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Originally Posted by BigV
A computer programmer, eh? That would explain a lot about your affinity for defined labels and your inability to embrace the mixed, indefinite, changeable, contradictory reality of people and their interactions, including elections, in the real world. Thanks for that bit of background.
No, I'm not a computer programmer, professionally. I do it for a hobby.
I like the changeable and the freedom to make changes, whether they be contradictory one's or not. What I don't like is when someone calls a chicken, a dog, or a pig, a horse. Like calling the attack on our consulate in Benghazi, a result of a demonstration against a film, when they had a real time feed from a recon drone, AND emails from the consulate, during the 5 hour attack, telling them exactly what was going on.
That's not a labeling problem - that's lying, and when it involves our Ambassador being killed and dragged through the streets, it's NOT a little inconsequential thing, damnit!
As for freedom, let me ask you, what about when two parties are in conflict, when their freedoms come at the expense of the other's. Imagine a situation where a manufacturing plant wants the freedom to discharge waste into a river (your introduction of the EPA made me think of this). They wish to be able to be free to do so. Imagine an individual downstream that wants to drink from or bathe in the water of the river. Without government inhibiting the freedoms of either, what happens?
Let me pose another one, since I know you have a strong preference for things that are favorable to business. Imagine that a manufacturer produces a widget. Now imagine another manufacturer sees what a great doodad that is, and starts producing the same widget with a different deelybob on top. Should the second manufacturer be free to do so?
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There are certain (and needed) protections from others making duplicate widgets, of your design. Those protections are limited however.
Think of cars - aren't they a very similar widget with a few deelybobs on top? Yes, but the basic design of a car is not patented. And I think we agree that we all benefit from the competition for our car buying business.
In a free market, if the widget was not protected by patent, trademark, copyright, etc., a company would be free to compete for the widget market. Note that unfair labor practices, might stop a company from being allowed to compete (child labor, forced labor, sweatshop labor, etc.).