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G-man's cheerleading for the Iraq II occupation--which I agree with, but on separate ground--got me wondering about this: can a government/corporation stand as a moral thing?
As mentioned previously by certain posters on the boards, one of the reasons America invaded Iraq was to alleviate suffering caused by Saddam. What is undeniable in the face of that assertion is that regimes exist throughout the world where such an intervention is necessary. This, of course, casts aspersions on such a motive. Is every move a government makes merely in the Stinson/Truman mold of security and hegemony being the most crucial factors in international politics?
...you tell stories, we tell lies.
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Maybe in the beginning of a government, but by now American government has become a beast of corruption that just promotes from within the powerful and the rich.
The Invasion of Iraq was not done for moral reasons. Saddam Hussein was always the same person. He was the same person in the 80's when we supported him and gave him the means to start WMD programs. He was the same guy when we supported him against Iran.
The Iraq war has been as much about getting oil as it has been about no bid contracts for Halliburton.
Remember Bush went to war on the foundation of supposed WMD that Saddam was planning to launch against us. Only when nothing was found did it become a war soley about freeing people.
Bush and his people are the perfect example of our government not being moral.
Businesses can be good, corporations by definition are not. Corporations run on making more and more profit, morality doesn't apply to them. They pollute, fuck over their employees, and use slave labor. All in the name of profit margins.
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All governments are moral. The question is whether or not those morals will agree with your own.
Our current government is a moral government. I don't agree with those morals, generally, while you might. Despite the picture many would paint, the government during the Clinton era was a moral government, but one with a very different moral stance.
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There are different opinions of "morality" as far as a type of label for a certain ethics goes. While that's correct though, I'd say it's more correct that the definition of morality has a one singular guideline to it--Specifically, that of its founders. The first civilization to actually consider what it meant for a person to think of things as being either "right" or "wrong" was Judea. And then after they sorted that mess out, they promoted Judaism. And that opinion of morality hasn't exactly changed. Ever.
A lot of people think it was Greece who came up with morals first, but that's cuz' they like to confuse it with ethics, which doesn't have anything to do with conceptions regarding "right" and "wrong".
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Quote:
r3x29yz4a said:
Maybe in the beginning of a government, but by now American government has become a beast of corruption that just promotes from within the powerful and the rich.
The Invasion of Iraq was not done for moral reasons. Saddam Hussein was always the same person. He was the same person in the 80's when we supported him and gave him the means to start WMD programs. He was the same guy when we supported him against Iran.
The Iraq war has been as much about getting oil as it has been about no bid contracts for Halliburton.
Remember Bush went to war on the foundation of supposed WMD that Saddam was planning to launch against us. Only when nothing was found did it become a war soley about freeing people.
Bush and his people are the perfect example of our government not being moral.
Businesses can be good, corporations by definition are not. Corporations run on making more and more profit, morality doesn't apply to them. They pollute, fuck over their employees, and use slave labor. All in the name of profit margins.
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a government always does what it does out of the best intentions.
 Racks be to MisterJLA
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I don't know. I think one might argue that government is simply a tool to allow people to live peacefully, etc.
And, if government is nothing but a tool, I don't know if you can abscribe morality to it any more than you could abscribe morality to any other tool.
You might as well, as such, ask if there is such a thing as a moral hammer.
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Quote:
the G-man said:
You might as well, as such, ask if there is such a thing as a moral hammer.
That's actually an interesting stance. But let me ask do you see "government" as the system and the laws alone or do you see "government" as the people running it.
Politics aside, you can't argue that Bush (and Clinton Reagan etc.) and the elected officials are ingrained in the "government" to the degree that their morals become the "government's" morals for their term in office.
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Quote:
Politics aside, you can't argue that Bush (and Clinton Reagan etc.) and the elected officials are ingrained in the "government" to the degree that their morals become the "government's" morals for their term in office.
If I used a hammer to commit an immoral act (or a moral one, for that matter), it doesn't imbue that hammer with any particular [im]morality. The [im]morality is unique to me.
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Quote:
the G-man said:
If I used a hammer to commit an immoral act (or a moral one, for that matter), it doesn't imbue that hammer with any particular [im]morality. The [im]morality is unique to me.
That's not entirely true. That object becomes an icon of the act commited. We put such things in museums. They become symbols of the act.
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Quote:
Wednesday said:
All governments are moral. The question is whether or not those morals will agree with your own.
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Quote:
the G-man said:
Quote:
Politics aside, you can't argue that Bush (and Clinton Reagan etc.) and the elected officials are ingrained in the "government" to the degree that their morals become the "government's" morals for their term in office.
If I used a hammer to commit an immoral act (or a moral one, for that matter), it doesn't imbue that hammer with any particular [im]morality. The [im]morality is unique to me.
But you don't hang on to the hammer between 4 and 10 years and wear at way at some parts while adding bits to other parts.
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Then substitute "hammer" for "car," a device which the average person owns 4-10 years and replaces parts on.
If I use my car to commit an immoral act, that doesn't make the car immoral either.
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Quote:
the G-man said:
Then substitute "hammer" for "car," a device which the average person owns 4-10 years and replaces parts on.
If I use my car to commit an immoral act, that doesn't make the car immoral either.
Ok ok. So you do believe the government is just the laws and the bills and not the people at all?
You don't consider a senator part of the government?
That's my point. Your that your "tool" is made up of the people.
Bow ties are coool.
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