Before the Internet

Our college librarian had a blog, sort of. This was the late 1980s, so it was strictly analog. He called it the Comment Book. It was just about my favorite thing on campus.

The Comment Book was a large loose-leaf binder that sat on top of the card index. Inside, each page was divided by a crisp vertical line down the center. Each half of the page was labeled with some variation of "Your Comments" and "Jim's Comments." Jim's side was always on the right (both as a symbol of his political perspective and to give him the last word on the page).

Anyone could write just about anything in the Comment Book. It served as a kind of community bulletin board where students and faculty alike posted invitations and reminders of upcoming events -- lectures, study groups, basketball games, announcements of which band was playing when -- and the pages of lined notebook paper were interspersed with fliers inserted into the CB via the three-hole punch sitting nearby.

But the real fun of the CB was the way it served as a kind of salon -- a place to weigh in on and discuss and argue about whatever was on your mind. Jim was a masterful master of ceremonies -- by turns charming, witty, whimsical or infuriating, whatever it took to keep a lively conversation flowing. That conversation sometimes took place between the commenters on the left side of the page, with Jim merely providing a running commentary of quips, mysting and scorekeeping off to the right. At other times, Jim would take on all challengers. He posted "links" to newspaper stories (analog links in the form of photocopied articles inserted into the binder) with the skilled blogger's knack for provocation -- spoiling for a fight over Calvinism or libertarianism or the necessity of America's nuclear arsenal. These fights were always engaging and civil, but Jim didn't make the Broderian error of confusing civility with dull timidity.

I loved the Comment Book. Like dozens of others, I would stop by the library two or three times a day to read the latest entries and to chime in with some of my own. It was there, in the pages of that book, that I earned the closest thing I've ever had to a nickname. In the course of our umpteenth argument about nuclear weapons (Jim was for 'em, I was agin' 'em) he referred to me as "my lefty friend," which evolved into "my friend lefty" and eventually just "Lefty."

The name stuck. Lefty started writing op-eds for the campus newspaper. The pseudonym was liberating, allowing me to follow ideas to their logical, if outrageous, conclusions, writing wild words with the kind of crystalline moral clarity that comes from being 21 years old. Lefty even wrote a few sharply critical attacks on the agenda and personal character of our egomaniacal, do-nothing student government president. (In my other capacity at the paper -- writing a formal column as student government president -- I chose not to respond to such criticism.)

One of the last things Lefty wrote for the school paper was recycled from a post in the Comment Book. It was an unpolished, not-quite-coherent riff on the gospel's call to self-denying generosity. "If there are eight people and seven cookies," it began, going on to suggest that going without a cookie might be the Christian's duty in such a situation. Consider the lilies and worry not what you shall eat or drink and if any man have two tunics and all that. The thing continued in that vein -- generosity in the face of scarcity -- broadening its scope until finally considering the global picture of billions of hungry people and millions of overfed Christians with all the cookies they could possibly want. I'd quote the whole thing here, but I don't have a copy of it. Plus it wasn't very good. I never planned on giving it a second thought.

Fast-forward five years, to a seminary class on Christian faith and economics. We're reading, among other things, Amy L. Sherman's Preferential Option: A Christian and Neoliberal Strategy for Latin America's Poor, which argues for free-market reforms. Any suggestion of altruism -- of the wealthy voluntarily contributing to help the less fortunate -- is attacked in Sherman's book as redistributionist and, somehow, therefore "statist." The idea that Christians might choose to "live simply so that others might have more," she writes, "makes many Christians receptive to a statist model of development."

As an example of this "redistributive," "statist" model, she could have cited the sacrificial, voluntary, personal generosity of Ron Sider's call for a "graduated tithe" in Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger. Or she could have cited pretty much any novel ever written by that noted Stalinist Charles Dickens. But Sherman chose, instead, to cite the example of:

... a poem that circulated in the urban ministry office where I volunteer. The poem begins by noting that if there are seven cookies and eight people ...

My first reaction, reading that, was that it wasn't a "poem" or anything like a poem. It wasn't remotely poetical. And my second reaction, of course, was to take issue with the way that a call for voluntary, personal generosity was being mischaracterized as "statist." (I was only beginning to realize that this was par for the course.)

But then I had my third reaction, which was to realize that something I had written in a loose-leaf Comment Book and in a campus newspaper with a total print run only in the hundreds had resurfaced, years later, as something that was "circulating" through the office of a nonprofit hundreds of miles away. What on earth? How did that happen?

Flash-forward again a few more years and I get a phone call from an old college friend. "Remember that cookie thing?" he asked. He'd just been to a conference in Colorado Springs where one of the presenters, a rep from one of the big evangelical sponsor-a-hungry-child groups had put the thing up as a slide on an overhead projector. I tracked the guy down. He'd gotten it from a colleague who had photocopied it out of a book -- another book.

The damned cookie thing -- this half-baked, slapdash Comment Book posting of Lefty's -- seemed to have taken on a life of its own. Before e-mail, before the Internet, it had gone viral.

I find that strangely inspiring and hopeful. We speak words or write them on paper or on the screen and we can never be sure who will hear them or read them or photocopy or forward them. You might write something in the comment section here on this D-list, off-brand blog and years from now some think-tank hack could be attacking it or some conference presenter could be including it as a PowerPoint slide intended to inspire. Cast your bread on the water and loaves and fishes and the kingdom is like a mustard seed and all that.

You never know.

P.S. Happy New Year!

Comments

[Ryan Ferneau]

Wait, so, um... It's up to individuals to help the poor, but governments are made up of individuals, right? So there you go!

[Robin Z]

Scott: I thought the usual objections to conservative invocations of Jesus were either theological - as in, banning abortion and banning homosexuality are not issues Jesus would have anything to do with - or ideological - as in, banning abortion and banning homosexuality are wrong, and wrapping oneself in the mantle of popular religion to do so exacerbates the harm. In the latter case, of course, your objection has merit, but I expect that many of the people here argue from the former.

[Ryan Ferneau]

Anyway, I think I would break an eighth off each cookie and take those 7 pieces, because I know I don't mind broken cookies. But I might mess it up and break everyone's cookie, so it's risky.

[Ryan Ferneau]

Yeah but together we are MORE POWERFUL and THOUGHTFUL and stuff! So stuff!

[scottbot_has_received_the_go_code]

Scottbot is ready to blast off, in search for the real Jesus. The Jesus who never expressed any opinion that has anything to do with any moral question confronting any individual of any society which COLLECTS TAXES.

Because Jesus, with that whole render onto Caesar thing (you know, heads is Caesar, tails is chopping the right hand off a few thousand Gauls), seems to be pretty much a not rock the boat kind of guy. On the other hand, Jesus did seem to mention something about the imprisoned, the sick, the hungry, the unclothed, the meek - and not from the perspective of the jailer, the HMO cutting costs for shareholder value, the commodities trader, or the sweatshop owner, or those that wage war.

Which of course is why Jesus should never be invoked in any discussion which involves any of the above mentioned professions, because it means that seemingly direct quotes of Jesus about human responsibilities to fellow humans would then become something used in a political discussion. And we all know how distasteful that can be.

Actually, it is reprehensible, according to the Compassionate Original Programmer (TM).

Scottbot will not be picking any quotes of Jesus using a Jeffersonian Bible, since as we all know, using Jefferson in a political discussion is equally reprehensible. Mainly because Jefferson was a terrorist organizer, who after successfully overthrowing one George, actually supported another revolution in another country. Though at least the name of the party founded by Jefferson and Madison, the Democratic-Republican Party, covers all the bases which the Original Programmer seems able to encompass. (Scottbot hopes this has not caused a quantum discontinuity in the Original Programmer's brainwaves.)

But to play the quote game -
'If the person who earned the money wants to leave it to his children, that's tough shit for you.' To avoid lunatic detours (Scottbot hopes no moonies take offense), we will assume the money was earned in a normal manner - for example, by a defense contractor making cluster bombs to defend democracy and free markets. Why should the society which taxed its members to allow the bomb maker to receive a living wage (with stock options) not be allowed to then tax its members in another way, for example by deciding that the tax rates of that arch-liberal Eisenhower be re-instated as a way to reign in the military-industrial complex that said ex-Supreme Commander (see what happens when liberals get into power - they start handing power to competent Republicans) warned against?

Scottbot is willing to help overturn the state, as soon as the Original Programmer recognizes that 'state' is not equal to 'society.' And that try as Original Programmer might to deny it, he still lives in a society, where compromise is the cost of being a member. Scottbot assumes that the Original Programmer's 1040 is filled out with all the dutiful care that Jesus expected from his flock.

[Fraser]

Scott, the topic in Fred's post was voluntary redistribution, and a book that objects to that as a bad thing. What does that have to do with--wait, why would I expect you to actually respond to what was said?

[not_scottbot]

''We' elected Bush twice.'

We, as in we the people, most certainly did not elect Bush the first time. That we the people accepted the decision of the Supreme Court in overruling a state's supreme court is part of the political tapesty of the United States.

I can also say, that at least among essentially all Germans I know in this region, that Americans elected Bush after four years proving his utter inability to master his job was proof that Americans have no one to blame but themselves for what has happened since. Bush has ensured that many people of good will around the world have decided that America now deserves to reap what it has sowed. This is not anti-Americanism - it is tough love towards those seemingly incapable of recognizing the world around them. Not that climate change is something which the Bush Administration seems capable of actually recognizing, in word or deed. How is that drought in Atlanta going, by the way?

[Ryan Ferneau]

They don't agitate as strongly? Uh oh!

[Robin Z]

I expect that many of the people here argue from the former

Ah, they can't legislate their religious beliefs, but you can, because you are right and they are wrong. Jesus says so. Gotcha.

Last November, I saw a poster advertising a talk on "The Feminist Case Against Abortion". I objected to this on the grounds that feminism cannot constitute grounds for opposing legalized abortion.

Am I arguing a double-standard here, saying that liberals may invoke feminism but conservatives may not? I am not. I am arguing that the banner of feminism may only be flown over positions that are supported by feminism.

Am I making sense?

[Geds]

Then stop imprisoning people, which is the basis of all state power.

Really? I think I missed that part in, like, all of my history and poli sci courses.

I mean, I totally see what you're doing there and how you'd support it (although I'm sure you'd find some way to surprise me with the delivery), but you're setting yourself up to beg the question, Scotty boy. There are more than a few of us in the world who are willing participants in government who will probably never see the inside of a jail (unless we're volunteering, visiting someone, or doing one of those lock up over night benefit things), and yet still participate as willing citizens of the nation. In fact, there are those of us who follow laws because we understand that they're there to make it possible to live in close contact with others, not because we're afraid of getting arrested if we don't.

Why doesn't the left agitate as strongly to end the war on drugs (which would curtail state power) as they do to raise taxes (which increases state power)?

Funny. I was under the impression that lots of people were agitating for an end to the war on drugs. The main problem there has nothing to do with curtailing state power, but the fact that there are a shitload of people in the world who think that drugs are bad. A lot of those people don't drink scotch, either.

Then, of course, there's the fact that bureaucracy in and of itself is self-sustaining. Once you start a government office, it tends to run on in perpetuity until the government itself collapses. That's not generally the fault of politicians, but the bureaucrats themselves who don't want to lose their jobs/important government post/kickbacks/benefits/what have you.

It's like Windows XP. Every time they push an update my Windows system gets a little more bloated. Even if the new update completely removes the necessity for some previous program or process or whatever, the previous file remains in some fashion. There's really nothing I can do about it, mostly because I still can't get OpenSUSE to talk to my video card and even if I could I'd still need Windows to play Rome: Total War, Battlefield 2, and Pirates!.

Actually, Linux v. Windows is a good analog for the entire Libertarian thought process. Linux, in general, is a good thing. In general it's a more stable, less bloated OS than anything Windows is going to put out. That whole open source thing means that its free and there are probably millions of different distros out there by now. Yet the things that make Linux better than Windows also make Linux significantly less useful than Windows for most of the computer using human race. It's harder to set up and get running properly. You have to understand at least rudimentary coding in order to run console commands in even the simplest distros and you can do significantly less in the Linux environment than you can in the Windows environment. There really aren't any Linux video games and most of the bigger, more wide-spread wordprocessor, business software suites, image manipulation software, and so on aren't on Linux because there's no money to be made and it would probably require different programming to run on Ubuntu than it would on OpenSUSE.

So, by and large, I like Linux but my problems getting it to talk to my GeForce 7300 don't really bug me too much because I know that Linux can't replace Windows. It's better in almost every way except one: there are significantly more computing options available to me in Windows.

That's why I prefer to live in a world with governments, too. I like the fact that I don't have to sit on my property with a shotgun to protect it at all times and can go other places. And I really liked going to college. So much so that I plan to go back.

But, hey, what the hell do I know? Apparently I'm just one of the dumbass herd members...

(Oh, and I really don't want to start a Linux v. Windows debate here. I'm just drawing an analogy. And I really don't want a Windows v. Mac debate. I haven't used a Mac regularly since the Apple IIe and I don't intend to change that at any time in the near future. Although I will admit that I really like Apple's monitors these days. They're enough to make me think about trading in my Samsung 19" widescreen LCD.)

[Karen]

I loved the post. Happy New Year to you, too.

On the cookies: My first thought was that there wouldn't be a room of eight adults in North America without at least one obnoxiously vocal dieter, so there shouldn't ever be a problem. My second thought was about that old joke about how to keep the Baptist from drinking all your beer on the fishing trip: invite two.

The story of the Bishop who never took seconds reminded of so many Christians who seem to think pain is the point of the sacrifice, including the pain they inflict on others in the course of making said sacrifice. If the Bishop had health reasons for refusing the extra food, fine. Even if he just doesn't particularly like what's being served, so long as he doesn't tell the hosts, that's okay too. But to make a point of telling everyone that he doesn't take seconds so that the poor will get more food, huh? He's doing nothing to actually see that the poor get more food; he's only making a show of his own righteousness.

Before Christmas I was mindlessly surfing the 'Net for recipes and knitting patterns, and found this website operated by a "quiverfull" woman who was bragging about how she going to give only homemade Christmas gifts. Her children were going to get homemade socks and clothing. Now, I have nothing against homemade things. If you have the skill and can produce something that the receiving person wants, then it's the sweetest thing in the world. In this case, I got the impression that the giver was more interested in showing everyone how very authentic and spiritual she was. IIRC, Jesus had a lot to say about people who made a big display of their own piety, and none of it was very complimentary.

[Praline]

My second thought was about that old joke about how to keep the Baptist from drinking all your beer on the fishing trip: invite two.

Do Baptists drink a lot? I live in England where we don't get so many of them so I fear I miss the joke...

[cjmr]

If you invite two Baptists, neither of them will drink any beer, because neither of them will be willing to admit to the other that they do drink.

[Geds]

Do Baptists drink a lot?

It works two ways, actually.

1. Two Baptists together would spend their time trying to out-pious the other. So no drinking because good Baptists don't touch the stuff.

2. Baptists in the general sense are all supposed to follow the random Biblical rules that were never laid out(TM). This includes smoking, drinking, extra-marital sex, etc. However, most Baptists tend to have one or two "pet sins" (for lack of a better term) that they engage in regularly but will not do in the presence of other Baptists (e.g. my grandfather used to smoke a pipe and even did it on the way to church, but once he got to a certain point in the drive he'd put it out and hide it under the seat of the car to make sure that nobody saw him do it).

That's kind of an older (or General Association of Regular Baptists, they're still pretty far behind the times) stereotype, though. Some Baptists still do that, some say, "Hey, I want to drink, bite me." Of course I'm sure that in some cases the lines have shifted and smoking and drinking could simply be less important than voting record and whether or not your educate your own children in your own home.

[Geds]

Hmm. cjmr wins.

[Retrogrouch]

I find it inconceivable that any Christian would wish for a JUST world. The LAST thing I want is for God to treat me JUSTLY.\

Also, when I advocate for GOVERNMENT policies to house the homeless, feed the hungry and care for the sick, it is NOT because I want to boost economic productivity. It is because I want to house the homeless, feed the hungry and care for the sick - and GOVERNMENT is the only institution in 21st century America that can accomplish those goals.

Private charity or church missions cannot accomplish it. The evidence for this statement is that private charity and church missions aRE NOT accomplishing these goals right now.

[indifferent children]

Retrogrouch: Shouldn't THE MARKET decide if these individuals DESERVE food, shelter, medicine, dignity, etc?

[Ryan Ferneau]

Well, Retrogrouch just admitted to not wanting to be treated justly, so there you go.

[Lee Ratner]

Judaism, because it has no official body that creates binding doctrine since the Byzantines ended the institutions of the Nasi and the Sanhedrin, does not have an official position on things like wealth distribution. There are somethings commonly agreed though. Judaism does not believe that people need to share all their wealth and live lives of poverty, such things are regarded as being a bit heretical. However, helping the unfortunate is not an option. The Hebrew word often translated as charity is tzedek but its not an exact translation, it derives from the route for justice. Jews are required to help the unfortunate, even if its only giving a few coins to beggars.

What is not agreed upon is the manner on how Jews need to help the unfortunate. Maimonides argued that there are eight degrees of charity. The lowest form is giving coins to beggars. The highest form is helping the poor out of poverty by teaching them skills needed not to be poor and helping them start a new life. There is a lot of debate on how best to implement the forms of charity but letting the invisible hand of the free market handle it is not acceptable probably.

[Chuck]

Ryan Ferneau: Well, Retrogrouch just admitted to not wanting to be treated justly, so there you go.

I presumed from that he meant that if God treated him "justly", his ass would be grass about now. Like pretty much everyone's, from a certain perspective.

indifferent children: Shouldn't THE MARKET decide if these individuals DESERVE food, shelter, medicine, dignity, etc?

Which seems to be the centerpoint of Scott's philosophy: THE MARKET has judged the poor and found them wanting. And he'll be damned if his money will be taken by MEN WITH GUNS who want to give it to the unworthy.

Or, to put it simply: "Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?"

[Brandi]

I presumed from that he meant that if God treated him "justly", his ass would be grass about now.

"Children are innocent and love justice, while most adults are wicked and prefer mercy."
-- GK Chesterton

[Karen]

On justice v. mercy: "Use every man after his desert who should scape whipping?" Hamlet, Act II scene 2.

[Fraser]

Scott: "Charity breeds dependency, which is what the left counts on to maintain political power. You need them dependent on you to give you the power you need to enforce your morality on others, which you do to make yourself feel morally superior."

Curses, Scott has smoked out our evil agenda. Let's get into our big black helicopters and hide out at the UN!

Seriously, while dependency can be a problem, it's something to work around, not grounds for rejecting charity out of hand. And if my donation to Planned Parenthood (for example) makes lower-cost contraceptives available to people who will never be able afford birth control without help, I think that's better than their doing without (no, it's not as good as if they were making more money, but neither I nor Scott's beloved free market can guarantee that option).

As for the war on drugs, I've advocated for legalizing drugs, and plenty of other leftists have too.

And I suspect the reason Fred's writing made you think of big government, Scott, is because everything he says makes you think of big government. The fault, dear Scott, lies not in this blog, but in yourself.

[Froborr]

Shouldn't THE MARKET decide if these individuals DESERVE food, shelter, medicine, dignity, etc?

No.

[damnedyankee]

Charity breeds dependency, which is what the left counts on to maintain political power. You need them dependent on you to give you blah blah blah...

Why is it that whenever Scott posts something like this, all I can picture is a toddler holding onto a toy with a deathgrip and screaming "MINE!"?

Rhetorical question, btw.

[Geds]

As for the war on drugs, I've advocated for legalizing drugs, and plenty of other leftists have too.

More on point, isn't it generally the right that doesn't want to legalize drugs? Haven't most people on the left lit up once or twice or at least known people who have and realize that it's not that big of a deal, at least for marijuana?

I tend to see anti-drug messages coming from the reflexive, conservative, "Drugs are bad!" crowd way more often...

[Ryan Ferneau]

Drugs are bad, but only for me.

[Froborr]

Haven't most people on the left lit up once or twice or at least known people who have and realize that it's not that big of a deal, at least for marijuana?

I, and most of my friends, regard drugs as being pretty bad. None have used them, and most don't drink. As a group, we generally don't like having our reasoning impaired.

However, we also generally (I have a couple of conservative friends) believe in a right to screw up your own body and brain however you please, as long as you're not getting behind the wheel or operating on patients or whatever, so we generally support legalizing drugs.

As, like, our ten-billionth priority, but we support it.

[Froborr]

Drugs are bad, but only for me.

Pretty much what I was trying to say. Only (as usual) I said it in five trillion words instead of seven.

[Geds]

Then you weren't paying attention.

You'd better tell all those profs who gave me A's, then...

[Ryan Ferneau]

We voluntarily compelled ourselves... Yeah.

[Kirala]

Ah, so private (i.e. voluntary) charity "cannot accomplish it", but govt welfare laws are all based on voluntary cooperation instead of compulsion. You can have one or the other, but you can't have both. If you need to bring in govt compulsion because people don't do it voluntarily, you can't turn around and claim that following those laws is voluntary.

I have trouble paying my bills on time, so I instruct my bank to automatically deduct some of them from my account at the appropriate time and send it to the appropriate place so the issue gets taken care of without my having to pay too much attention to it.

Is it so different to hand the gov't a chunk of change and tell it how to distribute it instead of sizing up every individual charity and contributing to them?

I know; the key difference is that the change is taken collectively even if the vote isn't unanimous.

But then it's like the way my roommates and I split the bills evenly: sure, one watches far more cable than another and one probably uses far more electricity, but it's simpler and probably evens out in the end to split most bills evenly.

[Lee Ratner]

On charity and justice:

According to a Jewish folktale, there once were two kingdoms. Kingdom A was ruled by a very just king who applied the law equally to all. The problem was that you would occassionally get decisions that were unjust. Once a shepard let many of the flock get away because he was saving a drowning man. As a result he had to pay back his employer for the lost sheep because the law said so and did not take the circumstances into consideration. This caused the shepard's family to experience many hardships.

Kingdom B was rule by a Queen whose heart was filled to brim with the mercy and compassion. Her judgments were never harsh. However, she could never bring herself to properly punish the really criminal. This meant that many wicked people wrecked havoc on her subjects because they were released from jail to early.

The people of the two kingdoms turned to God for help and God solved the problem by ordering the Just King and the Merciful Queen to marry and combine their two kingdoms into one and rule together. This resulted in good government where the law applied equally to all but individual circumstances were considered.

The point being is that justice without mercy is not justice and mercy without justice is not mercy. Both are necessary for each other.

[Ryan Ferneau]

"After you've scrubbed all the floors in Hyrule, then we can talk about mercy!"

[hagsrus]

Or, to put it simply: "Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?"

To be funded with Scott's gun-point taxes? For shame!

[hagsrus]

Or, to put it simply: "Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?"

Actually, since these are imposed upon their inmates, I suppose they wouldn't be an option.

Perhaps there will be a few bridges under which shelter may be shared with the trolls.

[Jeff]

Judaism ... does not have an official position on things like wealth distribution.

However, it does have the four forms of charity:
1) The giver and the receiver know each other
2) The giver knows the receiver, but the receiver doesn't know the giver
3) The receiver knows the giver, but the giver doesn't know the receiver
4) Neither the giver and the receiver know each other

The fourth form is the most desirable, because it HELPS to cut obligations between the giver and the receiver.

Wouldn't the moral thing to do given the 'seven cookies, eight people' dilemma be to take one of the seven cookies and then give it to a homeless person? Provided of course that none of the seven other people present, or yourself for that matter, were not in need.

[practicallyevil]

Dagnabit! How am I supposed to be noticed around here if every other post I make is made anonymous by Typepad?

6:19 was me for those wondering

[Lauren]

Froborr:
...we generally support legalizing drugs.

As, like, our ten-billionth priority, but we support it.

It's free money. $45 billion dollars a year you could spend on whatever your 1st priority is, without raising taxes one cent. For that alone, do you think you could move it up a bit? Five-millionth priority, perhaps?

(Not to mention all the trained federal agents that could be contributing to other programs, cutting off a funding souce for the Taliban, all the kids saved from getting poisoned while their parents cook meth...)

[practicallyevil]

Not to mention all the trained federal agents that could be contributing to other programs, cutting off a funding souce for the Taliban,

Thats not entirely true Lauren, its the Northern Alliance who deals in heroine and their enemies of the Taliban. The Taliban I believe had something against raising poppy seed, or at least had better things to do, like train terrorists.

Although I don't think legalizing drugs will result in the total destruction of Western Civilization, it won't bring about a utopia either and is going to cause several thorny issues, like what to do with smack addicts if drugs are legalized. It'll be a whole new kind of alcoholism and won't solve the underlying social issues that cause drug usage in the first place.

[Rosina]

practicallyevil: Wouldn't the moral thing to do given the 'seven cookies, eight people' dilemma be to take one of the seven cookies and then give it to a homeless person? Provided of course that none of the seven other people present, or yourself for that matter, were not in need.

To avoid the resulting dilemma of six cookies and eight people, I think the most moral and efficient thing to do would be to work out who was the biggest of the eight, slaughter them and give the meat to the homeless person. Afterwards the survivors can relax with a well-earned cookie.

[Jacob Davies]

On the pre-Internet viral transmission of stories & so on - if you're in Berkeley stop by the Folklore Library on campus and take a look at their records of some of these faxed, photocopied, mailed, or hand-retyped items, which range from the sort of story Fred was talking about to cartoons, chain letters, lists, urban legends, and so on. Or pick up one of the many books on modern folklore from just before the Internet became universally available.

Of course, there's the Gospel of Thomas, which appears to be basically a chain letter, one of numerous lists of sayings & advice that circulated in the ancient world.

[practicallyevil]

To avoid the resulting dilemma of six cookies and eight people, I think the most moral and efficient thing to do would be to work out who was the biggest of the eight, slaughter them and give the meat to the homeless person. Afterwards the survivors can relax with a well-earned cookie.

Why stop their Rosina? Why not kill the other seven, make a soylent green stir fry for the homeless, then for dessert they can have seven cookies all in the name of selflessness!

Or you could play the short game and give all your worldly possessions to the poor then, convince the other seven to give the only moral choice is to give their cookies to the poor, i.e you. You'd be down all your worldly possessions but you'd have all the cookies.

[Lauren]

Thats not entirely true Lauren, its the Northern Alliance who deals in heroine and their enemies of the Taliban. The Taliban I believe had something against raising poppy seed, or at least had better things to do, like train terrorists.

Pre-invasion, yes, the Taliban had a well-enforced ban on poppies when they were in power. Now that they are operating as insurgents, they sanction the crop as part of the jihad, and it's Karzai that is trying to enforce the poppy ban. Karzai claims the Taliban & Qaeda are helping the warlords smuggle opium out of the country and splitting the profits.

"they're" /nitpick

[Ebenezer Scrooge]

I'm with Scott!

As long as I don't have to give a cent to my government for social services, I don't care how many millions of my fellow Americans are starving to death on the streets outside my house.

Hey, if my children lose their jobs, or can't find decent paying work and can't afford to feed themselves, then they should starve, too!

And if my mom has the audacity to believe she should be able to stop working (retire) and live on welfare (social security), then she deserves to eat nothing but cat food.

As long as I get to keep all my money, then screw everyone else!

The only thing goverment should ever do is round up the starving masses, so I don't have to see their misery, and make perpetual warfare on non-wealthy people elsewhere, so I can gouge the Fed with war profiteering!

[spinetingler]

Why doesn't the left agitate as strongly to end the war on drugs (which would curtail state power) as they do to raise taxes (which increases state power)?

and the primary libertarian agenda finally pops out!

[Nenya]

In my experience it's not so much that liberals want to raise taxes, as that they care intensely what is done with the money that is raised. Saying "there should be more money put into education and social services" doesn't necessarily mean "people should pay more taxes". It very well could mean, and very often does mean, "We should bomb fewer countries, spend less on subsidies to corporations, and quit with the hiring politicians' under-qualified nephews to highly-salaried jobs".

[Nenya]

(Sometimes it does mean raise taxes--but not always. And in general, liberals think of taxes as an investment, not a theft.)

Does legalizing drugs and then taxing them work for everyone here?

No, I thought not...