I just hope all five countries told North Korea that if they nuke anybody we'll nuke 'em back!

First! I AM First. Always FIRST! HA ha ha ha! I got the bomb and I'm FIRST! Woo woo!

First?
Really? I'm new here and don't know for sure about this?

Insult ME! Now I will blow up Japan!

Um, actually, Comrade Kim, I may have just made it under the wire ahead of you, but please don't get upset. I used to have a sister-in-law named 'Kim', and I've always thought that was such a pretty name.

As for blowing up Japan, I wouldn't waste the nukes. We blew 'em up years ago, and I'll be darned if they aren't back and better than ever.

It is difficult to write satire about Kim.

Yes, Gene but Scott can do it. I can't see a news story on N. Korea without chuckling, remembering his post on Kim holding six-way talks with self.

Not to worry, Kim is on board with the agreement. He's just waiting for Madeline Albright to hop a plane to Pyongyang to seal the deal.

She'll make a quick stop in San Francisco to pick up a new "teddy" and a couple of "Baghad by the Bay" souvenir apertif glasses, and then off for a long weekend of give and take.

You weeel 'ave no peeze onless you include Frawnce een zeez talks.........I weel zee to zat. I am zchaque Cheeraq. I weel mage myself available een caze you want to send a leemozeen.

You can say what you like about the North Koreans but as a bastion of socialism, protectionism and government economic control, they’re not losing highly paid jobs to China and India.

Because they haven’t got any.

Because they haven’t got any--TWPOS

With the possible exception of nuclear scientists, I have no way of knowing how well they are paid.

North Korea is an economic failure because what they are trying only works when western intelligensia and ivy league doctrinaire keynesian MBA's are in charge.

Yes, everyone knows all you’re got to do is put those fellows in charge for a few years and you’ll have a car in every garage, provided, of course, you started with two.

Still, you get the satisfaction of knowing no one is getting rich off your work, least of all you.

Kim considered the agreement to meet again a success, because the talks will be held at a hotel with an all-u-can buffet. He intends to bring a high level diplomats, so they can eat for the first time this year.

(to the tune of Oklahoma)
Noooorth Korea, were the people can't afford to eat! (music fades out)

Yes, it is a shining example of Ranbutan's economic theories put into practice. They may not have much of anything, but boy are they equal! No top 1% here! Unless you count the guy with the one remaining cabbage leaf in the entire country.

Of course, we could send him a second cabbage leaf. Ranbutan could then claim that North Korean cabbage production has DOUBLED, while ours has not. Obviously, a country that can DOUBLE its food output is kicking our butts!

North Korea is Ran's Workers Paradise made manifest. We better buy tickets now to beat the rush of immigrants heading over there to live the good life.

Isn't ranbutan a kind of fruit?

I'm pretty sure it is.

A Former European -

Were you really once a snitch for the Stasi?

Is your current extreme right stridency a penance for days past? Past collaborators frequently pose as super-patriots when their Masters change. Do you still have your Young Pioneers scarf? If you were such a loud anti-communist as you proclaim, you wouldn't be so eager to sent our greatest strategic rival 120 billion a year in American dollars to help China's transformation into high tech military and it's quantum step naval, air, and amphibious force buildups.

On subject, N Korea is a bit of a misdirection. China could shut N Korea's belligerancy off tomorrow if it wished to. But it wishes the US and other nations to focus on N Korea. If N Korea attacks, hopefully the US is well to the rear - and everyone predicts that S Korea would soon win, though with horrific civilian casualties. And, China and Russia have warned N Korea that if they use nukes 1st, not a finger would be lifted if America nukes them into rubble - since they want to contain hostilities to just the Korean Peninsula. The true menace is with China, and it lies far away from Korea.

The real action is ignored - which is the completion of China's colonization and assimilation of Tibet - and the Taiwan situation.

China has purchased modern Russian anti-ship destroyers, subs, and cruise missiles to target the American fleet if it launches hostilities at Taiwan and the Americans are tempted to intervene. The Israelis have been caught selling F-16 avionics packages to equip China's new J-10 fighter, and advanced air to air, antiship missiles. France is now begging to be allowed to end EU sanctions and sell ECM packages, spy satellite technology, and it's advanced anti-ship missiles that they think can defeat US Navy countermeasures.

Taiwan has now disclosed that China has 489 ballistic missiles targeting Taiwan. Friday, 3 million Taiwanese joined hands across the island to show solidarity with their government's assertion that it will not fold if China tries to invade.

Thanks to the exploding Chinese communist economy, China is now able to escalate defense spending 18% a year (officially, unofficial estimates are higher) - and is using it's new manufacturing facilities transferred from the US to build jet, missile components, and a large number of amphibious craft.

The US, by a Navy spokesman, has said the buildup would threaten the US ability to block China's takeover of Taiwan as early as 2006.

But a Former European calls concern about the massive money, technology, and jobs transfer to China "commie-loving people who threaten free trade with China". He sure wants those cheap Chinese goodies, at any price.

True agenda? Hmmmmmmm, I wonder.

Ranbutan:
Nice attempt to hoist a position on others creating an easily knocked down Strawman.

Any corporation or ally that attempts to sell sensitive technology to China should be dealt with harshly. Be they a large contributor to Clinton/Gore or another country. If this has happenned and we had no response then whatever administration it happenned under should be taken to task. Since you have stated that you still support Bush with more than a few reservations you are as culpable as any here. I too have said I support Bush with some reservations, they just happen to be different ones than you.

I am troubled by China as well. It seems we have two choices, first, which you seem to support (I am sure you will correct me if I am wrong) is the isolation economically of China. Embargos, trade sanctions and tariffs. This would have the effect of creating a poor, angry, and very volatile enemy with a large military.

Second is a policy that administrations of both parties seem to have embraced, is to trade with them. In hopes of creating a more prosperous people with a rising middle class that will demand freedom and democracy. That is the rosy scenario, a more realistic outcome is to create a symbiotic relationship where China sees us as an indespensible trading partner without which they would be greatly damaged economically.

University of Maryland economist Peter Morici, former chief economist for the U.S. International Trade Commission:
in congressional testimony submitted Oct. 30, 2003.... Among the points Morici makes:

1. Trade Deficit impact reduces U.S. economic growth by at least one percentage point a year - or about 20 percent of potential GDP growth. China accounts for almost half of this lost growth.

2. Cumulative effects: Over the last two decades, these trade deficits have reduced the size of the U.S. economy by 10 to 20 percent. Without this lost growth, the Congress would not be facing large budget deficits or the funding of Medicare and SS.

3. Morici said the projected 120 billion trade loss to China surprised him, reflects China is now taking over entire US high value industries, and the 120 billion may just be the precursor of even larger deficits and US job losses in the future.

As for China, since China is not ruled by Corporate interests, it takes trade deficits seriously. Faced with a 9 billion trade deficit with S Korea in 2003, China dispatched senior Politburo officials to meet with the President of S Korea, and won an agreement to immediately resolve "trade imbalances that seriously harm the Chinese people".

http://www1.chinadaily.com.cn/en/doc/2003-08/21/content_256720.htm

Pile On -

Remember the thumb rule is for every 1 billion in net outflow of American dollars to any country, 50,000 jobs are lost.

Our technology transfer prohibitions are meaningless if we give the Chinese an extra 100-150 billion a year to spend on economic growth, jobs, and modern weapon procurement. The cash allures the Russians, Israelis (if they can do it without us catching them), and France. Who are more than happy to take those US bucks off China's hands for the latest weapons systems they've got.

Do I advocate a trade embargo? Not unless China starts killing our troops - and they own a half trillion in US paper right now so they are in a position to wreck our currency if we go against them over Taiwan - and the Christmas tree would be pretty bare without the "made in China stuff" under it.

But China is not getting mutual respect out of our trade deal - it must feel that it is like rolling over a punk for his lunch money - or perhaps more appropriately, getting the girl of lose ways to give it up for some cheap trinkets. Nor can China respect an America that sells out it's workers to enrich a few outsourcers or China market importers. That is betrayal in the Chinese value system, the communist system that governs them. China's reaction if it got Punk'd like it is doing to the US would be to dispatch their highest officials to the nation ripping them off, and find sudden massive problems with their goods at the customs port until the other side agreed to stop the bleeding of Chinese wealth out of China through the trade imbalance.

It will take considerable debate and political realignment to get America out of it's current tremendous economic mess. Greenspan just launched the 1st shot saying that America will never grow enough with global competition to pay out the FICA liabilities we have. Other reality checks are soon to come. Like telling Americans to not expect prosperity to last if everything they buy is made in China.

Ran, I am not an economist, but I have to say I am sceptical of your numbers. 50,000 jobs lost for every 1 billion in trade imbalance. How does anyone know that? Impiracle evidence? I doubt it. I have been hearing about record trade imbalances since I was a lad in the seventies. But if you look at unemployment and compare it to historical figures, what we have seen at the worst of the most recent recession, is quite good. Most likely that 50,000 number is just theory.

It is just a thumbrule, and is not applicable to all foreign trade scenarios. Morici references it when he talks about the significant loss in American GNP growth - if the GNP was 10% larger, his low end estimate, another 6 million jobs would exist. In projects where the gov't is the purchaser, they are interested in jobs created per contract, and you see figures like 20,000 spent locally, with the local money multiplier, creates 1 job - which makes politicians and locals happy.

In our past, it makes perfect sense to import items like oil and British Scotch & toffees. We send the Brits raw ethanol, tootsie rolls, and sour mash and we're even steven. With oil, it is cheaper than domestically developed energy, we have many American jobs involved in finding it, pumping it, refining it, and transporting it abroad - and we were traditionally able to sell tons of American-made blue jeans, Coca-Cola, telecommunications equipment, high tech stuff to get our trade balance back - or the extra was put into recycled petrodollars investment in US real estate, banks, and stock - The Arabs, Venezuelans, Indonesians all did this.

But with China, the Arabs and others are now not buying American made telecomm, blue jeans, high tech - since we sent much of that to China to be made - so our trade imbalances with petro countries are widening, same with Japan.

If Morici's high end estimate is right, most of our deficit would have been wiped out if we hadn't sacrificed growth for cheap goodies - and using that thumbrule - a 20% greater American GNP might have given us a domestic demand for 8-10,000,000 relatively high paying jobs.

N Korea is a minor issue compared to the China threat. I fault Clinton too, but Bush and his Corporate Republican crowd has been completely blind to it. In Clinton's time, the American wealth was bleeding to China at 40 billion a year. Under Bush, it's up to 100 billion, and China is targeting what the US used to sell to other foreign countries it runs deficits with. China knows what it is doing to the US economy, and is delighted. Bush has ignored crucial domestic policy and trade policy problems to focus only on tax cuts for the wealthy and being the "Evildoer Fighting" War President - and his pollsters are giving him the bad news - out of the Midwest they think the tax cuts have hurt America, created zero jobs in the Midwest and Rustbelt, the South - and the people away from NYC and Washington DC place terrorism on the bottom of the list of matters they are most concerned about.

"American wealth was bleeding to China at 40 billion a year"

We know Ranbutan probably understands what is actually happening and that it is only his choice of words which is so misleading, still for the sake of those not schooled in economics.

American wealth is not bleeding to China, Americans are buying goods (a form of wealth) from the Chinese for less money (another form of wealth) than they could have gotten them otherwise, so Americans become wealthier. The Chinese do not buy as much value of goods back, there is a difference of 40 billion dollars a year with which the Chinese make investments in the American economy. We buy shoes from them, which wear out, they buy stocks and bonds from us, which do not.

We don’t know if this is true, but it is what Ranbutan was trying to say.

The danger which he sees in this is that it is like getting in over your head on credit card debt and are soon working just to make interest payments for stuff you don’t even have any more. There are similarities but the situation is not so simple. For one thing it’s as they say:, if you owe the bank ten thousand dollars and can’t pay you’ve got a problem, if you owe them ten million and can’t pay, they’ve got a problem.

Were-Penguins

You err in saying it is a trade balance credit situation. Your credit card situation is at best an analogy for getting deep into debt, and the trade deficit is sometimes called the "current account" and factors into world lending criteria - Bankers don't like to lend to 3rd world nations with large negative current account debts because they see a consumer, vs. producer nation as heading into the financial toilet.

It is bleeding wealth, because we get the trinkets we want, the Chinese get the actual net wealth transfer in currency, not IOUs - in the form of glorious US dollars! 120 billion last year. Part of that they put in US and international debt instruments, part in Chinese companies, infrastructure and startups, part in free scholarships for their brighest students to acquire more Western high tech fields cutting edge knowledge to return home with - and lastly the most worrying part.

Ah the worrying part - China is increasing defense spending at the same rate as its industrial growth - a staggering 18-19% a year increase under Maximum Protector Bush, who is asleep on what is happening with our great 21st Century rival as long as the Corporations and Richest 1% are getting prosperous eliminating American labor for far cheaper ChiCom Serfs of the State. They are acquiring American weapons technology from the Israelis (who try to keep it secret, but keep getting caught in "anything to make a buck" deals). They get state of the art Russian warships, ECM, satellite recon, missiles, whole Russian tank factories, and subs. France wants a chunk of those 120 billion US bucks China got, and are begging the EU to let them sell advanced torpedos, military electronics, plus air-to-air, and anti-ship missiles the French believe will be unstoppable by any current American defense technology (re: US Navy).

The other day, Bill Gates made the first part of his tour of America's elite technical colleges. He is concerned that the students at MIT and RPI, for starters - no dummies they - are leaving computer science and computer engineering in droves (down 40% in the last 2 years on fear of being a career suicide major), and with grad students bailing to work Wall Street brokerages and going to law school and government service instead of doing a Masters ot PhD.

Gates told them to be optimistic, that there would still be jobs.

He did not mention Microsofts outsourcing figures for the last few years or future hiring plans.

Last fall, Craig Barrett of Intel did say that Silicon Valley would again rise as an innovator, but would never again be a significant employer of Americans - given the existence of some 300 million bright, highly educated, way underemployed Asians and former Warsaw Pact nations willing to work for a pittance.

Ran, given your analysis I am still left with the same question. Given historical figures, and in comparison with other industrialized nations, our unemployment figures are low. So who is going to fill all these additional jobs? Illegal immigrants could fill the unskilled positions I suppose, for the high skilled jobs I guess we could increase our levels of legal immigration. Or we could outsource.

Also given the fact that our economy has grown quite well for the last 21 years, you are talking about a pretty heated economy. This prosperity is going to give consumers a lot of disposable income. I guess people could use this money to buy domestically produced goods, of course they could also buy imports. Doh!!!!

Reading Ranbutan is like listening to a tax accountant drone on about the Internal Revenue Code, or maybe a life insurance salesman. A really annoying one.

Even if his identification of the problem is correct, which it is not, his proposed solutions (which he avoids discussing much) would be adding gasoline to put out a fire.

In Ranbutan's world, to beat China we must BECOME China. How about another Iron Curtain to prevent outsourcing? The proposed cure is far worse than the supposed ailment.

In my experience, devout Marxist ideologues like Ranbutan are so blinkered by their dogma that no amount of discussion will ever make them see the error of their ways. They BELIEVE with the fervor of a religious zealot, and you cannot convince them otherwise. You'd have better luck getting the Ayatollah to eat pork.

Actually Ranbutan does not want the US to become China, he wants China to become the US and subsidize their workers with high, unearned, wages taken from more productive citizens, thus slowing down their economy to the torpid level of a European socialist state. He regards the Chinese using a free labor market as an ‘unfair’ advantage.

What we want to know is how can a free labor market be so inconceivably horrible for the US and so good for China?

I remember gnashing my teeth and grinding them down to an inconvenient nub when Clinton granted China "Most Favored Nation" status...does anyone else remember this? And why did that happen, anyway, with all the talk about their human rights violations, etc.? I seem to remember something about contributions to a library, or legal fees, etc. Someone help me out with this!

Mellie - It was some contributions to Clinton by agents of the Chinese Government- Johnny Huang, and Noble Algore's infamous "no controlling legal authority" moment at the Bhuddist Temple Fundraiser also set up by the Chinese. But remember, Clinton's role was to bring over a few Democrats to join with the original backers of opening America up to flooding with Chinese goods - the Republicans. The Republicans even back then were the bought corporate whores of the Richest 1% - which anticipated high profit volumes from replacing American labor with cheap Chinese labor.

And, the Republicans were the ones that turned back arguments to link Chinese trade to human rights, environmental standards, and basic worker benefits like health care and right to organize, and the use of prison camp labor. The Chinese certainly were grateful - since it allowed them to increase balance of trade deficits from 40 billion a year under Clinton to 100 billion under Bush.

The surplus billions in wealth coming from America's accumulated wealth over our 200 year history - are allowing China to have annual industrial and military growth rates of 12.9% a year, while as just about everyone knows, our industial growth rate is negative under Bush and the Republicans, 3 million industrial jobs have been lost - 1 in 6 - and the Richest 1% are rolling in money.

So fault Clinton, but he was a minor whore for China compared to the Republicans...and give him one break.

Back when Clinton argued that free trade would create a huge market and growing Chinese prosperity would mean Chinese soon purchasing a lot of American made blue jeans, high tech, and telecommunications stuff - those industries hadn't been exported to China yet

Were-penguins -

Any commodity or good in an open trade system falls to the lowest price offered, as long as there is plenty of it. Which is why tariffs have always existed to nuture a nations growth -like the US did in the 18,19th, and early 20th century rather than just buy British or German manufactured goods produced cheaper. And, cartels like diamonds or petroleum were created to benefit those involved. Otherwise, you would see only Australia produce low-cost diamonds and all other diamond mines globally, closed.

If you let trade go unchecked, with o protections, then the country that makes the cheapest merchant ship out of 191 nations gets all the ship orders if their capacity is unlimited - unless or until a rival nation puts together even cheaper materials and labor and competes in raw price.

Since labor has been made into just another global commodity, and is effect unlimited with no limits on capacity - since China, India, and a host of Muslim countries now have 300 million high quality unemployed or underemployed workers, the eventual result is wage levelization.

Chinese and Indian workers will make more than the 1.00 an hour, American workers exposed to global competition will make considerably less than 16.00 and hour and lose benefits, and owners of companies or distribution channels will garner huge profits.

College students have already seen the writing on the wall on the eventual fate of many American job markets - as I mention Bill Gates in an above post now touring campuses urging students not to give up on high tech, sciences, or engineering careers.

But, they are leaving in droves (3 fields enrollment down 30-40% in the last two years) for safer jobs dependent on taxes (gov't administrator degrees), suing people (lawyers), or "extractive" fields where they don't produce - but can get a cut of each deal (import wholesalers, Wall Street)

And my questions sir?

Like I said before, life insurance or the tax code -- actually, maybe both put together. Can you imagine him at a party? What a buzzkill.

I can spout off a whole lot of Sadistics (errrrr... I mean Statistics) terms to change the pace a little bit. It still wouldn't make sense to anyone but the author, but at least it would look different.

Pile On - I believe most of your questions were answered by past posts on this thread.

So who is going to fill all these additional jobs? Illegal immigrants could fill the unskilled positions I suppose, for the high skilled jobs I guess we could increase our levels of legal immigration. Or we could outsource

How about filling them with Americans? 40% of black males between the age of 18-25 are long-term unemployed. Why not fit them into an apprentice program before crying for boatloads of Pakistanis?

Also given the fact that our economy has grown quite well for the last 21 years, you are talking about a pretty heated economy

Where have you been the last 3 years? Had enough of a cooloff - even with 1 trillion borrowed to "grow the economy and jobs", yet?

This prosperity is going to give consumers a lot of disposable income

Now Were-Penguins past credit card analogy is more apt. Pile on, do you realize that our illusion of prosperity is built on debt? We owe over 3 trillion to China and other claimants abroad. We have an unfunded 26 trillion Social Security liability, and a 50 trillion Medicare liability since all those imagined deposits have already been spent on other programs and tax cuts. Boomers count on the next generation to pick up the IOU.

Meanwhile, it's time to enjoy a house 4X the size of their parents, thrill to the 2 made in Taiwan snomobiles, hit the local Indian restaurant staffed by 30 illegals, then sit back and relax in front of that 100" diagonal plasma baby from Malaysia as you cheer young Army soldiers - who joined because they had no future, unlike 6-7 past generations - in their now-dead factory towns, now busily dropping ordnace on an "evildoer" position, for your entertainment - You cheering "USA is #1" and cheerin a President who only asks a few to sacrifice - and for the rest to go out and shop for cool new Chinese toys and duds.

Yes, let the Good Times Rooooooll!

How about filling them with Americans?--Ranbutan

You ignore my point about our low level of unemployment, a little perspective is in order.

Where have you been the last 3 years? Had enough of a cooloff--Ranbutan

Yes I have had enough of a cooloff, but I also know that this has been a mild recession by historical standards. We have yet to conquer the business cycle and for the last 21 years we have had pretty steady solid growth and we are again growing. You use a brief period to make a point, while ignoring the big picture.

Ran:

How about filling them with Americans? 40% of black males between the age of 18-25 are long-term unemployed. Why not fit them into an apprentice program before crying for boatloads of Pakistanis?

Since when are we obligated to go out and find people and pull them up by the collar points?

When I was 19, I dropped out of college and my parents told me I'd better get my butt into business school and get myself a marketable skill while I worked took a few classes at the local school (ODU).

I went downtown and signed up. I was the only white girl at an all-black business school. I was also the only person there who was paying her own tuition. I was also the only person there who did her classwork and homework, except for one other person - who by no coincidence was the only person there on work-study instead of a free ride like everyone else there. She actually tried in class and answered questions. She was a single mom and like me, she kept to herself a lot - you'll see why later.

Every day I got out for lunch and in the square behind the building were 18-20 young black men, loitering around waiting for the girls. Like the young ladies, they had no jobs and didn't appear to be looking for any. They were on public assistance (welfare) and all dressed nicely, and would walk right up to you and smooth-talk like there was no tomorrow. They seemed to assume that any young woman would just jump into bed with them, and from listening to the women I went to school with, quite a few had because many of these girls had children and none of them were married.

These girls weren't stupid, but they had no desire to work or to make anything of themselves. They were marking time. They talked about sleeping with men and hair and clothes and nails. They wore nicer clothes than I had and went to the beauty parlor once a week. And they were all on welfare.

I was a flaming liberal up to this point, but that experience made me rethink my assumptions. I had always believed that blacks had gotten a raw deal and we owed them a hand up. But what I saw was that welfare wasn't helping - it was destroying them. They had no pride and no drive - they were passive and angry and confused. And ignorant. Not stupid, because that's a different thing - just ignorant because they hadn't exerted themselves to become educated and inside they knew they weren't educated and it hurt their pride.

People need pride. But you can't give people pride - sometimes you have to kick out the props and let them struggle a bit and have faith that they will rise to the challenge. To believe otherwise is truly racist. We've seen the rise of a strong black middle class, so it's not as though there is no precedent, and there are black intellectuals who make you and I look like mental gnats.

So if Pakistanis have the grit to make it over here and compete for jobs, I think American black men ought to be up to the challenge. Don't be patronizing. They don't need your help - they just need liberals to stop making excuses for them. They're smart, they're strong, and they can do whatever they decide to do. A people who survived slavery can handle today's job market.

The thing about Ranbutan’s theme is parts of it are quite rational and then he just ignores an important point or confounds and mislabels it. This is why we think he is not much interested in pursuing the truth wherever it leads.

Economics, at it’s core, is quite simple, but like the rules of Chess, the outcome can be complicated. Focusing too much on money is a good way to become confused, not that money and it’s workings aren’t fascinating, but economics is really about goods, services and efficiency.

The Chinese sell us mostly objects and in return we sell them (a lesser amount) of objects and services and (sometimes in a roundabout way) investments, either as debt or ownership of businesses. Now unless you believe the Chinese have an insidious plan to buy up American business just to wreck it and damage the economy (sort of like vandalizing by throwing gold bricks through your windows) then the debt is the only worrying part. The debt means the frugal Chinese have elected not to buy from us today in the hope of getting more tomorrow, but they still can only use the debt to buy from us or sell it to someone who will. They could conceivably cause a financial panic by suddenly devaluing the dollar but that would hurt everyone, including them.

The real beef we think Ranbutan has behind his economic complaint is that he doesn’t like the fact that America will likely one day not be the most powerful nation on earth, and he doesn’t like the fact that technology makes some people thousands or even millions of times more productive than others. These things are facts, Ranbutan’s dislike will not make them go away.

Sheesh - so that's what a can of worms looks like opened up...
Ick.

This is why we think he is not much interested in pursuing the truth wherever it leads.

Just follow your nose...wherever it goes. For flavors of fruit, just follow your snoot.

ya'lls talks to much. aint nobody listin to you up in hea

On the contrary, Were Penguins, I see the problem as you having a failure of imagination and a willingness to extrapolate. In the 60's, the Japanese were industrial workers with a small farming base. In the 2 decades they gave us fits. Then Japanese wages and standard of living rapidly rose, met or exceeded America worker's wages and they lost their price edge, then banked on a quality edge that was also lost fairly readily.

While the EU has planned ahead and will not give up it's base employment - America has been far slower on the uptake:

1. China has 10 times the worker force Japan did, one can argue 20 times because China does not have the reticence of widespread female employment Japan did.

2. In 10 years of boom employment, wages have not gone up because 5 out of every 6 Chinese of working age are still in the countryside.

3. Unlike Japan, even when or if adequate peasant supplies run out and Chinese wages do increase, they start not a 3rd lower than US workers, but 20 times lower. And presumes the Communist Party officials and PRC Red Army of Liberation people that own and run the factories would diffuse the wealth, instead of keeping it for themselves as Saudi princes and America's Richest 1% do.

4. Analysts say the run of cheap labor in China could last 20 years before their enormous price advantage is eroded by a rising standard of living. And, then there is India to move to for cheap labor, then you have the 1.2 billion Muslims with the world's highest birthrate - doubling every 26 years - to go to next.

5. Like Japan, which is still running a 44 billion dollar trade surplus with the USA despite it's woes - China wants to maintain large surpluses forever. Postive cash flow is good, negative cash flows are shameful, betray the Asian worker, and cost the nation growth.

*********************

You also express confusion as to why our greatest strategic rival, China, would do something harmful to the USA, Taiwan, or Japan if it could cost them a buck.

Another failure in imagination.

Cass - Your feelings about the balck underclass aside, they exist.

You can drive unskilled blacks out of all employment opportunities by importing 5-6 million illegals a year - in some states, like California, blacks have been wiped out of the domestic, landscaping, janitorial, construction, and low skill automotive areas.

But they still exist.

With no way up.

That is why we need to work with the inner city communities and offer hope and paths into the Middle Class (if it doesn't shrink further).

Otherwise, stand by for some mighty ugly times.

America should take care of it's own first.

And Muslim immigrants such as the Pakis you welcome over US blacks, not American blacks, are the source of the people that seek to kill you earn their money, proselytize others, and seek vengeance on the Infidel.

On the contrary, Were Penguins, I see the problem as you having a failure of imagination ...--Ranbutan

Having read more than a few posts by were-penguins, I find that amusing, not to mention imaginative.

Ranbutan:

I hate to beat you over the head with the dreaded logic stick, but here goes:

Perhaps you can explain to me what exactly what is "driving unskilled blacks out of all employment opportunities"?

Is someone placing a gun to these people's heads and forcing them at gunpoint not to work? Perhaps those horrid immigrants are beating them up and taking their jobs?

Explain it to me, Ran, so I can understand it. I just don't get it. Two people show up to apply for the same job. How are American-born blacks driven away by those horrid brown-skinned, slant-eyed immigrants? Those fiends? Seems to me they'd have a competitive advantage - they've lived here all their lives - they have local connections - they speak the native language. Please do explain it to me, because I just don't get it.

Ran:

I've got a blog you've just got to check out:

http://proculian.blogspot.com/

You won't be sorry.

Our understanding of Japan (we have been there) is that the highly paid industrial worker and the company-man are a small percentage of the workforce. The backbone of the economy is small, unregulated suppliers. The number of metal sheds tucked into back gardens with low-wage mama-sans making car parts for the likes of Toyota and Nissan is remarkable. This is needless to say, not the image Japan likes to present to the world.

China, if they stick to a relatively free market, will likely pass America, they probably would have already but for the infection of Communism losing them 50 years (just multiply Taiwan) , it’s demographics and technology. What truly amazes us is that Ranbutan can’t see that the very solutions he would impose exacerbate the problem he perceives. It is the very people he wants to redistribute money to who buy Chinese ‘trinkets’ it is the very people he wants to take money from who fund the ever-higher labor replacing technology which alone has a chance to keep America on top. No matter how cheap the Chinese work, it isn’t as cheap as a robot, and there’s less shipping.

Negative cash flow only costs ‘growth’ because you discount the value of purchased items as soon as they are sold. It’s like saying "America loses $10,000 when you buy an imported car. It’s true there are $10,000 fewer dollars in America but there is a car, and the $10,000 dollars won’t get someone to work and their kids to soccer practice for the next ten years.

China is only a strategic rival of the US to the extent that they see the US as blocking their interests, which needn’t be the case unless perhaps they see the US doing everything it can to retard a billion people from sharing the good life. So frequently in history, great powers, to remain on top do the exact thing which will most quickly bring them down.

Cassandra,

One thing we find amusing; the very people who decry lower expectations of teachers towards black people as self-fulfilling do not see the same problem telling them they will have to deal with constant prejudice.

We know many Africans who come to America and are amazed at the mind-set of American black people..

I used to work for a discount drugstore chain in DC and hired lots of Africans. They were the most impressive employees I have ever worked with - they showed up for work every day in clean pressed white shirt and tie (to work in a drugstore). They learned everything quickly and never needed to be shown something twice. They always had a big smile on their faces, and most of them were working 2 jobs and were exhausted when they came on shift, but you would never have known this from their demeanor.

A lot of them were professionals back in Africa and working in a drugstore was a comedown for them, but they never acted that way. They were always polite and professional and a joy to work with.

Cass - professing Shock! Shock! at how blacks could possibly lose employment in a dozen fields if no gun was pressed to their heads.

Seems to me they'd have a competitive advantage (black unskilled workers over illegals) - they've lived here all their lives - they have local connections - they speak the native language. Please do explain it to me, because I just don't get it.

Hmmmm - All the industries we discussed are high turnover by nature. Blacks dominated those fields in SoCal in the 50's and 60's.

They were almost completely displaced in a decade (1970s).

Why? You could hire an illegal at under minimum wage, pay no benefits. Far more bang for the buck, more profits in your pocket. Fob off the social costs - crime, educating their many children, family medical care - on the local taxpayers. The American elites block enforcement of immigration laws, so you are safe hiring illegals. Just rember to live in an area far removed from the undesirable effects of illegal immigrants or the added taxes.

Two people show up to apply for the same job

And time and time again, studies show that employers will hire the illegal white, Asian, or Hispanic over the native black of equal qualifications.

Will look at your Blog link again. It appears to be potboiler stuff, but I saved it - maybe a future article will catch my fancy.

Been to many Asian countries too, Were Penguins. Seen after school assembly work in homes, and seen housewives getting extra spending money by doing subassembly. Not just Japan. China, Thailand, Philippines, S Korea. What I was saying was China is throwing women into the full time labor force, not like Japan's use of them for part-time piecework.

Japan was going gangbusters on robots and automated factories for a while until they gave up, concluding that Chinese and Vietnamese were cheaper than robots and better controllable under a Communist state. They are smart though and have trade deals that keep their balance of trade with their Asian partners as evenly balanced as possible by mutual assent.

Well, at least the issues of the economy, deficits, wealth and power concentration(and corruption), jobs, and globalization are now seen as what the election will be decided on - not foreign policy or security - as it should be. If workers find a good economy developing, the above issues addressed, and feel their children's future is not imperiled, Bush wins. If not, his signature identity - The Great Fighter of Evildoers - won't matter much.

However, Kerry could be smoked out as a flaming liberal phoney, and lose on character issues.

My own feeling is that whoever wins, this country is headed for the rocks unless key structural changes are made to how America addresses long-term issues.

Ran:

I know I am a cold hearted horrible person, but we all must adapt. For years I only made minimum wage and had a HS education. When I first got married we couldn't even afford to live together because I couldn't get hired - I was female and under 20 had a baby. No one would hire me in a college town for a FT job - too many other applicants with no child. I had a PT job, but I couldn't make enough to get by.

It didn't matter that it was illegal to ask me about the baby. What was I going to do: sue? So I picked up and left the state and my husband sublet our apartment and we lived apart for almost 2 years. I worked graveyard shift so I only had to be apart from my baby for 2 hours of his waking day and I could be a real Mom to him. I got no sleep for 2 years, but you do what you have to to survive. And then you make sure you don't have to do that again. You adapt.

We were married in college and everyone told my husband to quit - he could have made $10/hour loading trucks (which he did on off hours). He worked 2 jobs in college and took a full course load. He had the sense to take the long view and stay in school. Then he joined the military, which I don't think he really wanted, but he had a wife and baby to feed.

I'm sorry, but I don't have much sympathy. My daughter-in-law's family lives hand-to-mouth, no plans for the future - she has more sense and works her butt off. She put herself through college. First one in her family to graduate and now she's in grad school. Do you know that no one in her family even came to her college graduation?

That kid is worth 10 of any of them. They are nice people and I like them, but she is an adult and they still act like children and blame all their problems on someone else. It's always someone else' fault when life doesn't work out. And if you asked them, they'd probably say she's lucky when she's really hard-working and determined.

Life doesn't hand you any guarantees. We are so lucky in this country - we have so many opportunities to make it if we just put forth a little effort. And if one thing doesn't work out, there are a million other things out there. No guarantees, but lots of chances.

If you decided to compete for jobs at the bottom of the ladder, your skill doesn't count for much: one unskilled laborer is much like the next and the lowest bidder gets the job. I found that out very quickly and the little light bulb flashed in my pointy little head and I said to myself: "you'd better either get promoted or go to school, because this really bites".

And then I did it. Actually I did both. Several times.

Cass -

Should native Americans of below normal intelligence be accorded a life of productive dignity, or should they be treated like dirt and chucked away if a foreigner indicates the ability to work harder for less money?

Should inner city blacks continue to be displaced?

It is well and good to say that everyone should go to college and learn the next hot thing - PhD in protease molecule folding dynamics, etc. but right now, college kids are bailing out of the sciences, IT, computer science, high tech - anything they fear will be taken over by Indians or Chinese working at 1/10th to 1/20th the wage, and going into "safer fields" like lawyering or government administration.

While your biography and "up by your bootstraps" story is admirable, when we left the underclass to fend for themselves and lionized the occasional figure that arose to wealth - we ended up with massive crime and burning cities from our neglect.

I proposed what other nations do - treat those on the Left side of the Bell Curve as citizens who deserve a shot at dignity and the American Dream, not as unwanted trash. And, instead of college, put them in apprenticeship programs that will place them in a skilled or semi-skilled career and get some self-respect, stablity -

And stop hiring illegals to compensate for our failure to develop those in the underclass, and the failure of our public schools to realistically guide kids into careers that match their skill sets.

Ran:

And (as usual) you were paying absolutely zero attention when I described one of those govt. sponsored apprentice programs in great detail, Ranbutan...remember the Business school? I wasn't just going on about it for no reason - there was a point there.

That wasn't rocket science - that was preparing people for entry level jobs as receptionists, typists, secretaries and the like. We're talking basic stuff here. Vocational training. And they weren't trying and there was no buy-in.

I have actually worked at several community colleges in vocational programs, so I have some experience in this area. It's what I did for several years, and it happens to be a passion of mine. If I can swing it, it may be what I do with the rest of my life.

I think it is important, believe it or not. But you can't do it for someone else - they have to meet you halfway and that is the factor that has been lacking. Government programs don't work because there is no buy-in from the students - it's just like rich kids whose parents pay for everything - the kids don't take it seriously and they don't try and it's all a hideous waste.

Community college? (which we already have, in abundance, and it's affordable for everyone) By all means. And what's wrong with that, Ran?

Anyone can go to CC. If you're poor you can get a free ride on Pell grant. I did financial aid for 6 years and helped thousands of kids and adults do just that. Community college is a great deal, it's already in place, it partners with industry to train the skill sets needed by local firms - I've sat on committees where schools work with hospitals and large corporations to plan technical courses to meet future needs for jobs well into the next 2 decades.

What's wrong with community college? Immigrants are smart enough to use our CC system. Stop making excuses and whining so much - there are plenty of opportunities. We don't need to grab every child that comes out of HS and "guide" him or her. They need to share some of the responsibility - all they need to do is look around and pick one of the millions of options.

For pete's sake - they can join the military and learn a skill and go to college when it comes to that. Lots of people do and it's a great way up.

Ranbutan,

The Chinese and Vietnamese were cheaper than robots but the gap is closing. Robotics is now where computers were in about 1980. The progress of the robotic revolution will not be as quick as the computer one because it’s almost purely a business revolution, it will be more like factory electrification. It also takes a lot longer to fund such expensive research and development when someone keeps taking all your capital away and redistributing it.

It’s technology like this which makes us say you can’t predict the economic future.

The problem of underproductive people will only get worse though. Technology like this will make it possible for skilled, talented people to be even more productive, widening the gap between them and those who are not well adapted to the technological world.

The problem is not that the technology-challenged will be truly poor, but they will be grossly comparatively poor and they will not accept that they are so much less productive as to be deserving of their relative penury because they don’t understand the technology or economics (if they did they wouldn’t be poor). Demagogues will be there to gain power by flattering their ignorance and desire, they will continue to be subsidized by robbery labeled ‘social justice’ but as the technology increases the gap will become harder to paper over.

This is your real problem Ranbutan, when the demands of the underproductive become too absurd will the techno-savvy meekly submit to the yoke or will Atlas shrug?

Ran:

Read this over and over until it sinks in:

The problem is not that the technology-challenged will be truly poor, but they will be grossly comparatively poor and they will not accept that they are so much less productive as to be deserving of their relative penury because they don’t understand the technology or economics (if they did they wouldn’t be poor). Demagogues will be there to gain power by flattering their ignorance and desire, they will continue to be subsidized by robbery labeled ‘social justice’ but as the technology increases the gap will become harder to paper over.

YOU HAVE TO TRY IN LIFE. AND YOU HAVE TO KEEP TRYING. NO ONE SAID IT WAS EASY. THERE ARE PLENTY OF PEOPLE WHO WANT TO HELP. BUT IT'S STILL YOUR RESPONSIBILITY IN THE END.

WPOS: If you weren't a were-penguin, I think I would be in love with you.

Sadly, Cass, I don't think it will ever "sink in". If he possessed the necessary level of open-mindedness and introspection to change such a fundamental viewpoint, he wouldn't be such a rabid ideologue in the first place.

Cassandra,

Don't knock Penguine love.

Sadly, I fear I have frightened the Were-Penguin away forever.:) I meant nothing improper. Alas...

Chewin' on herring
Nibblin' on scrod
Sam said, "Susie, honey
If it's not too odd:
Be my Penguin?"
Now they're feelin'
Quite sanguine...

Any they whirl
And they twirl
Cross the ice floes
And he sings "Diddy-whop"
To her "whoa - whoas"

Slippin' and a-slidin' along...
Looks like
Penguin loooooove...
ooo-ooooove...

I apologise sincerely for that. Really.

Now see, Ran. I do torture other people occasionally.

Ah - um as enchanting as Ms. Tenniel’s music is, even in modified form (for us it summons delightful images of elevators, grocery store intercoms and being put on hold) we have already stated elsewhere that we are happily complex-married (some what similar to your Onieda community). As a token of your esteem we would be happy to receive a nice rock (it should be rounded and about the size of a human fist), just leave it anywhere in central Ohio, we’ll find it.

Dear Mr. WPOS:

Please do not worry. I am very happily married myself, so stalking were-penguins is not in the cards, tempting as the prospect might be.

I shall leave your rock in a prominent place as a token of my respect for your mental powers, and please extend my regards to the collective Mrs. Were-Penguin(s).

i love you oooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!