Why I love America

[Platapus]

http://www.cnn.com/2010/TRAVEL/11/11...hip/index.html

Cruise ship goes out and has an accident. Passengers OK but vacation not what expected. Slow tow back to shore. And then...

One woman, who said she worked for the cruise line, was wearing a T-shirt that said, "I survived the 2010 Carnival Cruise Spamcation." Vendors met passengers at the port, selling the shirts for $20.

Vendors already waiting with the T-shirt.

That's entrepreneurship at its finest.

Would this happen in another country, or is this only an American thing?

[Happy Times]

Originally Posted by Platapus

Would this happen in another country, or is this only an American thing?

It is originally but i would say it could happen here also.

[Buddahaid]

What's more incredible is the shirts were made in China.

[UnderseaLcpl]

I love it. Capitalism lets nothing go to waste. No opportunity for progress or proseprity goes unrealized.

The article doesn't mention the lengths to which Carnival Cruise lines went to reimburse the passengers - a full refund and a free cruise of comparable value, replete with a sincere apology! http://articles.latimes.com/2010/nov...-ship-20101110

Let's see socialism top that without stealing money from people

[UnderseaLcpl]

Originally Posted by Buddahaid

What's more incredible is the shirts were made in China.

So? Chinese people don't deserve the chance to earn a living and prosperity?

[Ducimus]

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

So? Chinese people don't deserve the chance to earn a living and prosperity?

Sure they do. However, I don't know about you, but personally, I draw the line where Chinese prosperity is taking jobs and industry away from America. China, is after all, a foreign country, and not the land that I love.

[Buddahaid]

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

So? Chinese people don't deserve the chance to earn a living and prosperity?

That was a joke even though it could be true.

[UnderseaLcpl]

Originally Posted by Ducimus

Sure they do. However, I don't know about you, but personally, I draw the line where Chinese prosperity is taking jobs and industry away from America. China, is after all, a foreign country, and not the land that I love.

An understandable and popular sentiment, if not an entirely correct one.

China does not "take" jobs from the US. US jobs are given to or earned by China because the price of US goods is such that they are no longer desireable. At the end of the day, you have to be able to provide a product that people want at a price they are willing to pay if you want to have an industry.

Your apparent mindset is typical of people who have bought the protectionist propaganda of dying US industries. I can't say I blame you for your opinion, as the general argument is very persuasive and appeals to our sense of pride and self-reliance. I once thought the same way. It feels good to "Buy American", support domestic industry, help American families, fight against outsourcing, and all that other assorted nonsense. Who doesn't want to help fellow Americans? (provided it doesn't require any kind of significant sacrifice on the part of the people making the argument- typical of unions and politicians) Who likes the idea of a countryman losing his job (and, surprise, the potential of losing one's own job) to a foreign national interest?

The laws of supply and demand tell us that it simply is not possible to sustain an industry whose product is not desireable, no matter what policies we adopt. You've been had by people who have nothing more to offer than a tug at the heartstrings. No amount of national pride or dedication will ever bring back the US steel industry or auto industry or any other industry comprised of highly-paid workers making overpriced goods in an overly-restrictive state framework that charges an additional 36% or so (not including legal costs, permits, licensures, and lobbying). Economics do not work that way.

Your opinion is a product of indoctrination and personal appeal on the part of people who are fighting to keep their jobs, and are not above stealing your money and the opportunity of others to earn an income by competing. I'd know, I am a union employee; a member of one of the most powerful unions around: the BLET. I am not proud of what my union does to American consumers out of sheer self-interest, but I'd be a fool not to take advantage of the opportunity. Just because we're working Americans does not mean we are incapable of extorting consumers and manipulating legislators to our advantage at the expense of everyone else.

Again, you've been had, my friend. The nostalgic appeal of the American factory worker is not the way forward. It is only a product of lazy and unimaginitive jerks who are not above bilking consumers and taxpayers alike out of their hard-earned dollars for their own purposes.

The only way to national prosperity is full speed ahead and damn the torpedoes. We must have not only a free market, but the most free market. We must not just espouse the ideals of competition, we must be the most competitive. We must not linger in the past and burden our industries and consumers and importers and markets with taxes and state-supported unions and protectionism. The lazy ass who gets paid $25.00 per hour to fasten doors to automobiles isn't going to like it when he has to pursue an education and/or do some kind of skilled labor - hell, I'm not going to like it when I have to actually put some kind of effort into earning a decent living - but that is the only way to get ahead, no matter what crocodile tears we may cry.

By simply cutting the corporate tax rate to an efficient 0.0% rather than the 30-something percent it is now (which we pay, btw), and reducing government entitlements for idiots to the point where they no longer threaten the viability of the dollar, we could catapult this nation's economy into the dominant role for the next century or so. There would be an unprecedented surge in the growth of new industries and technologies, much as there was before the state got around to shackling consumer electronics. Incidentally, given the current state of affairs, watch for silicon valley to become the new Pittsburgh in the next decade because of the aforementioned reasons. Trade protectionism and government have a habit of making the goose lay lead eggs.

Maybe you're convinced, and maybe you aren't, but I would like you to take another look at the wall of text I just had to post to explain my viewpoint. I didn't even really go in-depth on this one, but it takes that amount of explanation to even try to override the commonly-held opinion that outsourcing is bad, and the result of corporate greed, or that keeping unproductive industries is good. Common sense dictates that the economy should be more fluid and competitive, but there are legions of people who believe as you do for no better reason than that they have been swayed by compassion and pride, neither of which are the keys to making a nation's industry worth either.

[the_tyrant]

Originally Posted by Ducimus

Sure they do. However, I don't know about you, but personally, I draw the line where Chinese prosperity is taking jobs and industry away from America. China, is after all, a foreign country, and not the land that I love.

Even if I offered you the job, you would refuse
No health-care, no pension, a salary of $1 an hour, no safely, 10 hour work day

Even being a paper boy is better

[SteamWake]

A little off topic but...

I listened to a news report yesterday they interviewed some of the passangers of the cruise.

One said something that just made me laugh/cry and want to toss my radio through the wall.

"Thank god we made it home alive !!"

But then they interviewed someone that made it all better.

"It was a little uncomfortable but we had a good time. We will definatly take the free cruise !"

Its funny how two pepole whom experience the same inconvience can have two largely differing opinions.

[Buddahaid]

It was God's punishment for gay tolerance and they were soooo lucky. I mean the Champaign got warm for Pete's sake! How did they survive.

[frau kaleun]

They have been following this on the local news (of course) and yesterday I actually heard an anchorman say "... the Carnival Splendor is twice the size of the Titanic and sharing the same bad luck..."







Uh, no, I don't think being (relatively) safely adrift for a couple days off the Mexican Riviera and then being towed into San Diego by tugboats while the military airlifts you food and supplies, is quite the same kind of "bad luck" as watching the ship you were on sink with over half of its passengers and crew dead or dying while you, as one of the lucky ones, freeze your butt off in an open lifeboat in the middle of the freakin' north Atlantic and pray all night that some passing ship picked up your distress signals or maybe just happens to see you as it goes by.

But most of our morning/noon local news anchors appear to be high-functioning morons, so I suppose it's not that surprising.

[SteamWake]

Not to mention the fact that they were never more than 40 some miles offshore and uh... not sinking?

[Penguin]

Nothing against the people who sell these shirts, they are just into a quick buck. I have no respect for the people who wear them however. Damned pussies! Wow, you had no electricity and had to eat COLD sandwiches. Yes right, Titanic and Gilligans island 2.0.
If the people - soldiers and civilians - who made it through WW2 had written everything they survived onto their shirts - they would need XXXL shirts in 5pt fonts. You know why you don't see these people in shirts? This was a generation who had freaking balls and saw humbleness not as a sin. People who saw real brown sauce hitting the fan don't brag about it. It's only the loudmouths and sissies who think they know what it's like to look into Death's eyes.

...rants the angry Penguin, who would propably be the only one who would have died from starvation on the cruise - as I would never take anything from Ronald Reagan!

[Platapus]

Originally Posted by UnderseaLcpl

China does not "take" jobs from the US. US jobs are given to or earned by China because the price of US goods is such that they are no longer desireable.

Can we put this in big honkin font that flashes red?

I always shake my head ruefully when I hear that China is "taking" jobs.

This whole thing started post WWII when the American people made a choice:

Made in America for X price
Made in Japan for Y price

Americans, being good capitalists, chose the option that gave them the mostest for the leastest.

No one stole any jobs, no one took any jobs. The customers (us) chose.

Don't blame the government, don't blame "big business", blame the customers for choosing to buy foreign goods.

Well, now it is probably too late. America can't rebuild our manufacturing factories and even if we did, the price of the goods would not be attractive to the customer.

I believe you will find few American customers willing to pay American wages, to buy at American prices, what can be obtained from overseas.

Sure Americans "care" about the lost jobs... but do Americans care enough to pay much more for the same product? Probably not.

Most Americans seem satisfied buying a smarmy magnet from a Chinese company that states "buy American products"

No one took anything. We choose to give it away.

As Porky Pig would say "We buttered our bridges, now we can sleep on it"