It’s nice that my original Starbucks letter (2/7) spawned a debate on capitalism, but Joe Futrelle failed to show why fair trade isn’t nonsense or why Starbucks harms local cafes – and if it does, why it’s a bad thing. What’s your definition of “fair”? It is some twisted doctrine of equality, which states that the property of one man must be looted and redistributed among the parasites in society – I mean the public. Equality is never fair; it almost always involves some form of theft.

Some executives and corporations don’t deserve their wealth; Amtrak and other corporations that are kept alive through government pull and that massive farm subsidy that Bush, the “conservative,” signed. Yes, people live in poverty and might need more. But from whom? Through what means? If you think it entitles them to the product of another man’s work, you make a good criminal lawyer or priest. After all, poor thieves need food. Junkies need their quick fix. Drug dealers need their money. You make a good case for pardoning criminals and the scum of society, because most are driven by some need to fight the “forces beyond their range,” but not their free will.

Decades of endless picketing and progressive reforms didn’t come close to bringing as many benefits as capitalism did. Labor unions didn’t give workers cars; Mass production, low costs and some entrepreneur’s greed made them dirt-cheap. Good job, you got some bureaucratic monkey to OK your building’s specifications. But some greedy steel industrialist who owned a factory in the 1800s had to have made the steel to replace the crumbling wooden structure.

There are two choices: Become industrialized, or not. Love, sharing and any other third grade mentalities did not achieve this. The profit-driven nature of our system did. It isn’t evil to help people. The evil is when religion and Marxism punish the self-sufficient for their ability, for the sake of the needy, and turn it into an obligation.

Arjun Baindur

freshman in engineering