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