Letters to the Editor
red_gti2000
Published Letters: 319
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Supply and Demand, everything else is static and noise
[Read the article: So long, John -- gas is $4 a gallon]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Heh, when I bought my VW golf back in 2000 I wrote my friends back in Europe that 93-octane gasoline was costing me only 98c a gallon -- amazingly, cheaper than bottled water! I would go for 3-hr week-end drives because I just felt like it. Those days are long gone, haha. But the car still serves me well at 30mpg highway.
Even back then I couldn't bring myself to "trade up" to an SUV, even though I could easily afford it and the family wanted one. They just struck me as so inefficient and wasteful.
Now everything's coming home to roost. The Fed cuts interest rates to bail out the banks from their derivative credit losses, which causes the currency to drop, which forces a rise in the price of imported oil (and everything else). The credit losses will just get bigger as the whole system delevers during the next 3 years, so the Fed will have to cut rates even further. The currency will continue to drop because our balance of payments have been negative for the past couple of decades (or three? I don't remember) and only a relatively high interest rate has been keeping the US dollar afloat. Meanwhile, in a perverse manner, the lowering of interest rates allows speculators to borrow cheap money to further push up the price of commodities. Talk about the law of unintended consequences, lol.
It's time to take your medicine, America. After the Olympics China will cut its peg to the US dollar and we'll see an even more drastic fall of the currency. It's time to stop all that useless spending and save your money. Higher domestic savings is a prerequisite. The country's GDP is, what? 70% consumption? Where is all the money coming from to finance that consumption? Burning away all savings and taking on (foreign) credit, obviously. The only way out is for the US dollar to drop low enough so the US worker can once again compete against foreign workers. Will that lower our quality of life? In a purely material sense, of course. But, on the whole, life here will still be better than in most other countries.
Get Real, People. Dump the Lattes and start buying Dunkin' :).
Go Clinton !!!!
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China is the most environmentally advanced country on earth
[Read the article: Ask Pablo]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]That should be the take-away from what the "no more babies" posters would have us believe. China instituted the "one child per couple" law a long time ago. Do some research on where it has gotten them. Here's a sample:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5953508/
Enjoy.
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Obama. Here's why.
[Read the article: Who would the GOP rather face?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The GOP is campaigning for the center and center-right. Hence, McCain. They have given up on the ultra-right.
Obama will be very easily portrayed as ultra-left. Voting record + supporters (moveon.org, Farrakhan, et al).
Clinton is campaigning for center and center-left.
The center voter has always delivered the Presidency in a general. Hence, Clinton and McCain will be fighting for the center. The center doesn't believe in the ultra-right "culture war" arguments anymore -- but they still believe that the country has "enemies". The center may be sympathetic to Obama's claim that he has good "instincts" with regards to the country's security, but they will go for a "tested and proven" candidate on that point. That is why Clinton has been voting with the Republicans on certain issues the "ultra-left" now hate her for. She has been strengthening her "centrist" credentials.
If the Democrats want to win this election, they need to nominate a centrist candidate. Even if that means the ultra-left stay home and don't vote.
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@Reality-based Liberal
[Read the article: Who would the GOP rather face?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Exactly. Perception is what matters in politics. And what I have described is what the general public perceives.
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@Reality
[Read the article: Who would the GOP rather face?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Hmmm. That's a tough one.
How do you convince someone else that their thinking is incorrect? In my letter history you'll find a post regarding how people nowadays just "talk past" each other instead of engaging in honest debate.
I think that, with all the static and noise coming from all directions nowadays people just tend to go with their instincts (and biases), basically because they will always be able to find some argument (on the internet or somewhere else) that gives support to their own belief system. In short, trying to change another person's "perception of reality" for an election is almost doomed to fail.
OTOH, people change their "perceptions of reality" pretty quickly when cold, hard facts hit them on the head. Witness the current debacle in housing. From "houses will always appreciate in value" to "OMG, let's walk from this mortgage. It'll never come back."
So, for the purposes of winning an election I would go with playing into people's biases to win it, then maybe trying to change it from a position of strength.
Otherwise, the GOP will win again and _they_ will be in the position of trying to change people's "perception of reality" to their ends.
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@Taliesan
[Read the article: Who would the GOP rather face?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I invite you to the discussion between Reality and myself regarding the voters' perceptions of a candidate vis-a-vis the candidate's actions.
Just because a political party labels an opponent as something does not automagically cause the general population to believe that it is true.
I repeat my argument that both Clinton and McCain are viewed by the general population as centrists -- one from the left and the other from the right. And that it will be very easy for the GOP to label Obama an ultra-lefty -- and make it stick.
What political junkies choose to label them does not matter. What the voters think does.