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While kind of agree with your response Doc
I wonder how you know that most Crimeans Ossetians and abkazhians wanted to be basically annexed back into the Russian fold. I mean sure there were ahem elections and all but I can't help notice the strategic advantage for Putin to be so magnanimous. Without making a direct comparison to Hitlers annexations it is still disturbingly similar.

Having said that though, I'm not really too worried about Trump as commander in chief. He doesn't strike me as a madman. He seems more like a guy who is a master sales man. If I be American I'm far more worried about his policies plunging the union into economic woes. How does one extricate the country out of nafta and tpp or any number of free trade agreements without incurring law suits left and right? However if he does manage to break nafta that might not be so bad for us ...

Hello Christie and illegal real estate taxes

I thought early on in this erection that trump would attract more of sanders voters than Hillary and I still think that will pan out.

Strangelove wrote:


Admit it Berry, you hate the Donald only because he wears a hairpiece...

As if there were no other reasons....

griz wrote: You mean he'll be anti-globalism? Good. I think countries as geographically huge and resource diverse as Canada and the US should be self sufficient.

You obviously know next to nothing about economics!

This is why communist countries always go belly up. Self-sufficiency looks good on paper, but it DOES NOT WORK!
And yeah, some non-communist countries such as Spain under Franco, or Argentina under Peron, have also tried it. Result? Economic disaster. Banning competition does not make you a better athlete. It makes you fat, lazy and improductive. And you end up paying more for inferior products.

Do read Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations (published in 1776). It completely blows protectionism and mercantilism out of the water. The advantages of free trade are so fundamental that no serious person with any insight into the matter can question it. And we've known that for more than 200 years now.

Two hundred years ago, owning two shirts would be considered a luxury. That you have a closet full, and probably don't even use half of them, is thanks to free trade allowing you to get more bang for your buck. The idea that the economy suffers when jobs move elsewhere is wrong and shortsighted. Yes, there may be some initial hardship for those who lose their jobs, but you can't make an omelette without breaking a few eggs. When Pakistani or Chinese factory workers earn more, they eventually end up buying American products, and both sides profit. Both the US and Canada have vast natural resources, a reasonably well educated work force and decent infrastructure. There are tons of industries where you have huge advantages over most other nations, so there should be no risk that you cannot find branches where you can outrun the competition. Focus on doing what you do best and don't waste time and money subsidising industries that are not competitive.

Farming is a dying industry in Sweden, and people complain about it, say we need to buy local, etc, but they are wrong. Our climate sucks for farming. Why spend a fortune on growing tomatoes in glass houses when we can buy them cheap from Spain? Instead we can invest our money wisely in industries where we have an advantage, eg knowledge intensive stuff like engineering, industrial design or IT, and/or industries relying on mining or forestry.

Strangelove may think I'm a pinko, but I'm a died in the wool free-trade enthusiast.
The evidence of the benefits is just so overwhelming.

And yes, I have earned a "Master in the Sciences of Economics and Business Administration" degree, so I have a vague idea of what I am talking about.

Also, you must understand that when you oppose globalisation, this is what you oppose:

There has been marked progress on reducing poverty over the past decades. The world attained the first Millennium Development Goal target—to cut the 1990 poverty rate in half by 2015—five years ahead of schedule, in 2010. In October 2015, the World Bank projected for the first-time, that the number of people living in extreme poverty was expected to have fallen below ten percent. Despite this progress, the number of people living in extreme poverty globally remains unacceptably high.
•According to the most recent estimates, in 2012, 12.7 percent of the world’s population lived at or below $1.90 a day. That’s down from 37 percent in 1990 and 44 percent in 1981.
•This means that, in 2012, 896 million people lived on less than $1.90 a day, compared with 1.95 billion in 1990, and 1.99 billion in 1981.
•Progress has been slower at higher poverty lines. Over 2.1 billion people in the developing world lived on less than US $ 3.10 a day in 2012, compared with 2.9 billion in 1990- so even though the share of the population living under that threshold nearly halved, from 66 percent in 1990 to 35 percent in 2012, far too many people are living with far too little.
- - -
•East Asia saw the most dramatic reduction in extreme poverty, from 80 percent in 1981 to 7.2 percent in 2012. In South Asia, the share of the population living in extreme poverty is now the lowest since 1981, dropping from 58 percent in 1981 to 18.7 percent in 2012.

http://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/poverty/overview

Let that sink in.

In 1981 80% of the population in East Asia lived on less than two dollars per day.
in 2012 only 7.2% of the population remained in such poverty.

That is a HUGE victory, to use words that Trump understands.

And this is what people are angry about when they complain about jobs moving to China.

They want more people to starve, like in the good old days.

Throughout history the threat of starvation has always been greater than the risk of obesity, but for about a decade now, we have reached a point where more people in the World are obese than starve.

People can complain all they want about jobs going overseas and obesity being a problem - I see this as progress.
The World has become a much better place in our lifetime.

And poverty is not reduced by handouts. Poverty is reduced by offering jobs to the poor.
And this is what globalisation is all about. Poor countries can compete with cheap unskilled labour.
By moving jobs that can be handled by an unskilled workforce to those countries, we improve the world.

Now, when rich people get more money, they only spend a fraction of it.
When poor people get more money, they spend it all, or nearly all.

This means that moving money from the rich to the poor is not a zero sum game.
When poor people get more spending money it leads to an increase in demand, which means it creates more jobs.

Thus if we can move unskilled jobs away from the rich countries and instead educate our workforce so that they can work in industries that require skilled labour, everybody wins!

And this is what free trade - and globalisation - is all about.

griz wrote:
I don't know about a solution. But I can see the problem where a country over-trades with other countries at the cost of their own self sufficiency. This seems to make them more vulnerable to global and potentially uncontrollable events. For example, going to war with China ... what would be left on the shelves of Walmart or the Dollar Store?

This is of course another positive effect of globalisation; it reduces the risk of war.

And of course, I hope you realise that self sufficiency really means that two bad harvests in a row means you will starve? When we all trade with eachother a surplus in one place will equal out a deficit in another, but with impenetrable trade walls, you eat what you produce and when things go bad you starve.

See North Korea, a poster child for the ideal of self sufficiency.

Strangelove wrote:This is an excellent video on how the establishment (Dems + Repubs + media) is coming crashing down:



It's 41 minutes long so I doubt many here will watch, but if you do, trust me it gets much better toward the end

(be prepared to ride the volume levels, but it's worth it)

Crooked Hillary has been exposed.... the system is rigged and Bernie supporters are as mad as hell.

I keep getting this weird feeling that Hillary will be forced to drop out (blame health issues?)

... and Bernie will come back to win this thing.

Otherwise the Donald is going to be our new king for sure imesho.

You think his first presidential act will be to annect Canada!?

I know some people like to draw parallells to that Adolf fellar, but I haven't heard this Anschluss theory before.

Strangelove wrote:

Per wrote: Enter stage right: the second coming of Stalin, aka Putin.

OMG this is the kind of guy who compares Trump to Hitler!

Of course not!

Adolf fought honourably in WW1, was injured twice and decorated six times (including two iron crosses), wheras The Donald managed to get five draft deferrals during the Vietnam war, and was partying on Manhattan while laughing over how the stoopid McCain was tortured as a Vietnamese POW.

Fortunately the bone spur that prevented Donny from going healed out by itself, no need for surgery, by the time the war was over and has not bothered him since.

Trump is more comparable to Jean-Marie LePen or Nigel Farage.

Strangelove wrote:

Per wrote: Putin has violently subdued uprisings in eg Chechenya.

Here in the West we call Putin’s enemies in Chechnya: “terrorists”.

Those who attack civilians = “terrorists”.

Per wrote: He has invaded parts of Georgia and the Ukraine, and even annected the Crimea peninsula, which is part of Ukraine, to Russia.

Correction: He has supported separatists in Georgia and Crimea.

Separatists who wanted to rejoin Russia.

You do realize Georgia and Crimea were Russian states for hundreds of years until recently right?

Per wrote: To facilitate future interventions "to defend Russian minorities" he has offered any citizen of any country that used to be part of the Soviet Union or the Russian Empire the right to Russian citizenship. That includes all Finns.

Well now, I’d say that’s mighty magnanimous of him!

Per wrote: And at the same time he states that Putin will never invade the Ukraine. Newsflash! He already did!

Many folk (including most Crimeans) never saw themselves as part of the Ukraine.

It’s okay if you want to consider Crimea as part of the Ukraine (only 13 years total though!)

... but yeah, many of us see Crimea as belonging to Russia for 220 years... and counting.

I see you are buying the Putin narrative hook, line and sinker.

Now, the Chechens, if any, deserve the label separatists. They have fought for independence since the 1780's, but to little avail. They don't see themselves as Russians.

As for attacking civilians... Who was really responsible for the apartment bombings of 1999?
In one building some of the tennants discovered people placing explosives there and managed to prevent that building from being blown up. Those people spoke with Russian accents, and the explosives were of the typical KGB/FSB kind, according to a policeman who investigated the scene and then was fired and imprisoned on drugs and bribe taking charges.
https://postsovietpost.stanford.edu/dis ... ngs-russia


The "separatists" in Ukraine oddly enough have access to Russian tanks and artillery, and Russian soldiers keep coming home in body bags despite not officially being on the scene.... It's all very strange.

Besides, you may consider Crimea part of Russia, but the UN, the EU, the USA and Canada do not*, it has been part of Ukraine since 1954. Furthermore, since WW2 the international community has considered it illegal to change borders by force.

*nor does UEFA, which is why they have threatened to exclude Russia from international football if Crimean teams are allowed to compete in Russian leagues.

Per wrote:

griz wrote: You mean he'll be anti-globalism? Good. I think countries as geographically huge and resource diverse as Canada and the US should be self sufficient.

You obviously know next to nothing about economics!

This is why communist countries always go belly up. Self-sufficiency looks good on paper, but it DOES NOT WORK!
And yeah, some non-communist countries such as Spain under Franco, or Argentina under Peron, have also tried it. Result? Economic disaster. Banning competition does not make you a better athlete. It makes you fat, lazy and improductive. And you end up paying more for inferior products.

Do read Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations (published in 1776). It completely blows protectionism and mercantilism out of the water. The advantages of free trade are so fundamental that no serious person with any insight into the matter can question it. And we've known that for more than 200 years now.

Two hundred years ago, owning two shirts would be considered a luxury. That you have a closet full, and probably don't even use half of them, is thanks to free trade allowing you to get more bang for your buck. The idea that the economy suffers when jobs move elsewhere is wrong and shortsighted. Yes, there may be some initial hardship for those who lose their jobs, but you can't make an omelette without breaking a few eggs. When Pakistani or Chinese factory workers earn more, they eventually end up buying American products, and both sides profit. Both the US and Canada have vast natural resources, a reasonably well educated work force and decent infrastructure. There are tons of industries where you have huge advantages over most other nations, so there should be no risk that you cannot find branches where you can outrun the competition. Focus on doing what you do best and don't waste time and money subsidising industries that are not competitive.

Farming is a dying industry in Sweden, and people complain about it, say we need to buy local, etc, but they are wrong. Our climate sucks for farming. Why spend a fortune on growing tomatoes in glass houses when we can buy them cheap from Spain? Instead we can invest our money wisely in industries where we have an advantage, eg knowledge intensive stuff like engineering, industrial design or IT, and/or industries relying on mining or forestry.

Strangelove may think I'm a pinko, but I'm a died in the wool free-trade enthusiast.
The evidence of the benefits is just so overwhelming.

And yes, I have earned a "Master in the Sciences of Economics and Business Administration" degree, so I have a vague idea of what I am talking about.

So, let me get this straight; You advocate trade agreements with communist China that demand us to sell our precious raw natural resources, at a ridiculously low price, in exchange for their finished product?
And you think this is a good thing?
Till my dying breath, I will never see this as a good thing, I cry for my children and my, hopefully, grandchildren!
And you would even like us to expand this?
You may want to expand your knowledge on natural resources. No matter how vast they may seem, THEY CAN AND WILL RUN OUT! Then what?
IMO, we should be working as hard as we can to develop our second industries again, hence seeing the words;
Made in the USA or Made in Canada again.
I have talked to people who have managed to see what is really going on in China. There does seem to be as much poverty as ever among the common people, which is by far the most.
There is NO! respect for the environment what so ever, the air is at an all time bad.
These quick cash grab trade agreements are being made by short-sighted people.
You are talking about a country that has a military budget in numbers that is beyond my comprehension.
Problem is: almost 80% of that is spent on controlling unrest among THEIR OWN PEOPLE!!!
I am not an isolationist but come on man, I am for protecting our way of life so many have given their lives for...

Strangelove wrote:

Per wrote: The increasingly threatening behaviour of Putin has meant that there is a growing opinion in both Sweden and Finland for joining NATO. I've Always been against it, but Putin is beginning to convince me that maybe we should.

“NATO member nation's defense spending must amount to 2 percent of GDP”

“NATO members must buy their weapons primarily from American weapons corporations”

Sweden's military expenditure as part of GDP used to be around 3% back in the 70's, but under Gorbachev and Yeltsin we mistakenly assumed that Russia was becoming a normal country, and we started to downsize the military, including closing down the regiments on the Island of Gotland in the Baltic and replacing mandatory military service for all men with a smaller recruited military.

In recent years Russian fighter jets flying in the Baltic have started to make detours toward Gotland to see what the response is. Since Swedish jets responding have to come from the mainland, it takes a while, and I think all major political parties in Sweden are now in favour of increasing military spending again and having the air force return to Gotland and a reintroduction of mandatory service is being discussed.

We thought another war in Europe was unthinkable, but Putin has made us reconsider. I expect us to land somewhere in the 2-3% region either way. Basically a return to pre-Putin numbers.

Sweden's military expenditure as part of GDP 1988-2015:
1988 - 2.6%
1989 - 2.5%
1990 - 2.6%
1991 - 2.5%
1992 - 2.4%
1993 - 2.4%
1994 - 2.3%
1995 - 2.2%
1996 - 2.2%
1997 - 2.0%
1998 - 1.9%
1999 - 1.9%
2000 - 1.8%
2001 - 1.7%
2002 - 1.6%
2003 - 1.6%
2004 - 1.4%
2005 - 1.4%
2006 - 1.3%
2007 - 1.3%
2008 - 1.2%
2009 - 1.2%
2010 - 1.2%
2011 - 1.1%
2012 - 1.1%
2013 - 1.1%
2014 - 1.1%
2015 - 1.1%

As for weapons, we manufacture most of them (including fighter jets) ourselves, but as we are currently cooperating with the other Nordic countries, two of whom are NATO members, our military forces are equipped to and used to using standard NATO equipment, and we frequently coordinate major purchases with other Nordic countries as well.

Thus these two points are no biggie.

Per wrote:

Strangelove wrote:

Per wrote: Enter stage right: the second coming of Stalin, aka Putin.

OMG this is the kind of guy who compares Trump to Hitler!

Of course not!

*everyone looks at Damonberryman*

Per wrote: 2015 - 1.1%

As for weapons, we manufacture most of them (including fighter jets) ourselves, but as we are currently cooperating with the other Nordic countries, two of whom are NATO members, our military forces are equipped to and used to using standard NATO equipment, and we frequently coordinate major purchases with other Nordic countries as well.

Thus these two points are no biggie.

So you're good with doubling your spending on military and buying your weapons from the Donald?

Also, Big D has talked about "protection fees" for wimpy nations such as Sweden.

micky107 wrote: So, let me get this straight; You advocate trade agreements with communist China that demand us to sell our precious raw natural resources, at a ridiculously low price, in exchange for their finished product?

Of course not! You should only sell at a profit.
And you should only buy what you want. And by you, I mean "you, the consumer". The government should not intervene with tarifs and trade barriers.

In general Chinese products are of low quality. You should not compete with that. Cheap shit tends to bring little or no profit. That's a market you should leave to countries with an unskilled labour force.
You should aim for the premium market, where superior products are sold with a reasonable profit margin.

Working in a sweat shop is better than starving, but you don't want those kinds of jobs do you?
Make sure your kids get a good education, and they will always be able to make a good living.

micky107 wrote:You may want to expand your knowledge on natural resources. No matter how vast they may seem, THEY CAN AND WILL RUN OUT! Then what?

Natural Resources, while finite, do not run out as fast as people tend to think. Why? Because our estimates tend to be based on the known reserves, but as a natural resource gets more sparse, the price goes up and you start prospecting for more. Once you find enough, prices go down and you stop prospecting. That being said, there are some resources that truly are limited. That's why recycling is fundamental. We will never run out of (most) resources if we just learn to recycle!
And I never said you should base your entire economy on extracting natural resources; that would be kind of stupid, as you become too dependent on fluctuating prices and demand, and profit margines tend to be higher on end products than on resources.

micky107 wrote:IMO, we should be working as hard as we can to develop our second industries again, hence seeing the words; Made in the USA or Made in Canada again.

Absolutely. All for it. But you don't develop your industries by sheltering them. Quite the opposite! Take the home computer industries of the 1980's as an example. The US was dominating that segment. Then the Japanese started producing cheaper chips. The US companies got worried and cried wolf, and the US slapped a huge tarif on imported computer chips. What was the effect? Since the Japanese chips were cheaper and better, the US ceded most of the global market for home computers to Japan! Why would anyone in Europe/Asia buy a computer from the US that was twice as expensive as an equally good Japanes one? If US manufacturers could have bought and used Japanese chips as cheaply as the Japanese did, they would have been able to keep their global share of the highend market for the finished products. Eventually the US companies have managed to reclaim huge part of the market, but the protectionist move really hurt themselves more than anyone else.

You can also compare the quality of the Trabant, produced in Eastern Germany, where imported cars weren't allowed, with Volkswagen, Opel, Audi, BMW, Porsche and Mercedes, who were produced in Western Germany and had to compete with foreign imports every day of the week.

Protectionism is not the answer. It's like peeing in your boots to keep your feet warm in winter.
It feels nice and warm at first, but then.......

micky107 wrote: I have talked to people who have managed to see what is really going on in China. There does seem to be as much poverty as ever among the common people, which is by far the most.
There is NO! respect for the environment what so ever, the air is at an all time bad.

I was in China in 1990. Poverty was rampant. As bad as it may seem today, it used to be way worse.
We had a Chinese exchange student stay with us a few years ago. She had Nike shoes and a Nikon camera. That would have been unthinkable in 1990, unless perhaps for a small ruling elite. Her father worked at a school and her mother was a journalist. They lived in a tiny apartment in Beijing. Yeah, not part of the huddled poor masses, but of the growing middle class. China has roughly 1.4 billion people. While 1 billion still would be considered poor by our standards, there is now a Chinese middle class roughly the size of Western Europe, ie some 400 million people, and with a living standard close to that of Western Europe. That did not exist back in 1990. It's a new phenomenon, that has sprung from Deng Xiaoping's white cat/black cat redefinition of what communism may be.

According to the World bank, the number of East Asians (which would include China) that live in EXTREME poverty has shrunk from 80% to 7%. Believe me, China is a better place today than it was in 1990. It's still a dicatorship, the majority are still poor, and the environment is a complete disaster, but with a growing middle class you also have more kids going to college, which leads to more people asking questions, and there is now a fledgling environmentalist movement in China. It will probably take at least 20-30 years before they start to have some clout, but believe me it will happen. Even the Chinese need water to drink and air to breathe, and in some Chinese cities, right now both the water and the air is seriously hazardous for your health... The girl that stayed with us started warming up after a while and suggested one night that "the Swedish government seems very good, the Chinese... so-so." And I bet most of the millions of Chinese students studying abroad are coming to similar conclusions when comparing the trappings of democracy to what they have at home. And 20-30 years from now they will be the ones calling the shots.

micky107 wrote:I am not an isolationist but come on man, I am for protecting our way of life so many have given their lives for...

I couldn't agree more! We live in flourishing societies based on democracy, liberal principles (the original meaning; ie basically the bill of rights to an American, not the modern American use of liberal as a synonym for socialist) and free trade! We should not sacrifice these sacred tenets because certain trades, like ice vendors and saddle makers, have problems adjusting to changing times.

It is free trade that has given us prosperity and we would be fools to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs.
I tell you, North Korea, for all its protectionism, is no worker's paradise.

Strangelove wrote:
So you're good with doubling your spending on military...

I expect we will have to go back to that level either way. Being neutral is not the cheaper option. It means you have to have a defense that is enough of a deterrant to make the bad guys (eg Vlad and The Don) think twice about attacking.

I think the NATO option is probably thought of more as a way to keep the cost below the 3% level we had in the 70's by ganging up with some other countries to spread the cost.

Strangelove wrote:
... and buying your weapons from the Donald?

I would not want to buy directly from Drumpf. He is known for selling inferior products and not honouring the contracts he signs. Often by declaring bankrupcy after having siphoned the money into some other company he controls. But it should take some time before he has seized control of and nationalised all American companies, right? So we should have some options, at least initially.

We already buy some helicopters and stuff from the US.

OH! And wait a minute! If I'm not mistaken United Defense (?), or something, which is some US conglomerate, bought SAAB Bofors Weapons Systems from the SAAB corporation some years ago, so we can probably just keep buying our shit from SAAB Bofors anyway, right? That should count, shouldn't it?

Strangelove wrote:
Also, Big D has talked about "protection fees" for wimpy nations such as Sweden.

Yeah. And Mexico is going to pay for the wall.

+Nice too have you here Per. You manage to make the points I want to make without the homocidal underlying flavour. You go Per. Just do not expect to change minds with intelligent arguments. I live in the States and am afraid for my kids and grandkids.

BTW. I do not mind the hair piece. A guy has to do what he has to do. Fortunately I have a full head of hair but no Porsche. See a lot of balding men my age driving around in expensive cars and I toodle along in my cheap paid for ride WITH a full head of hair