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["Alan MacHett" <machett AT ibiblio.org>]

Okay, I was painting in broad strokes here, folks.  Although I was
speaking of Don Rua as an individual, I referred to Republican, Free
Market, and Socialism as the overarching terms they are.  Allow me to
demonstrate by rephrasing one of your statements:

  ...which was that /Christianity/ does not ensure
  that individuals act in an unselfish manner, and /Satanism/
  does not ensure that individuals act purely out of greed
  and selfishness.

  That is, I don't see the incompatibility between someone
  describing themselves as a /Christian/ (or /Jew/) and
  an advocate of /oppression/ and /bigotry/, and promoting
  behavior such as...

Which suddenly becomes a ridiculous statement because we all know that,
yes, individuals act however the hell they desire, but the broad
descriptor is supposed to function in a particular fashion.  Christianity,
at its core, is supposed to be good, but of course there are poorly
behaved Christians.  So of course there are charitable Capitalists.

However, we all know that the core of Capitalism is the accumulation and
reinvestment of wealth.  In Capitalism one is supposed to do what's best
for oneself or one's company.  Whereas in Socialism --

No, let's forego that word.  It doesn't mean what I want it to mean.  In
most connotations and denotations, Socialism equals Communism.  I dislike
Communism.  I support private ownership.  I support entrepreneurism.  But
mostly I support a relatively equitable society in which people take care
of each other.  So let us use the word Egalitarianism.

Phillip said, "One of the reasons that Libertarians maintain that
government charity is not needed, is the belief that in the absence of it,
private charity would take it's place."  Eh?  What history books have you
Libertarians been reading?  The whole reason the social support system
came about is because in the absence of "government charity" whole swaths
of the public (workers, the impoverished, non-Whites, women, etc.) were
being screwed.  They're still being screwed.  Capitalism, by it's very
nature, concentrates wealth and power into the hands of a very few, and
those few are loathe to give it up.

I applaud Don Rua for his actions and beliefs.  If everyone acted thusly,
then we might very well live in an Egalitarian society.  But he is an
anomaly.  Capitalism does not teach fairness and charity.  On the
contrary, nearly every lesson and practical application of Capitalism
involves greed.  To wit: Capitalism does not teach one to set a *fair*
price for one's goods, rather you should set the price to *fair market
value* , which isn't fair at all (notice the coopting of the word 'fair')
-- it means set the price to whatever you can get away with.  For example,
someone I know recently began making a product.  She brought samples to
show and told everyone that she planned to sell them for X amount.  She
believed that to be a fair price; it covered the cost of her materials
(and labor?), plus a little extra for profit.  Everyone was shocked. 
That's all!?  They told her that she could sell them for at least twice
that amount, 2X being "fair market value", or what they'd become
accustomed to being the cost of such a product.  So of course that's the
cost she sells them at, not the cost she initially calculated as fair, but
the cost she can get away with.  That is just one example.

Again, if everyone thought like Don (or me (ha!)) then we'd all be happy. 
But we've been living with this system for so long that nearly everyone
buys into it.  And then there's the problem of sheer numbers.  We need
government intervention for the very reason we need government in the
first place -- there are too damn many of us.  In small societies there is
no government per se.  Small groups are self-governing, and for the most
part everyone takes care of everyone else -- no one is allowed to fall by
the wayside, and no one is allowed to get too greedy.  [This, by the way,
is an *extremely* condensed version of an Anthropology class I recall.] 
But when a population reaches a certain point, mechanisms must be set in
place to ensure that everything happens as expected --
!voila!...government.

Now (to bring this around again) if Libertarians think that charity will
happen in the absence of government, do they also think that government
will happen in the absence of government?  Are Libertarians really
Anarchists in disguise?  As a test we could, say, do away with speed
limits, right?  We'll all self-regulate; everyone knows speeding is
dangerous and wastes fuel.  In the absence of speed limits everyone will
drive sensibly anyway, right?  (That's an oversimplified example; don't
take me too literally.)

Anyway, my point is that we should all do well by each other, but there
are too many of us to be trusted in mass; so we need Government to step in
and offer a helping hand.

And, just to round it all out and really make this a mess of a discussion,
I'd like to add that I'm all for less Federal Government and more State
Government (states' rights), but what I'd very much like to see is for the
real power in the country to be handed down to local or regional
governments (getting back to that Anthropological, small-society
concept)...

-Alan

In reference to Phillip Rhodes's messages:
[2]
> OK, fair enough.  That doesn't really have anything to do with
> my overall point, which was that "socialism" does not ensure
> that individuals act in an unselfish manner, and capitalism
> does not ensure that individuals act purely out of greed
> and selfishness.
>
> That is, I don't see the incompatibility between someone
> describing themselves as a Republican (or Libertarian) and
> an advocate of capitalism and free-markets, and promoting
> behavior such as paying "rank and file" employees more than
> management or giving back to the community.
>
[1]
> Why not? Capitalism and Free Market aren't about individuals not giving
> back to the community, etc.  "Socialism" (at least as it's commonly
> understood) is about government based charity.  One of the reasons that
> Libertarians maintain that government charity is not needed, is the
> belief that in the absence of it, private charity would take it's place.
>
> The relative greed and self-centeredness of individuals is really
> a completely separate issue from whether  you live in a socialist
> or capitalistic society.  In Soviet Russia during the height of
> Communism (the ultimate form of Socialism?) where there not individuals
> who managed to accumulate great wealth while others went hungry?
>
> Capitalism and "Free Market" economics do not *necessarily* equal a
> selfish, "me first" attitude on the part of everyone involved. Those
> attitudes transcend political and economic affiliations, IMHO.
>