Solomon

What does smaller government mean in practical terms? For example, the US federal government mandates publicly-funded primary/secondary education and the military but not public health-care. How do libertarians decide where to draw the lines on public spending? "Freedom" is a word that is much bandied around but it's clear that freedom means different things to people depending on their circumstances. How do libertarians rationalize the concepts of freedom in a society that is highly divided socially and economically?

Maybe someone could explain Libertarianism in a way that makes it sound less stale.

Maybe, but most leftists would like Cruz or Trump to get the Republican nomination.

It's exactly because there is a tendency for political systems to become corrupt that we should work to keep that corruption to a minimum. Corporate lobbying is a blatant form of corruption.

Why do you think JP Morgan et al did that? Patriotism? Altruism? Or could it be that they were the ones who had the resources to be able to see out the collapse and come out of it smiling?

The beast in question is a goat that Vald has hired to gobble some unsightly flowers that have sprung up, Vald being Vald, he'd had a beer or two and he slurred the word "leasing".

I smiled at "apparently". Could you be more insipid?

That's because your signature is cute and fuzzy but not Farky.

I preferred the "attach with each other" version before the edit. It was cute and fuzzy and Farky.

Taking advantage of some people's lack of understanding of cynical populism makes Donald Trump a Charlatan but not a Nazi.

Only the path of history will make the final decision but there is a relatively reliable short-term test, which is to ask people not directly involved in the conflict what they think.

I haven't managed it personally but I've heard there are millionaires in many forms of government, including social democracies.

It's a judgment call, isn't it? A handful of people with a premonition of the future isn't convincing enough to act, but neither is waiting until every stick-in-the-mud dies a good reason to wait. The common sense approach is to be sceptical of fads but also try not to be a silly Cnut!

Yes, it may change but I don't see the point in spending time on it until it does. I'm surprised you think it is simply inevitable when there is currently so little interest in it but if you feel strongly about it, and especially if you want to rise above hypocrisy, you should certainly make people aware of the possibility.

You're correct that acceptance of intermarriage and homosexuality were inevitable, but at the moment there's nowhere near enough groundswell for polygamy to become legal.

Do you consider homosexuality a current fad?

It seems we need an Islamic State addendum to Godwin's Law.

Lowering costs generally benefits both the producer and the consumer but the global petrochemical industry is a special case as it has managed to avoid the cartel restrictions that apply to most sectors. In the name of "energy self-sufficiency", previous US governments were persuaded to support high-cost-low-margin energy extraction projects despite warnings that the price of energy was volatile and easily manipulable. Those predictions have come true and now many US energy producers - especially the smaller and more highly-leveraged ones - are going to fail. That's why gas prices have become a political football. I don't think the post was aimed at you, Lannan13.

A president doesn't deserve all the credit/blame for what happens while he/she is in office, but as team leader they certainly deserve some of it. Obama deserves praise for what he helped achieve with the US economy, Cuba, Iran, gay marriage, climate policy, and health-care, but his greatest legacy will be how he pushed the core of the Republican party further to the right.

I'm surprised you think you need help in reducing your infra, FF. Choose one of your cities and enter a negative number in the "Buy/Sell Infrastructure" field.

You've missed the main point. Homosexuality has been recognized as innate, as has heterosexuality.

If people have fascist views, it's better that we hear them than pretend they don't exist. Education is a slow and sometimes painful process.

It's tempting to be naively optimistic or a doom-sayer about humankind's future but so many of the risks need more scientific study.

^ If I wanted to have a god, I can see why I might decide to give the position to the winning highlander.

I read it before I posted. What were you thinking when you put in the What if a mob of arabic men, who also sexually harassed a police woman, try to rape and/or rob me link?