I don't agree. My 'poor' leftie friends are all about tearing shit down, while most 'rich' people I know are pretty happy with the way things are, wanting only to make small tweaks here and there.
Maybe you didn't mean for your position to lead to private prisons. But it does, anyway, and that is all that matters.
The US is also not the only place where prisons are private[2], there's the southern hemisphere's Sweden a.k.a. big government paradise, and it has a private prison.
To say either "public" or "private" and ascribe some sort of good or bad to them without providing any reasoning is presumptuous in the least, but to then tell someone what their actual position is - in your view - after making such a presumption would only be to compound an error.
I know what I meant, try to focus on what you mean and fixing that before mischaracterising my views again, thank you.
[1] https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/06/history-of-amer...
[2] https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/crit...
We do have private prisons. As you note, they started under Reagan, in response to Reagan's "anti-crime" policies. Reagan is notorious for claiming to support small government and balanced budgets while actually spending us deep into deficit in order to purchase boondoggles. How are your preferences different than Reagan's?
What’s the average length of a post on HN and where does that post stand?
> How are your preferences different than Reagan's?
You just stated that he acted contrary to his claims, if your position is that I say I’m for small government but wish to spend, spend, spend, then I can see why you’re confused. Try dropping the assumption I’m lying, the principle of charity is a wonderful thing.
More to the point, as you are confused by sarcasm in the service of proof by contradiction, I’ll rephrase:
Would you claim that the government was historically small in 1983?
Is today’s government smaller or bigger?
How do both of your answers correlate with the increasing number of private prisons?
Finally, since your answers should be no, bigger, and bigger government correlates with more private prisons, what on Earth are you on about?
And yet you're going to avoid defending it, or even looking at, nor answering any of my questions and then accuse me of such matters. Ironic.
> This is an awful lot of words to avoid the question
What is it with those who support big government ascribing mendacity to their opponents? I'm not avoiding anything (except fallacies like ad hominem and false dilemmas).
> whether the small-government philosophy you personally subscribe to, whatever it may be
Here you admit that there is more than one possible outlook, yet you go on to produce this:
> If you prefer contracts, stop arguing, if you don't, explain why you think the operation of prisons is a proper function of a small government. It's not hard.
A false dilemma. Make your mind up, are there many types or only one?
Perhaps if my questions were answered I might feel more in the mood to answer those from people who accuse me of avoiding theirs.
> would prefer that government contract out prison services, or run them itself
My answer is either, it's irrelevant. The government is regulator and enforcer. It should promote (high) standards which it then enforces regardless of whom is running a service. Problems may arise when:
a) the one running the service is also the regulator, a clear conflict of interest and though in some cases permissible, it's not one for incredibly powerful entities like government.
b) the ones providing the service are also over-represented in government i.e. they have more than a vote, they have lobbying power (or straight up corruption) which in this case would lead to criminalising essentially non-criminal behaviours to produce whatever positive outcome for them and not for the populace they're supposed to serve. How many people are in gaol for marijuana possession?[1]
More criminals means more prisons, more tax money, more staff and budget (hence more power), more cheap labour… how does that sound anything like small government?
This[2] will come in handy for you.
[1] https://www.drugtestpanels.com/blogs/articles/jail-time-for-...
i think the bit where you talked about Sweden being in the southern hemisphere places it in the top tier of 'confusing' for me...
there's the southern hemisphere's Sweden a.k.a. New Zealand, the big government paradise
I can't edit now but thanks for pointing out something in a reasonable way.
Strike a "we", replace by "rich elites". "Small government" means in practice that most of what governments are doing now with taxpayer money at no-profit will be done by private for-profit companies, at a worse service level, or that regulations/regulatory agencies will be torn down.
For the first, just look at private prisons - make a lot of profit for their owners, while the level of care for the prisoners (access to healthcare, drug withdrawal treatment or education is often spotty, human rights abuse claims the norm).
For the second, look at how e.g. environment regulations were "relaxed" during the 45th.
It's all about the grifting opportunities.