The case for government

[Copernicus]

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Iran vs. Iraq, Britain during WWII (But the navy/air force more than the army), Russia in WWII, any country during WWI. Probably a dozen other cases. Armies are sometimes a necessary evil and ideally aren't needed, but things don't always work out so well.

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Iran V Iraq i already discussed a little- Iran's army did almost nothing for weeks and it was Iraq suddenly halting their advance that led to the drawn out war, not Irans defenses.
Russia in WW2? No- there army was totally destroyed, they lost 20million soliders and 20 million civilians, and what was it that stopped the German invasion? A nasty winter and over extended supply lines, and peasants with virtually no training and poor equipment dying by the millions in Stalingrad.
England in WW2 was in horrible shape when Germany declared war on the russians, and their biggest asset in defense was the Channel.
France had one of the largest militarys in the world pre WW1 and WW2, and they did a piss poor job defending that country.
WW1- "over the top one more time boys"- soliders sent out to charge machine gun nests with bold action rifles and bayonets?
The governments involvement in war is horribly inefficient, and rarely works once war breaks out, it most situations the standing army at the begining of the war was totally ineffective, there are almost no cases of a government providing "good" national defense.

EDIT: i should say that Isreal is a glaring exception to the general rule.

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your point can only be correct half the time...if one army prevails over another their government provided good enough national defense (or offense).

[tolbiny]

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Iran vs. Iraq, Britain during WWII (But the navy/air force more than the army), Russia in WWII, any country during WWI. Probably a dozen other cases. Armies are sometimes a necessary evil and ideally aren't needed, but things don't always work out so well.

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Iran V Iraq i already discussed a little- Iran's army did almost nothing for weeks and it was Iraq suddenly halting their advance that led to the drawn out war, not Irans defenses.
Russia in WW2? No- there army was totally destroyed, they lost 20million soliders and 20 million civilians, and what was it that stopped the German invasion? A nasty winter and over extended supply lines, and peasants with virtually no training and poor equipment dying by the millions in Stalingrad.
England in WW2 was in horrible shape when Germany declared war on the russians, and their biggest asset in defense was the Channel.
France had one of the largest militarys in the world pre WW1 and WW2, and they did a piss poor job defending that country.
WW1- "over the top one more time boys"- soliders sent out to charge machine gun nests with bold action rifles and bayonets?
The governments involvement in war is horribly inefficient, and rarely works once war breaks out, it most situations the standing army at the begining of the war was totally ineffective, there are almost no cases of a government providing "good" national defense.

EDIT: i should say that Isreal is a glaring exception to the general rule.

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your point can only be correct half the time...if one army prevails over another their government provided good enough national defense (or offense).

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This is only true if the only possible outcomes are
1. win
2. loss
and no one cares how much loss was involved. Was it really nessecary for 40 million russians to die defeating germany?
Secondly the assertion in this thread was that the government was the only/best way to provide national defense. Guerilla tactics by small groups unaffilaited with a largescale government have been very successful over the years. Afghanistan for example.

[Copernicus]

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Guerilla tactics by small groups unaffilaited with a largescale government have been very successful over the years. Afghanistan for example.

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Thats irrelevant to the discussion though, because standing armies have been built to defeat standing armies, and because society currently doesnt have the will to inflict the collateral damage that is engendered by guerilla tactics. There are armies quite capable of defeating the Taliban, the Iraqi insurgents, or the NLF if the citizenry wants/wanted them to.

[pvn]

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You can claim under your 'no government' system that these things will be there but the facts are that there are governments in almost all the countries and they have provided armies and roads.

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Do you know the difference between the converse and the contrapositive?

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For almost all of history we were without governments in the modern form. Today, nearly all successful countries have governments. This is unreconciably (horribly mispelled, I'm aware and too drunk to care) with your theories of AC.

Sorry guys! But AC is probably a hoax you have bought into.

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"nearly" all successful countries have governments? Which ones dont?

Of course *all* successful countries have governments. All unsuccessful countries have governments, too.

For almost all of history we were without ice cream. Today, nearly all successful countries have ice cream.

[pvn]

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While we're at it...

what about preventing monopolies and mergers?

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Good point. Getting rid of government would 100% prevent monopolies.

All monopolies exist only through government coercion.

Government, of course, being the biggest monopoly of all.

[pvn]

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Eg. AT&Ts (near) monopoly grew primarily out of the capital requirements for stringing wires all over the world,

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Wrong. After Bell's original patents expired, but before the 1913 Kingsbury Committment, the Bell monopoly went from 100% marketshare to about 50%. After Kingsbury, the monopoly re-consolidated via explicit monopolies granted to Ma Bell by local regulators. This consolidation was vastly accellerated by Nationalization of the phone system for a brief period in 1918 (during which time, AT&T was given the consession to operate the national phone system, which effectively wiped out all of their remaining competition).

[CallMeIshmael]

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Private business faces competition. Government does not. When the my shop was built it was at the end of the street. The black top that makes up my parking lot is of about equal size to the black top the county had to lay to finish the road. A private company did the parking lot. The county finished the road. Private company finished in two days. The county finished in two weeks. There isn't much incentive for government to work efficeintly or cost effective at all.

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I have no problem with a government contracting out road construction to competing companies. In fact, Im VERY for it.

Im just against having them become private property.

[Copernicus]

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Eg. AT&Ts (near) monopoly grew primarily out of the capital requirements for stringing wires all over the world,

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Wrong. After Bell's original patents expired, but before the 1913 Kingsbury Committment, the Bell monopoly went from 100% marketshare to about 50%. After Kingsbury, the monopoly re-consolidated via explicit monopolies granted to Ma Bell by local regulators. This consolidation was vastly accellerated by Nationalization of the phone system for a brief period in 1918 (during which time, AT&T was given the consession to operate the national phone system, which effectively wiped out all of their remaining competition).

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But you ignore the reasons for and quid pro quo for the Kingsbury Commitment. The KC was a settlement of an anti-trust suit designed to impede, not enhance the growing monopoly.

There was no interconnectivity of systems because of the cost of independent wiring. At one point there were thousands of regional competitors that didnt have the capital to expand beyond their local borders.

The KC required ATT to give other providers access to their land lines and forced the divestiture of Western Union. It was precisely the capital commitment of wiring that led to their competitive advantage and the (failed) attempt to disrupt the monopoly.

[Andrew Karpinski]

tolbiny : Your position is that having won't ever protect against an invasion? Or is it that sometimes having an army doesn't prevent an invasion? Obviously the first position is ridiculous and the second obvious, so I'm not sure what you're trying to prove here. Do you think maybe if you appease aggressors they will stop invading? Should Russia not have fought off Hitlers invasion?

[Andrew Karpinski]

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While we're at it...

what about preventing monopolies and mergers?

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Good point. Getting rid of government would 100% prevent monopolies.

All monopolies exist only through government coercion.

Government, of course, being the biggest monopoly of all.

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Drastic, sweeping generalizations like this are wrong 100% of the time.