A Forum for Grinches and Ho-Ho-Hoes

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
Someday we'll find out what Bush said to all these people to get them to come around.

Wead is a slime ball- he tape recorded a "friend" and now wants to sell the tapes. If you want to equate him to anyone recent, maybe the women who outed Monica on tape. The fuck should kill himself.

The next two "glaring reversals" sound more like standard political reversals of rhetoric. The last guy I don't know enough about to comment- maybe he is evidence of a vast conspiracy to threaten people into getting into lock step- or ELSE!

Funny, what about the half dozen people who left the administration and basically claimed Bush has fucked the world up. How come Rove's machine didn't go after them Ty?

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
Funny, what about the half dozen people who left the administration and basically claimed Bush has fucked the world up. How come Rove's machine didn't go after them Ty?

Plame?

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
Plame?

they apologized for the "betrayal?"

follow along- this isn't just dirty tricks- its something soooo heinous people reverse public positions in fear.

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
they apologized for the "betrayal?"

follow along- this isn't just dirty tricks- its something soooo heinous people reverse public positions in fear.

You don't think the Plame thing sent a message?

[Sidd Finch]

Originally posted by Spanky
A subset of people suffer temporarily, but it is miniscule compared to the benefits. Its like when the lightbulb was invented, a subset of people, the candlemakers were negative effected. But in the end the overall benefit to almost everyone was beneficial.

Without getting into the costs-v-benefits argument on this, let me ask you -- is "free trade with China" an oxymoron?

I am in general a big believer in free trade (and I think the G7 should eliminate farm subsidies to practice what they preach). But many, though certainly not all, commentators seem to believe that China has artificially suppressed its currency, and this makes the "free" trade a very murky proposition.

Related question -- if you believe that China does artificially suppress its currency, then does the fact that this keeps prices of goods imported from China low make it an acceptable practice -- or even a practice that benefits the US?

These are real, not rhetorical, questions.

And no, I haven't read the thread, I've had things going on, and if I should have STP'd I didn't.

[Sidd Finch]

Originally posted by Spanky
Any argument against free trade is just rehashed arguments used by socialist for economic statism.

Tell that to the sugar farmers in Florida. (They think it's anti-Cuba patriotism.)

[Sidd Finch]

Originally posted by Spanky
I am still new at this. Why did nobody respond? Is it because everyone is so scared and depressed by it that it is just better to ignore it? Denial and all that. This makes my skin crawl. Is there anyone who believe this is a good development? Megalaman?

RT's posts mostly concerns broads. There really aren't many broads here.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Sidd Finch


Related question -- if you believe that China does artificially suppress its currency, then does the fact that this keeps prices of goods imported from China low make it an acceptable practice -- or even a practice that benefits the US?

Cheaper prices are generally a good thing--do you think China's going to wait 20 years and then spring the trap, and jack up prices?

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic
I've been waiting, but since Club hasn't said it: I think you mean "Genderist fuck."

Wait, so you think it's not correct to say that my sex is female?

Mmmmm, sex.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Cheaper prices are generally a good thing--do you think China's going to wait 20 years and then spring the trap, and jack up prices?

As long as they are working on building a viable economy, and as long as its citizenry seldom buys imports, this is a very good thing for them. Granted, what it does have to import ends up expensive, but they minimize that, and plow everything into productive infrastructure using our dollars. It's an investment model of building - the people go without american blue jeans and BMWs now, but their factories and farms expand and modernize. In twenty years, they'll be the next Japan, Inc.

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
Not with each other, anyway, to the best of my knowledge.

Paigow's never posted on here? She leaves the entire field clear for Slave? Huh.

[Sidd Finch]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Cheaper prices are generally a good thing--do you think China's going to wait 20 years and then spring the trap, and jack up prices?

I don't know what China's going to do. But if currency suppression leads to cheaper prices for Chinese goods, it also leads to (prohibitively) higher prices for US exports to China.

The trade-off may be okay in your view. But it ain't "free trade." Is it?

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic

BR(Recount! Badnarik was robbed!!)C

I'm contemplating changing my party affiliation.

http://www.gunsanddope.com/

[Bad_Rich_Chic]

Originally posted by Sidd Finch
Without getting into the costs-v-benefits argument on this, let me ask you -- is "free trade with China" an oxymoron?

I am in general a big believer in free trade (and I think the G7 should eliminate farm subsidies to practice what they preach). But many, though certainly not all, commentators seem to believe that China has artificially suppressed its currency, and this makes the "free" trade a very murky proposition.

Related question -- if you believe that China does artificially suppress its currency, then does the fact that this keeps prices of goods imported from China low make it an acceptable practice -- or even a practice that benefits the US?

These are real, not rhetorical, questions.

And no, I haven't read the thread, I've had things going on, and if I should have STP'd I didn't.

Most studies of the econ. benefits/harms of free trade show that one-sided free trade is still beneficial to the free trader (i.e.: opening your own market benefits your economy overall, regardless of the trade or fiscal policies of your trade partners); perhaps even moreso than two-sided free trade relatively speaking, because the free trader gets benefits while the non-free trader gets comparatively fewer than they would if they, too, were open. So I'd say that there can be beneficial "free trade" with China even if China does not practice free trade. Who says that "free trade" has to be two-sided?

FWIW, I think the argument that China has "suppressed" its currency is a bit silly. It's pegged to the dollar, has been for dogs years. The dollar is, compared to most currencies, way down, and so the yuan is, too. That probably does mean that the yuan is undervalued vis a vis the dollar (and other currencies) when compared to what it would be if it floated, but it doesn't mean the Chinese gov't has some evil policy to artificially "suppress" their currency as part of some devious plot to screw US textile workers, as the press often seems to imply. Their longstanding currency policy has, currently, the effect of producing a very low-valued currency, which is beneficial to them in various ways at the moment, but ... I dunno, you can't really think that everyone (else) in the world should radically shift currency policy every time the international market produces some weird and not really forseen effect, so the whole thing has always seemed to me to be more of a straw man for various interests than a real economic issue. Honestly, the US has done more to "artificially suppress" its currency than China has, and while you can argue whether this is wise policy or not, I don't see the "unfair artificially suppressed yuan!" crowd yelling about how US exporters have an unfair advantage and the G should do something about it.

In any event, I think the low yuan does give a net benefit to the US, and I don't have a view of whether it is an "acceptable" practice or not. It primarily harms the Chinese in the long term, and while I might not do it were I Captain of the Universe, generally thinking it preferable to take a hit to the economy now and get it back on track than to suffer the greater harm of an entrenched, non-competitive, protected economy later, I'm not, and if someone wants to screw up to my benefit I generally have no moral compunction about letting them, so ... whatever.

Actually, I think the real risk posed by yuan's peg to the dollar is that, compared to FDI in other countires, investment in China is comparatively cheap, which means companies and investors (US and everyone else alike) risk overexposure to the coming economic armageddon over there. Investors with experience over there have been seriously reducing their exposure for a year or more, but the usual "hey, I just read in Newsweek that everyone's been investing in X for a couple years, and the price has gone way up, so now must be the time to buy in!" stupid money is flooding in ....

Oh, and "2" on the farm subsidies. I have family farming the great breadbasket, and they've lost the farm multiple times due to the "oppression of the American farmer at the hands of know-nothing city-folk who just want cheap, un-American agricultural products" or some such bullshit, even with subsidies, but somehow they can't take a hint.

[Bad_Rich_Chic]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
Wait, so you think it's not correct to say that my sex is female?

Mmmmm, sex.

I agree that you are of the female sex, while une belle dame sans merci is of the female gender. I merely noted that Club should disagree with the term "sexist."

I should have included a sarcasm alarm.