Pastors Plan to burn Koran endangers US troops

[perseus]

Prapor

Perhaps you should also see the founding Fathers restrictions of Business. These are far more restrictive than any socialist system I have ever seen. No doubt today Jefferson & Co would be denounced as Atheistic Communists. No I'm afraid Americans have been indoctrinated by anti-left Rhetoric. I Don't think you will see this in American 'thinker'!

When American colonists declared independence from England in 1776, they also freed themselves from control by English corporations that extracted their wealth and dominated trade. After fighting a revolution to end this exploitation, our country's founders retained a healthy fear of corporate power and wisely limited corporations exclusively to a business role. Corporations were forbidden from attempting to influence elections, public policy, and other realms of civic society.

Initially, the privilege of incorporation was granted selectively to enable activities that benefited the public, such as construction of roads or canals. Enabling shareholders to profit was seen as a means to that end.

The states also imposed conditions (some of which remain on the books, though unused) like these:

* Corporate charters (licenses to exist) were granted for a limited time and could be revoked promptly for violating laws.
* Corporations could engage only in activities necessary to fulfill their chartered purpose.
* Corporations could not own stock in other corporations nor own any property that was not essential to fulfilling their chartered purpose.
* Corporations were often terminated if they exceeded their authority or caused public harm.
* Owners and managers were responsible for criminal acts committed on the job.
* Corporations could not make any political or charitable contributions nor spend money to influence law-making.

For 100 years after the American Revolution, legislators maintained tight controll of the corporate chartering process. Because of widespread public opposition, early legislators granted very few corporate charters, and only after debate. Citizens governed corporations by detailing operating conditions not just in charters but also in state constitutions and state laws. Incorporated businesses were prohibited from taking any action that legislators did not specifically allow.

States also limited corporate charters to a set number of years. Unless a legislature renewed an expiring charter, the corporation was dissolved and its assets were divided among shareholders. Citizen authority clauses limited capitalization, debts, land holdings, and sometimes, even profits. They required a company's accounting books to be turned over to a legislature upon request. The power of large shareholders was limited by scaled voting, so that large and small investors had equal voting rights. Interlocking directorates were outlawed. Shareholders had the right to remove directors at will.

In Europe, charters protected directors and stockholders from liability for debts and harms caused by their corporations. American legislators explicitly rejected this corporate shield. The penalty for abuse or misuse of the charter was not a plea bargain and a fine, but dissolution of the corporation

http://www.reclaimdemocracy.org/corporate_accountability/history_corporations_us.html

It seems imperative for the Captains of industry to tell all American voters how bad anything other than free markets work, even though they rig the market to ensure societies which don't accept foreign business interests fail.

 

[Micha]

When people talk of Communism, their minds immediately jump to Karl Marx, Soviet Union, China, North Korea etc.

They are not examples of Communism, and this is the problem within Western media and society. We are taught that Communism is evil because they were our enemies, they didn't approve of freedom blah blah blah. Basically, 95% of the b******t they taught us in school is just that; b******t.

When I was in High School I shat myself six different ways when somebody mentioned Communism, China or the Soviet Union; They told me that Communism is based on evil, and is the work of the devil (I unfortunately had the displeasure of going to one of the most fanatic Christian schools in my state). After visiting my partners family in Romania, it sort of cleared out the lies I have been told when in High School & College.

See, Karl Marx's version of Communism written in the Communist Manifesto (Its a good read actually, even if you are Anti-Communist) is basically the closest we could get to having a heaven on Earth. However, his version of Communism while good, was outdated. In todays world, you simply cannot achieve Marxist Communism in any way because of how our society has changed. I personally believe that even if Marxist Communism could be achieved in todays world, it would take hundreds of years to achieve it because of its nature (Free goods, abolishing currency etc). In this sense, saying things like "The Soviet Union was Communist" doesn't work.

However, variants of Socialism which follow the good aspects of Communism while keeping in mind that some of its aspects will cause problems within the short term is in effect a good, proven system. I wont go on with my rant now because I am supposed to be working, but if anyone is interested I will go on.

P.S. I'm not a Communist by the way, I just like the idea of it.

Karl Marx wrote all his works in the 1850s and 1860s, almost 150 years ago and therefore some of his assumptions simply no longer exist.

But Marx's biggest mistake was to see capitalism's collapse and the working class victory as a kind of scientific nature. Gramsky called it "the poor man's messianisme" One day "doomsday" will come and the evil capitalists will be punished and the good workers will have their paradise here on earth, unlike the heavenly - but nevertheless a "heaven on earth".

Philosophy has played a significant derail role throughout the communist way of thinking, but there was obviously a huge agitation force in it.

But beside this unfortunate idea of working-class natural victory there were indeed a wide range of other of Marx’s 'predictions that did´t materialized. For example, the working class never became a majority of the population.

Also the idea that class interests and political awareness are closely connected has indeed proved to be wrong - in many respects the individual's cognition was raised reverse above their class interests. Marx, Engels and Lenin's really are examples of this - none of them came from the working class, which they then believed to represent, and on which their very political cognition involved.

Today, political awareness in our part of the world has become an even more independent and stronger factor in the overall game, thanks to better education, thus the class-bound, political recognition is further weakened. The class specific party loyalty, which was found years ago no longer exists. I would not say that the people act wiser - but the acting is undeniably more from factors that are not class specific.

There are a number of points where Karl Marx was wrong. Tomorrow's big political issues in a world of 10-11 billion people in just 50 to 60 years, is requiring a high economic efficiency and social justice, security, political freedom and respect for the environment, etc., This task, we can’t solve by any literal reading of Marx. We can still draw inspiration from Marx's concepts, but we must reject his solutions as outdated.

 

[Justice]

I am an American and I value freedom of speech and the right of every citizen to exercise their God given rights that is also afforded to them under the bill of rights, but its one thing to exercise your rights but a whole different thing to needlessly and provocatively offend over 1.5 billion plus followers of Islam and create a discord amongst Muslims and Christians.

I mean in the last decade I have witnessed offense after offense against Islam whether it be Koran burning, to depicting prophet Mohammed, to making racist drawings of Muslims under the guise of "freedom of speech" while spreading Islamophobia, while someone who claims to exercise their "freedom of speech" by questions the extent of the holocaust as those European historians were doing would be arrested, charged, persecuted with jail sentence and a hefty fine... While I am against the denial of such heinous act as the Holocaust I find it totally hypocritically and double standard that someone can be jailed for exercising their freedom of speech by questioning it while others are applauded and encouraged to burn a holy books and speak ill of prophet Mohammed... Freedom of speech should be protected across the board for all or for none, selectively choosing who enjoys freedom of speech and who doesn't is not a democracy its a hypocrisy.