PSX5Central
Non Gaming Discussions => Off-Topic => Topic started by: SirMystiq on April 03, 2006, 07:56:59 PM
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I\'m reading a book about pretty much everything. It talks about how the US is slowly declining from its once more commanding superiority. I was wondering, how long do you think this country will last together as a whole?
The author states that although he does not wish for this to happen, we are heading in that direction.
For example, Korea produces as many Engineers as the US. Knowledge is everything and the US is doing a very poor job at maintain in it.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0307237524/sr=8-1/qid=1144122957/ref=pd_bbs_1/103-5332587-2434241?%5Fencoding=UTF8
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yes, we are going to hell in a handbasket. Because of capitalism we are crashing to the rocky floor off ..were all going to die, The US is going to blow up the earth, China will gain superiority and take us over, the mexicans will rebel, i will poop on someones shoe etc. etc etc.
You hate our policies, and you think were going to fall as a civilization. So save yourself and go to mexico..o wait..their government is shit. Go to europe..o wait, their economy is being predicted to crash..go to japan, o wait youll kill yourself.
I dont know where im going with this,haha. Im just tired of everyone complaining and saying the world is coming to an end because we might not be the number 1 SUUPPPERRR POWWWERRR. im not losing sleep..im going to get a job, get a career, have a family, retire, have some adventures along the way and die. Or die sooner.
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yes, we are going to hell in a handbasket. Because of capitalism we are crashing to the rocky floor off ..were all going to die, The US is going to blow up the earth, China will gain superiority and take us over, the mexicans will rebel, i will poop on someones shoe etc. etc etc.
You hate our policies, and you think were going to fall as a civilization. So save yourself and go to mexico..o wait..their government is shit. Go to europe..o wait, their economy is being predicted to crash..go to japan, o wait youll kill yourself.
I dont know where im going with this,haha. Im just tired of everyone complaining and saying the world is coming to an end because we might not be the number 1 SUUPPPERRR POWWWERRR. im not losing sleep..im going to get a job, get a career, have a family, retire, have some adventures along the way and die. Or die sooner.
amen brother.
stop fretting. stop complaining. just live, get your American degree, American job, American house, and imagine for a second dubya isn\'t trying to snipe you
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Hmm...Ok, how about you actually think about the outcome?
Or...read the book?
Become informed?
This has nothing to do with GWB...
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I dont know how much it will last but that depends on the decisions your present and future leaders will make I think.
Usually parties that are in the government (for example US Republican party now, Democrats before), dont make rational decisions. Usually their decisions are the ones that give a good impression in the short run. Not necessarilly correct.
A general example (not necessarilly implying it happened in the US) is making great Government expenditures to increase GDP near election period. In the long run this increases national dept.
They tend to highlight either a partial truth or satisfy the interest of a group from which they can get support. This happens in all countries
Recent years have also showed Bush`s administration efforts to increase public support. When he was first elected his publicity fell vertically. He used the 9/11 incident, the citizens` insecurity and fear to gain it back, and decided to use this to throw a war in the middle east with possible long term expectations like investing and controling oil that might improve economically the country(which can be used in future elections).
In last elections he used the war against terrorism to get elected again. The elected party is usually the one with the biggest power over the media.
The war in Iraq was a big mistake economically and politically (Especially in foreign policy). I believe this was partially a result of political panic
What I predict is that future government parties will reach to a near dead end and they will get paniced, making irrational economic and political decisions mixed often with individual publicity gain and creation of good impressions, but making things worse instead. Even if there are potential to solve the problem they will send the country to a ressession.
The US imports huge amounts of products. National dept is also getting bigger I ve heard. I also wonder what GNP is relative to GDP since there many many foreigners imigrading in the US to get a job. `
I think the US is trying somewhat to have more control over the main energy source that is oil to control better the prices of the imports (or decrease national dept) since a part of price of imported goods produced include the cost of production which is relevant to the price of oil.
I only hope this wont give birth to more irrational foreign policies especially with powerfull countries (like China) because of fears that the US (or better the high heads) lose power that might shift to them.
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You said dept like 50 times. Dept = department.
Did you mean debt? :fryingpan:
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i fully believe the iraq war was political panic..but not for oil. I think bush got the false info (that he believed was true), made the deadline for the WMD\'s, deadline passed, and the rest snowballed.
Sounds stupid to people who think were there for the oil, but i have the same thoughts towards those people.
As for all these other problems were speculating on, everything works its way out. We got out of the great depression, we got through vietnam and its aftermath, well get through iraq eventually. Im not saying were going to hit a depression, because i dont think anythings going to happen any time soon (an atom bomb is going to go off and change things before our economy shits), but we if did hit a depression wed get out of it.
hell..the next imminent terrorist attack on the U.S. is going to change things dramatically, and thats probably the closest thing to happening than anything else.
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You said dept like 50 times. Dept = department.
Did you mean debt? :fryingpan:
oops yes :D
i fully believe the iraq war was political panic..but not for oil. I think bush got the false info
Personally I believe he NEEDED ¨false¨ info
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yea..i dont believe all the conspiracy stuff. But..who knows..maybe you\'re right and people like you are showing people its a possibility instead of us blindly believing everything..or we at least think about it..
everything balances everything out (except the a-bomb..then were fucked)...the issue that keeps people from seeing that is that giga knows hes right and you know you\'re right. All my opinion of course, which accomplishes nothing.
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btw I think I found something relevant in yahoo news
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060403/ap_on_go_co/congress_katrina_iraq
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I think we need a new system of electing our leaders to save this country. Right now we\'re voting on business men not leaders. I wish Ross Perot came back
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Ross Perot the business man?
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Right now we\'re voting on business men not leaders.
Word
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Ross Perot the business man?
Hey. Let him finish.
-Dan
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Ross Perot the business man?
He tried to change the voting system by throwing the electoral college out the window. Thats a big step in the right direction I would say
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In all honesty...the u.s. is slowly declining in all area\'s...look at the loss of jobs that are happening on the regular,..and those new jobs that the prez talks about that were created are mostly fast food joints and walmart type jobs...:rolleyes:...gas prices are thru the roof and my utilities bill for the winter was above 400.00 every month..that\'s ridiculous,...with companies layin\' off american workers in mass numbers,..how can the prez or anybody say that our economy is strong?...it\'s not..
How do this prez or any other after him expect people to buy cars, purchase homes, if most companies, y\'know the good payin\' jobs are layin off left and right? Then everything in america is outsourced...look at everything in your house....lookk and see where everything is made...most likely it will say china...now nothing is being made over here, and when we do sell our products in places like china, nobody in that country will purchase our products...
if america does crash the impact will be 3 times worse than any third world country, because of such high standards the american people live by,..hell when some people in america lose their job they commit suicide,..can you imagine when the whole nation itself crashes?...it\'s just a matter of time...america may be rich, but even america cannot afford to continue mass layoffs and continue to spend billions in iraq. Let alone the natural disaters that occur every year...look at what happened just recently in the midwest with those vicious storms....those types of snenarios are expensive unexpected expences that the gov\'t has to pay for.,..regardless if you have insurance or not.....
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He tried to change the voting system by throwing the electoral college out the window. Thats a big step in the right direction I would say
Yeah, because we want Florida, Texas, California, and New York making policies for the entire country.
You make no centz.
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I don\'t think the US will fully collapse. China is catching up, yes but the population they have is still so poor and will take many years to become what the US is (a higher ratio of people in the middle class and making decent money). The US may be overtaken as a super power in the coming centuries but it won\'t collapse. Things work out. Besides, we have the superior military and that will stay as long as we keep up with R&D. The next country even close to us is either China or Russia and they still use Cold War technology for the most part. China I dont\' think makes their own weaponry. I believe its all Soviet equipment.
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As much as everyone believes the WMD info was false, I was watching the Daily Show and they had on on of Saddam\'s right hand men. He said that he saw the WMDs with his own eyes, read the docuements and etc. He said that before the US invaded he shipped the WMDs to Syria, just an interesting tidbit.
As for the US, all civilizations had a rise and decline. The Romans were once the strongest, then fell apart, Alexander\'s emipre fell apart, the Mongolians were up there etc. We had out Golden Age, and were starting to decline. Soon, China will go through a Golden Age and they will be the world\'s super power. It doesnt mean America will be weak and helpless, we will stil be very stong, jsut not as strong as we once were.
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i saw that guy too. Pretty interesting if what he says is true.
might be a dumb question but, can we search syria? have the UN search them er something.
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But then what if they act the same as iraq? another war?
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This guy went on the Daily Show? *backs up slowly*
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I don\'t think the US will fully collapse. China is catching up, yes but the population they have is still so poor and will take many years to become what the US is (a higher ratio of people in the middle class and making decent money). The US may be overtaken as a super power in the coming centuries but it won\'t collapse. Things work out. Besides, we have the superior military and that will stay as long as we keep up with R&D. The next country even close to us is either China or Russia and they still use Cold War technology for the most part. China I dont\' think makes their own weaponry. I believe its all Soviet equipment.
The population may be poor but that doesnt mean that China cant overthrow the US as a superpower. If the Chinese government has the power and money it doesnt mean anything if the population is poor or not in China.
Also superior military doesnt imply that the US will be the main superpower. The more is spend in military R&D the more benefits are being shifted from the population to a government expendture that offer nothing to the wealth of the casual citizen. Even more the country needs other sources to finance these R&D. If other sections of economy dont bring money into it the more R&D is spent on military the bigger the hole the country will fall into.
Its a similar thing that happened with Russia back in the cold war. USSR restricted trade and relations from the outside world, Stalin slaughtered his neigbours that belonged to the Soviet Union with which Russia could have improved economically, relied soleley on military expenditures and spent HUGE amounts on military while other sectors in economy depleted and the result was, great enviromental destruction, an economy crisis and an enormous government expenditure for which people were forced to work like animals with minimum income and for benefits they could never get.
Now US is losing its influence and power over many sectors in ecomony and too much is being spent for the military.
check out these compare different government expenditures and be paniced
http://nationalpriorities.org/index.php?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=182
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How does our government do it...
We lost our government years ago it seems. Now a rich mob rules it.
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How does our government do it...
We lost our government years ago it seems. Now a rich mob rules it.
Yeah, because it\'s not usually run by the rich. Like the Kennedys.. Ooops, I mean the Reagans.. shit.. I mean.. Bah.. forget it.. I can\'t think of anyone.
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This guy went on the Daily Show? *backs up slowly*
Just because it\'s a comedy doesnt mean it reports false news. The guy was Saddam\'s right hand man and they had a serious conversation about the WMDs. Just because Jon Stewart hosts a comical new program doesnt mean hes not smart. He knows what hes talking about.
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Just say you saw it on 60 minutes. He was on that too...
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Just because it\'s a comedy doesnt mean it reports false news. The guy was Saddam\'s right hand man and they had a serious conversation about the WMDs. Just because Jon Stewart hosts a comical new program doesnt mean hes not smart. He knows what hes talking about.
I wonder how much he was being paid
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Just because it\'s a comedy doesnt mean it reports false news. The guy was Saddam\'s right hand man and they had a serious conversation about the WMDs. Just because Jon Stewart hosts a comical new program doesnt mean hes not smart. He knows what hes talking about.
Exactly. I guess there\'s no fun to be had when talking about world events. :rolleyes:
I wonder how much he was being paid
You make stupid points.
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The population may be poor but that doesnt mean that China cant overthrow the US as a superpower. If the Chinese government has the power and money it doesnt mean anything if the population is poor or not in China.
Also superior military doesnt imply that the US will be the main superpower. The more is spend in military R&D the more benefits are being shifted from the population to a government expendture that offer nothing to the wealth of the casual citizen. Even more the country needs other sources to finance these R&D. If other sections of economy dont bring money into it the more R&D is spent on military the bigger the hole the country will fall into.
heh, you just contradicted yourself so bad.
If China has the power & money it doesn\'t matter how poor the casual citizen is, yet when USA spends so much on wartime R&D it does matter how poor the casual citizen is?
I\'d tell you to speak Engrish but I know more of this USisgoingtohellyettheyhavethestrongesteconomy rhetoric would come out.
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If China has the power & money it doesn\'t matter how poor the casual citizen is, yet when USA spends so much on wartime R&D it does matter how poor the casual citizen is?
I hint of bias in Uni\'s perspective? Naw...couldn\'t be.
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But then what if they act the same as iraq? another war?
We can take Syria.
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The population may be poor but that doesnt mean that China cant overthrow the US as a superpower. If the Chinese government has the power and money it doesnt mean anything if the population is poor or not in China.
But if you have too many poor people, they could topple the elitist class in place via revolution (that is if Marxist Conflict Theory is correct). Then they are back in square one. Plus they don\'t have the capital yet to build up arms and industry.
Also superior military doesnt imply that the US will be the main superpower. The more is spend in military R&D the more benefits are being shifted from the population to a government expendture that offer nothing to the wealth of the casual citizen. Even more the country needs other sources to finance these R&D. If other sections of economy dont bring money into it the more R&D is spent on military the bigger the hole the country will fall into.
How do you think the US became a superpower? We built up arms against the Soviet Union and from the R and D came new technologies used in civil applications. Besides, if you are a "super power" with a weak military, a military superpower can pretty much screw you over. A point of being a superpoer is being economically stable as well as militarily strong.
Its a similar thing that happened with Russia back in the cold war. USSR restricted trade and relations from the outside world, Stalin slaughtered his neigbours that belonged to the Soviet Union with which Russia could have improved economically, relied soleley on military expenditures and spent HUGE amounts on military while other sectors in economy depleted and the result was, great enviromental destruction, an economy crisis and an enormous government expenditure for which people were forced to work like animals with minimum income and for benefits they could never get.
That is true but a lot of the labor was slave labor too in the Gulags. That\'s how Stalin built up his military. Using slave labor in the Gulags was cheaper and they could produce it wihtout spending money in the cities for industry
Now US is losing its influence and power over many sectors in ecomony and too much is being spent for the military.
I dont\' think that\'s true. We spend a lot of military research money but a lot of those researching are private companies, stimulating our economy (ie: Lockheed Martin)
As for the link, that is a retarded link. Its just a counter. That is not exactly what they are paying. Besides, wars aren\'t cheap. You expect us to go in and only pay like 10 million dollars? Soldiers need to be payed, ammunition costs money, Humvees cost money, fuel costs money especially now, tanks used today are more than a million dollars to build, military aircraft are also in the millions (i don\'t think they are being built for the war though, same with tanks. Humvees and transports might be the only things now that are being built). That link you posted is just as reliable as a Ford Edsil.
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We can take Syria.
We could, but I dont think anyone would be in favor of going to war with Syria. The only reason would be because of this guy and the WMDs.
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I hint of bias in Uni\'s perspective? Naw...couldn\'t be.
No its not. It is very Important for me to note that I am not complimenting China for having the potential to become a superpower despite the poor wealth of the people.
Also take into consideration that China and the US are under two 2 different economic systems. One is bureaucratic capitalism were everything belongs to the government and people just adapt and accept everything because of their fear and uncertainty that a different system could send billions into starvation, while the second is a system of free economy with uneven distribution of wealth, were the middle and high class have some control of the economy not just the government that have more motives to protest.
But if you have too many poor people, they could topple the elitist class in place via revolution (that is if Marxist Conflict Theory is correct). Then they are back in square one. Plus they don\'t have the capital yet to build up arms and industry.
True. And I agree
But if you check how things work in China, people feel that they are quaranteed that they will get a home, and food under the current system even if its the lowest.
Mao also used to say that for the communist system to succeed (not that Mao was a good example of communist), the workers must not have too much comforts.
Also people tend to revolt when they can compare theirselves to a higher class, for which they work for like slaves while getting nothing in return (everything flows to the higher class).
They cant do this in China. In China flows the false impression (of pseudo communism) that everyone produces for a labor owned government. With other words they feel like they produce for social benefits. They produce for the goverment which will redistribute evenly social benefits back to them.
How do you think the US became a superpower? We built up arms against the Soviet Union and from the R and D came new technologies used in civil applications. Besides, if you are a "super power" with a weak military, a military superpower can pretty much screw you over. A point of being a superpoer is being economically stable as well as militarily strong.
Ofcourse. But unlike the Soviet Union the US had capital inflows and great influence on trade. That financed the R&D (which is considered always as a cost not an investment) for military.
Otherwise the US would have sunk like the Soviet Union if there was no other source of inflow/ revenues.
But that was back then.
Now though the US is facing a few problems that make things similar to the dead ends the Soviet Union found. Low exports, high imports, capital outflows, depreciation of the $, huge amounts of employied low cost labor imigrants(decrease of GNP), all these increase national debt and result at lower inflows. Throwing moeny in R&D for the military or spending too much government expenditures on the army without revenues increase national debt because the government must borrow money from abroad to finance these. This has a negative impact on the wealth of your income in the long run.
I dont\' think that\'s true. We spend a lot of military research money but a lot of those researching are private companies, stimulating our economy (ie: Lockheed Martin)
Who pays them or quarantees them back their returns though? Would that be the government? These private companies are few and also consist mostly of specialiazed human capital. With other words these companies arent like other companies that can expand and open new positions to hire labor in which anyone can take part in.
Also their production isnt consumable. It mostly benefits the human capital\'s wages and businessmen\'s that work in such companies. Their products are either stored for future use (excess supply) or either used in a warzone (Excess demand by whom? Not the everyday USA citizen). They arent consumable.
As for the link, that is a retarded link. Its just a counter. That is not exactly what they are paying. Besides, wars aren\'t cheap. You expect us to go in and only pay like 10 million dollars? Soldiers need to be payed, ammunition costs money, Humvees cost money, fuel costs money especially now, tanks used today are more than a million dollars to build, military aircraft are also in the millions (i don\'t think they are being built for the war though, same with tanks. Humvees and transports might be the only things now that are being built). That link you posted is just as reliable as a Ford Edsil.
The counter is calculated on the yearly national budget. It uses actual numbers divided by time. The counter flows such way as by the year\'s end it will equal to the calculated yearly expected expenditure decided in the national budget.
So if for example the congress expects 1 billion for military expenditure to be spend in a certain year, the counter will flow accordindgly as to equal 1 billion until the end of the year.
It divides the expected expenditure by time variable with other words.
It gives a mean/average number of spending at any moment of time