Re: POLITICS - Private vs. Public (was Supporting WAPF or not)

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 2/18/05 1:56:34 AM Eastern Standard Time,

t.l.jeanne@... writes:

> I agree with most of your response. But would you disagree that in practice

> today, the vast majority of private organizations are overwhelmingly self-

> serving and not interested in the long-term public good, whereas the vast

> majority of public organizations serve the public with good intentions,

> however misguided, wrongheaded, poorly run, or corrupted by the influence

of

> private organizations they may be?

____

No, I'd disagree on several points. First, I'm really not sure how to go

about quantifying it. Do we go by mere number of organizations, or do we go by

degree of impact, or size? Also, since " public " organizations are

governmental, do we consider, say, the Federal government to be one

organization, or do we

consider each department, or each program, etc, to be one organization?

I assume by self-serving you mean serving the interests of private profit at

the expense of the greater good. This is problematic in that no individual or

group can participate in a market without offering good to others. In many

cases there are harmful consequences too (for example, a company might provide

electricity or other fuel that prevents people from dying in cold winters and

fuels air conditioners and fans that prevents elderly from dying in heat

waves, yet also pollutes the environment in doing so. How do you quantify the

benefits and harms?)

It isn't clear to me how the public hospitals in my state are doing anything

different than the private hospitals, but it IS clear to me that all the

medical establishments that are doing things RIGHT by our standards are private.

It's also clear to me that the Weston A Price Foundation, the farmers that are

growing healthy food on healthy soil and pasturing their animals, the farmers

selling raw milk from grass-fed cows, not to mention other groups you'd

probably perceive as serving the greater good such as environmental groups,

consumer

advocates, etc, are all private.

I quite definitely disagree strongly that most public organizations serve the

greater good and are just severely " misguided, " at least the public

organizations that have any significant impact. There's plenty of documentation

indicating that the FDA, parts of the public scientific establishment, etc, have

engaged or do engage in outright malice and are corrupted. Many people question

the personal motives of Bush II and co. in the Iraq war, too.

_____

> This is the generalization that I'm trying

> to make. Heidi made a similar generalization to which you responded with

two

> specific counter examples. Two examples don't magically discount a

> generalization any more than a generalization doesn't magically hold true

> with no exceptions.

_____

Yes, but I don't think the generalization holds true at all. It would be

just as naive to believe that public government always holds the (mythical)

" public interest " to heart as it would be to believe that the only thing my oil

company cares about is that I'm nice and toasty all the time, that the

environment is preserved, and that there's peace in the middle east.

____

> I was not aware of this. I'm a bit skeptical. Give me your source, please.

____

It's right on the website. I haven't read it in a while, but that's

Mercola's claim.

____

> What about his bestselling books? You're saying that he puts all the

> royalties into the website?

____

I didn't say that. I said the stuff he sells on his website. If he sells

the book on his website, then he probably gets an affiliate commission from

Amazon or wherever for selling the book, which would be a proceed that would go

into the website. The royalty he'd get from the publisher would be separate and

not considered a proceed from the sale of the website.

_____

> What about his private patients at his Illinois

> clinic?

____

I don't think he sells them on his website.

____

> I would guess that many of them come in after reading his website,

> and surely his physician fees are not going to www.mercola.com.

____

I think it would be a stretch to assume that his claim that the proceeds from

the items sold through his website go back into the website include his

patient fees.

____

I do think

> that he's basically a wonderful guy doing wonderful things and I subscribed

> to his newsletter for years, but I'm always wary of people who start

amassing

> power and influence while maintaining an image of virtue. History tells us

> that it's usually too good to be true. It's just tough to do that if you're

a

> human being. If he's doing it, great!

_____

Great indeed.

Chris

____

" What can one say of a soul, of a heart, filled with compassion? It is a

heart which burns with love for every creature: for human beings, birds, and

animals, for serpents and for demons. The thought of them and the sight of them

make the tears of the saint flow. And this immense and intense compassion,

which flows from the heart of the saints, makes them unable to bear the sight of

the smallest, most insignificant wound in any creature. Thus they pray

ceaselessly, with tears, even for animals, for enemies of the truth, and for

those

who do them wrong. "

--Saint Isaac the Syrian

[Guest guest]

>This is problematic in that no individual or

>group can participate in a market without offering good to others

No, no entity can participate in a market without offering PERCEIVED

good to others.

-

[Guest guest]

>>This is problematic in that no individual or

>>group can participate in a market without offering good to others

>

> No, no entity can participate in a market without offering

> PERCEIVED

> good to others.

>

> -

And PR people are good at PeRceiving good from any good, wheather it's

really good or not.

Wanita

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[Guest guest]

In a message dated 2/22/05 10:43:19 PM Eastern Standard Time,

Idol@... writes:

> >This is problematic in that no individual or

> >group can participate in a market without offering good to others

>

> No, no entity can participate in a market without offering

PERCEIVED

> good to others.

_____

Correct, I mis-spoke. However, these are essentially the same, except in the

case of fraud and dishonesty (which are, admittedly, common) because good is

necessarily subjective and therefore relativistic from an economic point of

view, therefore what one person believes is good for another can't trump the

other's view of what is good for himself.

But definitely a valid point. The pushers of aspartame, for example, offer

nothing but bad to people even by their own considerations, if they were to

know what they were consuming in it.

Chris

____

" What can one say of a soul, of a heart, filled with compassion? It is a

heart which burns with love for every creature: for human beings, birds, and

animals, for serpents and for demons. The thought of them and the sight of them

make the tears of the saint flow. And this immense and intense compassion,

which flows from the heart of the saints, makes them unable to bear the sight of

the smallest, most insignificant wound in any creature. Thus they pray

ceaselessly, with tears, even for animals, for enemies of the truth, and for

those

who do them wrong. "

--Saint Isaac the Syrian

[Guest guest]

Chris-

> > >This is problematic in that no individual or

> > >group can participate in a market without offering good to others

> >

> > No, no entity can participate in a market without offering

>PERCEIVED

> > good to others.

>_____

>

>Correct, I mis-spoke. However, these are essentially the same, except in the

>case of fraud and dishonesty (which are, admittedly, common) because good is

>necessarily subjective and therefore relativistic from an economic point of

>view, therefore what one person believes is good for another can't trump the

>other's view of what is good for himself.

In addition to fraud and dishonesty, there's simple error. And if you

admit that all three are common (or even exist at all) then it's absurd to

say that because good is subjective, we might as well say that no entity

can participate in a market without offering good to others.

Heck, why bother having words at all, if definitions are so fluid that

anything and everything can be encompassed within them? It's productive,

meaningful and illuminating to say that no entity can participate in a free

market without offering perceived good to others. It's clear and

accurate. It's obfuscatory to use your formulation.

-

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 2/23/05 5:57:50 PM Eastern Standard Time,

Idol@... writes:

> In addition to fraud and dishonesty, there's simple error. And if you

> admit that all three are common (or even exist at all) then it's absurd to

> say that because good is subjective, we might as well say that no entity

> can participate in a market without offering good to others.

____

I didn't mean to say that; I apologize for appearing to defend what I

referred to as having misspoken. I thought the latter paragraphs clarified

that, but

I can see how the paragraph you quoted gave the misimpression.

I meant it to make it's own point-- that we can't judge another's good by our

own values.

Your point, that fraud, deception, and error are common, is valid and I agree

with it.

_____

> Heck, why bother having words at all, if definitions are so fluid that

> anything and everything can be encompassed within them? It's productive,

> meaningful and illuminating to say that no entity can participate in a

free

> market without offering perceived good to others. It's clear and

> accurate. It's obfuscatory to use your formulation.

_____

Yes, that's why I agreed it was a misconstruction. I apologize again for

obscuring my admission by drowning it out with other points.

Chris

____

" What can one say of a soul, of a heart, filled with compassion? It is a

heart which burns with love for every creature: for human beings, birds, and

animals, for serpents and for demons. The thought of them and the sight of them

make the tears of the saint flow. And this immense and intense compassion,

which flows from the heart of the saints, makes them unable to bear the sight of

the smallest, most insignificant wound in any creature. Thus they pray

ceaselessly, with tears, even for animals, for enemies of the truth, and for

those

who do them wrong. "

--Saint Isaac the Syrian