February 10, 2012 
Just as the title says. A piece from a canadian university newspaper – since apparently the voting audience wants more Canada!
I know, it’s not cool to throw out an outside story and run – it’s still midterms week, I’ve been under the weather, and work has ramped up a bit 😦 So no podcast tonight, I’m afraid! However! I’m going to aim for either Sunday or Wednesday before resuming the normal Friday night schedule.
More updates and postings to come as I have time!
The Skeptic Conservative 
I have to disagree with the author of this article that financial freedoms are tied to individual freedom.
Care to elaborate? 🙂
They are different individual freedoms are things like free speech or language rights. Financial freedoms have nothing to do to it you as person are free. You do not need financial freedom to be free you can . Business is also something that should not be free.
In response to your 2nd comment; this sounds like a fundamental philosophical difference. A baseline of conservatism and/or classical liberalism is that property rights are of paramount importance. This piece discusses it rather well – http://www.fff.org/freedom/fd0811e.asp
This is a topic worthy of articles – but the nutshell is that you are not truly free without guarantee of respect of your property and finances. If government can dictate your financial condition or prices or property etc., the belief is that your freedoms as an individual are harshly constrained by this government as a result. The government that giveth (controls financial freedoms) can also happily taketh (since it can deny what it gives).
Finances control one’s station in life, how one can pass that station onto their children, and their ability to walk the career path they want / live where they want to / ability to effect their community through charity / social mobility. This concept is also rooted in the basic idea that the individual knows best how to spend their money where they want as opposed to government deciding that it knows best how to spend someone’s money. This ties in to debates over say, government financed healthcare. You may posit that government knows how to spend health care dollars better then the individual, a concept I disagree with.
I also vehemently disagree with the concept of business being undeserving of freedom, as you know 😀 but we also have very different ideas of how they run.
I will defend the author’s stance here – and you HAVE to remember – I live in a system where the government regularly wastes the taxpayer’s money. I think that right now, at this time in America, the individual will do a lot more good with their money then the government would since the system is simply out of control with spending.
Sure, you can be “Free” without financial freedoms, but I would suggest that it’s a stagnant freedom that doesn’t allow or motivate people to achieve better and greater things.Why innovate to make things better or more cost efficient if you have guaranteed funding from the government?
I don’t value personal finance or property. I don’t feel a person has any connection with their property/finances.
Why would that be, if I may ask? If a person doesn’t have connection to what they own, who does?
I see it as a commodity you don’t have a right to it or need of it. It is also something that should limited.
but why? I’m trying to figure out what your underlying philosophy here is 😀 are you following something specific, or is this something you’ve figured out on your own?
It’s something I’ve figured out on my own. That’s why I have such great difficulty explaining it. It’s a combination of what I have learned from my family and what I believe is right.
Aaaalrighty. Long reply time.
1st: Being a strong idealogue on these lines is an admirable thing – I will go out on a limb and say that I CAN actually see society moving into a similar phase with you and operating with a different sense of capital and economy altogether.
But not yet. We’re nowhere near close.
In the systems we currently live in, we have rules and whatnot that we live by, and certain realities are dictated by these rules. You can only rightly claim freedom from property and money ONLY if you are somehow a sovereign individual with no ties to a state – since as is, money is inherently tied with status. Also if you deem money and property as worthless the tax collectors of your state are probably going to want to have a discussion with you.
While I have ideals of varying types, I’ve personally chosen to sacrifice my pie in the sky vision of society for a compromise position of trying to clean and fix the current structure as much as humanly possible BEFORE pushing for more radical economic change. The idea being that of convincing people it can all work with enough time to draw it all out, explain, have case studies, blablabla as oppossed to say – a radical, sudden crash and restructuring. I like demonstrating by example rather than forcing or dictating – as I think in the end it encourages far more debate, constructive criticism, and ultimately respect for the new system if it’s chosen.
As to business – I would caution that pushing for it to be less free, right now, in the current system, will do more harm then good – speaking primarily from US context – since the regulators are deeply corrupt and broken. Even if things weren’t so bad, I think over regulation encourages stagnation. By taking out risk you eliminate incentive to improve.
Here are my next questions!
How are you seeking to implement your ideaology? To what degree do you feel other people should accept it? Is this a personal thing you will stick to or should society at large adopt it? How do you handle dissenters?
1. Well we already pretty much have a bill of rights that says nothing about property rights so we already have one foot in the door. I personally believe it will take a long time but we can change public opinion to be in favour of it.
2. I don’t understand the question.
3. It is just what I believe in and chances are there are a lot of people that have had similar experiences and think the same way.
4. Well I frankly don’t care if a majority wants it too bad.
1) Why? First – what is wrong about property rights — and then what replaces a complete lack of property rights – how far does it go? Is everything free? Are you able to distribute any digital work in an unlimited matter? How do you feed people? How do you motivate people to produce? Is this leading towards a sort of pure communism, or something different?
2) I’m asking if this is an absolute idea – society wide – since a non-currency system by nature must be absolute in order for it to work.
3) I’m not meaning to demean or insult you but this is a fairly radical position you’re taking – I’m not sure if society is ready for this kind of structure.
4) You advocate what I’m presuming is a form of direct democracy and/or rule of majority. Are you arguing for a police state to enforce your ideas or for dissenters to be exiled or something of the like?
No you seem to be taking this the wrong way I don’t want abolition of property like in a pure communist state. It’s kind of hard to explain but I follow a social democrat model in that you can own property but what you can do is regulated. I do not advocate a communist like society.