Salerno's Praxeological Analysis of War Making

[Richard Tanner]

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This is massively more costly than just trading with them. Do you see why?


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This depends on the price they want for their goods. Making an "economic law" here seems shortsighted. People A have what we want, their cost is too high, we'll take it from them for their cost-1, profit.

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I think your scheme would strain their credulity. 70% of people are already against the war we have now, much less wiping out hundreds of millions of people with neutron bombs.

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I would think so also, but personal opinion =/= fact.

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Lol. When has government ever been able to keep down costs? Especially when it doesn't have to (which is always)?

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Never off the top of my head, but that evidence is anecdotal. Just because a government hasn't thus far isn't proof it can't, nor would success promise continued cost cutting. Each government is different, as people's minds change so do their ways of ruling themselves.

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I will however, concede the argument, since I've decided that it may well have been that the Spanish conquests in Central America were profitable; their technology was so much higher than the natives that costs would have been relatively low, and they pulled a lot of gold and silver out. It wouldn't surprise me if they ultimately weren't profitable (because government can bungle anything), but they might have been.

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Agree, almost certainly Cortez made out like a bandit, and no one in the "Old World" cared about the injustice to the Latin Americans.

Cody

[The once and future king]

Does this "theory" apply to all States generally or certain States specifically. I mean how does this theory explain Switzerland, very strong State, not had a war in centuries.

Also Class lolz. How outdated a concept can you get. Marx didnt get his arse kicked because he wanted to share all the ponies, he got it kicked for methodology of generalizing power relations into homogeneous and exclusive class groups.

For example, if war is a distraction to stop the development of revolutionary consciousness in the productive class, why is so much of the productive class involved in the production of distraction. Productive/Parasite is a false generalisation as power in modern culture is heterogeneous, it has to be to maintain itself. The sheeple wants what the sheeple gets and that is distraction/"entertainment". Just look at the market value of Tom Cruise or Tiger Woods.

[Bill Haywood]

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real and abiding fear that sooner or later productive Americans will come to recognize the... naked exploitation. So the US government...is driven by the very logic of the political relationship to pursue a policy of permanent war.

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This guy is refreshing, that's for sure. Sounds like he is channeling Lenin. I think this approach has the most potential for reducing support for imperialism among the militantly patriotic.

That said, I always have a problem with the political science approach, which tries to set up models that explain a whole class of events, like wars. The archival record is rarely that clean.

Take the Korean War. The White House intentionally prolonged the war for a year-and-a-half because the emergency was so helpful in building the national security state. But that had little to nothing to do with Truman's initial decision to intervene. The praxeology in Truman's mind was Munich.

Take Iraq II. It is very clear to me that control of the world's on-off switch, that is, the strategic needs of empire, were the cause. The public was a lesser consideration.

All-in-all, Salerno seems to attribute war entirely to manipulation of the masses, and I don't find even a nod to other factors, like the desire for global dominance. (Based on the quoted passage.)

There are certainly wars launched purely for domestic consumption, but plenty of other aggressions are for other reasons. This is the great weakness of trying to create general theorems of causation, rather than look at the specifics. Models do not help much, since actual wars fit so sloppily.

When in a sloganeering frame of mind, I find economics, political science, and psychology all to be quack disciplines.

[Felz]

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Does this "theory" apply to all States generally or certain States specifically. I mean how does this theory explain Switzerland, very strong State, not had a war in centuries.

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on this Forum "the" state = US government

I find it very disturbing that "the" state on here is time and again rejected based on very limited empirical observation (almost exclusively refering to the current US political system) alone while an anarchic society is supported strictly on theoretical grounds. It's funny how Borodog claims that historically there have been AC societies in existence yet their apparent failure isn't used as empircial "evidence" against them.

[GoodCallYouWin]

"I find it very disturbing that "the" state on here is time and again rejected based on very limited empirical observation "

Well then relax pal, we reject the state out of praxeological reasons as opposed to empirical ones.

[Felz]

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Well then relax pal, we reject the state out of praxeological reasons as opposed to empirical ones.

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But only because you read at mises.org that AC'ists do - this forum doesn't reflect that at all.

Now say, what if I argue that private property rights are also coercive - so you can put praxeology to use. Off you go!

[Nielsio]

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Does this "theory" apply to all States generally or certain States specifically. I mean how does this theory explain Switzerland, very strong State, not had a war in centuries.

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on this Forum "the" state = US government

I find it very disturbing that "the" state on here is time and again rejected based on very limited empirical observation (almost exclusively refering to the current US political system) alone while an anarchic society is supported strictly on theoretical grounds. It's funny how Borodog claims that historically there have been AC societies in existence yet their apparent failure isn't used as empircial "evidence" against them.

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AC cannot fail because AC is not a thing. It cannot act it cannot accomplish anything.


What you are saying is the equivalence of "the absence of rape and murder has not had a good track record" and "you guys only look at the bad side of rape and murder from an empirical standpoint".

[Felz]

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An economic system cannot fail because an economic system is not a thing. It cannot act it cannot accomplish anything.

What you are saying is the equivalence of "the absence of rape and murder has not had a good track record" and "you guys only look at the bad side of rape and murder from an empirical standpoint".

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I see what you did there. [img]/images/graemlins/crazy.gif[/img]

[Nielsio]

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An economic system cannot fail because an economic system is not a thing. It cannot act it cannot accomplish anything.

What you are saying is the equivalence of "the absence of rape and murder has not had a good track record" and "you guys only look at the bad side of rape and murder from an empirical standpoint".

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I see what you did there. [img]/images/graemlins/crazy.gif[/img]

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What?

[Richard Tanner]

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An economic system cannot fail because an economic system is not a thing. It cannot act it cannot accomplish anything.

What you are saying is the equivalence of "the absence of rape and murder has not had a good track record" and "you guys only look at the bad side of rape and murder from an empirical standpoint".

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I see what you did there. [img]/images/graemlins/crazy.gif[/img]

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What?

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That line of thinking is nonsense. Right now we have a state. Right, wrong of indifferent it's what's in place, so a "change-over" to AC carries with it an oppertunity cost. AC can certainly fail if it works worse then "statism" in all it's varied forms.

Cody