fence for example. Also ghetto graffiti has the good intention of being an art form. Some prefer a different type art but the graffiti artist in his own mind is well intentioned.