Teh Ricer Civic!

Such remembrance has undermined the American work ethic.

How do schools afford paying a janitor $16 an hour plus benefits? Hire only a few of them and work them till they pass out?

And this is why regardless of whatever our foreign policy is, we need to maintain a very strong military as a deterrent to this kind of crap. The Chineese are, no doubt, "testing the waters" with the new president. I hope Obama shows that he is not a pushover on these matters. Also, harassment by another country, especially China, should be met by a large scale NATO exercise (peaceful exercises of course) showing China that their shenanigans are not acceptable. And i suppose if NATO wont get involved, a naval exercise with our friendly neighbors to the north, the British, and the Australians would suffice. Or, we could simply threaten them with cutting off food supplies as we did to Russia, if i recall China cannot grow enough food to support its own population. Economic sanctions are excellent if we can get the UN on board... But i agree that our society has become too soft. We do not want to be warmongers, at the same time we cannot be balking when another nation is harassing us... as with anything else in this world, we need balance. I guess people seem to have forgotten that China is still a communistic country with a rather bad history of human rights. Dissent within China has been on the rise as the middle class has slowly developed. There are several ways to bring down the chains of oppression in China without military action... but people are more concerned with having cheap stuff from Wal*Mart than they are for the welfare of others. Although, it is quite telling of the state of Western Capitalism when businesses find it more advantageous to manufacture in a COMMUNISTIC country than a Capitalistic one. ::Edit:: it appears as though China is planning on adding aircraft carriers to their fleet as "defensive" purposes. However, i cannot see why a country would need aircraft carriers to defend its coastlines against anything but another world power (i doubt pirates pose much of a threat to a naval vessel or that land based fighters couldn't hit them). Every other country with Aircraft carriers use them as floating fortresses capable of projecting force.

Take note that the Government will not let a company of this size go straight to chapter 7, it must go through 11 first. But really, Chapter 12 is where its at.

Well i guess if GM went under i'd be forced to get a Challenger or Mustang. =(

My favorite was the sniping through an old sniper scope.

Develop???? FOR RESALE? naw, my idea is to buy all this cheapo land and then bulldoze the buildings and build nice houses and then LIVE in them. You get enough rich and middle class people to do that and voila, upscale expensive community which will attract a lot of companies. Eventually it will happen, it always does, the "nice" neighborhoods always shift around towns as the populations move around.

Box wine is only acceptable if you remove the pouch from the box and drink straight from it.

Any cheapo White Zinfandel does the trick for me.

Is it? Last time i checked America is not a democracy (although it unfortunately seems to be progressing in that direction). Nay, America is a Republic... a system where the Rule of Law rules all of us, not mob rule (at least that used to be the case). How is it our job to promote ANYTHING in this world? That is what we did following WW2 and that's what you have been indoctrinated in. How is it OUR job to get involved in others affairs? Speak softly and carry a big stick. If you had been reading most of our arguments, dfelt, you would see that pretty much none of us are arguing for protectionism. Oh and i agree with the sentiments that more regulation is not needed. What IS needed is for the government to butt out of the economy and stop tinkering with it. This current fiasco is due in large part to the government making it possible for this to happen... and then when they could see what was happening... not doing anything.

I love COD4! i got the PC version. Tend to just use a 1911 cause i usually kill more people with that then i do with rifles or anything else... Plus the 1911 is a classic, 2 world wars, Korea, Vietnam, and still in service today by very limited amounts of the military.

I have an idea, lets get a bunch of rich people to buy out the entire city. Then rich and middle class people would move in (since it would now be dominated by rich and middle class people) and it will become a nice city again... and property values would necessarily skyrocket since it would become a desirable place to live again, and the returns on investment will be insane. Find enough people to do this with you (like a couple hundred thousand ) and i guarantee you could make a ton of money over a long period of time doing this.

I want to be one of those guys who has silver hair in their 40s and then stays looking exactly the same until i die, kinda like ole Leslie Nielsen

Actually i think what most of us are proposing amounts to little more than non-interventionalism, with some nationalistic strings.

Yep, just look at California for proof of that.

To all the recent posts. WE ARE NOT ADVOCATING PROTECTIONISM. In fact most of the posts seem to be classical liberalist or an older strain of conservatism.

perhaps, but at the cost of reduced efficiency overall. US products that can exceed in quality and compete in price should be the clear winners in our economy, they must be brutally efficient to be able to compete with foreigners but also receive a "bonus" for being homegrown. There is a lot of pride in accomplishing that task, a task that people should take to heart as the fruits of their own labor and ingenuity. Protectionism as law is never the answer, however a more subtle protection through culture is definitely a viable alternative.

I like to think of it the opposite way. We should maintain free trade and the Global economy and the benefits it brings, but to create nationalism gives people additional drive to be able to produce goods within the United States because of the pride they take in making things in the US while using technology and other methods gained from seeing how other countries produce to be able to compete even on pricing. Where there is a will, there is a way.

Very nicely stated Balthazar! I've found that if you mutter any semblance of that idea in public, you will be labeled a racist or intolerant... another product of modern American liberalism... i doubt classical liberalism has a problem with it though, any hardcore libertarians around here wanna chip in? Teddy is a bit of an oddball, i don't agree with some of the things he did (*ahem* income taxes), but he does have some great sayings and ideas if you feel like sifting through them.

So Camino, i take it you are on a fact finding mission to try and put together a plausible case for isolationism without the traditional implications of protectionism and overly strong nationalism? Not a bad topic to endeavor on, I've spent some time trying to think of a similar scenario myself in the past.

Please don't take this the wrong way. But how can you expect America to have a national identity when we are taught from a young age that we are supposed to be all inclusive of other cultures and other ideas? Sure it sounds grand in thought, and there are some excellent practical applications of it as well... after all American's technology has tended to be blends of other technology but with our distinct taste on it. But it seriously erodes peoples national identity... It's like that funky lookin VW that someone posted in the other thread, sure your all together, but WTF are you?

No, there is a difference. Chamberlain and other European leaders tried to appease Hitler through pure diplomacy. Of course Diplomacy utterly fails when someone wants something anyways. Churchill was a vocal opponent of Hitler and believed that Hitler needed to be disposed of before he became a threat. Protesters took to the streets and labled him a warmonger, not using diplomacy to its fullest extent etc etc. Of course within a short time it became blatantly obvious that Churchill was correct. Sad to think that the majority of the war could have been averted if Churchill was able to get France on board and take out Hitler before the German war machine was running fast enough to start WW2. Now with Iraq/Iran, that's just called a shadow war which is a different form of diplomacy. Unfortunately, over the course of time, America has become the Police of the world because Europe would rather just criticize us than take the initiative on anything and of course Russia is always looking for new ways to reestablish itself as a Superpower. Perhaps America should just take a break, let the EU handle all the big world problems (the EU would then become the 'evil empire' of the world, same way some people hate the Police). After many many years, the EU would probably come to the realization that diplomacy does not work in every case and end up being just like the US... hated by the world. Of course, with America on hiatus from large global problems, i could see Russia attempting more power grabs in the Eurasian area, since Russia does not appear to take many threats from Western Europe seriously. Nay, if you seriously want a restoration of AMERICAN sovereignty, of the sovereignty of the people within that country, people need to adopt a seriously different mindset. 1) membership in the UN would need to be terminated (it weakens our Sovereignty, plus the UN really has no bite to it without a standing army, and the UN having a standing army is a serious weakening of sovereignty). 2) Withdrawal from NATO, once again this weakens our Sovereignty, we should not be pulled into some conflict because of a treaty. 3) Withdrawal from any form of "market agreement" such as NAFTA. This DOES NOT MEAN that we cannot have free trade with those countries, just that active economic co-operation reduces our sovereignty. 4) Getting away from Fiat currency. Currency is held as a "tool" of the fed, they can essentially do whatever they want with the currency. This allows for potentially massive effects on the economy (see extended periods of loose monetary policy and problems that result). As such, currency would need to be placed back on some commodity standard (Gold and Silver?). This would avail the people of this country from tampering of our currency from our own government, restoring personal sovereignty (or rights as they are referred to in the constitution). 5) People need to be willing to occasionally have to "spill blood to rejuvenate the tree of liberty." Diplomacy inherently means compromise, if you have to compromise on your core beliefs, what have you gained? The reason America can generally get what it wants is because other countries know that failure to accept an American position may mean "action" will be taken against them. That is the reason the Soviets attempted to infiltrate America through putting people in to protest warmongering etc etc, because that was a way to reduce the strength of American negotiations. If American's would actively protest against what the government does militarily, then that weakens that card the government has (not that protestation is wrong of course, its a right of every man and woman who are citizens of this great nation, however all actions can have consequences unseen (including the heavy handed approach). The Point is, even in a relatively isolationist America, the rest of the world has to believe that any attempts to undermine America, any attempts to attack America, will be met with serious, resolved, and bitter consequences to those who attempt such things. Oh, and of course a bit of healthy nationalism would not hurt. But be prepared for a long haul to bring manufacturing back.

All your thoughts are belong to us!

Hmm eliminate the coastal population centers in California... that would leave California a rather Red state... and dramatically reduce the number of electoral votes it holds. I say we bring back Global Warming fighting, ozone depleting CFCs.

I don't think anyone is saying that climate change ISN'T taking place, but last time i checked, climates change all the damn time... it just takes a while and it does it regardless of what humans do. Maybe humans push it a tiny bit, or impede it a tiny bit, but nothing that any reasonable person would actually classify as under our control. I suppose all of our carbon emissions from landing modules and rovers on Mars is responsible for the warming that has taken place there too? people tend to overlook the fact that historically humanity has done BETTER during times of warmth... now sure some people may lose their coastal houses, but so is nature cruel mother of us all.