Wednesday, February 29, 2012

It's a religeous thing.....

Romney Mormon Santorum Catholic. Latinos Catholic. What do you think? I think it will be interesting if being a Catholic gets you the Latino swing vote.

Does that mean Oba mama is toast?

Think the Mexicans will vote to deport their relatives? Yea, right!

Arizona set to test Romney's appeal to Hispanics - Washington Times
PHOENIX — With this weekend’s endorsement by Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, Mitt Romney has amassed the backing of what could be considered the trifecta of hard-liners on illegal immigration — and he will put that to the test with Hispanic voters Tuesday in Arizona’s GOP primary.

Mr. Romney also has the support of former California Gov. Pete Wilson and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, who together with Ms. Brewer have led state immigration crackdown efforts during the past two decades. Their backing solidifies the former Massachusetts governor’s credentials as the toughest candidate on the issue.

Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Another liar about global warming....

What's interesting that even if they were telling the truth and we were warming the planet no one would believe them anyhow.

Kind of like Iran, a country barely out of the stone age, is much of a threat to us.

One aircraft carrier could destroy them in a couple of weeks! One nuke in 15 minutes!

miltonwolf.com: Manbearpig update: More global warming fraud exposed
Remember when the science was "settled" and if you dared to doubt the apocalyptic warnings from the high priests of the church of global warming, er, climate change, you were called a "denier"?

The outright collapse of the Global Warmists continues unabated. First came ClimateGate. Then ClimateGate 2.0. Now Michelle Malkin exposes Eco-fraud: Global warming crusader admits lying, stealing, smearing:

It was all For The Planet, of course.

Global warming zealot Peter Gleick, in the name of defending “rational debate,” committed flabbergasting fraud to try and bring down the free-market Heartland Institute.

He’s finally ‘fessed up. But the Heartland Institute is going to fight for its reputation and for justice — in court.

In Gleick's confession, he claims he committed fraud because "a rational public debate is desperately needed." Really? I thought the global warming science was settled.

Monday, February 27, 2012

Just be glad your not trying to make excuses for Oba mama....

The guy is all over the map. I thought he was a Democrat. Of course, most people thought he was a Christian!

Today Oba mama says the only thing the Republicans want to do is drill! Since he refuses to drill gas prices have doubled and most people can't get a decent job. He gave us the criminal gang in the  Solyndra company, closed down the Gulf, and now wants to raise taxes on then oil companies.

I suppose living in Washington does make people a little stupid and we can forgive him because he's a black guy, you know, and it would be racists of us to treat him like any other politician who lies!

Oil speculators got us into this economic mess and until we do something constructive about our energy needs will continue to rule the roost.

Buy food. If you need another car go for the mileage. Move closer to work. Be ready for collapse II.

Robert Reich (The Gas Wars)
Nothing drives voter sentiment like the price of gas – now averaging $3.56 a gallon, up 30 cents from the start of the year. It’s already hit $4 in some places. The last time gas topped $4 was 2008.

And nothing energizes Republicans like rising energy prices. Last week House Speaker John Boehner told Republicans to take advantage of voters’ looming anger over prices at the pump. On Thursday House Republicans passed a bill to expand offshore drilling and force the White House to issue a permit for the Keystone XL pipeline. The tumult prompted the Interior Department to announce on Friday expanded oil exploration in the Arctic.

Sunday, February 26, 2012

Obama makes a fool of himself.....

Sounded like Jimmy Carter to me. Without Republicans in Congress he's screwed on gas prices and they know it!

Even Romney can beat him if he whines about it, LOL.

Sessions: Obama 'defeatist' on rising gas prices - Washington Times
President Obama’s indignant defense this week of his administration’s energy policies has done nothing to deter GOP critics, as gas prices continue to rise amid worries that their continued climb could throw the economic recovery off course.

Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, the ranking Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, said in a letter to Mr. Obama Friday that the president was taking a “defeatist view” when it comes to trying to reduce gas prices.

“I reject the defeatist view that says the nation that won two world wars, pioneered space travel, and overcame the Soviet empire is now helpless in the face of high prices at the pump,” Mr. Sessions wrote. “We are not at the mercy of dictators, cartels and events beyond our control.”


Friday, February 24, 2012

Just be glad your not trying to make excuses for Oba mama....

The guy is all over the map. I thought he was a Democrat. Of course, most people thought he was a Christian!

Today Oba mama says the only thing the Republicans want to do is drill! Since he refuses to drill gas prices have doubled and most people can't get a decent job. He gave us the criminal gang in the  Solyndra company, closed down the Gulf, and now wants to raise taxes on then oil companies.

I suppose living in Washington does make people a little stupid and we can forgive him because he's a black guy, you know, and it would be racists of us to treat him like any other politician who lies!

Oil speculators got us into this economic mess and until we do something constructive about our energy needs will continue to rule the roost.

Buy food. If you need another car go for the mileage. Move closer to work. Be ready for collapse II.

Robert Reich (The Gas Wars)
Nothing drives voter sentiment like the price of gas – now averaging $3.56 a gallon, up 30 cents from the start of the year. It’s already hit $4 in some places. The last time gas topped $4 was 2008.

And nothing energizes Republicans like rising energy prices. Last week House Speaker John Boehner told Republicans to take advantage of voters’ looming anger over prices at the pump. On Thursday House Republicans passed a bill to expand offshore drilling and force the White House to issue a permit for the Keystone XL pipeline. The tumult prompted the Interior Department to announce on Friday expanded oil exploration in the Arctic.

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

You ever notice.....

That the biggest war mongers among us have never fired a shot or have a shot fired at them from the evil enemies?

Be a different story if they or their children had to participate, right? Should be a law that these over zealous frothing at the mouth would be Rambos had to shoot it out in some God forsaking dump.

But there are plenty of patriotic suckers to do it for them so no danger of peace in the world so far!

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Even some of the left-wing lackies agree with me.....

Firing government employees and cutting people's checks is idiotic during a bust.

Now Oba mama is terrorising Iran  into Armageddon. Even though high gas prices, refusing to drill for oil, and telling the Canadians to shove the pipeline up their asses is suicidal to his re-election campaign.

Oh but we did get to keep a couple of dollars a week after he robbed the Social Security tax, right?

Everyone in the media was giddy that he finally got something through Congress. Of course they're idiots but destroying the system has been the gangsters on Wall Street's plan for many years.

Imagine if all those billions were going to the crooks that fucked over and got us into this Depression.

Oh wait, that's only a matter of time, isn't it?

Pain Without Gain - NYTimes.com
Specifically, in early 2010 austerity economics — the insistence that governments should slash spending even in the face of high unemployment — became all the rage in European capitals. The doctrine asserted that the direct negative effects of spending cuts on employment would be offset by changes in “confidence,” that savage spending cuts would lead to a surge in consumer and business spending, while nations failing to make such cuts would see capital flight and soaring interest rates. If this sounds to you like something Herbert Hoover might have said, you’re right: It does and he did.

Now the results are in — and they’re exactly what three generations’ worth of economic analysis and all the lessons of history should have told you would happen. The confidence fairy has failed to show up: none of the countries slashing spending have seen the predicted private-sector surge. Instead, the depressing effects of fiscal austerity have been reinforced by falling private spending.

Furthermore, bond markets keep refusing to cooperate. Even austerity’s star pupils, countries that, like Portugal and Ireland, have done everything that was demanded of them, still face sky-high borrowing costs. Why? Because spending cuts have deeply depressed their economies, undermining their tax bases to such an extent that the ratio of debt to G.D.P., the standard indicator of fiscal progress, is getting worse rather than better.


Monday, February 20, 2012

Oba mama scaring the Iranians....

Time to raise gas prices. I guess the guy doesn't want to win. He'll have his hands full against Santorum if the Romney campaign finally dissolves. (Romney, a fellow liberal, can't beat him.)

Time will tell but he shouldn't be in this position but who said these people aren't arrogant.

Saturday, February 18, 2012

Makes you wonder don't it.......

If Social Security was going broke why rob the funding? But I already posted many times that deficits are accounting gimmicks and we can print, borrow, or steal all the money we need to finance our government. We always have and always will.

The experts just like to lie about it!

Congress passes payroll tax cut - Washington Times
Acting with striking bipartisanship, Congress on Friday passed a full-year extension of the payroll tax cut and renewed enhanced unemployment benefits, sending the bill on to the White House and delivering a major victory to President Obama.

Mr. Obama had made both the tax cut and the jobless benefits chief pillars of his economic plan, and he and fellow Democrats outmaneuvered Republicans and ended up shaping most of the package.

Friday, February 17, 2012

One of our local gas stations raised their price....

6 cents a gallon. Oil up to 103$. Oba mama better move or he's toast this November.

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

They own us....

You ain't seen nothing yet. And our kids will think it's normal for the government to feed, clothe, babysit, employ us, cure our illnesses, clean up after us, etc. etc.

The Republicans will do it after giving you a tax cut and the Dem's will do it because they are busy bodies so don't blame anyone else just keep voting for these fascists and it will all get better. LOL

Did anyone notice we've declared war on Iran? No?

Watch the price of oil. Make sure you have some food stashed away and don't be surprised if gas bumps $5 for awhile. I'm not betting on it but Oba mama will have to move fast to stay in office so "talks" will be instituted fast or he's toast.

After the election it will be bombs away!

NC School Officials | Preschooler's Homemade Lunch | The Daily Caller
A North Carolina elementary school forced a preschool student to eat cafeteria chicken nuggets for lunch on Jan. 30 after officials reportedly determined that her homemade meal wasn’t up to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s standards for healthfulness, according to a report from the Carolina Journal.

The newspaper reported that the four-year-old girl brought a turkey and cheese sandwich, a banana, potato chips and apple juice in her packed lunch from home. That meal didn’t meet with approval from the government agent who was on site inspecting kids’ lunches that day.

The Department of Health and Human Services’ Division of Child Development and Early Education requires that all lunches served in pre-kindergarten programs must meet USDA guidelines. Meals, the guidelines say, must include one serving each of meat, milk and grain and two servings of fruit or vegetables. Those guidelines apply to home-packed lunches as well as cafeteria meals.

The Carolina Journal reported that the girl and her mother wish to remain anonymous to avoid public scrutiny, but she did write to her state representative to complain about it.

“I don’t feel that I should pay for a cafeteria lunch when I provide lunch for her from home,” the mother wrote in a complaint to her state representative, Republican G.L. Pridgen of Robeson County.

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Big battle in Conservatism.....

Conservatives lost the argument about health care when they signed on to Medicare in '65. Once a benefit is given it can't be taken back.

And not putting everyone on Medicare a couple of years ago makes the issue worse. It becomes a pissing contest because of all the different ways health care is administered. But mostly it means that we have to pay for our own health care and for everyone else's health care.

And yes, it's Oba mama's fault. If he and the Dems had fazed all Americans into the Medicare system this argument would be ancient history and our government could have concentrated on paying for it and reforming the mess that they created.

Then the insurance industry could find something else to do for a living  like everybody else

Coulter Care - Peter Ferrara - Townhall Conservative
Why the Individual Mandate Equals Socialized Medicine

Here is why the individual mandate inevitably leads to full-blown socialized medicine, as it has with Obamacare: When the government mandates that you have to buy health insurance, then it has to specify what health insurance is required to satisfy the mandate. This means politics is involved in deciding what must be included and covered by that insurance.

And once politics is involved, that means you can't leave anything out, as that would be takenas an offense and a slight to both the consumers and the providers of the excluded service. Mental health benefits and counseling, drug rehab, maternity benefits (even for men and seniors), abortion -- everything must be covered. We will see that when the final regulations are issued for Obamacare by the Supreme Dictator, Kathleen Sebelius (who looks and acts the part of a villain from an Ayn Rand novel). We are already seeing that the mandated services must include sterilization and "morning after" pills, which even Catholic institutions will have to pay for in regard to their own employees.

That means the mandated health insurance will inevitably be extremely expensive, as we are just starting to see with Obamacare. To make such a mandated expense politically palatable, the government must provide extensive welfare subsidies well into the middle class and beyond, again as we see with Obamacare. The biggest expense there is not the explosion of Medicaid, as bad as that is. It is the entirely new entitlement program providing benefits (subsidies) for the purchase of the mandated insurance for families making up to $88,000 a year to start, indexed to grow to over $100,000 in the near future.

Monday, February 13, 2012

Another exercise in fantasy...

Oba mama comes up with a budget and the  Greeks get another bailout. Someday we'll here something real and then no one will report it.

Sunday, February 12, 2012

Even the leftwing nuts are getting it...

Our system is rotten no matter who is in Washington.

Robert Reich (The Sad Spectacle of Obama's Super PAC)
How many billionaires does it take to buy a presidential election? “With so much at stake” wrote Obama campaign manager Jim Messina on the Obama campaign’s blog, Obama couldn’t “unilaterally disarm.”

But would refusing to be corrupted this way really amount to unilateral disarmament? To the contrary, I think it would have given the President a rallying cry that nearly all Americans would get behind: “More of the nation’s wealth and political power is now in the hands of fewer people and large corporations than since the era of the robber barons of the Gilded Age. I will not allow our democracy to be corrupted by this! I will fight to take back our government!”

Small donations would have flooded the Obama campaign, overwhelming Romney’s billionaire super PACs. The people would have been given a chance to be heard.

The sad truth is Obama has never really occupied the high ground on campaign finance. He refused public financing in 2008. Once president, he didn’t go to bat for a system of public financing that would have made it possible for candidates to raise enough money from small donors and matching public funds they wouldn’t need to rely on a few billionaires pumping unlimited sums into super PACS. He hasn’t even fought for public disclosure of super PAC donations.

And now he’s made a total mockery of the Court’s naïve belief that super PACs would remain separate from individual campaigns, by officially endorsing his own super PAC and allowing campaign manager Jim Messina and even cabinet officers to speak at his super PAC events. Obama will not appear at such events but he, Michelle Obama, and Vice President Joe Biden will encourage support of the Obama super PAC

Friday, February 10, 2012

Who says crime doesn't pay....

Just bribe Oba mama and you get away with billions and only have to pay back peanuts.

Just ask his buddies in the banking racket. They got away with it. Oh, and they knew what they were doing. They made loans to people who couldn't pay it back and now blame the government for making them do it!

Except they bribed the Feds into giving them permission to lend these broke dicks the money in the first place knowing damn well that you and I would have to pay for it for electing the gang in Washington in the first place.

They were right!

Thursday, February 09, 2012

Speculators getting antsy....

May you live in interesting times. Who's going to buy all that 100$ oil in Europe?

More oil comes on line from Canada and then good old USA and prices collapse.

Plus a dozen assholes in California buy a hybrid and we have a glut! LOL.

Expect Oba mama to come up with a "new" drilling plan a little later to squash any oil price surge that makes him look helpless later this year as he enter reelection mode.

Crude Oil Trades Near Six-Week Low on Forecast of Rising U.S. Stockpiles - Bloomberg
Oil fell to near a six-week low in New York before a report forecast to show that U.S. stockpiles increased last week. U.S. crude’s discount to North Sea Brent oil surpassed $20 for the first time since October.

West Texas Intermediate futures extended yesterday’s decline, bringing this week’s loss to 1.8 percent. Greek Prime Minister Lucas Papademos will meet the country’s political leaders today to discuss measures for securing a second European Union-led bailout. U.S. crude inventories probably rose to the highest in more than four months and gasoline supplies climbed for a second week, according to a Bloomberg survey before an Energy Department report tomorrow.

“The market is oversupplied, which is putting pressure on WTI,” said Carsten Fritsch, an analyst at Commerzbank AG in Frankfurt, who forecasts oil will slide this year. “But fears of supply disruption are keeping Brent supported. The widening of the spread is the constant factor in the market.”

Oil for March delivery dropped as much as $1.07, or 1.1 percent, to $95.84 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange, and was at $96.03 at 1:07 p.m. London time. It fell to $95.44 a barrel on Feb. 2, the weakest level since Dec. 20. Prices have declined 2.8 percent this year.

Wednesday, February 08, 2012

Romney shits himself....



Santorum sweep: Wins Missouri, Minnesota, Colorado - Washington Times
DENVER, Colo. — Rick Santorum clobbered Mitt Romney in a head-to-head match-up in Missouri’s non-binding primary, easily won Minnesota’s caucuses and snagged a close victory in Colorado’s caucuses in a clean sweep Tuesday that once again rewrote the story of the Republican presidential nomination battle.

None of the three contests leads immediately to any delegates being awarded toward the nominating convention in Tampa, Fla., this summer, but Tuesday’s results suggest a strong pool of support for Mr. Santorum

Tuesday, February 07, 2012

Walmart fazes out the people greeter job.....

Patti and I will be able to stay on but after we quit the job no longer exists.

It's open season for shop lifters!!!

Sunday, February 05, 2012

Go Giants....

If the defense plays like they did against the Packers going to be a good game.

Saturday, February 04, 2012

I like being right....

Expect billions to come home and fire up the boom. Then we slash the budget and bust all over again.

Oh wait President Romney will bring us hope and change and Wall Street will be told to take a hike.

Yeah right.

I think the Aztecs have a better chance, don't you?

EMPLOYMENT DATA CRUSHES EXPECTATIONS | PRAGMATIC CAPITALISM
This morning’s employment data is likely to turn the “double dip” discussion into a “double rip” discussion. It’s now crystal clear that all of last year’s recession talk was well off the mark. The USA continues to be supported by a healthy budget deficit that is serving as a buffer to any downside in growth. This doesn’t mean problems don’t remain, but the bears have greatly exaggerated the weakness in the US economy.

Econoday has the details on this morning’s employment report which showed a healthy jump in private sector employment to 240K jobs in January as well as a decline in the unemployment rate to 8.3%:

Friday, February 03, 2012

Very few poor people vote....

The ones that do would never vote for a super rich snob like this guy.

Right now I'm still betting on the black guy because when the election is between two liberals the liberal always wins. Of course, it doesn't really matter which one wins for the average guy because he will pay for it.

Romney Isn’t Concerned - NYTimes.com
Faced with criticism, the candidate has claimed that he didn’t mean what he seemed to mean, and that his words were taken out of context. But he quite clearly did mean what he said. And the more context you give to his statement, the worse it gets.

First of all, just a few days ago, Mr. Romney was denying that the very programs he now says take care of the poor actually provide any significant help. On Jan. 22, he asserted that safety-net programs — yes, he specifically used that term — have “massive overhead,” and that because of the cost of a huge bureaucracy “very little of the money that’s actually needed by those that really need help, those that can’t care for themselves, actually reaches them.”

Thursday, February 02, 2012

You would think they are doing it on purpose....

They get pissed when we call the gang that drove our jobs overseas socialist and Luddites.

But that's because we are polite!

America’s Dirty War Against Manufacturing (Part 1): Carl Pope - Bloomberg
Policy. But is U.S. government policy really hostile to manufacturing?

Sadly, yes. Take tax policy. Historically, manufacturing was the high-wage sector of the economy -- manufacturing jobs still pay about 30 percent more than service jobs in education and health care -- so tax policy milked it. Manufacturing companies, in the old days, actually paid the corporate income taxes that many others avoided. Commodity producers (oil, timber, agribusiness) lobbied for, and received, federal subsidies, with investors in oil and gas wells simply voiding corporate income taxes on the profits they earned. Banking, retail and services found their own ways around taxes, often by offshoring intellectual property or shifting profit to tax havens. Eventually, manufacturers figured out how to duck taxes as well -- by going overseas.
Varying Regulations

Yet it isn’t just taxes. Wind turbines, for example, are enormous, heavy and expensive to transport -- so there is a big advantage to fabricating them close to the installation point. But consider the predicament of the Spanish wind manufacturer Gamesa Corporacion Tecnologica SA after it began operations in Pennsylvania. Because the George W. Bush administration’s Department of Transportation wouldn’t establish uniform standards for transporting the enormous turbine blades, each state followed its own rules. Whenever a blade crossed a state line it had to be unloaded by a construction crane and then reloaded to conform to the next state’s specifications.

Similar policy failures explain why Minnesota’s Port of Duluth exports iron ore to China and imports wind turbines from Europe. On the way to China, the ore freighters pass Chicago; Gary, Indiana; Cleveland; and Buffalo, New York -- cities where steel could be made and turned into turbine towers. But the U.S. wind market is too small, and the government too focused elsewhere, to make it profitable.

And that Long Island golf-course story? Not unique to New York. During the 1991 California drought, Silicon Valley’s electronics manufacturers were warned by Governor Pete Wilson that the state might have to shut off their water supply. Agriculture, Wilson said, came first. When I asked a Silicon Valley lobbyist in Sacramento if he had quietly received assurances that California would prioritize 21st-century computer chips over 19th-century alfalfa, he said he hadn’t. In fact, he said, some plant expansions initially planned for Silicon Valley were being diverted to Oregon to secure access to water.

In 1991, it was Oregon. Today, it’s Asia. Conventional wisdom blames globalization for the exodus of factories and jobs. Because other countries pay lower wages, the thinking goes, there is nothing we can, or even should, do about it. But the evidence of Germany and Japan -- and the experience of manufacturers in the U.S. -- tells a very different story.

We are not victims of an impersonal Leviathan called “globalization.” We’re the suckers who allowed our government to sacrifice the manufacturing sector while protecting the real winners: commodities, intellectual property, finance and agribusiness. The U.S. didn’t lose its manufacturing leadership; it threw it away.

In the next two parts of this series, I’ll discuss how that happened and what we can do about it.

(Carl Pope is a former chairman of the Sierra Club. The opinions expressed are his own. Read Part 2 and 3 of the series.)

To contact the writer on this story: Carl Pope at carl.pope@sierraclub.org

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Francis Wilkinson at fwilkinson1@bloomberg.net.

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Showing 1-40 of 84 comments on America’s Dirty War Against Manufacturing (Part 1): Carl Pope

unihans 1 week ago
I fully agree. It's time for US citizens to realise that they have been made suckers during the last couple of decades by senseless deregulations all based on the concept that greed is good and the markets are taking care of everything. The result: (i) a huge financial crises which made shareholders broke, tens of millions of empoloyees unemployed, financial executives stinking rich on the finance casino which many of them must have realised must collapse one day (ii) sinking quality of education (iii) lousy infrastructure, (iv) complete distortion of the use of talents where a much too high portion go to the finacial sector where remuneration has been rediculously high which has made any talent a sucker if he or she would choose to go to the industry where real value is created (v) lack of investments in alternative energy (vi) a senseless inequality where the middle class is the big looser and income and capital more and more is and more concentrated (vii) a dysfuntional democracy dominated by the big money which makes the democracy too much an illusion.

It reallly is wake up time.
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wjc9 in reply to unihans 1 week ago
I completely agree with you on this point. My friend works for a bank and he reviews resumes sometimes. He said he was stunned by the number of over qualified applicants.

"
(iv) complete distortion of the use of talents where a much too high portion go to the finacial sector where remuneration has been rediculously high which has made any talent a sucker if he or she would choose to go to the industry where real value is create
"
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shaneaves in reply to unihans 1 week ago
x 2.
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rocketman 5 days ago
Something that should have been obvious to everyone is that this country has far too much government and far too many regulations. If it was up to me the congress would not be permitted to pass anymore regulations on corporations until it eliminated at least 70% of the ones now on the books.
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Spartacusstoo 1 week ago
Moreover, we must come to understand that manufacturing represents something else not mentioned and that which is plant. By plant we are referring to the costly machinery used to manufacture just about anything as manufacturing has moved to computer controlled methodologies that result in enormously expensive plant equipment and technique. Replacement costs are prohibitive. And should a plant go bankrupt, the equipment is usually sold for scrap and so the plant is not replaceable as the start up costs are way too high.

Thus, we see that the government in it's ever reaching effort for more taxes to fund more government boondogles taxes corporations (actually a corporation is not a taxable entity, the shareholders are). And so we have the phenomenon of double taxation, the corporation first and if anything is left over, then the shareholder and this is why most corporations pay very little in the way of dividends.

To make it short and sweet, we've all been sold down the river by the liberals pandering for votes and we will not be able to put humpty dumpty back together again. Thus, Americas backbone, manufacturing, is a thing of the past and without it there isn't much to look forward to for a future.
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simonts in reply to Spartacusstoo 1 week ago
"We have been sold down the river by liberals", say you? Did you read the article at all? To you Pete Wilson was a liberal? It seems that to the right wing extremists all ills are caused by those pesky liberals. In fact most of the problems that underlie to the exodus of manufacturing industries from our country has been caused by the right wing of the conservative movement. First among those is the lack of universal health insurance and coverage and the excess cost this inflicts on manufacturing businesses. This is the main difference between Germany and the USA, as far as cost goes. Germany has stronger unions, higher wages, higher taxes and at least as strong environmental regulations as the US. The differences are twofold. One, in Germany there is universal health coverage provided by the state, lowering the fringe benefit cost for employers significantly. Second, there is MUCH less lobbying of representatives by industry and much less influence of corporate (or private) money on government policies in Germany. Hence, corporations, whether in financials, agriculture of manufacturing, all pay their fair share of taxes, unlike in our country. In general, the super rich (whether individuals or corporations) have not corrupted the government in Germany, as they have done it in our country starting with the Reagan era (with that pesky liberal president Ronald Reagan).
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map0557 in reply to simonts 1 week ago
Yes, I have a hard time pitying poor US corporations like General Electric who paid ZERO federal income taxes in 2010, despite making BILLIONS in profit.
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MikeSchoenberg in reply to map0557 1 week ago
Not to mention the extreme CEO compensation. Anyone remember Hoe Depots parting gift to a CEO of $277 million as his stock had dropped in half during his tenure.
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Matt Colbert in reply to Spartacusstoo 1 week ago
You must not have read the article.
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Ron in reply to Spartacusstoo 1 week ago
When corporations stop shielding their owners from liability we can stop taxing them. While the public allows corporations to shield their owners from liability, the public should get something in return, such as corporate taxes.
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Ransomexx 1 week ago
You people didn't look at the picture. We are a government of consolidated special interests. The consolidated politically powerful out maneuvered the less politically powerful. Let's face it, currently, consolidated financial capitalization, using "other people's money" is more profitable for the few than is manufacturing. In fact, the destruction of manufacturing is more profitable for the few over the short term.

Highly compensated executive management has joined forces with the short term thinkers that use other people's money to profit in the short term. There is a famous line in "Other People's Money" where a lawyer states that upon the signing of a document, America's entire steel manufacturing business is now controlled by those that know nothing about it (the precursor to today's financial capitalists).

Manufacturing has gone the way of the mom and pop meat and three when chain restaurants moved to town or the local businesses that disappeared when the Big Boxes moved in. It is "Get big, or get out". Apparently the financial capitalists are not so much a threat in China because China is trying to improve it's long term prospects, rather than destroy them.
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Robinson_Cruz 1 week ago
I am an executive in a small manufacturing company in New England. Our suppliers are nearby US manufacturers. We regularly discuss off-shoring our manufacturing and supply base. Why? Not once has anyone on our executive team raised the issue of taxes, regulation, water resources, or labor laws. There is only one reason: Money, driven primarily by the cost of labor. By off-shoring, we can reduce our own cost of labor. We can use off-shore suppliers, with their lower cost of labor, to reduce our cost of goods without incurring higher incoming freight costs. Why haven't we done it yet? Because moving would require capital we don't have. So once again, the argument is money. American capitalism is about the pursuit of money in the form of profit. When someone tells you that American executives make decisions for other reason, be skeptical.
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yahoo-R3VCGNCCINSERHJSJJWDSCOQZE 1 day ago
He took the long but it was there, Blame the tea Party!! I'm surprised Bush wasn't thrown in there. After two pages of reading how manufacturing was screwed by the tax code, manipulative politicians and idiot bureaucrats, it is somehow the fault of the one group that is actually shouting that government interference is the problem.
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samswede 4 days ago
As a manufacturer of 30+ years, I can tell you that every executive I met in my travels back and forth to Asia would have preferred making their product where the market is- in the U.S. It is a myth that mfg. moved offshore because of low wages. The biggest culprit was (and is) nonsensical governmental regulations. The U.S. is the most hostile environment in the world for manufacturers. When that changes- the jobs will return- period!
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Robert 2 days ago
There is an opinion that regulations strangle business and investment, which I don't agree with.
Business, safety and environmental regulations have been passed over the years for various reasons. Some political, some for the greater good.
Some laws and regulations are obsolete, no longer necessary. Some have had unintended consequences.
The view that ALL rules and regulations are bad and strangle business: let the "Free Markets" regulate themselves, is unrealistic

Worker rights, environmental safeguards, and safety regulations were put in place by the government because businesses (Corporations) in this country, being supposedly equal to humans, except with no conscience, have only the bottom line and increasing profits for motivation.
Given free reign, Corporations have little regard for safeguarding the enviroment or safety, and race to the bottom in labor overhead to maximise profits.
Labor is a necessary expense and should be controlled. Regulations were passed and Unions formed to make sure that Corporations would pay decent wages and have safe working conditions. The Corporations would not pay any more than the bare minimum while reaping big profits.
Worker's rights regulations were put in place to standardise and ensure that workers were not exploited as they would be without the regulation.
Safety regulations have been put in place to protect workers from unsafe, hazardous practices and materials.
Environmental regulations have been put in place to protect the enviroment. We know more now about things like: the ocean should not be considered an endless dumping ground, the air we breathe is affected by industrial processes, etc.
Do the manufacturing here, pay reasonable taxes, pay reasonable wages, share profits, obey environmental, safety and business regulations. Try to effect positive change for things that need to be changed.Change perspective to more constructive, empathetic, responsible view based on reality and science and not politics or religion.
On the other hand:At this stage of the game if we moved much manufacturing back to the USA some other countries might see their economies collapse with high unemployment. Some offshoring was done in the spirit of economic aid. Catch 22?
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wellsoup 1 week ago

"Highly compensated executive management has joined forces with the
short term thinkers that use other people's money to profit in the short
term. There is a famous line in "Other People's Money" where a lawyer
states that upon the signing of a document, America's entire steel
manufacturing business is now controlled by those that know nothing
about it (the precursor to today's financial capitalists)."

Exactly, just ask Mitt Romney...

Romney's Bain Made Millions as South Carolina Steelmaker Went Bankrupt




Monday 16 January 2012
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Will Stewart 2 days ago
Lots of anecdotes, low on real reporting. Nowhere does Pope run down the golf course story. In fact, he only uncovers agriculture as the priority. " infrastructure, workforce
training," Do people in Taiwan need no training? Which infrastructure, exactly?

I'm afraid this was an agenda looking for the slightest anecdotal support. Bloomberg is losing credibility.
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Richard Mertens 1 week ago
When a CA residential home owner pays $19/1000gl/H2O but an alfalfa farmer and factory pay $19 per acre foot (326,000 gallons) where's the motive to conserve? Business enjoys many subsidies like this that are out of whack. Germany and Japan also have lower productivity costs thanks to one single item, universal healthcare, an item oddly enough that many conservative business folk defend as incredibly important to capitalism even though millions go without and the rest are paying through the nose. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot. I swear if Obama said his favorite color was blue, the GOP would crap itself to rid the world of it.
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jeffpopovaclark 1 week ago
The examples of Japan and Germany are not informative. German boards include employee/union reps and Japanese governance is shared between execs, employees, financiers and even key suppliers. These companies aren't just chasing profit for owners and exec bonuses, they are trying to maximise benefits for all of those stakeholders. As a result, these companies pursue less profitable strategies that benefit their workers, suppliers, customers and partners. This does not happen in the US: if it doesn't maximise profits you don't do it. America's problem is primarily skewed corporate governance, not government policy (although that needs significant overhaul as well).
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yasutate 1 week ago
Any country which neglects manufacturing, which is the real creator of national wealth, will become a country which does not have any future. Many people of a neo-liberal idea claim that the financial industries are the future industry, but they never create any wealth of nation, but they bring casino capitalism, causing economic crises one after another. Look the US, the EU, and soon the UK, whose ratio of national debts to gdp is more than 1000%, if correctly calculated taking into account its bank debts which will be taken care of the government at the costs to its people.
As one BBC program recently has mentioned, Japanese lost decade is in a way paradise for other coutries, extremely low unemployment rates, manufacturing basis not affected at all by the money bubble speculation in late 1980s and early 1990s. This is mainly due to the manufacturing basis which still remains in Japan, creating national wealth, which in turn provides money to ordinary people, who in turn can support the economy. The Japanese depdendency on export is extremely low at 19%, as compared with 45% or more for Germany.
One big problem of the US is that its politicians do not know theory of economics, as the majority is lawyers, including Obama and Clinton and they are often more eager to enrich themselves supporting speculative capitals.
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JosephGordon2 1 week ago
We need a new comprehensive American "industrial production policy" that looks at the totality of our shrinking industrial base, our disappearing middle-class, our jobless recession recoveries. I submit they have come to represent what has become an US unbalanced economy that was camouflaged by a long running housing bubble.

The truth is we have had a drag on our economy for decades that has only gotten worse as a ballooning negative trade-balance has dogged us, replaced our jobs with outsourcing, and draws our technology innovation elsewhere. We have tried in vein to bolster our standard of living by importing, and our lifestyle is has now slipping materially. To dig ourselves out we have trashed the dollar, poor yield now encourages replacement of our US dollar as a reserve-currency with a basket of currency. This will result in higher interest rates on our borrowing.

All these problems have at their root we are no longer a net producing nation, but a debtor. This new " industrial production policy" should recognize "producing nations build wealth, and consuming nations become debtors. Our entire economy can be turned around in 5-years with improvement in one. Once again America will be the land of opportunity.

We don't need hope. We don't need change. We need opportunity! Graduates should be able to pay their loans, and again experience an upwardly mobile society. Boomers should never expect to be poor and jobless late in life. The middle-class needs living wage jobs to thrive and survive. Our policies should return America to the land of opportunity. If our politician are too vested in the status quo to act, they should all be thrown from office and replaced.
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Richard Laycock 1 week ago
I look forward to Mr. Pope's explanation of how it happened and how to fix it. For a preview of the challenges we face all you have to do is read the comments. It's almost incomprehensible that such a stream of inane stupidity and regurgitated PC nonsense could be the response to this excellent thoughtful piece by Carl Pope.

The problem with America is liberal Americans and the rotten academics that raise our children to be useless programmed cyphers. We are surrounded by the most spoiled, idle and arrogant idiots in human history.
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HECConsulting 1 week ago
Thank you for the story. I think the American Elite is too much focused on there own profit today and loose through that focus on sustainable profit and long term prospective with exception of the military
business. I do business with US and Japan since beginning 80th. I always heard reduce taxes, we will reduce taxes and so on and so on... It's like the adds of detergent... we wash whiter than white. In, compared with us, little Germany, there are 1500 companies, most of them not public owned and located in the manufacturing business, which are in there business field world-market leader. Germany has just 80 mil. inhabitants compared with. Same in Japan, which was badly hurt with it natural and technical disaster last year. It is the sustainability, the common sense of the society what let the japanese companies grow after the second world war.
By lowering taxes all the time USA underestimate, statewide and national, the importance of infrastructural investments, like water and energy supply and the networks who guaranties the undoubtable function of those basic necessities.
USA is trimmed to growth. Growth is not only definite by profit percentages. The future profit percentages have to be secured today, with functional networks who can stand future growth and will be always maintained. It has to be a no-brainer.
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Bloomberg View in reply to HECConsulting 1 week ago
Thanks for your comment! We’ve chosen it as our Comment
of the Moment on our homepage | http://www.bloomberg.com/view/
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Nick 1 week ago
While no one would argue that America's regulatory environment is obtuse, at the least, any argument that factories moved overseas for any reason other than the ability to pay people in China, Mexico, etc. far less, give them no benefits, and work them much harder is fundamentally flawed. The decision to outsource is a short term one that intentionally gives the finger to the ideals behind things like the minimum wage.


Outsourcing is the result of business schools teaching that it is better and easier to reduce costs via manipulation, rather than innovation; that it is better to lay off workers to drive up short term profits or balance a budget sheet rather than reallocating resources in the way that best drives R&D.
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ES71 in reply to Nick 1 week ago
I went to business school and they didn't teach me any of that. But they did teach me that the purpose of the corporation is to "maximize shareholder profits".However, you won't hear that anywhere but in the US. Other countries treat corporations just like any other citizen - expecting them to contribute to the social stability and prosperity of the country, not just reap profits regardless of consequences. US needs to reaccess how it treats its corporations. Why they allowed to influence the poltical process but have no responsibility for adverse results of their influence.
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Mike in reply to ES71 1 week ago
Perhaps we should also hold the environmental groups and the EPA equally responsible for many of the "obtuse" anti business regulations that require obscene amounts of expense and non productive labor to remain in compliance?.
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Nick in reply to Mike 5 days ago
Perhaps they should hold businesses responsible for destroying the environment?


I'd love to know what you think "obtuse anti business regulations" are.
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Nick in reply to ES71 5 days ago
Part of the problem is that American government does treat corporations like people, providing them with all of the benefits of citizenship and none of the responsibility. It needs to be all or none.
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Christopher 1 week ago
The author is inventing and confounding facts. Depending on the count, the US is the world's number one or number two manufacturer (China is the other). Employment has dropped but output has increased and would increase more if the skilled workers needed in high-end manufacturing could be found. As for South Carolina, there is still a textile industry but it is highly computerized and the skill sets needed in today's textile workers are different than 40 years ago. South Carolina has also greatly expanded its manufacturing sector by providing worker training in its regional community technical colleges.

If we want modern manufacturing jobs in the US, we have to train people to fill them. This means that our schools must produce literate, numerate graduates.
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Patrick Ebnit in reply to Christopher 1 week ago
inventing and confounding facts?For years I have heard the same reasons citedin this article along with an increase in technology/productivity for our loss of manufacturing jobs. Also South Carolina has done more than just provide worker training to expand their industry. Tax incentives and investments in infastructure have helped.
In the end your explanation is overly simplified. An educated work force is only a piece of the puzzle.
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scvblwxq in reply to Christopher 1 week ago
I sure have a hard time finding "Made in America" products at the big stores. Maybe food is our big "manufactured" product.
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MorganaW 3 days ago
Why wouldn't the fabrication business be in line for water rights after existing businesses? Golf courses and agriculture are businesses. They have seniority. They also create jobs, jobs that can't be outsourced. They are "resource friendly" to the community, providing additional tourism jobs or local food. Also, fabrication is not a "clean" business. It's not unreasonable to require them to monitor waste water, communities that haven't done so are facing extensive heavy metal poisoning in both surface and ground water.
Granted,the tax code is a mess and needs to be overhauled; good luck, in the environment of partisan politics. Still, there's no worry about a local government nationalizing an expensive plant if that plant is in the USA. No under the table handouts to local politicians. No kidnapping worries for senior executives.
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FrankRestly 1 week ago
Well said sir, well said
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Ron 1 week ago
Failure of government to govern prudently has always been a barrier to progress. Removing government altogether is not a solution, however, because government is a natural outgrowth of human activity. There will always be government of one sort or another. Government must be made to work for the benefit of those governed...all of them.
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samswede 4 days ago
The U.S. is the most hostile environment in the world for manufacturers. When that changes- the jobs will return- period!
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Paata Gurgenidze 1 week ago
The story is very convincing, but it lacks explanation. Why the US threw away the manufacturing? My answer in the simplest formulation is as follow - Governments have to serve people and their policies can favor manufacturing, while markets serve only richer players and favor higher profits. Unfortunately the US government favor markets instead of people. The manufacturing is being outsourced not because of lower wages in Asia ( this is also a fact), but because of higher profits in other than manufacturing sector in the US. It is comparative advantage that drives markets not competitive advantage. If your government supports unfettered markets you will end up with only banking sector instead of the diversified industries.
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Guyute Icculus 1 week ago
China and other Asian manufacturing bases have one thing the USA will never have:

CENTRAL PLANNING.
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Zeon in reply to Guyute Icculus 1 week ago
Central planning didn't do the Soviets much good.
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Da_mad_hatter in reply to Zeon 1 week ago
Well, they were even less able to do it than we are.

Let me put in a plug for Competency.
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Wednesday, February 01, 2012

If a guy didn't know better.....

He'd think that there is something crooked in Washington.

Oh wait! We do know there is something crooked in Washington!

Jive Talkin - Clusterfuck Nation
The topper for me, though, was the President's cheeky announcement that he'd ordered the Department of Justice to form a "special unit" to investigate mortgage fraud and other lethal irregularities in the banking sector. The fact that his congressional audience did not bust out laughing shows what a convocation of craven and perfidious cat's paws they are. Note to readers: the DOJ has a long-established criminal division fully empowered to prosecute all the familiar scams of our time from NINJA lending to the robo-signing of titles to MERS mortgage mischief, to the bundling and sales of booby-trapped CDOs - up to and including whatever Jon Corzine thought he was doing at MF Global.
Notice how lame the major newspapers and cable news networks were in responding to Mr. Obama's impudent japery. None of them, including The New York Times, bothered to ask Attorney General Eric Holder what he's been up to along these lines for the past three years. It is really hard to account for the stupendous incompetence of the news media in recent years. Of course, I'm allergic to conspiracy theories and the only explanation that adds up for me is the diminishing returns of technology. Among other untruths we've embraced collectively is the idea that computer-distributed information amounts to knowledge and understanding, tending toward judgment. Apparently, it's only made our society much dumber and more irresponsible. After all, none of the supposed media watchdogs even asked The New York Times or The Wall Street Journal, or CNN and a hundred other outlets why they didn't interview the Attorney General of the United States and ask him why he has not been taking care of the business now assigned to this special unit.