re: Who's a bigger threat to liberty - the government or large corporations?

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Voltaire didn't say that. It was Tacitus, the Roman historian.

I wondered why so many people attributed that to Voltaire, and I discovered that it was originally incorrectly attributed to Voltaire by some neo-nazi guy. I think it's on purpose, because not only can they say the quote doesn't exist, they can say it's just neo-nazi propaganda.

So, don't let that very valid point get derailed. It's Tacitus, not Voltaire.

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upgrayedd

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Many on here will blame government.

But private businesses and their lobbyists control government or at least influence economic decisions.

This is the paradox of "conservatives". At some point you have to face the fact that the businesses you support play a role the economic wellbeing and legal system of the place you live.

We can do what we want were a private company is all good until it works against you.

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Not even debatable. 

Government death toll and imprisonment in the 20th century makes the corporate side look like child's play

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You're looking at only physical forms of threat (death and prison). Corporations generally play by different rules.

As upgrayed mentioned, they can go after your livelihood and heavily influence your social capital depending on circumstances.

The common defense is that " I'll just use another product/service". That's assuming that the corporation has some form of competition. "I'll work in another business", which assumes that there is another company offering jobs in the area.

I can understand if your referring to small businesses. But larger corporations have massive pull and generally have a hand in governance.

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yes

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This...

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I wish we would stop blaming the ME wars on oil. We didn’t go there for oil, we went there because the Jewish lobby controls our politics.

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And yet there are many on here who are okay with letting Israel effectively influence our decisions as a nation.

I grew up Protestant. But I'm not so blinded by religion that dont see how dangerous it is to let another power have so much influence over our nation that we lose several lives over a conflict that, ideologically, will never end.

Government has police with guns, jails, judges and prisons.


So I'm going with government.

The unholy union of the government and big tech is the death knell of liberty.

This was posted by GumboPot in another thread but has a lot of relevance to this discussion. We would do well to remember that the split at the start of the 21st century isn't the same as it was at the start of the 20th...that is, it's not just communists vs capitalists.

The Chinese model - state capitalism - has people who were formerly capitalists endorsing big government because they see tha they can reap bigger profits through an incestuous relationship with a large powerful government than simply competing in a free market where a limited government plays the role of referee.

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the government or large corporations

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Corporations because they control the government.

The threat is the worst when they work together.