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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Phred]
    #1249154 -

"In America it is STILL possible to BECOME wealthy."

And it isn't in Europe?

There is crime against property, and then there is VIOLENT crime

You can't really compare violent crime statistics between completly different cultures. If you're living in a devoutly religious small village of 30 people in asia where everyone has very little and shares practically everything they've got, what motivation is there for "violent crime"? And surely a lot of violent crime in america is related to robbing someone or gaining control of drug markets etc.

No, it's not.

Yes it is. Only someone with no knowledge of economic reality could even question it.

The only businesses that benefit from wars are those whose revenues come from tax dollars

You seen the size of the "defence" budget? Are uniform makers really making that much? Unless uniforms cost around a billion dollars each that ain't gonna explain things.

"Defence" spending involves pretty much every aspect of hi-technology. Massive areas of hi-technology industry are going to benefit from enormous government paycheques. Not to mention the boost the oil corporations and all the spinoffs from that are going to get from controlling Iraq's oilfields. Will the average american see any benefit? Who cares? As long as profits for the corporations skyrocket Bush has served his purpose.

These guys don't go to war to lose money. They arn't that stupid. Wicked yes, stupid no.


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Don't worry, B. Caapi

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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Phred]
    #1249200 -

Are you an anarchist? This is a genuine question. If not why not? You seem to want 0 government intervention.


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"Little racoons and old possums 'n' stuff all live up in here. They've got to have a little place to sit." Bob Ross.

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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Phred]
    #1249486 -

hmm I think I'll just nod in agreement and keep reading.

Someone once said to me that when you are discussing something in this medium and the opposition falls silent you have likely made your points well enough that they cannot respond.

One last comment. When I was in high school our World Government teacher was Harry Smith. He was one of the most entertaining and thoughtful teachers I ever had. You remind me of him.

So, what did Mr. Smith do during summer recess?

He was a bartender.

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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: ]
    #1249879 -

Quote:
Someone once said to me that when you are discussing something in this medium and the opposition falls silent you have likely made your points well enough that they cannot respond.


Don't think that way please.. If I were to stop responding to this thread it would be because I've said my peace and I'm done with this.

I'll stick to my original point pinky, you may think my views are wrong and that my age is the problem.. But I think you are probably pretty stubborn and are strongly opinionated.. Not two traits that in my experience are worth arguing with since nothing I say will truly reach you.

You could say the same for me I'm sure :wink:

Its like arguing religion to a priest, I just wont bother :smile:

silence does not equal defeat... 

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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Phred]
    #1249927 -

Oh and I will respond to you pinky, later tonight when I have the energy  :grin:

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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: hongomon]
    #1249978 -

Everyone here knows by now that you're certain that years of viewing television programming and advertising have no effect on an individual's development, value system, or, in short, ability to exercise free will. Well I do. I totally, absolutely fucking think it does. I am currently working on a device that will un-invent the television.

Word. They're not called programs for nothing.
In the words of Timothy Leary, "who controls the media controls and progams your mind".


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All Information posted by me is for entertainment purposes only and should not be attempted in real life!!!

Edited by Andytweed (01/26/03 09:57 AM)

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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Thor]
    #1250661 -

Quote:
Quote:
Someone once said to me that when you are discussing something in this medium and the opposition falls silent you have likely made your points well enough that they cannot respond.


"Don't think that way please.. If I were to stop responding to this thread it would be because I've said my peace and I'm done with this."

Ok cool! :cool:

Don't feel that you have to respond to my points though.  I know how busy you are.  I never told you this but up until recently I was scared to death of you. I'm glad we talked about this. :smile:

Cheers


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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Xlea321]
    #1250782 -

Alex123 writes:

And it isn't in Europe?

Nope. Bill Gates had the same amount of money when he left school that I did -- not much. Today he is the wealthiest person in the world (or so the media -- even the European media -- claims). If Bill Gates had been operating out of a European country, he would have had 90+ per cent of his income seized, year after year.

You can't really compare violent crime statistics between completly different cultures.

I know that, Alex, that's exactly my point. Thor's assertion is that the reason there is so much violent crime in America is that there is poverty, ignoring the fact that many other less violent countries have far higher levels of far more extreme poverty. Similarly, you and others feel the reason America's violent crime rate is so high is that there are a lot of guns in America, ignoring the fact that both in Switzerland (with almost universal gun ownership) and Canada (with almost the identical per capita gun ratio as America) the violent crime rates are a fraction that of the US. Further, England, where the populace has been disarmed not only of guns, but also of everything from mace to blowguns to clasp knives, has a higher rate of violent crime than America. Clearly neither poverty nor gun ownership IN AND OF THEMSELVES explain America's rate of violent crime. It is, as you accurately (for once) point out, a cultural thing, and a culture is a complex matrix that can't be accurately defined by referring to any single aspect of that matrix.

You seen the size of the "defence" budget?

I am aware of the size of the defense budget. Are you aware of the TOTAL American GDP? I repeat, defense-related industries constitute a FRACTION of America's GDP. Do defense-related industries get a boost during times of war? Yes, of course. Does the economy AS A WHOLE? No, of course not. War is bad for business.

"Defence" spending involves pretty much every aspect of hi-technology.

No it doesn't. Do people buy twice as many computers or televisions or VCRs or microwave ovens or radar detectors or photocopiers or MRI machines or CAT scanners during wartime? Nope.

These guys don't go to war to lose money.

They don't let the fact that money will be lost stop them. Politicians don't CARE about losing money -- it's no skin off their collective noses since it's not THEIR money that is lost. All they have to do is either increase taxes or increase the defecit and let the next stuffed suit who gets elected deal with it.

pinky


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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: sir tripsalot]
    #1250835 -

sir tripsalot asks:

Are you an anarchist?

No. I am a Capitalist, or a Libertarian, or a Minarchist -- whichever definition you feel suits best someone who believes the only legitimate function of government is to protect its citizens from the initiation of force or fraud.

If not why not?

Anarchists, or at least the ones calling themselves Anarchists who post on this board, are vehemently anti-freedom in the field of how one may make his living. They are against not just government (except of course the governments they advocate -- "workers soviets", "community councils", "tribal gatherings" or whatever) but also against allowing people to hire others to work for them or allowing people to accept a job offer from another -- even if both people sincerely desire such a business relationship. The kind of Anarchists who post on this board don't believe in armies or police or courts or prisons or the right of an individual to build his own factory, unless that factory can be run by one person.

You seem to want 0 government intervention.

Then you have missed my repeated statements that there must be a government in any CIVILIZED society which has delegated to it by its citizens the authority to form and run the military (to protect its citizens from the initiation of force by foreign powers), the police (to protect its citizens from the initiation of force or fraud by other citizens), and the courts (to punish domestic criminals and to resolve contractual and civil disputes among men whose opinions may honestly differ).

Without an impartial, objective court system following a system of objective law that applies equally to every inhabitant of the society (from president to street sweeper), and without a police force to deliver those suspected of violating those laws to the courts, civilization is impossible. The purpose of a military is self-evident.

Those functions listed above use the collective might of a society to protect the INDIVIDUAL rights of each and every individual within the society. ANY other area in which the government tries to involve itself, from the coining of money to the education of children, necessarily involves the VIOLATION of individual rights, and is therefore a perversion of the concept of "government". The ONLY proper role for a government is as a "bodyguard", not as Santa Claus or Nanny.

Governments are not formed among men for the purpose of ruling men, but for setting men FREE of the rule of men. Without police and military, the members of ANY society are at the mercy of the first thug or gang of thugs that happens by, and will not exist for long.

pinky


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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Thor]
    #1250959 -

Thor says:

I'll stick to my original point pinky, you may think my views are wrong and that my age is the problem..

Your AGE per se is not the problem. The fact that you haven't yet had enough free TIME to think through the underlying principles of what you believe (and their consequences) is the problem. Some people never bother to undertake this effort, regardless of their age. Others (Randal Flagg, for example) undertook that effort at a younger age than I did. I have said before and I will say again that there was a time in my life where the opinions you hold today were not really all that far from the ones I held at in my early Twenties.

But I think you are probably pretty stubborn and are strongly opinionated.. Not two traits that in my experience are worth arguing with since nothing I say will truly reach you.

Check your premises. If I were stubborn and opinionated, I would still be hanging out with Marxist-Leninists (there is a picture from the Ottawa Citizen newspaper taken in the Seventies of me holding one pole of a street-wide banner of the Canadian Marxist-Leninist party at a demonstration march) and agitating for government-mandated thirty-hour work weeks and twenty dollar an hour minimum wage laws with compulsory annual cost-of-living adjustments. I would be in favor of socialized medicine rather than vehemently opposed to it. I would idolize Pieere Trudeau rather than vilify him.

If I were as stubborn and strongly opinionated as you seem to think, then the change in the opinions from those I held fifteen years ago (before moving to a third-world country) to those I hold today would not have occurred either.

I will, however, repeat that I would NEVER at that age have had the arrogance to proclaim in one breath that I would hold the opinions I held at twenty-five for the rest of my life, and in the next breath categorize those who don't travel as being close-minded. Some, apparently, feel no shame in making such a proclamation on a messageboard famous for its population of contributors ready to jump down the throat of anyone who exhibits such unequivocal close-mindedness. I salute the courage of those who make such open admissions.

The reason I no longer believe some of the things I believed a quarter century ago is not merely because I am older, but because I had the good fortune in my span of years on this beautiful planet to run across many very experienced and very intelligent people who were able to show me (through reason and observation) that some of my ideas contradicted reality. Of course, I also expended effort -- I took the TIME to seek out such people, I took the TIME to test and verify what they were saying, and I took the TIME to look further down the avenues to which they they had introduced me. All that TIME has added up to a sum of quite a few years to date, and that sum is not yet a final one. No twenty year old can afford to spend that number of years on nothing but knowledge-gathering if at the same time he must support himself. This is why it is unusual (some would argue impossible) to find a twenty year old who possesses the same level of wisdom he will usually possess at twice that age.

You could say the same for me I'm sure

Not only CAN I say it, I DO say it. I have had my errors corrected many times in my life, some of them here on this board. When it happens I acknowledge it, integrate the new fact into my sum of knowledge, adjust my worldview accordingly and move on. Can you say the same?

Its like arguing religion to a priest, I just wont bother

Ahh... but so far, you are NOT arguing. You are merely making assertions. In the words of the famous Monty Python sketch, "But that's not an argument! It's simple contradiction!"

As just one example, you believe that those who choose not to help the random unfortunates of the world voluntarily must be FORCED to do so. I believe they mustn't. I have not only STATED that forcing people to hand over their stuff is wrong, I have shown in literally dozens of posts in various threads in this forum WHY it is wrong. You, on the other hand, have never even TRIED to show WHY it is right for some people to force other people to hand over their stuff to still other people -- you have merely stated it as if it were a self-evident fact of nature, and insulted the character of those you believe are too depraved to do "the right thing". Is this arguing?

Perhaps I really AM wrong in holding the position I do. But until you at least ATTEMPT to prove the validity of your position, I need take no further notice of your arbitary ASSERTIONS. Here's your invitation, Thor -- in the words of those from Missouri, "Show me."

pinky


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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Phred]
    #1251043 -

If Bill Gates had been operating out of a European country, he would have had 90+ per cent of his income seized, year after year.

Well there's still plenty of self-made billionaires in Europe. Obviously it hasn't had that much effect on them.

I know that, Alex, that's exactly my point

But you can compare them between like cultures. The US and Britain for example are pretty similar. One has guns and has thousands of gun deaths, one doesn't and has hardly any. Coincidence?

War is bad for business.

Sorry but this is nonsense. War is the driver and motivator for massive areas of the economy. It's basic economics said by pretty much everyone from Keynes on.

They don't let the fact that money will be lost stop them.

Nah. They really arn't that stupid. If you think Bush is going into Iraq to liberate the poor suffering Iraqi people then there's really nothing more to say. It's about profit.


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Don't worry, B. Caapi

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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Phred]
    #1251047 -

opinions you hold today were not really all that far from the ones I held at in my early Twenties.

Maybe Thor just has some depth to his beliefs. I presume when you were in your twenties you had nothing and were attracted to "socialism" because of this? Then when you got some money you got more interested in the "I'm allright Jack" stuff? That's just selfishness really - nothing to do with deeply thinking about your position. If you can swap around so completly it suggests your views were never really thought about in the first place.


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Don't worry, B. Caapi

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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Xlea321]
    #1251200 -

Alex123 writes:

But you can compare them between like cultures. The US and Britain for example are pretty similar. One has guns and has thousands of gun deaths, one doesn't and has hardly any.

Which cultures are more similar? US and England or US and Canada?

You yourself don't think the cultures of England and the US are very similar, judging from your comments in this forum. Also, you have maintained that England's crime rate was lower than that of America long before the law-abiding English populace was disarmed.

It's basic economics said by pretty much everyone from Keynes on.

It most certainly NOT good for business, and I have explained why. Neither is it basic economics. Any economics professor will tell you that if you extract billions of dollars from the economy to produce a hydrogen bomb that produces no wealth, just a hole in the Nevada desert, those billions have been wasted. As for Keynes, his theories have been refuted so thoroughly so many times both by economists and by observable reality that it is redundant for me to add my comments.

The only time it can be possibly argued that war is good for "business" is in the case of outright conquest. For example, Imperial Rome recouped the costs of waging war against her neighbors by permanently occupying the nations she conquered, enslaving the populace, and sending the wealth of those nations to Rome's treasury. Imperial England did the same when she ruled a quarter of the globe.

If you think Bush is going into Iraq to liberate the poor suffering Iraqi people then there's really nothing more to say.

The MOTIVES Bush has for threatening to force Iraq to abide by the terms of the surrender agreement it signed don't alter the fact that the act of carrying out that application of force will cost money that will never be recouped.

I have shown WHY war is bad for business (except, of course, that fraction of businesses whose sole customers are government). You have presented no arguments showing why war is GOOD for business, other than to say that "everyone knows it" and appealing to authority in the person of John Maynard Keynes; the man whose theories are directly responsible both for deficit spending and the previously unheard of (prior to Keynes' publication of his theories) phenomenon of simultaneous high unemployment and high inflation.

pinky



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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Xlea321]
    #1251284 -

Alex123 writes:

Maybe Thor just has some depth to his beliefs.

What do you mean by "depth"? Could you possibly pick a word with less relevance to the validity of an opinion than "depth"? The Aztecs "deeply held" the belief that if they didn't drown babies on a regular basis, the rains wouldn't come. The muslim fanatics "deeply hold" the belief that woman are chattel. Clinging tenaciously to a false idea doesn't make it any less false. If you mean Thor can DEFEND his beliefs, that has yet to be seen.

I presume when you were in your twenties you had nothing and were attracted to "socialism" because of this?

No, it was just that I was born and raised in Canada -- a left-leaning country. I was educated during the Fifties and Sixties, when socialism was gaining ground (socialized medicine was introduced in the Sixties, for example, and there was still such a thing as government "baby bonus checks") and it was de rigeur for Canadian teachers to hold (and preach) the socialist point of view. When I reached adolescence all my friends were Lefties (this was the Peace, Love, Woodstock era, remember), and many of my co-workers were out-and-out Marxists. Canada was ruled by the Lefties, too -- these were the Trudeau years. So the reason I held some Leftist views was likely the same reason Thor holds his -- I was surrounded by Lefties and heard almost nothing of the opposite side of things. Only my father was a counterbalance, and (being the usual conformist teenager) I rejected what he said as a matter of course, since "he doesn't UNDERSTAND how things really ARE, man."

Then when you got some money you got more interested in the "I'm allright Jack" stuff?

You have crossed swords with Randal Flagg in this forum on a few occasions, have you not? He holds most of the same views I do, yet he's hardly affluent; he says he has enough money to last about two weeks if he stops working. Why isn't he a socialist?

If you can swap around so completly it suggests your views were never really thought about in the first place.

Exactly my point. To use YOUR phraseology, it shows that society's brainwashing had done its job on me. You are on a roll today, Alex -- you have hit TWO nails on the head in the same thread. Congratulations!

When I was fresh out of school I never DID think about the validity of my Leftist views. Almost everyone I knew, from teachers to friends to co-workers, held pretty much the same views. I just assumed they were probably pretty much right. And, to be blunt, in my early twenties I had little patience with political and economic theory. I found it boring -- all I cared about was scoring dope and chicks.

It wasn't until I actually started questioning the validity of some of the views I had always accepted uncritically that I discovered they didn't hold up to intense scrutiny -- and in many cases to even the most casual scrutiny (see the theories of Marx for an example of the latter). For this awakening I am more indebted to my Marxist-Leninist co-workers than to any Capitalists I knew at the time.

It would have been the easiest thing in the world to just swallow what I had been taught and to close my mind to any evidence that upset my tidy little applecart. I see a lot of people in this forum who do just that; people who proclaim that it is WRONG to even THINK ABOUT the views of people who actually know what they are talking about -- but it is perfectly reasonable to accept the views of Noam Chomsky and the various whackjobs who post on rense.com.

pinky



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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Xlea321]
    #1251289 -

Alex123 writes:

Well there's still plenty of self-made billionaires in Europe.

Name a few. Those from "old money" don't count -- I mean self-made European billionaires -- the European equivalent of Bill Gates or Steve Jobs or the WalMart dude.

pinky


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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Phred]
    #1251357 -

I would be most interested to see even a short list myself.

Cheers

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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: ]
    #1251408 -

Duke of Westminster: $5.5bn (?3.7bn)
David Sainsbury: $4.1bn (?2.7bn)
Sir Richard Branson: $3.3bn (?2.2bn)new money
Bruno Schroder: $2.3bn (?1.5bn)
Bernard Ecclestone: $2.2bn (?1.4bn)new money
Terence Matthews: $1.9bn (?1.3bn)new money
Anthony Bamford: $1.8bn (?1.2bn)
John Hargreaves: $1.8bn (?1.2bn)new money
Moores family: $1.8bn (?1.2bn)
Gary Weston: $1.6bn (?1.1bn)new money
Jonathan Harmsworth: $1.5bn (?1.0bn)new money
Sir Adrian Swire: $1.5bn (?1.0bn)
Joseph Lewis: $1.0bn (?600m)
Robert Miller: $1.0bn (?600m)new money
Lakshmi Mittal - Ispat International - ?900 million new money

Sri & Gopi Hinduja ? Sangam - ?800 million

Mike Jatania & Family - Lornamead International - ?548 million

Jasminder Singh - Edwardian Group of Hotels - ?400 million

Vijay & Bikhu Patel - Waymade Healthcare - ?298 million

Lord Swraj Paul ? Caparo - ?280 million

Anil Chandaria ? Comcraft - ?200 million

Sir Anwar Pervez - Bestway - ?175 million

Tom Singh - New Look - ?160 million

Viren Rastogi - RGB Resources - ?150 million

Old money?some is for sure but not all.
Short enuff list ? or do you wont shorter?


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er

Edited by G a n j a (01/26/03 08:39 PM)

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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: G a n j a]
    #1251519 -

Oh well done!

Thank you Ganja! :smile:

Not the first time you've helped me I might add! :smile:

Cheers

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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: G a n j a]
    #1252009 -

Cheers Ganja.

There's also Hans Rausing - 4.4 billion.


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Don't worry, B. Caapi

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Re: The U.S. Needs to Open Up to the World [Re: Phred]
    #1252016 -

The MOTIVES Bush has for threatening to force Iraq to abide by the terms of the surrender agreement it signed don't alter the fact that the act of carrying out that application of force will cost money that will never be recouped.

Recouped by who? Are you convinced that no-one is going to make a profit out of going to "war" on Iraq? Why do you think they are making up all kinds of utterly ludicrous "reasons" to try and give a pretence for starting a war? What motive do they have?

Big business loves war.


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Don't worry, B. Caapi

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