Slashdot Mirror

Mod parent up! The only thing that I'd add is to urge everyone to subscribe to The Economist. Every time I have airline miles about to expire, I spend about half on gift subscriptions and the rest I give to various charities; I'm still unsure which will produce the greatest future impact on the world. Anyway, the magazine is great for that "how others see us" perspective. Plus, not only do they have a few podcasts, there's an audio version (free for subscribers) containing word-for-word recordings of each issue.

Enough of the sales pitch, back to the parent post. The Economist has been pointing out for months that the average European would view Hillary Clinton as a radical right-winger. Of course, they believe that of anyone who references "God" more that once in a speech. Maybe that's why so many nerds are libertarian? Nerds tend towards agnosticism, and (in the US at least) that seems to correlate fairly well with libertarianism.

Mod parent up! The only thing that I'd add is to urge everyone to subscribe to The Economist. Every time I have airline miles about to expire, I spend about half on gift subscriptions and the rest I give to various charities; I'm still unsure which will produce the greatest future impact on the world. Anyway, the magazine is great for that "how others see us" perspective. Plus, not only do they have a few podcasts, there's an audio version (free for subscribers) containing word-for-word recordings of each issue.

Enough of the sales pitch, back to the parent post. The Economist has been pointing out for months that the average European would view Hillary Clinton as a radical right-winger. Of course, they believe that of anyone who references "God" more that once in a speech. Maybe that's why so many nerds are libertarian? Nerds tend towards agnosticism, and (in the US at least) that seems to correlate fairly well with libertarianism.

...the EU is on track to achieve 25 percent of their total energy supply from alternative energy.

I can tell that this will be a useful discussion. Once I'm finished reading the insightful and intelligent posts here, I think I'll go to the blog of The Economist or the Wall Street Journal and ask them about the latest Ubuntu release!

And why not, they might have some interesting things to say.

the US has incredible economical and financial muscle.

Make that "had", until about 5 years ago.

Today the USA has about as much financial clout as a homeowner who can barely keep up the payments on his subprime mortgage.

This cartoon from The Economist sums up the US financial position today.

Yeah, I always giggle when I read such kind of post in slashdot referring to the differences in pays of US compared to any other country... the article is actually quite good (yes, I read it /all/, until the paragraph when he says that he is looking for young successor before he gets too old to have good judgement), and the man and factory policies also seem quite nice.

My girlfriend works as a manufacturing Warehouse Manager for an international company in Mexico, she has a Master in Manufacturing and her pay is something like US $1,000 a month. She tells me about the conditions in the factory and the amounts workers get pay. To be payed US $300 a month for 6 day-8 hours/day work would seem ortrageous here in the UK, but for the living expenses in Mexico it is quite good. It might be wise to see comparisons such as the Big Mac Index if you want to know how good or bad you would live with certain salary.

http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm? story_id=9545933

Economist is a reasonably reputable source for information, are they not?

Be enlightened.

I really like the politically correct junk he throws in at the end...

"States should not be in the business of pushing people to have babies. If women decide to spend their 20s clubbing rather than child-rearing, and their cash on handbags rather than nappies, that's up to them."

The question is not "should states be in the business of pushing people to have babies", but rather "should there be professional services to assist in preventing or killing babies", and to a lesser extend, "should states be preventing men from pushing women to have babies".

Second, you can't say music stores don't facilitate music listening. I'm sure there are a lot of people who would listen to a lot less music if music stores weren't around. Blah blah vending- you can listen to music at music stores too. Finally, theater screening isn't necessarily critical to the success of a film. Sure, tehy make wads of cash from it, but they make more from DVD sales and such.

Music stores facilitate music listening, but a musician can sell an album without it. This is isn't really true of theaters: it IS true that studios make a majority of their money from DVDs, but the writers, producer, director and stars make most of their money from the theatrical run (it's where they make their money, royalties from DVD are peanuts by comparison). On top of that, studios make a ton of movie on DVDs if and only if the movie was a first-run theatrical feature in the first place -- it gives the film legitimacy in the eyes of the DVD market. Films that didn't have a theatrical run end up in the $4 bin at the Walgreens, with the DVD distro getting the sale and the artists getting a flat payout for the license.

Theater exhibitors are a gatekeeper to profitable feature filmmaking, like it or not. You can get your movie out without them, using internet, DVDs, whatever, but not in a way that has the same upside potential (that 20% of the first-dollar gross that's guaranteed to return the star $20 million). Why didn't the guys who made Napoleon Dynamite or Little Miss Sunshine just put their movie up on MySpace and solicit donations for their next movie? They're ambition and goal was to get theatrical, because it was the only real way to make back their investment.

The only major competitor to the theaters are premium cable channels HBO, but ad revs from those miniserieses (like From the Earth to the Moon) tend to be lower and the artists don't get the same kind of cut (they don't get a percentage unless they are the show creator or EP). TV is a worse deal $$$-wise than theatrical run for the people who actually do the work, and other distribution channels are only worse.

Let me drive home a point that I've left foggy, though the other branch of this thread touches on it: Artists REALLY REALLY LIKE the deal movie studios give them, even when the film is small. They are shoveled money if the movie does good in theaters. All the little creative issues and pressures they felt while making their film melt in a wave of cash. Almost no recording artists ever got such a deal from their labels, and now instead of offering better terms or profit participation to their acts, labels are insisting on 360-degree deals with new signs, which (rightly) horrifies their business managers and agents, and drives them away from the traditional label system EVEN MORE.

This entire argument, of course, is based on the supposition that the people who make the movie want to make money. Take that away and everything is up for grabs.

Oh, I don't know, maybe the huge funding advantage to pro-AGW researchers; if you're not studying a pro-AGW view, you don't get funded.

Or the billions and trillions that a carbon credit industry may be worth?

The AGW supporters are led by those at least as economically driven by those "evil" oil companies. That much is indisputable. Even the prophet of AGW, Al Gore, makes millions in pushing his AGW viewpoint. This level of hypocrisy and insider trading would be shouted from the rooftops if it was a "denier" so linked. But for the prophet, hardly a hiccup, especially among his acolytes...

http://www.economist.com/surveys/displaystory.cfm? story_id=E1_TSQSPDT

Modifying Moore's law

May 8th 2003
From The Economist print edition
Many of the innovations that made the IT industry's fortunes are rapidly becoming commodities--including the mighty transistor

IF GOOGLE were to close down its popular web-search service tomorrow, it would be much missed. Chinese citizens would have a harder time getting around the Great Firewall. Potential lovers could no longer do a quick background check on their next date. And college professors would need a new tool to find out whether a student had quietly lifted a paper from the internet.

Yet many IT firms would not be too unhappy if Google were to disappear. They certainly dislike the company's message to the world: you do not need the latest and greatest in technology to offer outstanding services. In the words of Marc Andreessen of Netscape fame, now chief executive of Opsware, a software start-up: "Except applications and services, everything and anything in computing will soon become a commodity."

Exactly what is meant by "commoditisation", though, depends on whom you talk to. It is most commonly applied to the PC industry. Although desktops and laptops are not a truly interchangeable commodity such as crude oil, the logo on a machine has not really mattered for years now. The sector's most successful company, Dell, is not known for its technological innovations, but for the efficiency of its supply chain.

As the term implies, "commoditisation" is not a state, but a dynamic. New hardware or software usually begins life at the top of the IT heap, or "stack" in geek speak, where it can generate good profits. As the technology becomes more widespread, better understood and standardised, its value falls. Eventually it joins the sector's "sediment", the realm of bottom feeders with hyper-efficient metabolisms that compete mainly on cost.
Built-in obsolescence

Such sedimentation is not unique to information technology. Air conditioning and automatic transmission, once selling points for a luxury car, are now commodity features. But in IT the downward movement is much faster than elsewhere, and is accelerating--mainly thanks to Moore's law and currently to the lack of a new killer application. "The industry is simply too efficient," says Eric Schmidt, Google's chief executive (who seems to have gone quite grey during his mixed performance at his previous job as boss of Novell, a software firm).

The IT industry also differs from other technology sectors in that its wares become less valuable as they get better, and go from "undershoot" to "overshoot," to use the terms coined by Clayton Christensen, a professor at Harvard Business School. A technology is in "undershoot" when it is not good enough for most customers, so they are willing to pay a lot for something that is a bit better although not perfect. Conversely, "overshoot" means that a technology is more than sufficient for most uses, and margins sink lower.

PCs quickly became a commodity, mainly because IBM outsourced the components for its first venture into this market in the early 1980s, allowing others to clone the machines. Servers have proved more resistant, partly because these powerful data-serving computers are complicated beasts, partly because the internet boom created additional demand for high-end computers running the Unix operating system.

But although expensive Unix systems, the strength of Sun Microsystems, are--and will probably remain for some time--a must for "mission-critical" applications, servers are quickly commoditising. With IT budgets now tight, firms are increasingly buying computers based on PC technology. "Why pay $300,000 for a Unix server," asks Mr Andreessen, "if you can get ten Dell machines for $3,000 each--and better performance?"

Google goes even further. A visit to one of the company's data centres in Si

The current P/E of NASDAQ is 24. That's a tad high; with bond yields around 5%, a P/E more than 20 must be based on growth speculation. I could reasonably see the NASDAQ losing 20% of its value in one shot. However, during the bubble, the P/E of the NASDAQ was over 100.

It's hard to overemphasize the difference between these two numbers. Look at the ratios between the NASDAQ P/E numbers and bond yields. Our current ratio is 1.2, which is 20% "too high". The bubble ratio was over 5.8, which 480% too high. The two situations are not even comparable.

If the NASDAQ actually lost over 75% of its value, like it did when the dot-com bubble burst, I'd be buying as much of QQQQ as I could get my hands on.

• Federal spending supports a third of all Alaskan jobs...
• ...the state is paved with pork--from its half-empty high-speed ferries to the $500,000 that the federally-funded Alaska Fisheries Marketing Board gave to Alaska Airlines to paint a giant king salmon on one of its aeroplanes.
• ...they are wrapped in a thick mink coat of subsidies.

we need to keep our food production locally. Dependence for food on other nations is a big no-no.

For food staples I totally agree. I can't think of a single place that shouldn't be food self sufficient. Now this doens't mean all food just food that's culturally appropriate, like casava, corn, potatos, rice, wheat, and whatever should be grown locally on farm owned and opperated by people living in the area. Some things that won't grow locally, as least not without a lot of inputs like energy and labor, should be traded. For instance a study I read about in the Economist magazine concluded it takes more energy and emits more CO2 by raising sheep in England than it takes in raising sheep in New Zealand then shipping them to England.

That said, I don't agree that they export the heavily subsidized stuff.

Wrong, corn is heavily subsidized yet it exported all around the world. Because US agribusinesses can grow corn then export it to Mexico where it's sold for less than Mexican farmers can grow corn, Mexican farmers are being driven off thier farms. This is one reason there are so many "illegal immigrants" or aliens in and trying to get in the US. Allow Mexican farmers to make a living on their farms and they will stay there.

They should just produce less, and that's often what happens: farmers are paid not to plant stuff.

Yeap, paying farmers not to plant some fields is another subsidy. While I don't agree with many subsidies, I approve of paying farmers to not plant, or ranch, in some places, such as along the banks of lakes and rivers. Instead pay farmers to use them as buffer zones to prevent these bodies of water from being polluted. That's what New York City does, NYC pays farmers in the Catskill Mountains, Catskills, to prevent farm runoffs from polluting rivers that run through the mountains where NYC gets most of it's freshwater. This isn't really a subsidy, the only other way to get the farmers to use buffers is to have a law mandating buffer zones, however such laws are a form of taking without compensating the owners.

Calculate the amount you'll pay them per month, the amount that they get in profit and then the cost of build out. Then figure out how long it takes to realize those "eventual" profits. It just doesn't make business sense sometimes. Now, if we want to say, that rather than being purely profit driven, it should be seen as some kind of right or necessity for the overall good, then that sounds like the time for government to subsidize it into making business sense.

Quick example: We all used to drive down roads just fine, but now that most places have cell phones, "dead zones" are considered a safety hazard when people can't call for help (Economist, July 12th 2007). Now if it really is a matter of public safety, why not subsidize the special cases where it is in the public interest to have another tower installed?

Now another option would be to make it a requirement on the licensing of the spectrum (i.e part of the business cost, so companies can factor it into the profitability equation when they make the decision), but I don't see why, for instace in your DSL example, I should pay more for the 974 feet to my urban Point-of-Presence to support the installation of an extra long run and repeaters for your DSL. It would seem to me that that really is just part of your cost-of-living, just like paying higher San Francisco rents is part of mine.

Newsflash.

http://www.economist.com/images/ga/2007w27/Petrol. jpg

* The US healthcare system is not free market, so much as fascistic. It's a rat's nest of politicized regulation and taxes, costing $169 billion annually.

* Swiss healthcare features both universal care and private providers. It provides a means-tested entitlement to those who can't afford care, while allowing those who can afford it to choose competing private insurers. It does require everyone to have health insurance [*], but under this system, such a requirement works.

[*] This does offend my libertarian sensibilities, but I think it's utterly irresponsible for an individual to not have health insurance and force people to give them emergency care, lest they die in the streets.

Your point is well-made -- transaction costs are high. Now, in a free market some service is supposed to step in and streamline things, but that doesn't always happens, especially if there are static gov't regulations to work around.

Healthcare is a prime example. Someone calculated recently that, in the the US, regulation amounts to a $169 billion "drag" on the system. If you are ill, navigating the system is no picnic.

Don't learn English from Slashdot! It's pretty bad here.

Try the following instead:
http://www.newscientist.com/news.ns

http://www.economist.com/science/tq/

I like your style, the condescension is palpable.

The problem in that "United States" is SINGULAR not plural as you seem to think.

Should you wish to retract your previous rant, I will allow you the opportunity to do so before I draw attention to the fact that you went through the process of constructing a particularly nasty rant that was, in fact, completely wrong.

It's ok, I'm sure you're not the first person to say something so stupid.

Here are some links you can read so you know why you're wrong, and can therefore avoid saying something stupid like this again in the future.

www.bartleby.com/68/32/6232.html
http://www.economist.com/research/styleGuide/index .cfm?page=805687
www.uwm.edu/Dept/English/wcenter/WCO4/handouts/set vi/SETVI3AP.html

Like I said, it's ok. You can't be expected to know everything, although you should know what the fuck you're talking about if you're going to rant like you did. Too bad you didn't know what the fuck you were talking about, huh? Now you look like a pedantic ass who is too stupid to be correct when he's engaging in pedantry.

Well, let's be fair—like all innovations in the history of innovation, ever, anywhere, the genesis of the idea doesn't come from any one person or company. Haptics has been the Next Big Thing for a while. That said, I'm glad someone's finally done something with it, if what you say is true.

It is time to let the Russian royal family rest in peace

Incidentially, I just read my current issue of The Economist, and they have a leader (op-ed piece) about absurd titles. You can read it online at http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm? story_id=9339915.

My favourite sentence from that piece: "What next? Führers, Caudillos, Duci, Gauleiters and Generalisimos must be due for a comeback."

My favorite Terry Semel fact: he had never used e-mail before starting at Yahoo[1]. And this was in 2001! No wonder he's done a poor job.

Word is that their software engineering efforts are a sad, sad mess, with a lot of smart people spending most of their time on politics.

[1] Source: The Economist, 10 May 2007, "Face Value: Out-Googled"

Quote: "You *HAVE* to have questions that have answers somewhat similar, or you make it way too easy to guess the answer by way of elimination."

I have one thing to say to you: http://www.economist.com/diversions/quiz/

As the gp stated, China is primarily authoritarian these days. Their communist ideology has been greatly softened, to the point where the official hero is not the little worker bee anymore, whose path to glory consisted of sowing his comrades' shoes at night and in anonymity. Instead, party propaganda is trying to leverage old sages like Lao Tse to cement their authority.

Communism is nothing but a tool for political control in the hands of the Chinese Central Authority. They realized that the consistent pursuit of communism won't turn them into an economic super power, even if it provided the easiest way to justify and cement their claim as the supreme political authority in the land. Instead, their rediscovered love of mercantilism needs a different type of political justification - hence their shift away from strict communism and towards historical/legendary chinese philosophers.

I'm not sure what to make of your rabid attachment to the idea that China is a communist country. All I can say is that you're completely missing the picture, and have absolutely no understanding about what drives China, where it wants to be and how it intends to get there. For a quick and dirty primer on China today, read this: http://www.economist.com/countries/China/. You might claim that everyone around you has been successfully brain washed by China, but I contend that you're obsession with communists has prevented you from seeing China's evolution from its hard-core communism in the 60s towards an economic, political and military super power whose preferred ideology is the one that gets them there.

In 2005 the economist had a report on war forecasting:
http://www.economist.com/science/displayStory.cfm? Story_ID=4368226

OK, so that wasn't really fair. :-)

Here's the executive summary: http://www.quebecoislibre.org/000902-3.htm

Some more references:
http://wiki.ffii.org/Martin041109En
http://www.mises.org/journals/jls/15_2/15_2_1.pdf
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/05/21/business/wh o.php
http://www.guardian.co.uk/globalisation/story/0,73 69,665969,00.html
http://www.dklevine.com/general/intellectual/again st.htm
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20020805/newman200207 25
http://www.economist.com/printedition/displaystory .cfm?story_id=5014990

"Within the past five or six years, economists in particular have started to question the USPTO's practices, finding little correlation, if any, between patent proliferation and invention. Economists have identified many situations in which patents actually retard the introduction of new products. "
http://members.forbes.com/asap/2002/0624/044.html

China and India pollute substantially less per person than any EU country or the US.

So? They're growing at a much, much faster rate. And the statement you chose - that it would be like saying, "We got to industrialization first, so we're the only ones who get to benefit! Oh and you have to clean up just as much as us even though we've made a bigger mess," - is telling, but it's actually the opposite of that: it's more like, "We got to industrialization, but we'll allow other developing economies to artificially pollute much more, leaving Western economies at an even greater disadvantage than they are now when competing."

One day, when India and China are serious polluters they will curb emissions.

Oh, they will? Really? Who's going to make China curb emissions? And China has plenty of problems now.

So yeah, it's not "fair" if China, especially considering the force it is already, isn't held to any standards at all; or, rather, would you find it surprising that there are other factors to consider in the US not simply wanting to happily allow a severe competitive disadvantage, and frames the discussions based on that? This isn't a "Republican" issue or a matter of "misuse" of scientific data. It's an issue of pure economics. Might it be treated more gingerly by more liberal politicians? Sure. But it wouldn't be a lot more than lip service, because no matter who is in office, the economic and other threats from China in particular are very real, and emissions are but small part of that equation.

Read The Economist for broader coverage of this issue. What concerns them and other news media is the frosting of relations between Russia and American.

However, and I had never heard this put before, Russia defines so much about itself by its opposition to the USA. So an increased sense of Russian worth is correlated with sabre rattling of this sort.

More points raised:

* The deterents posed by the Shield could never, ever stop the amount of weapons Russia has.
* The argument for the shields "They are only for defense", echoes the Iranian defence of their Nuclear Weapons program. We don't believe the Iranians, why should the Russians believe the USA/Europe??
* This is all about influence, rather than actual defense
* Putin won't be around forever

A snippet of coverage:: A few interceptors, a big gap
They also had a whole special on it a few weeks back, if you're interested, it's in there.

One of the biggest mistakes that we Westerners committed was to admit the Russians into the G-8. The original G-7 was intended to be the group of leading industrialized democracies committed to Western values.

We admitted the Russians in the hope that, although Russia was still highly non-Western (in, for example, its treatment of sexual-orientation or ethnic minorities), being lenient on Russia would encourage the Russians to modernize their society along Western lines. Well, we were wrong. Just last week, the Russian police smiled in approval as ordinary Russians violently beat up participants in a demonstration calling for rights for homosexuals. Some of the victims of the violence were European politicians who had participated into the demonstration.

The Russians make a mockery of the G-8 and its principles. Now, Putin is idly threatening to point his nuclear missiles at Eastern Europe. Nuclear annihilation is serious business. Before Russia joined the G-8, no member of the G-7 ever threatened nuclear annihilation against a prosperous, Western democracy.

The time has come for us to end this nonsense. We should expel Russia from the G-8, restoring the orignal name of "G-7".

One of the biggest mistakes that we Westerners committed was to admit the Russians into the G-8. The original G-7 was intended to be the group of leading industrialized democracies committed to Western values.

We admitted the Russians in the hope that, although Russia was still highly non-Western (in, for example, its treatment of sexual-orientation or ethnic minorities), being lenient on Russia would encourage the Russians to modernize their society along Western lines. Well, we were wrong. Just last week, the Russian police smiled in approval as ordinary Russians violently beat up participants in a demonstration calling for rights for homosexuals. Some of the victims of the violence were European politicians who had participated into the demonstration.

The Russians make a mockery of the G-8 and its principles. This demand for licensing fees on supposed patents of a 60-year-old technology is the latest in a string of non-Western activities.

The time has come for us to end this nonsense. We should expel Russia from the G-8, restoring the orignal name of "G-7".

Like all libertarians, he advocates rights for the rich, and slavery for the poor.

libertarianism provides only simple answers to complex questions

Those in Iowa certainly are!

Here's an article from the Economist on Iowa's ethanol economy. The effects are obviously positive on the local scale, with higher profits, more jobs, and increasing land prices as more people try to rush in and get a piece of the subsidy. Still, the same subsidizing policy can easily kill off the whole industry, if the government decides tomorrow that another biofuel is more "in".

The Economist, March 2006:

So what does the future hold? With only five data-points, it is hard to be sure exactly which mathematical curve is being followed. If it is what is known as a power law, then the 14-bladed razor should arrive in 2100. The spate of recent innovation, however, suggests it may be a hyperbola. In that case, blade hyperdrive will be reached in the next few years and those who choose not to sport beards might be advised to start exercising their shaving arms now.

With a graph showing the number of blades going to infinity around 2010.

here you go. It doesn't actually support your point of view; gasoline prices are set by supply & demand, and as the article says, we actually ship gasoline from Europe because of our shortage in refinery capacity.

'Argument' and 'Conflict' have their place. Conflict, for example, would be a longer term argument usually involving violence. A row would be a one-off, short term, on-the-spot shouting match, but I suspect the BBC follows its own version of the excellent Economist Style Guide.

> Depends how you define an "improvement."

How about "Higher standards of living and increased economic growth and efficiency"?

china, india and the like start developing their infrastructure outside of major cities and their workers wages start growing even faster there will be a higher number of people in poverty

Income in the two most populace nations in the world, China and India, are rising quite well. And partially because of this their birth rates are dropping. With the trends now going on now they believe within a couple of generations there will be more retired people in China than there are workers. The Economist has had some good articles on this in the past year as have other periodicals such as Foreign Policy .

Put it this way, if you are arguing with the business and can say "The economist said" its going to be a million times better that wired/slashdot/any computing mag you can think of.

I like reading "The Economist" myself. However because I only read one maybe two compleat issues a month and it's a weekly I don't subscribe.

Caught this article just a few weeks back, it goes into some detail on Kodak's inkjet technology.

Actually no, it's in relative decline.

Eh? Where are you getting this idea that Iran's leadership is insane? I have yet to read a credible source that gives me any particular reason to think Iran would be stupid enough to initiate nuclear attack. The mullahs are religious, Ahmadinejad hates on Israel—so what? Plenty of Israeli politicians still want to see the Palestinian Authority wiped out. Frankly, maybe a nuclear-armed Iran is exactly what Israeli moderates need to get their government to stop pissing off its neighbors in the Middle East with such impunity.

The planet is already overpopulated, and 2 is enough.

Actually the replacement, or fertility, rate is more like 2.6 children per couple. Some countries, like Sweden and the USA, are seeing a drop in native born citizens and the only way they can maintain the same level of population is by allowing more and more immigrants to settle in the country. Even the two most populous nations in the world, China and India, are seeing their populations leveling off. Though I don't have a link, I think some were in The Economist , I've read of studies that showed within a generation there will be fewer people in China supporting more old people there.

The best way to control the amount of people there are is to increase both education and equality. As the educational level improves the people are able to get better paying jobs and equality allows females not to only get an education but also get a ob outside the home. And as income raises people have fewer children.

"you do know that 79% of the tax burden is carried by the top 20% of income earners, right?"

You mean those folks that hold the vast majority of the assets? Sure just cherry pick a single statistic from a single source and proclaim 'look what I know, you dip shits didn't know this did you, huh, huh?'. Look the issue here is just how out of balance things can get EITHER way before it breaks the system. The balance right now grossly favors those at the top of the economic food chain. If it continues to the point of breakdown just what do you think the fate of the top x% will be? In the end it is in everyones interest to not break the frickin system.

"Maybe for once we should stop being partisan"

Yea, thats rich, considering the drivel to from the "conservative" party I have listened with great restraint, and admittedly often with amusement, for most my life. Can you make a clear argument just using common sense instead of falling back on a single cherry picked statistic form BillO's list of "facts" to throw at a liberal---remember you have to use this word in with a dirty slur pretext or voice. Don't take this to mean I am a just another sheep in the Democratic flock, which in contrast to the Republican flock, is actually more like a herd of cats anyway. I will say I like many others are sick of the "good cop - bad cop" routine the two parties have used so successfully for so many years. So exactly whose drivel is it you like best? Oh thats right you like to quote the "fiducially conservative ones", hehehe, yea.

Wabi-Sabi
Matthew

read...

http://www.federalreserve.gov/boarddocs/speeches/2 007/20070206/default.htm

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/f5e905ce-69d8-11db-952e-00 00779e2340.html

http://neweconomist.blogs.com/new_economist/povert y_and_inequality/index.html

http://www.chicagofed.org/economic_research_and_da ta/wp_abstract.cfm?pubsID=732

http://multinationalmonitor.org/mm2003/03may/may03 interviewswolff.html

http://www.economist.com/world/displaystory.cfm?st ory_id=7055911

http://ideas.repec.org/a/ecj/econjl/v112y2002i478p c68-c73.htm

http://dollarsandsense.org/archives/2004/0704tilly .html

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/18995

http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB11418244330 8492484.html

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/71954e1a-ad43-11da-9643-00 00779e2340,Authorised=false.html?_i_location=http% 3A%2F%2Fnews.ft.com%2Fcms%2Fs%2F71954e1a-ad43-11da -9643-0000779e2340.html&_i_referer=http%3A%2F%2Fne weconomist.blogs.com%2Fnew_economist%2Fpoverty_and _inequality%2Findex.html

http://ksgnotes1.harvard.edu/Research/wpaper.nsf/

Look closely at Vietnam. Though it is still an authoritarian society, the Vietnamese have made significant strides towards democracy and human rights. We rarely hear of pompous national goals like "First Vietnamese in Space" from Hanoi. The Vietnamese focus on things that matter: economy and social liberalization (e.g., human rights). In fact, "The Economist" reports that the strongest voices of support for democracy is coming from the membership of the Vietnamese Communist Party.

The Chinese focus on pompous national goals (e.g., space weapons and the like), but the Vietnamese focus on the things that matter to the common people. Note that the Vietnamese are specifically not developing nuclear weapons while Beijing is spending huge sums on aggressively developing nuclear-tipped missiles.

With the new national technology program, the Chinese may create the most advanced robot in the world, but their society will be socially impoverished. Meanwhile, the Vietnamese create a liberal democracy.

15 years from now, in which society -- China or Vietnam -- would you prefer to live? Another bowl of Pho please!

I think that the key to reducing car dependency is to increase the marginal cost of car use

Last year I read about a study I believe in the Economist magazine that said people budget a specific amount of their income even if not consciously for transportation, 17% I think it said. When fuel prices are low they use more expensive gas guzzling cars but when fuel is high they get fuel efficient cars.

maize - 1.3

sugar cane - 8.3

Wood - 16

maize - 1.3

sugar cane - 8.3

Wood - 16

From what I've seen you folks in Turkey have made stunning progress in the last three years, but evidently you still have your own 'attitude' problems:

http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id =8820431&CFID=118367886&CFTOKEN=a749f6-78ab393c-c9 2c-41e8-a5c6-7e3e2b46cdfd

Ironic, I just read that article Monday, and now lo and behold here comes some Turk lecturing me on how to run my own government.

Alas, the majority of us voters here in the USA disagree with you, sir -- we vote Republican because we think our economy is grows stronger when taxes are low and national interests are defended boldly.