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View Full Version : What would you rather have, Economy OR Liberty? (Not Both)




DamianTV
02-04-2011, 05:35 AM
"We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and liberty or profusion and servitude. If we run into such debt, as that we must be taxed in our meat and in our drink, in our necessaries and our comforts, in our labors and our amusements, for our calling and our creeds...we have no time to think, no means of calling our miss-managers to account but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow-sufferers. And this is the tendency of all human governments. A departure from principle in one instance becomes a precedent for another till the bulk of society is reduced to be mere automatons of misery. And the fore-horse of this frightful team is public debt. Taxation follows that, and in its train wretchedness and oppression."

(Link (http://www.rense.com/general78/liberty.htm))

If you had to choose between either a stable Economy, or Liberty, but could NOT have both, what would you choose and why?

I know it is not what Jefferson said in his choice, but it is the choice I offer to you, because it is the same choice that we are all being offered.

Gaius1981
02-04-2011, 05:39 AM
I think you're misinterpreting the quote. The first choice is liberty AND economy, and the second choice is profusion AND servitude. There is no "liberty OR economy."

With liberty you'll have a free economy, so libertarians would naturally go for that. A free and dynamic economy is preferable to a "stable" one in any case.

Travlyr
02-04-2011, 05:53 AM
If you had to choose between either a stable Economy, or Liberty, but could NOT have both, what would you choose and why?

I know it is not what Jefferson said in his choice, but it is the choice I offer to you, because it is the same choice that we are all being offered.

You present a false choice, and that is not what we are being offered today. We are currently enslaved with a debt monetary system which President Jefferson warned us to avoid.

A stable economy is only possible using real money which is liberty. In other words, an unstable debt monetary system steals liberty.

AlexMerced
02-04-2011, 05:55 AM
A good economy is a reflection of Liberty, but in the instance it decoupled I rather live poor and free than rich and controlled

Sola_Fide
02-04-2011, 05:57 AM
Great quote nonetheless!

noxagol
02-04-2011, 07:51 AM
Well, liberty duh. Liberty will bring economy.

fisharmor
02-04-2011, 08:00 AM
Well, liberty duh. Liberty will bring economy.

Also, I'm pretty sure the Soviets proved that economy without liberty doesn't work out real well, either.

Koz
02-04-2011, 08:01 AM
I agree, this is a false choice and not currently what we are being offered. I hate to disparage on this forum, but this is a worthless poll.

CUnknown
02-04-2011, 11:07 AM
The concept that you could ever have a prosperous economy without liberty is foolish. Because your masters will take away anything you earn, obviously...

Pericles
02-04-2011, 11:25 AM
Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!

Zack
02-04-2011, 01:13 PM
I think it's a shame that people are afraid to look at this question. It's a pretty important one. People understand that people have had to give up their lives for freedom, but they somehow don't want to believe that people have had to give up their prosperity for freedom. Guess what? Losing most of your young male population in a war isn't too great for your economy.

In the long term, the idea that more freedom will be more efficient and breed more prosperity is a kind of a truism, duh. But not necessarily for YOUR generation, or even your childrens. I could give a lot of examples of wars of independence that back up that point. Some that went on decade after decade. Sometimes your generation has to pay for freedom with blood, treasure, or both.

But I don't even need to give the example of full scale war and and people dying to make the point. Let's imagine a United States of 50 years from now. Despite our best efforts, the march to centralization and statism has continued without missing a beat, (very plausible scenario I think. dollar crash, or no) but one of the free state projects (let's say NH) has also grown massively and has enough popular sentiment locally to declare independence from the union. D.C. makes one overstep too many (perhaps mandatory biometric chips for newborns) and NH decides to leave the union. The U.S. naturally doesn't recognize this and considers NH part of the union, but doesn't want to deal with the images of people dying on the news, so doesn't bring in the military. They don't have to. They can cut off trade with all the "lawful" states until the "crazy manipulators" in charge in NH come to their senses. They can also use their influence over other countries to keep most of them from trading with NH without even setting up a blockade. This could go on for some time.

Guess what that means? Almost certainly more freedom for the people in that geographic area, and almost certainly less wealth. Or I should maybe say "tangible wealth" or "tradable wealth". What is the kind of wealth you value? Is it a wealth of freedom? It was a good question, I think. Sure, more freedom is more efficient economically. But what if it's not more efficient for you?

I chose liberty, and am glad to see the poll standing at 15 to 0.

pcosmar
02-04-2011, 01:24 PM
Liberty.
The economy will then take care of itself.

I don't want to be a rich slave.

A gilded cage is still a cage.

Travlyr
02-04-2011, 01:30 PM
While dying for the freedom of others is honorable, nobody who dies is free. Enslavement is the result of a debt monetary system; freedom is the result of an honest asset based monetary system. That is what President Jefferson was referring to. I too choose liberty, and that is why I promote Honest Sound Money for liberty, peace, and prosperity, and the way to achieve it by implementing A Cross of Gold in my signature line.

emazur
02-04-2011, 02:16 PM
I couldn't answer b/c you didn't specify if you chose economy, how much liberty would there be? I'll give you an example - let's suppose we lived in a society w/o income or SS/Medicare taxes, and taxes/tariffs considered necessary to run the state were a very small burden, business regulations were minimal, and there were no public schools. On the freedom side, suppose drugs/prostitution/abortion/homosexual acts were completely illegal. I'd take economy over liberty here b/c none of those civil liberty issues directly affects me. Turn it up a notch and say alcohol and porn was illegal. That affects me a little but I'd be more than willing to give those up for an extremely low tax burden, free market economy. But start throwing other shit at me like no right to free speech, no right to criticize government, censorship, no right to live where I want, no right to raise more than 1 child, etc and at some point I'd take liberty over free economy.

Zack
02-04-2011, 02:39 PM
I'd take economy over liberty here b/c none of those civil liberty issues directly affects me.

I was under the impression that few people here recognize any supposed distinction between economic and civil liberties. I think the question was more between how much you value your freedom (of expression, association, property, etc.) vs. living in a state that didn't recognize your freedoms, but one way or another made its citizens more wealthy, so far as stability of resources and possesions are concerned.

Brian4Liberty
02-04-2011, 02:53 PM
True Economy (for all) and liberty are related. If your liberty is gone, you will no doubt be a slave. But is that good "economy"? If everyone is successful in a thriving economy, liberty always flows from that. And likewise, true liberty for all will result in "better economy" for everyone.

What we have now is a better and better economy for the ruling class. Is that how we want to define a "good economy"?

Fox McCloud
02-04-2011, 02:56 PM
I don't think it's even really possible to decouple the two; if people are restricted, their economy will tend to be poorer; if they tend to be free to do as they please, it'll tend to be wealthier.

There are a few exceptions, but on the whole, that's the the trend--most of us here will agree Singapore's social laws are quite silly...but you'd be hard pressed to find someone that would suggest that Singapore was as draconian as, say, the USSR or even China.

DamianTV
02-04-2011, 05:27 PM
Im glad you guys did so well on the test. The answer was right in Jeffersons quote, which sums it up so very well right there. Liberty and Economy go hand in hand.

There is a deeper idea here, and a lot of you guys touched right on it.

The Debt Slave.

The important thing about the Debt Slave is more than just being financially burdened to pay bills and having to work for some employer. The idea is that when the Debt Slave has to go work for the employer, they choose to give up their Liberties to the Employer. When someone gets a job, they are usually expected without saying to not say anything negative about that company. Thus, Freedom of Speech goes out the window. If they have a Facebook profile, they can be terminated for unrelated material on their Facebook page. Freedom of Privacy goes bye bye. Unless a person is a cop, working in security, or is directly related to some sort of a job where guns are the focus of the job, Freedom to Bear Arms goes away. Most jobs (with exceptions like I said, cop, security, etc) dont exactly let you bring a sidearm to work. Smoke a joint and the paycheck vanishes on one of the employers random drug tests. A person doesnt necessarily have to be convicted of wrongdoing or misconduct, thus just being accused of Sexual Harassment is good enough to terminate a workers state of employ. Innocent until proven Guilty. The list goes on and on. Cut your hair a certain way, put on this Uniform, do what I tell you to do and think the way you are told to think. The mind is the last great resource, and it, too, is quickly being depleted. And the Harvester is Corporate America, which sees to separate people from both their Freedom AND Economy.

How many Freedoms and Liberties do people actually give up just to have jobs? Now, if you do have a job and work for someone else, do you really walk the walk of how you voted?

libertybrewcity
02-04-2011, 06:12 PM
you can't really have economy without liberty. a regulated economy is a distorted economy, not a real economy.

Kylie
02-04-2011, 06:19 PM
Im glad you guys did so well on the test. The answer was right in Jeffersons quote, which sums it up so very well right there. Liberty and Economy go hand in hand.

There is a deeper idea here, and a lot of you guys touched right on it.

The Debt Slave.

The important thing about the Debt Slave is more than just being financially burdened to pay bills and having to work for some employer. The idea is that when the Debt Slave has to go work for the employer, they choose to give up their Liberties to the Employer. When someone gets a job, they are usually expected without saying to not say anything negative about that company. Thus, Freedom of Speech goes out the window. If they have a Facebook profile, they can be terminated for unrelated material on their Facebook page. Freedom of Privacy goes bye bye. Unless a person is a cop, working in security, or is directly related to some sort of a job where guns are the focus of the job, Freedom to Bear Arms goes away. Most jobs (with exceptions like I said, cop, security, etc) dont exactly let you bring a sidearm to work. Smoke a joint and the paycheck vanishes on one of the employers random drug tests. A person doesnt necessarily have to be convicted of wrongdoing or misconduct, thus just being accused of Sexual Harassment is good enough to terminate a workers state of employ. Innocent until proven Guilty. The list goes on and on. Cut your hair a certain way, put on this Uniform, do what I tell you to do and think the way you are told to think. The mind is the last great resource, and it, too, is quickly being depleted. And the Harvester is Corporate America, which sees to separate people from both their Freedom AND Economy.

How many Freedoms and Liberties do people actually give up just to have jobs? Now, if you do have a job and work for someone else, do you really walk the walk of how you voted?




That is precisely why I work for myself now. Yeah, I have bosses, but we have a relationship that is on our terms, not "policy".

A verbal contract, if you will.

I like it alot better than being told what I can and can't do in my private life by some corporate bureaucrat.

DamianTV
02-04-2011, 06:48 PM
Does anyone want to put this poll up on other Forums that you guys visit? Im curious to see if people think the same way on say the McCain or Obama forums or whatever else is out there...