You respect and protect that by allowing other cultures to continue to immigrate and contribute to that culture.
And yet we elected a president who campaigned on exactly the opposite position. Namely keep the brown skinned people down/out and return our country to a false version of the 1950s when everything seemed great if you were a white man.
It's hard to image the UK engaging a serious navy in a conflict where one of these carriers and their aircraft won't be involved. Perhaps we could drop some of this overly superior American attitude?
Two carriers? The US has 10 active aircraft carriers (with more on the way) plus another 9 ships that would be called aircraft carriers in any other navy. Between 2 to 4 of these 10 carriers are deployed at any given moment - a fact that will not be true for the 2 British carriers. (they need periodic time in port for repairs and training) It's not about being smug. The US navy is just WAY larger and more capable than any other navy currently operating. Personally I think this is a ridiculous waste of resources but it's currently the way it is.
The way I understand it, wouldn't Alaska be the first part of NA to see combat?
Probably not. There isn't much in Alaska worth attacking aside from a few military outposts, none of which are enormous. The territory is huge, rough, and there is little strategic or tactical value in most of it. Minimal industry, sparse population, terrible weather for much of the year. During WWII the Japanese more or less ignored Alaska because there was no value in attacking it despite it being the closest part of the US to Japan. (yes it's closer than Hawaii by about 600 miles)
There is no navy on the world, except the US one, that is a thread to the UK's, or any other European navy.
Forgetting about the Russians aren't you? While they aren't what they were during the Soviet era they certainly qualify as a credible threat and they clearly aren't terribly friendly to UK and EU interests. I would expect the Chinese to become a credible naval power in due time as well. Possibly India too though like China distance will tend to defuse any tensions with the EU. Russia however is basically next door.
And the US are not a *serious* thread. if they would go rogue and try to attack Europe they need to get their carriers into strike range.
Umm, you do know that the US has intercontinental missiles, long range bombers, and troops and equipment ALREADY stationed in Europe right? While there is basically zero chance of the US attacking Europe they would not necessarily be likely to depend on carriers to do it should the need arise. Especially in light of the fact that several countries in Europe are nuclear armed. You can be quite sure that somewhere in the Pentagon there are plans for attacking Europe should the need arise and I'm pretty sure they've considered how to protect their carriers in such an eventuality.
Unlike the US navy most European navies are designed for "home defense"
I wouldn't fancy any of their chances against the US navy right now no matter what their disposition. There are some countries that could do some real damage but unless nukes get involved I'm pretty confident the eventual outcome of a naval fight with the US would favor the US. The US navy is about the most cartoonishly overpowered military force I can imagine.
Is anyone seriously planning on attacking British warships with something besides rafts full of IEDs?
Probably not but only an idiot prepares just for the most likely contingency.
What's the likelihood that Brits would be involved in a Naval engagement that didn't also involve the American Navy, a force that is nearly cartoonish compared to every other fleet on the planet?
So the plan is to further rely on the US military to pick up the slack? Given the rhetoric from the idiot about to occupy the White House that might not be such a smart plan. Yes the US wildly overspends on its military. That doesn't mean the interests of the US and the UK will always align or that the US will always be interested in playing the role of protective big brother.
Not only is the UK one of the wealthiest nations on earth, it is one of a few, if not the only one among NATO nations that spends the recommended 2% on defence.
My guess is that they are hoping the US will continue to pick up the slack since the US wildly over spends on it's military. Not sure how long that will go on with the new idiot about to enter the White House. But I agree that it makes little sense for a maritime nation like the UK to have a second rate navy. The UK might have it's problems but it's not exactly in the poor house with one of the 5 largest economies by GDP in the world.
When is the last time the British Navy fired an anti-ship missile from a ship? Almost 40 years? Seriously.
I can't be bothered to confirm that statement but even if we agree that it is true, so what? Just because you haven't had a particular type of battle in a while doesn't mean it won't happen tomorrow. Nobody has been nuked since 1945 but (unfortunately) they still are actively maintained for particular contingencies. I don't really care one way or the other since I'm not a UK citizen but if anti-ship missiles are a tactical necessity in modern naval combat then it seems rather silly to bring a knife to a gun fight.
My thought on it is that if the nation went to war in which naval battles were a possibility (or actually happening), the budget would be instantaneously available to them to do whatever necessary to protect their seas.
Having budget available doesn't mean you have munitions instantly available. There is a lead time to this sort of thing.
I'm sure they also have a rather large stockpile they could draw on in the meantime as well.
And what good are those if they are sitting in a warehouse somewhere because the launch systems have been removed from the ships and nobody has been trained to use them? Combat situations often don't announce themselves with several months lead time to get ready.
It's a problem for everyone around you who would have been warned had the sound been present - but who now won't be.
Which is precisely no one. The notion that the noise pollution my car puts out is some sort of useful or valuable warning to those around me is delusional. Anyone who actually depends on hearing a car as a means to remain safe is behaving in a very irresponsible and dangerous manner. There are plenty of gasoline powered cars that are nearly silent and somehow we've managed to avoid mass fatalities of pedestrians anyway.
I am. These racist idiots aren't giving me a lot of reasons to be proud.
Just because someone else acts the fool doesn't mean they are your responsibility or that you should be embarrassed by them just because they happen to share your skin color. I was born white and had no control over it. I see no reason to be ashamed over something I had no control over nor any reason to apologize for it. I'm disgusted by the racist behavior of many white people but I'm equally disgusted by the racist behavior of non-white people. Skin color is never a reason to feel ashamed no matter what the shade. It's how YOU behave that matters.
It's hard to tell my girlfriend that the idiot who told her to go back to her country, is an isolated incident.
I think it's naively optimistic of you to think that such a thing is an isolated opinion in this country. While it is not be the majority of white people I think a double digit percentage of the population probably would not be offended by such behavior at all and too many would agree with and condone it. Remember that we have tens of millions of white folks who think nothing of deporting 11 million Latin American people, most of whom are here peacefully and contributing to the economy. We have people who think police "stop and frisk" harassment of minorities is somehow justifiable. Minorities are subject to police harassment on a routine basis. We're not in some post-racial utopian society. We've made progress in the last 50 years but there is a looooong way yet to go. The recent election is proof positive of that.
The taxi had an internal combustion engine, anyway, and there were plenty of other vehicles each making their own noise. I don't see how, if it were electric, adding noise could've helped.
Exactly. In the places one is most likely to encounter a blind person there is copious traffic noise and the circumstances are unlikely to be such that adding more noise is going make a difference.
Basically we are imagining problems and "solving" them by maintaining an approximation of the status quo even though there is no evidence that the status quo is a good situation.
A bigger problem is, what happens if some pedestrian leaps out from behind a bush onto your hood and it's revealed that you've disabled the system?
That's my problem isn't it? Yes I'd be taking a legal risk. I don't really think it is a a meaningful risk or that the likelihood of it becoming a problem is significant but I acknowledge that it is a potential risk.
You can be fairly certain that it's going to be illegal to disable this system, and that if it's not working you're going to get a fix-it ticket.
I've got the money and the points to burn. Bring it on. I'll worry about it when they start actually enforcing noise ordinances against Harley Davidson motorcycles which clearly exceed any reasonable or necessary noise level.
There's no excuse for a pedestrian to be hit by a vehicle unless the vehicle is somewhere it shouldn't be - like a sidewalk.
THIS! Pedestrians that get hit are almost invariably doing something stupid. If you are walking in a place where cars normally drive then you are an idiot if you don't adjust your behavior to reflect that reality. Even if you are legally doing the right thing the laws of physics don't care about that. In a collision the car will "win" 100% of the time so any pedestrian that doesn't act accordingly is effectively either suicidal or a child.
That's not to say drivers shouldn't be careful too but common sense dictates that the pedestrians should be extra careful any time they are walking around moving or potentially moving cars.
I almost got run over the other day by a guy backing up his Chevy Volt.
I'm glad you are ok. That said, if you were paying adequate attention to your surroundings and being careful that shouldn't be possible.
First problem: no noise at all. I was walking in a parking lot close to the car and he didn't see me.
So don't walk close to the cars or if you must then pay careful attention. His job is to back up slowly if he don't have complete visibility. Your job is to carefully watch out for your own physical well being and all signs of a vehicle that could move (lights, motion, driver activity, wheel turning, etc). If you can't see what the car is doing then be careful until you are sure. As long as both of you do your jobs there shouldn't be any problems.
Do you mean like how digital cameras make a "click" sound when an image is captured?
Which we have the ability to turn off. And when I'm doing wildlife photography I often do turn it off to avoid spooking the subject I'm photographing.
Have you ever thought of how e-mail programs use images like stamps, envelopes, pencils, paper, and so on?
Yes and I think it's retarded that we use an icon of a floppy disk to indicate saving a document since nobody has used floppy disks in 20 years. The kids don't even know what the heck the icon is supposed to represent. It made some sense back in the 90s and earlier but it makes zero sense today. Similarly keeping byproduct sounds of cars just because we are currently accustomed to it is idiotic. Cars making noise isn't a feature - it's a side effect and a polluting one at that.
We use those images because we make a natural connection between sending a note electronically and sending a note by postal service.
Actually a lot of people don't make that connection at all. If you don't believe me I'll be happy to introduce you to some - I have several in my family. There are plenty of people that don't get the "folder" or "file cabinet" or "letter" analogies. At all.
What I fear though is that someone will use a sound that will get kids run over, like "ice cream truck".
How would that be different than today? Do you see kids getting run over every time an ice cream truck drives by? No you do not. Kids don't stay out of the road because of car sounds. They go into the road because they aren't aware of their surroundings which is why parents have to watch them. They don't equate car sounds with danger and they certainly aren't paying attention to the car sounds when chasing their ball into the street.
A $3 speaker and $1 of wiring per car will add up to $39 million?
$4 per car? Oh that's adorable that you think it would be that cheap. I run a company that makes automotive components. I can assure you that it will be no where near that cheap even for the OEMs. A part that costs $4 to produce will cost 4-8X that amount installed in a car after all the mark ups. It will be made by a Tier 3 or 4 company, and then resold 3-4X before getting to the OEM for final assembly with markups and overhead and labor being added each time.
Just for a crude rule of thumb if you want to guess what a part costs to actually make, go to a dealer and find the price. In rough numbers it will probably cost somewhere between 6-8X what it costs to make in most cases. Sometimes more, occasionally less depending on sales volume for the part. So if you have a part that costs $250 at the dealer, it probably cost something like $4 to actually make. For example we make a part that goes into a GM SUV. We sell it to our customer for around $4 and the assembly it goes to costs around $9 to the Tier 1 supplier. If you wander into a dealership and buy that assembly it would cost you north of $700. The markup on dealer parts is insane. My company makes wire harnesses. I've actually stood in line at a dealer watching a guy buy a wire harness for $200 that had *maybe* $5 worth of components and wire in it at wholesale prices.
Because any faster than that and you just can't stop for the deaf guy who steps into the cross-walk right before you get there.
Exactly how is adding noise to a car going to help a DEAF person hear the oncoming traffic? It might help a blind person in theory (though I find those argument specious) but a deaf person isn't going to hear any car no matter how loud it is.
And in plenty of situations, you are dependent on pedestrians hearing cars and protecting themselves.
Pedestrians that depend on hearing cars to protect themselves are not paying attention and are trying to earn a Darwin award. No driver should presume that any pedestrian will be dependent on hearing their car for safety.
You've got no hope of seeing the pedestrian walking behind cars through a parking-lot, and without any sound, they'll step right behind you as you're backing-up.
A) How fast are you backing up? and B) If you can't see well when backing up, then back up SLOWLY enough that pedestrians can take evasive action if necessary. Depending on pedestrians to actually hear your car is idiotic and unsafe.
In short artificial engine noise is utterly unacceptable in my view.
Agreed. The tires make enough noise as it is and many gas engines are so quiet you can barely tell they are running at idle. Noise is a form of pollution and we definitely don't need more of it. This seems to be more a case of anecdotal "data" jumping ahead of the actual facts. All this will accomplish is to add a lot of noise pollution with minimal to no benefit to society.
Someone will say "but what about the blind people? What about the children?" What about them? First off there are incredibly few blind people wandering about and it's not as if we have to dodge them on a routine basis. I honestly cannot recall the last time I actually saw a blind person attempt to cross a road. Certainly hasn't been for at least 20 years and never anywhere near where I live. Seriously, never. Pedestrians in general are not a big problem in most of the country. Maybe it's a problem in big cities but it sure as shit is not a problem in the suburbs or more rural parts of the country. As for children, they don't pay attention to cars that make noise today so it's not as if they are going to start listening to fake noises. Kids wander into streets because they don't know any better, not because they don't hear cars.
I rather thought it was elitism and looking down on the other side that got him elected.
I find the term "elitism" perplexing. So we are supposed to celebrate ignorance and stupidity rather than pointing out dumb ideas and insisting on intelligent and informed discourse?
Not necessarily. Your scenario is only if it becomes a full-out trade war.
It doesn't have to become a wide scale trade war for protectionism to be a terrible and self defeating idea. Tariffs almost always cause more damage than they help. Put a tariff on steel and congratulations, you've just made every car, plane, and machine that uses steel more expensive and less competitive.
Trump can play chicken to scare them to make changes.
That is a very dangerous game to play with global consequences if the Chinese don't blink. It's especially stupid given that such negotiation tactics almost certainly are unnecessary and stand a high probability of backfiring.
Because they depend on exports far more than we do, a game of trade chicken is riskier to them.
And we depend on imports more than they do. They hold a sizeable amount of our debt which is a danger to both China and the US. Any trade war would hurt both sides and it's not an exaggeration to say that we have more to lose than they do. We're the ones with the higher than average incomes. We're the ones who are living on borrowed money. Yes any trade war would hurt China too but like any knife fight we wouldn't come out unbloodied.
Let's give it a try rather than live with the status quo.
Trying something that is clearly dangerous and almost certainly counterproductive just to disrupt the status quo is idiotic. Different just for the sake of different isn't a sane plan. That's what people do when they don't know what the fuck they are doing.
The cards are on our side. It's an area where Trump's brashness may work to our favor.
That's simply not true. What we have is something of a standoff with both sides able to hurt the other rather badly. Trump's arrogant demeanor is FAR more likely to backfire than it is to help.
Or are you saying that Trump supporters are opposed to the free market?
I think Trump supporters (primarily though not exclusively working class rural white people) are absolutely terrified of a free market and a great many of them don't understand international trade at all. Sound bites are a lot easier than macroeconomics. Xenophobic sound bites that make foreigners scapegoats for their own failings and those of their country even more so.
Or maybe there coalitions that support candidates for a variety of reasons - and that not all the positions held by the supporters are in common?
Of course plenty of Trump supporters supported his lunacy for reasons other than protectionist sabre rattling. Some for reasons of racism, some for sexism, some for tribalistic loyalty to the republican party, some for pure amusement, some for unreasoning hatreds (KKK etc), some for misplaced fears ("2nd amendment people"), and plenty of other reasons besides. Most of them wrongheaded and ill considered but reasons all the same.
Therefore you agree that not all Republicans are for the free market.
Republicans have NEVER been for a free market. They just want a particular version of a capitalist market. Republicans have routinely been against "free" trade. If you recall during the most recent Bush administration they imposed steel tariffs which had the perverse outcome of reducing domestic steel production, increasing the cost of steel, and reducing employment in associated industries (like automakers).
By the NAFTA is not an example of free and open markets. Neither is TPP.
True but there is no such thing as a pure free market. In actual fact a pure free market would be a VERY bad thing. But those trade agreements DO reduce net trade barriers. Whether or not that is a net benefit to society is a separate question endemic to the particulars of the agreements in question.
Comparative advantage is only useful when both countries are at full employment.
Comparative advantage has nothing whatsoever to do with "full" employment. Comparative advantage explains why it can be useful for two countries to both engage in production of a particular good even though one of the countries has an absolute cost advantage over the other. If comparative advantage did not exist neither would much international trade.
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You respect and protect that by allowing other cultures to continue to immigrate and contribute to that culture.
And yet we elected a president who campaigned on exactly the opposite position. Namely keep the brown skinned people down/out and return our country to a false version of the 1950s when everything seemed great if you were a white man.
So according to Steven Bannon we can't have a "civic society" in America if there are areas whose population aren't a majority of whites.
That pretty much reflects the attitude of a substantial portion of the republican party and it's a big part of what got Trump elected.
I expected a more sophisticated racist euphemism from a Harvard-educated man.
Why? He's in a position of power now and has the ear of the president-elect so why would you expect him to be circumspect?
It's hard to image the UK engaging a serious navy in a conflict where one of these carriers and their aircraft won't be involved. Perhaps we could drop some of this overly superior American attitude?
Two carriers? The US has 10 active aircraft carriers (with more on the way) plus another 9 ships that would be called aircraft carriers in any other navy. Between 2 to 4 of these 10 carriers are deployed at any given moment - a fact that will not be true for the 2 British carriers. (they need periodic time in port for repairs and training) It's not about being smug. The US navy is just WAY larger and more capable than any other navy currently operating. Personally I think this is a ridiculous waste of resources but it's currently the way it is.
The way I understand it, wouldn't Alaska be the first part of NA to see combat?
Probably not. There isn't much in Alaska worth attacking aside from a few military outposts, none of which are enormous. The territory is huge, rough, and there is little strategic or tactical value in most of it. Minimal industry, sparse population, terrible weather for much of the year. During WWII the Japanese more or less ignored Alaska because there was no value in attacking it despite it being the closest part of the US to Japan. (yes it's closer than Hawaii by about 600 miles)
There is no navy on the world, except the US one, that is a thread to the UK's, or any other European navy.
Forgetting about the Russians aren't you? While they aren't what they were during the Soviet era they certainly qualify as a credible threat and they clearly aren't terribly friendly to UK and EU interests. I would expect the Chinese to become a credible naval power in due time as well. Possibly India too though like China distance will tend to defuse any tensions with the EU. Russia however is basically next door.
And the US are not a *serious* thread. if they would go rogue and try to attack Europe they need to get their carriers into strike range.
Umm, you do know that the US has intercontinental missiles, long range bombers, and troops and equipment ALREADY stationed in Europe right? While there is basically zero chance of the US attacking Europe they would not necessarily be likely to depend on carriers to do it should the need arise. Especially in light of the fact that several countries in Europe are nuclear armed. You can be quite sure that somewhere in the Pentagon there are plans for attacking Europe should the need arise and I'm pretty sure they've considered how to protect their carriers in such an eventuality.
Unlike the US navy most European navies are designed for "home defense"
I wouldn't fancy any of their chances against the US navy right now no matter what their disposition. There are some countries that could do some real damage but unless nukes get involved I'm pretty confident the eventual outcome of a naval fight with the US would favor the US. The US navy is about the most cartoonishly overpowered military force I can imagine.
Is anyone seriously planning on attacking British warships with something besides rafts full of IEDs?
Probably not but only an idiot prepares just for the most likely contingency.
What's the likelihood that Brits would be involved in a Naval engagement that didn't also involve the American Navy, a force that is nearly cartoonish compared to every other fleet on the planet?
So the plan is to further rely on the US military to pick up the slack? Given the rhetoric from the idiot about to occupy the White House that might not be such a smart plan. Yes the US wildly overspends on its military. That doesn't mean the interests of the US and the UK will always align or that the US will always be interested in playing the role of protective big brother.
Not only is the UK one of the wealthiest nations on earth, it is one of a few, if not the only one among NATO nations that spends the recommended 2% on defence.
My guess is that they are hoping the US will continue to pick up the slack since the US wildly over spends on it's military. Not sure how long that will go on with the new idiot about to enter the White House. But I agree that it makes little sense for a maritime nation like the UK to have a second rate navy. The UK might have it's problems but it's not exactly in the poor house with one of the 5 largest economies by GDP in the world.
When is the last time the British Navy fired an anti-ship missile from a ship? Almost 40 years? Seriously.
I can't be bothered to confirm that statement but even if we agree that it is true, so what? Just because you haven't had a particular type of battle in a while doesn't mean it won't happen tomorrow. Nobody has been nuked since 1945 but (unfortunately) they still are actively maintained for particular contingencies. I don't really care one way or the other since I'm not a UK citizen but if anti-ship missiles are a tactical necessity in modern naval combat then it seems rather silly to bring a knife to a gun fight.
My thought on it is that if the nation went to war in which naval battles were a possibility (or actually happening), the budget would be instantaneously available to them to do whatever necessary to protect their seas.
Having budget available doesn't mean you have munitions instantly available. There is a lead time to this sort of thing.
I'm sure they also have a rather large stockpile they could draw on in the meantime as well.
And what good are those if they are sitting in a warehouse somewhere because the launch systems have been removed from the ships and nobody has been trained to use them? Combat situations often don't announce themselves with several months lead time to get ready.
It's a problem for everyone around you who would have been warned had the sound been present - but who now won't be.
Which is precisely no one. The notion that the noise pollution my car puts out is some sort of useful or valuable warning to those around me is delusional. Anyone who actually depends on hearing a car as a means to remain safe is behaving in a very irresponsible and dangerous manner. There are plenty of gasoline powered cars that are nearly silent and somehow we've managed to avoid mass fatalities of pedestrians anyway.
I am. These racist idiots aren't giving me a lot of reasons to be proud.
Just because someone else acts the fool doesn't mean they are your responsibility or that you should be embarrassed by them just because they happen to share your skin color. I was born white and had no control over it. I see no reason to be ashamed over something I had no control over nor any reason to apologize for it. I'm disgusted by the racist behavior of many white people but I'm equally disgusted by the racist behavior of non-white people. Skin color is never a reason to feel ashamed no matter what the shade. It's how YOU behave that matters.
It's hard to tell my girlfriend that the idiot who told her to go back to her country, is an isolated incident.
I think it's naively optimistic of you to think that such a thing is an isolated opinion in this country. While it is not be the majority of white people I think a double digit percentage of the population probably would not be offended by such behavior at all and too many would agree with and condone it. Remember that we have tens of millions of white folks who think nothing of deporting 11 million Latin American people, most of whom are here peacefully and contributing to the economy. We have people who think police "stop and frisk" harassment of minorities is somehow justifiable. Minorities are subject to police harassment on a routine basis. We're not in some post-racial utopian society. We've made progress in the last 50 years but there is a looooong way yet to go. The recent election is proof positive of that.
The taxi had an internal combustion engine, anyway, and there were plenty of other vehicles each making their own noise. I don't see how, if it were electric, adding noise could've helped.
Exactly. In the places one is most likely to encounter a blind person there is copious traffic noise and the circumstances are unlikely to be such that adding more noise is going make a difference.
Basically we are imagining problems and "solving" them by maintaining an approximation of the status quo even though there is no evidence that the status quo is a good situation.
A bigger problem is, what happens if some pedestrian leaps out from behind a bush onto your hood and it's revealed that you've disabled the system?
That's my problem isn't it? Yes I'd be taking a legal risk. I don't really think it is a a meaningful risk or that the likelihood of it becoming a problem is significant but I acknowledge that it is a potential risk.
You can be fairly certain that it's going to be illegal to disable this system, and that if it's not working you're going to get a fix-it ticket.
I've got the money and the points to burn. Bring it on. I'll worry about it when they start actually enforcing noise ordinances against Harley Davidson motorcycles which clearly exceed any reasonable or necessary noise level.
There's no excuse for a pedestrian to be hit by a vehicle unless the vehicle is somewhere it shouldn't be - like a sidewalk.
THIS! Pedestrians that get hit are almost invariably doing something stupid. If you are walking in a place where cars normally drive then you are an idiot if you don't adjust your behavior to reflect that reality. Even if you are legally doing the right thing the laws of physics don't care about that. In a collision the car will "win" 100% of the time so any pedestrian that doesn't act accordingly is effectively either suicidal or a child.
That's not to say drivers shouldn't be careful too but common sense dictates that the pedestrians should be extra careful any time they are walking around moving or potentially moving cars.
I almost got run over the other day by a guy backing up his Chevy Volt.
I'm glad you are ok. That said, if you were paying adequate attention to your surroundings and being careful that shouldn't be possible.
First problem: no noise at all. I was walking in a parking lot close to the car and he didn't see me.
So don't walk close to the cars or if you must then pay careful attention. His job is to back up slowly if he don't have complete visibility. Your job is to carefully watch out for your own physical well being and all signs of a vehicle that could move (lights, motion, driver activity, wheel turning, etc). If you can't see what the car is doing then be careful until you are sure. As long as both of you do your jobs there shouldn't be any problems.
Do you mean like how digital cameras make a "click" sound when an image is captured?
Which we have the ability to turn off. And when I'm doing wildlife photography I often do turn it off to avoid spooking the subject I'm photographing.
Have you ever thought of how e-mail programs use images like stamps, envelopes, pencils, paper, and so on?
Yes and I think it's retarded that we use an icon of a floppy disk to indicate saving a document since nobody has used floppy disks in 20 years. The kids don't even know what the heck the icon is supposed to represent. It made some sense back in the 90s and earlier but it makes zero sense today. Similarly keeping byproduct sounds of cars just because we are currently accustomed to it is idiotic. Cars making noise isn't a feature - it's a side effect and a polluting one at that.
We use those images because we make a natural connection between sending a note electronically and sending a note by postal service.
Actually a lot of people don't make that connection at all. If you don't believe me I'll be happy to introduce you to some - I have several in my family. There are plenty of people that don't get the "folder" or "file cabinet" or "letter" analogies. At all.
What I fear though is that someone will use a sound that will get kids run over, like "ice cream truck".
How would that be different than today? Do you see kids getting run over every time an ice cream truck drives by? No you do not. Kids don't stay out of the road because of car sounds. They go into the road because they aren't aware of their surroundings which is why parents have to watch them. They don't equate car sounds with danger and they certainly aren't paying attention to the car sounds when chasing their ball into the street.
A $3 speaker and $1 of wiring per car will add up to $39 million?
$4 per car? Oh that's adorable that you think it would be that cheap. I run a company that makes automotive components. I can assure you that it will be no where near that cheap even for the OEMs. A part that costs $4 to produce will cost 4-8X that amount installed in a car after all the mark ups. It will be made by a Tier 3 or 4 company, and then resold 3-4X before getting to the OEM for final assembly with markups and overhead and labor being added each time.
Just for a crude rule of thumb if you want to guess what a part costs to actually make, go to a dealer and find the price. In rough numbers it will probably cost somewhere between 6-8X what it costs to make in most cases. Sometimes more, occasionally less depending on sales volume for the part. So if you have a part that costs $250 at the dealer, it probably cost something like $4 to actually make. For example we make a part that goes into a GM SUV. We sell it to our customer for around $4 and the assembly it goes to costs around $9 to the Tier 1 supplier. If you wander into a dealership and buy that assembly it would cost you north of $700. The markup on dealer parts is insane. My company makes wire harnesses. I've actually stood in line at a dealer watching a guy buy a wire harness for $200 that had *maybe* $5 worth of components and wire in it at wholesale prices.
Because any faster than that and you just can't stop for the deaf guy who steps into the cross-walk right before you get there.
Exactly how is adding noise to a car going to help a DEAF person hear the oncoming traffic? It might help a blind person in theory (though I find those argument specious) but a deaf person isn't going to hear any car no matter how loud it is.
And in plenty of situations, you are dependent on pedestrians hearing cars and protecting themselves.
Pedestrians that depend on hearing cars to protect themselves are not paying attention and are trying to earn a Darwin award. No driver should presume that any pedestrian will be dependent on hearing their car for safety.
You've got no hope of seeing the pedestrian walking behind cars through a parking-lot, and without any sound, they'll step right behind you as you're backing-up.
A) How fast are you backing up? and B) If you can't see well when backing up, then back up SLOWLY enough that pedestrians can take evasive action if necessary. Depending on pedestrians to actually hear your car is idiotic and unsafe.
In short artificial engine noise is utterly unacceptable in my view.
Agreed. The tires make enough noise as it is and many gas engines are so quiet you can barely tell they are running at idle. Noise is a form of pollution and we definitely don't need more of it. This seems to be more a case of anecdotal "data" jumping ahead of the actual facts. All this will accomplish is to add a lot of noise pollution with minimal to no benefit to society.
Someone will say "but what about the blind people? What about the children?" What about them? First off there are incredibly few blind people wandering about and it's not as if we have to dodge them on a routine basis. I honestly cannot recall the last time I actually saw a blind person attempt to cross a road. Certainly hasn't been for at least 20 years and never anywhere near where I live. Seriously, never. Pedestrians in general are not a big problem in most of the country. Maybe it's a problem in big cities but it sure as shit is not a problem in the suburbs or more rural parts of the country. As for children, they don't pay attention to cars that make noise today so it's not as if they are going to start listening to fake noises. Kids wander into streets because they don't know any better, not because they don't hear cars.
I rather thought it was elitism and looking down on the other side that got him elected.
I find the term "elitism" perplexing. So we are supposed to celebrate ignorance and stupidity rather than pointing out dumb ideas and insisting on intelligent and informed discourse?
China is a currency manipulator.
So is the USA. Or hadn't you heard about quantitative easing, also known as "printing money".
Not necessarily. Your scenario is only if it becomes a full-out trade war.
It doesn't have to become a wide scale trade war for protectionism to be a terrible and self defeating idea. Tariffs almost always cause more damage than they help. Put a tariff on steel and congratulations, you've just made every car, plane, and machine that uses steel more expensive and less competitive.
Trump can play chicken to scare them to make changes.
That is a very dangerous game to play with global consequences if the Chinese don't blink. It's especially stupid given that such negotiation tactics almost certainly are unnecessary and stand a high probability of backfiring.
Because they depend on exports far more than we do, a game of trade chicken is riskier to them.
And we depend on imports more than they do. They hold a sizeable amount of our debt which is a danger to both China and the US. Any trade war would hurt both sides and it's not an exaggeration to say that we have more to lose than they do. We're the ones with the higher than average incomes. We're the ones who are living on borrowed money. Yes any trade war would hurt China too but like any knife fight we wouldn't come out unbloodied.
Let's give it a try rather than live with the status quo.
Trying something that is clearly dangerous and almost certainly counterproductive just to disrupt the status quo is idiotic. Different just for the sake of different isn't a sane plan. That's what people do when they don't know what the fuck they are doing.
The cards are on our side. It's an area where Trump's brashness may work to our favor.
That's simply not true. What we have is something of a standoff with both sides able to hurt the other rather badly. Trump's arrogant demeanor is FAR more likely to backfire than it is to help.
Or are you saying that Trump supporters are opposed to the free market?
I think Trump supporters (primarily though not exclusively working class rural white people) are absolutely terrified of a free market and a great many of them don't understand international trade at all. Sound bites are a lot easier than macroeconomics. Xenophobic sound bites that make foreigners scapegoats for their own failings and those of their country even more so.
Or maybe there coalitions that support candidates for a variety of reasons - and that not all the positions held by the supporters are in common?
Of course plenty of Trump supporters supported his lunacy for reasons other than protectionist sabre rattling. Some for reasons of racism, some for sexism, some for tribalistic loyalty to the republican party, some for pure amusement, some for unreasoning hatreds (KKK etc), some for misplaced fears ("2nd amendment people"), and plenty of other reasons besides. Most of them wrongheaded and ill considered but reasons all the same.
Therefore you agree that not all Republicans are for the free market.
Republicans have NEVER been for a free market. They just want a particular version of a capitalist market. Republicans have routinely been against "free" trade. If you recall during the most recent Bush administration they imposed steel tariffs which had the perverse outcome of reducing domestic steel production, increasing the cost of steel, and reducing employment in associated industries (like automakers).
By the NAFTA is not an example of free and open markets. Neither is TPP.
True but there is no such thing as a pure free market. In actual fact a pure free market would be a VERY bad thing. But those trade agreements DO reduce net trade barriers. Whether or not that is a net benefit to society is a separate question endemic to the particulars of the agreements in question.
Comparative advantage is only useful when both countries are at full employment.
Comparative advantage has nothing whatsoever to do with "full" employment. Comparative advantage explains why it can be useful for two countries to both engage in production of a particular good even though one of the countries has an absolute cost advantage over the other. If comparative advantage did not exist neither would much international trade.