Goodthink (was: [PLUG] hiring full-time: PHP programmer)

[Jeme A Brelin]

On Thu, 21 Nov 2002, Floyd Mann wrote:
> > We all tend to get annoyed about someone going off topic,
> > especially when it's a wildly off-topic rant about something
> > we don't care about. However, in this case, Jeme's assessment
> > of the new economy is exactly correct.
> 
> I find this assertion disturbing, more or less akin to "it is ok to
> post long-winded political diatribes on this list as long as your
> political views match mine."

I think he's trying to say that the discussion was an attempt to assess
the root causes of a problem and discuss those rather than the
superficialities of a particular labor market.

There was no "long-winded political diatribe" (and believe me, being
responsible for many in my day, I know one when I write one).  There was
an attempt to describe the economic system we've achieved to date and how
it relates to the current labor market.

> Toeing the anti-corporate line is not a prerequisite to being
> interested in Linux.

Certainly not.  I don't know that anything I wrote was overtly
anti-corporate.  Now, if I'd gone off quoting Adam Smith and his argument
that "the firm" is a threat to the public good (and his perception of the
free market as an instrument of public benefit) and so on, that would
perhaps be more overtly anti-corporate.

If the logical activist conclusion to my assessment of the new economy is
to take an anti-corporate view, then so be it.  But the assessment itself
was not anti-corporate.  It was merely a description of the state of
affairs in our economy with a few notes as to why things are the way they
are.

J.
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     Jeme A Brelin
    jeme at brelin.net
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