06-20-2005, 03:00 AM
Cyber Stryker, has it ever occured to you that we can't solve al of the world's problems?
Killing Saddam Huessain would no matter how you do it would create a huge power vacuum. Civil war, just like what is happening now. It's not as simple as killing the evil dictator.
Not only that, but the problems that we don't have an answer to get ignored. Take Sudanese genocide. There was no good solution to that. We would have fucked it up if we did anything, and it would have been a mess, just like Kosovo. So, we ignored it. And now that it's all over, we shake our heads and go "Never again". It will always happen again. And it's not nearly as simple as good people doing nothing. People who are genocidal, who are so fanatical in their beleifs that they will kill for them will always exist. And stopping people like that all together is never an option.
And this is a nice article about foriegn aid. Thoigh, I know you'll hate me for posting something so anti-government.
[quote]A Foreign Aid Disaster in the Making
By Thomas J. DiLorenzo
[Posted January 6, 2005]
In the wake of the tsunami disaster in Indonesia, governments throughout the world are doing what governments always do: throwing money at the problem. In this case, the money is referred to as "foreign aid."
The billions of dollars (or the equivalent in other currencies) being sent to Indonesia, India, Sri Lanka, and other devastated areas are bound to do some good; it would be impossible to spend all that tax money without some of it leaking out to benefit some of the disaster victims. Indeed, the television news networks are already filled with scenes of American helicopters and cargo planes unloading in-kind aid of all kinds.
Politicians are bound to politicize this disaster, as they do with all other world events, in a way that helps them accumulate more power and confiscate more wealth from their citizens. Specifically, now that they are becoming rather fond of portraying themselves as internationalized Mother Teresas, coming to the aid of anyone, anywhere, as long as it is all paid for by their hard-working, hapless taxpayers, they will be inclined to become champions of ever-expanding foreign aid spending. To do this they will have to ignore the truth about foreign aid: For over half a century, it has been either ineffective or counterproductive in stimulating prosperity.
The late Peter Bauer (Lord Bauer) devoted his entire career to studying the law of unintended consequences as it applied to foreign aid, and many of his conclusions are summarized in his 1991 book, The Development Frontier.
First of all, notes Bauer, foreign aid is not "aid" but a transfer or subsidy. And it is typically not a transfer to the poor and needy but to governments. Thus, the predominant effect of "foreign aid" has always been to enlarge the size and scope of the state, which always ends up impairing prosperity and diminishing the liberty of the people. Worse yet, it leads to the centralization of governmental power, since the transfers are always to the recipient country
Killing Saddam Huessain would no matter how you do it would create a huge power vacuum. Civil war, just like what is happening now. It's not as simple as killing the evil dictator.
Not only that, but the problems that we don't have an answer to get ignored. Take Sudanese genocide. There was no good solution to that. We would have fucked it up if we did anything, and it would have been a mess, just like Kosovo. So, we ignored it. And now that it's all over, we shake our heads and go "Never again". It will always happen again. And it's not nearly as simple as good people doing nothing. People who are genocidal, who are so fanatical in their beleifs that they will kill for them will always exist. And stopping people like that all together is never an option.
And this is a nice article about foriegn aid. Thoigh, I know you'll hate me for posting something so anti-government.
[quote]A Foreign Aid Disaster in the Making
By Thomas J. DiLorenzo
[Posted January 6, 2005]
In the wake of the tsunami disaster in Indonesia, governments throughout the world are doing what governments always do: throwing money at the problem. In this case, the money is referred to as "foreign aid."
The billions of dollars (or the equivalent in other currencies) being sent to Indonesia, India, Sri Lanka, and other devastated areas are bound to do some good; it would be impossible to spend all that tax money without some of it leaking out to benefit some of the disaster victims. Indeed, the television news networks are already filled with scenes of American helicopters and cargo planes unloading in-kind aid of all kinds.
Politicians are bound to politicize this disaster, as they do with all other world events, in a way that helps them accumulate more power and confiscate more wealth from their citizens. Specifically, now that they are becoming rather fond of portraying themselves as internationalized Mother Teresas, coming to the aid of anyone, anywhere, as long as it is all paid for by their hard-working, hapless taxpayers, they will be inclined to become champions of ever-expanding foreign aid spending. To do this they will have to ignore the truth about foreign aid: For over half a century, it has been either ineffective or counterproductive in stimulating prosperity.
The late Peter Bauer (Lord Bauer) devoted his entire career to studying the law of unintended consequences as it applied to foreign aid, and many of his conclusions are summarized in his 1991 book, The Development Frontier.
First of all, notes Bauer, foreign aid is not "aid" but a transfer or subsidy. And it is typically not a transfer to the poor and needy but to governments. Thus, the predominant effect of "foreign aid" has always been to enlarge the size and scope of the state, which always ends up impairing prosperity and diminishing the liberty of the people. Worse yet, it leads to the centralization of governmental power, since the transfers are always to the recipient country