I don't see much problem with telling Germany, "If you don't give us troops to help out in Afghanistan, we're going to take them from our troops in Germany." Would be interesting to see how they react to that.

(04-24-2009 11:36 AM)GGniner Wrote:  although, I'm still not fully comfortable with the Germans militarizing again.

Normally I would call **** and balls on something like this if you said Japan or France or some other historical military power , but history hasn't exactly proven this concern about Germany incorrect, has it?

But jeeze, (talking to myself outloud) I don't think the German psyche could stomach another military build-up. The current Baby Boomer generation has serious misgivings about prior Nazism, however the current Milenials think of Nazis the same way American's probably think about the Civil War or Indian Wars - just another moment in history. German Milenials are not the same as their fathers and grandfathers.....

The Philippines has maintained relative stabilty since American withdrawl, although they are hampered by a serious lack of military hardware and training. I wouldn't put the Germans, Japanese or Koreans in that same boat, but an immediate American withdrawl of forces from overseas bases does leave a large void that honestly wouldn't benefit America. My feelings are that Korea would be especially vulnerable.

Certainly the any withdrawl of American forces from overseas is not a sum-sum game.

(04-24-2009 01:32 PM)Lord Stanley Wrote:  

(04-24-2009 11:36 AM)GGniner Wrote:  although, I'm still not fully comfortable with the Germans militarizing again.

Normally I would call **** and balls on something like this if you said Japan or France or some other historical military power , but history hasn't exactly proven this concern about Germany incorrect, has it?

But jeeze, (talking to myself outloud) I don't think the German psyche could stomach another military build-up. The current Baby Boomer generation has serious misgivings about prior Nazism, however the current Milenials think of Nazis the same way American's probably think about the Civil War or Indian Wars - just another moment in history. German Milenials are not the same as their fathers and grandfathers.....

The Philippines has maintained relative stabilty since American withdrawl, although they are hampered by a serious lack of military hardware and training. I wouldn't put the Germans, Japanese or Koreans in that same boat, but an immediate American withdrawl of forces from overseas bases does leave a large void that honestly wouldn't benefit America. My feelings are that Korea would be especially vulnerable.

Certainly the any withdrawl of American forces from overseas is not a sum-sum game.

What happened to that "Big Pushy Movement" in Germany, not too long ago, to close all our Military Bases and kick us totally out of there ???

I mean they were all bold and talking sh't trying to be mean and bowed up at us.

I guess with Putin and Iran exploding (literally) all around them, they "Changed Their Minds" ....

I guess we are like that old comfortable door mat that you use to clean the crap off your boots on when you need it.

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(04-24-2009 10:20 AM)DrTorch Wrote:  I'm glad someone else sees this. I was going to point to the same thing.

And while it may have worked 25 years ago, now that everybody is doing it, it stops working b/c there is no inherent advantage. In fact the inherent disadvantages just means it hurts everybody worse, particularly the average citizen. These include:

One aspect of the free trade agreements has been to heavily restrict the use of tariffs for competitive advantage. I'd like to see abatements addressed in future agreements - and, for companies that do international business, that should have the effect of outlawing it for companies like Boeing, etc. Unfortunately, I suspect abatements are a harbinger that the real problem is the base tax rates are too high to sustain economic growth.

(04-24-2009 11:15 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  (2) consumption (all consumption, nothing excluded, could work like either VAT or Fair Tax), with the Boortz-Linder prefund, and

Gary Hart was a big proponent of the consumption tax (growing up in Colorado I was on his bandwagon for his 1984 presidential campaign). Hart would've been a disaster in a lot of ways, but this idea has always intrigued me.

(04-24-2009 11:22 AM)GGniner Wrote:  Exactly, if we go down, Europe and the rest of the Socialist countries are screwed. Europe, China, Russia all also have much worse Birth Rates than the USA does.

China has shown it is all too willing to convert excess population into slave labor for the privileged class (in this era, it's the tech companies building up in Shanghai, Beijing, etc). Population growth or the lack of it may not impact China in the same way it will Italy or Japan, which are democracies and have a welfare state obligations.

(04-24-2009 11:48 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  I don't see much problem with telling Germany, "If you don't give us troops to help out in Afghanistan, we're going to take them from our troops in Germany." Would be interesting to see how they react to that.

I've always wondered what kind of agreements/obligations the US and host countries like Germany had. The economic impact of having thousands of troops in a foreign country has to be pretty significant, and I've seen references to using this as a way to manipulate those host countries before...

(04-24-2009 11:48 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  I don't see much problem with telling Germany, "If you don't give us troops to help out in Afghanistan, we're going to take them from our troops in Germany." Would be interesting to see how they react to that.

What is the threat to Germany that neighboring NATO countries can't help out with if needed? We don't need to be there.

One interesting aspect of a consumption tax is that all the free trade treaties specifically allow it to be imposed on imports and rebated on exports. That means that, unlike a tariff, it helps both to reduce imports and to increase exports. That's what other countries are doing when you hear complaints that they are "subsidizing" their exports to us. It's done in accordance with every treaty to which we are signatories, so we have no legal basis to complain. We could join the other 29 OECD countries and do the same thing, but we'd have to adopt the consumption tax for it to be legal.

This effect alone would significantly impact both our economic growth and our trade balance.

I am reminded of Winston Churchill who said "Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery."

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A SIMPLE ANALOGY from a Texas Tech University professor:


An economics professor at Texas Tech said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. That class had insisted that socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer. The professor then said OK, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.

All grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A. After the first test the grades were averaged and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy.

But, as the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too; so they studied little. The second test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F.

The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else. All failed, to their great surprise, and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great; but when government takes all the reward away; no one will try or want to succeed.
It could NOT be any simpler than that...

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Obama's Plan to Turn America European:

Well when we do go Ballz Up fully Socialist/Communist European, we have already got our selves a QUEEN ......

And Her Name is ...... BAUWANEE FUWANK !!!!!!!!!


And he has TONS of experience in setting up and running Red Light Districts since he is a Madam himself !!!!!! So we will legally be Ho'ing Fo Dolla's in NO TIME AT ALL .... $$$$$$ CHA CHING

Heck, I can't wait !!!!!!!!!!!!!! :ncaabbs:

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