HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: dms0207@zeus.tamu.edu (David Smith)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory
Subject: DC Statehood
Date: 7 Apr 92 17:47:00 GMT
Organization: TAMU
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41

I have a couple of questions regarding DC statehood.  I noticed recently that
J. Jackson is pushing for DC statehood.  

	1.	What is the population of Washington DC?
	2.	Why should DC be a state, when people who have moved their
		knew in advance that there was no voting representation in
		Congress?

Also, if the people of DC are so insistent on their voting rights, why not
have the different sections of the district divided up among the bordering 
states, with the Federal portion of the district still unrepresented in the
Congress?

Any thoughts on the matter?

==============================================================================
=If a word in the dictionary was misspelled, how would you know? (S. Wright?)=
==============================================================================
David Smith
dms0207@rigel.tamu.edu
Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory,alt.war
Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory,alt.war
Subject: Re: Why do we all believe war is inevitable?
From: mgreer@eagle.wesleyan.edu
Date: 10 Apr 92 01:26:33 EDT
Organization: Wesleyan University

In article <1992Apr8.191457.16827@yang.earlham.edu>, allens@yang.earlham.edu (Allen Smith) writes:
> 	There is the possibility that [some] sociobiologists are right and 
> humankind is inherently aggressive. I doubt that it is anything more than 
> an overcomeable tendency, but it is something to be thought about.
> 	Of course, it can be argued that war does good in the long run. It 
> spurs on some scientific and technological advancement, for instance. It 
> also reduces the population. It can remove societies which are falling 
> apart and replace them with more vigourous ones.
> 	-Allen

	In fact, two years ago the American Psychological Association came out
with a statement which stated:
	1) There is no aggression inherent in the neurology of the human brain
	2) Evidence suggests that there is no inevitable "structure" of human
	society which demands aggression, either overt, repressed, or
	rechanneled
	3) War is not known in all cultures.  Only those cultures with war
	have violent sports.  Thus, social violence is not an "outlet" for
	aggression, but rather part of a total cultural construct of
	interaction
	4) Therefore, war is not inevitable from biological, psychological, or
	from social-psychological standpoints.  It is, then, up to us.  We
	cannot blame our "nature", but rather our social norms and leaders

	About the "positive" aspects of war:
- There are other ways to spur on scientific and technological development.  A
study by the Brookings Institute showed that money put into defense and
war-fighting produced scientific and economic development less efficiently than
direct funding: ie, NSF grants and social spending.
- As for the reduction of the surplus population, that is the most cruel and
inhuman statement that I have ever heard.  People are not abstracts.  Let us
imagine that the "surplus" people who died were you and all of your loved ones. 
Besides, poor folks and people of color are overepresented in our Armed Forces.
Thus, your "surplus" population would be those already oppressed and
dominated, the mechanics of the war economy merely an appendenge of that
structure of oppression.
- I have no idea what you mean by a "vigorous" society.  Since you define it as
one that wins in war, we must assume you mean some sort of proto-fascist
military state.  Hardly an advancement on "weak" democracy.

						-Mike Greer
						mgreer@eagle.wesleyan.edu

Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory,alt.war
From: yarvin-norman@CS.YALE.EDU (Norman Yarvin)
Subject: Re: Why do we all believe war is inevitable?
Organization: Yale Computer Science Department
Date: Fri, 10 Apr 1992 16:43:14 GMT

mgreer@eagle.wesleyan.edu writes:
>- As for the reduction of the surplus population, that is the most cruel and
>inhuman statement that I have ever heard.

"It's safer to be heartless than to be mindless.  The history of the world
is the victory of the heartless over the mindless."
	-- Sir Humphrey Appleby, _Yes Minister_

>People are not abstracts.  Let us imagine that the "surplus" people who
>died were you and all of your loved ones.

As would happen if, on the urging of airhead idealists, we gave up the
practice of war.

--
Norman Yarvin						yarvin@cs.yale.edu
 "Self-loathing is one of those odd, illogical leaps of human intuition that
  is almost always correct." -- P. J. O'Rourke, _Give War A Chance_
Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory,sci.econ
From: lee@wang.com (Lee Story)
Subject: Re: Wage Slavery (Was: BIG LIE about the market)
Organization: Wang Laboratories, Inc.
Date: 8 Apr 92 14:28:55
	<1992Mar31.183837.24314@newshost.anu.edu.au>
	<1992Apr1.183413.18397@odin.corp.sgi.com>
	<1992Apr5.182340.6518@newshost.anu.edu.au>


(Albert Langer) writes:
   [...] But I really will have to break off now to get on with
   other priorities.

   The vehemence, (not "strength") of your opinion is pardonable.

   your conclusion that it is "silly" merely shows your own
   incomprehension.

   At which point, I hope you will understand why I do not consider
   it necessary to refute you further.

   If by "got it right" you mean "accurately regurgitated the lies your
   professors taught you about Marxism" [...]

   "What gives" is that the Marx your textbooks taught you about held
   DIRECTLY OPPOSITE views to Karl Marx. Perhaps they were writing about
   Groucho or some other Marx?

   Evidently you have not in fact understood the point I gave you
   credit for having understood (while expressing surprise at how you
   could grasp that while misunderstanding the rest).

   I'm not interested in a rehash of this issue and regret having
   mentioned it.

   Pathetic.

   As for arguing with Marxists, we are not a religion and neither are
   we slippery. I suggest you just leave such "refutation" to your
   professors.

It sounds to me like an anointed disciple interpreting the master's
words to the unclean rabble, while making it ever so clear that it
really isn't worth the interpreter's time.  It also seems the master
wasn't all that clear a writer, and maybe didn't even have enough
grasp of his concepts to present them clearly.  My rule of thumb:
anything in the ordinary affairs of men which is reasonable can be
stated clearly.  And the whole Marxist edifice seems to require some
notion of a will of the masses---whatever "masses" are, and in
whatever mystical way "the will" can be collective.

I'm perfectly content to dodge the arrows of the professors and
polemicists and declare that both Marxism and theoretical
Capitalism (which I take to be the belief that there is usually
sufficiently complete information and sufficient will-to-act to
make the "invisible hand" of the market stabilize and/or optimize
economic outcomes) are great and fascinating, but ultimately and
essentially unscientific modern religions.
--

------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Let your mind go, and your body will follow.
                   _L.A._Story_
  Lee Story (lee@wang.com) Wang Laboratories, Inc.
     (Boston and New Hampshire AMC, and Merrimack Valley Paddlers)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Xref: sparky talk.politics.theory:2026 alt.war:785
From: thant@horus.esd.sgi.com (Thant Tessman)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory,sci.econ
Subject: Capitalism, Marxism, and Religion (Was: Wage Slavery)
Date: 9 Apr 92 16:56:51 GMT
Organization: sgi

In article <LEE.92Apr8142855@meercat.wang.com>, lee@wang.com (Lee Story) 
puts a little perspective on my conversation with Albert Langer.

Also:

> I'm perfectly content to dodge the arrows of the professors and
> polemicists and declare that both Marxism and theoretical
> Capitalism (which I take to be the belief that there is usually
> sufficiently complete information and sufficient will-to-act to
> make the "invisible hand" of the market stabilize and/or optimize
> economic outcomes) are great and fascinating, but ultimately and
> essentially unscientific modern religions.

Given your definition of theoretical capitalism I would tend
to agree with you.  However, a more reasonable definition of 
capitalism might be: the use for production of privately owned 
resources made available through differred consumption.  This
would apply equally well to things like differred consumption 
of leisure-time to study as it would to monetary investments.
By this definition, capitalism just happens as a natural result
of human action.

Some think discussions of 'stability' and 'optimization' in 
relation to capitalism are intellectual smokescreens.  Profit
is only possible because preferences and the distribution of 
resources and information are constantly changing.  There's 
nothing stable about it.  (Stability as far as the 'business 
cycle' is concerned is a whole 'nother can of horses.)  Optimal 
solutions only exist from the point of view of the individual
market participants.  But this, and the fact that economic
calculation via money allows for the distribution of information 
about these optimal solutions are the source of the structure
in the marketplace attributed to the "invisible hand."  (That
was an ugly sentence.)

thant
Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory
From: GA.JRG@forsythe.stanford.edu (June Genis)
Subject: Re: FW: news release: abolish IRS
Organization: Stanford University, California, USA
Distribution: usa
Date: Mon, 6 Apr 1992 16:15:54 GMT

In article <1992Apr6.084808.10698@CSD-NewsHost.Stanford.EDU>,
baker@Xenon.Stanford.EDU (Andrew Baker) writes:
>In article <1992Apr4.085611.8063@eskimo.celestial.com> Corner.Core.Cafe writes:
>>
>>     The Libertarian Party is America's third largest and fastest growing
>>political party.
>
>Is it really the fastest growing?  Is it growing at all?  By what measure:
>votes, money raised, TV and newspaper coverage, or what?  Please post the
>relevant statistics or retract this claim.

One statistic that I can provide is that the dues-paying membership
in California has about doubled in the last year.  Registration has
not significantly increased but we really don't care about our
registration since all it affects is who can vote in the primary and
our primaries are almost always uncontested.  With the Green Party
making a lot of noise about how they are #3 because of their
registration, we may have to place more emphasis on registration
than we have in the past, but we care a lot more about votes and
our '90 vote tallies were up significantly over '88.  In many area
candidates received double the previous high percentage in those
contests in the past.

>Personally, I think the Libertarian Party is a joke.  If they were serious
>about getting anything done, they would (1) work within the Republican
>Party, and (2) give up their extremist rhetoric.  Some medium amount of
>money (say a million dollars) would yield far more publicity if it were used
>to back a candidate in the Republican primaries than it would if it were
>used to back a third-party candidate in the general election; the
>Libertarians could either run their own candidate or support one of the
>usual ones (say, a Du Pont or a Weld in '96).  Same goes for other offices
>besides the Presidency.  As someone once said, the Republican Party is
>a big tent, so another sideshow or a few more clowns wouldn't hurt.

I submit that a libertarian has virtually no chance of getting past
the primary (if that far) running in either major party unless
there is an unassailable incumbent running for reelection on the
other side.  Just look how the Democrats have treated Larry Agran.
At least this way we can campaign all the way to November.  And just
how many libertarians do you know who've been elected as
Republicans?

/June
Xref: sparky talk.politics.theory:1987 alt.war:668
From: tedrick@guitar.Berkeley.EDU (Tom Tedrick)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory,alt.war
Subject: Re: Why do we all believe war is inevitable?
Date: 10 Apr 1992 10:01:39 GMT
Organization: University of Communism at Berkeley
NNTP-Posting-Host: guitar.berkeley.edu

According to Hobbes:

"When all the world is overcharged with inhabitants, then
the last remedy of all is Warre; which provideth for everyman,
by Victory or Death."

Socrates argument as given in Plato's Republic goes

"Then we must enlarge our borders; for the original healthy
State is no longer sufficient ... the country which was
enough to support the original inhabitants will be too
small now ... a slice of our neighbor's land will be
wanted by us for pasture and tillage, and they will
want a slice of ours ... and so we shall go to war ..."

More from the Republic:

"I declare the Greek race to be akin and related to
themselves, but foreign and alien to the barbarians ...
when Greeks and barbarians fight, we shall say they
are natural enemies, warring against one another, and
this enmity is to be called war ..."

One definition of justice given is "doing good to our
friends and harm to our enemies"

According to Aristotle:

"What we gain in war is in a certain degree a natural
acquisition, for hunting is a part of it, which it is
necessary for us to employ against wild beasts ..."

J.F.C. Fuller gives a more detailed examination to the
question in "A Military History of the Western World"
and "The Generalship of Alexander the Great"
From: lee@wang.com (Lee Story)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory
Subject: Re: How a Bill Becomes Law (a science fiction story)
Date: 15 Apr 92 17:28:48 GMT
	<1992Apr14.164318.1083@panix.com>
Organization: Wang Laboratories, Inc.


(Gordon Fitch) writes:
   Of course, this assumes there will be any kind of comprehensible
   government or system of law 30 years from now.  In general,
   I don't think the population is likely to maintain enough
   interest to hang on some net studying the great issues of the
   day for hours.  Already, most of the adults in America don't
   vote, and when they do vote they seem to vote for personality
   rather than issues.  What's going to reverse this
   tendency?

There is little reason for this degree of cynicism (surpassing even my
own :).  The medium itself would seem likely to stimulate greatly
renewed interest, and parallel cases are clear:  almost anyone can
find some sort of active participation (whether quilting, building a
house, programming, wilderness trekking, making music...) which will
engross them for hundreds of hours, while they wouldn't think of spending
those hours watching someont quilt, build, etc. on television.  Well,
for most of us representative democracy is a matter of information
absorption with only the most meager feedback into the process (voting;
maybe attending a few local government committee meetings; once in a
while the limited and fantastically low-bandwidth---even compared to
the net---medium of a town meeting).

People don't vote because they know very well that those in power
don't want nonprofessional opinions, that the only mediums for
effectively spreading political opinion involve huge amounts of money
and career-level commitment, and that voting is a sop to the rest of
us who are merely allowed to decide which of the near-interchangeable
professionals shall lead in this term.

I believe that Tom's proposal is THE MOST interesting thing I've seen
in several years of browsing the politics groups, though couching it
as a "science fiction story" seemed unfortunate, since that begged
apparently begged us not to take it seriously.  This could form the
starting point for a real "new federalism".  Perhaps we could start by
playing Junius---developing the details and implications of the
ideas in a series of posted essays and responses.  (Interestingly,
this need not be restricted to the contributions of citizens of this
one country.)  When legislative access to email, and probably the net,
is ready, we could have a draft of a new "Federalist Papers" already
in hand.

(By the way, I received a note from the Chairman of the House
Committee on Administration, Charles Rose, assuring me that such
access would be provided very soon.)

--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
  Lee Story (lee@wang.com) Wang Laboratories, Inc.
              (Merrimack Valley Paddlers)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory
From: mece3d@judy.uh.edu (Chris Struble)
Subject: Re: Balancing the budget
Followup-To: talk.politics.theory
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    
Organization: University of Houston
Distribution: usa
Date: Thu, 9 Apr 1992 21:05:00 GMT

In article <TOM.92Apr6110736@amber.ssd.csd.harris.com>, tom@ssd.csd.harris.com (Tom Horsley) writes...
>Here is my plan for a balanced budget process - I am interested in knowing
>what is wrong with it. Please ignore the fact that the Congress would never
>adopt it, I already know that, I am just wondering what is technically wrong
>with it...
> 
  [ lengthy description deleted ]

The assumption behind your proposal is that a technical change can fix 
what is fundamentally a technical problem - IT IS NOT. The problem is
the simple fact that the Congress (and the Supreme Court, who are
supposed to watch over these things) have lost all interest in doing
anything remotely constitutional.  If we are to believe the departing
Senator Rudman, currently 45% of the budget is entitlements, which do
not go through the normal (i.e., legal) budget process, and cannot be
"tweaked" by anybody. This will increase to 65% by the end of decade.
Your proposal does not address this even remotely.

As long as Congress feels free to spend as much of our money on 
whatever they, in their august wisdom, feel like spending it on, 
no technical changes in how the money is actually allocated will 
make any difference. 

------------------------------------------------------------------------
|  Christian Struble	   |  To shield people from the consequences   |
|  Mechanical Engineering  |  of their own folly is to fill the	       | 
|  University of Houston   |  world with fools  		       |	
|  mece3d@jetson.uh.edu	   |    	Herbert Spencer		       |	
------------------------------------------------------------------------	
Xref: sparky talk.politics.theory:2004 alt.war:702
Organization: Penn State University
Date: Sunday, 12 Apr 1992 15:56:00 EDT
From: <TWZ101@psuvm.psu.edu>
Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory,alt.war
Subject: Re: Why do we all believe war is inevitable?
 <1992Apr5.063517.18334@usenet.ins.cwru.edu>
 <1992Apr11.185803.11193@usenet.ins.cwru.edu>

In article <1992Apr11.185803.11193@usenet.ins.cwru.edu>,
al037@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Dave Polewka) says:
>
    [stuff deleted--author was asked to propose a solution to war and
          preparing for it]






>I think that many people don't trust their government, and most governments
>don't trust each other.  We must build a foundation of trust in order to
>make a lasting peace.  The economy is the top priority to most, so we
>should try to build that foundation of trust by cleaning up the state
>financial affairs.  I propose to cut spending across-the-board, and use
>the funds to pay off the national debt.  This will set a good example
>for the rest of the world.  Other countries will have to follow suit,
>(or propose a better idea) at the risk of being branded as pro-war.

     Are you suggesting that nations with their financial houses in order don't
 go to war?  What about Hitler in 1939; he brought the German economy to a
 height it hadn't seen since before World War I.

     Are you suggesting that nations go to war because people don't trust their
 governments?  Or that governments "don't trust each other?"  The problem is
 that fear and uncertainty are inherent problems in a world where everyone has
 a separate, individual mind and is acting to secure his or her own future.
 Ethiopia, for example, trusted in the League of Nations to ensure its security
 in 1935, when Mussolini invaded.  If it instead had prepared for war, forging
 a modern military machine to deter and resist aggression, it might have
 actually ensured its own survival.  (No flames on the utility of this actually
 being possible, I'm just using it as an example.).

     Do you think that Kuwait was invaded because Iraq didn't trust the Kuwaiti
 government?  Or Hitler didn't trust the Czechoslovak gov't?  Or China didn't
 trust Japan?  I fail to see the meaning in this line of reasoning.

                                                --Tom--
                                        "On the road again, I can't wait to get
                                        on the road again" (suggestion for the
                                        new German nat'l anthem, as told to me
                                        by a German)
From: lee@wang.com (Lee Story)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory
Subject: Re: How a Bill Becomes Law (a science fiction story)
Date: 17 Apr 92 17:13:55 GMT
	<1992Apr14.164318.1083@panix.com> <LEE.92Apr15132848@meercat.wang.com>
Organization: Wang Laboratories, Inc.


My apologies for the lack of proper proofreading in my last response on this
thread, and for the substitution of "Junius" for "Publius" which I didn't
notice until after the post was out.
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
  Lee Story (lee@wang.com) Wang Laboratories, Inc.
              (Merrimack Valley Paddlers)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory,alt.war
From: al037@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Dave Polewka)
Subject: Re: Why do we all believe war is inevitable?
Reply-To: al037@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Dave Polewka)
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH (USA)
Date: Sat, 11 Apr 92 18:58:03 GMT


In a previous article, TWZ101@psuvm.psu.edu () says:

>  ........................................... Technology, religion, political
>  structures have all tried to end war in the past, but have abysmally failed.
>  In order to make anyone believe that the future will be different, you must
>  substantiate your claim.  What is YOUR solution?
 
I think that many people don't trust their government, and most governments
don't trust each other.  We must build a foundation of trust in order to
make a lasting peace.  The economy is the top priority to most, so we
should try to build that foundation of trust by cleaning up the state
financial affairs.  I propose to cut spending across-the-board, and use
the funds to pay off the national debt.  This will set a good example
for the rest of the world.  Other countries will have to follow suit,
(or propose a better idea) at the risk of being branded as pro-war.
-- 
=======================
"Endeavor to persevere"
=======================
From: rjc@cstr.ed.ac.uk (Richard Caley)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.theory
Subject: Re: US Armed Forces
Date: 17 Apr 92 05:25:36 GMT
	<RJC.92Apr16224450@brodie.cstr.ed.ac.uk>
	<1992Apr17.034951.25434@gordian.com>
Organization: Centre for Speech Technology Research

In article <1992Apr17.034951.25434@gordian.com>, Michael Thomas (mt) writes:

rjc> I thought the restriction was Europe rather than NATO. Oh well,
rjc> wouldn't matter anyway, they could just declare America part of
rjc> Europe:-). 

mt> Umm, didn't we have words about that a few years ago :-)

Well, I don't think that would be the bigest problem... the Japanese
would probably object more tha the Americans :-).

--
rjc@cogsci.ed.ac.uk				_O_
						 |<