Fed Communism (split from "Stupid Connie")

[Kamakazie Sith]

No, but the library must purchase those books, no?
There were several episodes where new Dixon Hill novels were being tried out, but not once did anyone comment on them just arriving or on them being bought for the ship.

Maybe they've been there a while. Maybe they come with Holodeck software 3.4, do you understand what I mean? When you purchase Win98, a bunch of things come with the package.

Because it's not a quest, it's a system of government.

It seems to be a quest to me.

Picard : "A lot has changed in the last three hundred years. People are no longer obsessed by the accumulation of 'things'. We have eliminated hunger, want, the need for possessions. We've grown out of our infancy." <---refering to humans

Picard : "But you took Sovak's money?"
Vash : "It was the only way I could afford to get to Risa! As for Sovak, he got exactly what he deserved." <---Vash needed money to get to Risa (A UFP world)

Picard : "The acquisition of wealth is no longer the dirving force in our lives. We work to better ourselves and the rest of Humanity..." <---Supports the idea that it is not a system of government but a goal for the human race

Jake : "I'm Human, I don't have any money."
Nog : "It's not my fault your species decided to abandon currency based economics in favour of some philosophy of self enhancement." <---Refering to humans, and not the UFP.

Paris : "Fort Knox--the largest repository of gold bullion in Earth's history. Over 50 metric tons worth over $9 trillion U.S. dollars." "When the New World Economy took shape in the late 22nd-century and money went the way of the dinosaur, Fort Knox was turned into a museum." <---FYI

[Alyeska]

With their being no private property, there would not be any purchasing either. The government would merely supply you with what you needed (ie food, clothing, entertainment, etc.) The fact that a monetary system exists within the culture, and that people serving the government in other ways (like the KGB) got a rubble worth more then the standard ruble, is clear evidence that the USSR wasn't communist. It had communist leanings, but was set up under an elitest rule. Communism would allow for the people to agree together what to do. In the USSR it was the party that controled everything, which is not true communism. Thus, the USSR is not a valid comparison when dealing with true communism.

As I said earlier, there is clear proof that some elements of capitalism exist in the UFP. There is also clear proof that some elements of communism exist. Logical conclussion, the UFP is a hybrid of the two. The unknown factor is where capitalism is in relation to communism.

[Patrick Degan]

To try to seperate Earth society from UFP society is sophistry. Earth runs the UFP. They build the ships, dominate the Federation Council, wrote the constitution, and the capital is on Earth. Earth sets the standard for the UFP, not the other way around.

The Soviet Union also had an economy. It was still a communist state. Individual Soviet citizens sometimes managed to get their hands on dollars, but that did not make the economy capitalist.

[Alyeska]

Paris : "Fort Knox--the largest repository of gold bullion in Earth's history. Over 50 metric tons worth over $9 trillion U.S. dollars." "When the New World Economy took shape in the late 22nd-century and money went the way of the dinosaur, Fort Knox was turned into a museum." <---FYI

Interesting quote... Says that the UFP turned "communist" before TOS era. Actually it states the Earth economy, not the UFP economy.

[Alyeska]

To try to seperate Earth society from UFP society is sophistry. Earth runs the UFP. They build the ships, dominate the Federation Council, wrote the constitution, and the capital is on Earth. Earth sets the standard for the UFP, not the other way around.

The Soviet Union also had an economy. It was still a communist state. Individual Soviet citizens sometimes managed to get their hands on dollars, but that did not make the economy capitalist.

No, the USSR was not a communist state. It was a state with communist leanings. Just like the USA is not a capitalist state, but a state with capitalist leanings.

[Evil Jerk]

Maybe they've been there a while. Maybe they come with Holodeck software 3.4, do you understand what I mean? When you purchase Win98, a bunch of things come with the package.

A possibility, but all that free software?
The point is that if they wanted to show that a publisher was making money of off things like that, they would say so, other shows do exactly this, ST consistentley does not.

It seems to be a quest to me.

Government propaganda can very well call their policies a quest, the USSR crowed about it's system being a quest for a better way of doing things for all the people of the world.

Picard : "But you took Sovak's money?"
Vash : "It was the only way I could afford to get to Risa! As for Sovak, he got exactly what he deserved." <---Vash needed money to get to Risa (A UFP world)

All this means is that the government refused her passage, and had to find other means, as she was an independant rogue ostracised by govt. organisations, this is likely.

Picard : "The acquisition of wealth is no longer the dirving force in our lives. We work to better ourselves and the rest of Humanity..." <---Supports the idea that it is not a system of government but a goal for the human race

Ever heard of propaganda?

Jake : "I'm Human, I don't have any money."
Nog : "It's not my fault your species decided to abandon currency based economics in favour of some philosophy of self enhancement." <---Refering to humans, and not the UFP.

Dealed with this earlier.

Paris : "Fort Knox--the largest repository of gold bullion in Earth's history. Over 50 metric tons worth over $9 trillion U.S. dollars." "When the New World Economy took shape in the late 22nd-century and money went the way of the dinosaur, Fort Knox was turned into a museum." <---FYI

Propaganda. It's a lie too.

[Kamakazie Sith]

To try to seperate Earth society from UFP society is sophistry. Earth runs the UFP. They build the ships, dominate the Federation Council, wrote the constitution, and the capital is on Earth. Earth sets the standard for the UFP, not the other way around.

The Soviet Union also had an economy. It was still a communist state. Individual Soviet citizens sometimes managed to get their hands on dollars, but that did not make the economy capitalist.

Actually, the President/Federation Council run the UFP. The council is made up of representatives from the different worlds.

[Alyeska]

Propaganda. It's a lie too.

Interesting way to deal with dialogue you don't like.

[Evil Jerk]

Paris : "Fort Knox--the largest repository of gold bullion in Earth's history. Over 50 metric tons worth over $9 trillion U.S. dollars." "When the New World Economy took shape in the late 22nd-century and money went the way of the dinosaur, Fort Knox was turned into a museum." <---FYI

Interesting quote... Says that the UFP turned "communist" before TOS era. Actually it states the Earth economy, not the UFP economy.

Come on, Tom Paris is obviously regurgitating propaganda.
Obviously the Federation has been rewriting history, or he could be referring to coinage and paper money.

[Evil Jerk]

Propaganda. It's a lie too.

Interesting way to deal with dialogue you don't like.

Tom Paris' quote < Numerous evidence from TOS

[Kamakazie Sith]

Propaganda. It's a lie too.

Interesting way to deal with dialogue you don't like.

Tom Paris' quote < Numerous evidence from TOS

What evidence?

[Darth Wong]

With their being no private property, there would not be any purchasing either. The government would merely supply you with what you needed (ie food, clothing, entertainment, etc.) The fact that a monetary system exists within the culture, and that people serving the government in other ways (like the KGB) got a rubble worth more then the standard ruble, is clear evidence that the USSR wasn't communist. It had communist leanings, but was set up under an elitest rule. Communism would allow for the people to agree together what to do. In the USSR it was the party that controled everything, which is not true communism. Thus, the USSR is not a valid comparison when dealing with true communism.

Read the Communist Manifesto, for fuck's sake! Your definitions of communism bear no resemblance whatsoever to the real thing.

{EDIT: on my ST communism page, I point out that "investment is the sharpest dividing line between communism and capitalism"; I have seen no attempt to deal with this point; you have continually and repeatedly ignored demands for evidence of capital, ie- investment while offering irrelevant evidence of trivial purchases}

[Kamakazie Sith]

With their being no private property, there would not be any purchasing either. The government would merely supply you with what you needed (ie food, clothing, entertainment, etc.) The fact that a monetary system exists within the culture, and that people serving the government in other ways (like the KGB) got a rubble worth more then the standard ruble, is clear evidence that the USSR wasn't communist. It had communist leanings, but was set up under an elitest rule. Communism would allow for the people to agree together what to do. In the USSR it was the party that controled everything, which is not true communism. Thus, the USSR is not a valid comparison when dealing with true communism.

Read the Communist Manifesto, for fuck's sake! Your definitions of communism bear no resemblance whatsoever to the real thing.

You must learn to control your anger! *looks at title* oh..nevermind...

[Patrick Degan]

To try to seperate Earth society from UFP society is sophistry. Earth runs the UFP. They build the ships, dominate the Federation Council, wrote the constitution, and the capital is on Earth. Earth sets the standard for the UFP, not the other way around.

The Soviet Union also had an economy. It was still a communist state. Individual Soviet citizens sometimes managed to get their hands on dollars, but that did not make the economy capitalist.

Actually, the President/Federation Council run the UFP. The council is made up of representatives from the different worlds.

Yep, a Federation Council on which humans are the majority represented, on which Starfleet has voting members, and operating on an Earth-written constitution. I fail to see the difference.

[Evil Jerk]

Interesting way to deal with dialogue you don't like.

Tom Paris' quote < Numerous evidence from TOS

What evidence?

Existance of Credits
Scotty bought a boat
"I'd give real money if he'd shut up"-McCoy
Cyrano Jones' money making ventures inside the UFP and on 100% UFP runned space stations, and he had his own ship
Kirk sold his cabin
That's all I remember now.

[Patrick Degan]

Read the Communist Manifesto, for fuck's sake!

Mike, you don't really want to subject anybody to that sort of torture, do you?

[Alyeska]

Tom Paris' quote < Numerous evidence from TOS

What evidence?

Existance of Credits
Scotty bought a boat
"I'd give real money if he'd shut up"-McCoy
Cyrano Jones' money making ventures inside the UFP and on 100% UFP runned space stations, and he had his own ship
Kirk sold his cabin
That's all I remember now.

I guess you missed the part where Paris was talking about EARTH economy. IIRC you were the one making a big deal about New Sydney being an Earth colony and not a UFP colony. So what would Earth changing its monetary system have to do with the UFP monetary system?

[Evil Jerk]

What evidence?

Existance of Credits
Scotty bought a boat
"I'd give real money if he'd shut up"-McCoy
Cyrano Jones' money making ventures inside the UFP and on 100% UFP runned space stations, and he had his own ship
Kirk sold his cabin
That's all I remember now.

I guess you missed the part where Paris was talking about EARTH economy. IIRC you were the one making a big deal about New Sydney being an Earth colony and not a UFP colony. So what would Earth changing its monetary system have to do with the UFP monetary system?

I do not think this whole Earth - UFP seperate economy thing holds any water, I see no reason why the center of the UFP would not impose it's system of government and economy on the majority of the UFP.
Even so, the examples I gave are valid.
Cyrano Jones was human and so was the bartender, on a human run station within the UFP, Scotty bought a boat on Earth, Kirk sold his cabin on Earth.

[Darth Wong]

Read the Communist Manifesto, for fuck's sake!

Mike, you don't really want to subject anybody to that sort of torture, do you?

Well, I am a dark lord of evil, you know ...

[Perinquus]

Sure have. JAG, for example (It's not a show I watch very often, mainly because I think it's pretty silly - I mean really, you might as well have a military action show titled "The Supply Sergeant!" - but Catherine Bell's a babe, so occasionally, if I'm bored and there's nothing else on the tube, I'll watch). And even as little as I see of that show, when I do watch, I quite often see the characters driving their cars, or see them in their homes, etc.

I enjoy JAG, it's good entertainment.

A better example, for our purposes is Babylon 5. Garibaldi once built an old Kawasaki motorbike with Lenier's help. He also ended up marrying the widow of the owner of a giant and powerful megacorporation. This was not intended to do it, but it does show marvelously well that capitalism is alive and well in the world of Babylon.

Good example. I need to get the details on that Holonovel company.

I really want to puke every time I hear nonsense like this from the Star Trek writers. It simply flies in the face of human nature. People are motivated by self interest, not some airy fairy, abstract altruism. That's just how it is. That's human nature, and basic human nature doesn't change. Cultures change, values change, but human nature is no different now from what it was during the bronze age and before.

But it does illustrate my point rather nicely. Humans (clearly the dominant species in the Federation) in Star Trek have abandoned money. They don't have it. They don't have money. They don't have investments. They don't have private ownership of anything but small, strictly personal items and business ventures. They don't have profit. They don't have capitalism.

I agree Humans don't have money, this has been clearly stated. However, I still hold that the UFP does.

And you point is what? That humans don't use money? That the UFP does not use money?

How could that possibly work? That would be like the people of California not using money (though come to that, California leans so far to the left these days that I'm surprised it hasn't slid off into the Pacific). How could they possibly interact with the rest of the country financially or economically?

I just don't think it is reasonable to suppose that Earth, the dominant world, and home of the dominant species, capital of this nation state would use an economic system radically different than the rest of the nation state. It's just not plausible.

And whether they use money or not is really kind of moot. They used money in communist Russia too (rubles), and they were still communist. So is the Federation, by all appearances.

[Kamakazie Sith]

How could that possibly work? That would be like the people of California not using money (though come to that, California leans so far to the left these days that I'm surprised it hasn't slid off into the Pacific). How could they possibly interact with the rest of the country financially or economically?

I honestly don't know how that could possibly work, but if you ask that question about the UFP government just think of Starfleet. How could TNG era Starfleet possibly work? The quotes that I have provided indicate a possibility of this.

I just don't think it is reasonable to suppose that Earth, the dominant world, and home of the dominant species, capital of this nation state would use an economic system radically different than the rest of the nation state. It's just not plausible.

Vulcans are also a dominant race in the UFP, no quotes exist that indicate that they don't use money IIRC.

And whether they use money or not is really kind of moot. They used money in communist Russia too (rubles), and they were still communist. So is the Federation, by all appearances.

[/quote]

With that I must apologize. Wong and others have pointed this out many times. What kept me going is I failed to see how no money is proof of communism but having money is not proof of capitalism. However, Wong pointed out what defines communism and capitalism, investing, and at the moment I can't think of a single example where someone in the UFP has invested something....perhaps other pro-ST people will be more fortunate. [/u]

[Raoul Duke, Jr.]

To try to seperate Earth society from UFP society is sophistry. Earth runs the UFP. They build the ships, dominate the Federation Council, wrote the constitution, and the capital is on Earth. Earth sets the standard for the UFP, not the other way around.

The Soviet Union also had an economy. It was still a communist state. Individual Soviet citizens sometimes managed to get their hands on dollars, but that did not make the economy capitalist.

Actually, the President/Federation Council run the UFP. The council is made up of representatives from the different worlds.

Yep, a Federation Council on which humans are the majority represented, on which Starfleet has voting members, and operating on an Earth-written constitution. I fail to see the difference.

Do you recall seeing the Fed Council? As I recall, the President is non-human, and humans are no more a majority on the Council than Caucasians are a majority in Los Angeles. Now since the Federation has over 150 member worlds and Earth is only one of them, how is it that humans could possibly be in the majority?

[Darth Wong]

True, the Fed Council has lots of aliens on it. It is Starfleet which is almost entirely run by humans. In other words, at the federal level, the government is dominated by humans despite the large number of species represented in council.

But of course, our picture of the political structure of the Federation is limited. So let's look at how the Klingons of ST6 perceived it: a "homo sapiens-only club". And no one made any serious effort to contradict them! Yes, they have lots of minority representation in council, but they obviously wield little real power.

[Raoul Duke, Jr.]

But they must exercise some power; again, the president (I believe it was at that time) was alien, and I seem to recall the same being true in either TNG/DS9 or Voyager. However, you will undoubtedly point out that, as in other governments, the President may be nothing more than a figurehead.

The question then being, if the Federation communism concept is true (personally, I believe it's based primarily on circumstantial evidence and dialogue open to interpretation) then who started it? The prime suspect in my book would be the Vulcans.

[Perinquus]

What is your evidence for that? You say we spun the whole Commie Federation out of circumstantial evidence, but you come up with the idea that the Vulcans started it on the sole evidence that they sent a ship to earth after detecting a warp signature, and that they have been "Holding earth back" prior to the launch of Enterprise NX-01. From this you infer that they turned the Federation communist? How do either of these things lead to the Vulvan's turning the rest of the Federation communist? We don't even know what kind of government or economic system Vulcan has, let alone that they influenced others to copy it.

And regardless of who started it, we have strong evidence that it is red.

As for the other races... it still seems pretty clear that humans are dominant. The vast majority of Starfleet (the military arm) is human. A large portion of the civil government is human. The civil government and the military arm are both based on the humans' homeworld. Regardless of how much power the other species wield in theory, humans are de facto the most powerful species in the Federation.