Re: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Jed Rothwell wrote: Rick Monteverde wrote: 2. It promotes economic growth according to Keynesian theory. Let's agree to disagree on that point. We don't disagree. You say the Keynesians are wrong and I say I don't have a clue if they are right or wrong. I am not taking their side. I am just reported what they say. Obama is definitely one of them. He has said so on many occasions. So was FDR. You're absolutely right Jed, both presidents were Keynesian's. It's not that it can't work in theory, the problem is getting it to work in practice. If the money from the Porkulus had been spent on funding venture capital projects, and if they had teams of people with business startup experience picking them, then it might have produced economic growth. Unfortunately a significant amount of the money was used to provide pork pies for the various left wing special interest groups who elected them. Well to the victor belongs the spoils. What if it had a few hundred million earmarked for LENR research? I'd have a terrible time going against it, but I know I should. It's supposed to be an emergency stimulus response. Well, as long as the few hundred million for LENR goes into the pockets of Americans, and is used to buy American-made lab equipment, that would make it a stimulus according to the Keynesian theory. It does not really If the money were to be spent on research, and that research were to prove fruitful, then it could produce economic growth. Of course this fanciful scenario assumes that there were venture capital available to capitalize these inventions. It also assumes that there were no Oligarchy determined to suppress the technology, and destroy America, and that there were no scientific establishment who were either in collusion with the aforementioned Oligarchy, or blindly protecting their favorite paradigms. Well, you know what happens when you assume, eh? So-called boondoggles or pork fail in category 3. They produce no benefit. But, as I said, WWII produced The original boondoggles were creations of WPA (whittle, piss and argue) workers, who spent their time creating them. WW II produced lots of savings, which were then spent to satisfy pent up demand. --- Get FREE High Speed Internet from USFamily.Net! -- http://www.usfamily.net/mkt-freepromo.html ---
RE: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Keynesian economics is a ponzi scheme. The story goes that Keynes was confronted with this accusation a few years before his death. He concurred, but said it didn't concern him because he would be dead before it all came crashing down. I think he died about three years ago. Would it help if we spit on his grave? Jeff _
Re: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Robin van Spaandonk wrote: I suspect WWII worked as a long term stimulus, because of the increased RD that it required, which later paid off in other areas. E.g. air transport. Probably it did, but that long term stimulus does not explain the immediate post-war boom. It took 10 or 20 years for most of the technology developed during the war to reach the marketplace. Penicillin and some plastics became available immediate, but things like computers and jet aircraft were not common until 1960, and did not have an impact in the late '40s. Many of the airplanes manufactured during the war were obsolescent, especially the DC-3. The military wanted a tried-and-true design. Frontline fighters were of the latest designs, and evolved rapidly. I recall there were ~20,000 surplus DC-3s on the market after the war. A huge glut. Douglas tried to sell an upgraded model, the Super DC-3, but it did not sell because it cost $200,000 at a time when you could buy a surplus original model DC-3 for $8,000 (B. Yenne, p. 151). My guess is that the GI Bill was the biggest long term stimulus. - Jed
Re: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Yes, but why do we have to keep burning stuff? Harry - Original Message - From: Jones Beene jone...@pacbell.net Date: Thursday, February 26, 2009 2:06 pm Subject: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy This is the first key to Obama's brilliant energy plan: http://tinyurl.com/dfrew7 or http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/02/researchers-biofuels-can-provide-viable-sustainable-solution-to-reducing-petroleum-dependence-by-2030 The second key is the plug-in automobile - either with or without a hybrid ICE backup. The third key, from the perspective of most of us here on Vortex is ARPA-E and the funding of radical new ideas. This three-pronged plan will replace 100% of Arab/Opec oil and rather soon. With only Canadian imports, this will make North America self-sufficient in transportation fuel... probably long before 2030. In fact, if biofuels maintain the same average growth rate of 2007- 2008 (actually even less) and if the technology of cellulosic fuels pans out (as all indications are telling us now) - then this goal of continental self-sufficiency will happen before 2020 (if we get past 2012, that is) For those naysayers on the extreme right who are falsely slandering this brilliant strategy as liberal free-spending, let me say this: get a life: you are so wrong, and so misguided by the same level of stupidity that elected Bush in the first place - and which put us into this gigantic mess. Thank heavens there is some sanity left in the electorate. Had we elected another bone-head conservative to our highest Office, that tired old man with antiquated Big-Oil leanings and so many mansions that he cannot keep track of how many - instead of an absolute policy-genius, this country would be on the edge of collapse into depression and maybe into anarchy by now, instead of looking for a genuine recovery in 2-3 years. Sit back and shut-up, or change you tired old spiel - that is the best thing you can do for us now, Neo-cons and assorted Rush-Bimbo- ites. It is never too late to change horses, so enjoy the ride. Yes we can. Yes, we will. Jones
Re: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Jones Beene wrote: Sit back and shut-up, or change you tired old spiel - that is the best thing you can do for us now, Neo-cons and assorted Rush-Bimbo-ites. I assume this is addressed to William Kristol, who wrote today: Republicans need to find reasons to obstruct and delay Obama's agenda. . . . Conservatives and Republicans will disapprove of this effort. They will oppose it. Can they do so effectively? Perhaps -- if they can find reasons to obstruct and delay. They should do their best not to permit Obama to rush his agenda through this year. They can't allow Obama to make of 2009 what Franklin Roosevelt made of 1933 or Johnson of 1965. Slow down the policy train. Insist on a real and lengthy debate. Conservatives can't win politically right now. But they can raise doubts, they can point out other issues that we can't ignore (especially in national security and foreign policy), they can pick other fights -- and they can try in any way possible to break Obama's momentum. Only if this happens will conservatives be able to get a hearing for their (compelling, in my view) arguments against big-government, liberal-nanny-state social engineering -- and for their preferred alternatives. . . . http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/25/AR2009022501756.html Rather blatant obstructionism. The preferred alternative in this case appears to be tax cuts . . . and, uh, Mr. Kristol can't think of anything else. The battle lines are drawn! The first round was from Gov. Jindal who said that spending $140 million on volcano monitoring is a waste of money. That is like saying that hurricane monitoring in the Gulf of Mexico is a waste of government money. I doubt the governor of Louisiana believes that. Volcanoes are common in Japan and they cause more damage than people realize. Blockbuster-movie style disasters in which people are run over by lava is extremely rare, but extensive low-level damage and danger from things like volcanic ash and poisonous fumes is common, and evacuations are expensive. Knowing when, where and how big the eruption is likely to be saves far more than $140 million. In the US, volcanic smoke disabled both engines in the jet and almost caused a crash. More than 80 aircraft have been damaged by ash in recent years, according to the USGS. This sort of thing can be avoided by monitoring of the smoke cloud and weather conditions, if you know what sort of ash you are dealing with, and you know a lot about volcanoes. http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/hazards/tephra/ashandaircraft.php (This photos and other information on this web page must have cost a fortune to assemble! This is the kind of government waste Jindal wants to eliminate.) Incidentally, the hotel in which the ICCF-6 conference was held was later destroyed by volcanic eruption. I read a surrealistic press report filed from the hotel a few weeks before it was finally abandoned, written by reporters who were camped out without water or electricity. They were watching the nearby volcano and ignoring meteorological agency warnings to evacuate. Kind of like reading a press release from Pompeii. I do not think the building was physically destroyed but it was rendered uninhabitable. That was probably a relief to the people who built it, because it was a debt sinkhole, allegedly with connections to Japanese gangsters. Jindal's comments are an example of the lingering anti-technology, anti-science attitude of the Bush administration and the Republican Party. Unfortunately, there is a lot of this attitude in the rest of society, among liberals and conservatives alike. It is one thing to be wary of unanticipated problems from technology, or putting too much power in the hands of Washington bureaucrats. It is quite another to claim that spending $140 million to monitor volcanoes is a waste of money! - Jed
Re: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Jones Beene wrote: Sit back and shut-up, or change you tired old spiel - that is the best thing you can do for us now, Neo-cons and assorted Rush-Bimbo-ites. Jed wrote: I assume this is addressed to William Kristol, who wrote today: Republicans need to find reasons to obstruct and delay Obama's agenda. . . . Let me repeat that: ...NEED TO FIND REASONS to obstruct and delay Obama's agenda... What an incredibly revealing sentence. Does he know what he said? Regards Steven Vincent Johnson www.OrionWorks.com www.zazzle.com/orionworks
Re: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
OrionWorks wrote: Let me repeat that: ...NEED TO FIND REASONS to obstruct and delay Obama's agenda... What an incredibly revealing sentence. Does he know what he said? It is hilarious. BUT that was the teaser headline. It could be that a Washington Post copy editor composed it, and reworded it to sound even more appalling than the column. In some newspapers, writers get to okay a headline or teaser summary. In others they do not. The text below that was copied from the column and I am sure Kristol has the final say on that: [Republicans] will oppose it. Can they do so effectively? . . . Perhaps -- if they can find reasons to obstruct and delay. . . . I would say that is close to the summary. It means they need to find reasons. Perhaps this is a misunderstanding? Perhaps he meant that Republicans need to come up with parliamentary maneuvers; i.e. reasons to slow down the procedures. Perhaps it does not mean they need to find ideological reasons to oppose the policies. They already have them, although in my opinion their reasons are threadbare. As I said, some of their reasons are weird and easy to demolish, such as Gov. Jindal's opposition to monitoring dangerous natural phenomenon that his state is not subject to. It is pork if you have no volcanoes nearby, and vital to survival if you do! If they do not spend this money and a volcano knocks an airplane out of sky -- as almost happened several times -- people will be up in arms because the government did not spend the cost of one large highway bridge to prevent the tragedy. The dollar amounts, casualties and other effects are similar to losing a large bridge in a metropolitan area. A modern industrial nation that fails to monitor such things would be insane. If a Japanese government official were to propose scrapping volcano monitoring, he would be thrown out of office in a few hours. (Let us be fair to Jindal and agree that a lot of programs probably are pork, and most people would agree they are. I do not know the percentage or dollar amount of such programs. He -- or his speechwriter -- just happened to pick one that isn't, in a spectacularly inept move.) (Speaking of Japanese officials getting fired, the MP and cabinet minister who showed up drunk at the press conference the other day also wandered around the Vatican Museum, blundered into exhibits and set off alarms. Details have not been published but I envision him pushing over the velvet rope to go up to a nude statue and stroke it on the butt. The Japanese Embassy in Rome must have been relieved when he stepped on the plane to leave the country. That MP happens to be from Hokkaido, Mizuno's district I think, and Mizuno made some unkind remarks about him. I feel that if we cannot have a competent politicians let us at least have amusing ones.) - Jed
RE: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Jed - Jindal's comments are an example of the lingering anti-technology, anti-science attitude of the Bush administration and the Republican Party. Unfortunately, there is a lot of this attitude in the rest of A demagogue takes things out of context and twists them, weaving truthful content into a lie. It's intellectually dishonest and wrong. You don't know how much it personally saddens me that such a vigorous advocate of real scientific progress on our important energy issues such as yourself chooses to take that route. I've followed your writings since the Compuserve days, and this really does bother me. Jindal was correctly pointing out that volcano monitoring, worthy as it may be, is just an example of the far-fetched things that should NOT be in an emergency economic recovery plan. Volcano monitoring money should be spent, IMO, and everybody, including I would say statistically all Republicans including Jindal, understand that. Pass an environmental monitoring bill or something. But first, handle the HUGE economic emergency facing us with appropriate action. This is just a giant government deficit spending bill that has nothing to do with economic recovery. It's a disastrous piece of legislation, perhaps the most disastrous ever. Jindal was pointing that out in the hope that people like you would understand exactly what he was saying and in the correct context. But instead you, others here and the left now falsely call Jindal antiscience and equate all Republicans with it. This is beyond partisan disagreement, it is a simple lie. It is a lie that is going to hurt us all for years to come should it persist in preventing rational action to take place in our government response to the economy, and it stands a very good chance of destroying us for good. We're blowing what is probably our last chance on this nonsense, and it leaves us too vulnerable. Try look at it this way: say the other shoe drops. Some big secondary economic shock, natural disaster, or devastating terror attack or war. How about a volcano blow that takes out two or three global growing seasons. We won't need $140m on volcano monitoring equipment if something like that down in Indo pops, the 1000 ft wave will be our first clue that the US and the world is out of recovery options. - Rick
RE: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Rick Monteverde wrote: Jindal was correctly pointing out that volcano monitoring, worthy as it may be, is just an example of the far-fetched things that should NOT be in an emergency economic recovery plan. Volcano monitoring money should be spent, IMO, and everybody, including I would say statistically all Republicans including Jindal, understand that. Volcano monitoring is a form of safety infrastructure, exactly like weather forecasting equipment and dikes in Louisiana. The monitoring equipment is reportedly decayed and unreliable because it has not been kept up-to-date or maintained properly. This is not even a bit far fetched. Repairing the equipment should be the first item on any list of emergency government programs. As I said this is exactly like repairing a bridge on the verge of collapse in a major metropolitan area. The cost and consequences of not doing this would easily rival the cost of a major bridge collapse. Furthermore, volcanoes affect multistate areas, and they require the most advanced technology and best scientific knowledge to monitor. Monitoring them is clearly the responsibility of the federal government. You would not want to leave this up to some state agency, or local government. Pass an environmental monitoring bill or something. This is NOT an environmental budget item. Nothing can be done to prevent volcano eruptions. The only purpose of monitoring them is to ensure safety and prevent unnecessary loss of money. Of course volcanoes, hurricanes and other natural phenomena do affect the environment, but the focus of volcano monitoring is not primarily environmental but rather safety. Even a small eruption or gas leakage is dangerous and destructive. We are not talking about rare events such as when Mount Saint Helens blew sky high. How about a volcano blow that takes out two or three global growing seasons. We won't need $140m on volcano monitoring equipment if something like that down in Indo pops, the 1000 ft wave will be our first clue that the US and the world is out of recovery options. Such an event is exceedingly unlikely. Volcano monitoring would be useless in such an event, and is not intended for it. Damage from volcanoes occurs daily in the US and in Japan. It seldom makes the news but it costs millions of dollars in damage to equipment and grave danger to airplanes in particular. On the negative side, because we do not know enough about volcanoes we often declare evacuations unnecessarily. This happens in Japan all the time -- it is a weekly occurrence. Such evacuations cost them far more than $140 million. Volcano monitoring reduces the danger and loss of life, and reduces the expense of eruptions. It pays for itself many times over, just as weather forecasting does. Not monitoring volcanos with the best state-of-the-art equipment would be economic insanity, and a direct threat to human life. It is hard to imagine a more apt or important government responsibility. Perhaps it seems a little strange or esoteric, but that is because you are not familiar with modern volcano monitoring. I know about it because it is everywhere you turn in Japan, and frequently featured on the seven o'clock news. This is like being unaware of the vital importance of monitoring peanut factories for salmonella. Volcano monitoring was impossible decades ago. It did not exist. So people are not familiar with it today, or aware of how important it is. It is one of the countless hidden technologies that have quietly come into being, and saved billions of dollars and countless lives. Our lives are a lot easier, cleaner and safer than they used to be because of stuff like this. We do not realize how many wonderful technologies and dedicated people are out there, doing things we have never heard of, helping everyone. You cannot have this kind of sophisticated high technology unless you pay Uncle Sam to do it. High taxes are the cost of living in an ultra-safe, coddled, modern world in which every box of peanuts and every rainstorm and volcanic gas vent is monitored by someone, somewhere, and put into a database, and analyzed at academic meeting months later by geeks who wear pocket protectors from places like the CDC and USGS. We owe them far more than we realize. - Jed
RE: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Let me emphasize again that I am talking here only about volcano monitoring. Rick Monteverde and Jindal may be correct about the overall recovery plan. I have not looked at it. For all I know, it could be 90% pork and wasted money on unnecessary functions of government. Naturally I understand that some people favor government investment in things wind energy and others oppose it. These are complicated issues. What is not complicated is that volcano monitoring is not pork or waste. It is an essential function of government. Many other functions of government sound like a farfetched waste of money to people unfamiliar with modern technology. Rick wrote: But first, handle the HUGE economic emergency facing us with appropriate action. Obama and I think that the most appropriate action is to make vital repairs to the national infrastructure. This serves two purposes: 1. It saves lives and money -- it saves much more money than it costs. 2. It promotes economic growth according to Keynesian theory. Perhaps we are wrong about #2. I do not know enough about economics to judge the validity of Keynesian theory. I do know about technology, and things like bridges, volcano monitoring, salmonella and food safety, and what the people at CDC do. Salmonella monitoring by the government at peanut factories is a good example. It costs practically nothing. It adds a tiny fraction of one penny to a kilogram of peanuts. And what happens when it is not done properly? Salmonella breaks out, hundreds of people get sick, dozens of people die, billions of dollars worth of food must be thrown away, companies go out of business, and the public raises hell. Decades ago we lived with this kind of risk because we had to. People will not put up with it today! Obviously we cannot trust the factory owners to monitor themselves. As one of the innocent factory managers explained: most people will follow the rules but it only takes one or two to destroy the industry. As for the supposedly horrendous cost of government and the economic disaster we face, I think we should tax the wealthiest top 10% of the country to pay for this mess, just as we taxed them for the First and Second World Wars. Just raise their taxes back up to 80% or so for a few years until the problems blow over and the economy recovers. They can easily afford it, believe me. I am in the top 10%. (Not in income but in net assets.) I know a lot of other people who are. Wealthy people get far more benefits from government than the rest of society. Also, note that wealthy people caused this mess on Wall Street, and benefited from the policies that led up to it. Not all of us, of course! I do not oppose wealth and I am certainly no socialist. Wealth allows me to promote cold fusion pretty much full time, which is a good thing. But there are times when rich people have to fork over and make sacrifices proportional to their wealth and circumstances in life. You need not feel sorry for them. Except when they are drafted to serve in war, they are never called upon to make the kind of sacrifices poor people make every day of their lives. - Jed
RE: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Jed - ... you are not familiar with modern volcano monitoring. Not that you would know anything about me or the ideas and interests I've discussed here all these years, but do you even consider where I live, who I have worked with here, and what I live ON? (Hint: I'll spot you a 'v', an 'o', and an 'l'. That's all you get, now try and guess the other 4.) Things have obviously changed, and I don't think there's much point in discussing this with you. I just correctly pointed out that environmental monitoring, good or otherwise, is a great example of NOT-STIMULUS, and you go on and on about how such monitoring is actually important, etc. etc. We're not hearing each other here any more, are we? - Rick
RE: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Rick Monteverde wrote: I just correctly pointed out that environmental monitoring, good or otherwise, is a great example of NOT-STIMULUS . . . This is a different issue entirely. According to Keynsians, spending money for any purpose is a stimulus. I wouldn't know about that. I know practically nothing about economics, so perhaps you are right. But I note that spending on WWII was the largest economic stimulus in history, and every dollar of that was wasted. Deliberately wasted: it was used to drop bombs and fire off shells, and to build thousands of warships that were scrapped soon after the fighting ended. If we are going to spend money it is better to spend it on things we need such as volcano monitoring. But based on the experience of World War II we might get an economic stimulus by absurd economic waste such as digging holes and filling them in. It worked even in the extreme case in which we dug holes and filled them in with hundreds of thousands of our dead soldiers. - Jed
Re: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
You forget Jed that WWII was not a stimulus to the rest of the world and we gained only because we sold the items that were destroyed for gold. After WWII we were the only country that could manufacture much of anything for a long time. I don't think the approach you suggest would work now. Ed On Feb 26, 2009, at 4:51 PM, Jed Rothwell wrote: Rick Monteverde wrote: I just correctly pointed out that environmental monitoring, good or otherwise, is a great example of NOT-STIMULUS . . . This is a different issue entirely. According to Keynsians, spending money for any purpose is a stimulus. I wouldn't know about that. I know practically nothing about economics, so perhaps you are right. But I note that spending on WWII was the largest economic stimulus in history, and every dollar of that was wasted. Deliberately wasted: it was used to drop bombs and fire off shells, and to build thousands of warships that were scrapped soon after the fighting ended. If we are going to spend money it is better to spend it on things we need such as volcano monitoring. But based on the experience of World War II we might get an economic stimulus by absurd economic waste such as digging holes and filling them in. It worked even in the extreme case in which we dug holes and filled them in with hundreds of thousands of our dead soldiers. - Jed
RE: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Jed - 2. It promotes economic growth according to Keynesian theory. Let's agree to disagree on that point. We agree on the intrinsic value of volcano and other environmental monitoring for well being and safety I 'm sure, and even further to wide ranging basic research, etc. --- except perhaps when rolled in as part of #2 above. What if it had a few hundred million earmarked for LENR research? I'd have a terrible time going against it, but I know I should. It's supposed to be an emergency stimulus response. Let all the other stuff be considered the usual way, with appropriate planning and forethought (hey, at least read the danged thing!) before voting on it. - Rick _ From: Jed Rothwell [mailto:jedrothw...@gmail.com] Sent: Thursday, February 26, 2009 12:42 PM To: vortex-L@eskimo.com Subject: RE: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy Let me emphasize again that I am talking here only about volcano monitoring. Rick Monteverde and Jindal may be correct about the overall recovery plan. I have not looked at it. For all I know, it could be 90% pork and wasted money on unnecessary functions of government. Naturally I understand that some people favor government investment in things wind energy and others oppose it. These are complicated issues. What is not complicated is that volcano monitoring is not pork or waste. It is an essential function of government. Many other functions of government sound like a farfetched waste of money to people unfamiliar with modern technology. Rick wrote: But first, handle the HUGE economic emergency facing us with appropriate action. Obama and I think that the most appropriate action is to make vital repairs to the national infrastructure. This serves two purposes: 1. It saves lives and money -- it saves much more money than it costs. 2. It promotes economic growth according to Keynesian theory. Perhaps we are wrong about #2. I do not know enough about economics to judge the validity of Keynesian theory. I do know about technology, and things like bridges, volcano monitoring, salmonella and food safety, and what the people at CDC do. Salmonella monitoring by the government at peanut factories is a good example. It costs practically nothing. It adds a tiny fraction of one penny to a kilogram of peanuts. And what happens when it is not done properly? Salmonella breaks out, hundreds of people get sick, dozens of people die, billions of dollars worth of food must be thrown away, companies go out of business, and the public raises hell. Decades ago we lived with this kind of risk because we had to. People will not put up with it today! Obviously we cannot trust the factory owners to monitor themselves. As one of the innocent factory managers explained: most people will follow the rules but it only takes one or two to destroy the industry. As for the supposedly horrendous cost of government and the economic disaster we face, I think we should tax the wealthiest top 10% of the country to pay for this mess, just as we taxed them for the First and Second World Wars. Just raise their taxes back up to 80% or so for a few years until the problems blow over and the economy recovers. They can easily afford it, believe me. I am in the top 10%. (Not in income but in net assets.) I know a lot of other people who are. Wealthy people get far more benefits from government than the rest of society. Also, note that wealthy people caused this mess on Wall Street, and benefited from the policies that led up to it. Not all of us, of course! I do not oppose wealth and I am certainly no socialist. Wealth allows me to promote cold fusion pretty much full time, which is a good thing. But there are times when rich people have to fork over and make sacrifices proportional to their wealth and circumstances in life. You need not feel sorry for them. Except when they are drafted to serve in war, they are never called upon to make the kind of sacrifices poor people make every day of their lives. - Jed
Re: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Edmund Storms wrote: You forget Jed that WWII was not a stimulus to the rest of the world and we gained only because we sold the items that were destroyed for gold. After WWII we were the only country that could manufacture much of anything for a long time. I don't think the approach you suggest would work now. It isn't my approach. I do not know enough about economics to judge whether Keynsian massive deficit spending works or not. I am only describing what the Keynsians say. They say that WWII was an example of massive deficit spending, and that is what kick-started the economy. Whether it will work now or not, I have no clue. My only message to Rick was that if the gov't is going to spend massive amounts of money, it should spend it doing things it is supposed to do anyway, such as fixing bridges and monitoring volcanos. They $140 million they spend on volcanos will go right into the pockets of U.S. workers at scientific instrument companies. Our equipment is still made in the U.S., and it is still the best. Even the Japanese labs I have been in use mainly U.S. instruments. Rick says it is a NON-STIMULOUS but I do not see any difference between building bridges, schools or fire departments and installing scientific equipment to monitor volcanos and earthquakes. As long as you help people, make them safer and generate wealth, it is all good, and it seems like stimulus to me. There are, of course, many gov't pork projects that do no good. Governments build a lot of stuff nobody needs or wants, especially in Japan. Anyway, Obama is a Keynsian and he believes that useful spending is a stimulous. I don't know but I hope he is right, and Rick is wrong. I do not think the prosperity following the war could have been caused by the fact that the U.S. had intact manufacturing and other countries did not. Three reasons: 1. The U.S. was still economically isolated then. Trade was only a small part of our GNP. We did not import or export much, so even if the rest of the world had vanished, it would not have affected us. (Economically speaking, it did vanish.) 2. Most of the exports were gratis. We were giving stuff away for free to the Europeans under the Marshall plan, and giving food to Japan for free. (But not any industrial assistance to Japan; on the contrary, we taxed them to pay the cost of the occupation.) That is the same as wartime spending: huge sums spent with no benefit to the U.S. consumer, and no improvement to the U.S. infrastructure. 3. When other countries recovered in the 1960s, our economy did not suffer. Nowadays, I will grant that competition with labor from other countries such as China has affected us. That is because shipping costs have fallen and telecommunications are virtually free. - Jed
Re: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
Rick Monteverde wrote: 2. It promotes economic growth according to Keynesian theory. Let's agree to disagree on that point. We don't disagree. You say the Keynesians are wrong and I say I don't have a clue if they are right or wrong. I am not taking their side. I am just reported what they say. Obama is definitely one of them. He has said so on many occasions. So was FDR. What if it had a few hundred million earmarked for LENR research? I'd have a terrible time going against it, but I know I should. It's supposed to be an emergency stimulus response. Well, as long as the few hundred million for LENR goes into the pockets of Americans, and is used to buy American-made lab equipment, that would make it a stimulus according to the Keynesian theory. It does not really matter what you pay these people to do. Building bridges, tutoring kids, insulating buildings or experimenting with palladium -- it is all the same stimulus. There are only 3 requirements: 1. The money stays here. Stimulus money used to by Chinese-made televisions stimulates their economy, not ours. 2. The people you pay have to spend the money. It does no good paying rich people because they don't spend. They put the money in the bank. The people I know who do LENR research at the NRL are all middle class scientists who don't earn much, and they will spend it. Instrument company engineers would also spend what they make. 3. The project has to improve people's lives and or economic prospects, short term or long term: the infrastructure, health and safety, education, energy, or what have you. We hope that LENR research would produce benefits but you never know. It might not pan out. Again, I have no idea if this actually works, but this is the theory Obama subscribes to. Paying American scientists $200 million to do LENR would help, and so would paying them to do plasma fusion, star wars, or the superconductiong supercollider. The latter examples seem dubious to me -- more like makework than research. So-called boondoggles or pork fail in category 3. They produce no benefit. But, as I said, WWII produced no benefit yet it seemed to succeed as a stimulus, so perhaps all you need are items 1 and 2. Either that, or postwar prosperity was coincidental with no connection to wartime spending. I have read revisionist historians and economists who believe that. - Jed
Re: RE: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
q: when is a stimulus not a stimulus? a: whenit is exciting for others but not for you. Harry - Original Message - From: Jed Rothwell jedrothw...@gmail.com Date: Thursday, February 26, 2009 6:51 pm Subject: RE: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy Rick Monteverde wrote: I just correctly pointed out that environmental monitoring, good or otherwise, is a great example of NOT-STIMULUS . . . This is a different issue entirely. According to Keynsians, spending money for any purpose is a stimulus. I wouldn't know about that. I know practically nothing about economics, so perhaps you are right. But I note that spending on WWII was the largest economic stimulus in history, and every dollar of that was wasted. Deliberately wasted: it was used to drop bombs and fire off shells, and to build thousands of warships that were scrapped soon after the fighting ended. If we are going to spend money it is better to spend it on things we need such as volcano monitoring. But based on the experience of World War II w e might get an economic stimulus by absurd economic waste such as digging holes and filling them in. It worked even in the extreme case in which we dug holes and filled them in with hundreds of thousands of our dead soldiers. - Jed
Re: [Vo]:The key to self-sufficient Energy
In reply to Jed Rothwell's message of Thu, 26 Feb 2009 23:05:28 -0500: Hi, [snip] So-called boondoggles or pork fail in category 3. They produce no benefit. But, as I said, WWII produced no benefit yet it seemed to succeed as a stimulus, so perhaps all you need are items 1 and 2. Either that, or postwar prosperity was coincidental with no connection to wartime spending. I have read revisionist historians and economists who believe that. [snip] I suspect WWII worked as a long term stimulus, because of the increased RD that it required, which later paid off in other areas. E.g. air transport. Regards, Robin van Spaandonk http://rvanspaa.freehostia.com/Project.html
