Hi Ham, > At 2:22 PM on 10/2, Chris Ivarsson said to Bo: > > > The reason why I see it as the most natural thing in the world > > for a MOQist to sympathise with the general ideas and themes > > of Marxism is because it can be categorized as a recipe for > > rearranging social patterns to serve the intellectual level: > > something that is evolutionary moral in the MOQ view. > > Earlier you had said . . . > > > I take my cue as to what marks the intellectual vs. society > > conflict from Pirsig: > > > > "The New Deal was many things, but at the center of it all > > was the belief that intellectual planning by the government > > was necessary for society to regain its health." (Lila, 22) > > > > The same belief is active today as witness the Wall Street > > bailout bill just passed in our Senate. > > Platt, how is it possible for Chris to use Pirsig's philosophy to support > Marxism, while you use it to support Capitalism? It just goes to show > that, > like statistics, a quotation in the hands of a clever politican can be > construed to justify any position.
Except Chris doesn't (and can't) use quotations from the MOQ to support his Marxist mindset. > Both of you might find F.A. Hayek's 'Road to Serfdom' of interest. > (Platt, > I know you're aware of this book, published in 1944, because you mentioned > the title a few days ago.) I'll be running a condensed version of Hayek's > chapter "The Great Utopia" in next week's Values Page. You could almost > imagine he was talking about the bailout in this excerpt: > > "Democratic assemblies cannot function as planning agencies. They cannot > produce agreement on everything - the whole direction of the resources of > the nation-for the number of possible courses of action will be legion. > Even if a congress could, by proceeding step by step and compromising at > each point, agree on some scheme, it would certainly in the end satisfy > nobody. > > "To draw up an economic plan in this fashion is even less possible than, > for > instance, successfully to plan a military campaign by democratic > procedure. > As in strategy it would become inevitable to delegate the task to experts. > And even if, by this expedient, a democracy should succeed in planning > every > sector of economic activity, it would still have to face the problem of > integrating these separate plans into a unitary whole. There will be a > stronger and stronger demand that some board or some single individual > should be given power to act on their own responsibility. The cry for an > economic dictator is a characteristic stage in the movement toward > planning. > Thus the legislative body will be reduced to choosing the persons who are > to > have practically absolute power. The whole system will tend toward that > kind of dictatorship in which the head of the government is position by > popular vote, but where he has all the powers at his command to make > certain > that the vote will go in the direction he desires. Planning leads to > dictatorship because dictatorship is the most effective instrument of > coercion and, as such, essential if central planning on a large scale is > to > be possible. ..." --[F.A. Hayek: Road to Serfdom] Hayek's "The Road to the Serfdom" ought to be required reading in every Economics 101 class. Fat chance in today's leftist-sotted academia. Thanks for the above excerpt. Warm regards, Platt Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
