buzz_knox: you are explaining your stance in such a fashion that it sounds ridiculous. The tragedy of the commons is a well-known economic phenomenon that is demonstrably true.
NO, the "tragedy of the commons" (which if you read the article you link to was written by someone who was WRONG about how village commons were managed, so even its namesake CASE is false!) is another tired "cry fire in a theater" argument for taking liberty away from individuals and giving it to government for "your own good" because those saints that go into politics are incorruptible and no so much better than you waht is good for you. Who ever OWNED the "commons" should have CHARGED for grazing (user's fees) and LIMITED patronage (wise use, common sense). The mere fact that there WAS a free commons (and the tragedy thereof) is an example of the very socialism you are trying to use the "tragedy of the commons" to argue for. I'll explain. The "Village" (governent) has NO BUSINESS "owning" the "commons" - it should be private property! If it is, the OWNER either wisely manages it, or suffers the economic loss of mismanagement. The so-called "tragedy of the commons" is not a "community resource over-exploited" (marxism thinking), but rather a case of the taxpayers shortsightedly voting themselves unsustainable largess at the expense of everyone else, possible due to the governemntal intrusion into arreas of life it has no business - (see Social Security, crop subsidies, "corporate welfare", PBS, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the National Debt.)
Government regulation of common resources is the usual response, and is generally seen as an acceptable one. Naturally, said government regulation can (and often does) over-regulate, but that does not mean all government regulation is invalid.
Slavery and the flat earth theory used to be "acceptable" - in some parts of the world, slavery and female genital mutilation still are - doesn't make them right. If OUR government goes beyond taxing imports and exports, coining real (not fiat) money, guarding the borders, raising such military as is needed, foriegn policy, and delivering the mail, then such regulation is indeed EXCESSIVE and INVALID - the sooner we can get 51% of the vox populi to get their noses out of the trough and recognize that, the sooner we get back to paradise on earth, 9or at least as close as we have ever come...)
For example, by your logic, if someone - I'll use Bill Gates as an example, since he's probably got the funding to really start pulling something like this off - trotted down into Las Vegas, and bought all potable water, the citizens would just have to move or die of dehydration. Any government regulation to prevent a private citizen from owning all of the readily-available potable water is clearly socialism, and tramples upon your rights. Or, in this case, Bill Gates'.
Assuming the citizens of Las Vegas own their municiple water supply, they would have been incredibly stupid to have done so, in which case they deserve to move. Otherwise, I don't see any elected representative signing off on such a deal - and if he did, he would immediately be impeached/recalled, and any such acts rescinded. See, I just saved Las Vegas WITHOUT the need for any statist/socialist intervention!
Similarly, if the Chinese government were to fund an American citizen in purchasing every imported barrel of oil, our government should simply sit back and watch it happen. Anything else is socialism.
Another nonsense case - you really think that ALL the oil companies, who have to answer not only to their board of directors, shareholders, their retailers and distributers, ("I'm a GAS STATION - do you expect my customers to push their cars in here so I can check the oil?!?!") and (by the way) their CUSTOMERS to aquiesce to this? Not to mention that if China wanted to do that, they could simply buy up all the oil at the source - EXCEPT that any attempt to do so in a half-way free market would just result in prices rising until biomass, nukes, oil shale, etc replace imported oil anyway, Sorry, no sale - where did you go to school, and who filled your skull with all this Keynsian mush?
If you accept that there should be a mechanism in place for addressing those situations - as matters of national security, if nothing else
I do not. Laissez-faire uber allus.
Arguing that government should regulate nothing at all is significantly more difficult.
No it isn't - its easy! I ask what part of the U.S. Constitution delegates the federal government the power to regulate ANYTHING (you know, like the Volmstedt ammmendmant granted the authority to regulate alcohol- since repealed), and then you don't answer.
