the cost of negative externalities - economics and the environment

[digitalmcq]

Here's an interesting article from Paul Krugman:


http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/green.html


"But the reality is that even the most conventional economic doctrine is a lot more subtle than that. True, economists generally believe that a system of free markets is a pretty efficient way to run an economy, as long as the prices are right--as long, in particular, as people pay the true social cost of their actions. Environmental issues, however, more or less by definition involve situations in which the price is wrong--in which the private costs of an activity fail to reflect its true social costs. Let me quote from the textbook (by William Baumol and Alan Blinder) that I assigned when I taught Economics 1 last year: "When a firm pollutes a river, it uses some of society's resources just as surely as when it burns coal. However, if the firm pays for coal but not for the use of clean water, it is to be expected that management will be economical in its use of coal and wasteful in its use of water." In other words, when it comes to the environment, we do not expect the free market to get it right.
So what should be done? Going all the way back to Paul Samuelson's first edition in 1948, every economics textbook I know of has argued that the government should intervene in the market to discourage activities that damage the environment. The usual recommendation is to do so either by charging fees for the right to engage in such nasty activities--a k a "pollution taxes"--or by auctioning off rights to pollute. Indeed, as the extraordinary response to the climate-change statement reminds us, the idea of pollution taxes is one of those iconic positions, like free trade, that commands the assent of virtually every card-carrying economist. Yet while pollution and related "negative externalities" such as traffic congestion are obvious problems, in practice, efforts to make markets take environmental costs into account are few and far between. So economists who actually believe the things they teach generally support a much more aggressive program of environmental protection than the one we actually have. True, they tend to oppose detailed regulations that tell people exactly how they must reduce pollution, preferring schemes that provide a financial incentive to pollute less but leave the details up to the private sector. But I would be hard pressed to think of a single economist not actually employed by an anti-environmental lobbying operation who believes that the United States should protect the environment less, not more, than it currently does. (The signers of the climate-change statement, incidentally, included 13 economists from the University of Chicago.) "


Any reactions?

[Hegel]

To tell you the truth, I'm quite a strong supporter of government intervention in economics (as well as everything else). I think that the idea of a tax on pollution would be a marvelous idea, kind of like a sin tax for smoking tobbaco. Besides, we could tax cars that way and force people to leave those annoying suburbs, and return to the cities where they belong:D

[digitalmcq]

I was hoping that some of the more ardent free market folks would have some comments.

[jj]

Originally posted by digitalmcq
I was hoping that some of the more ardent free market folks would have some comments.

They don't reply to things where they can't defend the outcome, I think.

[shanek]

There are some things you need to understand here:

PEOPLE DO NOT POLLUTE WHAT THEY OWN. Companies, corporations, and even individuals have to be worried about the future valuue of their property, so they have every incentive to make it as nice as it can be. Look at any privately-owned land, even land owned by logging companies, and compare it to the government-"protected" national preserves. You'll see that the private land is much nicer and much better maintained. That's because the people in charge of the land have a financial incentive to keep it as nice as possible. Government has no incentive.

Digitalmcq mentioned water pollution...this applies here, too. I live near a lake privately owned by a power company, who does not pollute the lake despite having three separate power plants on its shores.

PEOPLE DO NOT POLLUTE LAND PRIVATELY OWNED BY OTHERS. Since the owners of the land are concerned about its value as I have described above, they are most certainly going to seek restitution whenever others pollute their land. So companies, corporaitons, and individuals, not wanting to pay such costs, are not going to pollute land owned by others. In the lake example above, there are industries near the lake, and they don't pollute it either, for the same reasons.

PEOPLE DO POLLUTE LAND OWNED BY GOVERNMENT. Since government is not concerned about the future value of its land, it has no incentive to stop others from polluting it, nor to seek restitution against those who do so. Moreover, they do have a political incentive to give favors to politically-connected companies and corporations, favors which include allowing them to pollute on their land. And if you find a polluted lake or river, take a look at who owns it—I'll bet it's the government!

You also mention, as do many others, the pollution caused by traffic congestion as a problem of the free market...but this has never made any sense to me as the government has a monopoly on the roads. For their part, the car companies do an admirable job keeping their cars fuel efficient andas pollution-free as possible, going way beyond what government regs require, even for SUVs.

And finally, it's not so much that a "pollution tax" isn't a good idea; it's that in practice such measures just don't work.

[chulbert]

Great, you covered land. Care to touch upon air, water and the EM spectrum?

[chulbert]

Originally posted by shanek
There are some things you need to understand here:

PEOPLE DO NOT POLLUTE WHAT THEY OWN.

You obviously have never lived in or seen a rural area where people dump just about anything "over the hill out back" and burn their own garbage.

Why? Because it's cheaper.

PEOPLE DO NOT POLLUTE LAND PRIVATELY OWNED BY OTHERS.

People will do whatever they can get away with in order to save money.

PEOPLE DO POLLUTE LAND OWNED BY GOVERNMENT.

I imagine so, just like they'll pollute anywhere they can get away with that doesn't seemingly affect them.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek
There are some things you need to understand here:

PEOPLE DO NOT POLLUTE WHAT THEY OWN.


Visibly proven wrong in any community I've ever seen. A good example would be the backyard chemical dump in a house on Mountain Avenue, in Warren, NJ, just east of Valley View Rd.


PEOPLE DO NOT POLLUTE LAND PRIVATELY OWNED BY OTHERS.

Also trivially demonstrated to be laughably false. The illegal dump on a farmer's land (of "mixed waste" for (&(*sakes) just off of Dead Swamp Road in Warren, NJ, is trival disproof.

PEOPLE DO POLLUTE LAND OWNED BY GOVERNMENT.
Big surprise, since they'll polute anything else.

Now, it's interesting to see how evasive your reply is, since air and water were also mentioned, but you shrill on "conclusively" about land and only land.

How about a water table? It's part of land, but it moves.

Sorry, you're caught completely out. Since it appears you have no answer at all to the question, it would be better of you to just admit it.

[shanek]

Originally posted by chulbert
Great, you covered land. Care to touch upon air, water and the EM spectrum?

Um, I did cover water. And I've covered air and EM in other threads.

[shanek]

Originally posted by chulbert
You obviously have never lived in or seen a rural area

I live in a rural area. People don't do that.

In some low income areas they do, but that just proves my point.

People will do whatever they can get away with in order to save money.

But as I pointed out, they don't save money by polluting their own land or the land of others. Only government land.

Did you even READ my post?

[chulbert]

Originally posted by shanek
I live in a rural area. People don't do that.

Maybe not in your rural area, but where I'm from, they do, and I assure you it's not due to poverty.

But as I pointed out, they don't save money by polluting their own land or the land of others. Only government land.

Did you even READ my post?

Did you even THINK about your post?

Fine... let's do it non-point by non-point:

Companies, corporations, and even individuals have to be worried about the future valuue of their property

Bzzt, wrong. They don't have to be. Individuals with no intention of selling their property won't be very concerned with the resale value. Companies and corporations will do a simple cost/benefit analysis of their property and actions - does the resale value of a clean property outweigh the money saved by messing it up? For example, why would a company spend $100k to clean up their operation when the expected payout (probability of getting caught times the cost of getting caught) of dirty business is only $90k? Are you claiming that the cost of doing things right is always less than not?

so they have every incentive to make it as nice as it can be.

No they don't. They have every incentive to do what's in their economic, capitalistic, free market best interests. That may or may not be to "preserve the commons."

My family has owned our property for over 100 years. Do you think we worry about the resale value of it when we decide to knock down a tree or build a pig pen where it's most convenient?

You'll see that the private land is much nicer and much better maintained. That's because the people in charge of the land have a financial incentive to keep it as nice as possible. Government has no incentive.

In general, I think people do take better care of their own things as a matter of pride and not a matter of economic payoff. I do not think most people constantly consider the effects their actions have on the resale value of their properties. People, in practice, only care about the resale values of their properties when it's in their mind to sell.

Since the owners of the land are concerned about its value as I have described above, they are most certainly going to seek restitution whenever others pollute their land.

It depends on the pollution. Who do I sue about acid rain? Who gets fined because my water table is contaminated?

So companies, corporaitons, and individuals, not wanting to pay such costs, are not going to pollute land owned by others.

Probably not directly.

Since government is not concerned about the future value of its land, it has no incentive to stop others from polluting it, nor to seek restitution against those who do so. Moreover, they do have a political incentive to give favors to politically-connected companies and corporations, favors which include allowing them to pollute on their land. And if you find a polluted lake or river, take a look at who owns it—I'll bet it's the government!

Why can't the government be interested in the resale value of their property yet people and corporations must be? Why is the government powerless in face of bribes yet people and coporations are immune?

[Gem]

Government sometimes have incentives to save land. For example, Teddy Rosevelt, despite business's complaining, saved large acres of land for national parks. Government also takes care of those national parks, staffing it with rangers, etc. They have a POLITICAL motivation to preserve national parks.

Gem

[Cain]

Originally posted by shanek
[B]There are some things you need to understand here:

PEOPLE DO NOT POLLUTE WHAT THEY OWN. Companies, corporations, and even individuals have to be worried about the future valuue of their property, so they have every incentive to make it as nice as it can be. Look at any privately-owned land, even land owned by logging companies, and compare it to the government-"protected" national preserves.

How is it that in every free market fantasy enviornmental protection just happens to produce wonderful profits? I'm guessing it's magic. Yeah, magic.

Look up virtually any environmental economics textbook and you'll find marginal social benefit and marginal social cost curves that do NOT correspond to marginal private costs and marginal private benefits. This is well established and, as Krugman repeats, utterly non-controversial. Instead of pollution taxes non-Libertarian economists, also known as semi-sane individuals, argue in favor of pollution permit markets.

A rationally self-interested individual only cares about the environmental quality of her land in so far that she realizes a profit. If the land becomes useless, polluted, or a health danger near the end of the owner's life, why should she care? A profit has already been turned.

It's not surprising to see many libertarians say things along the lines of "F*ck future generations; they don't exist, therefore they have no rights." An argument as specious as it is common.

The problems relating to oceans and the atmosphere are considerably more messy. Oh, but that's nothing the Market God cannot clean up, right?

A former Libertarian discusses how he become disillusioned with core tenets of market dogma:

Upon graduation, despite possessing a liberal arts degree, I nevertheless
managed to get a good job pretty quickly with absolutely no experience doing
environmental engineering/health type work at a large manufacturing firm....

This place had also been busted for dumping hazardous waste on its own
property back in 1990. This was just more fuel to the fire - I couldn't help
but realize that at the end of the day, and despite the frustration of having
to deal with piles and piles of OSHA and EPA regulations, it was government
regulation that was protecting these workers. To this day, I get a good laugh
when some libertarian tells me that "things don't need to be complicated; let
companies figure it out for themselves." The whole notion that companies need
to (or are even able to) implement their OWN strategies for something like
hazardous waste disposal is completely absurd. We had approximately thirty
"waste streams", each of which had its own special packaging, method of
disposal, transportation, etc. It took our staff of six just to transport,
package, and deal with all of it. The alternative would've been what they
were doing before - dumping colloidial silver and god knows what else on a
corner of THEIR property. Should people be allowed to dump toxins on land
just because it's their own and let people a thousand years later deal with
it? The Libertarian ideal seemed sillier by the day.

[shanek]

Originally posted by chulbert
Individuals with no intention of selling their property won't be very concerned with the resale value.

That's just completely bogus. The land value does play a very strong role. Get involved in your local politics and you'll see that people are very concerned with keeping their property values up—even if they never intend on selling the land. It's still an asset, and they still lose out when the value drops.

Companies and corporations will do a simple cost/benefit analysis of their property and actions - does the resale value of a clean property outweigh the money saved by messing it up?

Again, look around you in the real world. With very few exceptions, corporations and companies have decided exactly that. You lose out a lot more by polluting the land than you spend out by keeping it maintained.

No they don't.

Yes, they do. Properly maintained land most certainly affects their bottom line. You clearly haven't looked in to how these decisions are actually made.

That may or may not be to "preserve the commons."

We aren't talking about commons here. Nice evasion.

People, in practice, only care about the resale values of their properties when it's in their mind to sell.

Why do you stubbornly think of it in terms of resale value? It's not the resale value, it's the value itself, which counts as an asset; as equity.

It depends on the pollution. Who do I sue about acid rain? Who gets fined because my water table is contaminated?

If you can find anyone responsible for it, sue them. If you can't, then you can't prove it was contaminated at all...particularly with pseudoscience like "acid rain."

Whatever bad science she used to try and prove their culpability, Erin Brockovich certainly proved that you could successfully sue in such a case.

Why can't the government be interested in the resale value of their property yet people and corporations must be?

Because the government just isn't interested in things like the bottom line, equity, or future value. Government didn't earn the money, government has no incentive to economize, government has none of the conditions and experiences that make this happen in a free market.

[shanek]

Originally posted by Gem
Government sometimes have incentives to save land. For example, Teddy Rosevelt, despite business's complaining, saved large acres of land for national parks. Government also takes care of those national parks, staffing it with rangers, etc. They have a POLITICAL motivation to preserve national parks.

As I pointed out in the post no one seems to want to read, they don't do anywhere near as good a job of this as private parks or even logging companies.

[shanek]

Originally posted by Cain
How is it that in every free market fantasy enviornmental protection just happens to produce wonderful profits? I'm guessing it's magic. Yeah, magic.

No, it's the result of a cost/benefit analysis.

It's not surprising to see many libertarians say things along the lines of "F*ck future generations; they don't exist, therefore they have no rights." An argument as specious as it is common.

And an even more pathetic strawman.

A former Libertarian

Whom you don't seem to want to properly reference or even name...

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


As I pointed out in the post no one seems to want to read, they don't do anywhere near as good a job of this as private parks or even logging companies.

Haaa hahahahahaha

I've been to both.

(Note: Some logging companies do indeed do a good job, their existance depends on it. Some, on the other hand, don't appear to give a (*(*.( )

When will you address reality instead of theory, Shanek?

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


No, it's the result of a cost/benefit analysis.


Yep, it is. "Let's see, if I bury these barrels at least 30 feet down, and then sell this as a housing development, it will be at least 75 years before anything becomes a problem, and we'll be long gone, both personally and corporately.


And an even more pathetic strawman.


Let's talk about how people really act. Ooops, your theory gets defenstrated the second we look at the real world. Have a nice flight.


Whom you don't seem to want to properly reference or even name...
'scuse me? He's obligated to reference and/or quote what? Nothing much I can seel.

To me "rand" is the name of a function that returns uniformly distributed random numbers between 0 and 1.

[Ziggurat]

Originally posted by shanek


Um, I did cover water. And I've covered air and EM in other threads.

No, you covered lakes. Nothing you said is at all applicable to rivers, or the ocean, where water currents carry pollution away from where it enters the system.

[Cain]

Originally posted by shanek
No, it's the result of a cost/benefit analysis.

Shanek, you fail to grasp an elementary point: private and social cost/benefit calculations diverge considerably in the realm of environmental economics. We're dealing with negative externalities. Particular economic activity may generate profits for a private actor, but this behavior also imposes costs on a third party.

At the moment I only see three ways of handling the problem:

1) Insist the rational interests of all economic actors never conflicts (in which case your libertarian faith has more in common with utopian Marxism than reality).

2) Explain that Ronald Coase solved this problem years ago. This is just plain wrong given the "messiness" of real-world situations. (The zero transaction costs assumption does not help).

3) Recognize, as nearly every economist in the world does already, that the problem of negative externalities requires government intervention beyond merely defining property rights.

And an even more pathetic strawman.

Ah, the "strawman" meme rears its ugly head once again (this mutant meme has plagued JREF discussions for quite a while, maybe years). But feel free to restate the argument in your own words.

(Desperate posters incapable of reasoned argument on this forum always, always, always cry "strawman [sic]" to avoid thoughtful examination of first premises.)

Whom you don't seem to want to properly reference or even name...

You've quickly managed to detect my wicked intentions. Or maybe -- just maybe -- I chose not to mention the person by name in order to avoid the impression of inflated importance. He's Joe six-pack. Here's a link: http://world.std.com/~mhuben/armstrong

_____________________________

I hope no one seriously thinks there's even a remote chance of convincing our prolific, monomaniacal friend of libertarianism's obvious shortcomings. The first time I entered a discussion with Shanek someone PMed me to warn of the utter futility. The best you can do is hope the nonsense dies down. But no. Most threads are pulled in in an uninteresting direction because one poster with way too much time and his hands feels compelled to offer the same nostrums for all types of problems.

This thread is instructive:
http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=18921&perpage=40&highlight=Cain&pagenumber=2

The first page demonstrates Shanek's limited understanding of libertarian philosophy. The second page exposes him as a natural rights advocate masquerading as an empirical libertarian The lower portion of the second page, perhaps the most interesting, contains an explicit admission of unfaslifiability in relation to free market fantasies.

[shanek]

Amazong how much disagreement there is among economists for something "every economist" knows...

http://www.mises.org/freemarket_detail.asp?control=367

Lionel Robbins challenged Pigou's analysis in the 1930s. Robbins pointed out that, as utility is not measurable, it is invalid to compare levels of utility between different people, as Pigou's analysis required. Robbins recommended using the criterion of Pareto optimality as the basis of welfare economics. A policy has to make at least one person better off and none worse off before economists can say it is unambiguously better. But Robbins held that if we just assume people have an equal capacity for satisfaction, then economists still can recommend certain state interventions.

The notion of justifying economic intervention on the basis of welfare analysis was dealt a severe blow in 1956, with the publication of Murray Rothbard's paper, "Toward a Reconstruction of Utility and Welfare Economics."

Rothbard pointed out that it is only through preference demonstrated in action that we can gauge what actors really value, and that to try to deduce values from mathematical formulas, without the evidence of action, is a hopeless cause. When people demonstrate their preferences by exchanging we can say that both parties felt that they would be better off trading goods than not. Since Pigou's solution involves imposing taxes and subsidies by fiat, without voluntary exchange, the numbers arrived at are mere guesswork.

Consider the case of river pollution from the foozle factory. If the people downriver from the factory have a property right in the river, the factory will have to negotiate with them in order to legally discharge waste through their property. We can't say what solution the participants might arrive at-the factory might shut down, the people downriver might be paid to move, or the factory might install pollution control devices or simply compensate those affected for suffering the pollution. What we can say is that, within a system of voluntary exchange, each party has demonstrated that it prefers the solution arrived at to the situation that existed before their negotiations.

Walter Block, now at Loyola University, has continued work on externalities in the tradition of Rothbard. Block has challenged the traditional distinction between public goods, which must be produced collectively because of the positive externalities they create, and private goods, the production of which may be left to the market. The proposed list of public goods often has included such items as postal delivery, roads, schools, garbage pickup, parks, airports, libraries, museums, and so on-just think of the activities your city undertakes. The consensus has run that unless such goods are provided through government action, people will attempt to become free riders, enjoying some of the benefits of such goods while letting other people pay for them.

Block points out that this sort of analysis is flawed in that almost any good could be said to provide some benefits or costs to third parties. What about socks? Doesn't the fact that other people wear socks, and I don't have to smell sweaty feet all day, provide me with a benefit for which I'm not paying? Must socks, therefore, be considered a public good?

The free market is not a panacea. It does not eliminate old age, and it won't guarantee you a date for Saturday night. Private enterprise is fully capable of awful screwups. Both theory and practice indicate that its screwups are less pervasive and more easily corrected than those of government enterprises.

Here's a good paper on the matter:

Why Externalities Are Not a Case of Market Failure (http://www.mises.org/asc/2003/asc9simpson.pdf)

[Cain]

Amazong indeed.

In past discussions pertaining to libertarianism you swore off associations with anarchism. Oh, but now objections to the problem of externalities are formulated by perhaps the most well known anarcho-capitalist (Murray Rothbard). Previously you decried the clear, direct, and inmistakable relationship to Ayn Rand, but the PDF file posted -- described as a "good paper on the matter" is completely informed (or misinformed) by Objectivism. The author alludes to the "collectivist" premise underlying traditional free-market thinking (Univ. of Chicago economists are Utilitarians -- oh my!).

The argument there -- a straw man if I ever saw one -- claims that we should compensate individuals for positive externalities if we're going to penalize others for negative externalities. That's just plain nonsense, and would of course undoubtedly result in worse overall circumstances. The fundamental premise, however, is utilitarian. Individuals are not punitively punished for generating negative externalities. We simply do not care for those effects because they reduce instead of maximize the social good.

The author of that paper also says something about not holding individuals accountable for unintended overall effects. This goes back to the tragedy of the commons. If I am the only person on earth to drive an automobile, then the emissions produced by that vehicle have a negligable effect on living standards. No one is adversely affected by my private behavior. However, if everyone drives a car that dirties the air, thus creating a condition that detracts from the social good (or greatest happiness for the greatest number, or whatever other "collectivist" measure we're using), then government has a role altering circumstances so as to internalize those externalities (that is, introduce new incentives and disincentives). I think he's guilty of the ecological fallacy on this point. Supposing six jurors passionately believe a defendant is not guilty, and six other jurors equally passionate think he's guilty as sin then the result, a hung jury, cannot be attributed to any single person. Indeed, juror number 11 can say, "Hey, don't hold me responsible for this mess; I think he should be put to death." The Austrian school's methodological individualism has always had difficulty addressing the *relationships* between the parts (and the part to the whole).

[qutoe] Block points out that this sort of analysis is flawed in that almost any good could be said to provide some benefits or costs to third parties. What about socks? Doesn't the fact that other people wear socks, and I don't have to smell sweaty feet all day, provide me with a benefit for which I'm not paying? Must socks, therefore, be considered a public good?[/quote]

A public good is non-rival and non-excludable in consumption. The market, left to it's own devices, overproduces negative externalities and underproduces positive externalities. Where again is the incentive to have smelly feet? That's only imaginable assuming initial conditions where practically everyone else never bothers to change her socks, and a malodorous stench engulfs most or all public places.

[shanek]

Originally posted by Cain
Amazong indeed.

In past discussions pertaining to libertarianism you swore off associations with anarchism.

Absolutely pathetic ad hominem. Just because I don't agree with anarchism doesn't mean that one or two of them can't have a good idea every now and then.

Heck, I've cited government statistics many times to back up my arguments. So get over yourself!

[shanek]

Originally posted by Ziggurat
No, you covered lakes. Nothing you said is at all applicable to rivers, or the ocean, where water currents carry pollution away from where it enters the system.

Here's something else for people like Ziggurat to ignore. I recently learned of this myself. Apparently, there's an organization in the UK called the Anglers' Conservation Association (http://www.a-c-a.org/), or ACA. Apparently, it's a completely private entity that uses donated money to sue polluters—including, apparently, local authorities, who enjoy Sovereign Immunity here in the US—on behalf of downstream property owners. Here's a bit about themselves from their website:

In 1949, backed by funds of just £200, a new pollution fighting body fought its very first case in Britain and won!

Three years later it forced a city corporation to spend 1.8m - worth 25m at today's prices on a new sewage works. The same organisation with only four full time staff takes on both large and small polluters throughout the country.

[...]

In its entire history ACA has only lost two cases against polluters. such is its reputation that most cases are settled out of court. With awards being made to enable ruined rivers and fisheries to be cleaned up, restocked or restored to there original pristine condition.

One more example of private organizations doing what the big government types say they can't...

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek

One more example of private organizations doing what the big government types say they can't...

You mean "one example".

It's amazing how when the very real example, evidence now in, regarding the east coast blackout points one way, you argue it's only one instance, but when a private organization does something that's only one instance, it's glorious evidence for your side.

Go away.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
You mean "one example".

One example, on top of the logging companies' efforts to preserve their own land, groups like the Nature Conservancy, and any other of the numerous examples I've already given in this forum.

Go away.

You first.

[Cain]

Originally posted by shanek
[B]

[quote]Absolutely pathetic ad hominem.

Shanek, I love you. When you have no argument you do two things: 1) incorrectly cite a logical fallacy. That's amusing enough, but then you have the dirty habit of doing something else 2) inserting the word pathetic.

We can all agree to tone down the irony.

Just because I don't agree with anarchism doesn't mean that one or two of them can't have a good idea every now and then.

One or two of them? No kidding. The problem of course is that Murray Rothbard -- by far the most influential anarchist -- takes precisely these arguments on externalities in a direction you deny. But enough about anarchism, what about Objectivism? The arguments in the pdf were pure Rand. I'm sorry that this is relevant in ways you find displeasing (specifically the threads relating to foundations of libertarianism).


P.S.

An example of an ad hominem:

Dave: "I think George W. Bush's policies in the middle-east will end up making us more vulnerable."
John: "Oh, but Dave! You're a *********** communist! Nobody cares what you think."

Not an example of an ad hominem:
Dave: "I think the post office is an inefficient, bumbling extension of government bureaucracy. We need full privitization and deregulation.
John: "Oh, but Dave! You're a *********** communist! Isn't that kind of contradictory?

P.S.S. Anyway, uh, keep up with the good posts. Or I should say just keep posting. Or actually, please stop posting. Thank you.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek
There are some things you need to understand here:

PEOPLE DO NOT POLLUTE WHAT THEY OWN. PEOPLE DO NOT POLLUTE LAND PRIVATELY OWNED BY OTHERS.



This is the sort of statement only an ideologue could make. A flat, absolute assertion that could not ever be right.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


Absolutely pathetic ad hominem. Just because I don't agree with anarchism doesn't mean that one or two of them can't have a good idea every now and then.

Heck, I've cited government statistics many times to back up my arguments. So get over yourself!

You didn't reply to his points.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
This is the sort of statement only an ideologue could make. A flat, absolute assertion that could not ever be right.

It IS right, as ALL of the evidence shows.

According to a report released by the Boston Globe in 1999, the Federal government is "the worst polluter in the land" and cleanup of environmental damage caused by Federal agencies and the military could exceed $300 billion—five times as much as the environmental harm (estimated at $57 billion) caused by all private agencies combined!!!

Not only that, but the vast majority of that $57 billion is environmental damage to government land, committed with the knowledge and even the permission of government.

If government were held responsible for the pollution it caused, and if all of this government land weren't around for them to allow others to pollute, you'd see pollution in this country dwindle down to almost nothing. And what you think you get out of stubbornly denying this I'll never understand; but it isn't a cleaner environment.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
You didn't reply to his points.

He made no points! He didn't argue the data AT ALL! He argued (probably deliberate) misconceptions, an ad hominem in the form of guilt by association (by associating me with anarchists and objectivists just because I quoted one of them making a good point with good data), and what the HECK did his jury example have to do with anything? It's been a long-held part of the trial by jury system that juries cannot be punished or rewarded for their verdicts.

I didn't reply to his points because he made no points to reply to.

[Dancing David]

Thank You for this great idea for a thread.

There is a tremendous cost when natural resources are used and explkoited. Wilson's The Future of Life discusses this very well, it tends to be mainly editorial. But there is a cost to all of us whenever natuarl resources are used and/or pollution is emitted into the enviroment..

ShaneK: I respect you as a libertarian and I admire the libertarian values, but this is an area where the argument just fall apart, there is a high profit motive to pollute and not clean up after wards. You can use the usual anecdotes and get shrill all you want, but the free market has done a very poor job of having consequences for enviromental impact.

[shanek]

Originally posted by Dancing David
there is a high profit motive to pollute and not clean up after wards.

As I have shown, this is really only the case when they do not have to worry about the land value. You're free, of course, to present any evidence you have to the contrary.

You can use the usual anecdotes and get shrill all you want, but the free market has done a very poor job of having consequences for enviromental impact.

Even though the overwhelming majority of pollution takes place on government land? Even though the Federal government is directly responsible for about five-sixths of all of the poillution in this country?

[Cain]

Originally posted by shanek


He made no points! He didn't argue the data AT ALL! He argued (probably deliberate) misconceptions, an ad hominem in the form of guilt by association (by associating me with anarchists and objectivists just because I quoted one of them making a good point with good data), and what the HECK did his jury example have to do with anything? It's been a long-held part of the trial by jury system that juries cannot be punished or rewarded for their verdicts.

I didn't reply to his points because he made no points to reply to.

:rolleyes:

[Dancing David]

OOOOH, look it is one citation in the Boston Globe that the government is the worst poluter of the land, gee ShaneK I guess that excuses every private land owner whoever polluted, because one source says that the government is the worst.

And Who Does IT for the Federal Government? , the blessed free market corporation, mainly defense contractors! Who are private companies under contract to the Federal government. Again, private companies.

Shane , sorry but the free market has done a piss poor job of defending sthe enviroment, the profit factor is too high.

So around here, where we have farms and not some park like rural property, the main polluters are PRIVATE LAND OWNERS, in the cities the major polluters are PRIVATE LAND OWNERS, all most every one of the Super Funhjd sites are from PRIVATE LAND OWNERS. In fact almost all of the majors envirometal disasters are from PRIVATE LAND OWNERS. Then they declare banruptcy and pass it on to the government. If a PRIVATE LAND OWNER destroys thier property and then declares bankruptcy , it then falls onto the government to clean it up, is that what the Boston Globe report is about.

Why aren't you citing the EPA ShaneK, why not the GAO, or any number of reputable private investagators of pollution. Who generated the statistic for the Globe, where did they come from. (Or is this like cribs killing babies and something you have no knowledge of?)

[fishbob]

Shanek:Apparently, there's an organization in the UK called the Anglers' Conservation Association, or ACA. Apparently, it's a completely private entity that uses donated money to sue polluters—including, apparently, local authorities, who enjoy Sovereign Immunity here in the US—on behalf of downstream property owners. You can't sue somebody for doing something that is not prohibited or damaging. The ACA does not make regulations, the ACA is doing the grunt work to penalize polluters.

Shanek - Too much of your position is based on idealized situations. Real world companies pollute, often without any good reason. Managers make decisions about property that a company owns. The manager is temporary, his interests in the property end when his employment ends. As inefficient as the government is, there is still no good alternative to government regulation to discourage polluters.

Dancing David - military bases are some of the most polluted places around, and for similar reasons as noted above. The decision makers are temporary. Military officers transfer away from the problem, defense contractors are only responsible until their contract ends.

[Gem]

I remember reading in my economic textbook about two types of environment regulations. The pollution tax and the market enviromentalism. Basicly, the tax taxes businesses for every ammout of pollution they cause. The problem with that is that each unit of pullution might be more expensive to reduce than the next company (car maker company vs clothing factory). The solution, signed into law by Senior Bush, were "polluting permits." Businesses could buy and sell these permits, allowing them to pollute. They gave an example, and the net result was that it cost businesses a lot less for the same ammount of pollution.

Isn't that a great mix of free market and regulation?

Gem

[Dancing David]

Originally posted by fishbob
Dancing David - military bases are some of the most polluted places around, and for similar reasons as noted above. The decision makers are temporary. Military officers transfer away from the problem, defense contractors are only responsible until their contract ends.

Quite true, and defense contractors are exempted from all sorts of emission laws as well, especialy the CFC laws, and they are immune from prosecution for exposing workers to toxic substances.

Mainly I am trying to point out that these are PRIVATELY OWNED COMPANIES and it is part of FREE MARKET ECONOMICS.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


It IS right, as ALL of the evidence shows.

According to a report released by the Boston Globe in 1999, the Federal government is "the worst polluter in the land" and cleanup of environmental damage caused by Federal agencies and the military could exceed $300 billion—five times as much as the environmental harm (estimated at $57 billion) caused by all private agencies combined!!!

Not only that, but the vast majority of that $57 billion is environmental damage to government land, committed with the knowledge and even the permission of government.

If government were held responsible for the pollution it caused, and if all of this government land weren't around for them to allow others to pollute, you'd see pollution in this country dwindle down to almost nothing. And what you think you get out of stubbornly denying this I'll never understand; but it isn't a cleaner environment.

If we accept your argument at face value, you are admitting that pollution is caused by the private sector. "The government is the worst polluter". Now if the government is the worst, then private industry is next in line. The idea that it causes no pollution is ridiculous.



PEOPLE DO NOT POLLUTE WHAT THEY OWN



At least state you case in reasonable terms.

People tend to pollute what they own less than what they do not own.

[shanek]

Originally posted by Dancing David
OOOOH, look it is one citation in the Boston Globe that the government is the worst poluter of the land,

The Boston Globe said it would cost over $300 billion to clean up pollution caused directly by the Federal government. The EPA calculated this number at $250 billion. Either way, it's still a lot more than the $57 billion caused by all private entities combined!

gee ShaneK I guess that excuses every private land owner whoever polluted,

When did I say that? I've always said that polluters should be held responsible for their pollution, just that big government is the wrong solution for it.

But go on, keep up with the strawmen. It'll avoid you actually having to consider my real arguments.

And Who Does IT for the Federal Government?

Those were all DIRECTLY by the government itself. It DOES NOT include pollution caused by others,e ven when under government contract. That's all part of hte $57 billion.

Why aren't you citing the EPA ShaneK,

I did, liar!

[shanek]

Originally posted by fishbob
Shanek:You can't sue somebody for doing something that is not prohibited or damaging.

Pollution isn't damaging??? Then why all the fuss?

Pollution isn't damaging...man, it's amazing the lengths you people will go to!

The ACA does not make regulations, the ACA is doing the grunt work to penalize polluters.

The ACA SUCCESSFULLY sues polluters who adversely affect rivers. In their entire 50+ years of existance, they've only lost two cases.

Shanek - Too much of your position is based on idealized situations.

The ACA is REAL WORLD—and it works!

[shanek]

Originally posted by Gem
I remember reading in my economic textbook about two types of environment regulations. The pollution tax and the market enviromentalism. Basicly, the tax taxes businesses for every ammout of pollution they cause. The problem with that is that each unit of pullution might be more expensive to reduce than the next company (car maker company vs clothing factory). The solution, signed into law by Senior Bush, were "polluting permits." Businesses could buy and sell these permits, allowing them to pollute. They gave an example, and the net result was that it cost businesses a lot less for the same ammount of pollution.

Isn't that a great mix of free market and regulation?

I will admit, I don't have much problem with that as a concept, provided the cost of the permits or the amount of the tax is set realistically. The problem is, I don't trust the government not to use this as just another tool to sieze even more power and money and give benefits to politically-connected companies, including the waiver of these fees.

Something like this is happening now; whenever they pass "tough, new environmental regulations," companies that are connected with the government always seem to get grandfathered.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
If we accept your argument at face value, you are admitting that pollution is caused by the private sector. "The government is the worst polluter". Now if the government is the worst, then private industry is next in line. The idea that it causes no pollution is ridiculous.

Except that I never said that the private sector causes no pollution. You made that up.

People tend to pollute what they own less than what they do not own.

And when they do pollute what they own, they tend to clean it up.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


Except that I never said that the private sector causes no pollution. You made that up.



And when they do pollute what they own, they tend to clean it up.

In your very first post, you said.



PEOPLE DO NOT POLLUTE WHAT THEY OWN

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
In your very first post, you said.

That is NOT the same as saying the private sector causes no pollution. In fact, I pointed out when they would be encoraged to pollute without having to face the ramifications of their actions, and how to make them face the consequences and therefore make them loathe to pollute in the first place. Since you read that post, you knew that when you mined that quote, so this is just more of your dishonesty at work.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


That is NOT the same as saying the private sector causes no pollution. In fact, I pointed out when they would be encoraged to pollute without having to face the ramifications of their actions, and how to make them face the consequences and therefore make them loathe to pollute in the first place. Since you read that post, you knew that when you mined that quote, so this is just more of your dishonesty at work.



PEOPLE DO NOT POLLUTE WHAT THEY OWN. Companies, corporations, and even individuals have to be worried about the future valuue of their property, so they have every incentive to make it as nice as it can be. Look at any privately-owned land, even land owned by logging companies, and compare it to the government-"protected" national preserves. You'll see that the private land is much nicer and much better maintained. That's because the people in charge of the land have a financial incentive to keep it as nice as possible. Government has no incentive.

Digitalmcq mentioned water pollution...this applies here, too. I live near a lake privately owned by a power company, who does not pollute the lake despite having three separate power plants on its shores.



The full section of your post. Where did I get it wrong?

You also fail to mention thermal pollution. The reason power stations are near water is that they need this for cooling, which naturally causes heating of the water, or draining of the water. So this is an impact on the environment. During the recent heat wave in France, the nuclear power stations needed special dispensation to be allowed to work at full capacity. This is because they were generating too much heat in the water systems they are connected to. And water pollution does have a negative effect, fish die from it.

[fishbob]

The ACA is REAL WORLD—and it works! It works because there is a law or regulation somewhere that states that what the polluter did is wrong. ACA could not win a lawsuit if the defendant did nothing perceived as legally wrong. ACA lawsuits are just an unusual enforcement mechanism to be used where the legal system is not performing adequately. What I am saying is that your ACA example does not support or detract from your position. It is a side issue.

And I am not "you people".

Your statement that people don't pollute what they own may have some validity on an individual level, but is much less valid for organizations. Corporate and government decision makers can be motivated by budgets, career, ignorance, greed, and many other things that are not in the best interest of the organization. And these decision making individuals are temporary. Therefore we need some motivation to discourage bad behaviour.

Somebody needed to develop a process to identify and deal with pollution and, unfortunately perhaps, government is the mechanism we use for doing this kind of thing. It is certainly bizarre that the US military is one of the worst polluters around, violating US environmental regulations.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
The full section of your post.

NO WHERE THERE DID I SAY THAT CORPORATIONS DIDN'T POLLUTE AT ALL!

In fact, later on in that VERY SAME POST, I said:

PEOPLE DO POLLUTE LAND OWNED BY GOVERNMENT.

If they pollute land owned by government, then that means that it's NOT true that "the private sector causes no pollution," the very argument you attributed to me.

Liar.

[shanek]

Originally posted by fishbob
It works because there is a law or regulation somewhere that states that what the polluter did is wrong.

Yes, damaging the property of others is wrong. The SCS is doing EXACTLY what I said would happen, and EXACTLY what people here have been saying won't work!

What I am saying is that your ACA example does not support or detract from your position. It is a side issue.

No, it's not! IT'S THE VERY SOLUTION I PROPOSED!!! And I was told it would NOT work in the case of rivers...well, here's a REAL WORLD EXAMPLE where it is!

Somebody needed to develop a process to identify and deal with pollution and, unfortunately perhaps, government is the mechanism we use for doing this kind of thing.

Even though that very mechanism is producing five-sixths of all the pollution?

It is certainly bizarre that the US military is one of the worst polluters around, violating US environmental regulations.

Even the EPA is violating them! According to that same Boston Globe report, their offices in Lexington, MA were found to be leaking mercury into the water! They also found that Federal government facilities of all kinds were much more likely to violate clean water standards than private companies. NASA themselves admitted to contaminating up to 913 sites in 10 states.

For crying out loud, people—how much evidence do you require???

[Cain]

Shanek may be shrill, but he's not smart.

[fishbob]

Yes, damaging the property of others is wrong. The SCS is doing EXACTLY what I said would happen, and EXACTLY what people here have been saying won't work! If damaging the property of others is wrong enough for ACA to win lawsuits, then law enforcement should to be taking care of the problem. If damaging the property of others is not wrong, then ACA could not win lawsuits.

[shanek]

Originally posted by fishbob
If damaging the property of others is wrong enough for ACA to win lawsuits, then law enforcement should to be taking care of the problem. If damaging the property of others is not wrong, then ACA could not win lawsuits.

It doesn't work that way. There's a difference between civil and criminal proceedings. If it's a criminal offense, then the authorities will "take care" of the problem by issuing punitive measures on behalf of "the people." The actual victim himself has no rights in this and will likely receive nothing from it other than satisfaction.

In order for the victim to gain compensation for the damage, they must take out a civil suit against the person or company who did the damage. That's what the ACA does—it takes those who pollute rivers to court on behalf of the downstream property owners, provides for the legal experts, and passes every penny of the judgement on to the property owners.

It happens. It works. And none of you can deny it no matter how much you whine.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


NO WHERE THERE DID I SAY THAT CORPORATIONS DIDN'T POLLUTE AT ALL!

In fact, later on in that VERY SAME POST, I said:



If they pollute land owned by government, then that means that it's NOT true that "the private sector causes no pollution," the very argument you attributed to me.

Liar.

Now you are really digging yourself into a hole. The only pollution the private sector causes is what it does to government land? Is that what you are saying?

Even if we take this at it's face value, you are saying that private industry needs to be made to stop polluting government land when it does so. You are also saying that if there was no government land, there would be no pollution.

Do you get some sort of feeling that you are writing a mony python sketch?

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
Now you are really digging yourself into a hole. The only pollution the private sector causes is what it does to government land? Is that what you are saying?

The vast, overwhelming majority of it, yes. If we stop the polluting of government property, whatever pollution remains would likely be so miniscule as to not pose a problem.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


The vast, overwhelming majority of it, yes. If we stop the polluting of government property, whatever pollution remains would likely be so miniscule as to not pose a problem.

As Ed asked, is libertarianism largely wishful thinking, this is a good example of it. For example, much of the pollution has been 'exported', to Bhopal, for example. I can still remember that tragic garbage barge from NYC, cruising up and down the South American coast, trying to find somewhere to dump it's load.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
For example, much of the pollution has been 'exported', to Bhopal, for example. I can still remember that tragic garbage barge from NYC, cruising up and down the South American coast, trying to find somewhere to dump it's load.

In other words, not on their own property. Thank you for supporting my argument,

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


In other words, not on their own property. Thank you for supporting my argument,

I was just giving some example of what they do. Not that they don't pollute their own land.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
I was just giving some example of what they do. Not that they don't pollute their own land.

You were attempting to present it as a refutation of my claim, which has always been limited to land that they own. You even called it "wishful thinking." IOW, it was another pathetic (if somewhat veiled) attempt at a strawman by you and it backfired.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


You were attempting to present it as a refutation of my claim, which has always been limited to land that they own. You even called it "wishful thinking." IOW, it was another pathetic (if somewhat veiled) attempt at a strawman by you and it backfired.


In what way is giving an example a straw man? All I did was say that, for example, this is what companies do with pollution.

Either way, the claim that companies never pollute their own land is still an abusurdity.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
In what way is giving an example a straw man?

Because your example was used to show my argument was "wishful thinking," but the example "refuted" something that I never claimed!

All I did was say that, for example, this is what companies do with pollution.

AND that my position was "wishful thinking."

[Dancing David]

Originally posted by shanek


As I have shown, this is really only the case when they do not have to worry about the land value. You're free, of course, to present any evidence you have to the contrary.


SaneK:

You haven't shown anything, why is it that most of the toxic sites in my county, including two superfund sites are on private land. Why is that? Whi is it that when most of the pollution created is on private land , you just ignore it?
You can say, ALL STASTICS , all the time it doesn't make it true.

For example, in acounty south od here we had a gentleman who was getting old transformers and stripping out the copper, and pouring the BCP on the ground, I think there was a similar case in Kentucky.

Profit. He didn't care about the value of his land, nor do any of the companies that declare bankruptcy after they pollute.

[Dancing David]

Originally posted by shanek


The Boston Globe said it would cost over $300 billion to clean up pollution caused directly by the Federal government. The EPA calculated this number at $250 billion. Either way, it's still a lot more than the $57 billion caused by all private entities combined!


I guess that just ignores the cost of the SuperFund doesn't it.




When did I say that? I've always said that polluters should be held responsible for their pollution, just that big government is the wrong solution for it.


So what is the solution, most of the toxic sites have been abandoned or sold after the private companies did the damage, much of it a hundred years ago. I disagree with you statistic that it take such a small fraction of money to clean up the toxics on private land. When did the EPA state that, what year, what report, which branch of the EPA


But go on, keep up with the strawmen. It'll avoid you actually having to consider my real arguments.


Straw wolf your self, you haven't presented a real argument, you haven't proved any of your points. So huff and puff windy!




Those were all DIRECTLY by the government itself. It DOES NOT include pollution caused by others,e ven when under government contract. That's all part of hte $57 billion.

Cite your source, date and time, not the whiny 'I did in previous posts'



I did, liar!
When you made the post that I quoted you hadn't. You just claim that the EPA made those figures, when and where.
Liar Liar, plants for hire

[Dancing David]

Originally posted by shanek


The vast, overwhelming majority of it, yes. If we stop the polluting of government property, whatever pollution remains would likely be so miniscule as to not pose a problem.

Care to back any of the up?

Where does this amazing statistic come from?

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


The vast, overwhelming majority of it, yes. If we stop the polluting of government property, whatever pollution remains would likely be so miniscule as to not pose a problem.

Does the government own the air?

[jj]

Originally posted by Dancing David


For example, in acounty south od here we had a gentleman who was getting old transformers and stripping out the copper, and pouring the BCP on the ground, I think there was a similar case in Kentucky.


Or the fellow down the road from where we used to live, who buried the used TriChlor from his drycleaning establishment in his backyard, next to a swamp.

I mean literally his back yard. Then he died, and the property sat for about 30 years.

Barrels rust.

Now everyone around him is connected to the water main, and they are using remedial wells to draw the stuff out and purify it before it gets into the river.

Government had nothing to do with private action, the polution was on private land, it affected about 40 houses (not ours, there was an advantage being in a different uphill aquifer), and the only solution was government (i.e. all of us) paying.

Then there's the big dump in the same town on some old farmer's back 40. (Some history here... This town was a farming town until the 1960's. MOst of the farmers got old, and sold off their farms. Some simply lived there and let the farms deteriorate, lasting until their 90's in some cases. More than one of those folks discovered, far too late, an illegal chemical dump in their back 40, put there by who-knows...)

The first example I give is of someone poluting their own (and a lot of other peoples') land. The second is polution of private land in a fashion that is unredressable.

The claim that most pollution happens to public land is just simply unsupportable.

[shanek]

Originally posted by Dancing David
You haven't shown anything, why is it that most of the toxic sites in my county, including two superfund sites are on private land.

What are the sites? Who owns the land? What do they do with them? references, please, or this is just another meaningless anecdote.

Profit. He didn't care about the value of his land,

The value of the land affects the profits if he owns it! Why don't you understand that?

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek

What are the sites? Who owns the land? What do they do with them? references, please, or this is just another meaningless anecdote.


Meet your own standard, and show a preponderance of evidence in your favor, and maybe we'll listen.

I guess any example that doens't agree with you is an anecdote?

Come on, the ownership of superfund sites can be found on a government site, I've forgotten it presently, but I use it every time I buy a house or property. It can't be that hard to find, since I re-find it every few years.

You're the only person here who's claiming that people mostly or only polute public land...

And that just doesn't work out to the kind of ownership I've observed in the various kinds of polution sites listed at the EPA at all...

So, data, man, show us some of YOURS!!! Meet your own standard.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


The value of the land affects the profits if he owns it! Why don't you understand that?

I've cited you a specific, existant example where that was not true, therefore we can all regard that statement as controverted in the real world.

The data is available from the NJ DEP and the EPA, too. I'm not going to bother, since you won't look anyhow. (You can count on, although you won't, the fact that when I bought property near that site I researched it rather a lot. It was private property, and it ()*&&(* well was polluted by its owner, who did not see any profit problem, since he was dead by the time the drums rusted.)

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


What are the sites? Who owns the land? What do they do with them? references, please, or this is just another meaningless anecdote.



The value of the land affects the profits if he owns it! Why don't you understand that?

But he believed, even if he is not right, that he would make more money from polluting it with PCBs (which are the work of the devil), than by not polluting it.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
Meet your own standard, and show a preponderance of evidence in your favor, and maybe we'll listen.

I've shown evidence. I pointed out a real-world example, who in the last 50 years has only lost three cases against polluters. An organization doing good and helping the economy using the exact same method you people said wouldn't work. You just ignored it.

You're the only person here who's claiming that people mostly or only polute public land...

And I provided evidence of that, which again went ignored by you.

So, data, man, show us some of YOURS!!!

Already have. Your turn.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
I've cited you a specific, existant example where that was not true,

And yet you refuse to provide any verifiable information whatsoever.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
But he believed, even if he is not right, that he would make more money from polluting it with PCBs (which are the work of the devil), than by not polluting it.

1) They haven't shown any evidence of that, and 2) even if he's stupid enough to do so he won't be for long when he sees the value of his assets dwindling. Equity is very, very, very important to property owners.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


And yet you refuse to provide any verifiable information whatsoever.

Actually, I did, once.

You're attemting a malicious whipsaw here, and you're trying to use your unethical behavior to suggest unprofessional behavior on my part.

I gave you the location of the place once. It's on the EPA maps, you know. You could verify this yourself, but you'd rather not and then claim that you can't verify it.

When I tell you, you claim that it's no kind of verification. When I give you the location, you show (since this is not a hard thing to search out) that you aren't willing to do the research yourself, either.

So, you won't believe others, and in fact you imply that they are lying, yet you won't look up the information yourself, either.

You don't want to know. That's what your position amounts to, flat-out willfull ignorance.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


I've shown evidence. I pointed out a real-world example, who in the last 50 years has only lost three cases against polluters. An organization doing good and helping the economy using the exact same method you people said wouldn't work. You just ignored it.



And we have your word. Given your unwillingness to accept facts that others relate to you, I don't value your word for much at all. I have given you the location and details of a piece of private property which is a complete counterexample to your unverified, unsupported, and seemingly absolute claims, and yet you refuse to examine the details, look up the data for yourself, or in any way engage in your own verification.

I won't repeat what I told you, it's your problem. A dilligent person would have reviewed the information the first time offered.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
Actually, I did,

No, you didn't. You didn't give me any informaiton on where this place is, the name of it, or any information so I can verify it myself.

So go make your pathetic excuses like the woo-woos.

Tell me the NAME. Tell me the LOCATION. Tell me WHO OWNS THE LAND. Tell me the kind of pollution, the dates, etc. If you can't do that, then no one has any way of verifying the claim.

I, unlike you, am telling you EXACTLY what you'd need to give me. And yet, you refuse to. How do you expect anyone to take you seriously?

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
And we have your word.

No, you have the name of the organization. You have the web site. You have everything you need to check it out for yourself!

But you're not going to do that, because it might shatter your pathetic little world-view...

I have given you the location and details of a piece of private property

No, you haven't, liar.

which is a complete counterexample to your unverified, unsupported, and seemingly absolute claims,

They ARE verified, they ARE supported. And unlike you, I gave you EVERYTHING you need to check it out for yourself.

I won't repeat what I told you, it's your problem. A dilligent person would have reviewed the information the first time offered.

There was nothing to repeat! I'm asking for what you REFUSE to give!

[fishbob]

The value of the land affects the profits if he owns it! Why don't you understand that? For individuals, profits and assets are not always a major consideration for their land. And your ACA distinction between civil vs criminal prosecutions also kind of misses the point. There is more to land ownership than profit and loss, and not every land owner is a money grubber or a sharp operator.

If someone knowingly polluted my land, I would much rather have them clean it up or rot in jail, than to get a "damages" check.

And stop being so shrill about all this. Geez - chill down.

[Cain]

Shanek- From now on I'm calling you Prophet Shanek not only because of your righteous obedience to the Market God but your self-righteous, hysterical, uncharitable tone.

Also, I would warn against monopolizing all the world's exclamation points, but they're a public good: non-rival and non-excludable!

P.S.

I thought I offered an example in the way of a once pious libertarian confessing the the deleterious by-products of a drive for prophet --erg, I mean profit. I then provided a link that contains his e-mail address so that if you're really interested in investigating these matters, you could message him (though the account might no longer be active).

P.P.S.

In chapter three of my old textbook, _Environmental Economics and Management: Theory, Policy and Applications_, the authors describe the problems of common property resources (in a section dealing with limitations of the Coase Theorm). What's the sub-title that follows, you ask? "The Solution: Government Intervention." Market approaches are offered in the way of a permit trading scheme, but nothing resembling Libertopia is considered after chapter 2 (and for good reason).

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek




No, you haven't, liar.




The evidence that I am not a liar and that you are a fully false accuser is on page one of this thread. You can find it yourself. I found it in 10 seconds. Retract your accusation.

You ignored it. Now you can't find it. It's not my fault that you remain willfully ignorant, and I am not lying when I state accurately that I have ALREADY given you the information that you now claim to have never seen. There is enough information in the article to go to the proper EPA web site, enter in the street names, and get the information. Yes, you have to go through a few steps, but that's the price of verifying it yourself.

You refuse to believe my direct relating of facts to you, so you now have fully taken on the obligation of doing the research yourself.

You shall now capitulate fully, and submit grovellingly to my demand that you retract that claim that I have lied.

In fact, you can now admit that I gave you enough directions to find not one, but two places where private property was contaminated, once by an owner and once by a criminal.

You demand proof, but when facts are related to you, you accuse the individual who related them of lying. When you are given the facts necessary for you to search out the information yourself, you fail to take advantage of the information, and again accuse the individual who related the facts to you of lying when they point out that they gave you the necessary information.

You have stated absolutes here, claims such as "people don't pollute their own property". You assert that the statements are true, and in doing so, fully represent yourself as an expert in the field, making an unqualified judgement. Surely, if you are such an expert on polluted land, you can find the proper EPA site in a matter of seconds, it must in fact be in your bookmarks/favorites already, yes?

If you aren't and you don't, why are you stating absolutes?

[shanek]

Originally posted by fishbob
If someone knowingly polluted my land, I would much rather have them clean it up or rot in jail, than to get a "damages" check.

The damages check would be to pay for the cleanup. That's what getting paid for damages means! It's the money you need to get it fixed.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


The damages check would be to pay for the cleanup. That's what getting paid for damages means! It's the money you need to get it fixed.

That's like saying if someone shoots me and injures me, a check will make it all better. I would rather just not get shot.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
That's like saying if someone shoots me and injures me, a check will make it all better. I would rather just not get shot.

No, no, no! That's a crime! Again, there's a difference between criminal and civil proceedings!

The damages award pays for the fixing of said damages. Which is presumably what you want out of the deal. If you want to punish them, there's also punitive damages.

[jj]

Where is your retraction, Shanek? The information has been sitting in this thread, all along, and you accused me of lying about that when it was in plain sight of all, yourself included. The necessary information to find the site on a map is sitting right in this thread, in an article last touched LONG before you claimed I'd lied about providing the necessary information.

Sorry, once again you are caught making baseless accusations.

Where is your retraction?

I know you're here and reading articles, because you're spewing more fertilizer at Evil Yeti elsewhere as well as here, so you have had to read past my article by now, and know both the falsity of your position as well as the evidence your accusation provides of your own failure to do any sort of dilligence.

Where's the retraction? What's wrong? No comment on that now, hunh? Why not?

I lived uphill from the place for 10+ years. I looked at it in the morning heading out to the Labs. I looked at it at night, coming home. I saw the little NJDEP signs on it. I saw the cleanup trucks. I read about it in the newspaper. I saw the names (No, actually the names I have forgotten), I saw the well analyses. I saw the plots of the shallow and deep plumes. I saw empty barrels coming out of the property... I saw the "DANGER KEEP OUT" signs. I saw dead birds (this is pre-West Nile). I saw dead raccoons. I saw the big chain-link fence put up to keep everything that didn't fly out for its own safety.

And now it's "clean" and it's a housing development.

And you care call me a liar!

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


No, no, no! That's a crime! Again, there's a difference between criminal and civil proceedings!

The damages award pays for the fixing of said damages. Which is presumably what you want out of the deal. If you want to punish them, there's also punitive damages.

You have missed the analogy. I would just prefer if my land was not wrecked in the first place. The check does not really compensate for the damage in the first place.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
You have missed the analogy. I would just prefer if my land was not wrecked in the first place.

Waaah. What would you ask of them, to build a time machine?

Holding them liable for damages is the best way to ensure that they won't mess up your land because it would be to their financial detriment to do so.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek
Holding them liable for damages is the best way to ensure that they won't mess up your land because it would be to their financial detriment to do so.

That works really well with somebody who has no money and a big load of toxic waste, I'm sure.

Are you really an anti-libertarian troll????

[Dancing David]

Originally posted by shanek


What are the sites? Who owns the land? What do they do with them? references, please, or this is just another meaningless anecdote.

Both are former gas stations owned privately and polluted privately, they incinerated the dirt at one, the other is still waiting. It cost $400,000 to incinerate the dirt and detoxify it. There are plenty of un documented sites as well, greatest issue in Illinois is private small dumps owned by rurral property owners. You may not like it but it is the truth. Why these two gas stations stored PCB I don't know, my guess is that they hauled them as toxics and then stored them.



The value of the land affects the profits if he owns it! Why don't you understand that?
The point is Shane that he didn't care about the resale value of his property he wanted the cash.
[/B]

Why don't you open your mind Shane? You are as strict a believr in your Church Of The Libertairian as any whacko.

[Dancing David]

Originally posted by shanek


The damages check would be to pay for the cleanup. That's what getting paid for damages means! It's the money you need to get it fixed.

This is more 'pie in the sky' than govenor Moonbeam ever dreamed of. Why would it work? The companies sell off thier assets and declare banruptcy as soon as the wind comes up . Waste Management Inc. knowingly and illegaly poured toxics in my cities lanfill. Slap on wrist r we declare bankruptcy. And again Shane you are talking about government intervention here as the remedy because this is one area where the blessed free market fails miserably.

And so where does the money come from when the company sells it assest, pays off the CEO and Board and then declares bankruptcy. just like evry thing the free market has it's limits. What about Victorian polution?

[shanek]

Originally posted by Dancing David
blah blah blah

DD, I posted actual, real-world examples of this working. It CAN work. It DOES work. It's not "pie-in-the-sky," "moon-beam," "believer," or any other desparaging remarks you can fling at it to avoid actually having to admit that you may be wrong about something. IT HAPPENS, IT WORKS.

[Dancing David]

Originally posted by shanek


blah blah blah
I am *******
blah blah blah

ShaneK, how does your proposed sytem deal with companies that declare banruptcy to avoid clean and damage costs. Is that a legitemate question. This has been done in the case of minng companies, it is now being done currently by the Clark Oil Corporation (at least here in Illinois and localy)and was also done by the manufactuerers of asbestos products.

Paying punative damages is a nice idea but in the case of waste mangement Inc., they just threatened bankruptcy and reorganised and got out of the fact that they had been illegaly dumping toxics. I feel that in general free market economics is a good thing, but there are areas where is fails.

(I suppose that like infant crib deaths they don't exist either.)

I don't think that pointing to the oraganization in England is proof that it would work here in the US. So what about the issue of companies declaring bankruptcy and reorganising to avoid lawsuits related to toxic materials?

[shanek]

Originally posted by Dancing David
ShaneK, how does your proposed sytem deal with companies that declare banruptcy to avoid clean and damage costs.

They can't "just" do that. The type of bankruptcy you describe does NOT get them out of paying anyone. That's a different kind of bankruptcy, and you not only have to be at the very rock bottom to do it, you also have to prove it in court. And then you're going to be stopped from doing anything involving the use of credit for SEVEN YEARS. No, it's not a good alternative to paying it off. Very, very rarely do companies "get out of" paying things like this, and when they do it's because the company has been completely destroyed.

[Dancing David]

Originally posted by shanek


They can't "just" do that. The type of bankruptcy you describe does NOT get them out of paying anyone. That's a different kind of bankruptcy, and you not only have to be at the very rock bottom to do it, you also have to prove it in court. And then you're going to be stopped from doing anything involving the use of credit for SEVEN YEARS. No, it's not a good alternative to paying it off. Very, very rarely do companies "get out of" paying things like this, and when they do it's because the company has been completely destroyed.

Well,
I understand that is probably the way it is supposed to work but the scenario doesn't play out that way.

The asbestos manufactureres did get out of it that way, I believe by selling off company assest they were able to claim that they were not actually the same company that did it.
Clark Oil , which I don't know how they are doing it, but they are declaring bankruptcy to avoid cleaning up all the oil tanks they own.
Mining companies , usualy declare themselves insolvent to avoid all sorts of issues.

So perhaps there would be a way to have a pay as you pollute system. Which while whacked out would allow for the compensation to be paid upfront.

ShaneK: I do not do this just to yank your chain but because big private companies do get away with poluution all the time, so I feel that a blended suysytem where you have to buy your pollution credits up front might work. Of course I don't understand why boards and CEO have limited liability for what thier companies do either.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


They can't "just" do that. The type of bankruptcy you describe does NOT get them out of paying anyone.


Can.

Has.

Does.

Which part of Faerie do you live in, anyhow?

[fishbob]

No, no, no! That's a crime! Again, there's a difference between criminal and civil proceedings! So polluting is not a crime, but civil proceedings can award damages against polluters for doing something that is not illegal? Huh?

[shanek]

Originally posted by Dancing David
The asbestos manufactureres did get out of it that way,

Well, that's a bad example, since that was nothing but a political fiasco anyway. Asbestos is only harmful in a manufacturing environment, and they stopped doing that in the 60s when that was discovered. Asbestos in the walls doesn't hurt anyone...until you go and remove it, that is.

Some people even think that if they hadn't stripped out the COMPLETELY HARMLESS asbestos from the World Trade towers they'd still be standing today.

So perhaps there would be a way to have a pay as you pollute system.

Sure. Pollution credits you could purchase whenever you needed to mess something up, to be refunded upon cleanup. Works for me.

I do not do this just to yank your chain but because big private companies do get away with poluution all the time,

Under the current system, sure. I think it's obvious that the system I'm proposing is far, far removed from what it is today.

[shanek]

Originally posted by fishbob
So polluting is not a crime, but civil proceedings can award damages against polluters for doing something that is not illegal? Huh?

Yes. That happens all the time.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


Well, that's a bad example, since that was nothing but a political fiasco anyway. Asbestos is only harmful in a manufacturing environment, and they stopped doing that in the 60s when that was discovered. Asbestos in the walls doesn't hurt anyone...until you go and remove it, that is.

Well, at least you get some things right... Or close. Manufacturing and installation were both dangerous, as is "remediation", but it is a rare installation where the fibre level in the air can get even close to dangerous in normal installations.

Some people even think that if they hadn't stripped out the COMPLETELY HARMLESS asbestos from the World Trade towers they'd still be standing today.

Unlikely given the heat, but arguable.


None the less, you can't escape the fact that many manufacturers have easily, trivially used bankruptcy of subentities in order to completely shirk all responsibility for pollution.

Now, since the information you claim I haven't given you is obviously on the first page of the thread in question, I have not lied, and I once again demand your retraction for your illicit accusation.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


Well, that's a bad example, since that was nothing but a political fiasco anyway. Asbestos is only harmful in a manufacturing environment, and they stopped doing that in the 60s when that was discovered. Asbestos in the walls doesn't hurt anyone...until you go and remove it, that is.

Some people even think that if they hadn't stripped out the COMPLETELY HARMLESS asbestos from the World Trade towers they'd still be standing today.



Sure. Pollution credits you could purchase whenever you needed to mess something up, to be refunded upon cleanup. Works for me.



Under the current system, sure. I think it's obvious that the system I'm proposing is far, far removed from what it is today.

Not true. Asbestos was routinely sprayed on ceilings as a sound deadener and insulator for many years. In schools, kids would throw things at it as a minor act of vandalism, so that it would break down.

Much asbestos was used as a building product which is safe until moved, but that is by no means the only use it had. It is/was also very popular as a break pad.

[jj]

Originally posted by a_unique_person


Not true. Asbestos was routinely sprayed on ceilings as a sound deadener and insulator for many years. In schools, kids would throw things at it as a minor act of vandalism, so that it would break down.

Much asbestos was used as a building product which is safe until moved, but that is by no means the only use it had. It is/was also very popular as a break pad.

Um, even when it "broke down", the actual fibre count not very high in most cases, and when it was high, then we have to consider the kind of fibre.

Don't forget that it's also only one class of asbestos fibres that are even moderately dangerous.

Now, I'm not saying asbestos is great, but the resulting rules are, I think, a classic example of overreaction.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
Now, since the information you claim I haven't given you is obviously on the first page of the thread in question, I have not lied, and I once again demand your retraction for your illicit accusation.

THIS is the thread in question...and here is every single one of jj's post from the first page of this thread:

They don't reply to things where they can't defend the outcome, I think.

Visibly proven wrong in any community I've ever seen. A good example would be the backyard chemical dump in a house on Mountain Avenue, in Warren, NJ, just east of Valley View Rd.

Also trivially demonstrated to be laughably false. The illegal dump on a farmer's land (of "mixed waste" for (&(*sakes) just off of Dead Swamp Road in Warren, NJ, is trival disproof.

Big surprise, since they'll polute anything else.

Now, it's interesting to see how evasive your reply is, since air and water were also mentioned, but you shrill on "conclusively" about land and only land.

How about a water table? It's part of land, but it moves.

Sorry, you're caught completely out. Since it appears you have no answer at all to the question, it would be better of you to just admit it.

Haaa hahahahahaha

I've been to both.

(Note: Some logging companies do indeed do a good job, their existance depends on it. Some, on the other hand, don't appear to give a (*(*.( )

When will you address reality instead of theory, Shanek?

Yep, it is. "Let's see, if I bury these barrels at least 30 feet down, and then sell this as a housing development, it will be at least 75 years before anything becomes a problem, and we'll be long gone, both personally and corporately.

Let's talk about how people really act. Ooops, your theory gets defenstrated the second we look at the real world. Have a nice flight.

'scuse me? He's obligated to reference and/or quote what? Nothing much I can seel.

To me "rand" is the name of a function that returns uniformly distributed random numbers between 0 and 1.

You mean "one example".

It's amazing how when the very real example, evidence now in, regarding the east coast blackout points one way, you argue it's only one instance, but when a private organization does something that's only one instance, it's glorious evidence for your side.

Go away.

Nope...no evidence at all, although there are some vague, unverifiable anecdotes.

So, who's the liar, jj?

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
Not true. Asbestos was routinely sprayed on ceilings as a sound deadener and insulator for many years. In schools, kids would throw things at it as a minor act of vandalism, so that it would break down.

But it wouldn't break down enough to be inhaled and therefore cause a problem.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


But it wouldn't break down enough to be inhaled and therefore cause a problem.

Did too, and in an old office building just near where I work, there were people who contracted mesothelioma. The stuff just broke down over time, releasing dust into the air, enough to make people ill.

[fishbob]

Asbestos exposure: maintenance workers have high potential exposures. Wallboard repairs, changing light fixtures where ceiling tiles need to be moved, plumbing repairs around insulated pipes, sweeping up broken floor tiles. Oh - these are lowly hourly workers, not capitalists. Oh - no big deal then.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek
Nope...no evidence at all, although there are some vague, unverifiable anecdotes.

So, who's the liar, jj?

Sir, you claimed that I did not tell you where the place in NJ was that was polluted by its owner.

You have directly quoted me, in the article I respond to, giving you exactly that location.

You are, therefore, shown to be again false in your accusation.

It is not surprising that you have maliciously tried to muddy the waters by implying claims and accusations that were not originally in this context.

Once again, retract.

You, yourself, have fully proven yourself a liar.

To anyone who still cares:

Shanek has claimed that I have not given him information sufficient to locate the site in Warren, NJ, where the owner did in fact pollute his own land.

In this very message, where he denies his malice, he has quoted exactly that location, directly from one of my messages. He has shown that he knows, unquestionably, exactly where the site is, contradicting his claim that he can not locate the site.

He is, therefore, shown to be completely found wanting.

[muckraker]

from shanek:

No, you didn't. You didn't give me any informaiton on where this place is, the name of it, or any information so I can verify it myself.

So go make your pathetic excuses like the woo-woos.

Tell me the NAME. Tell me the LOCATION. Tell me WHO OWNS THE LAND. Tell me the kind of pollution, the dates, etc. If you can't do that, then no one has any way of verifying the claim.

I, unlike you, am telling you EXACTLY what you'd need to give me. And yet, you refuse to. How do you expect anyone to take you seriously?

Here's a link to the New Jersey list of contaminated sites.

http://www.state.nj.us/dep/srp/kcs-nj/siteinfo.htm

The site jj mentioned is probably on there somewhere, but a quick look at any county/town will show that most of the sites are privately owned (with the contamination the result of the property owners' activities).

[Earthborn]

Originally posted by shanek
Asbestos is only harmful in a manufacturing environment, and they stopped doing that in the 60s when that was discovered.Sorry, Shanek. The harmful effects of asbestos were known long before that. Very long in fact:The Ancient Greeks named the mineral asbestos, meaning inextinguishable. The harmful biological effects were also observed by the Greeks. The Greek geographer Strabo and the Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder both mentioned a sickness of the lungs in the slaves that wove asbestos into cloth. Although they noticed this sickness in those who worked with asbestos, they were in such awe of asbestos's magical properties that they ignored this.Source (http://www.mesoinfo.com/asbestos/historyofasbestos.html) contains other examples of people observing its harmful effects before 1960.

[EvilYeti]

Originally posted by muckraker
from shanek:

Here's a link to the New Jersey list of contaminated sites.

http://www.state.nj.us/dep/srp/kcs-nj/siteinfo.htm



Christ, Shanek, you never heard of toxic waste dumps in NJ? Are you sure you're from the same planet we are?

[jj]

Originally posted by muckraker
from shanek:



Here's a link to the New Jersey list of contaminated sites.

http://www.state.nj.us/dep/srp/kcs-nj/siteinfo.htm

The site jj mentioned is probably on there somewhere, but a quick look at any county/town will show that most of the sites are privately owned (with the contamination the result of the property owners' activities).

It's interesting, isn't it, that he won't actually go do his homework and look up the information, but he'll demand I give it to him.

On the other hand, when asked to support his contentions, he dredges up things like that utterly irrelevant bit about international banking...

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
Sir, you claimed that I did not tell you where the place in NJ was that was polluted by its owner.

No, I didn't. I claimed you didn't give me the information I requested, and you didn't. A vague reference to the location does nothing to aid me in checking out the story for myself.

Once again, retract.

I will not. You are a liar, and everyone here can see it.

Here's what I said:

Tell me the NAME. Tell me the LOCATION. Tell me WHO OWNS THE LAND. Tell me the kind of pollution, the dates, etc. If you can't do that, then no one has any way of verifying the claim.

You have provided NONE of that. The city is NOT the location.

Liar.

[shanek]

Originally posted by muckraker
Here's a link to the New Jersey list of contaminated sites.

http://www.state.nj.us/dep/srp/kcs-nj/siteinfo.htm

The site jj mentioned is probably on there somewhere, but a quick look at any county/town will show that most of the sites are privately owned (with the contamination the result of the property owners' activities).

Where is this information? I didn't see anything in any of the files I looked at that stated anything about who owned the land.

[shanek]

Originally posted by EvilYeti
Christ, Shanek, you never heard of toxic waste dumps in NJ? Are you sure you're from the same planet we are?

I never said that; I want JJ to back up his claim, which he refuses to do. That's all.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
It's interesting, isn't it, that he won't actually go do his homework and look up the information, but he'll demand I give it to him.

Yes, because IT'S YOUR CLAIM!!! IT'S UP TO YOU TO BACK IT UP!!!

On the other hand, when asked to support his contentions, he dredges up things like that utterly irrelevant bit about international banking...

They aren't irrelevant, and you make yourself look like the biased, pigheaded bigot you are by denying it.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


No, I didn't. I claimed you didn't give me the information I requested, and you didn't. A vague reference to the location does nothing to aid me in checking out the story for myself.



I will not. You are a liar, and everyone here can see it.

Here's what I said:



You have provided NONE of that. The city is NOT the location.

Liar.

It is, curiously enough, also true that even had I *only give you the town's name,* a bit of digging at the NJ DEP site would have provided you with the exact LOCATION, based on what I said to you regarding the nature of the pollution. I did, however, give you the intersection, which is more than what you needed.

Your illicit, new demands for things like the "owner" are simple evasion, wherein you try to do my reputation harm by suggesting that I haven't given you something, ignoring the fact that the "owner" is utterly irrelevant to this discussion, and that only the owner's actions are relevant.

None the less, I have provided you with the exact location. Your lie here suggests that I've given you only the "town". Of course, what I've given you is "Mountain Avenue at Valley View Road in Warren NJ", which even the most simpleminded person in the universe can tell is more than the "town".

And that information, all by itself, allows you to find the site on the NJ DEP list.

Once again, your accusation is shown to be utterly preposteriously false. Your original claim was that I didn't tell you where it was. When you realized that was wrong, you modified your complaint post hoc to demand irrelevant information like the owner, the dates, etc, all of which is information completely irrelevant to the original discussion.

For instance, since the fellow did the work covertly, we do not know the dates that he buried the drums. That does not in any way lessen the knowledge of what they are and how they got there. None the less, you demand the "dates".

The polution, or some of it, is still there. You can find the site yourself, and gather any information you need from that. You have no cause to demand information from me when you get get it yourself. Furthermore, since you've also implied that I've lied outright when I've related the facts of the case to you, it is trivially obvious that had I given you dates and names, you would have simply cheated again by claiming I was telling you a falsehood BECAUSE YOU COULD NOT VERIFY THEM.

Conveniently, the same site points out that there is a host of sites where the owner polluted the land, offering not only my single counter-example but also a dozen or two more, showing that your original assertion that owners don't pollute their own land to be laughably false.

Retract. You, sir, are shown to be the liar, BY THE INFORMATION YOU SHOW IN YOUR OWN QUOTES OF WHAT I SAID.

[shanek]

Okay, here's an actual, verifiable example about how private companies are more responsible with their land than government is:

http://reason.com/8102/fe.ez.the.shtml

This is the story of "Love Canal." Hooker Chemicals & Plastics Corporation was being sued by the justice department for contaminating the site, when what happened WAS NOT THEIR FAULT. This was a toxic waste dump managed by Hooker, and they took every safety precaution to make sure that the waste was disposed of safely and was no threat to anyone. For over twenty years there was no problem with the site at all.

Then, the Niagara Falls Board of Education took over the property in 1953, for which Hooker received one dollar. The claim was made that this ruthless, evil corporation turned over the worthless property to the school board, when in fact Hooker did everything possible to dissuade them from building on the property. From the article:

As I was subsequently to learn, Hooker had evidently been so concerned that the Board know what it was getting in taking over the Canal that the company had not left to chance whether School Board officials would physically inspect the property prior to acquiring it. Instead, Hooker had escorted them to the Canal site and in their presence made eight test borings–into the protective clay cover that the company had laid over the Canal, and into the surrounding area. At two spots, directly over Hooker’s wastes, chemicals were encountered four feet below the surface. At the other spots, to the sides of the Canal proper, no chemicals showed up.

So whether or not the School Board was of a mind to inspect the Canal, Hooker had gone out of its way to make sure that they did inspect it and that they did see that chemicals lay buried in that Canal. Yet the subsequent behavior of the School Board would lead the casual observer to conclude that its members never knew the facts about the property they were acquiring.

I decided to try to talk with some of the people who sat on the Board during the key years of 1952 through 1957 and so had first-hand knowledge of the events. In the latter year, the Board was debating whether to sell portions of the Love Canal to real estate developers; Hooker officials came to the Board meetings to urge that these sales not be consummated. For this and other reasons, 1957 served as a turning point in the history of the Love Canal–the beginning of its precipitous slide into becoming a hell-pit.

There were two reasons why the School Board wanted to acquire Hooker’s Love Canal property. One was that the postwar baby boom had produced a need for construction of more schools, and virtually every available open lot of suitable size was being eyed voraciously by the Board of Ed’s Buildings and Grounds Committee for possible construction of new schools. The other was that since the area was not built up (one of Hooker’s reported criteria for the site’s suitability), land prices around this dumpsite were low, and the Board was strapped for cash. On October 16, 1952, the very same day that Hooker sent a letter to the Board of Education agreeing to donate the Canal property for the token price of $1.00, the Board itself recorded, in its minutes for that evening’s meeting, that "a communication was received from the Niagara Falls Teachers Association stating that teachers are becoming more and more uneasy because of their uncertain financial prospects. "

Looking over the School Board minutes from the early ‘50s, one notes two concerns that dominated and practically obliterated all others: construction of new buildings, and overcoming the monetary shortage. There is no indication that any long-term consequences were being thought of; the attitude seems to have been that the future could take care of itself. For example, the 99th Street School, which was built beside Love Canal, was being planned by the School Board simultaneously with the planning for another, the 66th Street School; and the Niagara Gazette reported on September 13, 1978, that high radiation had been found at that other location. It turns out that this school also may have been built upon a former dumpsite. The Board of Ed’s deed to the site (donated by the federal government) refers to the presence of radioactive substances.

The negotiations that culminated in Hooker’s transfer of the Love Canal property to the Board of Education took place over a period of several I years. The contemporary documentary record is very sparse, consisting of three perfunctory letters and the deed itself. Virtually all of the negotiations were verbal rather than written.

One thing, however, is clear: according to the School Board’s own records, the Board was already well along in its planning of the 99th Street School more than two years before Hooker deeded the Canal to the Board. And the Board meant business. It was gearing up for a string of condemnation proceedings for the Canal site and all properties abutting it. First, there’s a map, dated March 1951 and labeled "School Site Study Plan A" (Plan B was for the 66th Street School). This map not only shows the projected school being built right over the very center of the Canal itself but also shows the assessed condemnation values for the Canal property and each of the properties bordering it. Then there are two letters from the School Board’s attorney, Ralph Boniello–one dated September 4, 1952, informing the Board’s business manager, Frank Lang, that procedures were under way to purchase four lots abutting the Canal; the other dated September 19, 1952, addressed to Mr. Carmen J. Caggiano and sent registered mail, return receipt requested, informing Mr. Caggiano that since he had refused the Board’s "price offered of $10 per front foot" for the strip of 10 lots he owned along the east side of the Canal, "The purpose of this letter is to apprise you of the institution of an action in condemnation to acquire the above--escribed property for educational purposes."

One might wonder why Hooker deeded the property to the School Board for $1.00 rather than let it be condemned and seized under eminent domain. After all, condemnation would clearly have freed the company from future liability for the chemical dump, saving Hooker the trouble of spelling out such matters in the deed.

Hooker claims that it had wanted any future propertyholder there to know of the dangerous chemicals and that it had therefore agreed to donate the property, subject to the Board’s recognition that, to quote Hooker’s letter of October 16, 1952, to the Board, "in view of the nature of the property and the purposes for which it has been used, it will be necessary for us to have special provisions incorporated into the deed with respect to the use of the property and other pertinent matters." Had the land been condemned and seized, says Hooker, the company would have been unable to air its concerns to all future owners of the property. It is difficult to see any other reason for what it did.

The School Board, however, ultimately refused to accept the special provisions proposed by Hooker concerning the use of the property. Hooker wanted to require that the donated premises "be used for park purposes only, in conjunction with a school building to be constructed upon premises in proximity to" them. And it wanted the Board to agree that, should the property ever cease serving as a park, title to it would revert to Hooker. Instead of these restrictions, which the Board rejected, the company had to settle for the liability provisions and warnings in the last paragraph of the deed hammered out in meetings between Hooker and Board representatives.

On April 28, 1953, Hooker’s secretary and general counsel, Ansley Wilcox–the same man who later, as the company’s vice-president and general counsel, was to be the author of the letter read out at the meeting of the Board of Ed on November 21, 1957–submitted to the Board the final draft of the deed. Nine days later, the Board’s attorney, Mr. Boniello, wrote to the Board that, because of the provisions contained in the deed’s closing paragraph, "In the event that the Board shall accept this deed, it is my opinion that there is placed upon the Board the risk and possible liability to persons and/or property injured or damaged as a result thereof arising out of the presence and existence of the waste products and chemicals upon the said lands referred to in the said deed. " In short, the Board’s own attorney at the time was emphasizing to his client that if it were to accept the Canal it would be getting as part of the package liability for personal and property damage, as ultimately happened to homeowners in the area surrounding the Love Canal.

Nonetheless, on May 7, 1953, the Board voted unanimously to accept the deed. Similarly, the Board had voted unanimously to accept the deed to the site of the 66th Street School; that deed’s reference to radioactivity at the site served as no deterrent either. Both sites, incidentally, had already, on December 30, 1952, been approved by the Niagara Falls Planning Board.

In August 1953, before construction work had begun on the school, the Board voted (unanimously) to remove 4,000 cubic yards of "fill from the Love Canal to complete the top grading" at another school, on 93rd Street, whose construction was already well under way. This school, like the one on 99th Street nearby, is now closed down because of public concerns about the school children’s exposure to chemical waste residues.

[cutting a bit to try and make a long story short; you can read the whole thing at the link]

Hooker sent its attorney, Arthur Chambers, to attend the meeting of the Board on November 7. As reported in the Niagara Gazette the next day, Chambers admonished the Board of Education that it had "a certain moral responsibility in the disposition of the land. "After reminding the Board that chemicals were buried under the surface, he explained that this "made the land unsuitable for construction in which basements, water lines, sewers and such underground facilities would be necessary." He referred to "negotiations at the time the land was deeded to the board," in which Hooker had urged that it be used only for surface constructions or parks. According to the Board minutes from that evening, Mr. Chambers conceded "that his company could not prevent the Board from selling the land or from doing anything they wanted to with it," but he made clear Hooker’s "intent that this property be used for a school and for parking. He further stated that they feel the property should not be divided for the purpose of building homes and hoped that no one will be injured. "

The head of the Buildings and Grounds Committee, Wesley Kester, was furious. According to the article in the Niagara Gazette, he spluttered, "The land is a liability to us. There’s something fishy someplace. Now they tell us it shouldn’t be used." The battle lines were now clearly drawn.

Hooker was determined to prevent, if it could, the selling of this land to subdividers. The showdown came at the Board meeting of November 21. Arthur Chambers again made his appearance, this time reinforced with a lengthy letter from the company’s vice-president, Ansley Wilcox, in which the Board was reminded in no uncertain terms of the details of the mostly verbal negotiations and unwritten promises that had preceded the transfer of this property to the Board more than four years earlier. In addition, Hooker’s position on the proposed sale was again stated. According to the Board minutes, "They feel very strongly that subsoil conditions make any excavation undesirable and possibly hazardous." As the Niagara Gazette quoted him the next day, Chambers told the Board, "There are dangerous chemicals buried there in drums, in loose form, in solids and liquids." The Buffalo Courier-Express, too, referred to Chambers’s speech about this "chemical-laden ground."

Anyway, long story short, they built anyway, the chemicals—for the first time in twenty years—started to leak and cause problems, and Hooker got the blame even though they did everything possible to make the site safe and dissuade the Board from building on the property.

Note the following point:

(Of course, even without a statute on the books, Hooker would be liable, subject to the relevant statute of limitations, for damage to third parties due to negligence, were its practices in fact negligent. But it would be hard for such a claim to get very far if Hooker’s practices decades ago met and exceeded regulations, generally regarded as stringent, effected only in 1980.)

There you have it. Once again, I have provided DIRECT VERIFIABLE EVIDENCE, with more than enough information for anyone to check out for themselves. I'm sure people like jj would love to ignore the facts and show how this is an example of big, evil corporations polluting the environment, but the fact remains that the government made a problem out of a chemical site that would not have caused anyone any problem had they just left it alone., and the government tried to shift the blame to Hooker, who did everything they could to prevent it...and this is the exact same entity you people want in charge of preventing pollution!

[shanek]

[QUOYour illicit, new demands for things like the "owner" are simple evasion,[/b][/quote]

No, it isn't, as who owns the land is crucial to my point. It's NOT irrelevant.

And NONE of your posts answered ANY of my direct questions to you. None of your rambling can change that, or cover up your blatant dishonesty.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek
[QUOYour illicit, new demands for things like the "owner" are simple evasion,

No, it isn't, as who owns the land is crucial to my point. It's NOT irrelevant.
[/B]
It is completely, absolutely irrelevant. The ONLY thing you need is a credible statement that the owner, WHOEVER THAT WAS, did the polluting.

And you've got that on the NJ DEP site over and over and over and over and over again, not only on the site I know about, but on a great bloodly lot of them.

And NONE of your posts answered ANY of my direct questions to you. None of your rambling can change that, or cover up your blatant dishonesty. [/QUOTE]

I told you how to find the place. You QUOTED the place I did that. That is a DIRECT bit of information. I have INDEED DECLINED TO REPEAT IT, because your demand is illicit in and of itself BECAUSE YOU HAVE ALREADY BEEN TOLD.

Were you to show some evidence of a "human interface", or perhaps the ability to honestly and politely discuss something, rather than your repeated name-callings, insults, and the like, perhaps I might have been motivated to HELP YOU OUT BY RESTATING WHAT I SAID, OR MAYBE EVEN GIVING YOU THE WEB SITE, but you do not act like a nice person, your human interface is despicable, rude, and offensive, and your demands unreasonable, unnecessary, and deceptive.

So, if you want to retract your accusation completely, learn how to show manners and civil behavior, and treat people who disagree with you, at least initially, decently, perhaps there's hope for you. (Note, I say "initially", because at some point one does need to respond to trollery, for instance like yours...)

If you can't do all of the above, you are going to be one unhappy puppy for a long, long time.

Don't take it out on me by calling me a liar. That won't increase your happiness a teeny-tiny bit.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek
Your illicit, new demands for things like the "owner" are simple evasion.

No, it isn't, as who owns the land is crucial to my point. It's NOT irrelevant.

It is completely, absolutely irrelevant. The ONLY thing you need is a credible statement that the owner, WHOEVER THAT WAS, did the polluting.

And you've got that on the NJ DEP site over and over and over and over and over again, not only on the site I know about, but on a great bloody lot of them.

And NONE of your posts answered ANY of my direct questions to you. None of your rambling can change that, or cover up your blatant dishonesty.

I told you how to find the place. You QUOTED the place I did that. That is a DIRECT bit of information. I have INDEED DECLINED TO REPEAT IT, because your demand is illicit in and of itself BECAUSE YOU HAVE ALREADY BEEN TOLD.

Were you to show some evidence of a "human interface", or perhaps the ability to honestly and politely discuss something, rather than your repeated name-callings, insults, and the like, perhaps I might have been motivated to HELP YOU OUT BY RESTATING WHAT I SAID, OR MAYBE EVEN GIVING YOU THE WEB SITE, but you do not act like a nice person, your human interface is despicable, rude, and offensive, and your demands unreasonable, unnecessary, and deceptive.

So, if you want to retract your accusation completely, learn how to show manners and civil behavior, and treat people who disagree with you, at least initially, decently, perhaps there's hope for you. (Note, I say "initially", because at some point one does need to respond to trollery, for instance like yours...)

If you can't do all of the above, you are going to be one unhappy puppy for a long, long time.

Don't take it out on me by calling me a liar. That won't increase your happiness a teeny-tiny bit.

[EvilYeti]

Originally posted by shanek


I never said that; I want JJ to back up his claim, which he refuses to do. That's all.

You think all the toxic waste dumps in NJ are on public land? I used to live in NJ and believe me, that is not the case.

The Bell Labs campus, in Murray Hill, NJ, where JJ and I both worked at one time has toxic waste on site. If I remember correctly Lucent wouldnt be able to sell the property without a huge cleanup effort first.

JJ has provided ample evidence to verify the claim. You choose not accept it as it contradicts your religious beliefs. Your circular demands (whats next, you'll want the ownders mothers maiden name?) are tacit admission of this.

J.C. on a popsicle stick man, you live in the south, are you telling me you've never seen a house with a broken washing machine in the front yard?

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek
I'm sure people like jj would love to ignore the facts and show how this is an example of big, evil corporations polluting the environment, but the fact remains that the government made a problem out of a chemical site that would not have caused anyone any problem had they just left it alone., and the government tried to shift the blame to Hooker, who did everything they could to prevent it...and this is the exact same entity you people want in charge of preventing pollution!

I have no doubt that the government often worsens things.

Why did Hooker polute ITS OWN LAND in the first place?

Once again, it's time for you to admit that you have no evidence, and that you've been cited enough information for you to trivially determine that your claim that 'owners don't polute their own land' is demonstrably false.

It's time for you to admit that you are wrong, and that the people you wrong in your diatribes have completely, utterly destroyed every element of your unsupported assertions.

It's also time to admit that I'm not a liar, and that you had the information all along, and that furthermore you knew that to be the case.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
It is completely, absolutely irrelevant. The ONLY thing you need is a credible statement that the owner, WHOEVER THAT WAS, did the polluting.

Which necessitates determining if the polluter of the property and the owner of the property are one and the same. To do that, you need to know who the owner is. Duh!

And you've got that on the NJ DEP site over and over and over and over and over again, not only on the site I know about, but on a great bloodly lot of them.

I looked around that site, but I still couldn't find any information as to the actual owners of the individual sites.

Were you to show some evidence of a "human interface", or perhaps the ability to honestly and politely discuss something, rather than your repeated name-callings, insults, and the like, perhaps I might have been motivated to HELP YOU OUT BY RESTATING WHAT I SAID, OR MAYBE EVEN GIVING YOU THE WEB SITE, but you do not act like a nice person, your human interface is despicable, rude, and offensive, and your demands unreasonable, unnecessary, and deceptive.

Pathetic excuse for not doing the minimum that you should have done to begin with.

Don't take it out on me by calling me a liar.

I'm not. You did that yourself when you LIED.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
Why did Hooker polute ITS OWN LAND in the first place?

They didn't. They disposed of the waste properly, on land specifically purchased for that purpose. It was properly contained, and actually exceeded environmental standards that would not even exist for another fifty years.

Once again, it's time for you to admit that you have no evidence,

:rolleyes:

You're still a liar, and compounding your lie day by day.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


They didn't. They disposed of the waste properly, on land specifically purchased for that purpose. It was properly contained, and actually exceeded environmental standards that would not even exist for another fifty years.


Oh, I see, the fact the government REGULATED it makes it all ok?

What a curious coment for you to make.


:rolleyes:

You're still a liar, and compounding your lie day by day.

You have yet to show a single lie on my part, and have made one yourself every time you repeat your claim.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


Which necessitates determining if the polluter of the property and the owner of the property are one and the same. To do that, you need to know who the owner is. Duh!


An obvious, mistake on your part, sir. You need to read the site quite a bit more carefully, and dig deeper.


I looked around that site, but I still couldn't find any information as to the actual owners of the individual sites.


And you don't need to know who any owner is. We've been over this before. What's more, you CAN distinguish the owner of at least one site, but you seem to have decided to evade that as well.


Pathetic excuse for not doing the minimum that you should have done to begin with.


You're making the extraordinary claim that people don't pollute their own land. You provide the extraordinary proof. All I have to do, which I have done, is point out that there are a host of counterexamples.

I owe you nothing. You're making the extraordinary claim. YOU provide the extraordinary proof.

All I need to do, to counter your absurd example of your claim that people don't pollute their own land, is to show one example. Despite your evasions, I have.

What's more, now you've stipulated that Hooker polluted its own land, with government permission and regulation.

But you still deny that people polute their own land.

You provided your own counterexample.

Pathetic.


I'm not. You did that yourself when you LIED.

I'm tired of your bull. You, yourself, have now examined SOME of the available information (I can tell from your excuses that you didn't do a very good or complete job, and I'm not surprised at that, either), and know very well that I started this debate with the necessary evidence and all of the information that you required in order to fully have your absurd, extraordinary claim refuted.

I require your full capitulation.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
Oh, I see, the fact the government REGULATED it makes it all ok?

That isn't even CLOSE to what I said and you know it, liar!

There were NO REGULATIONS at the time, and they STILL exceeded the requirements that the EPA was to make FIFTY YEARS LATER!!!

Now, explain that to me!

You have yet to show a single lie on my part,

There's another one right above this.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
An obvious, mistake on your part, sir.

How is it a mistake? How can I determine whose property it is if I'm not given the information as to whose property it is?

And you don't need to know who any owner is.

Why not? Since my claim is that the owner of the site is the one who is damaged, that's very relevant!

I owe you nothing. You're making the extraordinary claim.

YOU MADE THE CLAIM!!! AND YOU REFUSE TO BACK IT UP!!!!

All I need to do, to counter your absurd example of your claim that people don't pollute their own land, is to show one example.

No, you don't. One example tells you bupkis!

What's more, now you've stipulated that Hooker polluted its own land,

No, they didn't, not even according to the stringent EPA requirements that were to be made FIFTY YEARS LATER! They disposed of their waste PROPERLY!!!

Retract your lies, sir!

[muckraker]

Boys, please! If you can't play nicely....

Shane, you are correct that the "contaminated sites" list I linked to doesn't give the property owners.

But it's obvious that the majority of those sites are privately owned, and not owned or operated by the government.

And I have first hand knowledge of dozens of sites on that list (I'm a hydrogeologist with an environmental consulting firm in NJ). In the majority of those cases I am familar with the responsible party (i.e. the polluter) is also the owner and operator of the site.

I posted that link for one reason- to show that businesses and industries can and do contaminate their own properties. Usually, it's not intentional, but rather the result of leaking tanks and pipes, "sloppy" operational practices, etc.; or waste disposal practices that were legal and acceptable at the time. But sometimes it is intentional, and businesses have knowingly violated laws and accepted practices.

Your points about Hooker Chemical are largely correct. Hooker was acting legally, in accordance with the accepted practices of the time, when they disposed of their chemical waste. It is also irrelevant to the point being discussed, namely that private, non-governmental entities can and do contaminate their own properties.

[jj]

Originally posted by muckraker
And I have first hand knowledge of dozens of sites on that list (I'm a hydrogeologist with an environmental consulting firm in NJ). In the majority of those cases I am familar with the responsible party (i.e. the polluter) is also the owner and operator of the site.

Watch out, I have firsthand knowledge of two of them, too, and he does nothing but call me a liar, liar, liar.

He's asked for "proof" of something I have firsthand knowledge of, AFTER I've related the first-hand knowledge.

I posted that link for one reason- to show that businesses and industries can and do contaminate their own properties. Usually, it's not intentional, but rather the result of leaking tanks and pipes, "sloppy" operational practices, etc.; or waste disposal practices that were legal and acceptable at the time. But sometimes it is intentional, and businesses have knowingly violated laws and accepted practices.

Your points about Hooker Chemical are largely correct. Hooker was acting legally, in accordance with the accepted practices of the time, when they disposed of their chemical waste. It is also irrelevant to the point being discussed, namely that private, non-governmental entities can and do contaminate their own properties.
I admit I'm having some trouble with his kook ranting about Hooker when his own quote shows that Hooker quite deliberately (notice I didn't say illegally) contaminated their own land, and yet he insists that "owners don't pollute their own land".

He's hopeless, I think, and he has a bad habitof making accusations that will come back around to bite him in the end.

[EvilYeti]

Shanek, you are not helping the Libertarian movement with your insistance that everything is such a black/white issue.

If you say that no one pollutes their own land, then you are going to look like a total kook. Almost everyone here has first hand experience with this. I'm sure some of us have even done it (ever spill oil on your driveway and just wash it away with a hose? Thats pollution).

Why don't you try and make the argument that more public land than private land is polluted per square mile? That should be a good starting point for a discussion.

As usual all you do is offer anecdotes and faith-based assertions to support your position and claim anything to the contrary doesnt exist. That makes you look like a religious zealot.

[a_unique_person]

Going back to Shanes statement that a land owner would not pullute their own land because it would lower the value of the property. In simple terms, if they make more money from creating the pollution than from not creating it, then it makes sense, in a purely economic sense, to pollute it.

[shanek]

Originally posted by muckraker
But it's obvious that the majority of those sites are privately owned, and not owned or operated by the government.

As I pointed out, those aren't the only two alternatives.

But all of this is beside the point anyway.

I posted that link for one reason- to show that businesses and industries can and do contaminate their own properties. Usually, it's not intentional,

And that goes to demonstrate my point. I never said that accidents don't happen, but it does serve to show that companies don't want to do so on purpose, which is what we've been discussing.

Your points about Hooker Chemical are largely correct. Hooker was acting legally, in accordance with the accepted practices of the time, when they disposed of their chemical waste. It is also irrelevant to the point being discussed, namely that private, non-governmental entities can and do contaminate their own properties.

It's not irrelevant...jj's response is evidence of that. He insist that this is an actual instance of a private company polluting its own land, when that isn't what happened. And it serves to show how mismanagement by a future property owner can create pollution from previously safely-stored waste.So you can't just point out private property being polluted and say it's the result of some evil corporation who cares about profits, when that just ain't so.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj

I admit I'm having some trouble with his kook ranting about Hooker when his own quote shows that Hooker quite deliberately (notice I didn't say illegally) contaminated their own land,

No, they didn't. They stored it safely, exceeding standards that wouldn't be around for fifty years. The site wasn't contaminated until the government started building on it, which Hooker did everything possible to dissuade them from doing.

JJ, these waste products have to go SOMEWHERE. You're acting like their mere existance counts as pollution; that's a very specious definition at best. As long as they're properly contained, and not leaking into the environment, then it's not pollution, by definition.

[shanek]

Originally posted by EvilYeti
Shanek, you are not helping the Libertarian movement with your insistance that everything is such a black/white issue.

I'm not saying that. I'm being shoehorned into defending it and having to continually point out that it's not as simple as that. That's why jj and others are insisting that if they just find one single example of a company polluting its own land they win, when I said long ago that if all land were privately owned pollution would be so minimal as to not be a problem, which is NOT the same as saying there would be no pollution.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
Going back to Shanes statement that a land owner would not pullute their own land because it would lower the value of the property. In simple terms, if they make more money from creating the pollution than from not creating it, then it makes sense, in a purely economic sense, to pollute it.

Again, it's not as simple as that. You're comparing a one-time savings to a long-term recurring line item.

[EvilYeti]

Originally posted by shanek

I said long ago that if all land were privately owned pollution would be so minimal as to not be a problem, which is NOT the same as saying there would be no pollution.

You made the claim, now back it up.

All U.S. acreage is spoken for as far as I know, it is either publicly or privately owned. If you could provide evidence that 90% of the polluted acreage in America was on public land you might have the beginning of a point. Until then we have nothing but your faith. Remember, this is a skeptics board, we need evidence!

Have you even adressed issues like agricultural runoff, where private land owners pollute neighboring public land? How is libertarianism going to fix that?

Put up or shut up. And stop calling everyone a liar, putz.

[shanek]

Originally posted by EvilYeti
You made the claim, now back it up.

I did, with figures from the Boston Globe and the EPA, which everyone is ignoring.

All U.S. acreage is spoken for as far as I know,

The government owns over 40% of the land assets in the US.

Remember, this is a skeptics board, we need evidence!

You are no skeptic. You have never properly addressed ANY piece of evidence I have ever given you.

$300 million in damages done by the government, and only $57 million by private companies. Even if we figure that ALL private companies pollute their own land, which is blatantly untrue, that still leaves government causing 85% of the pollution in America!

I have given ALL of this as evidence. And if you don't want to be called a liar, then just don't lie.

[EvilYeti]

Originally posted by shanek

I did, with figures from the Boston Globe and the EPA, which everyone is ignoring.


And I'm sure you misinterpreted them, again.


The government owns over 40% of the land assets in the US.


Yeah, its spoken for. As I already stated.


You are no skeptic. You have never properly addressed ANY piece of evidence I have ever given you.


$2000 to the JREF if you can provide independant evidence of your claims. You won't even acknowledge the wadger, which is at no risk to you.


$300 million in damages done by the government, and only $57 million by private companies. Even if we figure that ALL private companies pollute their own land, which is blatantly untrue, that still leaves government causing 85% of the pollution in America!


What about private citizens?

Since when is the government in the manufacturing business anyway? How can the I.R.S. produce toxic waste? Where does the damage come from?


I have given ALL of this as evidence. And if you don't want to be called a liar, then just don't lie.

I got to hand it to you Shanek, you don't lie, yet you are perfectly wrong about everything you claim. You are the most honest idiot I've ever met!

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


Again, it's not as simple as that. You're comparing a one-time savings to a long-term recurring line item.

And in the end, we are all dead. Even then, many businessmen couldn't care beyond this years accounts. A classic case was the fate of National Mutual in Australia. It made it an aim to write the most life insurance business in Australia. For one year, they achieved that. Then all the dodgy business process they used to achieve that aim blew up in their face. The end result was it went broke was sold to Axa. Don't tell me businessmen all look to the infinite future to make rational business decisions.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
And in the end, we are all dead. Even then, many businessmen couldn't care beyond this years accounts. A classic case was the fate of National Mutual in Australia. It made it an aim to write the most life insurance business in Australia. For one year, they achieved that. Then all the dodgy business process they used to achieve that aim blew up in their face. The end result was it went broke was sold to Axa. Don't tell me businessmen all look to the infinite future to make rational business decisions.

Look at the hilighted portion: you just made my point for me. If businesses don't look to the long term future, they tend to go away.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


Look at the hilighted portion: you just made my point for me. If businesses don't look to the long term future, they tend to go away.

The point was that there are businessmen who can't think beyond the next year. Anyone with a grain of sense could have seen that their business strategy would not survive. Similarly, people will pollute even if it does not make long term sense.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
The point was that there are businessmen who can't think beyond the next year.

I never said otherwise. What you failt o acknowledge is that, unlike government agents, businessmen who screw things up tend not to stay around long. Governments live to pollute and destroy another day.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


I never said otherwise. What you failt o acknowledge is that, unlike government agents, businessmen who screw things up tend not to stay around long. Governments live to pollute and destroy another day.

I was just trying to illustrate, in concrete terms, businessmen who don't think in the long term.

Either way, bad businessmen are always coming to replace the last batch. I don't recall the end of companies going broke because they are badly run.

[muckraker]

from shanek:
I never said otherwise. What you failt o acknowledge is that, unlike government agents, businessmen who screw things up tend not to stay around long. Governments live to pollute and destroy another day.

If you look at the NJ list of contaminated sites, you will see many Exxons, Shells, Mobils, Hess's, Sunocos, etc. All of these companies are still in business.

from shanek:
And that goes to demonstrate my point. I never said that accidents don't happen, but it does serve to show that companies don't want to do so on purpose, which is what we've been discussing.

Most contaminated sites (govt and privately owned) are the result of negligence, rather than any intentional, overt act to pollute.

For example, all gas stations have underground storage tanks that they use to store fuel. In the past many/most of these tanks leaked, usually as a result of corrosion of the (steel) tank. These leaks are/were a major source of ground-water contamination.

The major oil companies made little effort to correct this situation (either because they were unaware of it, or didn't care) until regulations regarding the construction and monitoring of USTs went into effect in the late 1980's. Even once the extent of the problem became known, the oil industry opposed the new rules.

[Solitaire]

Originally posted by shanek
Okay, here's an actual, verifiable example about how private
companies are more responsible with their land than government is.

Actually it's an example of how stupid american royality can be.

This is the story of "Love Canal." Hooker Chemicals & Plastics Corporation
was being sued by the justice department for contaminating the site,
when what happened WAS NOT THEIR FAULT. This was a toxic waste
dump managed by Hooker, and they took every safety precaution to
make sure that the waste was disposed of safely and was no threat to
anyone. For over twenty years there was no problem with the site at all.

It is their fault becuase of the way the deal was done.
I have no doubt the engineers did a good job with the site.
They probably designed the site to last hundreds of years
after which future technologies would be applied to deal with
the problem. In fact we have some of those technologies now.

Then, the Niagara Falls Board of Education took over the property
in 1953, for which Hooker received one dollar. The claim was made
that this ruthless, evil corporation turned over the worthless property
to the school board, when in fact Hooker did everything possible to
dissuade them from building on the property.

It's at the point where they knowing sold the property for a dollar
where they became fully liable for the future.

Hooker got the blame even though they did everything possible to
make the site safe and dissuade the Board from building on the property.

This is management thinking - it ignors reality for a contract solution.
A responsible company would've carfully opened up the site, removed the
waste to another site, and then sold the property to the school board.

I'm sure people like jj would love to ignore the facts and show how this
is an example of big, evil corporations polluting the environment, but the
fact remains that the government made a problem out of a chemical site
that would not have caused anyone any problem had they just left it alone.

All you've proven is that Hooker's management did a back room deal
to unload a future liability with people they knew would not use the
site as agreed upon.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek

(says to Yeti)
You are no skeptic. You have never properly addressed ANY piece of evidence I have ever given you.


This is what Shanek requires of people who argue with him. None the less, I've given him firsthand knowledge of one site, and he's refused to accept it. I've given him the necessary location for him to dig for more information, and he's refused to use it.

So, the rules with Shanek are simple. He gets to say whatever he wants, and we're not allowed to question it. When we say something, not only do we have to "prove" it, whether it's an assertion of known facts or a pure opinion, and then he's not obligated to examine external proof even if offered, and is instead permitted to make serious ethical accusations such as "liar" simply because he is unable or unwilling to follow up on information he has in hand. He is, also, allowed to complain he doesn't have enough information, even when he can gather it by himself.

Interesting rules for someone who claims about someone else: "You are no skeptic".

[Solitaire]

Here's The Monsanto Case. (http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/11/07/60minutes/main528581.shtml) Pretty standard corporate behavior.

By the way, corporations decide what rights you have. (http://writ.news.findlaw.com/commentary/20030814_jackson.html)

[shanek]

Originally posted by Synchronicity
It is their fault becuase of the way the deal was done.

Why? They made the deal for $1 so they could make sure they were aware of the problems with building on the site. If they hadn't, the government would have just claimed eminent domain and siezed it anyway. What were they supposed to have done?

[shanek]

Originally posted by Synchronicity
Here's The Monsanto Case. (http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/11/07/60minutes/main528581.shtml) Pretty standard corporate behavior.

By the way, corporations decide what rights you have. (http://writ.news.findlaw.com/commentary/20030814_jackson.html)

They have this power only because government allows it. If the government were protecting our rights like it's supposed to, they wouldn't be able to do this. THIS is what happens when you get big government! There's just no way to give the government power without it being used and exploited by the politically-connected.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


They have this power only because government allows it. If the government were protecting our rights like it's supposed to, they wouldn't be able to do this. THIS is what happens when you get big government! There's just no way to give the government power without it being used and exploited by the politically-connected.

And the obvious, visible REASON that the government allows it is because the businesses pay the politicians in the form of campaign funds. It's the ultimate outcome of unbridled capitalism, it's the outcome of what you so dearly wish for, in short, it shows the collapse state of unbridled (as opposed to reasoned) capitalism, just like North Korea shows the collapse state of communism.

Yes, unbridled capitalism at least initially collapses better, but we have here the visible evidence of where your ideas lead.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


They have this power only because government allows it. If the government were protecting our rights like it's supposed to, they wouldn't be able to do this. THIS is what happens when you get big government! There's just no way to give the government power without it being used and exploited by the politically-connected.

So, if there was small government, who would that mean it is better at protecting our rights?

[EvilYeti]

Originally posted by jj

Yes, unbridled capitalism at least initially collapses better, but we have here the visible evidence of where your ideas lead.

Are you suggesting Shanek has proven Libertarianism as fundamently flawed and unworkable? Again?

I wonder if he has any toes left, considering how often he shoots himself in the foot.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
And the obvious, visible REASON that the government allows it is because the businesses pay the politicians in the form of campaign funds.

And ultimately why the government should be restrained from doing anything of the sort.

It's the ultimate outcome of unbridled capitalism, it's the outcome of what you so dearly wish for,

You know perfectly well that's not true! You know perfectly well I want the government constrained by the Constitution so that they won't be able to do anything like that! You KNOW this, but the only way you can even try and beat my arguments is to lie about what they are...

What was that you were saying about how honest you were?

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
So, if there was small government, who would that mean it is better at protecting our rights?

Because a) that would be its job, and b) it wouldn't be able to do anything else.

[DavidJames]

"If the government were protecting our rights like it's supposed to, they wouldn't be able to do this."

This is why it's useless to debate this guy. Read the above statement from him. From the one side of his mouth he wants to reduce government regulations. Now out of the other side he says makes the above statement.

So, let me get this straight, you want to reduce/remove government regulations because the corporations will, due to the profit motive, do the right thing. Yet, by your own admission, they are not doing the right thing and to top it off, you claim the government is at fault because they are not "protecting our rights like it's supposed to"

Business's only pollute public land
When business's pollute, it's because the government "allows it"
Hello - who polluted in the first place? Yet they have no responsibility, no fault, it's a free ride for them.

When you only have a hammer, all problems look like a nail. When you are a Libertarian, all problems are the fault of the government. No thanks, if I ever decide to worship beliefs based on illogical conclusions drawn from random and arbitrary anecdotes, I'll take Christianity over Libertarianism.

[shanek]

Originally posted by DavidJames
This is why it's useless to debate this guy. Read the above statement from him. From the one side of his mouth he wants to reduce government regulations. Now out of the other side he says makes the above statement.

This is NOT talking from the other side of my mouth! This is precisely consistent with the viewpoint I have held since my first day posting on this forum!

The government is doing too much of what it's not supposed to be doing, and not enough of what it is! And what it is supposed to be doing is protecting our rights!

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness, that to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed..."

If you actually bothered to read and understand what it is I've been saying, you wouldn't be making statements like that. It is 100% consistent, and it makes 100% sense.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


Because a) that would be its job, and b) it wouldn't be able to do anything else.

That's it's job now.
Many organisations do more than one thing now, succesfully.

[EvilYeti]

Originally posted by shanek

The government is doing too much of what it's not supposed to be doing, and not enough of what it is! And what it is supposed to be doing is protecting our rights!


But thats not what Libertarians want! They are OPPOSED to the Gummint protecting our rights!

They oppose gun control that prevent felons from obtaining weapons.

They are opposed to minimum wage and child labor laws.

They are pro-slavery.

They are against the right of every American to an education.

They support unaccountable private monopolies while condemming accountable public ones.

They oppose the Constitution, as it was originally written as well as its amendments.

The oppose federal regulation of food and drugs, which allow us the use of safe food and medicine.


"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness, that to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed..."


Unless they are black, then feel free to own as many as you like. If the get uppity just go ahead and whip 'em, we won't mind.


If you actually bothered to read and understand what it is I've been saying, you wouldn't be making statements like that. It is 100% consistent, and it makes 100% sense.

I have read your stuff and its quite entertaining, when its coherent that is.

You inverted your statistics again, make that 100% inconsistent and 100% nonsense.

[shanek]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
That's it's job now.

But it's not doing it. That's the problem!

[EvilYeti]

Originally posted by shanek


But it's not doing it. That's the problem!

How is making it 10X smaller and taking away all its regulatory power going to fix that?

You are suggesting a 100 man army armed with pitchforks is better than a 1,000 man force with automatic weapons!

[shanek]

Originally posted by EvilYeti
But thats not what Libertarians want! They are OPPOSED to the Gummint protecting our rights!

That is absolutely untrue. I challenge you to quote any official Libertarian Party document stating this.

They oppose gun control that prevent felons from obtaining weapons.

No, we oppose gun control that prevents law-abiding citizens from obtaining weapons. It's obvious by now that you can't stop felons from getting weapons. But you can let people have the means to defend themselves.

They are opposed to minimum wage and child labor laws.

Which are attacks on our freedom, as I have shown in several threads.

They are pro-slavery.

This is another one of your LIES. Again, prove it with official LP documents or SHUT UP.

They are against the right of every American to an education.

No, we aren't. The right to an education doesn't include the right of forcing someone else to pay for it.

They support unaccountable private monopolies while condemming accountable public ones.

No, we don't. In fact, there is no such thing as "unaccountable private monopolies." ALL private institutions are accountable, and there is never any such thing as a private monopoly.

They oppose the Constitution, as it was originally written as well as its amendments.

Another of your pathetic lies. Again, I challenge you to produce official LP documents stating this.

The oppose federal regulation of food and drugs, which allow us the use of safe food and medicine.

No, they don't. We oppose them because they don't work, and they hurt far more people than they help. Again, as I have provided evidence for in the past.

Unless they are black, then feel free to own as many as you like. If the get uppity just go ahead and whip 'em, we won't mind.

More of your frothing trollery.

Go away.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


And ultimately why the government should be restrained from doing anything of the sort.



So the answer is REGULATION! !?!?!?!?!?!?! :eek:

Goodness, could you be any more confused?

[jj]

Originally posted by EvilYeti


I have read your stuff and its quite entertaining, when its coherent that is.

You inverted your statistics again, make that 100% inconsistent and 100% nonsense.

Yeti, this is the person who says that regulation is bad, evil, immoral, etc, but who turns around when asked how to prevent government excesses, and his answer is REGULATION.

Whoooeeeee. I don't have that kind of chutzpah!

[EvilYeti]

Originally posted by shanek

That is absolutely untrue. I challenge you to quote any official Libertarian Party document stating this.

Everything they put out reinforces this. They want less government regulation of private industry. That means industry has MORE freedom to violate citizens rights.

No, we oppose gun control that prevents law-abiding citizens from obtaining weapons. It's obvious by now that you can't stop felons from getting weapons. But you can let people have the means to defend themselves.

No gun control means you support the right of everyone, including wanted felons, to purchase as many and as powerful as weapons as they wish. You are in favor of arming criminals.

Which are attacks on our freedom, as I have shown in several threads.

Oh yes that wicked Gummint, preventing American Industry from paying orphans a nickel a day to work in the coal mines. What unenlightened savages.

This is another one of your LIES. Again, prove it with official LP documents or SHUT UP.

There is nothing in the Constitution or the first ten amendments that prohibt slavery. No minimum wage means workers can be forced to toil without pay.
The free market loves slavery, check the history of the U.S. as a reference and Libertarians love the free market!

No, we aren't. The right to an education doesn't include the right of forcing someone else to pay for it.

How can I exercise my RIGHT to an education if I'm too poor to afford it? Its not a right if its only for the privledged is it? All the rights afforded by the constitution are USELESS if they are unenforced. And enforcement takes MONEY. MONEY comes from TAXES.

No, we don't. In fact, there is no such thing as "unaccountable private monopolies." ALL private institutions are accountable, and there is never any such thing as a private monopoly.

Who the hell are private monopolies accountable to? Do you even know what a monopoly is? There has never been a private monopoly in the history of the United States? Where did you get your history from, a comic book?

Another of your pathetic lies. Again, I challenge you to produce official LP documents stating this.

So the Libertarians support the 16th amendment? Thats good to know, I'll call you chapter and tell them you are pro-income tax.

No, they don't. We oppose them because they don't work, and they hurt far more people than they help. Again, as I have provided evidence for in the past.

Ah, more shanek trademark assertions with a mix of whatif? and special knowledge. You would really prefer patent medicince to modern medicine?

More of your frothing trollery.


More of your baseless assertions and unverifiable claims. Snore.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj
So the answer is REGULATION! !?!?!?!?!?!?! :eek:

Goodness, could you be any more confused?

How is restraining the government regulation?

And you call me confused... :rolleyes:

[shanek]

Originally posted by EvilYeti
Everything they put out reinforces this. They want less government regulation of private industry. That means industry has MORE freedom to violate citizens rights.

In other words, you can't produce any literature from the LP saying that government shouldn't protect our rights.

No gun control means you support the right of everyone, including wanted felons, to purchase as many and as powerful as weapons as they wish. You are in favor of arming criminals.

Criminals are going to arm themselves anyway. Why do you want to take away the right of people to defend themselves against criminals?

Oh yes that wicked Gummint, preventing American Industry from paying orphans a nickel a day to work in the coal mines. What unenlightened savages.

More Socialist whining. You probably believe everything in The Jungle, too.

There is nothing in the Constitution or the first ten amendments that prohibt slavery.

HUH?????

Amendment 13:

Section. 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section. 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

No minimum wage means workers can be forced to toil without pay.

No, they can't. Why would they work without pay? Why wouldn't they just quit and go somewhere else?

The free market loves slavery,

No, it doesn't. Government had to enforce slavery. The free market was largely what freed them, by producing the technology to make them obsolete.

How can I exercise my RIGHT to an education if I'm too poor to afford it?

You can get a scholarship; you can get a sponsor; there are several ways you can get pay for your education without having to force everyone to pay for a failed government system that graduates people who can't read.

Who the hell are private monopolies accountable to?

There are no such things as private monopolies. And all private companies are accountable to their customers.

Do you even know what a monopoly is?

Yes. You, apparently, don't. A monopoly is something like your local phone company, which in most areas has an exclusive mandate from the government to provide the service. A competitor couldn't show up if they want.

You can't have monopolies in the free market, because the free market doesn't have any way of restricting new competitors from entering the market. The most you can have in a free market is an oligopoly, which is what most people mislabel as a monopoly when they go on whining about the free market like you do.

So the Libertarians support the 16th amendment?

How is opposing one amendment opposing the Constitution? How is recognizing that the Constitution has problems that needed addressing opposing the Constitution?

You would really prefer patent medicince to modern medicine?

False dichotomy. Fallacy of excluded middle.

So, you can't support ANY of the things you say about Libertarianism, and yet you know so well what Libertarianism stands for. Sounds like trolling to me...

[Solitaire]

Originally posted by shanek
Why?
They made the deal for $1 so they could make sure they were
aware of the problems with building on the site. If they hadn't,
the government would have just claimed eminent domain and
siezed it anyway. What were they supposed to have done?

They have primary responsibilty for the waste buried in that land
and cannot take actions that will result in a release of the chemicals
that includes this sale of the surface rights of the land to a third party
that annouced very loudly that they had intentions to dig the place up.

A responsible company recognizing the situation does have two choices.
First they can go to court and explain to the judge that if he condems the
land and they build there then great harm will occure to the community.
A good layer ought to be able to do this simple task. Second choice, they
could have explained to the school board that the chemical storage exists
on the sight and that if they want to build there, the school board must pay
for the removal of the chemicals and their proper burial at another site.
They decided to do the stupid thing instead.

The idea of selling someone a surface area and not the land underneath
is a concept riddled with disasters. A good example of this problem might
be the sale of the surface land out west to a group of ranchers meanwhile
the BLM kept the mineral rights. What happened? The extractive industry
entered the land and polluted it. If the government had sold the mineral
rights to the ranchers, they would have at least some control over the
problem and made far more money to boot. I wont go into the protected
wetland sillyness.

[shanek]

Originally posted by Synchronicity

They have primary responsibilty for the waste buried in that land
and cannot take actions that will result in a release of the chemicals
that includes this sale of the surface rights of the land to a third party
that annouced very loudly that they had intentions to dig the place up.

And what were they supposed to do? If they hadn't sold it, they would have lost it anyway to eminent domain, and not have been able to place any conditions in the sale against building on the property.

Second choice, they could have explained to the school board that the chemical storage exists on the sight and that if they want to build there, the school board must pay for the removal of the chemicals and their proper burial at another site.

Uh, this is exactly what they did!

[Solitaire]

Originally posted by shanek
And what were they supposed to do? If they hadn't sold it,
they would have lost it anyway to eminent domain, and not
have been able to place any conditions in the sale against
building on the property.

Go before the judge who has the power to condemn
and transfer the property and explain the problem to him.

Uh, this is exactly what they did!

But with the condition that if the school board did not pay for
the removal before the sale, they would not sell the property
for one dollar and instead go to court.

Okay? :)

[shanek]

Originally posted by Synchronicity
Go before the judge who has the power to condemn and transfer the property and explain the problem to him.

But with the condition that if the school board did not pay for the removal before the sale, they would not sell the property for one dollar and instead go to court.

Okay? :)

And how would the outcome have been any different in either of these cases? They were GOING to build on the land, and Hooker most certainly let them know about the dangers and did everything they could to prevent them building on it!

How can you possibly lay the blame for this on Hooker and still have any semblance of rationality left?

[Solitaire]

Originally posted by shanek
And how would the outcome have been any different in either of these
cases? They were GOING to build on the land, and Hooker most certainly
let them know about the dangers and did everything they could to prevent
them building on it! How can you possibly lay the blame for this on Hooker
and still have any semblance of rationality left?

Who has the responsibilty for the chemicals both in storage at the site
and ultimately their disposal (as in rendering them inert to living creatures)?
I'd say Hooker has full responsibilty.

Suppose for a minute that a crazy person broke into the lot with a backhoe
thinking there's gold buried on the land and starts digging up the place, who
then is responsible? No Hooker, but the crazy person bears the full cost of
cleaning up the place.

Suppose Hooker learns of the crazy person's plans, visits him, informs
him about the danger, and then a dollar sells him the rights to drive
the backhoe around on the land all he wants - no digging. He then goes
ahead with his plans anyway and digs up the place despite their wishes
- who is responsible? They both are. Is it safe yet for me to assume you
don't understand the nature of the joint liability?

[shanek]

Originally posted by Synchronicity
Who has the responsibilty for the chemicals both in storage at the site and ultimately their disposal (as in rendering them inert to living creatures)? I'd say Hooker has full responsibilty.

If they sell the land to someone else, that someone else assumes full responsibility assuming they were fully notified of the land's condition, which they were.

And you're AGAIN ignoring the fact that they only sold the land for $1 after learning that the government was going to declare eminent domain and take the land anyway.

By ANY measure, Hooker did EVERYTHING they could. All you're doing is hand-waving and making excuses.

[Solitaire]

Originally posted by shanek
If they sell the land to someone else, that someone else assumes full
responsibility assuming they were fully notified of the land's condition,
which they were.

If the waste does not stay with the party that made it then only one
outcome will result each time. Sooner or later the land will pass into
ownership that through ignorance or fraud will release the chemicals.
It is not in the best interest of society to permit these kinds of sales.

And you're AGAIN ignoring the fact that they only sold the land for
$1 after learning that the government was going to declare eminent
domain and take the land anyway.

Let's assume for the moment that I do not know what is meant
by eminent domain. Could you explain this governmental process?

By ANY measure, Hooker did EVERYTHING they could.
All you're doing is hand-waving and making excuses.

I have strong doubts....

[shanek]

Originally posted by Synchronicity
Let's assume for the moment that I do not know what is meant by eminent domain. Could you explain this governmental process?

Basically, the government can sieze any land they want at any time through eminent domain.

Theoretically, they have to properly appraise the land, notify you of their intent, provide compensation in the form of the fair market value of the land, and provide relocation assistance.

In reality, they condemn the land so that the "fair market value" will be dirt cheap. There's also no way to hold onto your land if you don't want to. They will give you a jury trial if you insist, but all the jury will do is decide what amount is proper compensation; they can't actually stop the government from taking the land.

It's a particularly egregious form of tyranny and completely antithetical to the very idea of property rights. And it happens all the time.

[jj]

Government exists.
Shanek needs the last word, too.
Thus, I say nothing.

[Solitaire]

Originally posted by shanek
In reality, they condemn the land so that the "fair market value"
will be dirt cheap. There's also no way to hold onto your land if you
don't want to. They will give you a jury trial if you insist, but all the
jury will do is decide what amount is proper compensation; they
can't actually stop the government from taking the land.

Clearly, this aspect of government must change to add a court
appeals process that goes, even as far, to the supreme court,

Even so, Hooker must be held liable in part for the actions on those lands.
I've thought long and hard about this and concluded that they had access
beyond what the average person has. I'm puzzled why they didn't involve
others in the process, such as contacting other state and local officials.
Surely the school board responds to pressure from higher up.

I realize now that you cannot allow the companies to merely write a legal
clause and then let them off the hook if someone else ignors that clause.
In essense, the company has lasting property right to the waste store on
the land and the obligation to protect this property as long as it remains
hazardous. Without such a right, the possibility of release increases greatly
with time.

[Gem]

You can't have monopolies in the free market

I'll have to disagree. Ever heard of trusts in the 19th century, Shanek? A business wants to be a monopoly, and they will try to become one. Standard Oil, for example.

Gem

[shanek]

Originally posted by Gem
I'll have to disagree. Ever heard of trusts in the 19th century, Shanek? A business wants to be a monopoly, and they will try to become one. Standard Oil, for example.

How many times do I have to point this out?

STANDARD...OIL...WAS...NOT...A...MONOPOLY! It was an oligopoly. There was nothing stopping competitors from emerging. Because of this. the way Rockefeller kept his dominance in the market was to act as if the competition were there, and accordingly price the goods and pay the workers at a competitive level. If he had started gouging prices, and/or paying the workers less than what they were worth, a competitor could have easily emerged to take his business. So they didn't have any of the problems people say arise from free market "monopolies."

They always ignore this, and they always ignore Rockefeller's extensive and bountiful charity work.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by shanek


How many times do I have to point this out?

STANDARD...OIL...WAS...NOT...A...MONOPOLY! It was an oligopoly. There was nothing stopping competitors from emerging. Because of this. the way Rockefeller kept his dominance in the market was to act as if the competition were there, and accordingly price the goods and pay the workers at a competitive level. If he had started gouging prices, and/or paying the workers less than what they were worth, a competitor could have easily emerged to take his business. So they didn't have any of the problems people say arise from free market "monopolies."

They always ignore this, and they always ignore Rockefeller's extensive and bountiful charity work.

The Mafia like to get public approval too, and give to charity.

When you are the dominant force in a market, you can screw the competitors by manipulating the market enough to let them stay in business, but not threaten your dominance. It is something that companies aspire to today. Market dominance. Once you dominate, you dictate the terms of the market and competition.

[jj]

Originally posted by a_unique_person


The Mafia like to get public approval too, and give to charity.

When you are the dominant force in a market, you can screw the competitors by manipulating the market enough to let them stay in business, but not threaten your dominance. It is something that companies aspire to today. Market dominance. Once you dominate, you dictate the terms of the market and competition.

And, of course, the cost of moving stuff via rail had nothing to do with the problems around Standard Oil, too.

Shanek, your history is almost obscenely selective.

[shanek]

Originally posted by jj


And, of course, the cost of moving stuff via rail had nothing to do with the problems around Standard Oil, too.

Shanek, your history is almost obscenely selective.

I could say the same about you. The rails were heavily regulated. It was a cartel, managed by the government.

[jj]

Originally posted by shanek


I could say the same about you. The rails were heavily regulated. It was a cartel, managed by the government.


*cough* Um, you left something out.

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by jj



*cough* Um, you left something out.

I'm all ears.