REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

Excellent article on Iraqi WMD backstory: 'Wilson’s House of Lies'

POSTED BY: LYNCHAJ
UPDATED: Monday, November 14, 2005 17:16
SHORT URL:
VIEWED: 2294
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Tuesday, November 8, 2005 5:26 PM

DREAMTROVE


Bumping this thread is as close to treason as I intend to come. I have very few things to say here.

1. Treason is treason regardless of your personal opinion of the defendant, which is irrelevent.

2. The man had the utmost respect of Mr. George H. W. Bush, who, unlike his son, is not a traitor. If Bush Sr, supports Wilson, as he does, I have no reason to doubt him.

3. I think of myself as a right wing nut and I actually read frontpagemag and I get their regular email updates, and I read those and sometimes respond, and I still don't consider them a credible source.

4. This is all dancing around the issue.

The issue is:

5. Bush, or moreover Cheney, intentionally falsified intelligence information to support a case for war.

6. That war was then pressed as an emergency of national security based on an absurd premise that Saddam Hussein, a man incapable of shooting down a US aircraft over his own country, was about to launch a full scale nuclear assault against the united states to which there was no defense.

7. This absurd scenario swayed the US congress and the UN to endorse a doctrine of pre-emptive war that was nothing other than a nazi imperial invasion.


I've made this point lots of times. If you want to get rid of Saddam Hussein. Fine, you have my vote. If you want to endorse genocide, please I beg of you, get out of my party and do it on someone else's ticket.

The Iraq war is an act of genocide. We seek to subject these people through whatever means to change there society and make it suitable for a new state which will supply us with oil.

It was carried out through a means of preemptive war with no deference to any of the groups that were already in opposition to the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein, even arguably the Kurds, because quite frankly the thinkers at PNAC did not want to compromise, because as they wrote several hundred times throughout history, compromise is a weakness of lack of planning, or something to that effect.

We then gain an oil cornerstone which leads to a globally dominant position. This is great. I would favor actually having such a thing.

But the means DO NOT justify the ends. If you accept that they do you have just accepted the basic tenet of fascism.

Furthermore, the support for this action, the action itself AND

QUITE SPECIFICALLY

The action taken in revealing the identity of Valerie Plame

Was an overt action to disarm opposition while simultaneously being an inadvertent aid to Al Qaeda.

If you, through your actions, as the intended or inadvertent consequence of your actions, which are taken knowingly with the all of the possible outcomes, aid the forces of the enemy in their desire to harm the United States of America, you have committed treason.

There is nothing more to say. The WMD field team under the command of the non-field agent Valerie Plame was disabled as a result of an intentional leak by the administration, and no amount of spin will make that not so.

The only benefiaries of this were officials within the administration in their desire to deceive their own govt. that of the United States, and to allow the forces of Al Qaeda to make transfers of weapons of mass destruction now unknown to us.

In both cases it is extremely possible, if not a dead certainty that this has aided enemies of the United States

And, BTW, Lynch. I am dead serious about this. There is no politicking or spin here. I don't say this because I want Cheney to resign and be replaced by McCain or some other more experienced more level head than Cheney. I say it because it is true. The administration deliberately took action which aided the forces of Al Qaeda. If it were left to me personally, I think they should be tried for treason.

I would be blissfully happy, even if their replacements were all also members of PNAC, which clearly I would not consider an adequate solution, if the US foreign policy were to shift to something which was not the best friend of Al Qaeda.

Finally, I think that these actions and the defense of them increase the chance of the people electing a democrat who I expect to be Hillary Clinton, and I think that this is actually one of the intended consequences. I think this will be a disaster for our country, and treason against the party, but I cannot take it as seriously as I take overt acts of treason against the United States of America.

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Wednesday, November 9, 2005 11:44 AM

GEEZER

Keep the Shiny side up


C,mon, Lynch. Don't you realize that, although this much info about a Bushie would lead the crowd here into an impeachment frenzy, you won't even get a discussion going about this particular topic. Just another chorus of "Bush lied!", all the while ignoring this evidence that one if the people who calls him that isn't too truthful himself.

So far no one has been indicted for blowing the whistle on Ms. Plame, but who cares for due process?

"Keep the Shiny side up"

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Wednesday, November 9, 2005 2:32 PM

DREAMTROVE


Hey, still a right wing extremist here. Bush did lie. Clearly no one cares, I hardly care myself. But I do care about treason, and what I see here is a couple of people defending it.

The proper thing for the right to do here is turn on Bush, or rather Cheney, like a pack of wild dogs. The failure to do so is daily doing mortal damage to the Party. I can only think that those who don't are stealth lefties themselves.

Did you not see those appalling '05 election results? If we had already decapitated this govt. that wouldn't have happened. If we want any chance of not getting slaughtered in '06 we had better serve up a dish of Cheney stew. It's the only loyal thing to do. The man is a traitor. He's a traitor to the GOP and a traitor to the USA.

There is nothing right wing about the Bush admin. Libby and Cheney are in no way conservatives. I see no contradiction here. I scanned these articles, but quite frankly, after watching all of the senate hearings it is hard to think that there is anything that even could be said in defense. The quanitity of information that would be required for a burden of prood in defense is similar to what would be needed to prove that the holocaust never happened. Admit your candidates disaster, blame Cheney, kick him out of there, and come back into the fold before you and yours get completely marginalized in this part, which is what is seriously in the offing here.

I can't fairly blame Bush because I don't think he knows the difference between Chechnya and Kashmir. Or for that matter between a hammer and screwdriver. Pick your Cheney replacement and go for it. I'll start out by nominating Mrs. Plame.

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Thursday, November 10, 2005 6:27 PM

DREAMTROVE


Lynch,

Okay, I'm going to try to make this as succinct as possible.

1. I already gave a detailed explanation on another thread about lies, etc. I think that argument was unshakeable.

2. Your endless rebuffs have lead me to think that your faith in the Bush Admin is also unshakeable, so it is pointless for me to waste time arguing.

3. I don't believe you're an ideological supporter. I think you're a beneficiary supporter. I know many people who themselves benefit from the Bush Admin, and a couple who are directly connected to it. Their faith is also unshakeable.

4. Because of points 1-3 I don't think you're baiting an argument out of curiosity, I think you expect to convince me. I don't think that is likely to happen.

That said, there are some things I have to say.

5. Cheney is PNAC, and PNAC is a global social militarist, which is not a right wing concept, it's pretty solidly left.

6. Cheney had his hands up to the elbows in the Clinton Admin.

7. Nothing these people do or support rings even remotely true to conventional conservatism. In fact, almost none of it even falls to the right of absolute center.

8. Torture? This is Cheney's latest schtick. This is conservative? A Pro-Torture position? Get this man out of my site.

9. Treason in aiding Al Qaeda on more than one occassion, most assuredly in the Plame case, possible in the Iraq War, and conceivably in 9/11. It's at the very least enough to worry me.

10. There is no shortage of good conservatives around. I have so many doubts about these guys that I see no reason to even bother with them. I have a long list of people I know I can trust. why mess with people who might betray you? It's not even worth the time.

11. I had no concerns about Bush and Co. in 2000. He had a solid team of Republicans, and I was too bent on hating Gore. Honestly, I don't think Gore won that election, as the vote counts later proved, but I didn't like the supreme court ruling. I thought that, horrible as Gore was, it was worth the chance of a recount, which would have turned out in our favor anyway. Here's the problem I had with the ruling: It gave the left a means to call the election and the president illegitimate. I would have rather due process continued. I didn't think then it would have made any difference in the outcome. Numbers since then have proven me correct.

12. Bush lost me over time. Let me count the ways.

13. The Patriot Act. What a pure socialist piece of legislation. Did Ashcroft have to hire former Soviets to write this for him?

14. The Spending. This spending is madness, and it is for socialist things that you mentioned.

15. Iraq. This was a typical democrat type thing to do, turn what could be a lightweight exercise into a big feeding frenzy for the military industrial complex. It reminded me of Johnson. I agree with nixing Saddam, I really do, but I think this stopped being about that long ago. This war also stank of Clinton, and PNAC.

16. Abu Ghraib. Not only did this torture prove to lead back to the top level, but they supported the idea. And still do.

17. Valerie Plame. Believe it or not, this is where he completely lost me. But it was just he straw that broke the camel's back, and it's very broken now, and there's no putting it back together.

18. He never handled anything deftly! North Korea now has nukes. China is an unchecked force for global domination. We've done nothing about the hostile takeover of Taiwan.

19. Good God what a nightmare. Intelligent Design in schools? Bans on Stem Cell research? This is a Republican Administration? If I didn't know better I'd think it was a coalition between Bin Laden and Trotsky!

20. Godwin's Law is a cheap attempt to cover the fact that Nazi politics are incredibly strong and have profound influences on much of what goes on in the world today. There is no way I am granting the worst left wing socialist extremist govt. of all time to get off scott free like this. No way in hell. This doesn't relate to the discussion per se, it's just my absolute gutteral reaction to Godwin's Law.

21. I agree, Bush is no extremist. He's extremely middle of the road. I think he's ideologically very close to Joe Lieberman. But I also don't credit Bush as having any power at all, so I basically discount him. He is such a non-entity that when any action would safe face for him but might cost someone in the back row a nickel, he doesn't take it. This says to me they have him under complete control.

22. You are not going to win with semantics. I was there the whole time, I saw it happen, we all know what happened. I know you are spinning this. I know you know that cheney ordered his people to spill Plame's name to 11 reporters on the same day intentionally as a deliberate act of treason. I am absolutely 100% sure that you DO know this, but don't care. You will never ever admit it, instead you will give me spin.

23. We have been betrayed by these neo-cons, which is, afterall, just a name given to a ring of socialist ideologues who decided to drop their support for the democratic party. You know that this is where the name comes from, and that it was these same people, not Cheney per se, but a lot of people in that PNAC group, and other neo-conservative think tanks closely connected to it.

Quote:

Was 2004 a big win for the Democrats? I think not.


24. What planet were you on? Democrats can't win by themselves, they almost never have. There are only two ever:

a) LBJ, who had Kennedy's popularity+assassination combo, plus the Texas bonus.

b) FDR, who has the depression propelling him into office, and the economic recovery+war pres. holding him there.

Every other dem. who ever won did so by splitting the opposition vote.

The % Kerry got was scary. Bad Bush policy is to blame. But Bad Bush policy is just getting worse. By 2008, it could be the big #3 Democrat gets more than 50%. It's looking that way in opinion polls right now.

Quote:

Sun Tzu


25. Bush is the fool. I know people who know him as I said. He's not so clever that he bombed his way through college. His own friends said he was high on cocaine and couldn't make it through on his own. It would be far more honest to treat him as a non-entity here. This is not like Carter or Kennedy playing the fool. Sorry, couldn't think of a Republican who had done it. They usually like to appear smart. Reagan wasn't smart, again, he wasn't playing the fool, he also was the fool, but not braindead like this guy, not early on.

But it's okay to have a moron pres. if you have a good guy behind the scenes. I thought that India played a beautiful stealth play with Sonja Ghandi, and then bait and switch with the completely unelectable Manmohan Singh. Brilliant. IMHO.

Finally, I think this is pure fantasy. I realize you profit in some way by this Admin, since you seem to smart to hold to something which is so clearly at odds with the interests of the conservative movement. Anyway, I will read your link and give you some feedback on it.

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Thursday, November 10, 2005 6:57 PM

DREAMTROVE


Okay, reading the article

Some brief thoughts, as I read:

1. Democrats are not a factor, normally, people should stop pretending that they are. There is one debate currently in America, and it is the one you and I are having right now. Neocon vs. Conventional Conservative. Democrats were marginalized a long time ago, and only when the right splits does the left stand a chance. I don't believe Clinton was the traditional left though, I think he was a neocon stooge. He enacted few of the traditional democratic follies, and did apply some fiscal discipline. To that effect I think it was merciful he was a neocon stooge and not a traditional democrat. But still he was, to me, appalling.

2. When a neocon in the GOP f^&ks thinks up this badly, it does create the rare possibility for actual democrats to gain ground. This is not to be taken too lightly, so and Admin must always tread lightly to some degree, and not violate the public trust so absolutely constantly as this admin does. To explain this, I mean to press forward with a policy that the bulk of the people disagree with. I read the polls on every issue, often from as many as five mainstream sources, so I know when the public opposes a policy. Bush Admin never backs down ever. This is a dangerous game to play. Dangerous for the party.

3. I don't care about Rove. He's a small fish. He's also more of a real Republican. I think he sometimes does questionable things, but I'm not demanding his resignation. I'm not sure I'd trust him enough to hire him myself, but he doesn't really bother me. I'm not sure he intentionally, knowingly, participated in the treason, though he did participate. If he knew he was committing treason when he talked to Novak, then he should probably resign, but that remains to be seen. My guess is Rove agreed to squeal, probably on Cheney.

4. I don't think that Ms. Plame sent Wilson, but it's irrelevent.

5. Mr. Wilson had plenty fo forged documents already. There were forgeries submitted to the agency in the summer of '02, Wilson's trip was in summer of '03 was it not? I recall the forgeries being questioned, this was definitely a long time before Wilson's trip.

6. This article paints this as a partisan conflict. This simply is not the case. Brilliant democrats aren't out gathering information to build false cases against a well founded truth. This is an illusion elaborately crafted. Here's the truth:

Democrats aren't doing anything at all. Democrat attacks are just a constant echo of yesterday's news. They pick out what might make Republicans look bad if everyone knew it, and echo it. No democrat attack has any intention of winning. They are just spinning the constituency with yesterday's news. They say things that were already said by someone else, usually a republican or civil servant, and say it loud enough for their own voter to hear. This isn't action, it's echo. They're hope is to boost their '08 and '06 chances. But they aren't morons. They aren't going to echo lies, because then the rebutt would kill them. So they select what they think are defendable but damaging truths.

In American politics, the party in power tends to lie more. Clinton lied his ass off. A Kerry Admin would be lying right now, possibly more than Bush. As I said, Bush lied, it doesn't bother me that much. I'd prefer someone who was less blatantly dishonest than Bush, but it's not the end of the world.

The article wants the Bush Admin to fire back more, but I think that the Bush Admin knows that it is fighting a losing battle if it does.

Let me explain.

Think like a democrat for a second.

Scary, but do it.

You pick a fact you think is defensible but damaging. The outing of Plame, whatever.

Then you make a rediculous attack on Bush.

You're baiting him. You want him to fight you on your own turf, where you have just set the rules. If he comes to you, and fights you on this one fact which you think is either a) unshakeably true, or b) has enough behind it that you can convince the public that it is unshakeably true, then Bush would be winning your own battle for you by arguing the point.

That is about the only thing the Dems are up to at the moment. The saw the Kerry 48% as a strong finish, which it was, for a democrat. They are convinced that with a little exploitation they can win over 5% of the voters, enough for a rare win.

They might do it. They will never keep that 5%, because 4 years of true democrat rule ought to be enough to send them crawling back to the GOP


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Thursday, November 10, 2005 7:21 PM

DREAMTROVE


Okay, I'm up for stepping this debate up a notch.

I want to know a couple of things. I'll tell you where I'm coming from and you tell me where you're coming from.

Try to be on the level here. I'm serious about this. No one stumbles on to newamericacentury.org and then cites it as a source. It's an ideological extreme which does rule our govt. and you already know that.

You support it for some reason, and I'd like to know why.

Here's where I'm coming from.

In college I was a student of history, got a degree in it. I must've been to 20+ years of college by now. I farm tomatoes, I'm not anyone of importance.

Like the members of PNAC, I too used to be a socialist sympathizer. I considered many of the ideas of the former Soviets, and considered their possible validity. At the time it seemed to me that they had a valid global strategy, and possible cures to the human condition.

This sympathy led me to know a lot of Soviets. They convinced me that I was undeniably wrong. This itself would be a very long discussion, but suffice it to say, I became convinced that the flaws I saw in America were not from lack of social support structure, but from lack of freedom, and excess of social support structure. Over the course of the years, I re-examined the situation, the blind idealism that built the USSR and other disaster states, and I came to see these fallacies in the democrats, and in other globalist movements, such as the neocons.

Globalist strategies are important. The main reason is that if you don't have them, the other guy still does, and he might conquer the world while you're not looking.

I plan to have global strategies. It might take me some time. I know a lot of other people have them, and I know pretty well what those strategies are. The biggest globalist player is China. The Saudis, Al Qaeda, also play this game. Old Europe for the most part plays it in a profiteering way, but not in a serious way, they're done with that now.

Neocons have a strategy, and I understand where it comes from too. The plan to hold control posts, dominate industries that other nations rely on, hold leverage over them. I know they seek to create a global consensus rule where they hold a compound majority, a fluke rule based on the peculiar makeup of the hierarchy that they have spend decades designing.

But overall, I don't like it.

Here's some serious problems I have with it:

1. It's very much like Athens in the PPW. Sparta won that war not because it was a socialist state, but because it had willing allies. Athens had subjects which it used to funnel money into the machine. Long term, this sort of relationship is always problematic. Subjects never follow you as far as true allies will. For the neocons, Tony Blair is an ally, England is less so, and Iraq and Afgh. will never be true allies. However, for Al Qaeda, Iraq an Afgh. may become true allies. If this is ever the case, they will win in these arenas.

2. It's not as US focused. I really don't care about ruling the world, only stopping someone else from doing so. If America is supported fully, I believe she will continue to be supreme, and a force that can always step in and alter any equation. If she is compromised by a costly global agenda, this may cease to be true, and the stability of the Earth may depend on the new global order, and that might lead us to a course of action which is not in our best interest, as a nation, or as a planet.

3. It's very image costly. American business will suffer immeasurably as a result of this course of action, with the minor exception of a small handful of companies.

I think that when Bush took office in '00, there were two major players in this game: The US and China. Now I think there are four. China is clearly in the lead, and Al Qaeda is growing strong into a full fledged player. The US has now split into two empires, which sort of occupy the same space, but one is building itself in a very globalist manner, and the other in a much more conventional American powerbase manner.

This last part I think is a bit tricky, but let me put is as simply as possible. If you are the neocon, and you're ally is the UK under Tony Blair, my conventional conservative ally is the UK under Michael Howard.

Is all of this making any sense? If it makes a whole lot of sense I'd much rather skip all the silly stuff about Bush and Plame and more right on into this.

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Friday, November 11, 2005 4:35 AM

CHRISISALL


C'mon, Andrew! Dreamtrove is pulling your leg.
Presidents of this country don't lie.
If he posted that the sky was blue, would you take him seriously on that too?
Sheesh!

Chrisisall

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Friday, November 11, 2005 5:16 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


DT, you have to realize that Lynch AJ has an idee fixe about WMD and another one about Bush. NOTHING you could say would convince AJ that Bush or anyone in his administration lied about anything, ever. And Geezer? Well, the former voice of reason has resorted to posting flamebait. WARNING: Get sucked in to this debate at your own risk. Sign me: Been there, done that.

---------------------------------
Please don't think they give a shit.

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Friday, November 11, 2005 6:08 AM

CHRISISALL


Quote:
Originally posted by lynchaj:

Can you site a specific documented and verifiable case where President Bush has lied?
No, because Bush has never, to anyone's recollection, ever lied.

Once, when he was young, he came home stumbling. His dad asked, "Georgie, are you DRUNK?" to which he responded, "Yessireeee!". Truth always.
In school one of his classmates asked what job his father had. "My daddy runs the CIA, Nya nya, nya nya nya !" Again, the truth. College was fun.
When he tanked his dads businesses, he even appoligized truthfully. "Dad, I ed up."

All this brings us to WMD's. No, Bush didn't lie. He isn't smart enough to. He believed what he was told, and repeated it. Technically, that's not a lie.

You're welcome.



Chrisisalltruthful

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Friday, November 11, 2005 7:15 AM

DREAMTROVE


Okay, at this point your abusing sarcasm.

I get that lynch has his head in a tin pail and is never coming out, so I thought we could debate something else. The thing is I know Lynch doesn't really believe what he's saying, he thinks he's being rhetorically clever. He's not.

Bush lie #1: There was a consensus of intelligence on WMD. I watched the non-consensus reports on cspan. So probably did all of you. There's not really any docmuntation here. Googling it would probably provide you with 10 matches right off the bat.

Here's another one: There was a consensus of intelligence saying saddam had an extant nuclear program. There almost was, almost everyone though this was a ringer, ie. there was no nuclear program. There had been a nuclear power program, but that was shelved after the bombing and sactions. That program was not locally Iraqi, it was run by the French.

The idea that this was behind the move to war in Iraq is beyond absurd.

Here's who DID have an extant nuclear program and had threatened attack the USA with nuclear weapons: North Korea. NK's longterm goal has to be to take over the SK economy. While SK is devestatingly competitive with the US: This is what we want! Free market capitalism seeks devestating competition. That which does not kill us makes us stronger. But if NK attacks, there is little defense short of a US/Japanese intervention, which is why NK has threatened to attack our civilian populations with nukes if we intercede. It would be kinda nice if someone had done something about this before it came to this point.

Finally, you ducked my offer to debate strategies on globalism and global militarism, so I'm dropping it.

I know these lies of course because I was watching when they happened. I repeatedly saw officials say one thing, and they saw Bush tell the public they said something else. Sorry if actual experience isn't a link, but I'm sure people have posted them

Okay I'm not vouching for this site, becuase it's just the first thing that came up when I googled it, but #8 on this page addresses the consensus one.

http://www.bushlies.net/pages/10/

I seem to remember a fair number of reversals on campaign promises, also. Unless you want to say "oh, that's not lying, that's him changing his mind." This man doesn't have a mind to change.

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Friday, November 11, 2005 7:36 AM

CHRISISALL


Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
The thing is I know Lynch doesn't really believe what he's saying, he thinks he's being rhetorically clever.
*tries to keep from choking as he laughs*
That's the thing, DT, he's serious!!!
I know, he communicates intellegently, and is obviously well-educated, and yet he holds on desperatly to the idea that Bush is some kind of HERO!!!!
See,.. you're wrong/don't have all the facts/him being wrong doesn't=lie/he never said that/no proof/Bush-hating slander, yadda yadda blagh blagh.....
(I hold that he's paid by the Bush team to spy on us)

And there's no abusing sarcasm when Andrew starts on his pro-Bush rants!

(...but he's cool off the RWE...)

Chrisisall

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Friday, November 11, 2005 8:20 AM

DREAMTROVE


Chris

but it was such a great buffy quote I had to use it :)

If you're right and Andrew actually believes this stuff, and is not just trying to spin us then he's a lot dumber than I thought, and perhaps I'm wasting my time.

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Friday, November 11, 2005 8:29 AM

CHRISISALL


That's the boggle! He's really bright, I can only conclude it's a fear-of-being-wrong fixation, you know, like, "Daddy doesn't beat me, he diciplines me." He can counter every negative comment about Bush with a spin, or outright denial. Hell, I can come up with more negative comments about James T. Kirk than he can about Bush. It's somewhat unsettling.

Chrisisall

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Friday, November 11, 2005 8:49 AM

DREAMTROVE


Potbelly
Repeats self, others
Wears pajamas to work
Always chases after the nearest human female or most human looking alien
Can't protect his redshirted staffers.

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Friday, November 11, 2005 9:03 AM

CHRISISALL


Federation-hating Kirk-basher!


Chrisisall

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Friday, November 11, 2005 10:56 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


*Wipes tears from eyes and coffee from monitor*

Tends... to insert pregnant... pauses in strange... places. (It's Shakespearean ya know.)

ALWAYS decapitates the ship's command by sending the top officers into every dagnerous situation. (BTW- What ARE those 400 minions doing on the Enterprise? Stoking coal???)


---------------------------------
Please don't think they give a shit.

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Friday, November 11, 2005 11:14 AM

CHRISISALL


Yeah, yeah, that's right. Next time you face a Romulan invasion, don't call for a Starship!

Damn Borg-huggers.

Chrisisall

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Friday, November 11, 2005 12:51 PM

DREAMTROVE


Signym,

Don't you realize that sending all of your ranking officers down in a shuttle is the surest way to promote rapid promotion? Why without that incentive, surely the workers would become disaffecte and might space themselves.

:)

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Friday, November 11, 2005 1:45 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


PHWAAAHH!!!

*gasp! sputter! cough! cough! LOL!* I really should swallow my coffee before I click on this thread! So NOW I know what those 400 minions are doing- they're sharpening their knives! HAHAHAHAHA+!

---------------------------------
Please don't think they give a shit.

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Friday, November 11, 2005 5:21 PM

DREAMTROVE


Yes, well the minions have had various uses in various incarnations of Trek.

In Classic Trek, the minions are made up mostly of miniskirted tralks who are lining up to bed the captain, and a few good men, some hired jiggalos of the whore corps, and others who themselves are lining up to bed Sulu.

In STNG, the bulk of the crew are schoolchildren, whose main purpose seems to be to get into an inordinant amount of peril in order to motivate the crew into action. So sterile is the next generation crew, that they lack the chutzpah to act, unless something truly horrific on a televisionific scale is about to occur.

In DS9, the minions mainly serve to gamble, get drunk, and spend way to much cash to keep quark in business so that cisco can tax him as his sole profitable business on the station in order to keep operations running.

On Voyager, the minions are all of the 'Kes' species, and exist to mature and breed at a phenomenal rate so they can replace themselves as rapidly as possible, hoping to offset the paradox that way many more crew members are seen dying on screen than were ever on the crew manifest to begin with.

I haven't seen Enterprise, so someone else has to fill in here.

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Friday, November 11, 2005 10:46 PM

FLETCH2


I have some thoughts about globalization and some of what DT has spoken about but to get up to speed with where I’m coming from and so that my points don’t get lost in explanation a preamble is called for…….


There’s a principle in classical economics called comparative advantage. Basically it goes like this --- Adam Smith in “The Wealth of Nations” gives an example of free trade where by England trades wool with Portugal for wine. England at that time made most of its money from wool (in fact the Chancellor of the Exchequer sits on a wool sack to remind him of that) and wine was Portugal’s primary export. Smith argued that it was in the countries best interests to trade what they had for what they needed rather than attempt to be self sufficient in everything. Later an economist called David Ricardo considered a variation on Smith’s example. What happens, he wondered, if by chance Portugal was better at producing both wool and wine than England? In that instance it would appear at first sight that the Portuguese were self sufficient and needn’t trade with England at all. However, the value of wine is more than the value of wool. Ricardo argued that economically it was better for the Portuguese to stop producing wool and convert that farmland into more vineyards than continue to have a mixed wine/wool economy. It could then trade the extra high value wine produced for England’s lower value wool rather than produce its own wool. Though able to produce both Portugal had a comparative advantage in producing wine and economically it was in its interest to stick with what its good at.

Comparative advantage is the basis on which we have built global free trade. The argument goes that it is better to make high value products like computers and software in the US and buy in the steel the country needs from cheaper countries, than to make the steel locally in Chicago and Pittsburg. The US has a comparative advantage making IT equipment – so we will sell them high value computers and buy back low value steel.

In Ricardo’s example both wine and wool needed the same resources --- agricultural land – so the source of your comparative advantage was restricted geographically and finite. The first few hundred years of industrialization also had geographic constraints – initially it was power, first industries were powered by water, later by steam. Countries that industrialized early had easily exploitable coal and iron reserves --- again a geographic advantage. Later in colonial days the imperial powers fought for control of geographical resources. Empires are great examples of comparative advantage being exploited, third world colonies sent low priced raw materials to the mother countries where industry turned them into expensive finished western goods and shipped them back to the colonies for sale. Needless to say the manufacturers in the UK, Germany and France tended to be the ones that profited from this.

Physical heavy industry remains geographically restricted; it needs special plant, has energy and raw resources requirements and is highly dependent on support infrastructure. So, you can’t build it just anywhere and once it becomes established it becomes very difficult and expensive to move. You could call this “comparative advantage inertia.” At the end of the day comparative advantage is about “who does it cheaper” but as manufacturing industry requires so much effort to set up initially it becomes hard to move. In the west people don’t move factories hundreds of miles to take advantage of a few dollars in infrastructure savings. The move of industry to places like China only happened after the Chinese spent billions setting up the support infrastructure to allow that level of industrialization. Having that infrastructure and artificially low labour costs now gives them a comparative advantage for manufacturing that is hard for multinationals to ignore.

Up until now we’ve been content to let them have those industries because in Ricardo’s model we are still winning the game --- they sell us cheap consumer goods and receive expensive information technology based products. Unfortunately these new industries have no geographical restrictions. This means that it’s cheap to move entire industries to wherever it’s cheapest to operate, wherever in the world that may be. We’ve seen that happen with a lot of IT number crunching jobs --- CC processing, bank computer processing, IT backroom stuff. We have seen it happen with IT service positions and helpdesks. The next wave with be high value white collar jobs in the financial services industry --- you go to an HR Block tax booth in your local mall, get talked through the forms you fill out by a girl paid standard service industry wages, she sends that data to Bangalore where your taxes are prepared for 1/3rd the cost of a US accountant. A US accountant then gives the completed return a once over and signs off on it.

Next stage is R&D and new product development, which will happen in a big way in the next few years. I know some that say “well we’ll move into xxxxxx and stay ahead…” the problem, is that ANY knowledge based industry can move countries extremely easily. It’s not necessarily that IT is especially susceptible to outsourcing; it’s just a good example of a knowledge based industry of any type. If China bangs out 200,000 biochemists in the next 5 years don’t expect the US economy to be rescued by biotech.

Anyway….. that was an exceptionally long preamble to my thoughts.

I think Globalization became inevitable with the fall of the Soviet Union. For the first time since the fall of the Roman Empire you had a single dominant system operating over most of the world. This time it wasn’t a political system but an economic one – Capitalism won and now communism had fallen it was the only game in town. I think the smart people had figured out that a global capitalist system was now possible, it would have some of the characteristics of an Empire, --- but Americans hate that word, they are like 500lb gorillas that still like to see themselves as a little monkey --- so lets call it a “new world order” instead. The only question left to be decided was who runs it?

I think you are right in thinking that there are multiple players. I just disagree with who they are. My rundown of them is this ---

The UN. For a brief period in the early 90’s the UN looked as if it could run the show, though it became clear this was actually just reflected glory from the success of Dessert Storm. Still the threat had US militia loonies hiding out and looking for “black helicopters” so as entertainment it had some compensations. (Ironic since the UN for most of its life has been a showcase for America --- that’s why it’s based in New York. Diplomatically it’s unusual because UN ambassadors tend to have personal contacts with their country’s ruling elite rather than being career diplomats. The NY base gave the US a major advantage, it meant that representatives of the various nations had to come to the US and were subject to US culture. Further it put people of influence close to US industrial lobbyists --- if a power plant is built in country X, Siemens has no choice but to send a delegation or talk to X’s ambassador to Germany a man with probably little influence. GE’s rep can talk to X’s UN rep, a man linked to the ruling regime AND the GE man doesn’t even have to leave NY state.) Anyway, UN is kinda useless at anything important so that idea fell flat.

PNAC --- the forces of US Imperialism. The central idea of PNAC --- that the 20th century was good to America and that Americans can do things to keep that advantage goes against history – lots of places had the odd good century, not one of them ever thought “well we had a good time, let’s step back and let someone else have a go…” Every empire tried to hang on to power, they all failed because anything organized on that big a scale is inherently unstable. PNAC is like the little Dutch boy with his finger in the dyke trying to stop the inevitable collapse.

American Corporate interests. Allied to any other American group that can help them is US commercial interests. These are the guys that see globalization as a method of making a quick buck for themselves. Key to their strategy is the extension and consolidation of US copyright and intellectual property laws abroad. They have worked out that knowledge based industry is mobile, they intend to move it wherever they can make the biggest profits. They hope that IP laws will stop other people from setting up in competition using the same low cost base. An economist friend of mine calls them “the landlords of the information age.”

American government interest. Currently influenced by PNAC. In Clinton’s day by the DLC. My view is that no mater who supplies the ideology it is the corporate interest that supplies the money, so in the end they will be the one served. For your information America isn’t considered to have a “traditional” method of working. I’ve heard it described like this. Everyone in the world plays diplomacy like chess, and as in chess they are willing to take setbacks to strengthen their overall position. The US plays diplomacy like poker, if it wins a hand it leaves the table and doesn’t think the game is still running. The US has traditionally played the short term advantage game, if you believe that to be a good thing then I worry.

China. Intends to be the big player. No explanations necessary.

India. English gave them an advantage they would like to exploit. They are very active in the Commonwealth and like the idea of bilateral agreements with other Angloized nations. This idea could work.

Saudi’s AlQ. Not a factor in anything. Convenient boogieman for enacting draconian laws in western democracies but not really that effective. Their biggest advantage is the initial shock of their tactics – it’s hard to stop an attack if the attacker doesn’t mind dying.

Europe --- we’re busy right now, please call back in 100 years or so.



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Saturday, November 12, 2005 6:20 AM

CHRISISALL


Quote:
Originally posted by lynchaj:





I am not willing to discuss further on the issue because your other arguments are based on the faulty assertion that "Bush Lied". If and when you can support your assertion, I will continue and expand to other subjects.

You can't PROVE to me that Clinton lied about having any sexual relations with that woman, Ms. Lewinsky. All you have is so-called 'evidence', and maybe he was wrong, but he never actually lied! Convictions can be obtained through less than legal means, so they don't count, either.

Only GOD can deem someone guilty, and he's GW's pal, so no, he never lied.

And don't even START on common sense!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Chrisisall, who never lies.
"Andrew, I'm lying...."
But if he never lies, then he is telling the truth! But if he says he is lying...
Norman, co-ordinate!

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Saturday, November 12, 2005 7:34 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
All I have been asking for is a specific, verifiable, documented quote where President Bush or someone in his administration has publicly LIED about something
And I have previously provided the example of the cost to Medicare of Bush's proposed drug program, which was widely touted by the Administration as $400 billion. However, that was not the figure calculated by the chief actuary.
Quote:
Late one Friday afternoon in January, after the House of Representatives had adjourned for the week, Cybele Bjorklund, a House Democratic health policy aide, heard the buzz of the fax machine at her desk. Coming over the transom, with no hint of the sender, was a document she had been seeking for months: an estimate by Medicare's chief actuary showing the cost of prescription drug benefits for the elderly. Dated June 11, 2003, the document put the cost at $551.5 billion over 10 years. It appeared to confirm what Ms. Bjorklund and her bosses on the House Ways and Means Committee had long suspected: the actuary, Richard S. Foster, had concluded the legislation would be far more expensive than Congress's $400 billion estimate -- and had kept quiet while lawmakers voted on the bill and President Bush signed it into law.
foi.missouri.edu/whistleblowing/mysterious.html
Oh, I'm sure you'll come up with some kind of rationalization as to why this wasn't a LIE. So PLEASE don't bother replying to my post, just let it be noted that I expect some sort of mental gymnastics of the kind I've seen from you many times before. In fact, I will PM someone with your expected answer.... You see, I know your bullshit as well as you do! Sign me (again) "Been there, done that". This will be my last post to you on this topic.

Who volunteers to get the PM?

---------------------------------
Please don't think they give a shit.

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Saturday, November 12, 2005 8:06 AM

DREAMTROVE


Fletch,

1. Comparative advantage. Sure, that's how division of labor between countries happens, why Afirca is in agriculture.

2. Tricky tricky here. I don't think it is really ever about who does it cheaper. Industry tends to gravitate towards the highest wage countries, not the lowest wage, as is commonly believed. Every once in a while a situation like Korea or Eastern Europe will spring up where huge currency differences make educated labor realitvely cheap, but this soon corrects itself. This is not, IMHO, the driving force of industry shift.

3. Who does it better is really the issue. If the Japanese made cheaper suckier cars, they would hold the section of the car market held by Yugoslaiva. People buy Japanese cars because the product is superior. Hands down superior. I love this country, but honestly folks. People buy from Korea because the products are superior. Sometimes they are surperior to the Japanese, sometimes not, But typically superior to the American.

4. People move factories to Korea not because labor is cheap, but because labor is more productive. High worker productivity, high skill base, and favorable govtl. regualtions are the typical things cited at board meetings when moving abroad. Sure there are low end labor markets like Walmart slave labor camps. But on the important tech industries, these are the issues.

5. Think about it, if cost of labor were the issue, everyone would outsource to Haiti. Cheaper than China, anda lot closer too. If skilled labor were the issue, which it often is, everyone would be in easter europe. But skilled labor, favorable regulation and worker productivity are the issue. The places to be are Korea, Japan and Eastern China. On a global scale there are some of the highest wages on Earth.

6. Unfortunately, this presents a more serious problem then your model. If the problem were cost we could simply subsidize and add tarriffs and compensate. This won't cut it. The principle problem is that Koreans are smarter than us, more efficient than us and better organized than us. Sad but true. We need to combat this on every level, with a drastic changes to education, govtl. regulation and work environment.

7. The final place for us to fear is India, for similar reasons. Smarter than they are cheap. China and India both outnumber us in the extreme, but India has a better grasp on education. They are much more likely to mint off 200,000 biochemists for that reason.

8. I was principally talking about players militarily. As an economic force, Here's my list of players:

Saudi/Open/Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda is a major military player, they will dominate 1 billion people I suspect. They are making noise in Europe, which is very far from their home turf, you have to bet that they will be shaking it up in their own world. The Saudis and opec have a ton of cash to throw around. They are another ownership society, but as a risk board, I have to see the black and green army as holding a lot of territory. Al Qaeda and the Saudi's biggest asset is ownership, particularly of the US media, but they will shift it to whatever is working. They invest well.

China and the commies.

India/America. India will take over much of the US economy, and be much more likely to work with us rather than against us.

PNAC/India/America. This is the opposing global monopolist branch of american economic thought to the regularly free market capitalist thought.

Both the America branches will basically be republicans and democrats will be totally marginalized.

EU/Russia will be a lesser player.

Japan/Korea. Together they are probably an America. They're less populated by better educated with fewer slackers. America's actual working population is far lower than that of its rivals percentagewise.

BTW I think international copyright is a doomed prospect, I hope it's not key to anyone's strategy.


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Saturday, November 12, 2005 8:19 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


To all and sundry- I PMd RUe with my guess as to what AJ would say and dang if I wasn't right on target. As I said- AJ has an idee fixe. Only time and an SSRI or beta blocker can help him, and no amount of discussion will change his mind.

---------------------------------
Please don't think they give a shit.

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Saturday, November 12, 2005 8:28 AM

DREAMTROVE


Lynch,

Quote:

I am not going to do your research for you


And the same back to you. Actually, it is YOUR research not mine. I told you where I got this info I posted, from watching cspan religiously, and then I sent you a random link there are an inifinite number of sources.

Here's what I think: (The consensus seems to be)

You are unshakable from your position because:

A) You are some sort of religious extremist who sees the Bush agenda as part of a prophecy, or
B) You benefit from it financially.

In either case, there is no way to win an argument.

Finally I gain nothing by educating you. It seems to be a task that would take an inordinant amount of work and achieve nothing.

Your failure to discuss the actual important issues indicated you know nothing about them, in which case, my interest in this political discourse is zero.

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Saturday, November 12, 2005 8:45 AM

DREAMTROVE


Quote:
Only time and an SSRI or beta blocker can help him


ROFL

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Saturday, November 12, 2005 9:00 AM

CHRISISALL


Quote:
Originally posted by lynchaj:



Nobody says it better than the Boss himself.

Hey Andrew, you give me a quarter, and I'll give you a Reeses peanut butter cup, my kid says there's one in the kitchen (hmm, I thought I ate it, oh well...).
Okay, I got your quarter, but I can't find the candy...
What? You want your quarter back? I already spent it, sorry. But the candy IS there, I just can't find it right now... be patient.
*Years pass*
DUDE, I'm still lookin', in the mean time, you wanna buy my issue #1 of The Amazing Spider-man, mint condition? My kid tells me I left it in my study...

Chrisisall, who still never tells a lie,
but the truth can get a mite bendy...

Now we sing:
"Born in the USA, I was, born in the USA..."

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Saturday, November 12, 2005 10:09 AM

DREAMTROVE


I will that this truth become unbendy?

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Saturday, November 12, 2005 10:13 AM

CHRISISALL


Yer not singin' the Boss' song.

EVERYONE NOW....

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Saturday, November 12, 2005 10:15 AM

CHRISISALL


I lost you with the peanut butter cup thing, didn't I, Andrew?

Obtuse Chrisisall

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Saturday, November 12, 2005 1:32 PM

FLETCH2


DT

I'm assuming here that quality of product remains constant much as Smith did. For example there are very few places in England where you could grow wine grapes, so in practice England couldn't choose to make the wine at home rather than trade. Smith assumed quality would be the same to simplify the argument, I didn't think I needed to explicitly state that, but if I must I must.

First let's reestablish that I am talking about two different economic segments, traditional manufacturing and more modern knowledge based industries.

For traditional industry you say that cost of workers is not the only factor and I would agree, because as I stated there are geographic factors that determine good places to operate industrial plants.

If I had several billion dollars I *could* move industry to eastern europe and exploit those cheap workers as you suggest. That high investment represents the lack of decent infrastructure and the costs of getting it to a level where I could use it. Even if that were done for traditional industry there is still "comparative advantage inertia" If I have a vacuum cleaner factory in Ohio and a US workers using that factory make me profit X per cleaner then for a Polish factory to make sense they would have to make me a considerably bigger profit Y to offset extra distribution costs and the cost of a new factory etc.

What China offered was government subsidised infrastructure improvement coupled with low worker cost. That was why I said that combined it represented a deal too good for most multinationals to pass up. If China can deliver profit Y per vacuum cleaner then that factory in Ohio is toast and that's what happened. I don't know if it's a kind of self loathing but you seem to get the idea that things are outsourced to places with better productivity. That tends not to be the case the US tends to be a world leader in productivity and if some difference did exist between say the US and S Korean it would be marginal and probably not enough to offset the additional shipping and distribution costs of manufacturing offshore. What drives manufacturing offshore is cost base, energy, raw materials and labour costs.

Most other things being similar the deciding factor tends to be labour costs.

Now let's deal with "knowledge industries."

Unlike manufacturing industry they don't need a massive infrastructure investment to get started. Yes they do need educated people, so right now you cant move R&D to subsaharan Africa. What you seem to suggest is that the US is falling behind on educating people and that is why those worthy Asians are winning. You are mistaking effect for cause. The problem is that in knowledge based industries (again assuming comparative levels of skill) the lower worker cost wins out. This is because knowledge based jobs use data as a raw material and modern datacoms technology makes this easy to move about. Chances are if you recently had a catscan your data was sent to India to be analysed. This is not a question of productivity --- I would actually hope that someone checking my medical data would check it carefully --- it is entirely a matter of cost. With modern datacoms if two equally qualified people in two different countries compete for work analysing the same data, the guy with the cheapest labour cost wins. A lot of jobs have gone to India not because it was hard to find qualified US canidates but because our Indian cousins are cheaper. It is the resulting absence of jobs and the resulting fall in pay that then makes these high tech careers less attractive to new students. If you are taking on considerable debt to get an education you want some garentee of a return on that investment.

So it is as stated labour costs. Now here's the interesting thing. Labour costs are low in part because the cost base in these places is also low. I had a friend who would go to India every year to visit relatives. At the station he would hire a man servant and a maid at two pounds a day. They would cook/clean/do his laundary and run his errands while he was there. His argument at paying them so low was that at that time he was paying 3 times the going rate in that village. Right now the cost of living in Bangalore are low so there is little pressure on wage inflation. However, there will be a trickle down effect to these tech dollars which will boost the local economy and over time the cost base will rise as a result. My belief is that by then other places in the world will step up and start the process of offshoring FROM India.

The problem for the West is that you can't cut your cost base because a lot of it is tied up in the value of concrete assets. An engineer in Bangalore could until recently buy a nice house on 1/3rd of the pay of an American in the same field. This was what allowed him to keep his job price so low. Now however India is starting to see a real estate boom and house prices are going up. When a point is reached where the engineer can no longer afford to buy he will either relocate within India, using the mobile nature of his job, or his pay will go higher.

The problem for the US is that this underlying costbase cannot fall significantly unless the US economy suffers massive deflation, something that would be disasterous socially.



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Saturday, November 12, 2005 1:32 PM

FLETCH2


DT

I'm assuming here that quality of product remains constant much as Smith did. For example there are very few places in England where you could grow wine grapes, so in practice England couldn't choose to make the wine at home rather than trade. Smith assumed quality would be the same to simplify the argument, I didn't think I needed to explicitly state that, but if I must I must.

First let's reestablish that I am talking about two different economic segments, traditional manufacturing and more modern knowledge based industries.

For traditional industry you say that cost of workers is not the only factor and I would agree, because as I stated there are geographic factors that determine good places to operate industrial plants.

If I had several billion dollars I *could* move industry to eastern europe and exploit those cheap workers as you suggest. That high investment represents the lack of decent infrastructure and the costs of getting it to a level where I could use it. Even if that were done for traditional industry there is still "comparative advantage inertia" If I have a vacuum cleaner factory in Ohio and a US workers using that factory make me profit X per cleaner then for a Polish factory to make sense they would have to make me a considerably bigger profit Y to offset extra distribution costs and the cost of a new factory etc.

What China offered was government subsidised infrastructure improvement coupled with low worker cost. That was why I said that combined it represented a deal too good for most multinationals to pass up. If China can deliver profit Y per vacuum cleaner then that factory in Ohio is toast and that's what happened. I don't know if it's a kind of self loathing but you seem to get the idea that things are outsourced to places with better productivity. That tends not to be the case the US tends to be a world leader in productivity and if some difference did exist between say the US and S Korean it would be marginal and probably not enough to offset the additional shipping and distribution costs of manufacturing offshore. What drives manufacturing offshore is cost base, energy, raw materials and labour costs.

Most other things being similar the deciding factor tends to be labour costs.

Now let's deal with "knowledge industries."

Unlike manufacturing industry they don't need a massive infrastructure investment to get started. Yes they do need educated people, so right now you cant move R&D to subsaharan Africa. What you seem to suggest is that the US is falling behind on educating people and that is why those worthy Asians are winning. You are mistaking effect for cause. The problem is that in knowledge based industries (again assuming comparative levels of skill) the lower worker cost wins out. This is because knowledge based jobs use data as a raw material and modern datacoms technology makes this easy to move about. Chances are if you recently had a catscan your data was sent to India to be analysed. This is not a question of productivity --- I would actually hope that someone checking my medical data would check it carefully --- it is entirely a matter of cost. With modern datacoms if two equally qualified people in two different countries compete for work analysing the same data, the guy with the cheapest labour cost wins. A lot of jobs have gone to India not because it was hard to find qualified US canidates but because our Indian cousins are cheaper. It is the resulting absence of jobs in the US and the resulting fall in pay that then makes these high tech careers less attractive to new students. If you are taking on considerable debt to get an education you want some garentee of a return on that investment.

So it is as stated labour costs. Now here's the interesting thing. Labour costs are low in part because the cost base in these places is also low. I had a friend who would go to India every year to visit relatives. At the station he would hire a man servant and a maid at two pounds a day. They would cook/clean/do his laundary and run his errands while he was there. His argument at paying them so low was that at that time he was paying 3 times the going rate in that village. Right now the cost of living in Bangalore are low so there is little pressure on wage inflation. However, there will be a trickle down effect to these tech dollars which will boost the local economy and over time the cost base will rise as a result. My belief is that by then other places in the world will step up and start the process of offshoring FROM India.

The problem for the West is that you can't cut your cost base because a lot of it is tied up in the value of concrete assets. An engineer in Bangalore could until recently buy a nice house on 1/3rd of the pay of an American in the same field. This was what allowed him to keep his job price so low. Now however India is starting to see a real estate boom and house prices are going up. When a point is reached where the engineer can no longer afford to buy he will either relocate within India, using the mobile nature of his job, or his pay will go higher.

The problem for the US is that this underlying costbase cannot fall significantly unless the US economy suffers massive deflation, something that would be disasterous socially.



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Saturday, November 12, 2005 2:23 PM

DREAMTROVE


Lynch,

1. I stated my case
2. 98% of the world already accepts bush-liar
3. So What.
4. I gain nothing by engaging you, and waste time
5. Moving on...


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Saturday, November 12, 2005 2:54 PM

DREAMTROVE


Fletch,

In general I'm faithful to the founding ideas of America, but if America isn't faithful to them, I have little loyalty.

If I were hiring, whether I hire americans or someone else depends on who has the skills.

Quote:

I don't know if it's a kind of self loathing but you seem to get the idea that things are outsourced to places with better productivity.


Oh no, but it's true.

It's a sad truth, but it's a very true truth. Koreans are better workers.

If I hire Americans, here's the deal

1. for every hour the govt. will make me pay up to $20/ worker, vs. $1 in korea, this is totally aside from wages.

2. American workers have poor education, poor test scores and drug problems.

Naturally, I'd be very selective of my Americans, but if you were to ask me right now, given a total random sampling, who would you pick, Japanaese would come first, and Koreans second, followed by E.Europeans, and Canadians (our biggest outsourcing partners) E.Indians might edge out Americans. This is just from objective studies I've read in the financial news. People care about results first.

The solution is America needs its ass in gear. People here dilly dally over whether or not it would be right or acceptable to stop the drug trade or reform the education system. From my POV it's not really an optional thing, it's an absolute necessity.

Right now, in the global free market, E. Asia is winning, and it deserves to win.

Yeah, you heard me right.

As long as America has her head burried in the sand, E. Asia deserves to win.

China has a right to subsidize its labor if it wants, so do we. It may not be "fair trade" but I'm not much for fairness. This is tooth and nail.

Re: where can you go

Right now you can't do jack in subsaharan africa because there's no infrastructure and for the most part no education. India is a different matter.

It's simply not sound to say an Indian worker isn't more effective than an American. I've watched them work, it is so, they do work harder. Many places they work harder. On average. Sure there are plenty of great workers in America. But we can't afford to rest on our laurels, or trust in our own superiority.

It's a drag out fight, and may the best man win. All I'm trying to do is give America a much needed kick in the ass.

The thing is cost of labor is totally subjective. You can hire guys in inner city America for les than you can in India. Will they have tech. skills, sure. Will they have competitive tech. skills, probably not. Does the equiv. tech. skills cost more here? Yes, sure, becuase it's rarer here.

But the reality is what we outsource to low wage markets is bottom rung labor, call centers and the stuffing of little toy dogs. Could this be outsourced to America's poor? Sure, but not if the present regulations stay in place.

So what does a corp. pay for each American it hires?

Personal Income Tax. 95% goes to defense in some form or other, so I call this War Tax. War Tax is not paid by workers, you as a worker never see this money. It is sent by the company to the govt. in your name. It's part of the price they pay for hiring an American. This is about 50% as much as your take home pay on avg.

Medical Coverage. This typically comes to $7/hr. If the US would simply institure sane and non corrupt medical market reform similar to that in east asia the current medicare budget (paid by the 6% medicare tax, not the fed inc. tax.) would more than pay to cover all americans.

State Tax or as I like to call it, Education Tax, because that's where much of this money goes. Right now because of our yes socialist, essentially, state controlled education system we have a highly innefectual, highly costly, education system. $15,000 per child per year. This is the price of college tuition. Open private sector competition could cut this cost by 2/3.

Aux. Benefits, retirement, soc. sec. etc. Most corporations are paying into two redundant and highly inefficient systems riddled with corruption for the people they hire. As much as 13% can go to SS and up to 6% for IRA. This could be slashed to about 2% if it was shifted into one comprehensive corporate bond investment program. I'm talking g'teed returnd with govt. insurance backing it up, not gamble on the market stuff. It has to be better than the current soc. sec. which BTW returns only 30 cents on the dollar for everything put into it. And yes, that's no interest, plus 70% disappearing into thin air, that's what we have now.

Sorry for the rant.

Essentially, I mean to say, we could create a totally compeitive business structure with no loss of services and pull our educational quality up with our competitor nations, for the same 10% or so that they pay, rather than the 200% of take home pay per worker that we pay for these services here today.

There is one hitch though. We would have to abandon a quixotic military quest for global domination.

Since we could do all of this and compete successfully with not just Japan and Korean, but China as well, and the communists there would not stop spending on their quixotic quest for global domination, we could ultimately beat them. But it means getting out act together and doing it now.


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Saturday, November 12, 2005 4:28 PM

FLETCH2


I am not saying Indians are less effective, I work with a lot of them and they are very smart people. Read what I wrote again. Compare two equally qualified canidates in different parts of the world and the lower cost man wins. I'm not suggesting that lesser cost in any way infers a less capable man, just the reality of basic capitalist economics. Do they "deserve" to win, no, because what you deserve is a subjective thing, they win because they can do the same job at a lower price.

Now part of the reason they can offer lower prices is because the cost base is less. You said before that you scrape through week to week on your pay. If tomorrow your company instituted a 66% pay cut could you live on your new salary? Assuming your energy costs, housing and food costs remained constant I'm guessing that you couldn't and yet someone in India could live comfortably on that 1/3rd income because costs of living over there are lower. Property prices are lower, food prices in fact probably only energy prices would be comparable. No matter how hard an American works he can't be paid less than his cost base and still survive, If he cant make morgage/rent, if he cant pay for food/education he's toast. People in China and India are paid less than it costs just to survive in the US no matter how far you go you can't make the cost base that low. Yes a big part of that is government phantom taxes and benefits but it's also higher food prices brought on by agricultural subsidies and the cost of real estate.

Now here's your biggest problem. Most working people have most of their life incomes invested in their home, it's appreciation represents the biggest capital gain most people ever see. Part of the reason customer confidence in the US didn't tank in 2001 was that house costs remained boyant, people felt comfortable because they held considerable equity in their homes, interest rates were low enough that many refinaced. That and the "tax cut" injected capital into the US economy at a critical time.

To compete with India and China and force that cost base down real estate prices would have to be adjusted downwards. An Indian can buy a modest house on an income of less than $16,000. You would be hard pressed to do the same in the US. However if real estate falls so does people's equity and they feel poorer. That makes the adjustment unlikely to pass political muster.

For knowledge based jobs there is nothing a qualified American can do that an equally qualified Indian can't do cheaper. No new knowledge based industry you produce cant equally be developed in India or China given enough educated talent. Only three things can change this.

1) An adjustment of costbase between nations, painfull for the US to adjust down but others will adjust up in time.

2) Interlectual protectionism. US companies ride into new territory and stake IP claims before the other guys get there. This is what the current trenjd to force US style IP laws through the WTO is about -- "landlords of the information age."

3) Technical security --- basically if both contries produce equally qualified people the lower cost guy wins. So you establish "comparative advantage" by developing industries based on trade secrecy where only your guys know the secret formular and you only teach Americans certain technologies. Not workable because smart people will figure it out. The Russian's stole the A bomb but the unpublished secret that makes the H bomb work they figured out from first principles (I could tell you what that is but under US law I'd then have to kill you )


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Saturday, November 12, 2005 6:04 PM

DREAMTROVE


Sure, granted. But I don't think cost is the principle driving force. Cost equalizes itself in the global market extremely quickly. Salaries in China for certain jobs are already up to the same as their American equivalents. Japanese people still find jobs by turning in much higher worker productivity.

Now I'm a bad example here because I'm a pretty much subsistance person, and I am self employed. If I lost my source of income, I wouldn't run into too many problems. But I get most Americans would,m particularly if they're life is debt financed.

The Bush tax cuts were pathetic. From the completely opposite perspective from the democrats, I see the tax cuts as not nearly far enough. Here would have been a good start: The Tax Abolish. That wouldn't solve the problem, but it would be a good start.

Bush's tax cuts were bonuses for his rich friends, as the dems say, but the dems are wrong that those should go away. The truth is they need to be more thoroughly spread to the working classes. Not to help the working man, the working man doesn't really pay taxes, he only thinks he does. His employer pays the taxes.

But I have some real key things to say about this:

1. The problem is so much worse than it appears. It's not just competition, but rapidfire automation and drastic increase in the globally active population will send the current economy through the floor.

2. America is nowhere near ready. If Indian wages pass American wages on the way up, tomorrow, which they probably will, over 90% of Americans will still be unemployable.

3. I don't think the solution the US will actually apply is even on the right track. I think it's about 180 degrees away from where it needs to be. The US is likely to launch on some protectionist plan. America needs to compete globally. If it shuts itself off, it is doomed.

4. What America needs to do is use good old American knowhow to hold on to the cutting edge, and to drastically realign its economy to compete with the new order.

Finally, I don't think America will really do any of these things I say, and so it will probably do yours. I feel absolutely convinced that this will doom it to certain failure. Since I think this course is pretty close to sealed in fate, and I am already certain of the outcome, I don't know where that leaves this debate.

I'm sort of coming I guess from a theoretical perspective of if anyone would pay attention to what's happening, America wouldn't have to die a horrible death. Maybe the best place to carry that is to think of how one could create a new America somewhere as a subset. That would require being free from the Tax Machine, the unltimate business killer.

You did read that stuff I posted earlier that these 'cheap labor' countries workers are actually earning more money, esp. places like Korea, they get more dollars per hour than the American workers they're replacing do. It's the absence of the auxilliary taxes and govt. mandated expenses that makes them 'cheaper.'

I agree we need to adjust our wages down, and the first place to start is getting rid of those auxilliary expenses that are attached to hiring americans, my last post i thought i laid out a detailed plan to do that.

I don't think that attempts to control the technology are even a good idea. I think it slows progress. Better to keep acrest of the wave and try to hold on to the major share of the traffic.

I think in general trade secrets will lower the information exchange, and slow the progress again. Information sharing societies will take over.

It'll be tough. I think we'll lose horribly. I think our number one problem, BTW, is drugs. A person on drugs is functionally no more intelligent, from a problem solving perspective, than some of the higher functioning animals, monkeys, mice, etc. Our second problem is education. We waste at least 90% of classroom time, and with a little help from intelligent design we can push that to 95%.

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Sunday, November 13, 2005 6:27 AM

CHRISISALL


According to Andrew, all you have to do is say anything you want, then add on "I'm told" or "I believe" or "It seems to be the case", and you're NOT lying!!
And find some old weapons and snow-cone machines or whatever, and presto! The tip of the (as yet unfound) WMD iceberg!!

Andrew can be such an idiot, I'm told.

Chrisisall, also an idiot at times, I believe

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Sunday, November 13, 2005 6:32 AM

DREAMTROVE


Should I tell you again.

Actually. let's try this one.

Everything Bush says is a lie.

I'm told that can't be disproven.

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Sunday, November 13, 2005 9:40 AM

CHRISISALL


Quote:
Originally posted by lynchaj:
Chris, do you have anything constructive to add to this discussion or are you just here to disrupt it with endless blithering?

I am here to chew bubblegum and kick ass. And I'm aaaall outta bubblegum.

Chrisisall:)

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Sunday, November 13, 2005 10:55 AM

CHRISISALL


Quote:
Originally posted by lynchaj:
If all you want is to be silly and make nonsense statements please start another thread. You can go on as much as you want there.

Hey, all's fair, Andrew. Go ahead, I invite you to hijack some of my threads.
C'mon, let your inner child go wild!

Chrisisall, the anti-Bush, anti-lie, anti-WMD, anti-matter man

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Sunday, November 13, 2005 11:45 AM

CHRISISALL


Quote:
Originally posted by lynchaj:
I recommend everyone read the whole article at the following URL before commenting on this thread.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Printable.asp?ID=20082

BTW, this 'Guide to the Left' is about as brainwashed as you can get. Now I see where you learned all you semantics. There's a lot of truth in what they say, but they point all smoking guns in a lefterly direction. They are just the mirror of the lunatic liberal fringe (and devoid of the funny to boot). Pointing fingers is easy; getting to the root causes takes digging and understanding of how the process of dirty politics works as a whole. There's a lot of blame at both ends of the spectrum for the woes in our world.
But they keep us divided, which is their fundamental goal, I suspect.

Chrisisall

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Sunday, November 13, 2005 12:08 PM

GEEZER

Keep the Shiny side up


Quote:
Originally posted by Geezer:
C,mon, Lynch. Don't you realize that, although this much info about a Bushie would lead the crowd here into an impeachment frenzy, you won't even get a discussion going about this particular topic. Just another chorus of "Bush lied!", all the while ignoring this evidence that one if the people who calls him that isn't too truthful himself.


So, Lynch. Can I call 'em or not? I've been traveling and haven't had a chance to participate here, but it went just about as I expected.

Actually, the most interesting thing in this whole thread was your links to the ISSA article about the Lybian deception around the Niger-Iraq yellowcake tie-in.


"Keep the Shiny side up"

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Sunday, November 13, 2005 12:46 PM

CHRISISALL


Hey, G. I would direct you to my Arnie for prez thread. And yeah, you can call 'em.

Chrisisall, one of the crowd.

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Sunday, November 13, 2005 2:11 PM

CITIZEN


*Wants to go back to the Trek stuff, that S**t was reeeaaal funny*


More insane ramblings by the people who brought you Beeeer Milkshakes!

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Sunday, November 13, 2005 2:51 PM

CHRISISALL


Quote:
Originally posted by lynchaj:


Once the photos and videos emerge of Iraqi WMD SCUD launch sites getting wiped out by Australian SAS commandos it is going to turn this whole Iraq WMD story completely on its head. Then some anti-war folks here in the US are going to have some really tough 'splaining to do.

Bring it. I will be one of the first to order up a healthy heapin' of crow.
Just don't see it comin', is all.

Chrisisall

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Sunday, November 13, 2005 3:40 PM

DREAMTROVE


Lynch is living in a fantasy land.

What this war is really about has nothing to do with freeing Iraq.

This is one of the reasons I hated Clinton.
This is the post-Gulf war campaign. To dehumanize and destroy the people of Iraq so we can control their govt. and steal their oil wholesale.

I hated Saddam Hussein because this is what he did to them. I guess I had an illusion that the United States of America was somehow better than that. I thought we had taught that lesson tot he world in Kuwait.

But no. What ensued was a dehumanizing campaign of starvation, slaughter, and torture, for more than a decade. It's a genocidal pogram which has claimed over a million lives.

The reason we are there close to alone is that we would not budge on the issue of our right to that oil. It's the reason they invited Al Qaeda in to fight us. This latest battle royale had not yet even begun when the Hussein govt. fell. Peace and democracy in Iraq was very possible at that point. All we had to do was give up claims to that oil, and if Bush and all his neofacist former commie cronies can't do that, they're no better than Saddam Hussein. And in that case...

Bush,

You Uncle Tom.

Come on people.

This isn't a spectator sport.

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Sunday, November 13, 2005 4:49 PM

MALBADLATIN


So what if Wilson lied, its Fake but Accurate. The whole story fits into the current progressive transnationalist Bu$h lied meme. Even if elements within the Wilson story have been proven to be false the story continues to be pushed forward, just like the Bush - national guard story, Mary Mapes still insists that the forged documents are genuine.

I don't deny the Bush administration kept swapping stances looking for a trial balloon that would generate support for the invasion of Iraq. What bothers me is that Wilson is a political plant whose sole purpose is to generate opposition to conservatives during the runup to the senatorial elections next year and ammo for the 2008 Presidential elections.

All I want is honest dialogue, if a politician lies to us I want them booted out of office. I don't care if they have a (R) or (D) next to their name.






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Sunday, November 13, 2005 6:14 PM

DREAMTROVE


Quote:

if a politician lies to us I want them booted out of office. I don't care if they have a (R) or (D) next to their name.


Bush Sr. personally vouched for Wilson. That's all I need. Wilson worked for Bush, and Plame worked for the CIA. People in the CIA are not allowed to politicize intelligence. They vouched for her, so we have to assume that she didn't violate their rules. All in all, everything Bush says is a lie, so if Bushes people spin the "Wilson is a liar" story, how can we possibly believe a word of it. Even the underlying evidence is suspect, because it is all possibly made up by an attack machine with a track record of almost never telling the truth on anything.

Believing anything that the Bush support team put out would be as daft as believing the information spit out by Tass or its Iraqi equivalent.

Show me a story in guardian.co.uk to back your claim, and I'll listen.

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Monday, November 14, 2005 2:57 AM

FLETCH2


Not sorry at all that Saddam has gone --- any regime that uses rape as a method of political control needs to be fought. Glad we got him.


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