Megaloman84
All American
2119 Posts
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It's not the government that maintains order. There have been and continue to be plenty of cops and national guardsmen in and around Nwalins. (obviously, otherwise how would they be getting shot at.) In some cases we're even seeing the cops join in the looting.
The reason that the social order in NO has broken down is that the hardworking, productive, law-abiding, peaceful classes of society, the burgoise and the trades people and professionals and the solid portions of the working poor, have mostly had the good sense to leave the city. They have abandoned their city to the dregs of society, a group of urban savages raised by the welfare state with an overactive sense of entitlement and a total disregard for others and even their own future. If home-owners and shopkeepers and other backbone members of the community were actually still around to defend what is theirs, we simply wouldn't be seeing anything like what we're currently witnessing.
Over the last couple of days we've all seen images of people wading through knee-deep water with shopping carts piled high with plunder and gleeful grins of victory on their faces. But what do they have to celebrate? Do they think they're going to be able to take it home and put it in the closet? Do they think that the national guard is going to let them on the bus with 14 pairs of brand new tennis shoes? The only possibly explanation is that they simply haven't though it through even that far.
This, people, is what distinguishes a savage from civilized man. While a savage goes through life never living beyond the moment, with nothing more than the resources that can be gathered up off the ground, civilized peoples plan, and save, and invest, forgoing present gratification for future returns. The entire history of technological, economic, and social development is a history of expanding time horizons, of ever more far-sightedness, of increased willingness to delay gratification. A primitive, proto-human barbarian might wade into a stream to catch a fish with his bare hands. A more advanced savage might take the time and effort and resources to fashion a crude spear, delaying his payoff somewhat in order to improve his productivity. An even more advanced human, approaching what we might recognize as true civilization, might take much more time and labor to fashion an intricate net. Today, we see an even greater degree of future orientation, with advanced fishing trawlers taking literally years to be transformed from raw ore to reach the point where they can be used to actually yield a return. In short, civilization is a future-oriented approach to life and a corresponding willingness to delay gratification for greater future returns. Savagery, on the other hand, consists of present-orientation and lust for instant gratification.
The historical trend towards civilization and away from savagery has been halted and even reversed in many places by the welfare state and its redistributionist policies.
Is it any wonder that a system which systematically punishes thrift, foresight, hard work, savings, investment, productivity, good planning and success through a "progressive" tax system should produce correspondingly less of these civilized characteristics?
Is it any wonder that a system which systematically rewards sloth, indolence, recklessness, apathy, ignorance, irresponsibility, short-sightedness, parasitism, criminality, dependence, and a whole host of other manifestations of rampant present-orientation through a myriad of handouts and subsidies should produce correspondingly more of these "savage" characteristics?
[Edited on September 2, 2005 at 10:36 PM. Reason : f]  9/2/2005 10:24:02 PM
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