RadioBanter - View Single Post - BTW Stevie were watch the news lately about NASA

October 8th 05, 04:27 PM

wrote:
Mike Coslo wrote:

wrote:

K4YZ wrote:

wrote:

K4YZ wrote:

"We" are busy selling our hats to each other at the
moment. "We" don't
have a national will to do great things any more.

"We" had the national will to fight a couple of wars in the Persian
Gulf. Plus Afghanistan, Bosnia, etc. Whether those qualify as "great
things" is another issue. They sure were expensive things, though.

If it has been possible for us to keep people from killing each other in
the name of religion or ethnicity, I believe it to be worth every penny.
If we can prevent others, regardless of religion or ethnicity, from
attacking us, I don't believe there is a price too high.

And I think "we" made the right decision.

Lessay we concentrate all our resources into feeding
the poor, fixing
all the social inequalities, and making the world a better
place for our
children and our childrens children.

Wrong goals.

The goal is not to "feed the poor" but to make it possible for "the
poor" to feed themselves. Big difference. Same about the other stuff.

Then we've failed massively. We continue to feed the poor but we've
made little progress in teaching folks how to feed themselves. To
paraphrase the late Sam Kinnison, "This is sand. Nothing grows here.
Nothing is ever going to grow here. Let's stop sending food and send
them U-Hauls and suitcases and bring them to where the food is."

After all that. I would wager my life that there will still be poor,
there will still be starving people, there will still be
inequality, and
the world will not be any better a place than it is today.

Sounds pretty fatalistic to me.

It sounds pretty realistic to me. Those who are too stupid to learn and
those who are smart enough to learn but too stupid to pay attention will
always be with us and will always be a burden to the rest of society.
Ditto those who, for whatever reason, are prevented from obtaining an
education.

The Japanese government donated some hefty electrical generating plants
to Sierra Leone around 1991. As the plants sat on the docks, thieves
stole the cast aluminum heads and melted them down into cooking pots.
They made money in the short term but still sat around in the dark.

I say things can be made a lot better, if the will is there to do it.

Our will does not necessarily trump the will of the stupid, the greedy
or any who wish to thwart our will.

Take the whole energy issue. Suppose there *were* a serious, longterm,
well-funded national program to improve our energy situation. Attack on
all fronts - conservation, recycling, new sources, greater efficiency,
etc. Do you really think such a program couldn't help improve the lives
of almost all Americans?

I really think that it might not improve the lives of almost all
Americans. There would be those who have no desire to cooperate, those
who haven't the mental capacity to cooperate and those who cannot afford
to cooperate. There are 96% efficient, gas furnaces. That's super for
those who can afford them. If you have three kids, a car with 120k
miles, own a mobile home on a rented lot and you drive 50 miles per day
to and from a job which pays $7.00 per hour, you're not likely to have a
lot left over toward that new efficient furnace or an efficient
refrigerator.

Dave K8MN