The Romantic View of the Past is a Bunch of Happy Horseshit

[curl]

a moderator threatened to shut down the thread in which the above comment appeared...twice...if the conversation continued down that tangent. i respect the moderators discretion to keep threads from degenerating or going off on some non topical direction.
still i have a hard time letting some comments just hang out there without taking them up on the implied invitation to engage with them. However, if the moderators want to lock this thread, that’s fine – I respect their discretion on this forum.
my argument against today's administrative state is not based on a harkening back to some simpler blissful horse and buggy past. nor is it based on a determination to burn down the entire federal govt. these are two of the typical answers to the argument that the federal govt is too big for its britches.
my bias against the big administrative state starts out with my bias towards liberty solutions to problems, especially economic or financial or business problems. everyone's got problems, but when we add and subtract them all together, they pretty much cancel each other out. it's a big mistake for the national govt to take sides in problems that are essentially self correcting. And it shouldn't surprise anyone whose side the govt normally takes.
Big govt ain’t a necessary adjunct to our modern economy or modern culture. In other words, our economy is modern, but big govt isn’t. big govt itself is a harkening back to the good days of kings and dictators. The public good is just a new and improved way to say divine right of kings. Another way to think of big govt is that we’ve wondered off on a tangent away from the liberty solutions method our founders handed off to us. Peeling back the layers of govt regulation ain’t a return to olden times; it’s a course correction.

 

[sfsteves]

Curl said:

... it's a big mistake for the national govt to take sides in problems that are essentially self correcting.

... big govt ain’t a necessary adjunct to our modern economy or modern culture ... our economy is modern, but big govt isn’t. big govt itself is a harkening back to the good days of kings and dictators. The public good is just a new and improved way to say divine right of kings. Another way to think of big govt is that we’ve wondered off on a tangent away from the liberty solutions method our founders handed off to us. Peeling back the layers of govt regulation ain’t a return to olden times; it’s a course correction.

Curl, that encapsulates my views on government quite nicely ...

 

[numbersix]

Curl - the mods here are pretty strict with political posts. The object is to avoid flame wars and keep us a bunch of happy pipesmokers.
You might want to try here instead:
http://www.reddit.com/r/politics
With over 3 million people willing and able to argue any and all points.

 

[layinpipe]

Curl, AGREED. That is as far as i will go.
Also i will second what JYD said, about the awesomeness of the title. Yeah, this thread will probably get deleted as it is politically charged and that's one of the golden rules. Agree or disagree, that's what it is.

 

[woodsroad]

Don't let your rejection of romanticism of the past eclipse the stunning reality of history.

 

[tuold]

On the other hand there are forum rules we agreed to when signing up. No political threads and no discussing moderator decisions are two those rules. As is constantly pointed out when this comes up, there are endless discussion boards on political topics and very few about pipes. Personally, I'd rather focus on the things that unite us and not the ideas that may divide us.

 

[condorlover1]

I believe it was the bard who once said 'Kill all moderators!" then I remembered it was a reference to removing lawyers and not poor under appreciated moderators. Actually being a moderator is one job I would happily volunteer for on this forum - a sort of Judge Jeffrey's! Its a fun thread but lads we really cannot do this one as it breaches the terms on the back of the box when you joined. If we are not careful we will wind up with a thread on National Socialist Pipe Smokers or worse. Just in case anyone was wonder I have not left for the UK yet until Monday but thank you for asking!

 

[papipeguy]

I guess I'm not drunk enough yet to understand just what the point of all this is supposed to be. Will revisit later after 6 scotches.

 

[daimyo]

Politics... causing trouble since we were dumb enough to invent them. Yet, humans are not ready to take full responsibility for themselves or each other yet either. So at the end of the day, all political ideals from anarchy to totalitarianism, have the seeds of their destruction sewn in their creation. I personally enjoy this site being about pipes not politics, so I have no problem with the mods keeping it that way.

 

[mso489]

Many people like history because they are insulated from the cruelty and risk. To imagine that you

are the knight who always kills scores of enemy knights and lance men with swift smooth swings

of your sword is one thing. To have an arrow drive through your armor and into your lungs is quite

another question. That's my notion on the romanticizing of history. I agree with the moderators.

A good political discussion requires more moderation, self-control, and self-governance that most

of us have, as we may see from the U.S. Congress on both sides of the aisle and most of the current

governments of the world. I really enjoy the pipe and tobacco discussions on Forums.

 

[latbomber]

Oh lawd, protect meh from duh guvmunt...

I guess I'm not drunk enough yet to understand just what the point of all this is supposed to be. Will revisit later after 6 scotches.

Me too! :D

 

[drwatson]

This isn't going to end well!

 

[pipesinperu]

Yeah, I'm just going to bite my tongue on the politics and +1 this:

Personally, I'd rather focus on the things that unite us and not the ideas that may divide us.

I like that I can come here and have something in common with people who, if we saw each other in the street (and we weren't smoking pipes!), we might prejudge each other and never speak. This community, its generosity, and general positivity has definitely played a big part in my enjoyment of this hobby as I've gotten involved in it over the last half a year or so.

 

[saint007]

I hear you loud & clear Curl!
That's why I am a registered Libertarian.
I want the big nanny out of my life.

 

[metarzan]

Tarzan prefer way of jungle.

 

[yazamitaz]

LMAO John

 

[condorlover1]

+Metarzan I saw recently a rather fun ditty about Tarzan in the jungle having lots of playing noughts and crosses on O's bum! We have to lift the tone here a little. Any thoughts?

 

[ravkesef]

There are two things to say about this. First, if we look to the Bible, we find in the book of Ecclesiastes the comment: "do not say that the former days were better than these, for it is not out of wisdom that you say this." I think that's a pretty accurate quote and demonstrates a little bit of scriptural wisdom. The second and most significant, is that political comments of any sort are not permitted on this forum. This is a pipe smoking forum, and your comments should be restricted to that. If you want to talk about tobacco taxes, or big government intruding on our rights as smokers, that's a different thing but don't change the subject and get into the topic of big government or anything of that sort, because that's not the kind of forum this is. You are certainly entitled to your views, and maybe there's somebody on this forum who dearly loves big government. But this is not the place for the two of you to engage in warfare about it. Stick to pipe smoking; that's why we came here, that's what we want to see, and anything else is an unwelcome intrusion on our rights as pipe smokers.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

Personally, I'd rather focus on the things that unite us and not the ideas that may divide us.

Another +1

 

[metarzan]

“I do not understand exactly what you mean by fear," said Tarzan. "Like lions, fear is a different thing in different men, but to me the only pleasure in the hunt is the knowledge that the hunted thing has power to harm me as much as I have to harm him. If I went out with a couple of rifles and a gun bearer, and twenty or thirty beaters, to hunt a lion, I should not feel that the lion had much chance, and so the pleasure of the hunt would be lessened in proportion to the increased safety which I felt."
"Then I am to take it that Monsieur Tarzan would prefer to go naked into the jungle, armed only with a jackknife, to kill the king of beasts," laughed the other good naturedly, but with the merest touch of sarcasm in his tone.
"And a piece of rope," added Tarzan.”