wrote:

Fully supported by the parents and family. Not too many kids with a bunch of
disposable income or good credit limits going through the checkouts.
How many pairs of Nikes did you have as a child? What about the $200 club
jackets?

Nike's didn't exist when I was a kid. If you had a pair of Converse
All-stars, you were "da man". My "toys" as a kid were commensurate with
my parent's ability to afford them. Today, as a parent, I work within
the same rules. We shop at Wal-Mart, as you can get the most bang for
the buck (I don't care where the stuff is made). Name brands are a joke.
My kid is going to learn that image does not supercede value (Unless, of
course, she wants to earn her own money to make up the difference). I am
probably the worst type of the consumer demographic. I pay cash, I look
for best value, and buy on line if it saves money. I avoid malls at all
costs. Our Christmas shopping usually starts in September, and is
usually done by late October.


Dave

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Doug Kanter wrote:

"Dave Hall" wrote in message
...


Dave, do you ALSO think that the Swiss are innocent of all wrongdoing
from
WWII? Court documents aren't good enough for you? :-)

I withhold any comment on the Swiss situation until I see more
information. I was merely commenting on Harry's typical modus operandi,
of making assumptions of someone simply because they hold a different
political ideology, and then demonizing them based on his conjectures.

Dave

Well, the court proceedings took place throughout the 1990s. Plenty of
information out there. If the court documents are too dense to wade through,
as they usually are, search at one of the major newspapers.


Judging from what I see, there is enough of a smoking gun, as to cast
suspicion if nothing else. How this all relates to how the Swiss finance
their economy, is open to wide speculation, and somewhat pointless for
those of us who live in the U.S..

Dave

Harry Krause wrote:

Dave Hall wrote:

Harry Krause wrote:

Doug Kanter wrote:

"Jonathan Ball" wrote in message
hlink.net...
Lone Haranguer wrote:


Jonathan Ball wrote:

jps wrote:

Bull****, they collect tolls off of blood money.

Prove it.


http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/06.27H.swiss.pay.htm

A an extremist radical propaganda site. It's crap from
beginning to end.


I'm not sure what you're having trouble believing, but perhaps things like
this will snap you out of whatever trance you're in:
http://www.nyed.uscourts.gov/IRURF.pdf


Methinks Jonathan is a college freshman with a rich daddy.



What "you think" is irrelevant.

Ah, but what I think-and do-is far more relevant than what you think or
do, and for reasons I won't get into in a newsgroup.

Again, your opinion. You have no facts to substantiate that claim. The
fact that you lace your bias with conceit, born from a nasty case of
narcissism, is also telling.


You're just
right-wing trash, and in the course of human events, you and those who
think and feel like you will end up on the discard pile.


You're just left-wing trash, and in the course of human events, you and
those who think and feel like you will end up on the discard pile.


See how the game works yet?

Dave

Jonathan Ball wrote:

Harry Krause wrote:

Dave Hall wrote:


Harry Krause wrote:

Doug Kanter wrote:


"Jonathan Ball" wrote in message
. earthlink.net...

Lone Haranguer wrote:


Jonathan Ball wrote:


jps wrote:


Bull****, they collect tolls off of blood money.

Prove it.


http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/06.27H.swiss.pay.htm

A an extremist radical propaganda site. It's crap from
beginning to end.


I'm not sure what you're having trouble believing, but perhaps things like
this will snap you out of whatever trance you're in:
http://www.nyed.uscourts.gov/IRURF.pdf



Methinks Jonathan is a college freshman with a rich daddy.



What "you think" is irrelevant.


Ah, but what I think-and do-is far more relevant than what you think or
do, and for reasons I won't get into in a newsgroup.

I doubt it. Since you are too arrogant and/or scared
to tell us why you think you are, I'll just consider
your claim unsupported bull****.


And you would be correct.

Dave

Harry Krause wrote:

Dave Hall wrote:

jps wrote:

In article k.net,
says...
Harry Krause wrote:

jps wrote:


In article , says...


I think that is sufficient proof that the claim was accurate.
LZ


Thanks LZ.

Mr. Jonathan Ball should probably look into Swiss history a little more.

It's pretty clear they're a mercantile lot living under the
misperception of neutrality.

The Jewish people are just one of many who've been stolen from and then
stiff armed by Swiss banking laws. There are folks around the globe
who've been screwed by creeps, thugs and the like whose ill-gotten gains
are "protected" by the Swiss banking system.

It's a pretty country hiding some of the ugliest secrets in the world.

jps



Ball probably is very young,

No. $50 says I'm older and have more documentable
education than you, putz.

very smug,

Hardly. The correct term is self confident. I am self
confident, you are smug. Older, wiser people like me
know the difference.

Allow me to suggest your self-confidence is unearned.


inexperienced in the reality of the world

No.

and likely believes the holocaust was a myth.

No.

This guy is a loudmouthed fool whose references are as paper thin as
whatever foreskins he's got. Ask him about Switzerland or the
Employment Policy Foundation and you'll find him a font of
misinformation.

You know he's an idiot if he thinks he's older and has more education
than Harry! ;^)


How do you know what Harry REALLY has. You only have his word for it.
And well, quite frankly, history will show that Harry isn't the most
honest person around......

How would you possibly know that, Dave? From reading the vomitus of
Karen Smith, Dave Mann and a few other right-wing ejaculates?


Your propensity toward projecting an arrogant air of self-importance for
one. Then there is your staple "You are not worth a response" answer
anytime your feet are placed to the fire on an issue which you can not
defend beyond the snippets of your own narrow opinions, and cut and
paste tripe.

Then there are the endless conflicts in which you have been a
participant. Like the old saying, "You're right, the world's just
crazy"......

Dave

Fred Ziffel wrote:

On Wed, 03 Dec 2003 13:55:55 GMT, Dave Hall
wrote:

Fred Ziffel wrote:

On Tue, 02 Dec 2003 17:54:34 GMT, Jonathan Ball
wrote:

Fred Ziffel wrote:

On Mon, 01 Dec 2003 16:32:56 GMT, Jonathan Ball
wrote:



We used to make very high quality products too.

We still do. We make those things where we have some
comparative advantage. Increasingly, the things we
make are not tangible. That doesn't make them any less
valuable.


Sorry, I've been listening to these same bull**** arguments for over
20 years,

No, you clearly *haven't* been listening to them. You
very clearly don't understand comparative advantage,
and patterns of trade. You are economically illiterate.


No, I'm not "economically illiterate," I just don't have my head up my
ass, like you do. You are obviously a brainwashed fool who would
deliberately destroy America with your idiotic theories about
economics, theories that have absolutely no basis in reality.

I'll leave you now so you can worship at the altar of "comparative
advantage."

But you might want to give the collum below a read when you are done
saying your prayers to the gods of free trade. It may be
enlightening.

Fred Ziffel

----------------------------------------------------------

http://www.unsustainable.org/view_art_un.asp?AID=291


Once again, another leftist is attempting to scare people by citing
statistics and drawing an unrelated conclusion from it. And as true to
form as ever, the author is quick to lay out the blame (and thereby
exposing their not-so-hidden agenda), but offers not one bit of advice
on how to "fix" it.


"Another leftist?" "Unrelated conclusions?" "not-so-hidden agenda?"
Care to be more specific? Perhaps you are exposing your own
not-so-hidden agenda by being penultimately vague.

Perhaps my "vagueness" is simply your inabilty to comprehend.



One of the biggest reasons for a trade deficit are differences in
economic standings.

Bull****! Our industrial base has been largely closed down, exported,
and sold off.

And why do you think that is?


We have been put at a disadvantage in our own market.

By other country's economies which aren't as bloated as ours.

It has nothing to do with "economic standing."

It has EVRYTHING to do with it.


The only reason we
continue to get away with this insane situation is because the dollar
is the worlds reserve currency (temporarily), and the financial
fascists that run America can continue to inflate the money supply and
give us the illusion of prosperity.

You fail to consider that the economy is a roller coaster of ebbs and
flows. The economy cannpt remain low, as the decline eventually spurs
growth when the costs come down sufficiently again. And the cycle
repeats.



The US economy is recovering faster than much of the
rest of the world. As such the U.S. dollar is failry strong. As long as
the dollar remains strong there will be more imported goods than
exports, simply because our money can buy more goods, while selling less
compared to the currency in other countries. Everyone cries when the
dollar devaluates, but that's exactly what needs to happen in order to
equalize the trade situation.

There are other factors to consider as well, but the last thing we need
to do, is get the government involved with trying to regulate free
trade. There are so many facets to the economy, that you might think
that a ceratin "control" (such as a tariff) would have a short term goal
of bolstering domestic production. But it could have damaging
repercussions in other areas.

What can be more damaging than to sacrifice a nations productive
capacity, and the ownership of the entire nation, to the false gods
of free trade.

Forcing socialist governmental controls on it.



Even Warren Buffet seems to agree with this author. Is he just
"another leftist" drawing "unrelated conclusions" to promote his
"not-so-hidden agenda?"

Buffet has a known left leaning ideology.



And what is Warren Buffet's solution you ask?

------------------------------

"The time to halt this trading of assets for consumables is now, and I
have a plan to suggest for getting it done. My remedy may sound
gimmicky, and in truth it is a tariff called by another name. But this
is a tariff that retains most free-market virtues, neither protecting
specific industries nor punishing specific countries nor encouraging
trade wars. This plan would increase our exports and might well lead
to increased overall world trade. And it would balance our books
without there being a significant decline in the value of the dollar,
which I believe is otherwise almost certain to occur.

We would achieve this balance by issuing what I will call Import
Certificates (ICs) to all U.S. exporters in an amount equal to the
dollar value of their exports. Each exporter would, in turn, sell the
ICs to parties -- either exporters abroad or importers here -- wanting
to get goods into the U.S. To import $1 million of goods, for
example, an importer would need ICs that were the byproduct of $1
million of exports. The inevitable result: trade balance.

Because our exports total about $80 billion a month, ICs would be
issued in huge, equivalent quantities -- that is, 80 billion
certificates a month -- and would surely trade in an exceptionally
liquid market. Competition would then determine who among those
parties wanting to sell to us would buy the certificates and how much
they would pay. (I visualize that the certificates would be issued
with a short life, possibly of six months, so that speculators would
be discouraged from accumulating them.)"

-------------------------------------

So, it seems that the second wealthiest man in the world believes that
it is time for the US to implement TARIFFS to solve the trade deficit
problem.

So what? The first richest man in the world has convinced the majority
of people that the blue screen of death is "normal".


Tariffs are fine if you can convince your trade partners to agree to
them. Have you been monitoring the steel tariff situation? We can impose
anything we want. But other countries can counter as well.



So, who should we believe. On one hand, we have Eamonn Fingleton:
Internationally respected author, former editor of the Financial Times
and Forbes, who's commentaries appear in many major American
publications. And seemingly standing shoulder to shoulder with him is
Warren Buffet, internationally known and respected investor and the
second wealthiest man in the world.

On the other hand, we have usenet posters like Dave Hall, Jonathan
Ball, and many others, who stubbornly cling to their failed globalist,
internationalits, and free trade theolegy like a drowning man clings
to a sinking life boat.

We have history to guide us. The economy has ebbed and flowed many times
over the years. This is no exception. The great depression followed a
period of robust growth. This is again no different. What IS different
is that, like it or not, we are now a global economy. We can either
futilely fight this trend, or we can adjust to it, and work it to our
advantage. But trying to bully the rest of the world, isn't going to
help us in the long run.

Dave

Interesting reference to our new "Wal Mart Economy" in this item:

Article written by Rick Bender, Nov. 2003.

Two years after the official end of the recession, and the beginning of the
so-called recovery, the economic fault lines in our state continue to shake. On
a national “Richter Scale� report of economic indicators, Washington state
measures 4.4, joining 29 other states with scores of 4 or more on the scale.
The indicators include fundamental benchmarks on unemployment, poverty, health
care coverage, personal bankruptcies and household income.

Unemployment in our state has grown 2.1 percent since January 2001, when the
rate was 5.5 percent. Finding new jobs is tough for Washington’s unemployed
workers. In September, close to 40 percent of those who had exhausted their
benefits, had not found work by the time their unemployment checks ran out.

Staggering job losses, particularly in Washington’s manufacturing and
information sectors, created our high unemployment rate. We’ve lost 69,800
jobs between January 2001 and September 2003. What is so worrisome about this
loss is that these were high-quality, family-wage jobs with decent health
benefits. The new jobs being created in our “Wal-Mart� economy are
low-wage, dead-end jobs with no decent benefits. All jobs are NOT created
equal!

Other worrisome economic indicators measured on this “Richter Scale� shows
health care coverage becoming a big problem, with the share of uninsured
Washingtonians increasing by 100,000 residents in the last couple of years.
Another measure is the poverty rate which is creeping upwards, along with the
rate of personal bankruptcies. It is no coincidence that the single biggest
cause for personal bankruptcy is not reckless consumer purchasing, but
expensive medical bills.

It is cold comfort to know that Washington isn’t alone with these problems.
In fact, the states with the highest “Richter Scale� scores are North
Carolina and Mississippi. This dismal outcome shows the folly of pursuing a
low-wage, low-standards and low-road approach.

Indeed what is striking across the entire country is the pain in the falling
standard of living for all of working America. Median household income
actually declined in 38 states between 2000 and 2002. Washington was one of
only 13 states to see a tiny increase in household income, up a grand total of
$388. And we may soon see that small advantage disappear.

There’s trouble ahead. In January, new unemployment insurance rules will
force a cut in jobless benefits. Unemployed workers who didn’t work the
exact same number of hours every week may get benefit cuts of up to $200 a
week. The new “four-quarter averaging� formula for calculating benefits
which was backed by the business lobby in Olympia, will create a further
erosion of the living standards for the most vulnerable Washington workers --
those who are trying to find a job in this lousy economy.

Our top priority should be improving our economy by putting people back to
work. Claims of recovery based on stock market tickers and fancy economic
statistics don’t tell the true story of what’s happening in our state and
national economy. Cheerleading about the economy won’t do the trick. Job
cuts in October this year reached their highest level in the past 12 months,
with businesses announcing 171,874 few workers working, a 125% increase from
the September cut of 76,506 jobs.

To create a real economic recovery, we need to get people working in decent
family wage jobs with decent health benefits. That’s the only way to achieve
a return to the economic health of the 1990’s, when we had a state economy
that was the envy of every other state in the nation.

jps, hate-filled race-baiting bigot, wrote:

In article k.net,
says...


Actually, idiot, I've spent a bit of time there myself. Unlike you,
however, I had my eyes opened to their history and place in the world.

Cut the ****. You were on a package tour. You saw the
covered bridge in Luzern and falsely concluded you
"know" Swiss history. You don't know anything.


I have friends who live in a 400 year old house heated by a yurt

No. A yurt is not a heating apparatus.

outside
of Beatenberg, opposite Interlochen. He's a scientist who lives and
works where he pleases.

Good for him.


You have no adult friends there.

False. I have half a dozen adult friends there.


You were an exchange student living in luxury in the Zurich or Geneva?

Not luxury. It was a comfortable middle class family.
The father was an engineer specializing in dam
construction; he worked on the Grand Dixence dam, among
others. In order to head off your inevitable unfounded
charge of anti-semitism, I'm quite confident no forced
Jewish labor was used in the construction of the dam.


I never accused Switzerland of forced labor,

You'll get around to it, bigoted race-baiter.

just participating in the
holocaust loot that the Furer and his minions gave to the Swiss for safe
keeping. No doubt that and other stolen, unclaimed property has helped
float the Swiss economy over the last 60 years.


Both before and after my stay with them, the family
lived in Iran, where he also worked on dam
construction. You, being a paranoid bigot, probably
see that as evidence of anti-semitism. You are a fool
in addition to being a loathsome bigot.


And you're a blowhard know nothing.

Nope. I am knowledgable. You'll just have to take my
word for it.

jps wrote:

In article k.net,
says...


This guy is a loudmouthed fool whose references are as paper thin as
whatever foreskins he's got. Ask him about Switzerland or the
Employment Policy Foundation and you'll find him a font of
misinformation.

Answer the question, bigoted punk: are the facts about
who earns minimum wage, and for how long, correct or
not? Show competing conclusions, if you have any (heh
heh heh).


Go learn for yourself without the right wing spin...

http://www.bls.gov/cps/cpswp2000.htm

I read it; I answered it. It support the research
conclusions I posted: as people get older, their wages
go up, and in fact almost no one is trying to support a
family on poverty-level wages or less.

jps, hate-filled race-baiting bigot, wrote:

In article .net,
says...


If they'd cleared it all up in 1948, it would've been fair to say that it
was over. But, legal proceedings were still going on until just a couple of
years ago, which was proven with a link to court documents. At that point,
you failed to say "Oh...OK....fine. I was mistaken".

The FIRST link someone posted for you was from what you considered an
unreliable or biased source. The SECOND one, which I posted, was a direct
source of information.

Not that I've straightened this out for you, do you still believe the Swiss
did NOT hang onto assets which belonged to Holocaust victims?

I never believed it; yours is an invalid complex question.



Then do you assume that Swiss participation in hiding and holding (and
plundering unclaimed portions) of both holocaust victims assets
deposited in Swiss accounts and illegally derived assets has not and
still does not contribute to the health and prosperity of the Swiss
economic system?

Extremely little.