Post Here Your Favorite Romney Policy Stances

[giblets]

I would just prefer a society where the powerful have to provide things of value to people in order to get that power. Centuries of empirical data prove this a good idea.

Which brings us around full circle. Mitt Romney

I think historical experience has shown that to be preferable, but people have to accept that even "capitalist" societies will sometimes do bad things and not claim that those things "aren't really capitalist".

Although since the Corn Laws existed for the benefit of land owning aristocrats, someone could reasonably say they weren't a product of capitalism.

[Jaguar]

But import controls aren't really capitalist.

[Hauldren Collider]

Capitalist societies can have aspects that are not capitalist, and it's totally reasonable to blame those on negative effects we don't associate with capitalism.

[Jaguar]

Although since the Corn Laws existed for the benefit of land owning aristocrats, someone could reasonably say they weren't a product of capitalism.

I call DanS on this, but I will respond to it nonetheless.

Many anti-capitalist things exist to benefit the rich, even now. For example, American leftists design inefficient systems and put them through Congress to give themselves high-paying jobs interpreting the red tape.

But of course, as a highly-paid lawyer, you knew that already. Edit: scratch this, I think I confused you with Imran or Wezil or one of the other lawyers on this site.

[giblets]

I call DanS on this, but I will respond to it nonetheless.

Many anti-capitalist things exist to benefit the rich, even now. For example, American leftists design inefficient systems and put them through Congress to give themselves high-paying jobs interpreting the red tape.

But of course, as a highly-paid lawyer, you knew that already. Edit: scratch this, I think I confused you with Imran or Wezil or one of the other lawyers on this site.

I'm in college.

[giblets]

Capitalist societies can have aspects that are not capitalist, and it's totally reasonable to blame those on negative effects we don't associate with capitalism.

Oh come on. It's dumb when Communists cite some definition of communism to claim Gulags had nothing to do with communism. Claiming a capitalist country can have a famine and capitalism is in no way responsible is dumb.

[DaShi]

Are you all having fun in your circlejerk thread? We can play the same game with Obama, if you like. So how about that Guantanamo, guys? Or the whole "if unemployment is over 7% by the end of my next term, I deserve to be a one term president"? Etc.

Obama actually has policy stances to like. Romney, who knows?

[DaShi]

The policy of not being Barack Obama.

Yup, this pretty much sums up his entire campaign. And I can understand people not liking Obama. What I don't understand is why people think he would be a good president.

Frankly, I'm surprised that any Republicans are getting behind him, unless they truly believe that Obama is going to be outstanding in the next four years. Otherwise, let Obama tank the democratic party.

[DaShi]

Of course he deserves to be a one term president.

I disagree. Obama doesn't deserve to be a one-term president. Overall, his policies weren't that bad. They just didn't set the world on fire, which, for some reason, has become the new standard.

[C0ckney]

Another cool thing about Capitalism is that it doesn't have mass starvation.

no but the emerging capitalist system did keep a huge number of people in desperate want, with many on the edge of starvation. the lives of the poor actually got worse in the late 18th and early to mid 19th centuries, even as the total wealth of society increased enormously. things only started to improve for the working classes when laws were introduced to restrain the capitalists. restricting working hours, restricting child labour, that kind of thing.

[Hauldren Collider]

I'm pretty sure almost everyone's lives improved in the 19th century when compared to the 18th century. You're telling me that trains, steamships, and all manner of advances did not improve the lives of the common person? Try again.

In the United States, the labor restrictions you're talking about didn't start to happen until the 1910s or so. I think you would have to be an idiot to make the case that a person in 1905 lived a harsher life than a person in 1805.

[giblets]

Are you basing this on historical data about real wages or are you just assuming new technology -> people better off?

[Fake Boris]

I would just prefer a society where the powerful have to provide things of value to people in order to get that power. Centuries of empirical data prove this a good idea.

Yes, like issuing currency valued on the people's future labor.

[giblets]

Here's an example of something that would actually support the notion that life was improving in the 19th century better than simply calling someone a moron:

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/01/the-malthusian-insult/

[C0ckney]

I'm pretty sure almost everyone's lives improved in the 19th century when compared to the 18th century. You're telling me that trains, steamships, and all manner of advances did not improve the lives of the common person? Try again.

In the United States, the labor restrictions you're talking about didn't start to happen until the 1910s or so. I think you would have to be an idiot to make the case that a person in 1905 lived a harsher life than a person in 1805.

i'm talking about the old world, principally england. the new world is different and things happened differently there.

and if you actually read my post, you can see that i said very clearly, the early to mid 19th centuries. things did start to get better after that.

for example if you look at life expectancy at birth in england. you can see that in 1631 a person could expect to live 38.7 years, in 1831 he could only expect to live 37.6 and in 1871, he could expect to live to 41.3 years old. so we can see that despite the passage of more than two centuries (in fact we can go back to 1571 when life expectancy was 38.2, i.e. better than in the early part of the 19th century), despite the industrial revolution and increase in productivity (which interestingly, wasn't actually that great), people led, on average shorter lives.

also the first factory act in britain which attempted to improve conditions for workers and provide some regulations for child labour (and was actually enforced) was in 1833. i would astonished if the US waited until 1910 to implement similar restrictions.