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Originally Posted by JoshJ  Bullshit. You're basically saying "the government is authoritarian so we should embrace that" rather than trying to fix it. |
Nope, not "we should embrace that." Simply "governments have as much power, and
exactly as much power, as the people give to them, and to say that they don't have that power quickly reduces the argument to absurdity."
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Originally Posted by JoshJ It doesn't help "society" if you drink a beer, unless you want to talk about the money funneled from you to Wal-Mart, from them to Budweiser, from them to their marketing companies, etc; and any currently-illegal drug would have the same positive benefit on society's economy as a whole. |
Actually, I'd call into question that having money go in an ever-increasing spiral of consuming->marketing->back again is actually a waste, ineffecient and a net loss for society. This is one of the fundamental problems I have with the traditional free market approach - it works great when people actually buy based on product quality, but when marketers have the populace figured out, product quality no longer drives their decisions (but that's another thread).
Anyway, I have work tomorrow, I got to get to sleep. I'll be back on tomorrow, unless I've come to my senses and cut my internet connection by then...