I think you are right. I think that even in Americas not so distant past,. There have been husband masters and wife slaves mostly enforced by personality traits of dominance and submissiveness. Call it perhaps voluntary slavery

Every aspect of slavery has been "villanized," but in the age when it was accepted, it was not limited to brute force, suffering and no thinking. Throughout history, many societies had very highly placed slaves, some that even ran governments. In the American South, shortly before the Civil War, some slaves were very well off (compared to free laborers) and some were in fairly important and comfortable positions. I am not supporting slavery here; I am being historically accurate, as opposed to historically selective. For reference, read historical accounts written at the time, not about that time.

Actually, slavery, when first begun, was a revolutionary achievement. Prior to slavery, the captured enemy was eaten.

I might just do that. I had an extra day in Charlottesville when I was visiting my prostate cancer doc, and visiting Monticello is about all there is to do there.... It turned out to be very interesting.

Its not that important, and it was 200+ years ago anyway. My point was that the beginnings of this country were not as pristine and consistent as one might have thought. It was great and it was flawed, as most things are. What I took from the Montiicello visit was that the founding fathers most important thing was to get away from the rule of England and the church of England and the King of England and try to keep from making the same mistakes as the english did in running the US. It was a very difficult goal, and they got farther than anyone else in history.

Paying the debts you owe is not enforced slavery, I agree. But when one engages in debt, there is little difference in the results except that its self inflicted. Perhaps this is only semantics.

In a short term, slavery will get certain things done, as it did in the south. But long term, it definitely becomes harder and harder to keep going, and eventually fails because it is based on an incorrect view of humanity.

If you're really interested in Jefferson you could listen to the Thomas Jefferson Hour on your local PBR station or go to http://jeffersonhour.org You can download any of the shows from Itunes for free. Clay Jenkinson portrays our third president and answers calls from listeners the way Jefferson would answer. Skeptical? Listen to one; you may be surprised.

Actually, Jefferson should be more objective. One of our greatest Presidents and, certainly, the most enlightened.

Esceptico did not ask anything. He made more false assertions. He has been called on this before and responds with more vacuous personal attacks. He has a record, like gratuitously calling Leonard Peikoff a "lap dog", denouncing Ayn Rand for "evasion" for not writing about an irrelevant topic he would prefer, and much more. Reject his overt hostility and he thinks he has answered by calling the rejection an "ad hominem". He has no kindness and decency to return to. His repeated hostility is nothing to "wag" about and anyone can read his posts to see it.

Not at the moment, but the 13th Amendment does permit slavery as a punishment for crime. Therefore slavery has not been made totally illegal (i.e., abolished).

term2: "I spend a whole day at Monticello museum set up in honor of Jefferson. Lots of information there to be had. You might want to actually go there and see for yourself before you make a further ass out of yourself by claiming I am a Marxist !!. The information is all there to be had, and backed up by a lot of history contained right there in that museum."

Your day trip seems to have left out the facts you have been ignoring and don't address after they are given to you. If you don't want to be a Marxist then stop echoing Marxist slogans attributed as motives to people you do not understand. If you want to discuss this further then drop your sarcasm and name-calling. Reading about Jefferson instead of taking a day trip does not make one an "ass".

Having to pay your debts is not slavery, whether or not you resentfully "feel" like it. Neither is today's society with taxation, as bad as it is and based on false and immoral collectivist premises, like the outright slavery of the old south. Please try to show some common sense perspective and adherence to reality.

Slavery does not "work" as an economic system and never did. That some got away with taking what they wanted from others does not mean slavery "worked", anymore than getting away with robbing banks can mean robbery "works" as a system. The feudalist slave system of the old south was stagnant. A slave society does not "work" and cannot for the same reasons it is immoral. Objectivism rejects the Pragmatist, neo-Marxist "analysis" and rewrite of history.

I have asked you to point out where I did that. But all I get from you are more nasty comments. I do not take this personally in as much as I see you are also unpleasant with others in the Gulch.

Once the forms of civility are violated by discussion participants resorting to name-calling there remains little hope of return to kindness or decency. Your ad hominem attacks upon me are impolite, but consistent with the attacks I have received on this post. I suggest you learn to wag more and bark less.

A lot of a-philosophical "libertarians" are still conflicted today. Notice the denunciation of Jefferson for putting "his own self interest ahead of moral principles he espoused", as if there would be a conflict. That is in addition to the fact that he did act to oppose slavery in action.

There are serious parallels between physical slavery and what the government does to us today. The government takes about half of what we can make, leaving the rest of it for us to stay alive on. We do have to privately arrange for the details of living, which is different from the plantation owners.

But, if we refuse to pay the government, they do imprison us, which is a lot like actual slavery. They feed us and we get to make license plates or work on chain gangs and such.

As long as you worked on the plantation and produced, and kissed the hind end of the plantation owner, there was no need to beat you into submission. You got your food and you could rest until the next day.

Nowadays, there is 'free speech" up to the point where Obama and his ilk will stop tolerating it. Ask Snowden how far you can go in exposing true Obama evil. If he were here, he would be in prison or executed.

My point is that our government has forbidden slavery, but imposed on us instead its own more acceptable version of it. If you make money, dont you feel like they have enslaved you for some months of the year so you can pay what you earn to them against your will?

You are right that people should be judged in the context of their knowledge and state of affairs at the time. They didn't have Ayn Rand's ethics and may have acted differently in some ways if they had, but they did have the enormous advantage of the Enlightenment and made enormous progress because of it, including establishing the foundation to eliminate slavery.

There never was a justification for slavery, morally or economically, but whatever mistakes they made along the way to emancipation, the best of them, including Jefferson, were certainly not "hypocrites" following Marxist-supplied motives as the faddish drumbeat tells us today.

Please take your personal hostility and dramatically pronounced insults somewhere else. This isn't the place for it. You have in fact misrepresented and smeared Ayn Rand and others here repeatedly in your obsessive negativity and hostility.

Your resentful feelings don't change the facts of what borrowing is in contrast to slavery.

Government enforces the tax laws by force. It doesn't make most taxation the same as living like slaves in the old south.

Actually, I spend a whole day at Monticello museum set up in honor of Jefferson. Lots of information there to be had. You might want to actually go there and see for yourself before you make a further ass out of yourself by claiming I am a Marxist !!. The information is all there to be had, and backed up by a lot of history contained right there in that museum.

It has little to do with Marxism. Jefferson was a very practical man, in addition to being a politician and knowing what he could get others to agree to.

Its in Charlottesville VA, if you care to go there. Its worth the few bucks admission.

You know nothing about Jefferson or the people who lived on his plantation or why either did what they did. You know nothing about any desire or ability of the people living there to leave or Jefferson allegedly refusing. You know nothing about what he did to try to free slaves and abolish the institution.

The leftist fads you echo attack Jefferson in Marxist terms for "needing" slavery for "economics" and undermine the founders of this country in every way they can. The best of the founders of this country, including Jefferson, achieved greatness because of what they did and thought in the time they lived in. It didn't come from being "good talker" hypocrites. But you would have to learn something about the history to know that, not follow leftist revisionist publicists.

"Rationalism", at your level of understanding in contrast to the philosophical roots and meaning, means verbal manipulations in the name of logic while equivocating on and ignoring the meaning of words in relation to facts of reality. It is how you string together arguments to dramatically reach such outlandish conclusions at odds with the facts of history and what historical figures said they believed and why they did what they did.

To smear is damage the reputation of (someone) by false accusations; slander. http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/.... I have never done that and you cannot point to one time that I did. I do thank you for confirming my conclusion when I categorized your words in the “crudest form” designation described by Kelley.

Also, there are family members, whom it would be
just as well not to cut off.--In some cases, there
are just persons with whom you cannot discuss
certain things.

I had a good friend (now deceased) with whom I worked in a restaurant commissary. She
was black, but she never showed any prejudice
against me for being white (unlike some other
people there). But, in a friendly way, she once
told me that she always preferred to vote for the
liberal Democrat. Well, I quietly told her wherein
I disagreed. We didn't get nasty with each other.
Later she "retired" (somewhat; she still occas-
ionally returned to work); later, I left, due to un-
fortunately believing another employer would
hire me (had been given a starting date, but they
still backed out after I had given notice and been
replace, on grounds of my seizure disorder, though the fact had been on my job application
and I had even pointed it out); I still called her
on the phone sometimes and sometimes went
to see her. But she eventually had a heart attack; at least I think so; it was sudden. And I
went to see her lying in state.
But sometimes you can have a friend by
appreciating the good things about the person,
and who says he has to be perfect?
Also, the standards for a friend may be dif-
ferent than the standards for a spouse.

There isnt the physical violence involved with slavery now that the government does it. BUT, try not paying the government willingly and see what happens to you. Jail would look a lot like slavery to me.

As to credit and its effects on a person, its not physical slavery, and you dont go to jail anymore for not paying up, but it FEELS like being trapped. That was my point. For all practical purposes, you have signed yourself up for years of working for the 'man' to pay off the debts.