On my way home from work yesterday, I was listening to the NPR (National Public Radio) and heard about President Chávez calling President Bush "the Devil". Chávez went on to say that the smell of his sulfur is in the air. !!! Wow. "Diplomacy" in the UN doesn't usually exceed a certain threshold, but that is waaaaay over it, no? According to the radio report, the last 'event' in the UN was when someone took off their shoe and banged it on their desk to gain the attention of the assembly.
An interesting intersection of events: I was recently refered to Noam Chomsky's site by a housemate of mine who is a political moderate (neither liberal or conservative). Chomsky's book "Hegemony or Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance" was recommended by Chávez during the UN session, and Chomsky is apparently highly influential in political thought (and has obviously helped to shape Chávez' views).
So, this is all interesting.
In addition, my friend Eric has mentioned what he deems to be the flaw of Libertarianism as being that it requires a degree of intelligence not found in the common populace, and so it is not possible. This Chomsky fellow calls himself a libertarian socialist. Does he know better than Eric in believing that Libertarianism is possible? Chomsky also calls himself a sympathizer of anarcho-syndicalism.
I think I need to learn more about these things. There's quite a lot on wikipedia about different political ideologies. With all of these complex fields of thought, just Democratic vs Republican seems pretty simple, eh?
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The if intelligence is the only problem, the answer to Libertarianism is education. Unfortunately, there are other problems too. Most democratic styles either assume a high level of moral idealism, or a low veiw of the "common populace". I find myself sympathizing with libertarian socialists, while understanding that it could only work in a quite isolated way, which we may never see again on this tiny planet. After watching how labor unions work in the US, I have little interest in a nation that is run that way, and anarcho-syndicalism just scares me.
like I said, I need to learn more about this stuff. I haven't read the articles on libertarian or anarcho-syndicalism yet. I'll get around to it later this evening. I don't think I gave Eric justice for his reasons why he doesn't consider libertarianism to be a viable system. I should change it to say, "one of the reasons" instead of "the reason".
Thanks for putting up the pictures of this past weekend.
Chavez is a typical dictator - blame all your problems on others. He's lucky he has oil or he'd be in a real fix. One of his very best friends has been Robert Mugabe.
"Mugabe takes a similar cant (except his country's in shambles - having no oil): President Robert Mugabe denies claims that government policies, including land reforms, have contributed to the problems - instead blaming domestic and foreign enemies for the country's difficulties." BBC News
Not to be too stereotypical, but Chavez and Mugabe are taking leaves out of Hitler's book. Blame someone else for your problems, and your support skyrockets.
I think my reasons are:
1. Lack of raw intelligence in pretty much everyone, the world is just too complex.
2. It isn't always in an individual's worldly self interest to aim for the good of the whole.
But, I do think it is an ideal to regulate people as little as possible. On the other hand, no matter what, probably all of us want some guidance in reaching our goals. Everyone reinventing the wheel for themselves just gets boring after awhile. However, this guidance is not followed out of compulsion, but out of trust and desire.
Politics and pol. ideologies are complicated! When it comes to ideologies there are so many groups which are again divided into sub-groups. There's not just left and right but on each side one finds various sections, groups inbetween, groups that take something of both sides or cannot even be labelled!
And when it comes to politics it's even more complicated. To get an opinion is easy but to have an objective one?
Everything we get to know about politics is from either a party's campaign or from the media. So already here we cannot start from a neutral ground.
What am I trying to say? I don't know too much about Chomsky's political views though I heard he is active in that area. I think he should stick to linguistics. He is an expert on that. The little I heard about his pol. views doesn't convince me. It seems to unrealistic and radical to me.
Jonathan, I don't think it is right to call Chavez a dictator. After all he's been elected. He is a typical politician by blaming others for one's ow mistakes. What he does and says (e.g. in the UN assembly) seems weird to me and he probably is doing some bad things in his country and by siding with that, excuse me, demonic-psycho-Iranian President. But still he is no dictator. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez)
The world is not just two sides, the good guys and the bad guys.
I'm glad I don't have to put my trust in politicians. And even though here in Germany I more or less side with one party I still don't have to say Yes and Amen to all they do and think. I usually vote for the CDU (christian democratic union) which is a conservative party. Chancelor Merkel is from that party, for instance. They are in the same international association as the US-Republicans.
Politics and pol. ideologies are complicated! When it comes to ideologies there are so many groups which are again divided into sub-groups. There's not just left and right but on each side one finds various sections, groups inbetween, groups that take something of both sides or cannot even be labelled!
And when it comes to politics it's even more complicated. To get an opinion is easy but to have an objective one?
Everything we get to know about politics is from either a party's campaign or from the media. So already here we cannot start from a neutral ground.
What am I trying to say? I don't know too much about Chomsky's political views though I heard he is active in that area. I think he should stick to linguistics. He is an expert on that. The little I heard about his pol. views doesn't convince me. It seems to unrealistic and radical to me.
Jonathan, I don't think it is right to call Chavez a dictator. After all he's been elected. He is a typical politician by blaming others for one's ow mistakes. What he does and says (e.g. in the UN assembly) seems weird to me and he probably is doing some bad things in his country and by siding with that, excuse me, demonic-psycho-Iranian President. But still he is no dictator. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez)
The world is not just two sides, the good guys and the bad guys.
I'm glad I don't have to put my trust in politicians. And even though here in Germany I more or less side with one party I still don't have to say Yes and Amen to all they do and think. I usually vote for the CDU (christian democratic union) which is a conservative party. Chancelor Merkel is from that party, for instance. They are in the same international association as the US-Republicans.
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