[xvector]

Why are you assuming that I want the private sector to grow in power? These aren't mutually exclusive.

> But the American private sector is even more enthusiastic to commit atrocities and enforce the authority of the few on the many.

Shows a keen misunderstanding of American history. The US government commits far more atrocities on a yearly basis than the private sector ever has. I could fill up this whole page with links describing absurd infringements on our constitutional rights by the US government, many of them ongoing to this day.

[sudosysgen]

How, practically, do you want to limit government power in a way that doesn't increase the power of the private sector?

I spoke of enthusiasm, not volume. The private sector commits less atrocities insofar as the government prevents them to. If you want a good historical example, recall that one of the main reasons for the American Revolution was that the private sector was angry at the Crown that they couldn't commit as much atrocities and steal as much land from the natives as they wanted to.

[elefanten]

>the private sector was angry at the Crown that they couldn't commit as much atrocities and steal as much land from the natives as they wanted to.

Never heard that one. Sources?

[btilly]

Playing Devil's advocate, the Declaration of Independence does include the phrase, "He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions."

Also during the Revolution, the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sullivan_Expedition lead to atrocities against the natives and the later acquisition of a large amount of land for American settlers.

I wouldn't consider this in the top 10 motivations for the American Revolution. (In fact that complaint was the 27th of 27 complaints.)

But as a motivation, it was not exactly absent either. And the economic consequences of this particular item did prove, in hindsight, to be immense.

[kortilla]

It’s a joke.

[inglor_cz]

What are the measuring units for enthusiasm?

[busymom0]

Not arguing against your point, I would like to add that the current treatment of Assange was a responsibility of multiple countries working together to take him down - US, Sweden, Ecuador and Australia.

The espionage act which got used against Daniel Hale is also what the US is using in Assange's case.

[boomboomsubban]

>The US government commits far more atrocities on a yearly basis than the private sector ever has

This is one of those claims that's basically impossible to prove. I have no doubt you could link hundreds of constitutional infringements, but at the same time some reports suggest ~25% of workers regularly encounter some form of wage theft.

Or let's use this stories drone strikes as an example. Hale's revelation was that the military vastly underreported the number of civilian deaths to drone strikes. But I don't think private contractors would even be required to publish a bs number of casualties caused (I can't find any reporting requirements, but my search was hardly thorough.) Many private injustices can be very effectively hidden.

[xvector]

> This is one of those claims that's basically impossible to prove.

This is one of those claims that is self-evident after taking a highschool or college level US history class.

Also, wage theft is not nearly on the same scale as literal war crimes.

[boomboomsubban]

>This is one of those claims that is self-evident after taking a highschool or college level US history class

It really isn't. That class should also bring up the Pinkerton's, which is just an example of what shady shit the private sector engages in.

I brought up two examples, wage theft and private military contractors. One of the two very much is the same scale as literal war crimes.

[briantakita]

> The US government commits far more atrocities on a yearly basis than the private sector ever has.

Let's not compare which class of entities is more evil than the other.

We can't ignore that East India Company which ran drugs worldwide or I.G. Farben (maker of Nazi weaponry & Zyklon B), which later became Monsanto (maker or Agent Orange, DDT, etc.), Bayer, BASF. How about Corporate Sponsored "Tobacco Science" extolling the virtues of smoking? What about the various industrial complexes supporting the even more evil government?

With the Government infiltrated by agents who are connected with corporations & vice versa, is there any difference anyways? Are corporations & government inherently evil or are there contexts of corporations & government that are more evil than other contexts? Can criminal factions gain power over the government & corporations? Would corporations & government be less evil if honest people ran them instead of criminals?

Perhaps it's social phenomena, that we all participate in. Of course much if this phenomena is instigated by various cartels managing systems and hacking human consciousness & desire to consolidate power & curtail individual freedom & rights.

[vagrantJin]

Dont know why you opinion/ theory is being downvoted as much. Its well within the realms of probability.

Im sure a lot of Americans have no idea what their government has been doing to other sovereign nations. Even Obama went on a world tour to disarm smaller nations like South Africa of their Nuclear Weapons. He certainly didn't go to Russia or China or North Korea. After South Africa made that deal about 2011~2012 - an influx of American imported food ravaged the local food production industries bringing one of the biggest poultry producers in the SADEC region to it's knees. Thats not a conspiracy theory. Thats just politics.

[briantakita]

> Dont know why you opinion/ theory is being downvoted as much. Its well within the realms of probability.

If you have 3 hours to spare, this is a good Epistemological explanation...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RAqOMGnJ2MQ