From: thf2@ellis.uchicago.edu (Ted Frank)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.misc,alt.activism,alt.conspiracy,alt.fan.rush-limbaugh
Subject: Re: Privatization
Date: 24 Jan 93 01:19:16 GMT
Reply-To: thf2@midway.uchicago.edu
Organization: University of Chicago

In article <1jslq0INNb4i@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu> an030@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Broward Horne) writes:
>         Here, Ted, follow me on this one:
>
>    I) Empirical data
>
>     #1 - Depressions at regular intervals are historical fact

Yep.  There've been two or three in my lifetime, maybe a couple of more
that I'm forgetting.  Of course, they're called "recessions" now, but
then again, "depression" was just an earlier euphemism for the earlier
term "panic."

>     #2 - Past governments have laid claim to having "smoothed out"
>          the busness cycle, much like our current government
>
>     #3 - Past governments have been wrong 

Then again, no government has ever done so for a whole half-century.  The
worst recession since the Great Depression was in Reagan's first term,
and it was nowhere as bad as the three or four recessions that preceded
the Great Depression.

>   So.  Based on empirical data, not only are we DUE for a depression,
>   it's likely that the government is wrong about being able to 
>   prevent it.

They've done a fairly good job for quite some time.  

>    II)  Multiculturalism -
>
>       Let us suppose that any of several cohesive cultures could 
>       exist and respond to reality.
>
>       My Next Theory - the presence of several, competing and 
>       conflicting cultural "realities" is A Bad Thing.
>
>    Now, what do these two theories add up to?
>
>    A movement towards a re-orientation of reality, based on ONE
>    dominant culture.  Personally, I think we're seeing the 
>    begginings already, expressed as "Politically Correct" thinking.

I think you're becoming increasingly loony.  "PC" is hardly sweeping the
country, except in the mounds of straw being dashed to pieces by the
mainstream media.

>    It's become painfully obvious to me that large numbers of the 
>    American people are disconnected from reality now.  Here, some
>    recent poll numbers from my memory -
>
>        % expecting the deficit to be halved -   65%
>        % expecting national health care -       80%
>        % expecting continued U.S. military intervention - 60%
>
>    Now, I ask YOU, do these numbers show a people who are grounded 
>    in reality?

Sure.  Now, if they also expected tax cuts, there might be a problem.

>    Does a $4 trillion debt show an understanding of reality?

It's not optimal, but it's also not necessarily fatal.

>    Therefore, I would suggest to y'all that there is at least a 
>     fairly good chance that you are wrong about the "deficit not
>     mattering".  A chance.

No one says the deficit doesn't matter.  What we've been arguing is
for attacking the problems that are causing this particular deficit,
rather than just have people recite the catchphrase "The deficit is
bad" without any understanding what *makes* a deficit bad.  And not
all deficits are bad.

You're free to panic over the deficit now, and flee to a hut in Ecuador
if you like.  There are still people in shelters in Montana waiting for
the inevitable global thermonuclear war, after all.
-- 
ted frank                     | thf2@ellis.uchicago.edu 
standard disclaimers          | void where prohibited
the university of chicago law school, chicago, illinois 60637