Will he lead by example?

Once this downturn really gets going where do the governments begin to cut. I was doing some recent reading on which the zeal of enforcing Prohibition waned then died as the GD really got going in 33. How does the war on drugs fare as this goes forward? How much money is spent yearly on that fight that might not be available?

Somewhere in San Pedro, Gray Davis is doing a little jig.

No way does this actually happen. I bet the stimbamalus package throws more than a few billions to the states.

If they don't want to cut during bad times, they should not splurge when the tax revenues go up.

A lot of couties and cities werev already doing this ...

Everybody goes broke slowly rather than some people alll at once ...

On the Clock --

Yeah, it's the whole wage/price spiral in reverse.

Pretty soon, not only will you get paid less, but also the money won't buy as much. That is called "Keynesian policy response".

Pretty soon, not only will you get paid less, but also the money won't buy as much. That is called "Keynesian policy response".

~~~~

And there is still 50 trillion in aggregate debt looming out there.

Empty threat.  By Feburary the State will be illiquid.  Actually They don't have enough for January so a Feb threat is doubly hollow.  Sacramento is still clueless, they just don't understand the electorate.  I take that back, they unstand the electorate, they vastly misunderstand the taxpayer.  In California like few place else those are not congruent.  Those of us who pay are not going to pay what they expect.  The Golden State is planning on killing the Golden Goose. 

10% pay cuts. Isn't that deflationary?

But if we took this opportunity to cut drug prosecutions and reduce the prison population maybe something good could come out of this.

nemo, are you really Prof. krugman?

Yes! I'm also Nouriel Roubini, Joseph Stiglitz, and Peter Schiff. And Larry Kudlow.

(Have you ever seen two of us together at once? Case closed.)

Here's a link to the letter to state employees:

Cutbacks

Part of this is a negotiating tactic. This will end up as an either/or. Will the unions prefer pay cuts for everyone, or layoffs for a minority? Sophie's choice.

rob dawg,
I'm with nemo, The Obama admin is going to shovel money to the states
billyboy | 12.19.08 - 7:53 pm | #
Absolutely.  California needs $20b to carry through to April tax reciepts. Just exactly what guarantees do we need to make?  The problem isn't revenue, it is spending.  There literally isn't enough money to deal with California's structural problems. 

Wage and benefit concessions will be widespread by the end of 2009, I'm convinced.

~~~~

And there still will be $50 trillion in aggregate debt looming out there.

"Those of us who pay are not going to pay what they expect. The Golden State is planning on killing the Golden Goose.
Rob Dawg | Homepage | 12.19.08 - 7:51 pm | # "

Nobody's presented the voters with hard choices in years -- golden goose is the wrong metaphor. Having your cake and eating it, too, is the right one. So they've been pandered to, and lied to, and now the pols are afraid to try to speak straight to them.

And it'll take a bigger man than Arnold to do it -- or woman. We'll just go down the tubes until the pain gets big enough and the electorate, shocked out of their blissful stupor, will see things clearly and make a decision. Which may be different than what either you or I might hope for.

Nancy will make him.
mmckinl | 12.19.08 - 7:54 pm | #

There are an awful lot of new incoming congressmen.  Does Nacy win?

Will the unions prefer pay cuts for everyone, or layoffs for a minority? Sophie's choice.

Based on my experience, unions will accept layoffs and early retirements for the few to protect wages for the many.

At the local level there are many bargaining groups, and they don't play nice together. They throw each other under the bus.

now the pols are afraid to try to speak straight to them.
Bob Dobbs | Homepage | 12.19.08 - 8:00 pm | #

What?  When did it start?  Oh,  Biden.

Ahhnold does not draw a salary from his job as governor...maybe we got what we paid for...I just wish he could pronounce the name of our state correctly....

How does the war on drugs fare as this goes forward? Seeeing as how the DEA has become institutionalized, and too many jobs depend upon its support, as well as prison guards, counselors, parole officers, no reduction in the war on drugs will occur until there is a reduction in the dominant puritanical attutudes under which this country labors.
001

Many states are going to be forced to release the 'user' druggies put in prison for long terms because the cost of prisons isn't tolerable in bad times economically. This is to the good, IMO, because prison has become a business and major occupation that is probably negatively productive to society.

The prison guards (and the cost of prisons) are going to object, and they have the testicles of the male legislators and the children of the female legislators. I'd bet 30% of the prison population could be released or released into drug programs without a blip of public security.

American Honda cancels "2009 Honda Hoot" due to economic uncertainty. FYI, the third-largest annual motorcycle rally in N. America. The Hoot is one of Honda's biggest sales events in the US.

This comes after announcing no new models and pulling out of Formula I racing and they're considering pulling out of Moto GP racing. Sport motorcycle sales in the US revolve around who's participating in Moto GP.

See "Road Racing World," December 19, quoting press release.

Does anyone sense a problem here?

A Honda spokesman in Japan said, "More than we imagined, the economic crisis has had an influence on what we do."

See "Motorcycle News," December 9, 2008.

God Shammgod | 12.19.08 - 7:56 pm

Good point.

Supposedly people have been sitting on the sidelines as far purchasing Christmas presents. So in the last week or so we have heard:

Chrysler is toast. All their suppliers know this. The people working in these plants see the drops in what is going on. GM same. Nissan and Toyota down south are seeing the same thing.

The Hedge fund and Madoff is not going to register. The MSM which is doing stories on the billions going to bonuses will.

The CA 2 days without pay will definetly register. Since CA is so huge retail sales will feel it. Almost every state and county employee will be paying attention.

My translation: Retail is really, really going to suck. So will the loss of those sales taxes.

Coke and hookers.

Nah - that's New York. In CA it's raw food retreats and meditation labyrinths.

Going back to the last thread about commodities and precious metals, I'd like to say that I really do value the consensus opinion on this board. So, if several informed regulars think gold will tank, I do consider what they are saying.

I think they are wrong, but I will allow their argument has merit.

I do monitor all commodities daily. It was very interesting that both USO (oil) and GDX (PM miners) both rallied into the close after weakness earlier.

I also look at the futures contract structure, which is vastly different now for oil (deep contango) and gold (verging on backwardation). Contango means glut; backwardation means hoarding. Historically, it's usually been exactly the opposite, with backwardation in energy and contango in PMs.

I am very long PMs now and have done great with them the last two weeks. But if energy weakens from here, I'll be moving some PM money into energy. I still believe in food, which had been doing well until today, and soon I'll probably heavy up on base metals.

If you have a mid- to long-term horizon, you can't go wrong with commodities. They are real and the world needs as much of them as it can get.

Think real, not paper. I'll let you know what I think.

and what percent of CA jobs are govt? Lets say 10%. SO, 10% of 10% is 1% of CA income toast. That will work REAL well for the budget and the economy in general.

There was once this movie with Sean Young and some blond guy...Kevin something...maybe he should have been governor.

We'll know a lot more about California in January ...

~~~

And it will be worse.

I could live with a 25% paycut, and I make like 1/10th what you mandarins make.
jeff | 12.19.08 - 7:48 pm | #

Does that mean we are oranges that come in little cans?

What about hard work and top notch education to invent and produce the products of the future ?

~~~~

No where to work , education is too expensive and products don't sell in a world wide depression.

CA prison guards:

Division of Adult Institutions, responsible for the adult prisons, and Division of Adult Parole Operations. These have a 2006/07 budget of $8.75 billion and 57,641 employees, of which 32,772 are sworn peace officers.[9]

California State Prisons

Avenal State Prison (ASP)
California Correctional Center (CCC)
California Correctional Institution (CCI)
California Institution for Men (CIM)
California Institution for Women (CIW)
California Medical Facility (CMF)
California Men's Colony (CMC)
California Rehabilitation Center (CRC)
California State Prison, Centinela (CEN)
California State Prison, Corcoran (COR)
California State Prison, Los Angeles County (LAC)
California State Prison, Sacramento (SAC)
California State Prison, Solano (SOL)
California Substance Abuse Treatment Facility and State Prison, Corcoran (SATF)
Calipatria State Prison (CAL)
Central California Women's Facility (CCWF)
Chuckawalla Valley State Prison (CVSP)
Correctional Training Facility (CTF)
Deuel Vocational Institution (DVI)
Folsom State Prison (FSP)
High Desert State Prison (HDSP)
Ironwood State Prison (ISP)
Kern Valley State Prison (KVSP)
Mule Creek State Prison (MCSP)
North Kern State Prison (NKSP)
Pelican Bay State Prison (PBSP)
Pleasant Valley State Prison (PVSP)
Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility at Rock Mountain (RJD)
Salinas Valley State Prison (SVSP)
San Quentin State Prison (SQ)
Sierra Conservation Center (SCC)
Valley State Prison for Women (VSPW)
Wasco State Prison - Reception Center (WSP)

Contrast:
- Within the 98,000 square miles that make up the Oregon landscape
- Just over 3.7 million people make up the population of this diverse state.
- Oregon State Police has 580 sworn personnel and approximately 700 non-sworn personnel working in 39 offices throughout the state.

I'd sure rather have more officers on patrol than prison guards for MJ/coke possession in these coming hard times.

Werner,

Deine Mama fickt für Busgeld und geht trotzdem zu Fuß

und

Dir hat wohl einer in's Hirn geschissen und vergessen zu ziehen!

Go Home.

If you disagree, please provide an alternative...
Anonymous

~~~~~

Medicare for All ...

Currency and credit as a public utility ...

Electrification of transportation...

Tax reform with higher taxes on all income, treat all income as regular income and reciprocal trade agreements.

but, it won't happen.

Folks, this little stink bomb was entirely expected. It's the gov's way to clear a lot of heads of the interested parties.

If you look at what he intends... He wants reductions from the entitities that receive State General Funds. If true, this brings an interesting complication to the reduction process.

There are two entities that receive NO general funds: CPUC and Energy Comm'n. Some others receive lion's share of their total budgets from Fed sources (Rehabilitation, ~78%; Education ~? and Transportation ~50%).

In particular, Transportation ("Caltrans") is going to need to be fully staffed in order to shovel Cali's share of the pending Infrastructure Investment Bailout (Super-TARP) into the highway and transit projects that are being lined up.

I see this as a double-threat. Not only is Ahnold threatening the State's legislators, he's also threatening the state's congress-people. The most visible items a cong-prsn can deliver to the home district is transport/transit projects. If these are delayed, some newly-minted cong-prsns are going to look like they failed to deliver to their voters, especially if other states are able to translate their cash-backs into delivered projects sooner.

This "memo" just puts the point on his "requests" for federal assistance with the state's budget.

ChefVisar | 12.19.08 - 8:30 pm

Is this Arnold or are his advisors that good?

No one, and I repeat, no one gets out alive...

~~~~

The truly wealthy already have their luxury bunkers ... it's a whole industry now.

Obama has only one thing that he can promise to the states: he can offer them funding to be paid for by future taxes. In other words, he can offer them your time and labor.
Once that is promised, your personal possibilities are diminished by that amount. Have fun.
wally | 12.19.08 - 8:26 pm | #

They can also increase the money supply and funnel to the states [instead of the banks]. Now which of the two is more likely to hoard?

wally writes:
"I bet the stimbamalus package throws more than a few billions to the states

With a wild guesstimate of 2009 state budget shortages Obama will need 100B a year. Then add in state pension funds...

ova:

Wie sagt Man 'Busgeld' auf Anglisch?

something 'money'?

The problem with the governor's brinksmanship is that he has the weak hand.  The teacher's union runs primary and secondary education and has no qualms in tweaking parents with draconian tactics.  Likewise the CHP can and will adopt strict enforcement and labor rules.  Nothing like a few thousand 56mph speeding tickets to explain the situation to the populace.  California spends too much on personell and nowhere near enough on infrastructure.  This isn't going to change within the existing political structure.  There's an even more ominous issue of regional conflict.  There's the two megapolitan areas of SF and LA and the rest of the State. 

Hhmmm....I've always found Austrians much more friendly than Germans (with the possible exceptions of Hitler and Freud).

Austrian--Nice people! Kinda like the 'Germans who act more like Italians.' (Although you can add the guy who kept his daughter in the cellar to the earlier list). Tschuß!

As to education, good. T.A. Edison e.g. did not have good education.
And look what he did !!!
Werner

~~~

The low hanging fruit of invention has already been picked.

tg:

what the heck is a
'dope i

dryfly writes:

"Does that mean we are oranges that come in little cans?"

My Satsumos are ripening quite nicely, thank you. Enjoyed the first two of the season this morning.

Samdog - fave people who came from Austria:

Feyerabend
Popper
Buber
Wittgenstein

C

Basically, California is GM. The voters are the UAW, unwilling to give up the entitlements they think they "earned" and the politican/executives are so hamstrung by prior bad choices that there no viable options now.
serf hopeinsd | 12.19.08 - 8:54 pm | #

Except California is GM as  ESOP.

Ummm...tg? Was that for me?

Kinda hard to follow, but let me give it some thought.

My Satsumos are ripening quite nicely, thank you. Enjoyed the first two of the season this morning.
Comrade V

MMM, I had never had them until I moved to Florida, exquisite.

mmckinl:

do you see martial law in our near-future?

As most of you know, I am a San Diego area municiple police officer. Our city, like every other city in the county or state for that matter, is facing serious budget issues. Our union is going around and around with our city council, and we have just agreed to give (postpone) our next year's raises in lieu of a threat to lay off dozens of officers. The golden parachute was offered again (second time this year) to those close to retirment, so the strategy is to get them off the city's dole and onto CalPer's. My wife, who works for the county, is also getting constant budget related news. They face serious shortfalls and golden parachutes abound at her work.

No one has made the move to actually lay off public safety people. But the threat to (like Arnold's threat) has gotten employees and their unions to start conceeding raises and other perks.

We all hope and pray that we don't lose 3% at 50 retirement...but I don't see how they don't try to take it away...it amounts to a back breaker for the taxpayer longterm.

There is no way we are at bottom, because all govt agencies are pussyfooting around and havent been forced to make real decisions. Come this next fiscal year July 2009, you will see the sh$t hit the fan and the next leg down in unemployement and the economy will come.

However, it would be easy for the Fed to simply inject money into all the state's coffers and make them instantly solvent. This would prevent jobloss, amount to a stimulous package, would begin to reflate the deflating bubble, and save politicians from actually making hard choices. If they could magically make digits appear in the bank accounts of the states, much of the worst problems will be avoided. Since Bernanke has said they will do anything to avoid deflation....I think printing money in the form of simply adding a zero or two to state's reserves qualifies as "anything".

Yep. Has anyone heard that Paulson & Co dropped the 'martial law' bomb to get the $700B?

Yep. Has anyone heard that Paulson & Co dropped the 'martial law' bomb to get the $700B?
Samdog

~~~~

Again ?

I remember hearing about the "martial law" bomb when it happened. One Congressman discussed how his colleagues had told him of that very conversation. People told me was a conspiracy theorist at the time...

Samdog - No Mozart. Too complex, and doesn't work on my tonal preference.

Anonymous - on Arendt? Are you baiting me?

More next comment.

C

Rob Dawg writes:
DMV consumes nearly all the fees collected with operations.

~~~~

Does that include registration fees? I thought tat was one reason we were in this mess was the lowering of reg fees.

I like Mozart--but very old school. Beethoven's more original.

mmckinl, it's true, don't you remember the Congressman that came forward that same week? Wish I could remember his name, but he said other Congressmen had told me of that conversation. It was downplayed by the press and didn't get much traction in the blogosphere but it is exactly why they got it passsed the second time.

That's 'quo

To that comment on prisons.

If anyone thinks eliminating prisons will save money they are smoking crack.

The prisons are either full of very violent people...and there are alot of them in California, or they are full of druggies.

The cost to house a prisoner for a year is about 50 grand or so. Now, the cost to support a drug habit is way way way more than that. And, if you pay for the habit by having them steal something you paid $500 bucks for and sell it for $20, then it gets even more expensive.

The prisons are full of people that are rotated in and out over and over. Each time they go in, they consume time and effort, court time, probation time, police time etc. It's much cheaper to put them in and keep them there than to let them out and let them cause thousands of dollars of damage, not to mention violence and death, so we can work our butts off to catch them again and prosecute them.

When they are out of prison, they befriend others and teach them their criminal ways, they impregnate strangers and leave kids in their path that need welfare and suffer abuse and neglect only to grow up criminals.

If I only paid taxes for one thing. It would be for prisons.

Anonymous writes:
I have only one question...

OK, but a lot of this stuff is rhetorical. I think most people know there are definite advantages to preserving the order, but I'm only speaking for myself...

Samdog - I go back a bit further to baroque. That's how I've lived to the ripe old age of 375...

On the Arendt front, there's way to much banality of evil going on, and far too little natality.

C

Comrade Kristina writes:
LOL mmckinl, we are the United Sachs of Goldman America...

~~~~

No, they are ... we are just peons ...

Comrade Kristina writes:
LOL mmckinl, we are the United Sachs of Goldman America...
Comrade Kristina

Good one--and I'm glad you remember the martial law business...interesting point that it was downplayed.

Paulson used the martial law comments in a Congressional conference call Sept 19th Congressmen Inohofe, Sherman and Burgess confirmed. 

Comrade Kristina writes:
mmckinly, here is an article on it from the time. Now the right has picked it up and Worldnut is carrying it. When we were bringing it up we were told we were moonbats, go figure.

~~~~

The right has been sidelined, they'll do anything to get traction right about now.

It's All Corporatocracy Now Baby ... the right and the left are out of business.

Sadly, you are correct mmckinl. I've been shouting it to the rooftops for awhile. One thing Barack is definately correct about, until such time as we all work together, change is near impossible. The left and the right and everything inbetween needs to get their acts together...

serf hopeinsd writes:

"California's problem that in its political systems voters are required to make the hard choices, and they just can't do it."

As RE points out, Cali voters are not monolithic. Rob Dawg has it right, everyone gets to vote but not everyone pays. The propositions put on the ballot are engineered to exploit this seperation between choice and consequence.

Gotta go--my daughter's calling. She's only seven (great stuff that Viagra....)

"So they've been pandered to, and lied to, and now the pols are afraid to try to speak straight to them."

He also insists on running his office out of LA rather than the capitol. I'm fairly confident that that luxury costs the state vastly more than the salary he forgoes.

Anyhow California's problem, in more ways than one, is prop 13.

It simultaneously accentuates housing bubbles, gives the insane 1/3 minority party a veto over the budget, and destabilizes the tax base by minimizing the weight of property taxes.

All three of its main effects are feeding into California's recurring and current problems.

At a deeper level the problem is the bad state constitution, which can be amended by a simple majority vote giving us various bad laws (like prop 13).

"The US places more people in prison on a per capital basis than any other !st world nation"

This is CRAP. These are the SAME people counted over and over as they go through the revolving door.

A door that is heavily used precisely because it is revolving.

Even IF we have too many prisoners it is only because we have too many people willing to stick a gun to a person's side and demand money, or steal a car, rob a bank, or stab another gang member.

Remember these people aren't in Prison because they are innocent. If we have too many prisoners it's not by accident! And you don't solve it by fewer prisons! In fact, if we put more people in prison for longer we'd need fewer of them.

But this is too hard a concept for people to understand.

Prison is a symptom, not a cause. You don't reduce those who deserve prison by reduce prison space.

Every druggy in prison is only there for drugs because they couldn't catch him while he was burglarizing your house or stealing your car. They are burglars for 5 minutes a day...they are druggies ALL day long...

Try supporting ONE druggie on your salary and you'll realize these guys are NOT paying for their own sh#t. It's coming from you one way or another.

I also brew beer, wine, cider & mead for the household, which saves a few pennies too.
Joanna

~~~~

Marry me ?

heh, wrong quote... I meant to quote the one about the governator's $1 salary!

Currently Accounting writes:

"To be fair, Arnold did try to head this off in 2005:"

That was one of the worse run political campaigns I have ever seen. The unions crushed him with all their adds of pretty uniforms.

Comrade Kristina writes:
RE, perhaps people need to stop breeding at such an alarming rate?

~~~~~

Peoples best weapon against servitude ... low birth rates ...

cs, you sure know how to get a girl all tingly on a Friday night!

RE, perhaps people need to stop breeding at such an alarming rate?
Comrade Kristina | 12.19.08 - 9:39 pm | #

I firmly believe that computers will win this race no matter what breeding rate we have.

"The US places more people in prison on a per capital basis than any other !st world nation"

This is CRAP. These are the SAME people counted over and over as they go through the revolving door.

No, it's the percentage of population in prison at any given time. We are totally off the charts compared to any other developed nation.

Every druggy in prison is only there for drugs because they couldn't catch him while he was burglarizing your house or stealing your car.

We all know the equation - if drugs are illegal, people commit illegal acts to get them. If they aren't, they don't. If marijuana or opium were legal, there wouldn't be people stealing to get them, just as they don't for alcohol and cigarettes today.

And, no, there are a lot of people in jail for drugs who have not committed violent crime or burglary. I know two people who got sent to jail via sting operations.

Look for a higher and stronger safety net with reductions in working hours and retirement benefits.
mmckinl | 12.19.08 - 9:00 pm | #

And probably less total wealth in aggregate but a more even distribution of what wealth there is.

I think that is where we are heading politically today - willing to accept less in aggregate to be certain we [each of us] gets something individually ourselves. It is a huge 'c' change from where we were 10-20 years ago but not unlike where we were in the past - say 40s and 50s.  Things cycle.

cs, what else do we have?

Jacked said,

"Prisons are the result of failed social programs/political agendas and a very real threat to trying to solve problems by warehousing them."

I almost agree 100%.

Warehousing them though we are not doing. We are sending them there temporarily just long enough to make their coming back into society impossible.

If they were truly warehoused, they'd be unable to get out, procreate, commit more crime, recruit others, and stand as example to their community that there are no consequences.

There are alot of reasons that we have so many people that belong in prison...but that doesn't make them any nicer or safer, and it isn't because we have alot of prisons.

Trust me, by the time they get to prison...the vast majority have been arrested many times and have committed themselves to a life of crime.

I think that is where we are heading politically today - willing to accept less in aggregate to be certain we [each of us] gets something individually ourselves.

"From each according to his ability, to each according to his need"

K. Marx

Why aren't there a greater proportion of rich white males in rape-my-ass prison? Plenty of them commit crimes more deplorable than "possession".

Because the SEC is asleep at the wheel.

Your local beat cop can only combat street crime. When your rich white males start jacking old ladies for 20 bucks...then you may see a change.

Comrade V,

That's comming...it really is.

Those of us grandfathered in will live off the retirement contributions of those that follow us. Sound familiar?

I also brew beer, wine, cider & mead for the household, which saves a few pennies too.
Joanna

Where can I get some mead not too expensive? I would pay up to maybe $6 a quart.

Comrade K,

Touche.

The real trend I see is less and less freedom. We've given up control of our lives for the illusion of security.

I could list a litany of reasons and rest stops along the slippery slope, but it all boils down to the fact that the average "born and bred dope" (tm Jas) doesn't want to fight for their freedom.

We've grown too comfortable, and too affluent to fight back.

Maybe a good depression will change that.

cs, I don't disagree. I just grow weary with the "Socialist" bashing, especially by "Christians". I have to believe in my heart, somewhere in the middle there is a compromise that works for all.

Average Joe, I've followed your comments here for a long time, and I respect your views.

I've always guessed that legalizing most drugs would reduce the crime that drugs create. What are your thoughts?

Prop 13 is the only law that keeps the State from taking property from the poorest by raising taxes on property. There are a lot of poor homeowners and there will be lots more soon.

If you think the poorest own real estate anywhere in the US, never mind overpriced California, you lead a very sheltered existence.

Doc at the Radar Station - great quote from Popper.

My grandfather had a battle royal with Popper in the late 40s. Granpa, as a Prof of mechanical engineering, thought he was a fool, a fraud and a pseud. Thought some of the visionary stuff was ridiculous, and that he'd moved waaaay too far from evidently valid hard empiricism and the natural order of the superiority of revealed truth of hard sciences vs the nuance of historicism, due relative perspective, and (horrors!) commenting on the interface of science and political economy...

Granpa was delighted that I was heading into academia in the early 90s before he found more time to be with his soul.

Oops. Wonder what he'd make of my path...

C

CC, were gangs dealing in Coca
Cola back then? I'm guessing not, the local Fountain Shop handled it...People as a collective lose knowledge from generation to generation.

If drugs are legal, they still aren't affordable...especially for a unproductive druggy.

That's flat nonsense. The common drugs are all cheap when legal, and even the destitute can be addicted without serious criminality - winos in the US today; opium smokers in 19th century china; hashish smokers in India; coca leaf chewers in the Andes.

Anonymous - c'mon, are you going to hang together or hang separately?

Can you be on my team?

C

werner, good commentary. Thanks for the insight and the honesty. Sometimes truth is inconvenient to a worldview driven by ideology or principles - whatever you call fixed preconceptions - rather than by the bare facts.

Thanks Fair Economist. Do you happen to know, even roughly, what the overall population's addiction rates were in the examples you gave of entire countries that had fully legalized drugs?

What I am trying to understand is: If the criminality was low, was the unarguable damage to society (in lost human potential and productivity etc) very high, or medium, or low?

Fair Economist writes:

"If you think the poorest own real estate anywhere in the US, never mind overpriced California, you lead a very sheltered existence."

I believe his comment was relative to others in California. Unless you are famaliar with Cali, it is huge and diverse, and the folks in the back country live a very different life than what you imagine based on coastal metro areas. Try visiting Hemmet, e.g. Ever been to Baker (not Bakersfield)?

I mention Meth and Crack because those are, in reality, the only drugs that are filling the prisons with criminals.

FairEconomist has a point...but Im sure he only learned how it "used to be" from reading a book. Go on a ride-along with a cop someday...you may be shocked at how others very close to you are living their day to day lives...and when you see the children and how they have to grow up, you'll want to throw their parents in jail just for being terrible parents.

Werner, you're starting to win me over.

So, the system actually is "dynamic", and the real game is that the game always changes until human imagination is exhausted.
So, the only thing being constant is change.
Werner | 12.19.08 - 9:58 pm | #

Werner,

I don't actually think so.  Automation/robotics is a game changer that outmodes human ability.  I simply cannot see human ability keep pace with Moore's law.  Your version of events will only happen if "artificial evolution" is constraint.  I personally don't bet on it.

RE, werner is, I think, right about the endless human capacity for invention and the endless nature of change.

I've been a student of history for over 30 years, and this is one lesson I have learned over and over again - that change is forever!

Even in my own lifetime, I grew up in a Europe split in two by an apparently permanent wall - gone. China was that hostile, ideological, and economically backward sleeping giant in Asia, and would always be thus -transformed.... There's lots more.

Werner writes:

"NO! Definitely not. He did not hook up with IBM, he bought it from IBM who owned the code (and possibly that company who wrote that code)"

I suggest you have it backwards, Gates licensed it TO IBM for use in its first PC. In the singular biggest business mistake IBM ever made, they agreed to pay a per copy royalty instead of a fixed fee. That was the making of MS. When IBM tried to introduce their own OS years later to compete with MS/DOS, they found they couldn't wean the DOS users away.

RE, werner is, I think, right about the endless human capacity for invention and the endless nature of change.
patientrenter | 12.19.08 - 10:59 pm | #

I am not disagreeing with his premise.  The human race is quite adaptable.  However, from my perspective it doesn't stand a chance to compete in the technology race, i.e. with Moore's law.  Hence my point about the "commoditization of labor".  You can observe that very easily today in manufacturing as dryfly points out time after time.  The real number of jobs are not anymore in manufacturing but in white collar.  Automation and robotics have caused a displacement further up the intelligence scale.  It is now a race. 

If a computer can beat a chess champion one on one whereas when I started in the biz that was considered a fantasy, realizable but very far in the future.  Playing chess takes a high form  of "intelligence".  Most humans do not have that level of readily implementable intelligence.  However, in the automation field that level of intelligence is a cheap commodity item worth a few dollar and replicated at ease.

I suggest you have it backwards, Gates licensed it TO IBM for use in its first PC. In the singular biggest business mistake IBM ever made, they agreed to pay a per copy royalty instead of a fixed fee.
Comrade V | 12.19.08 - 11:08 pm | #

You are exactly correct though I think that the single biggest mistake was made by Gary Kildall from Digital Research (as pointed out above) when he snubbed IBM.  CPM-86 was a much better and vastly more mature operating system than QDOS and reasonably well tested by then.  I used it for quite a while.

zendiet, you may not be a long-time reader here, but if you were, you would recognize that Average Joe is no narrow-minded ideologue.

"btw, how do you guys pay that down?
Any serious plans ?
(serious, I said, not the typical CR-blog crap of e.g.: never, etc. )"

Inflation if they can pull it off, default otherwise.
There are no other options.

Average Joe: as much as we may disagree on the single issue of drug policy, I too echo thanks to you and your collegues for your valued service. And the troubling times notwithstanding, may you and yours enjoy the best of holidays.

Boss stamping feet impatiently for movie to begin.

Pissed off in Califonia - I'll do Glen Branca instead (!).

But rightabout now, I'm doing this... a liddle revolution:

YouTube - Spacemen 3 - Revolution

C