Freedom VS. Democracy

[HannahP 119]

I am surprised that LS liked it, it goes against most of the things he purports to believe in.

Libertarians are scary. You should just ignore them.

Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, we're taking over now

Damn Commies. Run for the hills.

[DeadPoolX 9]

Think about it; how many times have you seen something that was absolute garbage and was faced with free competition actually succeed in the market? Look at Sega. The Dreamcast was a worthless piece of #######. Sales of Nintendo and Playstation were favored, and Sega went down... Free competition.

Actually... the Dreamcast was an amazing piece of technology for its time and included many innovations that would later become "standard" on consoles.

The reason the Dreamcast failed had very little to do with the system and far more with Sega itself. The Genesis (Mega Drive outside of North America) was a fantastic console and came out a couple of years before the SNES, so the main competition at the time was the original NES. For quite a while, the Genesis did extremely well.

As the Genesis's lifespan began to fade, Sega rolled out the first of their failed expansions. The Sega CD was plagued with horrendous games -- most of which relied heavily on FMV or used a laserdisc-like system, similar to that in Dragon's Lair or Space Ace. The most notable Sega CD game was Night Trap, which (along with Mortal Kombat) eventually paved the way for the ESRB ratings system. I'd say the Sega CD had two decent games: Road Avenger and Tomcat Alley.

The next disaster came as Sega unveiled the 32X. This was an add-on for the Genesis (like the Sega CD) and fit into the cartridge port. Supposedly this add-on allowed the Genesis (a 16-bit system) to play 32-bit games. Although very few 32X games were ever made and the system sold poorly, Sega claimed the 32X was a major jump in technology.

The Saturn was Sega's attempt to fight Sony's Playstation and to a lesser extent, Nintendo's N64. While the Saturn was a 32-bit system, it couldn't render 3D graphics as well as the PS1. After titles like Battle Arena Toshinden and Ridge Racer were displayed on the PS1, very few people were interested in 2D games. Eventually, the Saturn died.

All of that leads us to the Dreamcast. Once again, it was a remarkable machine for the time. Unfortunately, gamers were so distrustful of Sega's hardware at this point, the Dreamcast failed miserably. Nowadays Sega creates software, which is why older Sega games sometimes appear on the PS2, PSP and Wii. I'm not sure if the PS3 and Xbox 360 have any Sega titles (old or new), but I'm sure they do somewhere.

To be fair, Sega was far from the only console failure. Anyone remember NEC's Turbo Grafx-16? How about the Atari Jaguar or Panasonic 3DO? Nintendo missed the boat, as well, when a deal between Nintendo and Sony fell through. Sony was developing a CD add-on for the SNES, but due to disagreements, Nintendo backed out. That's when Sony decided to create the Playstation.

[mRx 16]

Think about it; how many times have you seen something that was absolute garbage and was faced with free competition actually succeed in the market? Look at Sega. The Dreamcast was a worthless piece of #######. Sales of Nintendo and Playstation were favored, and Sega went down... Free competition.

I really don't know how I can be any more tangible than I already am trying to be.

How about cigarettes, how about deadly pharmaceuticals you see time and again how they get put out, hyped up and then we come to find it hurts more than it helps? There are so many products that did well but end up being hype or worse, addictive and/or irreversibly damaging. I suppose free market corporations having all the money, advertising and investment gurus, AND more rights than individuals gives them the right to deceive and cheat us poor gullible sheep er I mean masses? Lets get the FDA stamp of approval! We have no mad cows here! yum yum

Pharms must be approved by the FDA before market entry, so you cannot blame the free market for dangerous medications currently approved. The FDA is concerned with their special relationships with the pharmaceutical industry, not consumer safety. If consumer safety is achieved, that is just an added bonus.

The FDA's job could better be performed by private medical experts and chemists, but none of that is the point.

How do businesses have more rights than individuals? How can you say that an untangible entity has any rights? A business cannot go to the store and buy bread. Businesses have no rights, only individuals.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

Democratic idealism doesn't coexist well at all with individual liberty. Democracy has nothing to do with freedom. It just follows that the majority's wishes will be fulfilled. The majority considered drug usage to be immoral and wrong, so regardless of what any one individual personally felt about it, the choice to use such things was made for them by the majority. They lost the freedom to make such a choice.

I don't know where you envisioned a free-market to be something of a black market. You have to realize that every decision is voluntary in a market economy. Sellers don't become wealthy by making products that are dangerous, deceptive, or low quality. The fact that free competition exists unequivocally disproves that a market would lean towards a deceptiveness or black market.

Think about it; how many times have you seen something that was absolute garbage and was faced with free competition actually succeed in the market? Look at Sega. The Dreamcast was a worthless piece of #######. Sales of Nintendo and Playstation were favored, and Sega went down... Free competition.

I really don't know how I can be any more tangible than I already am trying to be.

Dreamcast was a great machine for its time, but Sega lost out because of other factors - mainly an already saturated market, although consumers now have come to accept multiple game platforms.

What I mean by tangible examples - we currently have no examples of a truly free market accept the Black Market. So I'm not sure if you're advocating that we do away with any oversight, regulations or rules over a market, or if you would agree to some kind of governance. And if see some kind of role for government in a role for the market, just how do envision it to be? Should we do away with the SEC? The Treasury Dept., The Federal Reserve?