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Penn Jillette: What shocked me about the campaign videos; "...I would vote for Bernie if for no other reason than he didn't offer me hope, and he didn't make me feel that if I voted for him, I would win something. He made me feel like we should talk about government." (cnn.com)

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[–]jfoust2 40ポイント41ポイント  (85子コメント)

Maybe Libertarians eventually figure out they'd be happy with socialism, in the same way that some Objectivists find they're OK with much of Buddhism.

[–]SpudgeBoy -9ポイント-8ポイント  (84子コメント)

Libertarians eventually figure out they'd be happy with socialism

Why not, Ayn Rand ended up going on social security.

[–]Obi-Schlong_Kenobi 19ポイント20ポイント  (82子コメント)

Do you have a good argument on why she shouldn't have taken advantage of something she paid into? I'm not even an objectivist, but it's pretty tiring to see that argument over and over again. And that's not even relevant to what the op of this thread was saying.

[–]jfoust2 0ポイント1ポイント  (15子コメント)

Do you have any evidence she was keeping track of what she paid in, so she could judge when she had finally recovered what she had been legally required to surrender?

It's one thing to claim it was ethical because she paid in; it's another to say she didn't need to keep track.

Extra credit exercise for the Objectivists: Make an argument why she should not have dipped into her Social Security or Medicaid.

[–]sirbruce -1ポイント0ポイント  (12子コメント)

Do you have any evidence she was keeping track of what she paid in, so she could judge when she had finally recovered what she had been legally required to surrender?

Social Security only pays out based on what you've paid in. It's not "free money".

[–]jfoust2 4ポイント5ポイント  (11子コメント)

Really? I think you should study more. Also, in Rand's case in particular, because she didn't hold a regular job, she didn't pay in very much at all.

[–]DrFlutterChii 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

People with alternative (legal) sources of income still pay into social security, its just not witheld. Books, speaking fees, whatever. If you obtain any money, g-man gets a cut or you go to jail.

[–]sirbruce -4ポイント-3ポイント  (8子コメント)

Really? I think you should study more.

Really. I think you should READ MORE. I said it pays out BASED ON what you paid in. If you don't pay any SS taxes, you don't get anything when you retire.

Also, in Rand's case in particular, because she didn't hold a regular job, she didn't pay in very much at all.

Social Security requires a certain number of "work credits" to get paid anything, so she must have worked enough to earn them.

[–]jfoust2 4ポイント5ポイント  (7子コメント)

And I quote from my link:

In most cases, people get more from Social Security and Medicare combined than they put in, though the specific amount can vary depending on income and family circumstances.

[–]sirbruce -3ポイント-2ポイント  (6子コメント)

And your quote contradicts nothing I said.

[–]jfoust2 1ポイント2ポイント  (5子コメント)

You said "Social Security only pays out based on what you've paid in." I assume you'd like to emphasize the "based on", else you'd mislead someone into thinking that they'll simply get back what they'd paid in, and no more.

If you'd like to actually address my first question, this might be more fun.

[–]Obi-Schlong_Kenobi -2ポイント-1ポイント  (1子コメント)

I do not disagree with that argument. But I don't think that is incompatible with what I've said. For her to have been the epitome of morality she claimed to be, she absolutely should have kept track and taken no more than she put in. Even with that said, with what I know about Ayn Rand and that I do not consider her hypocrite, I don't imagine she would have been opposed to not receiving social security benefits if the program were ended prior to collecting those benefits. I simply don't agree with the idea that she should be vilified or labeled a hypocrite for using a system that she did oppose, but also paid into by voluntary coercion.

[–]jfoust2 -1ポイント0ポイント  (0子コメント)

She certainly used all sorts of services paid for by taxes. It's not much different from that.

On the other hand, Rand's SS example is not the only time I've heard anti-statists make this same unmeasured approach to reaping a government benefit, be it tax exemptions, farm subsidies, etc. As long as you remain mentally opposed to it you supposedly retain some intellectual integrity, and there's no need to measure because you're just getting what's coming to you. Meanwhile, you still use the roads, and there's no activism needed to see that other people get this benefit, too, or any concern that it's unjust that you get it while they don't, etc.

[–]SpudgeBoy -2ポイント-1ポイント  (52子コメント)

Do you have a good argument on why she shouldn't have taken advantage of something she paid into?

Not sure why I need to come up with an argument for why somebody spent their entire lives railing against something, then ended up using it. The hypocrisy is enough to not warrant an argument from my side.

[–]woobagooba 10ポイント11ポイント  (2子コメント)

How many avowed socialist get up every morning and go to work for the capitalist oppressors?

[–]bloodraven42 15ポイント16ポイント  (24子コメント)

She addresses this, by the way. To objectivists it's like stealing back their money from those who stole it in the first place. I personally disagree, Social Security is vital, but it doesn't make her a hypocrite.

[–]SpudgeBoy 1ポイント2ポイント  (13子コメント)

She didn't see it as stealing back. That is a bullshit story made up for why she did it. She was broke and her nurse talked her into it, because she was broke.

[–]bloodraven42 1ポイント2ポイント  (12子コメント)

Yes, a bullshit story, when she specifically wrote about the issue in a magazine dedicated to her philosophy.

Since there is no such thing as the right of some men to vote away the rights of others, and no such thing as the right of the government to seize the property of some men for the unearned benefit of others—the advocates and supporters of the welfare state are morally guilty of robbing their opponents, and the fact that the robbery is legalized makes it morally worse, not better. The victims do not have to add self-inflicted martyrdom to the injury done to them by others; they do not have to let the looters profit doubly, by letting them distribute the money exclusively to the parasites who clamored for it. Whenever the welfare-state laws offer them some small restitution, the victims should take it.…

[–]jfoust2 -1ポイント0ポイント  (3子コメント)

Yeah, she was talking about grants and scholarships, though.

[–]bloodraven42 5ポイント6ポイント  (2子コメント)

She was, but she was also talking about SS. Elsewhere in the quote:

The same moral principles and considerations apply to the issue of accepting social security, unemployment insurance or other payments of that kind.

[–]jfoust2 -4ポイント-3ポイント  (1子コメント)

So no measurement is needed? You can take, take, take? Wouldn't it seem to be more fair to be required to measure what you contributed and what you took, in the same way she finds it relevant that deep inside, you remain personally opposed to it?

[–]drysart -4ポイント-3ポイント  (7子コメント)

Yes, it absolutely does. By the very definition of hypocrisy from the dictionary. Plus, taking Social Security money is justifying the system.

Nobody said having principles was supposed to be easy. Sometimes it means standing against something even if you'd otherwise personally benefit from it.

[–]bloodraven42 17ポイント18ポイント  (6子コメント)

I'm curious - how much do you actually know of her principles? Read her works? Fiction or the books outlining her actual philosophy? I don't agree with them, but I have, and I can tell you that you'd be wrong. Personal benefit is the whole theme and point of her philosophy. She wrote treatises on the moral benefits of selfishness. Of course she'll take her money back.

Social Security is not voluntary. Your participation is forced through payroll taxes, with no choice to opt out even if you think the program harmful to your interests. If you consider such forced “participation” unjust, as Rand does, the harm inflicted on you would only be compounded if your announcement of the program’s injustice precludes you from collecting Social Security.

She founded the philosophy. The position she takes are the moral positions of the philosophy, like it or not. Also, here's a quote from before she was on social security.

Since there is no such thing as the right of some men to vote away the rights of others, and no such thing as the right of the government to seize the property of some men for the unearned benefit of others—the advocates and supporters of the welfare state are morally guilty of robbing their opponents, and the fact that the robbery is legalized makes it morally worse, not better. The victims do not have to add self-inflicted martyrdom to the injury done to them by others; they do not have to let the looters profit doubly, by letting them distribute the money exclusively to the parasites who clamored for it. Whenever the welfare-state laws offer them some small restitution, the victims should take it.…

Tell me how she violated her own beliefs again?

[–]tokyoburns -2ポイント-1ポイント  (1子コメント)

That argument would only work if she took exactly what she put in or less. I'm not sure anybody has the info on what those numbers might be.

[–]rspeed 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

I would imagine that would violate HIPAA.

[–]YankeeQuebec 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

Those who call for more taxes, why don't they donate their money to the government instead? You can literally give all of your money to the government, yet here we have people wanting to tax everyone else, while not wanting to be taxed themselves.

There is literally an entire department of a government system designed to take donations.

Gifts to the United States

U.S. Department of the Treasury

Credit Accounting Branch

3700 East-West Highway, Room 622D

Hyattsville, MD 20782

[–]spoiled_generation -1ポイント0ポイント  (22子コメント)

Bernie and Lizzie sure like to talk shit about the banks but I guarantee they use them.

[–]exploderator 10ポイント11ポイント  (1子コメント)

Uh yeah, you might notice they are not people who run banks in a corrupt manner, which is what they are speaking against. They never once said all banks must go, they just say we need all banks to be honest. This is completely unlike AR's alleged hypocrisy.

[–]YankeeQuebec -1ポイント0ポイント  (0子コメント)

Bernie and Liz sure talk about wall st being evil, yet both voted for the nomination of Loretta Lynch who is a Wall St. insider who bankrupted legal small businesses, while letting convicted foreign bankers get away with their crimes.

Liz likes to bitch about the greedy 1%, yet she herself is a greedy 1%er who profited off of the financial collapse.

Bernie and Liz sure like to talk about evil financial corporations, yet both voted to force every American to buy a product from an evil financial corporation or face a fine.

That's hypocrisy.

[–]JackOfCandles 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

I don't think anyone is arguing that the idea of banking itself is wrong.

[–]Dr_WLIN 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

Probably because they are not against the idea of a bank, but more so the power a few specific banks have attained that would never have happened 20 years ago.

[–]ScheduledRelapse [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

I would say they likely have Credit Union accounts.

[–]SpudgeBoy 0ポイント1ポイント  (13子コメント)

Bernie and Lizzie (not sure why you are resorting to talking like a third grader) talk shit about bank regulations, not banks or banking.

[–]bawbzilla 0ポイント1ポイント  (2子コメント)

Bernie and Lizzie

stop that

[–]spoiled_generation -3ポイント-2ポイント  (1子コメント)

What would I be stopping?

[–]bawbzilla -2ポイント-1ポイント  (0子コメント)

You know what you're doing.

[–]krunk7 0ポイント1ポイント  (11子コメント)

I have two reasons:

First, SS isn't an investment. Current payments go towards funding future payments. Meaning her money was not there to "take back".

Second, if someone steals from you (her belief) it does not entitle you to steal from someone else.

If I was mugged on the way home today, it does not give me a moral pass on mugging a random stranger to get my money back.

[–]joombaga 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

I'm not sure thats a fair analogy. It's more like if a mugger took your $20 and spent it, then robbed someone else for $20, and then you found the mugger and took the other person's $20 as repayment for the theft.

[–]McGobs 1ポイント2ポイント  (6子コメント)

A better analogy is that a mafia robs you of your car, and then you steal a painting from one of the henchmen's living room that was also likely stolen.

The idea is that you're taking back stolen goods. Just because it's jumbled up before being redistributed doesn't change the fact that you didn't do the initial stealing, you're just trying to reclaim some of what was stolen. I also don't think that stealing back more than was stolen from you is necessarily more unethical than someone outright stealing from you.

[–]jfoust2 -1ポイント0ポイント  (5子コメント)

And who gets to judge? You want vigilante injustice reclamation theft squads running around, righting imagined and claimed wrongs?

[–]McGobs 1ポイント2ポイント  (4子コメント)

You want vigilante injustice reclamation theft squads running around, righting imagined and claimed wrongs?

Of course. If you didn't know, I'm actually made of straw.

Straw people, straw people
Talk real bad, walk like people

[–]jfoust2 -1ポイント0ポイント  (3子コメント)

Yes, ignore my straw-man sarcasm.

But who gets to judge? You think you should be able to make up your mind on your own about what constitutes appropriate redistribution to right your wrong?

[–]McGobs 1ポイント2ポイント  (2子コメント)

They are called dispute resolution organizations, started by entrepreneurs who seek to provide the most people with the best protection at the best price while finding ways to reduce cost and therefore reduce prices for you in order to be more competitive in the market place. You can read up about them on any of the thousands of libertarian websites, written by people who have thought and conversed extensively about how a society would manage to function based on a marketplace that actually represents the will of the people. ("With money!" you say.)

[–]jfoust2 -1ポイント0ポイント  (1子コメント)

Ooh! Private enforcement! Makes me all tingly! You're supposed to wave your invisible hands really fast when you say that. And you thought I was being the crazy one when I said "vigilante injustice reclamation theft squads"!

[–]Obi-Schlong_Kenobi -1ポイント0ポイント  (2子コメント)

I think the difference is that we're not talking about anyone mugging anyone else. The government might be stealing from her, but she's not stealing from anyone else. If we follow the reasoning of her argument (forget we're talking about Rand for a moment, supporter and haters alike get real emotional when talking about Rand), then the only bad guy in this situation is the government, for stealing from anyone at all in the first place.

So let's think about why she didn't like social security. It's because she didn't like redistribution of wealth. Is she wrong to want recompense (as designed by the system) from the system that distributed her wealth away? I like /u/jfoust2 's idea that she should have taken no more than she put in to remain morally consistent.

[–]jfoust2 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

Yeah, that jfoust2 guy has some really good ideas.

[–]AdvicePerson -1ポイント0ポイント  (0子コメント)

If she was so great, she would have invented a superior form of steel and sold it to finance her retirement.

[–]Bukujutsu 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

That's a myth. Complete torn apart here: http://freestudents.blogspot.com/2011/10/lying-about-ayn-rand-and-social.html