Wild Speculation - ff on Teh Economy

[Jerome]

Originally Posted by chunksmediocrites

Medicare and Social Security are not in any real danger of insolvency or shortage. Social Security is the one area of the government where there is actually a surplus of revenue.

That is only an accounting trick (one that would be illegal if I paid my taxes with) of double counting money that has already been spent.

[Jerome]

Originally Posted by chunksmediocrites

3) single-handedly spend 41% of the world's combined military budgets.

I agree, those socialist countries should be funding their own defense.

[SR71]

Did you all see Boehner? He's gonna dig his heels in again over tax increases, otherwise known as paying down the debt. So, if everyone's taxes go up, nobody's fault but The Crying Man.

[Watser?]

Originally Posted by Jerome

I agree, those socialist countries should be funding their own defense.

Right, you're not a right winger...

[Jerome]

How does 'right-winger' equate to the us not funding the defense of other nations?

[SR71]

Defense of other nations from whom, exactly? What we are paying to defend is nothing more than our access to shipments of cheap fossil fuels from the Middle East and Eastern Eurasia. If we were not prepared to attack nations that decided to turn off the spigots that enable us to exist as we do, all they would have to do to bring us down but good would be to institute a coordinated embargo ("us" being North America and Western Europe, throw most of East Asia in there for good measure).

The Europeans are paying for their own defense by trying to move to renewables as quickly as possible. We are not. Energy is security in the modern world.

[Jerome]

We have had an army stationed in the heart for Europe for over 60's years.

You should read some European history and you will learn whom our army is protecting Europe from.

[SR71]

Originally Posted by Jerome

We have had an army stationed in the heart for Europe for over 60's years.

You should read some European history and you will learn whom our army is protecting Europe from.

You should do the reading. These are the lessons of 60 odd years ago.

Sohbet Karbuz: Oil Logistics Lessons from WWII


“

God was on the side of the nation that had the oil”
Professor Wakimura, Tokyo Imperial University in Postwar Interrogation

To those we must add Erwin Rommel: “Fuel shortages! It is just enough to make one cry,” “The bravest soldiers can do nothing without weapons, weapons are nothing without ammunition, but in terms of mobile war neither weapons nor ammunition cost much without means of transportation with the necessary volume of fuel for engines.

Meanwhile the attempts to prevent Germany from using the Romanian Ploiesti oilfields failed. As early as before the capitulation of France, both the British and French governments offered Romania $60 million for self-destroying its oilfields and, thus, preventing Germany from exploiting them. However, the parties failed to agree about the price, so [2]the Romanian oil came to Nazi Germany. (source)

On 15 May 1944, the commander of RAF’s bomber force, Air Marshal Arthur Harris, nicknamed Bomber ordered 99 RAF bombers to attack the German refineries….Throughout the period of fighting for Caucasian oil, the Soviet Army lost 344,390 people, while the German Army lost 281,000 soldiers and officers in the offensive operation alone. That was a price for oil called “the blood of war.”(source)

What we should still keep in mind, especially today, that
the old saying “Amateurs talk strategy, and professionals talk logistics,” is still valid.

[Jerome]

You don't seem to be following the conversation.

The purpose of stationing an army in the heart of Europe for 60 years has nothing to do with oil.

[SR71]

To reiterate, whom are we supposed to be defending against? Ottomans?

A lot has changed in 60 years. The Old Eastern Bloc ain't what it used to be. The Axis nations were much too busy rebuilding to constitute any resurgent threat through the 1980's. We can no longer produce enough domestic petroleum to meet our own needs since the 1970's. We can not air or sea lift a timely reaction force (invasion) to the middle east from North America. We import 42% of our oil. We get about a third of our imports from OPEC members in the Middle East and North Africa. We are not the only nation that depends on those supplies. Any disruption would have a tremendous effect on crude prices worldwide.



The only practical way for us to secure those sources is by railhead from Western Europe with a relatively easy hop across the Mediterranean. We simply can not do that from the continental US. It's logistically impossible.

China is rapidly becoming as oil hungry as we are. Have you looked at a map lately? They are much closer to those sources than we are.

This brings us to the Keystone Pipeline. Complete that, environmental costs be damned, and we can tell OPEC to take us off their mailing list. Not until then will you see our forces quit Europe.

[Jerome]

Originally Posted by SR71

To reiterate, whom are we supposed to be defending against?

Read European history starting 60 years ago and work your way back in time.

[Jerome]

Originally Posted by SR71

The only practical way for us to secure those sources is by railhead from Western Europe with a relatively easy hop across the Mediterranean. We simply can not do that from the continental US. It's logistically impossible.

Oil is sold on the world market. If we were invading these nations, taking their oil for use exclusively in our nation, thus excluding those resources from the world market, you would have a point.

[SR71]

Originally Posted by Jerome

Read European history starting 60 years ago and work your way back in time.

Done long ago. Do you have a point or are you just trolling for the hell of it? Don't bother answering that. I really have no use at all for your nonsense. I'm actually putting you on ignore. I've never done this before in my entire internets experience. If I cared to argue against libertard claptrap I have plenty of other venues available with opponents more worthy of my consideration than you. You are disturbing my peace.

[Jerome]

Europe was embroiled with war for centuries until the us provided a defense from war.

You can't give away free things during war .. resources are short.

We are to blame for their socialism.

[godfry n. glad]

Originally Posted by Jerome

Oil is sold on the world market. If we were invading these nations, taking their oil for use exclusively in our nation, thus excluding those resources from the world market, you would have a point.

Hmmm...Lessee....Iraq has pretty much been in a state of war since the Iran-Iraq conflict beginning in 1980. That stretched on until 1988. Then, in 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait and set off the 'Desert Storm' conflict, which was followed by sanctions and then the whole invasion thing in 2003 and since. During that time, the whole oil extraction infrastructure of the region has gone woefully underutilized, and consequently undermaintained, and only insignificant amounts of oil have been extracted from the stores under Iraq. The continuing conflicts have acted as means of suppressing extraction and storing the crude 'in-ground'. I understand this is one reason why the US embassy in Baghdad was one of the largest on the planet.

We don't take it exclusively for us, we trade it for the cheapest crude we can find so that when refined and sold for the same amount as more expensive crude (say, Indonesian) the refiner (usually western oil companies) can extract the greatest profit from the hapless consumer.

Perfect knowledge of market forces, consumer sovereignty, and producer competition have all been excluded from the interactions...by the oil producing corporations and their governmental handmaidens....obviating any reference to 'free markets'.

[koan]

The OP suggests musing on the subject, so here goes:

There is no economy without production. Things need to be made, work needs to be performed, people need to be employed in a meaningful way. Replacing workers with machinery only benefits the economy if those same workers are employed by maintaining machinery or designing what the machines make etc. If machines are supposed to make human lives more pleasant by taking over menial jobs then people should find themselves able to enjoy a less gruelling work day but, instead, they've found they have no work at all.

The economy also requires people to spend money. This becomes problematic when large portions of the population have no disposable income. That problem was fixed by credit cards. Unfortunately, the people still do not have the money to pay for it, they just have more debt.

Then we have the large amount of money that is made on using money to speculate on stock markets. Nothing is made, nothing is added to the economy, it just takes available wealth and moves it from one pocket to another... and people get a portion of the money as it moves. I think investigating and eliminating "work" that involves no benefit to the economy would be a better place to start your queries than machines. At least some bloke with a coverall gets paid to physically oil the machine.

It is the same problem when we focus on street crime instead of white collar crime. White collar crime costs society way more than the crimes we focus on and, I'd wager, create much of the street crime by removing massive amounts of wealth from the community.

[Jerome]

Originally Posted by godfry n. glad

The united states war machine shared their confiscated oil on the world market.

We are to blame for their socialism.

[godfry n. glad]

Originally Posted by Jerome

We are to blame for their socialism.

Um...You are putting words in my mouth now? This is below your usual poor performance, Jerome.

[Jerome]

Boil down what you said and that is it.

I was not unfair.

[godfry n. glad]

Originally Posted by Jerome

Boil down what you said and that is it.

I was not unfair.

Sez you. I disagree. Speak for yourself and only yourself, chump.

[Jerome]

:whyyou:

[koan]

Why do I think this thread has more going on than teh economy?

[SR71]

Originally Posted by godfry n. glad

Hmmm...Lessee....Iraq has pretty much been in a state of war since the Iran-Iraq conflict beginning in 1980. That stretched on until 1988. Then, in 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait and set off the 'Desert Storm' conflict, which was followed by sanctions and then the whole invasion thing in 2003 and since. During that time, the whole oil extraction infrastructure of the region has gone woefully underutilized, and consequently undermaintained, and only insignificant amounts of oil have been extracted from the stores under Iraq. The continuing conflicts have acted as means of suppressing extraction and storing the crude 'in-ground'. I understand this is one reason why the US embassy in Baghdad was one of the largest on the planet.

We don't take it exclusively for us, we trade it for the cheapest crude we can find so that when refined and sold for the same amount as more expensive crude (say, Indonesian) the refiner (usually western oil companies) can extract the greatest profit from the hapless consumer.

Perfect knowledge of market forces, consumer sovereignty, and producer competition have all been excluded from the interactions...by the oil producing corporations and their governmental handmaidens....obviating any reference to 'free markets'.

Here is a clear link between BP interests and the latest Iraq war. Communications between government and industry pertaining to the spoils. These are from the UK. I don't know of any similar release of information in the US. I don't doubt their existence though. Funny, I don't recall France participating in that war.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk...q-2269610.html

Whereas BP was insisting in public that it had "no strategic interest" in Iraq, in private it told the Foreign Office that Iraq was "more important than anything we've seen for a long time".

BP was concerned that if Washington allowed TotalFinaElf's existing contract with Saddam Hussein to stand after the invasion it would make the French conglomerate the world's leading oil company. BP told the Government it was willing to take "big risks" to get a share of the Iraqi reserves, the second largest in the world.

[SR71]

Originally Posted by koan

The OP suggests musing on the subject, so here goes:

There is no economy without production. Things need to be made, work needs to be performed, people need to be employed in a meaningful way. Replacing workers with machinery only benefits the economy if those same workers are employed by maintaining machinery or designing what the machines make etc. If machines are supposed to make human lives more pleasant by taking over menial jobs then people should find themselves able to enjoy a less gruelling work day but, instead, they've found they have no work at all.

The economy also requires people to spend money. This becomes problematic when large portions of the population have no disposable income. That problem was fixed by credit cards. Unfortunately, the people still do not have the money to pay for it, they just have more debt.

Then we have the large amount of money that is made on using money to speculate on stock markets. Nothing is made, nothing is added to the economy, it just takes available wealth and moves it from one pocket to another... and people get a portion of the money as it moves. I think investigating and eliminating "work" that involves no benefit to the economy would be a better place to start your queries than machines. At least some bloke with a coverall gets paid to physically oil the machine.

It is the same problem when we focus on street crime instead of white collar crime. White collar crime costs society way more than the crimes we focus on and, I'd wager, create much of the street crime by removing massive amounts of wealth from the community.

Just so. It seems evident (to me) on casual examination that at some point automation becomes counterproductive to the wider economy and society in which it exists. There has to be a point of over saturation, and I would argue we are on the cusp of this now, if not already somewhat past that point.

This article describes what it is like to work in a large, modern warehouse. The automation consists of little more than handheld scanners that eliminate the need for paper and pencil. What will happen to these workers when even the legwork of running from bin to bin to fill the pick lists is done by machinery? I have a friend who works in that area, automated logistics. There are people working now to eliminate the need for human labor at even this menial task. What then?

This article describes what it's like for those workers now. The abbreviated version - it blows really hard. It's not a job most would do if they had any alternative. The time approaches when even this poor option of meeting ones immediate need by trading ones labor will disappear.

I Was a Warehouse Wage Slave | Mother Jones

[Jerome]

It will be even worse when the middle-class has their mortgage interest and retirement savings taxed away.

Just like government, encourage a behavior and pull the rug out from under the worker once they are locked into a long term deal.

I remember when all interest was not taxable, that is how they encouraged the workers to make purchases on credit instead of paying up front.