Obama Won

[MasterWuuf]

"He's SOOO stupid, he got hit by a parked car".

Hee, hee, hee Good one. I'll refuse the urge to get started with 'stupid' jokes.

If you've never seen the movie "The Stupids" before, it's worth getting just to hear the 'I'm My Own Grandpa' song. The rest of the movie???? Simply STOOPID.

[Roquen]

MasterWuuf: Tell just one, pent-up emotion is not good. Just how stupid am I?

I didn't complete my argument on National debt....that silly work thing got in the way. To float debts forever is equivalent to creating a "perptual motion machine", which violates the first and/or second laws of thermodynamics. Physicists may not agree on much or hold any "laws of physics" as being absolutely correct, but for either the 1st or 2nd laws to be wrong means pretty much everything we think about both physics and mathematics is wrong.

Enough of this...back to your regularly scheduled program.

[Zyx]

Err... stick to the uncomplete argument next time.

[Roquen]

Zyx: I'll translate into english - "There's no such thing as a free lunch."

[Zyx]

I meant that debt being NOT energy, the analogy has no value.
(unless you consider trust, debt, money, rights, human labor and human disponibility to be the same aspects of some human energy?)

There's not such thing as a meaning.

[MasterWuuf]

This is becoming, what's the word for it???? Oh yeah, so MEANINGFUL to me.

Oops. That was close. That parked car almost sideswiped me.

[Gambit37]

This is getting absurd!

[Sophia]

Yeah, this is the first thread on here to ever end up absurd.

[beowuuf]

Yeah, most usually start absurd and move swiftly to the filth

[Trantor]

I'm almost sure that it wasn't my fault this time...

[Zyx]

Then we made a point. A Monthy Pythons' point. Gambit, can you split the thread right before it meanders?
I'd like to pollute the original topic.

[Lunever]

But don't forget to ban Trantor for this thread.

[Adamo]

Yeah, Trantor wrote at least 5 posts in this thread! I`ve got the feeling it`s all his fault. This needs to be punished!

[Gambit37]

OK, I've split the thread, banned Trantor (again), watched Holy Grail AND Life of Brian backwards, and finally I set up a home for the mentally disregarded and filled in the application forms for most of you. Oh, and I shot JR. Was there anything else?

[MitchB1990]

I voted for Obama, yay I'm 18 , I think he will be able to handle this just as well as the other candidates could've. But each would've done it in a wholly different way. In the end though we all want the same thing, it's just the means by which we get to them that people are looking at.

[T0Mi]

Coming home between 10:00-11:00 pm my energy just last long enough to read
(and to some extend: understand) the posts and I wish I had the EnGlIsH to share some of my thoughts.

We do have some mighty clever folks in here.
Most of what has been written made me nod silently, but a few statements also made me -very- angry. "War doesn't cost money", or "shameful job" did.

I'd like to sum it up with a quote from the forum:
"people certainly are different, thats why they are forever fighting"

cheers
T0Mi

P.S. ban Trantor, Amiga suckz, ST rulez!

[Adamo]

Amiga suckz, ST rulez!

personally I opt for the Super Nintendo

[sucinum]

>>WAR: I brought up Bastiat because his "Broken Window Fallacy" has been used to argue against the notion of "War being good for the economy" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of ... ken_window


That is of course right, but means another scale of war. The war in Iraq is rather a "conflict", the US doesn't have stretch to fight it.
And just to make it clear: by no means i support the Iraq war, but i simply don't think it hurt the US too much economically (in opposite of the Iraq).


>>You follow up (on Obama's perceived program) by stating that social policies strengthen an economy. Personally I think that is a 'fault' in your argument because it is difficult to back-up (as is any direct cause-and-effect situation). I think a better argument would be: "It's a shame that such a wealth nation, which thinks of itself as the 'land of opportunity', does have not have policies to help insure that dream". That's hard to argue with, other than "Screw the needy". I think that well balanced social programs do strengthen an economy in the long term, but it is very hard to prove and everyone will have a different perception of what well balanced means.


Actually i made both arguments.
Germany has a real social economy where the US won't come too close in expectable time, but every step in that direction counts. But Germany had the chance to recreate their economy more or less "from scratch" with support (Marshall plan) and great economists (especially Erhardt). That's not comparable to the US, change has to be slow and can be undone by a future government. Inside this limit, Obama works very well.


>>You also contradict yourself in your arguments: you use the notion that increasing the "velocity of money" when given to the poor helps the economy and turn around and say "Shameful jobs" don't increase the GDP. Increasing the velocity of money is always good for an economy and these bad jobs move money faster. And the GDP is simply one of many metrics used to measure the economic health of a nation (I probably should have used the Big Mac index instead).


You got a point there, at least it keeps people busy. But it's not a job where you can sleep well if your corporation has bad times.


>>SHAMEFUL JOBS: If you argued that "It's shameful for people to have to work for misery wages." I might agree with you, but the notion that any honest job is shameful?? Never. And who judges? Why is packing groceries more shameful than: serving food, drinks, sweeping floors, picking up garbage, being an investment banker, an actor, an astronaut, etc, etc. I think opening doors and greeting people with a smile has a bigger impact on society than some post-doc student researching the "influence of chamber music in 16th century literature". Research of this nature is fine, but it impacts virtually nobody.


I don't value those low jobs by the brain usage and i'd never deny that being paid for simply being friendly isn't a good thing in general. Maybe i'm not used enough to friendly people to value that (i'm from germany after all). But the US have an overweight of those service jobs and that is very unstable. Bluntly said, americans serve each other.
Of course this is the result of over production and this will happen to each industrial state sooner or later. The "other option" would be, that people work far less and this way share evenly the production/research of everything they need. This won't work because of global competition ofc.


>>Back to grocery stores: These people also help the elderly get food they can't reach and help them take their food to their cars, which helps these people live independent lives. Most stores will let people phone in orders and have the food delivered by these people. As I mentioned before, the consumer pays slighter higher price for it...they can vote for or against the system by choosing where they shop.


That is business economics: for a single corporation, this pays out. But in national economy, this has no impact, it only shifts customers from one corporation to another, until all corporations have such service people (sparing those firms who can't afford this, they might die out or shrink further, so this basically raises the level you need to start a business). Nationwide, this doesn't sell a single pack of butter more or less.
Elderly people get food as well in other countries (i know since i work at "mobile nursery" and this is part of what we offer) - (partly) payed by the social system btw...


>>As for corporations, if they didn't think that providing this extra service increased their profit, these jobs probably wouldn't exist. Personally I enjoy going to a cafe and being served. It isn't necessary by your reasoning, I could just a easily go order and pay for myself, but the two experience are different.


It increases their profit, but not the nations wealth. You could say that the corporation shares parts of their wealth with normal people, but they could also raise the prices to cover this.


>>NATIONAL DEBT: The notion that national debt is merely numbers on a spreadsheet is dangerous. Virtually everyone knows that an individual attempting to “float” debts (has you have suggested for nations) is driving towards a brick wall and accelerating, given that interest grows at an exponential rate. The only difference is that nations have deeper pockets so it takes a lot longer to hit the wall…but they will be going much faster. If national debt is hand waving magic , why did Canada go through such efforts to get theirs under control? In an idealized situation, where a country is incurring new debt merely to cover the interest of some old debt and not make payments to reduce that original debt, it will reach the point where the entire economy is working to secure loans. Of course that can’t happen because it is beyond the wall.


National debt is no problem if a country produces or researches valueable goods. In bad times, they can "simply" sell out. In this regard, production is more valueable then service, though.
There are countries in the third world close to this wall - but eventually, their debts are withdrawn. Of course this won't work for a much richer state, even Iceland will get problems.


And just in case this isn't clear: i enjoy this discussion and hope i don't shock too much people, but the world isn't a friendly place either. Wars happen and i surely don't support this, actually i'm happy that i work in a job where i sell goods i can sleep well about.
Despite all economic theory and as we could clearly see in the bank crisis, our capitalism is an artifical construct which only works in times of growth, when people trust each other. To maintain this growth, it is essential to destroy/throw away fully functional stuff, so that new stuff can be bought. So "hand waving magic" is as important as solid growth.

[Paul Stevens]

americans serve each other.

Unfortunately, this is becoming most
true in the health care industry. That
is the only place to get jobs today.
Soon we will have full employment while
producing zero wealth. I do not understand
why people on the street can see this
happening and foresee the results while
our leaders still seem to think that we are
rich so long as money flies from one hand
to the other. Maybe it is because they
get a percentage of each transfer.

We might as well have half the people in
the country moving rocks from the east
coast to the west coast while the other
half moves them back. FULL EMPLOYMENT!

[Adamo]

moving rocks to from the west coast to the east and back.

That was the case of sociallist countries. Officially there was no unemployment, but, in fact, there was something called (I`m not sure how to say it in english properly) "false employement".
For example, a guy was hired to protect the magazine full of wooden chests; but as there was no heating in a magazine, he had to burn these chests, wchich he was hired to protect, not to freeze to death, under the approval of the boss. Then came the next wooden chess delivery, wchich was burnt for the heat. And so on. So why not to dismiss the guy? If they did, unprotected magazine would be sistematically robbed. So, maybe instalating the real heating would be a solution? No, because it would require more money to approve the heating, comparing to wchich they loose on burning almost worthless chests. And one person would stand without the job. So, everyone is happy, especially the guys who produce these chests, because they had large orders.

It is rumoured to be a thrue story!

[sucinum]

Unfortunately, this is becoming most
true in the health care industry.

Health care is at least a good deed in the opposite to opening doors or fillinng shoppings in bags.
There's quote saying (analogous) "you can see the value of a country in how they treat their elders".
But it's hard to draw a line which service is "good" and which is redundant. You have to see the sum and start cutting at the bottom, if necessary.

[cowsmanaut]

just a side note back to India/Pakistan partition since I walked off to do work and didn't return for a few days.. and the conversation went on without me

Particion, the English left in 1946, just over 250 people were killed at that time. They left their own people in charge establishing a government order of their own people. The result was the deaths of thousands. Killed by their own people. Indirect involvement is not the same in this case. This was a religious battle of Muslim against Hindu as is often the case. (that is to say, one religious faction against another and blood between)

So again I press the point that the British were far better at negotiating a strategic withdrawl without sending in their armies to kill millions of people in a futile attempt to hold it when it wasn't theirs in the first place.

Any death is a shame.. but the results are also cumulative.

[Lunever]

BTW: Zyx, hasn't the bunch of nazis moved to argentinia?

[Sophia]

The result was the deaths of thousands. Killed by their own people. Indirect involvement is not the same in this case. This was a religious battle of Muslim against Hindu as is often the case.

So, by your logic, the "morally correct" thing for the US to do is to withdraw and let the Sunni, Shia, and Kurds in Iraq fight it out. In this case, as in India, it'd be their own people doing the killing. It doesn't matter how much the US presence might have mitigated widespread bloodshed, or what sort of shoddy shape they leave the country in-- all that matters is that they're no longer there.

a futile attempt to hold it when it wasn't theirs in the first place

Keep in mind that the partition occurred after 100 years of ruling over India, a land that "wasn't theirs" to begin with.

[Adamo]

Cowsmonaut wrote:

Particion, the English left in 1946, just over 250 people were killed at that time.

Why`s that? That`s mainly because:
1) GB was quite civilised empire at that time,
2) they, in fact, wanted to leave India (decolonize it military) after the war.

For a contrary, take a look what Belgians did in Kongo: ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congo_Free_State_Genocide ) or French in Algeria: ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algerian_War ).

[cowsmanaut]

If the US was really in Iraq to help.. to stop blodshed. To help establish peace.. that would be great. I think it's fairly evident that natural resources are a major player in the reasons for them being there. As I said, they wave a flag of righteousness to cover those deed which are less than pure.

Anyway, my issue is not that they are still there or not there.. sure, Bush is out.. for the moment.. he's still got a brother who has yet to run. My issue is that so many of the government heads in the past have constantly done wrong, and not just in the US... just different in each place.. Canada seems to have a habit of giving away things for nothing in return. Funding education well enough to build great minds, which then leave because after school they can't get funding for anything else..

etc etc...

I can only hope that things change for the better.

I just have a problem with the past constantly biting us in the ass..

[Jan]

I've god a bad feeling about this thread...