Ike Was Right (America's infrastructure in bad shape)

[Shogoki]

Who needs to repair the roads, the Romans built them to LAST.

SO, I wonder what if the US acted more like the roman empire?

The Roman roads didn't have to deal with a constant stream of 2000kg+ vehicles.

[MarkIX]

Do you think throwing around the "fundie" word scares me, pal? Libertarianism is based on two assumptions: one, the human beings are self-governing individuals who have the legal right to act as they wish so long as they don't infringe on anyone else's rights

And if this is not a definition of fairness, you must use the word in a completely different way to me

and two, government should restrict its activities to arbitrating in cases where those rights conflict, protect against the violation of rights by force or fraud, and provide services necessary to society but which the private sector is unable to handle. Now, you can feel free to dispute those assumptions, you can produce evidence that disproves those assumptions. The difference between libertarianism and fundamentalism is that libertarianism doesn't appeal to some imaginary sky fairy's unfalsifiable authority.

I wan't commenting on the sky fairy I was commenting on the tendency to presume that some people have less rights than others because of their belief structure. And Actually I should have used the word Fanatic.

As for fair, the best government can do is try to make sure everybody plays by the same rules. Your idea of fair is apparently that everyone's exact share of the use of infrastructure is calculated down to the nickel, which is functionally impossible once you factor in the indirect benefits the entire society enjoys.

Please show me where I said that all factors should be calculated down to the nickel and I'll withdraw my use of the word strawman

Perhaps once we've done that, we can cut off tall people's legs and stretch out short people on the rack so nobody has an unfair height advantage.

Again Please show me where I said anything about physical equality being required for fairness and I'll again withdraw the use of the word Strawman

You've now crossed the line into fucking idiocy. I'll say this again: government provides things that everybody needs but that only government can provide.

I'm not talking about everybody I'm talking about User Pays in relation to Libertarian Corporations, so this has nothing to do with my argument what has it got to do with yours? And you haven't shown that only governments can provide these services.

Get it now? Everybody needs roads. Even if you're a complete fucking agoraphobic recluse who never sets foot outside your door, the guy driving the fucking Meals on Wheels truck needs the road to get to your house, and so did the trucker who brough the food to the supermarket from the distribution warehouse, and the trucker who brought the food to the warehouse from the farm, and all the way back up the line. The same goes for every other segment of infrastructure. Again--unless you live in the forest and hunt using stone tools you made yourself, you depend on the grid. The fact that you're too stubborn or too idiotic to recognize this does not change anything.

Again show me where I said that infrastructure wasn't required, the best you can do is that I said people rely on it to varying degrees so whats that word again? thats right strawman.

In other words, you do not refute the claim that everybody depends on it, and thus, even by your idiotic "let's calculate everything down to the hundreth of a cent and charge people exactly what they use" system, everybody still owes money. Concession accepted.

So now I've gone down to the nearest hundreth of a cent? maybe you should have said I would go finer, or are you saving that for your next post, but wait since I never said that, that would be a Strawman, and if you're claiming that I ever said that Infrastructure was unessecary, perhaps, just a sugesstion mind. You should READ MY POSTS. If you want to keep the Idea that I have conceded anything you are fully entiled to keep dreaming.

If you're too stupid to recognize that the purpose of a sound infrastructure is to foster a functioning economy, effective national defense, and better overall quality of life, then there's no point even arguing with you. And nice try there subtly claiming victory by accusing me of moving the goal posts. The goal posts are right where they always were--I can't help it if your head is too far up your ass for you to see them.

I don't think you are arguing with me I think you are arguing with what you thought I said which I haven't said. I said if you want it you should pay for it that applies to national defence as much as anything. Further to the point I don't regard "National defence" as part of Infrastructure if you do then you should say so and why. And as for who's head is where, well I think you should come out and take a look around.

What in the fuck are you trying to say here? People are benefitting but not paying? Outside of children and tax cheats, who would these people be?

People who benefit more than they pay, really simple concept.

People aren't benefitting? If you're claiming that, you'd Goddamn well better produce for me a Goddamn serf dying of the Goddamn bubonic plague, or I'm going to laugh hard enough to cough up a kidney.

No I'm not saying that so don't start laughing yet.

You could call it that. People who put extra strain on the system pay above what normal users (which by your own admission, includes everyone) do.

As they should, do you have trouble with this?

The Pennsylvania Turnpike is a perfect example. To drive from one end to the other in a car costs around ten dollars in tolls. To drive from one end to the other in an eighteen wheel tractor trailer costs almost ninety, because tractor trailers are heavier than passenger cars and cause more wear and tear to the road. But on top of tolls for the users, everybody in the state pays road taxes to maintain it--because without it, there'd be no major highway connecting Pittsburgh, Harrisburg, and Philadelphia, and the entire state would suffer.

So they benefit, they pay and they seem to pay in relation to the benefit do you have a problem with this?.

Your return is not having to chase bears through the woods with a spear for your dinner.

Buzz word Bingo "False Dilemma" that is not the only choice or even the most reasonable and its not even relevant to my question, which was why should I carry you? not why should I pay for Infrastructure, I know why I pay for infrastructure.

Private enterprise can't function above a rudimentary level without a basic support structure. Private enterprise can't provide that support structure because 1) it's simply too big a project for anyone besides government to do, and 2) if there's no tangible return on the investment, the investment won't be made, as Marxists around the world have yet to figure out.

1) so there are no big companies in small countries and small companies can't form partnerships if there were or could this wouldn't hold true 2) So nobody builds toll roads or cellular networks because you don't make money..... whoops.
And if thats a sideways implication that I'm a marxist, Bzzzzt thanks for playing you lose.

The last time vital infrastructure was built from scratch by the private sector was when the railroads built their networks and the phone company built theirs. In both cases, the builders of the infrastructure had a monopoly on its use--the railroads owned all the equipment for hauling material over their lines, and the telephone company was a national monopoly. You'll note now that Ma Bell no longer gets paid for every telephone call made in the United States, but is still responsible for maintaining the wires and switchboards, the national phone infrastructure is starting to get creaky. And the railroads bought their land for what amounted to pennies an acre from the Federal government, so the government was still needed to help build it.

I understand Ma Bell was broken up not because it was losing money but for the opposite reason, they where stealing from people. And as for the railroads I can't comment because Idon't know enough about it.
But this doesn't detract from my point unless they got people to pay where they didn't derive benefit.

[RedImperator]

Do you think throwing around the "fundie" word scares me, pal? Libertarianism is based on two assumptions: one, the human beings are self-governing individuals who have the legal right to act as they wish so long as they don't infringe on anyone else's rights

And if this is not a definition of fairness, you must use the word in a completely different way to me

I don't see how this has anything to do with user-pays vs. taxpayer supported infrastructure, unless you think being taxed to pay for roads is a violation of your rights.

and two, government should restrict its activities to arbitrating in cases where those rights conflict, protect against the violation of rights by force or fraud, and provide services necessary to society but which the private sector is unable to handle. Now, you can feel free to dispute those assumptions, you can produce evidence that disproves those assumptions. The difference between libertarianism and fundamentalism is that libertarianism doesn't appeal to some imaginary sky fairy's unfalsifiable authority.

I wan't commenting on the sky fairy I was commenting on the tendency to presume that some people have less rights than others because of their belief structure. And Actually I should have used the word Fanatic.

And the point where I said some people have less rights than others was...?

As for fair, the best government can do is try to make sure everybody plays by the same rules. Your idea of fair is apparently that everyone's exact share of the use of infrastructure is calculated down to the nickel, which is functionally impossible once you factor in the indirect benefits the entire society enjoys.

Please show me where I said that all factors should be calculated down to the nickel and I'll withdraw my use of the word strawman

You can withdraw it until you show me where you defined user pays as anything besides, "Whatever you say, I'm for the opposite".

Perhaps once we've done that, we can cut off tall people's legs and stretch out short people on the rack so nobody has an unfair height advantage.

Again Please show me where I said anything about physical equality being required for fairness and I'll again withdraw the use of the word Strawman

Here's a word for you: mockery.

You've now crossed the line into fucking idiocy. I'll say this again: government provides things that everybody needs but that only government can provide.

I'm not talking about everybody I'm talking about User Pays in relation to Libertarian Corporations, so this has nothing to do with my argument what has it got to do with yours?

I'm going to try this ONE MORE TIME: the idea that only the people who use the infrastructure should pay for it doesn't work because EVEN THE PEOPLE WHO DON'T DIRECTLY USE IT STILL BENEFIT FROM IT.

And you haven't shown that only governments can provide these services.

So Mr. Fallacy Man is tut-tutting at me for not proving a negative, huh? I believe it's up to you to prove that private industry can built its own infrastructure. I can't wait to hear how the interstate trucking companies could have pooled their resources to built I-80.

Get it now? Everybody needs roads. Even if you're a complete fucking agoraphobic recluse who never sets foot outside your door, the guy driving the fucking Meals on Wheels truck needs the road to get to your house, and so did the trucker who brough the food to the supermarket from the distribution warehouse, and the trucker who brought the food to the warehouse from the farm, and all the way back up the line. The same goes for every other segment of infrastructure. Again--unless you live in the forest and hunt using stone tools you made yourself, you depend on the grid. The fact that you're too stubborn or too idiotic to recognize this does not change anything.

Again show me where I said that infrastructure wasn't required, the best you can do is that I said people rely on it to varying degrees so whats that word again? thats right strawman.

You can put that strawman up your ass, pal. Let's review: you want, so far as anyone can decipher thanks to the fact you've yet to define user pays in any meaningful way, a system in which the people and corporations who directly use the infrastructure pay for it. In other words, if Archer Daniels Midland needs a seaport to load grain onto cargo vessels bound for Europe, Archer Daniels Midland should build that seaport (along with the shipping companies who'll make a profit hauling that grain across the ocean). My argument: the entire country benefits from having good infrastructure, not just those who use it directly, therefore everybody should pay in. In other words, just because I'm unlikely to ever need to ship something out of the container facilities at the Port of Newark, doesn't mean I never benefit from them or should be exempt from paying taxes to support them.

In other words, you do not refute the claim that everybody depends on it, and thus, even by your idiotic "let's calculate everything down to the hundreth of a cent and charge people exactly what they use" system, everybody still owes money. Concession accepted.

So now I've gone down to the nearest hundreth of a cent? maybe you should have said I would go finer, or are you saving that for your next post, but wait since I never said that, that would be a Strawman, and if you're claiming that I ever said that Infrastructure was unessecary, perhaps, just a sugesstion mind. You should READ MY POSTS. If you want to keep the Idea that I have conceded anything you are fully entiled to keep dreaming.

This is like arguing with Huxley's monkeys. Let's try this AGAIN: you admitted everybody needs infrastructure. If everybody needs infrastructure, the idea that only those who benefit from it directly should pay for it goes out the window. The existence of sound infrastructure improves the quality of life for everybody in the country, by your own admission--so why shouldn't everybody pony up to pay for it?

In fact, one might even say it's unfair to make only the industries that rely on a particular facility pay for it if everybody's going to benefit from it. If I'm paying lower prices in the store because the Port of Newark's modern facilities cut shipping costs for suppliers and manufacturers, why whouldn't I be paying taxes to make sure the facilities stay in good condition?

If you're too stupid to recognize that the purpose of a sound infrastructure is to foster a functioning economy, effective national defense, and better overall quality of life, then there's no point even arguing with you. And nice try there subtly claiming victory by accusing me of moving the goal posts. The goal posts are right where they always were--I can't help it if your head is too far up your ass for you to see them.

I don't think you are arguing with me I think you are arguing with what you thought I said which I haven't said. I said if you want it you should pay for it that applies to national defence as much as anything. Further to the point I don't regard "National defence" as part of Infrastructure if you do then you should say so and why.

Part of the problem here is that you haven't said anything. I'm still waiting for a definition of user pays. For another, apparently you DON'T understand how infrastructure is necessary for national defense or anything else. Why do you think the interstate highway system is called the "National Defense Interstate Highway System"? It was built to MOVE TROOPS, with impoving civilian transportation and communication as a seconday goal. How do you think we get troops and equipment overseas without good ports? How do we move fuel and ammunition? How do civilian defense contractors get raw materials and electricity? How do they move out finished product? How can we afford any of it without a good economy, which depends on the infrastructure to function?

And as for who's head is where, well I think you should come out and take a look around.

I'm looking, but all I see is your wall of ignorance.

What in the fuck are you trying to say here? People are benefitting but not paying? Outside of children and tax cheats, who would these people be?

People who benefit more than they pay, really simple concept.

Like who, exactly? Name these people. And so much for your crying strawman all over the place--I might have been exaggerating when I said down to the nickel or hundreth of a cent, but obviously you want there to be some kind of accounting so people who benefit less pay less.

You could call it that. People who put extra strain on the system pay above what normal users (which by your own admission, includes everyone) do.

As they should, do you have trouble with this?

Not with the general idea, but yes with the implementation. Tolls increase congestion, as anybody who's ever spent 35 minutes trying to get through the Mid-Country interchange could tell you. They do take a lot of the maintenence burden off of the state transportation budget, though. I definitely wouldn't support making every road a toll road.

The Pennsylvania Turnpike is a perfect example. To drive from one end to the other in a car costs around ten dollars in tolls. To drive from one end to the other in an eighteen wheel tractor trailer costs almost ninety, because tractor trailers are heavier than passenger cars and cause more wear and tear to the road. But on top of tolls for the users, everybody in the state pays road taxes to maintain it--because without it, there'd be no major highway connecting Pittsburgh, Harrisburg, and Philadelphia, and the entire state would suffer.

So they benefit, they pay and they seem to pay in relation to the benefit do you have a problem with this?

See above. And note that while the highway is maintained by user fees, it was built with state money--and it does not turn a profit.

Your return is not having to chase bears through the woods with a spear for your dinner.

Buzz word Bingo "False Dilemma" that is not the only choice or even the most reasonable and its not even relevant to my question, which was why should I carry you? not why should I pay for Infrastructure, I know why I pay for infrastructure.

Explain how you're carrying me if by paying to build a road (and by the way, I'm paying taxes too, so it's not like I'm getting off scot-free) I can ship something you need to you cheaper and faster. Are you "carrying" UPS because your taxes helped pay for the airport they use to ship your online purchases to you?

Private enterprise can't function above a rudimentary level without a basic support structure. Private enterprise can't provide that support structure because 1) it's simply too big a project for anyone besides government to do, and 2) if there's no tangible return on the investment, the investment won't be made, as Marxists around the world have yet to figure out.

1) so there are no big companies in small countries and small companies can't form partnerships if there were or could this wouldn't hold true

Explain why those companies would build a national infrastructure out of the goodness of their hearts? Wouldn't it be more likely that if they have to build their own, they'll only build them where they need them to go, and the folks out in Bugtussle are on their own?

2) So nobody builds toll roads or cellular networks because you don't make money..... whoops.

Cellular networks are a special case, analogous to the railroads. To use a wireless phone company's network, you must purchese equipment from the wireless company and pay a monthly fee to the wireless company to keep using it. If you want to use someone else's equipment on their network, you have to pay an additional fee (romaing charges). And if you happen to live in or are driving through an area where there's not enough people to justify building a cell tower, you're shit out of luck.

With the railroads, if you wanted to use, say, Union Pacific's track, guess what? You had to pay to ship your good on a Union Pacific freight car hauled by a Union Pacific locomotive, and you paid by the mile. And if the place you needed to ship to or from was too small to have a railroad come through, well, tough. Ship it by horse-drawn cart however many miles to the freight depot, or move somewhere else.

As for toll roads, let's count the number of successful private toll highways in the United States. There's....well, there aren't any. Funny how that works. Railroads and cellular phone companies force you to use their equipment on their networks. If the only thing a network owner can charge for is use of the network itself, they go bankrupt.

And if thats a sideways implication that I'm a marxist, Bzzzzt thanks for playing you lose.

It wasn't, so eat me.

I understand Ma Bell was broken up not because it was losing money but for the opposite reason, they where stealing from people.

You missed the point. Ma Bell could afford to maintain a national infrastructure so long as everyone who used that network had to pay them. Now that they don't, but they're still responsible for the infrastructure, the infrastructure is slowly degrading as volume goes up and margins go down. It's going to be a crisis in a few years at the rate things are going.

And as for the railroads I can't comment because Idon't know enough about it.
But this doesn't detract from my point unless they got people to pay where they didn't derive benefit.

The point was that the railroads were a special exception because they had a monopoly on the use of the track. That's simply not possible with roads.

[phongn]

Part of the problem here is that you haven't said anything. I'm still waiting for a definition of user pays. For another, apparently you DON'T understand how infrastructure is necessary for national defense or anything else. Why do you think the interstate highway system is called the "National Defense Interstate Highway System"? It was built to MOVE TROOPS, with impoving civilian transportation and communication as a seconday goal.

Another thing to support your point is that the layout of the Interstate Highway System was deliberately designed to support the old Army Air Defense Command and the never-implemented ABM systems that were planned during the initial construction of the highways. If you look at the maps, you'll see intersections in odd places and such.

[Iceberg]

On I-90, between Winona and Rochester there's a sign that reads "Eisenhower Interstate Highway System." Do these signs have any particular significance?

[Joe]

On I-90, between Winona and Rochester there's a sign that reads "Eisenhower Interstate Highway System." Do these signs have any particular significance?

He's the one that signed the bill.

[Iceberg]

On I-90, between Winona and Rochester there's a sign that reads "Eisenhower Interstate Highway System." Do these signs have any particular significance?

He's the one that signed the bill.

I knew that, though. I perhaps should have asked if they have any particular significance aside from the obvious.

[Iceberg]

On I-90, between Winona and Rochester there's a sign that reads "Eisenhower Interstate Highway System." Do these signs have any particular significance?

He's the one that signed the bill.

I knew that, though. I perhaps should have asked if they have any particular significance aside from the obvious.

[Iceberg]

Ergh. Double post - please delete.

[Sea Skimmer]

Maybe if we stopped pouring our money down that money pit known as
the BIG DIG in Boston, and stopped suckign Ted Kennedy's cock, we'd
have enough money to do some good infrastructure repair.

Now just because it cost 1.9 billion per mile of road doesn't mean it was a fucking retarded project. It's the fact that many of those costs could have been avoided that makes the whole thing a big pile of stupid.

[RedImperator]

Maybe if we stopped pouring our money down that money pit known as
the BIG DIG in Boston, and stopped suckign Ted Kennedy's cock, we'd
have enough money to do some good infrastructure repair.

Now just because it cost 1.9 billion per mile of road doesn't mean it was a fucking retarded project. It's the fact that many of those costs could have been avoided that makes the whole thing a big pile of stupid.

The whole project could have been avoided if they'd built the fucking thing underground in the first place. I'd really like to throttle the idiots who thought that we wanted elevated highways running through the middle of cities. For Christ's sake, right as those highways were going up, they were tearing down the elevated railroads for the exact same reason we'e tearing down elevated highways today.

[MKSheppard]

For Christ's sake, right as those highways were going up, they were tearing down the elevated railroads for the exact same reason we'e tearing down elevated highways today.

Erm no, Elevated Railroads were a cheap efficient way to transport huge
masses of people thru a city without tearing up lots of prime real estate space (aka highways)

Let me guess, all these elevated railroads got replaced with GM Diesel
buses, right

[MarkIX]

Do you think throwing around the "fundie" word scares me, pal? Libertarianism is based on two assumptions: one, the human beings are self-governing individuals who have the legal right to act as they wish so long as they don't infringe on anyone else's rights

And if this is not a definition of fairness, you must use the word in a completely different way to me

I don't see how this has anything to do with user-pays vs. taxpayer supported infrastructure, unless you think being taxed to pay for roads is a violation of your rights.

This was a direct comment at the vacous

Libertarianism has nothing to do with being fair.

if it has nothing to do with being fair then as a method of governance you are left with two options, the gun or the bribe which do you favour.

and two, government should restrict its activities to arbitrating in cases where those rights conflict, protect against the violation of rights by force or fraud, and provide services necessary to society but which the private sector is unable to handle. Now, you can feel free to dispute those assumptions, you can produce evidence that disproves those assumptions. The difference between libertarianism and fundamentalism is that libertarianism doesn't appeal to some imaginary sky fairy's unfalsifiable authority.

I wan't commenting on the sky fairy I was commenting on the tendency to presume that some people have less rights than others because of their belief structure. And Actually I should have used the word Fanatic.

And the point where I said some people have less rights than others was...?

See above about fairness

As for fair, the best government can do is try to make sure everybody plays by the same rules. Your idea of fair is apparently that everyone's exact share of the use of infrastructure is calculated down to the nickel, which is functionally impossible once you factor in the indirect benefits the entire society enjoys.

Please show me where I said that all factors should be calculated down to the nickel and I'll withdraw my use of the word strawman

You can withdraw it until you show me where you defined user pays as anything besides, "Whatever you say, I'm for the opposite".

If you keep piling up the strawman you'll soon be able to open you own factory making compressed straw board. you say I can withdraw the word strawman and then say you don't even know what I was saying, and yet still managed to quote me. NOT WITHDRAWN.

Perhaps once we've done that, we can cut off tall people's legs and stretch out short people on the rack so nobody has an unfair height advantage.

Again Please show me where I said anything about physical equality being required for fairness and I'll again withdraw the use of the word Strawman

Here's a word for you: mockery.

Here's a word for you: stupidity. If you use tatics like that in a real debate someone will hand you your head.

You've now crossed the line into fucking idiocy. I'll say this again: government provides things that everybody needs but that only government can provide.

I'm not talking about everybody I'm talking about User Pays in relation to Libertarian Corporations, so this has nothing to do with my argument what has it got to do with yours?

I'm going to try this ONE MORE TIME: the idea that only the people who use the infrastructure should pay for it doesn't work because EVEN THE PEOPLE WHO DON'T DIRECTLY USE IT STILL BENEFIT FROM IT.

And this can't be readily quantified under the current system but we are talking about a libertarian system or had you forgotten (or aren't you)

And you haven't shown that only governments can provide these services.

So Mr. Fallacy Man is tut-tutting at me for not proving a negative, huh? I believe it's up to you to prove that private industry can built its own infrastructure. I can't wait to hear how the interstate trucking companies could have pooled their resources to built I-80.

He who asserts proves. You could start by trying two things showing where government workers are the only ones capable of building infrastructure by showing that no private company has or does build infrastructure and show where all the companies running infrastructure are losing money.Wow a company or alliance developing Assets to improve their business thats never happened before ( I don't really need sarcasm tags do I?)

Get it now? Everybody needs roads. Even if you're a complete fucking agoraphobic recluse who never sets foot outside your door, the guy driving the fucking Meals on Wheels truck needs the road to get to your house, and so did the trucker who brough the food to the supermarket from the distribution warehouse, and the trucker who brought the food to the warehouse from the farm, and all the way back up the line. The same goes for every other segment of infrastructure. Again--unless you live in the forest and hunt using stone tools you made yourself, you depend on the grid. The fact that you're too stubborn or too idiotic to recognize this does not change anything.

Again show me where I said that infrastructure wasn't required, the best you can do is that I said people rely on it to varying degrees so whats that word again? thats right strawman.

You can put that strawman up your ass, pal. Let's review: you want, so far as anyone can decipher thanks to the fact you've yet to define user pays in any meaningful way, a system in which the people and corporations who directly use the infrastructure pay for it. In other words, if Archer Daniels Midland needs a seaport to load grain onto cargo vessels bound for Europe, Archer Daniels Midland should build that seaport (along with the shipping companies who'll make a profit hauling that grain across the ocean). My argument: the entire country benefits from having good infrastructure, not just those who use it directly, therefore everybody should pay in. In other words, just because I'm unlikely to ever need to ship something out of the container facilities at the Port of Newark, doesn't mean I never benefit from them or should be exempt from paying taxes to support them.

And if they built it themselves they of course wouldn't pass the cost on to all their customers

In other words, you do not refute the claim that everybody depends on it, and thus, even by your idiotic "let's calculate everything down to the hundreth of a cent and charge people exactly what they use" system, everybody still owes money. Concession accepted.

So now I've gone down to the nearest hundreth of a cent? maybe you should have said I would go finer, or are you saving that for your next post, but wait since I never said that, that would be a Strawman, and if you're claiming that I ever said that Infrastructure was unessecary, perhaps, just a sugesstion mind. You should READ MY POSTS. If you want to keep the Idea that I have conceded anything you are fully entiled to keep dreaming.

This is like arguing with Huxley's monkeys. Let's try this AGAIN: you admitted everybody needs infrastructure. If everybody needs infrastructure, the idea that only those who benefit from it directly should pay for it goes out the window. The existence of sound infrastructure improves the quality of life for everybody in the country, by your own admission--so why shouldn't everybody pony up to pay for it?

In fact, one might even say it's unfair to make only the industries that rely on a particular facility pay for it if everybody's going to benefit from it. If I'm paying lower prices in the store because the Port of Newark's modern facilities cut shipping costs for suppliers and manufacturers, why whouldn't I be paying taxes to make sure the facilities stay in good condition?

but if I'm mostly buying local stuff and would be quite happy paying more for the imported goods I buy, why should I pay more taxes? Get it yet?

If you're too stupid to recognize that the purpose of a sound infrastructure is to foster a functioning economy, effective national defense, and better overall quality of life, then there's no point even arguing with you. And nice try there subtly claiming victory by accusing me of moving the goal posts. The goal posts are right where they always were--I can't help it if your head is too far up your ass for you to see them.

I don't think you are arguing with me I think you are arguing with what you thought I said which I haven't said. I said if you want it you should pay for it that applies to national defence as much as anything. Further to the point I don't regard "National defence" as part of Infrastructure if you do then you should say so and why.

Part of the problem here is that you haven't said anything.

Oh I understand now, those weren't strawmen after all. They where just you trying to get a handle on what I was saying. Perhaps you should have asked or is that concept too foreign to you? My guess is that Mr Red was a litle Grumpy and thought he would add a nOOb scalp to his belt.

I'm still waiting for a definition of user pays. For another, apparently you DON'T understand how infrastructure is necessary for national defense or anything else. Why do you think the interstate highway system is called the "National Defense Interstate Highway System"? It was built to MOVE TROOPS, with impoving civilian transportation and communication as a seconday goal. How do you think we get troops and equipment overseas without good ports? How do we move fuel and ammunition? How do civilian defense contractors get raw materials and electricity? How do they move out finished product? How can we afford any of it without a good economy, which depends on the infrastructure to function?

People who dervive benefit from the structure pay in proportion to the derived benefit. And the government cargoes are exactly what percentage of shipped freight? 90% 80% less, well I guess they would just have to pay whoever did own the ports for what they moved then, or are you going to claim that nobody else needs good ports so they wouldn't have been built?

And as for who's head is where, well I think you should come out and take a look around.

I'm looking, but all I see is your wall of ignorance.

That is probably why "Blinded by stupidity" is such a common phrase

What in the fuck are you trying to say here? People are benefitting but not paying? Outside of children and tax cheats, who would these people be?

People who benefit more than they pay, really simple concept.

Like who, exactly? Name these people. And so much for your crying strawman all over the place--I might have been exaggerating when I said down to the nickel or hundreth of a cent, but obviously you want there to be some kind of accounting so people who benefit less pay less.

I don't have to name them you have already conceded they exist. Well there are two ways of doing it if its a government, those that benefit less pay less and if its run by private enterprise those that benefit most pay most.

You could call it that. People who put extra strain on the system pay above what normal users (which by your own admission, includes everyone) do.

As they should, do you have trouble with this?

Not with the general idea, but yes with the implementation. Tolls increase congestion, as anybody who's ever spent 35 minutes trying to get through the Mid-Country interchange could tell you. They do take a lot of the maintenence burden off of the state transportation budget, though. I definitely wouldn't support making every road a toll road.

They are using technology to reduce the congestion problem. But this argument isn't local implimentation its about Macro implementation.

The Pennsylvania Turnpike is a perfect example. To drive from one end to the other in a car costs around ten dollars in tolls. To drive from one end to the other in an eighteen wheel tractor trailer costs almost ninety, because tractor trailers are heavier than passenger cars and cause more wear and tear to the road. But on top of tolls for the users, everybody in the state pays road taxes to maintain it--because without it, there'd be no major highway connecting Pittsburgh, Harrisburg, and Philadelphia, and the entire state would suffer.

So they benefit, they pay and they seem to pay in relation to the benefit do you have a problem with this?

See above. And note that while the highway is maintained by user fees, it was built with state money--and it does not turn a profit.

Are you saying user pays doesn't work or are you saying Governments are inefficient at delivering services.

Your return is not having to chase bears through the woods with a spear for your dinner.

Buzz word Bingo "False Dilemma" that is not the only choice or even the most reasonable and its not even relevant to my question, which was why should I carry you? not why should I pay for Infrastructure, I know why I pay for infrastructure.

Explain how you're carrying me if by paying to build a road (and by the way, I'm paying taxes too, so it's not like I'm getting off scot-free) I can ship something you need to you cheaper and faster. Are you "carrying" UPS because your taxes helped pay for the airport they use to ship your online purchases to you?

I am carrying you if you derive more benefit than you pay for and I derive less than I pay for. I am carrying UPS because my taxes helped pay for the airport and the taxes they pay are passed onto me as well as part of the cost of delivery so the answer is yes as I pay twice. obviously you didn't understand my point.

Private enterprise can't function above a rudimentary level without a basic support structure. Private enterprise can't provide that support structure because 1) it's simply too big a project for anyone besides government to do, and 2) if there's no tangible return on the investment, the investment won't be made, as Marxists around the world have yet to figure out.

1) so there are no big companies in small countries and small companies can't form partnerships if there were or could this wouldn't hold true

Explain why those companies would build a national infrastructure out of the goodness of their hearts? Wouldn't it be more likely that if they have to build their own, they'll only build them where they need them to go, and the folks out in Bugtussle are on their own?

They wouldn't even an idiot should understand that, they would do it because it would make their business easier or more profitable and they would be able to pass the costs on to the consumers, an equitable arrangement. If you choose to live in Bugtussle then you know what you are in for.

2) So nobody builds toll roads or cellular networks because you don't make money..... whoops.

Cellular networks are a special case, analogous to the railroads. To use a wireless phone company's network, you must purchese equipment from the wireless company and pay a monthly fee to the wireless company to keep using it. If you want to use someone else's equipment on their network, you have to pay an additional fee (romaing charges). And if you happen to live in or are driving through an area where there's not enough people to justify building a cell tower, you're shit out of luck.

With the railroads, if you wanted to use, say, Union Pacific's track, guess what? You had to pay to ship your good on a Union Pacific freight car hauled by a Union Pacific locomotive, and you paid by the mile. And if the place you needed to ship to or from was too small to have a railroad come through, well, tough. Ship it by horse-drawn cart however many miles to the freight depot, or move somewhere else.

As for toll roads, let's count the number of successful private toll highways in the United States. There's....well, there aren't any. Funny how that works. Railroads and cellular phone companies force you to use their equipment on their networks. If the only thing a network owner can charge for is use of the network itself, they go bankrupt.

So if it a non government entity does it its a special case strangely I have a CECT phone on a CMCC network. And as for the Raliroads whats your point? that the user payed and the system worked. OMG my aguement is in tatters because my oponent keeps making my points for me.

And if thats a sideways implication that I'm a marxist, Bzzzzt thanks for playing you lose.

It wasn't, so eat me.

As I am not a cannibal eating you is totally out of the question

I understand Ma Bell was broken up not because it was losing money but for the opposite reason, they where stealing from people.

You missed the point. Ma Bell could afford to maintain a national infrastructure so long as everyone who used that network had to pay them. Now that they don't, but they're still responsible for the infrastructure, the infrastructure is slowly degrading as volume goes up and margins go down. It's going to be a crisis in a few years at the rate things are going.

Why because the users aren't paying. doesn't make your point

And as for the railroads I can't comment because Idon't know enough about it.
But this doesn't detract from my point unless they got people to pay where they didn't derive benefit.

The point was that the railroads were a special exception because they had a monopoly on the use of the track. That's simply not possible with roads.

Another special case but I don't understand your contention with roads are you saying that roads can't be a monopoly or are you saying nobody can build their own road for some reason?

[RedImperator]

For Christ's sake, right as those highways were going up, they were tearing down the elevated railroads for the exact same reason we'e tearing down elevated highways today.

Erm no, Elevated Railroads were a cheap efficient way to transport huge
masses of people thru a city without tearing up lots of prime real estate space (aka highways)

Let me guess, all these elevated railroads got replaced with GM Diesel
buses, right

The elevateds were almost universally loathed by anyone who lived near them. They didn't physically consume much space, but they did the next worst thing: land values near them plummeted. They were replaced by subways whenever they could be. A lot of them went out of service and weren't replaced as ridership on public transit overall declined. And yes, you're right, some were replaced with buses, which is not an ideal solution, but most people who lived on those streets would rather have had buses than elevated trains.

Elevated highways were just totally senseless. They still wasted real estate because you couldn't build anything under them and they had to be so wide that you couldn't just run them down the middle of the street and leave the buildings intact on both sides. They were eyesores. They ruined land values on either side of them. And they acted like walls between neighborhoods, sometimes cutting entire sections of the city off and leaving them to rot. Boston is spending a zillion dollars on the Big Dig because the Central Artery cut the city center off from the harbor.

[Guardsman Bass]

*song* War- what is it, good for?


Why, distracting the populace from problems at home, of course.

[RedImperator]

And if this is not a definition of fairness, you must use the word in a completely different way to me

I don't see how this has anything to do with user-pays vs. taxpayer supported infrastructure, unless you think being taxed to pay for roads is a violation of your rights.

This was a direct comment at the vacous

Libertarianism has nothing to do with being fair.

if it has nothing to do with being fair then as a method of governance you are left with two options, the gun or the bribe which do you favour.

False dilemma, Mr. Fallacy Man: libertarianism is about finding the best way to keep society functional with a minimal intrusion onto the personal and economic rights of others. Fairness is everybody playing by the same rules, not "let's calculate to make sure that nobody pays more than how much they benefit". Guess what: you enjoy the benefits of living in a society, including a libertarian society, you still have to pay to keep it functioning. The free market, wonderful as it is, is not very good at doing certain things, and one of them is providing basic infrastructure, barring certain special exceptions.

Please show me where I said that all factors should be calculated down to the nickel and I'll withdraw my use of the word strawman

You can withdraw it until you show me where you defined user pays as anything besides, "Whatever you say, I'm for the opposite".

If you keep piling up the strawman you'll soon be able to open you own factory making compressed straw board. you say I can withdraw the word strawman and then say you don't even know what I was saying, and yet still managed to quote me. NOT WITHDRAWN.

Enough of this bullshit. Define "user pays", in coherent English, or concede the debate.

Again Please show me where I said anything about physical equality being required for fairness and I'll again withdraw the use of the word Strawman

Here's a word for you: mockery.

Here's a word for you: stupidity. If you use tatics like that in a real debate someone will hand you your head.

Fuck you. This is an internet debate on a board with a high tolerance for sarcasm and mockery. Believe me, if I'm ever holding forth on the floor of Congress, I'll conduct myself approppriately.

I'm going to try this ONE MORE TIME: the idea that only the people who use the infrastructure should pay for it doesn't work because EVEN THE PEOPLE WHO DON'T DIRECTLY USE IT STILL BENEFIT FROM IT.

And this can't be readily quantified under the current system but we are talking about a libertarian system or had you forgotten (or aren't you)

It can't be quantified at ALL. Please, explain how you quantify the benefits of having a society where transportation and communications are fast, cheap, and reliable.

The problem here seems to be you've got your nose pressed too close to the picture. You're still thinking in terms of how much, in dollars and cents, does any one person directly use the infrastructure, and missing the fact that without it, society as we know it doesn't exist.

And you haven't shown that only governments can provide these services.

So Mr. Fallacy Man is tut-tutting at me for not proving a negative, huh? I believe it's up to you to prove that private industry can built its own infrastructure. I can't wait to hear how the interstate trucking companies could have pooled their resources to built I-80.

He who asserts proves. You could start by trying two things showing where government workers are the only ones capable of building infrastructure

Which I never said, you retard. Private contractors design and build it--the government just pays for it. And even if I had, to prove only government workers can do it, I'd have to prove that private workers CAN'T. That's called proving a negative, and it's logically impossible to do. The burden would fall on you to prove that private workers can build them (a trivially easy thing to do).

On the off chance you meant that only government in general could build infrastructure, I'd still have to prove that private entities can't do it, which is still proving a negative, which is still impossible.

by showing that no private company has or does build infrastructure

Burden of proof fallacy. Learn it, love it, cherish it, for it is the bullet which sunders thy opponent's foot.

and show where all the companies running infrastructure are losing money.Wow a company or alliance developing Assets to improve their business thats never happened before ( I don't really need sarcasm tags do I?)

Not all are. Why, in Canada, there's even a privately owned toll highway. This doesn't change the fact that 1) private industry is not suited to construct an entire infrastructure network due to the vast sums of money involved, 2) even if it could, it would not build where there was no potential return on the investment, and 3) such a system would be inconvenient to the point of unworkability for a nationwide network--or are you volunteering to be the first with a toll booth at the end of his driveway?

You can put that strawman up your ass, pal. Let's review: you want, so far as anyone can decipher thanks to the fact you've yet to define user pays in any meaningful way, a system in which the people and corporations who directly use the infrastructure pay for it. In other words, if Archer Daniels Midland needs a seaport to load grain onto cargo vessels bound for Europe, Archer Daniels Midland should build that seaport (along with the shipping companies who'll make a profit hauling that grain across the ocean). My argument: the entire country benefits from having good infrastructure, not just those who use it directly, therefore everybody should pay in. In other words, just because I'm unlikely to ever need to ship something out of the container facilities at the Port of Newark, doesn't mean I never benefit from them or should be exempt from paying taxes to support them.

And if they built it themselves they of course wouldn't pass the cost on to all their customers

They wouldn't build it at all, a point that consistantly flies over your head. They'd continue to ship the old fashioned way, off of docks, and pass the added cost onto you without any of the benefits you get from a modern port.

This is like arguing with Huxley's monkeys. Let's try this AGAIN: you admitted everybody needs infrastructure. If everybody needs infrastructure, the idea that only those who benefit from it directly should pay for it goes out the window. The existence of sound infrastructure improves the quality of life for everybody in the country, by your own admission--so why shouldn't everybody pony up to pay for it?

In fact, one might even say it's unfair to make only the industries that rely on a particular facility pay for it if everybody's going to benefit from it. If I'm paying lower prices in the store because the Port of Newark's modern facilities cut shipping costs for suppliers and manufacturers, why whouldn't I be paying taxes to make sure the facilities stay in good condition?

but if I'm mostly buying local stuff and would be quite happy paying more for the imported goods I buy, why should I pay more taxes? Get it yet?

I've gotten it since the beginning. What YOU haven't gotten, and what I'm sick and tired of repeating, is that society AS A WHOLE benefits from the existence of such facilities, and thus, every member of society is obligated to help pay for them. Maybe you don't directly benefit from them. Who cares? Society, even a libertarian society, means giving up something in exchange for the benefits of being in a group. The more technologically advanced society becomes, the more it depends on the underlying infrastructure to keep functioning. The recent electrical problems in the Northeast demonstrated that as graphically as possible. Paying taxes to ensure that the modern industrial democratic society you live in, with all its benefits, continues to function is not an unbearable infringement on your unalienable human rights, no matter how much you think it is.

Oh I understand now, those weren't strawmen after all. They where just you trying to get a handle on what I was saying. Perhaps you should have asked or is that concept too foreign to you? My guess is that Mr Red was a litle Grumpy and thought he would add a nOOb scalp to his belt.

Psychoanalyzing my motives doesn't constitute a rebuttal. And the onus is on you to provide a definition of your own argument, not say something, wait for me to rebut what I think it is, based on your own statements, and then squeal "That's not what I mean! Strawman! STRAWMAN!" I'm not responsible for your poor communication skills.

I'm still waiting for a definition of user pays. For another, apparently you DON'T understand how infrastructure is necessary for national defense or anything else. Why do you think the interstate highway system is called the "National Defense Interstate Highway System"? It was built to MOVE TROOPS, with impoving civilian transportation and communication as a seconday goal. How do you think we get troops and equipment overseas without good ports? How do we move fuel and ammunition? How do civilian defense contractors get raw materials and electricity? How do they move out finished product? How can we afford any of it without a good economy, which depends on the infrastructure to function?

People who dervive benefit from the structure pay in proportion to the derived benefit.

In other words, exactly what I've been arguing against since the beginning, with all your cries of strawman about "a nickel" or "a hundreth of a cent" just red herrings. Glad to see it took us this long just to get to a rudimentary, barely functional definition of the concept, which by the way, doesn't mention a thing about who actually builds anything. Concession accepted.

And the government cargoes are exactly what percentage of shipped freight? 90% 80% less, well I guess they would just have to pay whoever did own the ports for what they moved then, or are you going to claim that nobody else needs good ports so they wouldn't have been built?

For the last fucking time, it's not about how much the military uses the infrastructure, it's the benefit to the ENITRE SOCIETY that comes from a military that has a modern, efficient infrastructure to use.

And yes, I will claim that nobody else will build modern container ports because it's cheaper in the short term to keep moving things out the old way, on small ships with internal cargo holds loaded from traditional wharves and docks--assuming even those got built, because even in the 19th century, they were built by local goverments. No private entity is going to spend billions of dollars to build a modern container port with no guranteed short term return--unless they get enormous government subsidized loans, in which case we're right back where we started.

And as for who's head is where, well I think you should come out and take a look around.

I'm looking, but all I see is your wall of ignorance.

That is probably why "Blinded by stupidity" is such a common phrase

Oh God, I am going to cough up that kidney. You're funny without even trying.

People who benefit more than they pay, really simple concept.

Like who, exactly? Name these people. And so much for your crying strawman all over the place--I might have been exaggerating when I said down to the nickel or hundreth of a cent, but obviously you want there to be some kind of accounting so people who benefit less pay less.

I don't have to name them you have already conceded they exist.

Would you care to point out where I conceded that? After you fail to do that, would you like to actually provide evidence they exist, or shall I just consider this another concession from you?

Well there are two ways of doing it if its a government, those that benefit less pay less and if its run by private enterprise those that benefit most pay most.

Which requires accounting either way. So much for my "strawmen". Concession accepted.

Not with the general idea, but yes with the implementation. Tolls increase congestion, as anybody who's ever spent 35 minutes trying to get through the Mid-Country interchange could tell you. They do take a lot of the maintenence burden off of the state transportation budget, though. I definitely wouldn't support making every road a toll road.

They are using technology to reduce the congestion problem. But this argument isn't local implimentation its about Macro implementation.

You can't consider macro implimentation without looking at the problems that exist on a local level, because that's the level at which most people have to deal with it. The particular interchange I mentioned is a local example, but the problems that come by building a toll booth across a major highway and making everyone stop are universal. There are methods now for collecting tolls without even slowing down, but they require drivers to purchase special equipment and set up an account with the approppriate government agency--hardly ideal.

See above. And note that while the highway is maintained by user fees, it was built with state money--and it does not turn a profit.

Are you saying user pays doesn't work or are you saying Governments are inefficient at delivering services.

The former. Toll roads are money losing enterprises unless the toll is set so high it becomes burdensome. Remember that tolls pay for maintenence, but they can't recover the cost of construction fast enough to make it a worthwhile investment--there were a number of such projects in the United States in the early days of the automobile, all of which were eventually sold off to the states after the investors took a bath. The Long Island Motor Parkway comes to mind--even with tolls that would be in double digit figures today and Vanderbilt money backing it, it never made a cent and was sold to New York State in 1938.

Buzz word Bingo "False Dilemma" that is not the only choice or even the most reasonable and its not even relevant to my question, which was why should I carry you? not why should I pay for Infrastructure, I know why I pay for infrastructure.

Explain how you're carrying me if by paying to build a road (and by the way, I'm paying taxes too, so it's not like I'm getting off scot-free) I can ship something you need to you cheaper and faster. Are you "carrying" UPS because your taxes helped pay for the airport they use to ship your online purchases to you?

I am carrying you if you derive more benefit than you pay for and I derive less than I pay for. I am carrying UPS because my taxes helped pay for the airport and the taxes they pay are passed onto me as well as part of the cost of delivery so the answer is yes as I pay twice. obviously you didn't understand my point.[/quote]

Obviously I did, and you're just too fucking stupid to recognize a rebuttal. The airport wouldn't exist without taxes. UPS wouldn't be able to get your goods to you as fast or as cheap as they can now. Undoubtedly, UPS would build its own private air terminal (the airlines did in the early days), but it would not be able to handle enormous cargo jets without being prohibitively expensive (in fact, such jets probably wouldn't exist because nobody could build the facilities to handle them).

1) so there are no big companies in small countries and small companies can't form partnerships if there were or could this wouldn't hold true

Explain why those companies would build a national infrastructure out of the goodness of their hearts? Wouldn't it be more likely that if they have to build their own, they'll only build them where they need them to go, and the folks out in Bugtussle are on their own?

They wouldn't even an idiot should understand that, they would do it because it would make their business easier or more profitable and they would be able to pass the costs on to the consumers, an equitable arrangement. If you choose to live in Bugtussle then you know what you are in for.

Unacceptable. The peope in Bugtussle need to have access to the national infrastructure the same as everyone else, or you essentially have two societies--the haves with the modern infratructure and the have-nots rotting back in the sticks. By your own admission, your system is unworkable.

Say the words with me now: "Concession accepted".

2) So nobody builds toll roads or cellular networks because you don't make money..... whoops.

Cellular networks are a special case, analogous to the railroads. To use a wireless phone company's network, you must purchese equipment from the wireless company and pay a monthly fee to the wireless company to keep using it. If you want to use someone else's equipment on their network, you have to pay an additional fee (romaing charges). And if you happen to live in or are driving through an area where there's not enough people to justify building a cell tower, you're shit out of luck.

With the railroads, if you wanted to use, say, Union Pacific's track, guess what? You had to pay to ship your good on a Union Pacific freight car hauled by a Union Pacific locomotive, and you paid by the mile. And if the place you needed to ship to or from was too small to have a railroad come through, well, tough. Ship it by horse-drawn cart however many miles to the freight depot, or move somewhere else.

As for toll roads, let's count the number of successful private toll highways in the United States. There's....well, there aren't any. Funny how that works. Railroads and cellular phone companies force you to use their equipment on their networks. If the only thing a network owner can charge for is use of the network itself, they go bankrupt.

So if it a non government entity does it its a special case strangely I have a CECT phone on a CMCC network. And as for the Raliroads whats your point? that the user payed and the system worked. OMG my aguement is in tatters because my oponent keeps making my points for me.[/quote]

Oh for Christ's sake you fucking dildo--THEY'RE A SPECIAL CASE BECAUSE THEY CONTROL ALL THE TRAFFIC ON THE NETWORK! What in the fuck is so Goddamned difficult to understand about that? User pays works when one company controls the network AND the means to use it, which is TOTALLY IMPOSSIBLE with roads unless Hertz Rent-a-Car is now in the highway contracting business.

And if thats a sideways implication that I'm a marxist, Bzzzzt thanks for playing you lose.

It wasn't, so eat me.

As I am not a cannibal eating you is totally out of the question

American colloquialism. It refers to a rude sexual act, not actual consumption of human flesh.

I understand Ma Bell was broken up not because it was losing money but for the opposite reason, they where stealing from people.

You missed the point. Ma Bell could afford to maintain a national infrastructure so long as everyone who used that network had to pay them. Now that they don't, but they're still responsible for the infrastructure, the infrastructure is slowly degrading as volume goes up and margins go down. It's going to be a crisis in a few years at the rate things are going.

Why because the users aren't paying. doesn't make your point[/quote]

The Bell system could maintain the lines easily when they controlled the means by which the lines were used. Once that control was taken from them, infrastructure maintenence became increasingly burdensome. The situation is getting steadily worse.

And as for the railroads I can't comment because Idon't know enough about it.
But this doesn't detract from my point unless they got people to pay where they didn't derive benefit.

The point was that the railroads were a special exception because they had a monopoly on the use of the track. That's simply not possible with roads.

Another special case but I don't understand your contention with roads are you saying that roads can't be a monopoly or are you saying nobody can build their own road for some reason?[/quote]

Roads can't be a monopoly. There's no concievable way to restrict road users to vehicles run by the road owners.

[LadyTevar]

As far as the no-bid contracts go, Robert Byrd (D-WV) was estimated to have cost the US treasury about $2 billion as of 1993.

Only $2Billion? I'm shocked, shocked I say.

I'm positive it's been at least $5billion over his lifetime in Congress.

Now, I would like to note that much of that money dear ol' Senator Byrd acquired for the State of West by-god Virginia did go into infrastructure, namely the Interstate System that is only ~25 years old. Why do I say this?
Because I remember when there wasn't Interstates, when there wasn't a New River Gorge Bridge, and when it took an hour to go from my home town to the county seat, something that now takes 15 minutes because of the new road and bridge. There's an Actual Law on the books that even if Amtrak goes belly-up, there *must* be a railroad office in Charleston, WV, with full passenger service.
Hell, I remember when the town of Ansted had been granted enough money to pave all the major roads in the town! It was fascinating how fast a bike could go on asphalt, instead of reddog and gravel! They even paved up the mountain to the city limits, so once you actually got your bike *up* that 1/4mile, 9% grade, going down it shot you to the bottom and down the road for over a mile without touching your pedals! It felt like you were going 30-40mph! (no one ever measured... this was before Mountain Bikes, just one-speed, push-the-pedal-backwards-to-brake K-mart bikes)

Gah.. Didn't mean to do a rant...
I'll admit that Senator Byrd is a Master of Pork, but I have to be fair and say that most of his pork projects WV really did need at the time. Nowadays, however... *shrug* I think he's just Porking to be Porking.
Still... I vote for him. Of course, no one's been dumb enough to run against him in decades.........

[MarkIX]

Here we go I'm going to summarise because I feel the post are getting too long for me so I imagine other people are getting bored.
it started with a....

if the user doesn't pay then some are given an unfair advantage. Which I thought was not the point of libertarianism

Libertarianism has nothing to do with being fair

Which I should have just accepted as he is a Libertarian and I'm not and haven't studied the Idealogy, to any great degree.
On this I will concede.
But what it got down to was a definition of Fair
his being

Fairness is everybody playing by the same rules

where mine is:
"If you pay the same price you get the same benefit"
I fail to see that anything more needs to be said.
Next comes the idea of imfrastructure its not what I'm arguing about, I accept that there is a need for infrastructure and I always have, to me the argument is about who provides it and who pays.
To sum up my argument:
If something is constructed then its real cost can be determined. The owners of that thing can then charge the cost to the users, who will in turn pass on the cost to their customers and so on.
If a requirement or demand for a thing exists someone will supply it, if the demand is high enough.
The original Owners of the thing do not have to be the Government who pass the cost on to the public regardless of useage, anybody could own the thing.
that in essence is my argument .
if you get that you can skip the rest (not implying that it is correct just that the rest is basically directed at RedImperator)
Now on to the fun stuff

It can't be quantified at ALL. Please, explain how you quantify the benefits of having a society where transportation and communications are fast, cheap, and reliable.

My satisfied customers continue to use my services despite the greater cost

The problem here seems to be you've got your nose pressed too close to the picture. You're still thinking in terms of how much, in dollars and cents, does any one person directly use the infrastructure, and missing the fact that without it, society as we know it doesn't exist[b/].

I thought that was the whole point we aren't talking about society as we know it we are talking about a different society. The impression I get is that you are saying because we have a government like the current one we need a government like the current one.Is this your thought?

Which I never said, you retard. Private contractors design and build it--the government just pays for it. And even if I had, to prove only government workers can do it, I'd have to prove that private workers CAN'T. That's called proving a negative, and it's logically impossible to do. The burden would fall on you to prove that private workers can build them (a trivially easy thing to do).

On the off chance you meant that only government in general could build infrastructure, I'd still have to prove that private entities can't do it, which is still proving a negative, which is still impossible.

Conceded

Burden of proof fallacy. Learn it, love it, cherish it, for it is the bullet which sunders thy opponent's foot.

Conceded
I misconstrued what you said.

They wouldn't build it at all, a point that consistantly flies over your head. They'd continue to ship the old fashioned way, off of docks, and pass the added cost onto you without any of the benefits you get from a modern port.

If they needed it why wouldn't they build it if they knew nobody would do it for them.

What YOU haven't gotten, and what I'm sick and tired of repeating, is that society AS A WHOLE benefits from the existence of such facilities, and thus, every member of society is obligated to help pay for them. Maybe you don't directly benefit from them. Who cares? Society, even a libertarian society, means giving up something in exchange for the benefits of being in a group.

so your point is that the Benefit of the group out ways the individual cost? My point would be why do I have to pay an indivdual cost and a monetary cost if you get more than me and get to pass on your monetary cost at the same time.

The more technologically advanced society becomes, the more it depends on the underlying infrastructure to keep functioning.

I would despute this unless you are talking specifically about the current centralised system.

The recent electrical problems in the Northeast demonstrated that as graphically as possible.

see above

Paying taxes to ensure that the modern industrial democratic society you live in, with all its benefits, continues to function is not an unbearable infringement on your unalienable human rights, no matter how much you think it is.

And I never said it was, so how did you some to the conclusion I thought it. Logical deduction or wishful thinking

Psychoanalyzing my motives doesn't constitute a rebuttal.

since you didn't make a point rather claimed that I had said nothing there was no need for a rebuttal

And the onus is on you to provide a definition of your own argument, not say something, wait for me to rebut what I think it is, based on your own statements, and then squeal "That's not what I mean! Strawman! STRAWMAN!"

regardless of wether I have failed to justify my position to your satisfaction misrepresenting what I have said to strengthen your own arguement is still a strawman you made some rather startling extraoplations that simply weren't justified and then used them to deride my position that is the textbook defination of a strawman.

I'm not responsible for your poor communication skills.

and likewise I am not responsible for your poor cognative processes.

In other words, exactly what I've been arguing against since the beginning, with all your cries of strawman about "a nickel" or "a hundreth of a cent" just red herrings.

So you didn't need me to redefine the concept you didn't read or understand it int he first place and you threw in some strawman which you now consider to be red herrings, I guess they work because I attempted to answer them. That is to say if they are red herring they are your red herrings since you introduced them.

Glad to see it took us this long just to get to a rudimentary, barely functional definition of the concept, which by the way, doesn't mention a thing about who actually builds anything. Concession accepted.

Again you bring up infrastructure like that is what I am arguing against, My argument would be that government is an inefficient method of distrubuting real cost to real beneficiaries and anybody who would use such a model has an ulterior motive.And this isn't a concession stand when I concede I'll be sure to tell you.

For the last fucking time, it's not about how much the military uses the infrastructure, it's the benefit to the ENITRE SOCIETY that comes from a military that has a modern, efficient infrastructure to use.

And hopefully for the last time an efficient infrastructure is not incompatable with user pays.

And yes, I will claim that nobody else will build modern container ports because it's cheaper in the short term to keep moving things out the old way, on small ships with internal cargo holds loaded from traditional wharves and docks--assuming even those got built, because even in the 19th century, they were built by local goverments. No private entity is going to spend billions of dollars to build a modern container port with no guranteed short term return--unless they get enormous government subsidized loans, in which case we're right back where we started.

Unless it really is cheaper or some other reason forces them to because the government won't do it for them . and if its not cheaper (in real terms) then who actually wants the thing what good is it. If the demands of the freight are there and a modern container terminal is the best way then it would get done.

Oh God, I am going to cough up that kidney. You're funny without even trying.

who said I wasn't trying (I was looking for the superficial smile/grimace but close enough)

Would you care to point out where I conceded that? After you fail to do that, would you like to actually provide evidence they exist, or shall I just consider this another concession from you?

OK you didn't so I guess I will have to fall back on my example of UPS suckers, don't consider it a concession til I actually concede it'll save you a lot of heartache

Which requires accounting either way. So much for my "strawmen". Concession accepted.

where did you get this from I, I never claimed that either system wouldn't require accounting they both would I just claimed that your strawmen requiring account to the Nickel and the 1/100 th of a cent where just that strawmen and again don't consider it a concession til I actually concede it'll save you a lot of heartache

You can't consider macro implimentation without looking at the problems that exist on a local level, because that's the level at which most people have to deal with it.

User pays works at the local level, I thought we were arguing about how it applied to the Macro level (nation wide)

The particular interchange I mentioned is a local example, but the problems that come by building a toll booth across a major highway and making everyone stop are universal. There are methods now for collecting tolls without even slowing down, but they require drivers to purchase special equipment and set up an account with the approppriate government agency--hardly ideal.

so they have to have an account and a special piece of equipment to use it, puts it somewhere between a credit card and mobile phone, please tell me you don't have a problem using either of those.

The former. Toll roads are money losing enterprises unless the toll is set so high it becomes burdensome.

your tolls are offset by your taxes not much of a win. one you have a choice one you don't

Remember that tolls pay for maintenence, but they can't recover the cost of construction fast enough to make it a worthwhile investment--there were a number of such projects in the United States in the early days of the automobile, all of which were eventually sold off to the states after the investors took a bath. The Long Island Motor Parkway comes to mind--even with tolls that would be in double digit figures today and Vanderbilt money backing it, it never made a cent and was sold to New York State in 1938.

there are still private toll roads admittedly I am not sure of the circumstances they are operating under but its obviously not a total waste of time. other forms of infrastructure are also profitable.

The airport wouldn't exist without taxes. UPS wouldn't be able to get your goods to you as fast or as cheap as they can now. Undoubtedly, UPS would build its own private air terminal (the airlines did in the early days), but it would not be able to handle enormous cargo jets without being prohibitively expensive (in fact, such jets probably wouldn't exist because nobody could build the facilities to handle them).

People will build what they need to get the job done if you don't have to because you can get a sucker to do it thats good for you, but its not all that good for the sucker.

Unacceptable. The peope in Bugtussle need to have access to the national infrastructure the same as everyone else, or you essentially have two societies--the haves with the modern infratructure and the have-nots rotting back in the sticks. By your own admission, your system is unworkable.

you are cliaming that my system is faulty because it can't do things that other systems can't do either I'll admit that but no more faulty than other systems and they work (sort of) you seem to be claiming that if an infrastructure isn't totally comprehensive then it is a failure I know of places that are totally isolated from infrastructure and the people have developed their own. so that doesn't work

Say the words with me now: "Concession accepted".

Say the words with me now: "I can keep dreaming about a concession but that doesn't make it true"

Oh for Christ's sake you fucking dildo--THEY'RE A SPECIAL CASE BECAUSE THEY CONTROL ALL THE TRAFFIC ON THE NETWORK! What in the fuck is so Goddamned difficult to understand about that? User pays works when one company controls the network AND the means to use it, which is TOTALLY IMPOSSIBLE with roads unless Hertz Rent-a-Car is now in the highway contracting business.

wishful thinking on your part doesn't constitute any obligation on my part. to address your point, hertz, budget, the government if its a monopoly whats the difference, the only difference is that NOBODY can compete with ther government so their monopolies are secure just saying its a special case doesn't change the fact that user pays works.

American colloquialism. It refers to a rude sexual act, not actual consumption of human flesh.

I know( I was just covering all bases) I don't live under a rock but its still out of the question

The Bell system could maintain the lines easily when they controlled the means by which the lines were used.

you mean when they got paid by the users

Once that control was taken from them, infrastructure maintenence became increasingly burdensome. The situation is getting steadily worse.

the problem is that cash flow regardless of source does not meet obligations this has nothiong to do with either User pays or government subsidised it would be a problem under either system.

Roads can't be a monopoly. There's no concievable way to restrict road users to vehicles run by the road owners.

Form a coalition charge what the market will bear and no more, or your competition will take your business works most other places.(barring anti competition laws)
OMG I just finished that and I get a screen telling me to log in and then I get the blank window of doom I was perturbed but all was well my browser still remembered