It's not surprising that logic is not your strong suit.

No one is saying how moral one can or cannot be. In a Godless world, "rights" exist only so far as one has the power to exercise them. I have the "right" to nuke England off the map, if I have the ability and desire to do so.

As there is no God to provide an objective standard of morality, therefore it is moral for me to nuke England off the map, should I desire to do so.

Group morality is just another expression of slavery.

Well, Hiraghm seems to think it's OK.

I think a doctor who is drunk and operating should be put in jail.

Same for any driver.

Same for anyone who is in a position where people will be hurt if they screw up.

And yes, I do certainly believe that if someone is behind the wheel driving and blows positive that they should be immediately be put in jail for 24 hours and their car impounded. At the end of 24 hours they get out and get their car.

Second time 48 hours.

Third time a month.

And so the trend continues.

Due process is very simple. Behind the wheel and blow. Over the limit it's an immediate time out.

Yes, had America stepped up at the beginning of things, invaded Cuba and made it American territory, things would have been different. If things weren't as they were, everything would always be different.

And no, their health care isn't on a par with ours.

Who says?
Ayn Rand was a woman with remarkable insight, in some ways.

What makes you think I follow her teachings, ignorant child?

Awwww Hiraghm, you've gotten it wrong again: ""Morality" is therefore defined by what pleases me to define it,.."

You can be as "moral" as you want (or don't) in America.

We don't use "morality" to define us. We use social contracts. Individual "morality" is irrelevant.

Forgot for a moment. Ayn Rand was an atheist.

Nobody can worship a god and follow her teachings at the same time.

You *don't* want to go there with me.

As for enforcing them... free will, baby. If He enforces them, how are we to have the choice to surrender them? Or defend them.


Rights cannot come from other men, unless you stipulate that there are some men who are superior to other men as rulers by some criterion (please specify this criterion).

Rights are a convenient fiction we use to establish the relationships between men. Rights don't exist; there is only power and action. And therefore, objectivism goes in the same toilet as socialism.
"Morality" is therefore defined by what pleases me to define it, and consists of doing that which I have the power to do. There is no right or wrong beyond that which benefits me and that which does not benefit me, and the effect this has on others is irrelevant.The only limitations on my will are those other people more powerful than myself.

Still wanna play like there's no God?

So? What's your point?

The Republican party of Lincoln's, or even as recently as Eisenhower, only shares a name. You need to review the "Southern Strategy" to see just how hateful the current Republican party has become.

BTW, didn't taking the slaves away take away property? I suspect that in that era you would have been screaming about property rights.

Further, if corporations are "people" (as defined by our government) how's come they can be traded for money? Isn't that a form of slavery?

Ah.... The old Republican gambit. Proclaim you've won and run away.

Naw, I don't make deals with people who don't care about other people.

Awwwww Hiraghm, you should know better than that...

America don't have no state religion. It's right there in the Constitution. Without having a religion / god acknowledged it can't be protecting something.

Are you really in America, Hiraghm? You sure do seem to have a different slant on things.

Not when we do it on our own.

BTW, are you using "socialist" the same way Rush used "Marxist" about the Pope?

Also, it doesn't matter what you call them they still have better health care than we do.

WE ARE NOT A DEMOCRACY.

Neither the Declaration of Independence nor the Constitution give us any rights. Not one.

God gave us rights. The Constitution protects them.

"The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not." - Thomas Jefferson

"To compel a man to furnish funds for the propagation of ideas he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical." - Thomas Jefferson

"I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents." - James Madison

"If, from the more wretched parts of the old world, we look at those which are in an advanced stage of improvement, we still find the greedy hand of government thrusting itself into every corner and crevice of industry, and grasping the spoil of the multitude. Invention is continually exercised, to furnish new pretenses for revenues and taxation. It watches prosperity as its prey and permits none to escape without tribute." - Thomas Paine

" As riches increase and accumulate in few hands, as luxury prevails in society, virtue will be in a greater degree considered as only a graceful appendage of wealth, and the tendency of things will be to depart from the republican standard. This is the real disposition of human nature; it is what neither the honorable member nor myself can correct. It is a common misfortunate that awaits our State constitution, as well as all others. "

-= Alexander Hamilton, speech to the New York Ratifying Convention, June, 1788

yes.
yes
yes

I don't have to give Shriner's Hospital a single penny.

I didn't say *military* doctors don't have enough incentive. Although I'd bet you military doctors are NOT the most skilled and capable doctors available.

Anything done involuntarily for the "common good" is slavery.

It is slavery for me in OK to pay for a road in Hawaii.

It is slavery for me in OK to pay for soldiers to make Afghanistan safe for Afghans. It would not, however, be slavery for me to pay for soldiers to conquer Afghanistan for possession of and control over, for the benefit of the United States.

It is slavery for me in OK to pay for clean water, etc in Hawaii.

Aside from the armies, the rest of that is no business of the federal government's, according to the Constitution. And even the Constitution prevents the federal government from having a standing army... legally.

The Founding Fathers were neither Democrats nor socialists; therefore their attitudes and views were not static in time, nor in lockstep with one another.

You mean the same "right" that freed the slaves and supported the civil rights movement.

You have been reduced to arguing like a child. You know full well that your position is incompatible with any rational description of the United States as created by the Founding Fathers, so of course you insist upon referring to America in socialist terms.

I am through entertaining you. Retain your ignorance, and do not ever let your shadow fall in my presence.

I'll make a deal with you.

I'll support never funding another "stupid" war, or oil subsidies (which are indeed stupid)...

You agree to abolishing the 16th Amendment, and not every giving one single penny of taxpayer money to any social welfare program.

Deal?

(I mean, we'd have been so much better off had we not funded that stupid war, which crippled the Northern States and devastated the Southern States...)

The concept. Would "alien" be preferable?

You are the one who referenced the socialist paradises with universal healthcare. To bring their socialist ideas here would be to introduce a foreign element.

Has nothing to do with it. A republic is based upon a foundation of law, not the whims of 50.1% socialist scumbags. A democracy cannot and does not protect the rights of minorities or individuals; a republic can and does.