"Brandon Sommerville" <grimrod@mindless.com.gov> wrote in message
news:4d4cf3ca55f752d609fdc1c94d537987@news.teranews.com...
> On Thu, 04 Dec 2003 15:49:21 GMT, "David J. Allen"
> <dallen03NO_SPAM@sanNO_SPAM.rr.com> wrote:
>
> >
> >"Brandon Sommerville" <grimrod@mindless.com.gov> wrote in message
> >news:e13b4d55ee057f7ffdc53c6d9c2e1ce3@news.teranews.com...
> >> On Wed, 03 Dec 2003 18:17:50 GMT, "David J. Allen"
> >> <dallen03NO_SPAM@sanNO_SPAM.rr.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> >The Europeans and Canadians choose to tax themsleves to provide cradle
to
> >> >grave care for health care. It's a choice they make. Good for them.
> >> >There's a price they pay for that. There's far less innovation and
change
> >> >in Europe than there is in the US. They tend to stick with the status
quo.
> >> >In the US, the competitive juices among companies are often too much
for
> >> >European companies. Airbus was subsidized for years to support
foreign
> >> >sales. Another example is telecommunications. Nokia has struggled
with
> >> >CDMA technology in the US because of the constant change and forward
> >> >movement in technology here. Europe would be happy to stay with GSM
as a
> >> >universal standard while US companies are pushing the technological
> >> >envelope. Is the most efficient? Maybe not, but it's the price we
pay for
> >> >innovation and new technologies. High energy competition is dollar
driven
> >> >(oh, how evil.... the greed!). The European model severely dampens
that
> >> >energy.
> >>
> >> Enron was dollar driven as well.
> >
> >Your point? Maybe that the profit motive is akin to corruption? If you
> >want to go there, be prepared to point the finger at more than corporate
> >corruption.
>
> No, that dollar driven isn't by definition a good thing. I'm not
> saying that it's a bad thing, but you appear to be saying that it
> simply makes it better by being that way. If you really want the
> latest in techno gadgets you have to look at the Japanese market, not
> the American.
>
Then we agree. The profit motive is key to a market driven ecnomy, which
works as opposed to central planning. Techno gadgets? Hmph. The point is
an economy that allows supply and demand to work and allows hard work and
innovation (read create wealth) to occur will respond to demand more
readily.
> >> >You can see the desparation to bring in outside money in Europe;
> >> >like government subsidies, their selling of weapons systems (France,
> >> >Germany) to ANYONE (read Saddam Hussein), willingness to accept
despotism in
> >> >exchange for lucrative trade deals (do you really think France opposed
the
> >> >war on "moral" grounds?).
> >>
> >> Give me a break. American companies were perfectly happy to sell to
> >> Saddam as well and as far as "accepting despotism" who do you think
> >> put him there in the first place and kept him there for years?
> >
> >Saddam's ledger is a long list of German, French and Russian companies.
> >France's reputation for selling to anyone for the right price is decades
> >old.
>
> And American companies didn't sell to him at all, right? You don't
> seriously believe that, do you?
Don't know and don't think it matters. There's always somebody out there
willing to do anything to make a buck. If they did, they broke the law.
>
> >The US did tolerate despotism in some countries, but not for money. You
> >just had to be anti-communist (or in Iraq's case a counterweight to
Iran).
> >It was cold war politics and it was a calculated risk. Were they
mistakes?
> >Probably. You can focus on the consequences of supporting a despot to
run a
> >country, but don't forget to wonder how things would had gone had
Communism
> >not been contained.
>
> The US has demonstrated that it's willing to support a friendly
> dictator to a democracy that doesn't agree with them many times over,
> regardless of the cost to the people involved. Claiming that they
> were going to go communist is a good way of justifying the actions,
> but that's all it is.
Bull. You don't understand the cold war for what it was. You look at bad
things that happened and extrapolate to the strategy as if the whole
strategy was flawed and designed to make (or not prevent) bad things happen.
The west had a strategy that ended up working. Some bad things happened
along the way.
The French were purposefully subverting the agreed upon UN strategy in Iraq.
It wasn't an accident or byproduct. There's a culture of "me and mine"
there that was the point I was making previously.
> --
> Brandon Sommerville
> remove ".gov" to e-mail
>
> Definition of "Lottery":
> Millions of stupid people contributing
> to make one stupid person look smart.