The Ugly Face of Socialism

MikeK

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I favor greater reliance on nuclear power. It really can't be called cheap anymore though.

I like the idea of making more machine tools in the US - but the problem with US-built machine tools was that they were simply not cost competetive. With tarrifs we can make American companies pay for American machines by artificially raising the cost of foreign-made machines, but that favors everyone else, not us. Sure, Hardinge will sell more Bridgeports at $16k a pop and that creates a (literal) handful of jobs - but now American machine shops are spending $16k to buy a machine that is no better than the foreign model they bought last year for $6500. Everybody else is paying $6500 for knee mills. Additionally, now the Asian world is mad because overnight their export machine tool business dries up. Is it your intent that American businesses will be able to sell to American buyers but not be competetive globally, especially since other countries will likely also employ protectionist tax policies more than they are today on goods imported from the US? I'm not saying that won;t work, I don;t know if it will, I'm just wondering if I'm understanding your plan.

Also, in the event that we decide to open steel mills, auto plants, etc, you'll need a few brainy guys. I have a hand in hiring metalurgists, engineers, metrologists, etc. At least half of our hires come from India. Americans, on average, aren't that bright and don't work very hard. They want to make a lot of money and work 40 hour weeks. Indians will gladly work long hours, produce more, and of a higher quality, all while demanding less money to do it. How do we turn that around in a generation or less?
 
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Antigone

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I favor greater reliance on nuclear power. It really can't be called cheap anymore though.

I don't get why you 'murcans don't just cover the whole of New Mexico in solar panels. From what I hear nobody wants to live there anyway.

(kidding, New Mexicans)
 
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AMDG

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MikeK

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I don't get why you 'murcans don't just cover the whole of New Mexico in solar panels. From what I hear nobody wants to live there anyway.

(kidding, New Mexicans)

Are New Mexicans like New Bohemeans? If so, they're awesome.

I know nothing about large scale solar power, but if I had to guess I'd suspect that they use solar and wind to the extent possible with fossil to fill in the gaps. I suspect line loss is the reason they don't export power to better states, it costs a lot of money to move electricity efficiently.
 
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AMDG

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I don't get why you 'murcans don't just cover the whole of New Mexico in solar panels.

The EPA wouldn't allow it. (It might hurt the little lizards.... ;) ) Besides it just wouldn't provide enough energy for the whole continent (not even if we added the windfarms that the EPA says is killing the birds so we need us to stop that too.)
 
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AMDG

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usury is another problem and is what mainly caused the housing crisis bubble. Since people like Alan Greenspan did nothing to properly control the usury abuse and excessive loaning that was going on. Sub prime mortgages were motivated by interest greed. They didn't care if people couldn't pay them.

Must disagree here too. What caused the housing bubble was not usury. It was a lack of personal morality. In the 90s the admin. said that everyone should have the "American Dream" of a house--even if they *knew* that they couldn't afford it so the admin. forced banks to give loans for houses to people who *knew* that they couldn't afford a house. NINJ--no income, no job--loans and nothing down on the home either. Immoral folks jumped at the chance to get something for nothing. And things were wonderful at first. But soon things at Freddie Mac and Fanny Mae showed problems, but of course our "friend" Congressman Barney Frank kept saying that all was just fine and there was no need for concern. (I was shocked when I found on a free Canada site that Bush questioned it in 2001, but that's as far as it went. Frank kept assuring all that all was good. The site has probably been "scrubbed" now--haven't looked again.) Anyway, it wasn't usury that brought on the housing bubble and subsequent collapse--it was the NINJ loans that the government forced the banks to make against better judgment. And it was all the people who wanted something for nothing and the lying politicians that used those people to get votes so that they could remain at the public feed trough. If everyone was moral and honest it would have never happened. Hmmm--maybe that's in part what was meant when the founders said that this country was made for those religious and moral and without that, it would fail.
 
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Aeyamar

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Are New Mexicans like New Bohemeans? If so, they're awesome.

I know nothing about large scale solar power, but if I had to guess I'd suspect that they use solar and wind to the extent possible with fossil to fill in the gaps. I suspect line loss is the reason they don't export power to better states, it costs a lot of money to move electricity efficiently.

From what I've read, even if we used solar technology from a few years ago, we would only need a roughly 10 by 10 mile square of panels to generate enough power for the entire country.

Assuming we take that and distribute it to the states and these plants are half as effective outside of the dessert, all we need is an average of 4 sq mi of solar panel per state. The large under populated states can have this area spread out among many locations to ensure good power distribution and will likely require less than the 4sq mi in total area anyway. The more densely populous states will require more solar land area but since panels even if they require double or triple the average power this amounts to only 8 or 12 sq miles which in most populous states could be placed in the relatively rural lands outside of the main cities. You may run into some problems with really small and populated states like NJ, CT, RI and DE. But if you could find some land within the states or just close to the border in the next state (In NJ you could get land in northern swamps or the southern parts of the states), I think this one goes away too.
 
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AMDG

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From what I've read, even if we used solar technology from a few years ago, we would only need a roughly 10 by 10 mile square of panels to generate enough power for the entire country.

Assuming we take that and distribute it to the states and these plants are half as effective outside of the dessert, all we need is an average of 4 sq mi of solar panel per state.

There are some states that do not get sun the required amount of time. (Did you think that Forks in that Twilight Trilogy was as imaginary as the sparkeling vampires? It's not. And the joke goes that people in this area of the country rust rather than tan. And don't forget that some parts of Alaska have six months of darkness a year.) Some states have other reasons that solar panels aren't all that feasible--too mountaninous, too populated, or whatever. And it seems like a joke, but the EPA has already stopped some solar panels in the desert because they end up "frying" the resident lizards. IOW solar power *seems* like a good idea, but like that Solyndra company that took the taxpayers money while going under, it's a bust and will leave the people "holding the bag". Also, athough I realize that the people in the Northeast seldom realize it, there *must* be some land given over to food production.
 
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StThomasMore

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Must disagree here too. What caused the housing bubble was not usury. It was a lack of personal morality. In the 90s the admin. said that everyone should have the "American Dream" of a house--even if they *knew* that they couldn't afford it so the admin. forced banks to give loans for houses to people who *knew* that they couldn't afford a house. NINJ--no income, no job--loans and nothing down on the home either. Immoral folks jumped at the chance to get something for nothing. And things were wonderful at first. But soon things at Freddie Mac and Fanny Mae showed problems, but of course our "friend" Congressman Barney Frank kept saying that all was just fine and there was no need for concern. (I was shocked when I found on a free Canada site that Bush questioned it in 2001, but that's as far as it went. Frank kept assuring all that all was good. The site has probably been "scrubbed" now--haven't looked again.) Anyway, it wasn't usury that brought on the housing bubble and subsequent collapse--it was the NINJ loans that the government forced the banks to make against better judgment. And it was all the people who wanted something for nothing and the lying politicians that used those people to get votes so that they could remain at the public feed trough. If everyone was moral and honest it would have never happened. Hmmm--maybe that's in part what was meant when the founders said that this country was made for those religious and moral and without that, it would fail.

It was uncontrolled usury that caused ARM mortgages to balloon out of control. As adjustable-rate mortgages began to reset at higher interest rates (causing higher monthly payments), mortgage delinquencies soared. With people like Alan Greenspan doing absolutely nothing to curb the interest rate problems that were going on.

Why did they even give loans to people who they knew were unreliable and couldn't pay them? Because they knew people with lower FICO scores could be charged much higher interest rates than people with higher FICO scores. So instead of the banks just saying no, they decided to give these people loans because they wanted to blast them with higher interest rates. The government didn't have much to do with it, since these loans were from the private sector. Motivated by greed they bundled subprime and regular mortgages together which looked wonderful on paper due to the nice looking return it could give. But it was all an illusion. But at the core it is all based on fraudulent usury
 
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Baqueinfaith

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The U.S has one of the lowest tax rates in the world. So I don't believe that its taxes because people are going overseas. Its because of corporate greed and trying the squeeze the work penny as much as possible. There are companies that live in countries that have much higher taxes than the U.S., and they don't go on mass market exodus of work layoffs so they can take advantage of destitute overseas Chinese workers. I know one company a friend worked for, and out of the capital and money they make, only 5% of it actually goes to the workers wages. Like I said earlier, the profit from the amount of product I make in ONE day is enough to cover over half a years wage for me. That means from the profit of that product, I only make 0.5% that comes from it.

Economist Intelligence Unit placed the United States second, behind the Netherlands, for the "best place in the world to conduct business."And a study by GrowthPlus, a European think tank, compared 10 major countries to determine which had the best environment for entrepreneurial growth companies.Again, the United States finished second, this time behind Britain.

So in reality corporate companies in the U.S. really have no excuse. Rather they just want their cake and eat it too. They want the benefits of laize faire capitalism from the U.S. while at the same time reaping the benefits of the extremely low wages that communist countries force on their citizens. Funny how these people claim that they are pure capitalists , but yet seem to have no problem getting involved in communist countries for the sake of more capital gain.

I never said illegal aliens should be hired and work. When jobs hire an employee they always require 2 forms of I-9 identification. Usually a SS card, Birth Certificate, etc. Its not like illegals can just waltz on in and take American jobs. I agree that too many immigrants have taken too many jobs in the market and have left born americans without any space left to find work when they get laid off. But this is because corporatist companies know that many immigrants are willing to take lower wages, and they take advantage of this.

Inflation is what kills an economy. And a proper income policy would give a proper inflation ceiling so people cannot charge over the value of a product. It would also give more value to the dollar if there was ever an increase in minimum wage and prevent inflation because of it. I never said prices should be calculated. I had stated there should be a ceiling than one cannot go over. The market can calculate its own prices. And there is already a black-market anyway.

usury is another problem and is what mainly caused the housing crisis bubble. Since people like Alan Greenspan did nothing to properly control the usury abuse and excessive loaning that was going on. Sub prime mortgages were motivated by interest greed. They didn't care if people couldn't pay them.

I specifically referred to corporate tax rates. US corporate tax rates are among the HIGHEST in the world.

And we tax corporations on income earned anywhere. So they keep profit earned abroad abroad, instead of bringing it back to the US.

Please read what I write before trying to debunk it.

Your point about companies in higher taxed countries again, falls, because US corporate taxes are higher than corporate taxes in those countries.

But that was only one point I made.

Plus, many, many other developed countries have been de-industrialized. The few that haven't are either tiny, or relied on serious protectionism.

They want the benefits of laize faire capitalism from the U.S. while at the same time reaping the benefits of the extremely low wages that communist countries force on their citizens.

Okay, I thought we were going to have a serious conversation. I see that we're not.
 
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Baqueinfaith

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I favor greater reliance on nuclear power. It really can't be called cheap anymore though.

It's still worth it.

I l
ike the idea of making more machine tools in the US - but the problem with US-built machine tools was that they were simply not cost competetive. With tarrifs we can make American companies pay for American machines by artificially raising the cost of foreign-made machines, but that favors everyone else, not us.

Or, we can subsidize American machine tool exports, so long as they are manufactured domestically, while raising tarrifs on imported machines. That's actually the standard way of creating an industrial base. It works.

Sure, Hardinge will sell more Bridgeports at $16k a pop and that creates a (literal) handful of jobs - but now American machine shops are spending $16k to buy a machine that is no better than the foreign model they bought last year for $6500. Everybody else is paying $6500 for knee mills.

That's why you subsidize their manufacture.

Additionally, now the Asian world is mad because overnight their export machine tool business dries up.

Well, too bad for them. They've been doing that to American companies. The EU fights back against Chinese bullying. France doesn't stand for half the nonsense from China that America does. If Americans would stop glamorizing Asian culture, they'd see that China needs us more than we need China. My friends in finance tell me the Chinese economy is one big joke that needs to keep buying American debt to keep its illusion of growth. They can't do anything about it.

Is it your intent that American businesses will be able to sell to American buyers but not be competetive globally, especially since other countries will likely also employ protectionist tax policies more than they are today on goods imported from the US? I'm not saying that won;t work, I don;t know if it will, I'm just wondering if I'm understanding your plan.

You're understanding it. Other countries are already protectionist. And the Asians...the Asians steal and copy every technology anybody produces in their countries. Without license. And then there's the "legal" way the Chinese do it, by requiring partial tech transfer for any company that even does business in China. Along with, of course, brazen theft.

Also, in the event that we decide to open steel mills, auto plants, etc, you'll need a few brainy guys. I have a hand in hiring metalurgists, engineers, metrologists, etc. At least half of our hires come from India. Americans, on average, aren't that bright and don't work very hard. They want to make a lot of money and work 40 hour weeks. Indians will gladly work long hours, produce more, and of a higher quality, all while demanding less money to do it. How do we turn that around in a generation or less?

Well maybe the Indians should go back to India and stop lowering our wages.

I go to UC. I'm in the sciences. I deal with Asian students, both American born and foreign born. They really aren't that smart. I could tell you story after story after story. The Indians are better, but the East Asians? No. Family members of mine didn't believe me until they too started working with loads of them. Let's just say the stereotype of knowing how to take tests, and learning things by rote while not being able to think for themselves...isn't a stereotype. Again, Indians seem to be better, though they aren't very good at decision making.

As for the other cultural problems they bring, again, I could tell you story after story after story, but I'll let the NY Times do it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/06/education/edlife/the-china-conundrum.html?pagewanted=all

This article doesn't tell you the half of it. It barely scratches the surface. And the problems, as well as being deeper and more common, and affected the Asian-American students, are also far, far more severe.

As for how we turn it around? Pretty simple to me.

We abandon this joke that is "egalitarian" schooling.

We institute an education system something like Germany's. We separate students, not into different classes, butinto different schools entirely based on ability and need. But need does not trump ability.

We will ahve academic high schools, accessible only to the academically high-achieving. No other criteria.

Then we have technical schools.

And finally we have neighborhood schools.

In addition to actually, finally educated people, it will also promote social mobility, because those with talent who come from por environments, can be thrown into an environment where the ethos is one of success.

This seems like a rather obvious solution to me that people can't seem to grasp. Egalitarian schools fail everyone.
 
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Baqueinfaith

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I don't get why you 'murcans don't just cover the whole of New Mexico in solar panels. From what I hear nobody wants to live there anyway.

(kidding, New Mexicans)

Wind and solar both require back up conventional power plants, because they don't consistently produce energy.

Also, exactly how much of our landscape do we have to deface?
 
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Baqueinfaith

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There are some states that do not get sun the required amount of time. (Did you think that Forks in that Twilight Trilogy was as imaginary as the sparkeling vampires? It's not. And the joke goes that people in this area of the country rust rather than tan. And don't forget that some parts of Alaska have six months of darkness a year.) Some states have other reasons that solar panels aren't all that feasible--too mountaninous, too populated, or whatever. And it seems like a joke, but the EPA has already stopped some solar panels in the desert because they end up "frying" the resident lizards. IOW solar power *seems* like a good idea, but like that Solyndra company that took the taxpayers money while going under, it's a bust and will leave the people "holding the bag". Also, athough I realize that the people in the Northeast seldom realize it, there *must* be some land given over to food production.

I think....I think I love you.:love:
 
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Antigone

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Wind and solar both require back up conventional power plants, because they don't consistently produce energy.

Also, exactly how much of our landscape do we have to deface?

Not that much. I think another poster pointed out you need about ten square miles to power a big city.

And how much of that desert, exactly, were you using for aesthetic purposes?
 
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Baqueinfaith

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Not that much. I think another poster pointed out you need about ten square miles to power a big city.

And how much of that desert, exactly, were you using for aesthetic purposes?

Well, thing is, I'm still hoping Frieda Kahlo will come back an paint more flowers and stuff. And what happens if she comes back and the one flower she wanted to paint is now a solar panel?

Did you think of that?

You ought to be ashamed of yourself.

(This post has been tongue in cheek and is not meant to be taken seriously)
 
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Antigone

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Frieda Kahlo can just go on and use her imagination. Or google a picture of a flower. I think it's about time she got up with them modern times, y'know? Get that girl an iBook.

But the point is, you still need a back up station that is capable of producing consistent power.

What, in case the sun stops burning?

I don't have that many problems with nuclear energy (unusual for a lefty, I know, but still) but I think using it as a main power source will yield in nuclear waste storage problems.

Also I'd like for countries to stop building nuclear power plants on tectonic hotspots *coughfukushimacough*
 
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AMDG

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What, in case the sun stops burning?

Ooo--a new game. Instead of rock, paper, scissors, we'll have--sun, clouds, rain. Or maybe we'll add EPA regulations, or various other things like land needed for food, or land already used by population, or land unsuitable for other reasons...or maybe we can just add the fact that taxpayers simply can't afford (like that Solyndra scam with the robots that play Disney songs curtesy of taxpayers who paid for it and now are being denied even a chance to recoup anything) to the mix.
 
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Baqueinfaith

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Frieda Kahlo can just go on and use her imagination. Or google a picture of a flower. I think it's about time she got up with them modern times, y'know? Get that girl an iBook.



What, in case the sun stops burning?

I don't have that many problems with nuclear energy (unusual for a lefty, I know, but still) but I think using it as a main power source will yield in nuclear waste storage problems.

Also I'd like for countries to stop building nuclear power plants on tectonic hotspots *coughfukushimacough*

To be honest I don't understand the technicals. Too much book learnin', but something about how solar panels store power, they can't feed the grid when they're not producing much, so you need something to flip on in the mean time.
 
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Antigone

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Ooo--a new game. Instead of rock, paper, scissors, we'll have--sun, clouds, rain. Or maybe we'll add EPA regulations, or various other things like land needed for food, or land already used by population, or land unsuitable for other reasons...or maybe we can just add the fact that taxpayers simply can't afford (like that Solyndra scam with the robots that play Disney songs curtesy of taxpayers who paid for it and now are being denied even a chance to recoup anything) to the mix.

I think we can all conclude that robots singing Disney songs would be a terrible waste of electricity, regardless of where the power came from or which Disney movies they choose to perform.

To be honest I don't understand the technicals. Too much book learnin', but something about how solar panels store power, they can't feed the grid when they're not producing much, so you need something to flip on in the mean time.

I'm not sure how and if storage works, but in the summer in a southern state in an area that's already desert(ed), I think it's worth a shot.

Especially because mass production of solar panels would make the price drop.
 
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