Thread: Where Do We Draw The Line?

Joe,

IMO the term "nanny state" is severely overused, mostly by those who feel that the gub'ment has no place in telling us what to do. But in truth ANY law restricts freedoms of some sort, so like you say where do we draw the line? After core services opinions will diverge wildly. I'm not sure you'll get any definitive answers from this thread....

I'm beginning to get that idea Ryan....

Now, I like being Canadian, but I wish we would have a serious look at loosening up some restrictions that just seem completely stupid to me.

I'd like to buy my beer at the corner store, I'd like to be able to own and use a shotgun for trap shooting without having to submit myself to privacy invasion....I won't even mention a hand gun for sport shooting.

I was speaking to the owner of a local cigar shop in my area and it seems our government is hell bent on putting him out of business. he can only buy his products from a government authorized distributor and absolutely positively cannot have a smoking section where his clients can sample a cigar or pipe tobacco. it seems that in its efforts to keep us healthy, our government has banned smoking in all business establishments...including those that make their living from smoking and pay their share of taxes. It just seems kinda crazy that this guy has a license to sell perfectly legal products, but does not have the right to let his clients use those products anywhere but in their home.

I'm waiting for the cops to come for me as I enjoy a cigar while on my favorite trout stream

I love this type of discussion started by people who are concerned about the nanny state.
It is a reality that if the government did no mandate certain things, private enterprise / capitalism would not 'compete fairly to the best interest of the consumer'. They would collude, and lie, cheat and steal to get as much money out of your pocket as possible.

And generally, government step in in new areas only when private industry has screwed up.

The EPA was started because industry kept dumping their pollution wherever it was financially most sound without caring about consequences.
The FDA was started because industry was lying about the products and treatments they sold.
There are healthcare regulations precisely because as a society, the majority of the people agree it is wrong to turn away people from the ER if they can't pay.
There are federal roads because some president whose name I forgot discovered that moving troops from one side to the other proved nearly impossible without them.
There are state and federal parks because noone else would pay for them.
And just be glad that energy is regulated or you might have an electricity grid like Japan with 2 different frequencies and voltages.
And while noone really likes them, zoning laws and various regulations keep populated areas livable and limit the ability of 1 griefer to spoil the lives of the entire neighborhood.

If you want to have a society that is greater than a local rural community, you have to accept the fact that that means there will be limitations.

Bruno,

You have articulated your points very well. There's not much I can argue about in your examples, but I do have one little bone to pick

There are certain areas (gas prices are the most obvious one) where government not only turns a blind eye to collusion and price fixing, but actually encourages it.

In the Greater Toronto Area gas prices do not vary by more than 0.5 cents per litre. That's 2 cents a gallon. Every gas station just happens to have the same price at the same time. As if by magic, their price signs all change at exactly the same time to exactly the same price. Now, just in case you don't know, the GTA (Greater Toronto Area) covers about a 40 mile wide stretch and has a population of about 4 million people.

I once talked with an independent gas station owner (they are mostly all gone now) and was very clear...if you don't toe the line and sell at the agreed on price, you simply will not get gas.

I like using the parks system, the roads, the hospitals and libraries, but why do they have to be offset with things like gasoline prices?

Just along the lines Bruno brought up, in just about every case the reason Govt expanded was to deal either with issues the citizens demanded they deal with or to deal with private industries that took advantage of no regulation and put profit ahead of all else. Look at the Govt back in the 1800s when it was small, very small and you will find Govt didn't expand because some bureaucratic was a megalomaniac and just wanted Govt to increase in size.

To me this is all a manufactured issue anyway. When you talk to people about Govt they recite the talking points like a parrot but when you bring up things that affect them directly and specifically they want Govt to be big and bigger.

As far as gas prices go what do you want Govt to do? The prices are mostly driven by investors and speculators and much is outside the U.S Do you want the Govt to set gas prices or tell wholesalers or retailers what they can charge? Now that is big intrusive Govt.

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

As far as gas prices go what do you want Govt to do? The prices are mostly driven by investors and speculators and much is outside the U.S Do you want the Govt to set gas prices or tell wholesalers or retailers what they can charge? Now that is big intrusive Govt.

Nope...I just want them to enforce competition regulations. They investigated Apple with price fixing on e books, they investigate insider trading...

Gasoline is the classic text book case of an oligopoly and there's way too much money that goes between oil companies and government for either side to stir up trouble.

Late edit: between the USA and Canada, we have enough oil to be self sufficient for much longer than it would take to come up with alternative fuels. Here's the reality; we can keep buying oil from theocratic dictatorships that have no concern for freedom or we can use our own oil, which is many orders of magnitude more ethical and will build our economy and make more jobs and prosperity. The tired old story of oil prices being driven up by speculators outside our respective countries is wearing thin. We both lost an opportunity recently with the keystone pipeline proposal. The US ends up still feeding the sheiks of Saudi Arabia and Canada has to sell its oil to China...talk about a lose-lose situation.

But that's a different topic altogether

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

When you talk to people about Govt they recite the talking points like a parrot but when you bring up things that affect them directly and specifically they want Govt to be big and bigger.

My favorite slogan along these lines was 'Get your gov hands off my Medicare!'.

Originally Posted by joebehar

We both lost an opportunity recently with the keystone pipeline proposal.

It's not as simple. The cost of using your tar sands is pretty steep. That is if you factor in all the costs many of which are currently externalized. The numbers I saw were about $120/barel, so if the oil price drops below you loose money. The whole process was started with political deals and not a result of free market calculation of cost vs. benefit.

Originally Posted by Bruno

I love this type of discussion started by people who are concerned about the nanny state.
It is a reality that if the government did no mandate certain things, private enterprise / capitalism would not 'compete fairly to the best interest of the consumer'. They would collude, and lie, cheat and steal to get as much money out of your pocket as possible.

And those in government never collude, and lie, cheat and steal to get as much money out of your pocket as possible? The difference is that you have a choice not to participate with private industry. If you allow yourself to be fooled into participation by their tactics, especially when you should know better, then shame on you. If you refuse to participate with mandates of government, regardless if those mandates are legitimate or not, then the government can seize you or your property. Which would you prefer?

And in response to the OP:

It seems that we often forget that the line already exists in the form of our constitution which defines the rule of law that our government must follow. If we fail, or neglect, to read, understand and enforce the rules of the game, then it's anyone's game. And then who's to decide if the game was fairly played or not?

Originally Posted by honedright

And those in government never collude, and lie, cheat and steal to get as much money out of your pocket as possible? The difference is that you have a choice not to participate with private industry. If you allow yourself to be fooled into participation by their tactics, especially when you should know better, then shame on you. If you refuse to participate with mandates of government, regardless if those mandates are legitimate or not, then the government can seize you or your property. Which would you prefer?

+100 if you're counting on the government to be the arbitor of fair equitable and honest...Wow! let me know how that works out for ya. By definition, life is not fair and nothing is equal. If one of the "dastardly Capitalists" has the tumerity to make more money than I do, good for him. Don't know about you but I never got a paycheck from anyone who makes less money than me. I have less than zero problem with laws and legislation keeping opportunities equal. Results however should be left to the individual. Otherwise where's the incentive to work hard or do anything exceptional? In any such "egalitarian" economy, citizens regardless of their unique talents, intelligence and work ethic, become little more than farm animals, queuing up at the government trough at the appointed time. The only thing being equally distributed is misery. Unless of course you're part of the government elite, in which case, you have the best of everything while the common folks at best have whatever is left. It really is like a sophisticated intellectual exercise in slopping the hogs and guess what, most of us are hogs. Thanks but no.

So anyone hear about Obama signing legislation making it a felony to protest the president/elected leaders? free speach anyone?? just saying...