On Thu, 04 Dec 2003 05:34:37 GMT, Fred Ziffel wrote:
Bull****! Our industrial base has been largely closed down, exported,
and sold off. We have been put at a disadvantage in our own market.

If that were true (it isn't) how do you explain that the value of US
manufactured goods has increased 12.7% since 1997?
(Source http://www.nemw.org/mfgfact.htm )

If our industrial base has been largely closed down, who is making
those products?

It has nothing to do with "economic standing." 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.

Inflation? The US inflation rate for November was -4.2%. In other words,
there is no inflation, we're still experiencing *deflation*. The CPI shows
an overall decline since 1993. See
http://data.bls.gov/servlet/SurveyOu...=C U_cpibrief


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

Buffet is a securities trader, so of course he'd favor another way
of paper trading. Money in his pocket. But it would just be another
layer of middlemen profiting on trade, without any benefit to either
producer or consumer.

Gary

Fred Ziffel wrote:

No, you fail to consider that we are being subjugated by a fraudulent,
debt-based fiat money system that requires periodic recessions to
cause enough bankruptcy to clear the excessive debt created.

Which resets the economy. Otherwise inflation would grow virtually
unchecked.

Think about this: Why do people deserve raises every year for doing the
same exact job? If there were not a cost of living increase (inflation),
the only reason a person should get a raise is due to promotion. Yet,
workers seem to feel that they are entitled to a raise every year (above
the current COL index). What do you thing this practice does to the
bottom line, and the rate of inflation?

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.


Nothing socialist about tariffs. They were being used long before
socialism was ever created.

Socialism saw it's first roots in, of all places, Plymouth Rock. But be
that as it may, if you do not allow trade to equalize the market, you
will continue to have inequality in it. It sounds bad for us, who have
lived in an economic situation of rampant inflation, which has pushed up
both our wages and costs. But much of the rest of the world has not kept
pace with us in this area, and that's why we have the outsourcing
problem that we have today. The only true way to solve this problem is
to equalize the standard of living throughout the rest of the world.
Then there would be no incentive to outsource.


Buffet has a known left leaning ideology.


So, since Pat Buchanan is in favor of some kind of tariff, does that
make him a leftist? Perhaps anyone who disagrees with "Dave" is
automatically a leftist.

Buffet has been labeled as left leaning. Calling me names won't change
that.

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.


We don't have to convince our trading partners of anything. We can
impose whatever tariffs we want. Do the math Dave. The trade defecit
exceeds 50% of our total exports. I think maybe we'd be better off
not even trading! We're loosing money and depleating our assets!

So what are you going to do, when in response to our protectionist
tariffs, our trading partners impose tariffs and sanctions of their own?
We can't force the rest of the world to do business with us, unless we
have something the rest of the world wants more than the goods they
offer us. In case you haven't been paying attention, the U.S. doesn't
make much here anymore.

We are no longer in the position of holding the rest of the world
economically hostage to our demands.


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


Thats right Dave, we do have history to guide us. America became a
wealthy, modern industrial nation protected behind a high wall of
tariffs.

Yes, we needed tariffs so that our fledgling industries could compete
with established producers in Europe. Once we could become competative,
the tariffs were no longer needed.


We became wealthy BECAUSE of the tariffs, not in spite of
them.

Yes, and some could argue that our current disparity in living standard
and inflation with WRT the rest of the world is at least partially the
result of those actions.


Following the religion you espouse has resulted in a declining
standard of living for millions of Americans, is transfering our high
tech jewels to the Japanese and other foreigners, and is making us as
a nation poorer.

It's a wake up call. We have been used to living in a living standard
bubble. We certainly adjusted to it fine enough. But compared to much of
the rest of the world, we are hopelessly bloated.


Its always been a global economy Dave. Its just
that before we always protected our interests.

No, it's not the same thing. Yes, we traded with other "global"
partners, but our corporations were 100% U.S. owned and operated. Today,
the fact that the corporate headquarters of a particular company may sit
in the U.S., much of the infrastructure is in other countries, and many
of the employees are foreigners as well. Much of the profit for those
companies are spread out over the world. If the U.S. starts adopting
policies such as tariffs, it may only give greater incentive to further
divorce companies from our soil. It doesn't cost much to relocate to a
place like Bermuda (Tyco) or the Bhamas, and the company would be free
to trade with other countries, wihout the restrictions of the U.S.
government.



Now, because of the
head-up-the-ass "free trade" ideas that you are promoting, we are
depleating our wealth and destroying our capacity to maintain a middle
class and a high standard of living for the majority of Americans.


Head up the ass? Hardly. I just see the writing on the wall. We can
either fight the trends, and face certain failure, or we can adjust and
adapt to them, and find ways to take advantage of our assets. You are
not going to turn the clock back, and the rest of the world doesn't want
that either.


But apparently thats all OK with you, because you belong to the "I've
Got Mine Club." Dave's got his, **** everybody else.

Your emotions are getting the best of you. Try being a little more
objective.

We are part of a world market, like it or not. We are not in the
position to call all the shots anymore. We can either play by a set of
rules that everyone can accept, or we can try to go it alone. Which
seems to be the better choice in the long run?

Dave

In article .net,
says...
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.

Then you'd be wrong. It's a major industry for them. Attracts stolen
money and good from the world over.

jps wrote:

In article k.net,
says...

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


In article ,
says...


Harry Krause wrote:



I'm in downtown DC several days a week. As I walk from one appointment
to another, I usually encounter some homeless or otherwise visibly
impoverished people. A high percentage of these folks are mentally
unbalanced, and some seem to be suffering from schizophrenia.

Apparently you are unaware that it was the social theories of liberals
who closed mental hospitals and turned those people out to the streets.


Golly, that's the first I've heard that Ronny Raygun was a liberal.

It had nothing to do with Ronald Reagan, your former
president. It began long before he was president.
It's a garden variety lie of the left that he "caused"
homelessness. It was the Kennedy administration that
began a policy to get crazies out of state mental
hospitals and back into the communities.




I beg to differ. Reagan took what was a system in transition and doomed
it to failure...

From a recent ABC news report:

This group bulged in size, largely due to a deliberate process of
"deinstitutionalization" first begun in the 1950s. A patient's best
interest, mental health experts then agreed, was served not so much by
long-term residential care, as by community outpatient treatment. As a
result, the number of resident mental health patients in the U.S.
dropped from 559,000 in 1955 to only 54,000 in 2000, Manderscheid
reports.

But the community outpatient care system that mental health providers
had hoped to build failed to blossom. A federal grant helped construct
about 750 new community health centers between 1963 and 1978; but when
the Reagan administration converted remaining funding into block grants
to states, most opted to finance currently existing mental health
centers, rather than build new ones. According to Manderscheid, the
envisioned community mental health system "froze at that point in time."

The psychiatric ER stepped in to fill the gap in community mental health
care. Variously described as a place patients choose over prison or a
homeless shelter, or where social service agencies "dump" their toughest
cases, the psychiatric ER can play a recurring role in a patient's
behavioral pattern or disease cycle and is often the last line of
defense for repeat patients known as "frequent fliers."

As deinstitutionalization continued, releasing many of the mentally ill
to their hometowns, large numbers discovered they lacked families and
communities willing or able to care for them. Now homeless, unemployed
and uninsured, any health crisis brought them to the steps of the ER =3F
the one place that cannot turn them away.

According to logic, you should blame the states for diverting the money,
not Reagan for making the funds available in a different format.

Nitwit.
LZ

jps wrote:

In article k.net,
says...

jps wrote:


The Olin *Foundation* does not own a munitions factory.


No, the Olin family owns both the munitions factory and the Olin
Foundation Little nebbishball.

Show us the deed.
LZ

jps wrote:

In article .net,
says...


You speak as if you'd done the research yourself. Your arguments are as
paper thin as your vocabulary.

Answer the question, you lying race-baiting bigot: are
the conclusions about the minimum wage right or wrong?
If you claim they're wrong, support your claim.


Your claims are irrelevant to the discussion. You introduced the short-
sighted claim about "minimum wage" as a red-herring to distort the
conversation.

The relevant issue is that Walmart doesn't pay it's people a living wage
but freely asks them to commit time off the clock and asks third-party
labor services to find them labor on slim budgets. Walmart knows full
well what they're doing and they don't care.

Neither do you, nor would I expect it.

I agree. Walmart=whale ****.
LZ

Calif Bill wrote:

"jps" wrote in message
...

In article k.net,
says...

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


In article ,
says...


Harry Krause wrote:



I'm in downtown DC several days a week. As I walk from one

appointment

to another, I usually encounter some homeless or otherwise visibly
impoverished people. A high percentage of these folks are mentally
unbalanced, and some seem to be suffering from schizophrenia.

Apparently you are unaware that it was the social theories of liberals
who closed mental hospitals and turned those people out to the

streets.


Golly, that's the first I've heard that Ronny Raygun was a liberal.

It had nothing to do with Ronald Reagan, your former
president. It began long before he was president.
It's a garden variety lie of the left that he "caused"
homelessness. It was the Kennedy administration that
began a policy to get crazies out of state mental
hospitals and back into the communities.



I beg to differ. Reagan took what was a system in transition and doomed
it to failure...

From a recent ABC news report:

This group bulged in size, largely due to a deliberate process of
"deinstitutionalization" first begun in the 1950s. A patient's best
interest, mental health experts then agreed, was served not so much by
long-term residential care, as by community outpatient treatment. As a
result, the number of resident mental health patients in the U.S.
dropped from 559,000 in 1955 to only 54,000 in 2000, Manderscheid
reports.

But the community outpatient care system that mental health providers
had hoped to build failed to blossom. A federal grant helped construct
about 750 new community health centers between 1963 and 1978; but when
the Reagan administration converted remaining funding into block grants
to states, most opted to finance currently existing mental health
centers, rather than build new ones. According to Manderscheid, the
envisioned community mental health system "froze at that point in time."



Why is it's Reagan's fault. He gave the states some funding, they abused
it. Where is it the Federal governments job to fund state mental health
programs? Did the Fed's fund the state hospitals?


Don't use logic on JPS. It just confuses him.
LZ

Lone Haranguer wrote:

jps wrote:

In article k.net,
says...

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


In article ,
says...


Harry Krause wrote:



I'm in downtown DC several days a week. As I walk from one
appointment
to another, I usually encounter some homeless or otherwise visibly
impoverished people. A high percentage of these folks are mentally
unbalanced, and some seem to be suffering from schizophrenia.


Apparently you are unaware that it was the social theories of liberals
who closed mental hospitals and turned those people out to the
streets.



Golly, that's the first I've heard that Ronny Raygun was a liberal.


It had nothing to do with Ronald Reagan, your former president. It
began long before he was president. It's a garden variety lie of the
left that he "caused" homelessness. It was the Kennedy
administration that began a policy to get crazies out of state mental
hospitals and back into the communities.




I beg to differ. Reagan took what was a system in transition and
doomed it to failure...

From a recent ABC news report:

This group bulged in size, largely due to a deliberate process of
"deinstitutionalization" first begun in the 1950s. A patient's best
interest, mental health experts then agreed, was served not so much by
long-term residential care, as by community outpatient treatment. As a
result, the number of resident mental health patients in the U.S.
dropped from 559,000 in 1955 to only 54,000 in 2000, Manderscheid
reports.

But the community outpatient care system that mental health providers
had hoped to build failed to blossom. A federal grant helped construct
about 750 new community health centers between 1963 and 1978; but when
the Reagan administration converted remaining funding into block
grants to states, most opted to finance currently existing mental
health centers, rather than build new ones. According to Manderscheid,
the envisioned community mental health system "froze at that point in
time."

The psychiatric ER stepped in to fill the gap in community mental
health care. Variously described as a place patients choose over
prison or a homeless shelter, or where social service agencies "dump"
their toughest cases, the psychiatric ER can play a recurring role in
a patient's behavioral pattern or disease cycle and is often the last
line of defense for repeat patients known as "frequent fliers."

As deinstitutionalization continued, releasing many of the mentally
ill to their hometowns, large numbers discovered they lacked families
and communities willing or able to care for them. Now homeless,
unemployed and uninsured, any health crisis brought them to the steps
of the ER =3F the one place that cannot turn them away.

According to logic, you should blame the states for diverting the money,
not Reagan for making the funds available in a different format.

Ah, but where's the emotional satisfaction in that?
Lying hate-blinded ideologues like 'jps' NEED devils
with names and faces to blame for what they falsely
consider to be injustice.


Nitwit.
LZ

jps wrote:

In article k.net,
says...


You just fall completely flat trying to sound like a
caring capitalist.


Fact is, it makes you look like the selfish asshole you are and you
can't stand it.

I'm in business to make money but not without helping the people who
work for my company also earn a living wage and ensuring them access to
first class medical insurance.

You go ahead and **** people to your heart's content. Hope you don't
believe in an afterlife and you've got a good therapist -- or,
alternatively, someone you screw punches you in the nose for being a
heartless *******.

But if you trample people and get rich, you can be a caring
philanthropist like Bill Gates. That should buy several tickets into
heaven, right?
LZ

jps wrote:

In article et,
says...

Mark Neglay wrote:

jps wrote in message . ..


Looking at table 5 of that that DOL report, those living below poverty
level comprise 20.5 million, only 8.7 million are "unrelated" or, not
part of a family. That's not a majority.


Now you are discussing all people, not just those who are working full
time, as you were before.

Why did you change your demographics?

Because he is utterly incompetent with data.




At least my data reflects reality vs. your skewed crapola that only
serves to forward the "conservative" agenda of screwing those who cannot
make a living wage.

Heartless screwballs. I'll bet none of their kids are in Iraq right now
risking their lives while their parents make nice profits from the
munitions they sell to the US Government.

Probably Republican Pioneers or Rangers. Scum.

Hey poopsy! How much combat time do you have? Any?
LZ