I'm sorry, but I gotta respond to this one before stuffing 'Richard
Erlacher'
into my procmail black-hole...
Richard Erlacher wrote:
> It's not the politicians that are corrupt. It's the citizens who don't
hold up
> their end of the social contract.
I've seen you use the phrase 'social contract' more than a dozen times in
this
thread, and am left with no option but to conclude that _you_ don't
understand
"the" social contract.
Society doesn't value individuals based on how well they conform to the law.
It values them on their contribution to society. One can have a separate
debate on how to valuate such contributions, but the fact that seems to both
be eluding you and the source of your frustration is this: society is self
promoting and not willing to shoot itself in the foot simply to stand on
principle.
To illustrate this, I'll take the case of the prototypical "pot smoker" that
you've held out as an example of someone flaunting the law. The US
government
is quite happy to extend TS clearances to people who have been arrested for
crimes related to use, possession and cultivation -- even if they are
_still_
using controlled substances -- as long as they admit to it. Why? Because
the individuals have something that society -- as personified by
government --
values highly, and as long as the individual admits to it -- and thus
removes
it as a possible source of blackmail -- society doesn't care. The NSA
requires
"lifestyle" questions on polygraph examinations, but on more than one
occasion
has backed down when a candidate told them to pound sand -- it turns out
that
"society" values the contribution of cryptomathmaticians far above
conformance
with the law. Where those curves cross is a direction function of the
perceived contribution of the individual.
Does this result in unequal administration of justice? Yes. Does that
result
in the infringement of the rights of others? No. There's no enumerated
right
in the constitution requiring that just because you might be prosecuted for
a
crime someone else must also be so prosecuted. This flexibility allows
society to, in effect, optimize the risk that an individual poses to society
against the reward that they present to society. Even if one were to create
a highly inflexible and intolerant judicial system, where the responsibility
of
the defendant at trial (assuming there _is_ a trial) is to prove their
innocence,
and wherein even the most petty crimes resulted in death, "society" would
still
make exceptions -- no society can afford to place itself at a competitive
disadvantage relative to other societies for any significant length of time.
In another attempt to drag this back on topic, does anyone know where lift
gate
trucks can be rented in the south bay? Ideally for a one-way rental with
drop-off
in Sac or Reno?
Sheesh,
Chris.
--
Chris Kennedy
chris_at_mainecoon.com
http://www.mainecoon.com
PGP fingerprint: 4E99 10B6 7253 B048 6685 6CBC 55E1 20A3 108D AB97
Received on Sun Jul 08 2001 - 16:22:40 BST