Guard Dog

Indeed. I think this is a good thing. What I'm far more annoyed about is the stupidly large increase in university fees for UK students. University should be free or heavily subsidised. Find other spending cuts to make you bastards, like this ship! Of course it should. Because universites don't cost anything do they? I mean, all those professors and lab intructors and campus staff, they work for free right? Capus facilities and equioment like research labs and the money to fund them, that just grows up from the ground right? The day college is free is the day a degree becomes worthless.

I'm against it, I used to be for it.

Try liberal amounts of bourbon in your coffee/tea. It always works for me. No, bourbon is awful in tea you have to use vodka. I have field-tested this extensively, if you are going to drink bourbon at work become a lawyer or a doctor. Lawyers don't drink at work, they do blow instead. Huh. My ignorance of this particular rule might just have something to do with the disappointing performance assessment... Well, th extra pep from the coke might have helped your communication score but your wife would be wondering why the bank accounts were always empty. Besides, lawyers are supposed to drink scotch. You don't want to get disbarred do you?

Heh, me too... I feel a midlife crisis coming on. The only problem is to get the corvette and younger woman I need to have either money or good looks. I'm a little short on both counts!

Right about now Argentina is thinking"Hmmmm if we only had air superiority back in '82"

BTW, your idea sounds very interesting. How complete is it?

This makes a lot of sense to me. Tread carefully though. Hopefully if the scores for this cycle can not be revised your boss will be inclined to grant you that mid cycle review.

I'm in the process of rewriting/revising a book I've been working on for a few years. After hearing "No" a lot while trying get a publisher to even look at the full manuscript (never send them a full manuscipt, just a sample and an outline or you might see your book with someone elses name on it) I hired a real editor to work with me on it. If you have the money to do that I highly reccomend it. The lady I hired is a professor at Mississippi State and is freelance editor and writer with few published works and articles. Plus she has some connections to help sell the manuscript once it is finished. If it ever is. Editing a book is a lot of work, getting a friend/collegue to help is nice but my advice is to bite the bullet and hire a professional.

Try liberal amounts of bourbon in your coffee/tea. It always works for me.

That was not really the point I've been driving at. The majority sentitment on this thread is Economic Activity = Enviormental Harm = Bad and Government Regulation = Good for the Enviorment = Good. To paraphase Aristotle the truth is in the mean. Unregulated economic activity has the potential to be very harmful to the enviorment. No one, not even me is arguing that. What I'm trying to point out to everyone is unrestrained regulation is just as bad. Government does have a role to play in protecting the enviorment from the excesses of business but when it is unable to restrain it's own excesses then it becomes harmful. If it is forced to live within it's own established responsibilities, then it is a good thing. When it overreaches it is not. Far from it. Now the examples I've provided were specific, but much of the discussion has been philisophical. It is a difficult subject to discuss in the abstract because the net effect of government is not always detrimental but it can be, if it not applied with restraint. You know where I stand on it, I know what you think about it. I doubt we'll ever agree on the philisophical questions of the size and role of government in any way but that's ok too. I do find it interesting however that a so many people are distrustful of business, which is run by people, are so trusting of government, which is run by the same kind of people. Often the SAME people.

Not exactly. Dumb regulation is just dumb regulation and it is onerous and harmful no matter what quarter it comes from. Keeping the scope and power of government small only serves to minimize the harm it can do. There really is little difference in being screwed of by a well meaning but stupid buerecrat or a feckless or even malicious one. Limiting their power protects you from every type. Now that is not to say government has no role to play of that regulation is a bad thing per se. I think by now I should have made that abunantly clear in both philisophical arguments and examples. But it MUST be applied carefully and with restraint and consideration. The government at any level does not know how to apply power judiciously or with restraint. As Regan once said, government is like a giant baby, an insatiable appetite at one end and no sense of responsibility at the other. Do you think those idiots who wrote the everglades restoration act realized the end result of their well beaning but ignorant law would be thousands of acres of green sugar cane fields being paved over for houses? Which do you think did greater harm to the enviorment, the sugar farmers who had already stopped suing phosphate of the government that ran them off forever? Florida banned the use of phosphate fertilizer, that was a good and restrained regulation. They also partnered with US Sugar in redirecting water runoff to minimize the amount that seeped into the everglades. That was also good. The federal government came in and took the whole thing over and ruined everything for everyone because they did not listen to the people who actually live in the state and they did not even try to work with US Sugar. You cannot make government smarter, it just cannot be done because to govern effectively you either have to know everything about everything (which is impossible) or get politicians to listen to someone other than their campaign advisors or the lobbyists who support them (also impossible).

Ah, so you can start being "that creepy old guy" at the gaming stores? That it, this thread is over, Raithe wins! Too funnny.

You can play just 5 min of Civ at a time?

I can not answer for how it is done elsewhere but that really does not happen here. State and local governments use zoning laws to determine what land can be used for to prevent things like that from happening. And they are quite good at it. It only gets screwed up when Uncle Sam sticks his finger into it. I'd dispute that one a bit. States and local governments in the U.S. can and have screwed these kinds of things up for decades, largely because ecological effects don't particularly care about jurisdictional borders. For example, Maryland has been dealing with problems in the Chesapeake similar to the ones you mentioned earlier w/r/t the Everglades. But a chief source of the agricultural runoff was coming down the Susquehanna from Pennsylvania, which didn't have much incentive to police its own farmers aggressively for the benefit of ecology and commerce outside its borders. (Rust-belt coal-fired power plants causing acid rain in the Northeast is another example that springs to mind.) Press coverage and public anger can overcome these problems by putting pressure on the states and local governments where the emissions are happening, but federal action (e.g., regulations under the Clean Water Act) is a much surer way to correct externality-based market failures like this when the externalities aren't all contained in one jurisdiction. Oh no arguments there. In fact in an earlier post I mentioned it was all together appropriate for the Federal government to act in situations such as these. There are a few court cases I listed where financial/punative damages were sought and awarded by affected states against offending parties that fell under the jurisdiction of other states. By and large though, the regulation of land use in a particular state or community is best left to the governing body of that state or community.

I don't disagree but then I've been saying for this entire thread that is a good application of government power. Do you actually read what Im posting? State and local governments are made up of people from that state and communities. They are the most accesible, most reactive, and as a rule know the history and needs of their constituients far better than faceless burecrats on the other side of the country in DC. You can pick up the phone and call a state rep and they will talk to you. Try that with a congressman. State governments hire civil, agricultural, mining, and enviormental engineers to assist with policy. The Federal government does not. You do know that 99% of federal legislation is written by lobbyists right? Also state and local governments do not run farms. People do. Businesses do. All the government does is provide a regulatory framework but it should come from the government closest to the community who understands the land, enviorment, people and needs of the community. And who is most accountable to the community their policies affect. Like I said it works well until Uncle Sam gets involved. If you had actually read any of the examples I've posted you would see where I was coming from.

In North America (Canada, US & Mexico) fisheries ARE regulated. Overfishing is not really a serious problem here. If the fish population begins to suffer they simply restrice the seasons or catch limits or even suspend a season entirely. Certain areas have been restricted for fishing for a season or two. It is a system that works pretty well because all three contries particiapte in it. I can not answer for how it is done elsewhere but that really does not happen here. State and local governments use zoning laws to determine what land can be used for to prevent things like that from happening. And they are quite good at it. It only gets screwed up when Uncle Sam sticks his finger into it. The problem there is that government officials are somewhat skilled and proficient at being government officials. However, being that puts them into a position to create laws and policy on theings the are utterly ignorant about. My time working with these people has lead me to two conclusions in that direction. 1) Elected officials actually do believe they are wiser and more informed about everything that anyone else just because they are an elected official. This leads well meaning people to do incredibly destructive and harmful things. It also lends purpose to evil people to do harmful and destructive things. 2) If you try to convince one of them they are wrong about something they will automaticly ignore your facts, figures, logic, and reason and dismiss everything you are saying because they figure you have a political axe to grind. It never occurs to them they arrived at their conclusions because THEY have a political axe to grind. Most elected officials assume eveyone is political and therefore all facts are open to political intepretations. Smarter government would be great, if only there was some way to get it and keep it. Until then I'll settle for smaller government.

I have a date on Saturday. First one in...oh five months at least. She's a English & European Literature teacher in Millington HS and she teaches night classes at Shelby County CC. I don't think I'll tell her I'm writing a book, she would probably laugh.

She didn't invite you to stay? Bummer. Better luck Saturday tho.

Gotcha. What it boils down to is that you are a little pessimistic by nature and that colors how you see things. I can hardly fault you for that, like that Jimmy Buffet song says "We've got a lot to drink about".

Well, Torment, Baldur's Gate 1 & 2 and Icewind Dale all got me through my divorce. Those plus liberal helpings of Makers Mark (when I could afford it, Jim Beam when money was tight). I'd think it was fair to say I was addicted to those games at that time. Not because they were high quality or engrossing but because my circumstances were so rotten I needed the escape they provided. Isn't that really what addiction is all about, using something as a vehicle to escape from your problems? Good video games can do that. We're not talking Tetris here, these games all have charaters you can relate to and interact with after a fashion. Of course it's never healthy when those interactions start interferring with or even substituting for real life. Maybe that is a good angle to take in your discussion. They are not physical addictions in the way that drugs and alchohol can become, where your body becomes dependent on something for chemical balance but a psychological additction is nearly as strong.

I suspect you and I will never find much common ground on this subject. I do find it curious that you do not trust people to do the right thing when they are assembled in corporations but somehow think the exact same people will do the right thing when they are assembled in governments. I will never understand that. Governments are short sighted, arrogant, ignorant, and wasteful just like business can be because all of them are run by people. How do you trust one but not the other? Yes I read your platitudes about it being the role of government to look out for the good of the people in a perfect world. Well, reality is light years from perfect and I hope you are not so naieve as to think that it isn't.

Once again I cannot answer for how it is done elsewhere but in the US and Canada commercial fishing is restricted to certain seasons. It is specifically desiged to give the fish time to school, spawn and mature. In Alaska the crab season is just six weeks long. This is all done to manage the fish populations and to prevent overfishing. In Florida lobster season is just 13 weeks, Stone Crab season is short, all sport & commercial fishing seasons are finite leanths. Just down the road from me is over 10000 acres of timber land owned and managed by Georgia Pacific Co. Every seven years or so they cut down every single tree then replant the whole 10000 acres with pine saplings. Seven years later they repeat the cycle. The big commercial cotton farms south of Memphis always have a certain percentage of their fields lying fallow. Plus you do realize a good portion of the fish and all of the beef/chicken/pork consumed in North America is farm raised now. As far as freshwater fish is concerened, commercial fishing no longer exists, it far more cost effective to simply raise them. Many saltwater hatcheries are popping up, especially in the northwest. You guys seem to think there is no conservation going on. Nothing could be farther from the truth. When you find examples of evil corporations despoiling the land it is the exception, not the rule. In fact I would say far more harm is done by well meaning but ignorant government officials and enviormentalists. The regulations these companies are operatig under are a mixed bag of state and federal but the majority of it comes from state governments. Like I said, that is all together appropriate and it not an overreach, until the federal governemnt steps in and screws everyone over, like all the examples I've listed.

Wow, America bashing on an obsidian thread. How f-----g original. We're all stupid, we're all uneducated, we don't understand how the world works, yadda yadda yadda. I have a feeling I've read this all before...

Agreed Ok, I think this is an important point to discuss but I'm at work right now and can't give it the resonse it deserves because of time contraints. But, in short your two examples are flawed because 1) No one has ownership of fisheries becasue it is well settled here and elsewhere, property lines end at the waters edge. Therefore activites such as fishing are subject to regulation by whatever government entity they fall near (state for lases rivers and within a certain distance of the shore on the ocean, federal beyond on bordering on federal management areas). This is all together proper and appropirate for the reasons I listed before. 2) A mishandled private farm can no more starve the people than I could. If a farm is mismanaged it goes out of business. Sometimes that is just a small red mark on a corporate blotter, sometimes it means a family loses their land and home. In every case it ends with the farm being sold to somone else who will probably do better. Crop rotation, land stewardship, it's all a part of succesful agriculture and and that is one of the few things the US has done right over the years. Whenever the federal government gets involved, all that happens is everything gets screwed up and the "enviorment" still suffers. Ok, case in point. This was a big issue I took an unpopular stand on in my political career. There was a proposal in Florida to pass a $.01 per pound (yes we still measure that way for some reason) tax on all sugar produced in Florida (FL produces more sugar than any other state except Hawaii). The plan was to use the money to finance the clean up of the Florida Everglades. Now it was a fact that the everglades were suffering because of sugar farming. For over 100 years sugar growers had been using phosphorus base fertilizer on their fields. That was just how it was done, no one knew any better. The problem was the run off waer from these farms was phosphorus laden and when it entered the Everglades Waterway it cause an explosion of alge growth. The alge depeted the oxygen in the water which caused fish to die by the millions. What's worse the water entered the Gulf of Mexico and caused the infamous Red Tide fish kills that made world news back in the 80s & 90s. Once it was determined what the cause was the law banning phosphate based fertilizer was passed by the Floida Legislature and US Sugar (the big evil corporation in this fairy tale) had already voluntarily eliminated its use. Now, the everglades still needed restoration. So the proposal for the "Sugar Tax" was popular because the price of sugar was fixed by subsidy, therefore the cost of the tax could not be passed on to the consumer (which is what usually happens). I was against it, I wrote a paper opposing it, campaigned against it and of course everyone assumes it was because I was anti-enviormental or some shill for evil "big business". I hear that a lot on this board lately. But I had really good reasons for opposing it and it was all based on one simple fact, In the 1990s US Sugar earned $.0015 on every pound of sugar it produced. The tax would drive them out of business because it could not compete with other companies if it was forced to produce at break even money. I was partially correct. The tax failed the first time it was proposed in 1996. The voters of Florida had the good sense to realize what would happen. It later passed as a federal tax by congressional act. US Sugar shut down everywhere in south Florida. The only sugar farms left were around Belle Glade and Clewiston. The towns of Immokalee, La Belle, Pahokee, Indiantown, Lake Placid, and Andytown were plunged into poverty and unemployment. These were thriving communities. US Sugar moved the bulk of it's operations to the Bahamas. The land was parceled up and sold. Some of it became vegtable farms, most was plowed up paved over and houses built on it. A large portion was built out for industrial use. Now instead of hundreds of miles of green we have houses, sewage, buildings, pollution from cars, people, etc. All to solve a problem that had already been solved. This is almost ALWAYS what happens when the federal government steps in. As a sort of happy ending the state of Florida passed a bond in 2008 to buy up the land around Bell Glade with the closure of the mill in Bryant. That will at least prevent more enviormental damage from more houses and such but it will never bring the folks who worked there there lives and homes back.

Keeping on a philisophical level here because you and I do agree some level of regulation is appropriate, do you trust government to look out for the long term viability of business? You already conceeded that business only looks out for iteslf, to enrich itself. Don't you expect government to behave in exactly the same way, only look to empower itself, and empower and enrich the people who run it?