🚀 go-pugleaf

"CKIM" <nobody@hotmail.com> wrote in message

> The problem in South Africa isn't so much that whites were the first to
> extract gold and diamonds. The problem is that they exploited the black
> population, and maintained a police state in order to perpuate their
> exploitation. Now, even with the end of apartheid, the gold and diamond
> trade is securely in the hands of whites, who have no intention of
> reinvesting that wealth into the land that produced it. It is for this
very
> reason that we fought a war with the British. Unfortunately for them,
their
> colonial oppressors never relinquished control.

South Africa is a sovereign nation so can do whatever it wants. Look at what
Zimbabwe is doing with the farmland. It could nationalize all the mines, so
why do you suppose it doesn't?

> > So what was more evil - for the Europeans to leave, or for them to stay?
>
> As I've said before, it's most evil for them to leave, but maintain
economic
> control from afar. That, and the pathetic attempts of European liberals to
> uplift the locals. They managed to tame some of the disease in Africa,
which
> led to higher populations, which led to starvation. But I'm sure those
> involved are still patting themselves on the back for being such good
> people.

No doubt about that last part.

> You're lucky to live in a nation where the common man plays a large part
in
> shaping public policy. Go ahead and do your part. However, you'll find
that
> if public policy were to tilt further in your favor, that crime would
rise,
> unemployment would rise, the economy will stagnate, and you'll suffer. Did
> you take any economics classes in college? If so, you'll recall that
> programs like unemployment insurance and welfare are designed to protect
the
> economy from sharp downturns. Our current income redistribution programs,
> while burdensome, are vastly preferable to the societal rubble that
> America's earlier, freer, industrial age created. Robber-barons made
paupers
> of the rest of us, regardless of color.

And the Federal Reserve was created to prevent the boom-and-bust cycle, and
we had the Depression 16 years later.

If neither alternative worrks wee we should come up with a third. Just
because things were horrible 100 years ago is no reason to accept another
horror now.

> Furthermore, I contend that individuals, left to their own devices, are
> generally too greedy to be very good at charity. While you and all your
> friends may be decent and giving people, the vast unwashed would rather
buy
> more crap on the Home Shopping Network than help their fellow man.

We have the Red Cross, United Way, and Salvation Army, among others, all
supported by donors. Whenever a disaster happens anywhere in the world, we
are quick to send relief. And this is all for people we don't know and will
never meet. Don't you think we would respond even better if the needy
individuals were right in our own town?

The difference is that if given a choice, we would respond only to genuine
need. We would not hand out cash to lazy and irresponsible people like the
government does now.

Mark