Healthy economy equals quiet bulletin board

[Shapley]

Well, I guess since the economy is rolling along, and everyone is adding their efforts to the constantly improving productivity of the American worker, they have little time for posting on the Bulletin Board.

The DOW rises and falls like waves on the ocean, but the overall economic situation continues to rise, like globally warmed oceans, thawing frozen assets as the earth thaws its frozen reaches in the North. Economic indicators are replenished like watersheds filled with glacial runoff. Commerce, unleashed by the thawing of tax rates, flows like melting polar ice-caps.

Environmentally, water trapped by glaciers for thousands of years flows through the land, restoring fresh water to the environment even as it adds long-extinct species to the eco-system. The winters are warming, the summers grow longer. Soon we will know the passing of the seasons only by the budding of the trees. The eternal summer, long a surfer's dream, will be a reality for us all.

"Procreate and fill the world", we were told, and so we have. Our progeny fill every corner of the world, except Antartica. Soon it, too, will be habitable as it was in the days when giant lizards ruled the land. A continent, long buried under miles of ice, ready to be explored and settled. A land waiting to be mined and plowed, industrialized and exploited. What wonders will we find there? Oil, perhaps to fuel the machinery that propels our lives? Uranium, to build the power plants to light and cool our homes? Something new, unknown, to be tamed and utilized to continue our march to fate? The mind is filled with wonder as a new world rises before us. Nearly three and a half billion acres of wonder await.

We live in interesting times. Woe to those who disparage these wonders. Technology has brought us a new world, and with technology we will tame it. We have only scratched the surface, literally, of the wonders this world offers us. Look at the photos of the earth from space; one cannot yet see a mark that tells the naked eye that we are here, now, upon its surface. We build highways and airports to take us from one end of the planet to another, and yet, from our nearest neighbor, the moon, one cannot see a single monument to our accomplishment.

Let us rise to the challenge! Let us leave our mark on this world so that, in the centuries to come our ancestors returning to this mostly harmless piece of rock from their homes in the as-yet-unknown regions of space, will see from afar our monuments and say: "Behold, the land of my fathers".

V/R
Shapley

[Selma in Sandy Eggo]

Excellent ideas, I'm planning to start up a modest farm (way) down south, as soon as the thaw progresses far enough. Antarctic Tomatos, LLC. Yup, something to occupy my spare time.

BTW, Shap, you've had enough coffee. Time to switch to decaf. Excuse me now, the paperwork on my current desk is threatening an avalanche. I'd hate to be buried.

[Shapley]

Selma,

Actually, our server is down, so we're spending the day twiddling our thumbs, since all of our data files are on the server, and we can't access them. Otherwise, I'd be doing my part to keep the economy rolling.

V/R
Shapley

[Jeff Dutton]

Shapley, your vision inspires me. If it was hunting season, I'd run out and shoot something in your honor to have for dinner tonight.

[Shapley]

We'll have to check with tan and see if she has any Diatomyidae running around. They were first discovered in a meat market in neighboring Laos, surely we can find some in Cambodia. Then it's off to tan's guest house for a feast on once-extinct rodent and electrified beer!

There's a sailboat in nearby Malaysia I'd like to have a look at while I'm in the neighborhood. I could take the long way home.

V/R
Shapley

[dai bread]

Shapley, your opening post was quite poetic!

At the moment, much of the newly-released water is falling on my roof, and has been, off & on, for several days. The people up the road chose this time to have new tiles put on their roof.

I haven't come across any extinct species yet though.

[Shapley]

Dai,

Thanks. I was feeling a bit poetic, waiting patiently for the microchip gurus to restore our network, to allow our server to once again serve our needs. They've restored the network but, somehow, lost all my files in the process. No problem, really, as the backup is intact and they can be restored, but that means yet another day spent twiddling my thumbs.

Ah! For a heaping plate of steamed Apteryx and some Antarctica yams. I've found three articles so far relating to long-extinct (or so they were believed to be) species being found. I posted links to two of them in the "Other News" section. They're thinking now that they've been among us all along, and they just didn't know it. Yeah. Sure. It's global warming, and it's a wonderful thing. A new and exciting world opening up before our eyes! Who knows, maybe continental drift will reverse itself and we'll all be in Pangea again. One world, one body of land. Imagine the possibilities!

V/R
Shapley

[shostakovich]

Hi Shap. I'm responding only to your opening paragraph about the economy. It isn't as good as most people think.

First, the only indicator people tout is the stock market. That's the economy for people who are wealthy enought to be in the stock market. For others, making ends meet can be difficult to impossible. This is exacerbated now by high gas and oil prices, and the price increases for all products that need to be transported. There's lots of complaining about "pain at the pump". Almost nothing is said about heating oil. Our oil budget just doubled over last year.

Second, the apparent good economy is buoyed up by the enormous national debt. Bush claimed in 2004 to cut the additional debt by 50% during his second term. It helped him get elected. I think we all know the debt has been accelerating. I don't believe he had any intention of cutting the annual debt. He certainly has done nothing that could help. The recent tax cuts exacerbate the debt increase. Consequently, the wealthy and the stock market seem to be in good shape FOR NOW. When the real fiscal conservatives (in both parties) get control, and the economy is in a shambles, we'll be able to look back at "W" as the cause.

Anybody can have a great looking personal economy on borrowed money, especially if there is no intention of paying it back. If he/she lives long enough, the debt will catch up to him/her. This country will live long enough for the debt to catch up to it. Our children and grandchildren will know our economy today is just an illusion, even if many of us don't.
Shos

[Serenity]

Shap, what brand of anti-depressant is that?

[Shapley]

Shos,

You're wrong. Bush proposed cutting the national deficit, not the debt. The deficit peaked at about $400 billion in 2004, and has been dropping since. The debt is increasing, but we've had discussions on this before, and I still say it's not a big deal. Prof. Walter Williams agrees me, or me with him, whichever. I do believe he said it first.

Is There a Federal Deficit?

Oil costs are high, and that is bad news. It is also slowing the rate of growth of the economy, and that is bad. But, if the cost of oil didn't slow the rate of growth, the Fed would raise interest rates more than they have in order to slow it artificially. The economy is growing at about the fastest rate it is allowed to grow. I should point out, however, that the cost of fuel is now about twice what it was in the '70s, having dropped in the '80s and held low through the '90s. In the overall picture, that is not such a significant increase, figuring out at an increase of about $.05/year, or about a 3.3% annual rate of increase since 1976. It could be argued that we've gotten a 'free ride' for over twenty years on fuel costs. On top of that, you can factor in the fact that promininent Democrats (such as Al Gore and Paul Tsongas) have been arguing for increasing the cost of fuel for decades, they just wanted to do it artificially, through taxes. They're argument is that higher costs will reduce consumption, thus slowing the march to global warming, and delaying the time until I can purchase a beachfront home in tropical Alaska.

V/R
Shapley

[Giant Communist Robot]

A couple o' thoughts about the economy:

this linkie gives the growth of the GDP as 4.7% last quarter--this is the equivalent to adding another Brazil or Australia to the world economy.

The IMF forecast for the US GDP '06 is 3.4%, suggesting a slowdown this year. linkie

The stock market is a pretty good leading indicator for the economy; what happens in the market usually happens in the economy 6 to 9 months later. Recent market levels imply a slowing economy late in the year.

[Giant Communist Robot]

Oh! I wanted to add this to Shapley's comment about oil and taxes linkie

and you can see, according to OPEC, how lightly our politicians have taxed us compared to others.

[Shapley]

GCR,

I've not really concerned myself with our tax rate as a comparison to other nations. The Democrats have used that comparison in the past to justify their calls for raising taxes, but it doesn't wash, IMHO. Europeans have payed more at the pump for their fuel for years. They also have an extensive network of public transportation, even in many rural areas, as well as a public mindset that does not lessen a persons stature if he doesn't own his own auto.

The Democrats want to Europeanize America, I don't. As I said back in the Happy Republicans thread, I see opportunity where others see woe. That is the basis of this topic: A bunch of scientists who have been wrong in most of their predictions on global warming are convinced that it is a bad thing which must be prevented at all costs. I am putting forth the argument that global warming can be an instrument for positive results.

V/R
Shapley

[BigJon@Work]

The ridiculousness of taxing the oil companies "windfall" explained.

[barfle]

Shap, I'm of the opinion that global warming is upon us, and as it progresses, it won't be pleasant. I see a lot of upheaval, and that's going to cost a lot of people everything (including their lives).

That doesn't mean I can cite a human cause to that effect, but I'm suspicious that the increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is a contributor to the effect. I have no idea what percentage of global warming can be attributed to the combustion of fossil fuels and how much of it is attributable to circumstances beyond our control.

With all those disclaimers, I still feel we would be better off if we weaned ourselves from the petroleum we burn at such a prodigious rate for many reasons, scientific, political, and economical. I've heard it said that if we could take all the solar energy that fell on Texas, we could satisfy the world's needs for energy. I'm not suggesting there's a way to do that, but clearly the potential is there for harnessing the energy of the sun, whether it be through biodiesel, dams, ocean currents, wind, or any other solar-powered technology we can come up with.

I also feel that nuclear fission works, but we still need a rational way to process the waste from that, which is far more toxic than carbon dioxide. The mines aren't all that nice, either. Too bad fusion still seems like a pipe dream. If anyone ever figures out how to make that work, we'll be in great shape for several hundred years.

[Giant Communist Robot]

The ridiculousness of taxing the oil companies "windfall" explained.

Requires registration


oil company windfall tax=our government's egregious greed



I was listening to Rush Limbaugh the other day and he said something like: people squeal like "stuck pigs" when the price of gas goes up five cents, yet nobody ever mentions how high taxes are. Where is their squealing about taxes?

[BigJon@Work]

Try this link or search on Deroy Murdock and "war on profits"

[BigJon@Work]

Barf,

Can you give me some scenarios on the loss of human life? That is a long stretch at this point.

[Shapley]

Barfle,

I don't deny that global warming is upon us, although to what extent and from what causes I cannot say. I don't know if it's a long term effect brought about by the production of greenhouse gases, or a simply the natural cycle following a period of global cooling. I don't deny that people will be affected by it, some positively, some negatively. I was trying to point out, in a facetious manner, that there may be a flip side to the doom and gloom offered by most of the scientists and pseudo-scientists reporting on it.

One of the errors noted in reporting on state of affairs is that, contrary to the computer models that are the basis for the dire predictions, the summers are not getting hotter, even though the winters are getting warmer. The average temperature is getting higher, but the peak temperatures are not. We are approaching a more uniform temperature. Given that evidence exists that Antarctica apparently had steamy jungles and dinosaurs, yet there is no evidence that the equatorial regions were scorched barren during that time frame, I would say we are approaching a repetition of an historical cycle.

Most of the world's population is concentrated in tropical and temperate regions. It seems logical that, if we increase the land area in these regions, we will decrease the perceived problem of overpopulation. More arable land, more room to roam, more fresh water (not that we can't desalinate the salty stuff, if we need to), a veritable paradise on Earth.

V/R
Shapley

[Jeff Dutton]

Well, yeah, but don't forget that the Ozone Hole will, um... never mind...