cgwhite, nice of you to get us back on topic and in such a comprehensive way. That's a good compromise, it maintains societal sponsorship in the training of people who contribute generously to the society with their work (teachers, nurses and other civil servants). Also, not holding a candidate to his promises when he joins a coalition is a no-brainer. Still, Nick should be giving a detailed explanation to his voters, if he hasn't already.
Now back off topic to the natural rights vs. positivism... I noticed there is a new thread on property rights, but it has gone a very different direction, and Ghost isn't defending his ideas over there, so...
+3 Jack, obviously we agree down the line. Several times during this conversation, we responded simultaneously and found I was just repeating what you had already posted. Good succinct arguments.
To fill in gaps a little,
@chrispy: It might seem like semantics, but the difference is significant. It's not for nothing that the argument has been going on for centuries. Much is at stake.
Ghost is saying that the right is prior to the government, and that this priority gives a “right” the status of a moral imperative which the government must be (ought to be) subject to. Any government, according to G-man which violates those rights of individuals is to that extent immoral.
The concept of natural rights goes one step further (with Draug), appealing to a Creator who by creating us as sentient deciding beings granted unto us these inalienable rights. This “innovation” has the advantage of lending to the presumed (but not demonstrated) moral imperative of the rights a certain authority (ie over a government) which is otherwise lacking, but also saddles it with an overt metaphysics that in a philosophical conversation is as seaworthy as a sponge . But without the metaphysics, this conception of rights is just a hand-full of desires, some wistful "ought nots" that are no more moral imperatives for any subsequent formation of government than "thou ought not pick your nose in public".
So what's the prize of trying to sell this inalienable rights idea? Well, if it's accepted and people get fired up about it, it can spawn a revolution or pressure a government (with a higher authority) to conform to a certain ideology to which the proponents usually prescribe, namely that of the tyranny of the individual and the absolute right of a few to accumulate unimaginable riches at the expense of the many.
Then, with the "rights" enshrined in the State's Constitution, it is a simple matter to keep the children droning recitations about "certain inalienable rights" until these rights finally appear to everyone as obvious and as solid and as beyond doubt as the very noses on their faces. This is otherwise known as The Greatest Scam Ever Perpetrated Upon the Many by the Few.
Look at Ghost's argument about taxation and how it's a violation of the property right. I started from there to trace back the origins of that right and discovered that for Ghost, the only legitimate expenses of a government are Military, Police and Justice, precisely and only those institutions which are necessary for the protection of the property of the few from the desiring glances of the many. None of the more frequently cited communal rights, like access to food, shelter, health care or education.
For Ghost, all rights proceed from the right to own yourself, which (according to him) is the root of all other rights. As rights go, it's hard to argue with, but it could be phrased differently: it could be a right to live and act freely without interfering with others' rights to do the same. It could be a simple prohibition of slavery. But no, he (and many others before him) worded it explicitly as to insinuate the concept of property. You OWN your body. And if you can own your body, according to Ghost with no further explanation, you can own anything other than someone else''s body. If no-one else has claimed it and registered their claim, it's yours if you want it, and once you make your claim, no-one will be able to deny it, not even the government. If you ask him what is so morally imperative about the right to own or how owning your body necessitates owning anything beyond your body he squeals “you're changing the definitions, creating a strawman, making circular arguments”, but that's nothing more than a distraction.
Now look for a second at what happens when you throw the concept of pre-existing rights in the garbage can. Well, if the society agrees, nothing happens. The property right continues to be recognized by the law as before. But it is not immutable or inalienable, it is not the basis and sum of morality. If the society so desires, it can choose another basis for it's concept of morality, something more egalitarian, perhaps, which provides an equal opportunity for everyone in the society to make of their lives what they will. Which of course is a much fuller and meaningful definition of liberty than that which Ghost derived from his mother-of-all-lies, the property right.