If all trade is stopped and you don't recover quickly enough you will annex Mexico and Canada. Harry
On 21/6/2007 5:09 PM, StifflerScientific wrote: >>> That's science fiction, needless to say. > Yes I agree, we would be stupid to do this ourselves, yet what if we really > pis__d of China for example? Your not going to change gears over night or > even in a few years. We have given up Steel, Cooper, Aluminum, Textiles, to > name some primary ones. Not to mention we and our animals are being > poisoned. I purchased from a national chain pharmacy Cipro for a chronic > infection and in reading the enclosed fact sheet, noted a number of spelling > errors. Needless to say this was counterfeit. > > To say our imports could not be stopped is not in my mind impossible, albeit > not our choice, or maybe our enemies could just poison us over a period of > time. > > I do not believe we as a people are capable of turning around quick enough > to prevent serious problems. The old school 'Uncle Sam Wants You' or be > another 'Rosie the Riveter' inner responsibility is alive and well. > > -----Original Message----- > From: Jed Rothwell [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: Thursday, June 21, 2007 3:32 PM > To: [email protected] > Subject: Re: [Vo]:US Lost > > > Stiffler Scientific wrote: > >> If the US could Seal all borders, nothing IN from anywhere, could we > survive >> without anarchy? >> >> Would we become a starving, unable to self support nation? > > That's science fiction, needless to say. There is no way we would > want to do such a thing. But I am sure a country the size of the U.S. > could easily be self-sufficient. It was nearly self-sufficient for > nearly all extraction (mining), industry, energy and other major > economic sectors up until the 1960s. > > The only difficulty, at first, would be the supply of oil and other > liquid fuel. The U.S. imports ~60% of its oil. The price of gasoline > would soar to $5 or $10 for a while. People would make very rapid > adjustments such as carpooling and video telecommuting -- as we have > discussed here -- and the problem would be fixed in five years or so. > I think there would be less disruption and suffering than people > realize. I think we should immediately impose a $2/gallon tax on > gasoline and make this happen, with much of the money used to reduce > tax rates for people earning less than $30,000 per year. > > The other critical import that would hurt a lot more than oil in the > long run is brainpower. Many of the most talented students at the top > U.S. technical universities and at corporations such as Google are > from foreign countries. Thomas Freidman described the graduation > commencement at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute this year: > > "Laughing and Crying > > By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN > Published: May 23, 2007 > > First I had to laugh. Then I had to cry. > > I took part in commencement this year at Rensselaer Polytechnic > Institute, one of America's great science and engineering schools, so > I had a front-row seat as the first grads to receive their diplomas > came on stage, all of them Ph.D. students. . . . > > The reason I had to laugh was because it seemed like every one of the > newly minted Ph.D.'s at Rensselaer was foreign born. For a moment, as > the foreign names kept coming -- ''Hong Lu, Xu Xie, Tao Yuan, Fu > Tang'' -- I thought that the entire class of doctoral students in > physics were going to be Chinese, until ''Paul Shane Morrow'' saved > the day. It was such a caricature of what President Jackson herself > calls ''the quiet crisis'' in high-end science education in this > country that you could only laugh. > > Don't get me wrong. I'm proud that our country continues to build > universities and a culture of learning that attract the world's best > minds. My complaint -- why I also wanted to cry -- was that there > wasn't someone from the Immigration and Naturalization Service > standing next to President Jackson stapling green cards to the > diplomas of each of these foreign-born Ph.D.'s. I want them all to > stay, become Americans and do their research and innovation here. If > we can't educate enough of our own kids to compete at this level, > we'd better make sure we can import someone else's, otherwise we will > not maintain our standard of living. . . ." > > By every meaningful measurement, the U.S. is dead last in First World > education. Roughly 20% of the U.S. adult population has not graduated > from high school. See: > > http://www.census.gov/prod/2003pubs/c2kbr-24.pdf > > U.S. high school graduation rates are below half in many poor > counties and cities. 1.2 million drop out of high school per year in > the U.S. I do not know about the rest of the country, but the quality > of public education in Atlanta is drastically different from one > neighborhood to the next, and in most schools it is dreadful. There > is no way the U.S. will survive as a major power or as anything other > than an economic colony of Japan, China or the E.U. Ireland will soon > have more native high-tech brainpower than the U.S. The U.S. also > spends three times more than any other country per capita on > healthcare, but by most standards we are dead-last in the first > world, and far below places like Costa Rica and Cuba. The nation is > in very serious trouble in three fields: energy, education and health > care. We have done nothing to address these problem for the last 20 > years, and unless the voters and political leaders get serious we > will be far worse trouble a generation from now. > > - Jed >
