John Stossel the libertarian idiot

Finally one of the truly idiotic egos in the US makes my case for me:

You continue on your quest, and finally find that dreaded monster, the price gouger. He offers a bottle of water that cost $1 last week at an "outrageous" price -- say $20. You pay it to survive the disaster.

You resent the price gouger. But if he hadn't demanded $20, he'd have been out of water. It was the price gouger's "exploitation" that saved your child.

It saved her because people look out for their own interests. Before you got to the water seller, other people did. At $1 a bottle, they stocked up. At $20 a bottle, they bought more cautiously. By charging $20, the price gouger makes sure his water goes to those who really need it.

The people the softheaded politicians think are cruelest are doing the most to help. Assuming the demand for bottled water was going to go up, they bought a lot of it, planning to resell it at a steep profit. If they hadn't done that, that water would not have been available for the people who need it the most.

[...]

It's the price "gougers" who bring the water, ship the gasoline, fix the roof, and rebuild the cities. The price "gougers" save lives.

Now you have to really appreciate the philosophical principle behind this sort of syllogism. Let us get the picture of this altruistic water seller, standing on a corner with an ice chest out of which he pulls some bottled water and offers it for a completely unrealistic price. The water is something you need, for yourself and your child. The seller seems to have no needs except money(why this is the case in the middle of a huge disaster of course is not addressed) and is solely interested in generating private wealth from the property he controls. Withholding the property from those that need it intentionally inflicts suffering and possible fatal consequences on others. Stossel for some bizarre idiotic reason thinks a person is going to pay for the water because: they have the extra dollars floating around, they are wealthy but incapable of caring for themselves, that human beings will of course behave coldly rational in this situation, the water is available from a number of similar vendors, etc. When needs are not met, and when one is using desperation to increase one's personal wealthy the only rational logical action is to shoot the fucker and take the water and distribute it to others who need it for free. How could there be any other response.