wrote


Is it ethical to import a large percentage of something - anything -
needed to keep a country's economy and way of life going? Particularly
when such importation requires dealing with, and empowering, people
whose values are very different from your own?


My state grows no oranges, and must import them from Florida, home of the
hanging chad and other values not compatible with "Minnesota nice". Is it
ethical to drink orange juice in Minnesota?

Or maybe ethics hasn't a damned thing to do with it. I like citrus products,
and I'll buy from whoever sells them at a price I'm willing to pay. Meanwhile
we grow some damned good corn, wheat, and soybeans here on the prairie. We'll
be happy to sell it to whoever meets the going price, regardless if their
"values are very different" from ours.

Beep beep
de Hans, K0HB

.... it is the "Control Freak Mentality." Once an individual adopts it,
seems to become a way of life, as addictive as heroin too, it seems...

Manipulation of sovereign nations seems to be in vogue these days... if
their ideas are just different, no problem. If they plan on
enslaving, depriving citizens of freedom, "poverty-izing" people, killing
people, BIG PROBLEM!

John

On Fri, 12 Aug 2005 20:34:19 +0000, KØHB wrote:


wrote


Is it ethical to import a large percentage of something - anything -
needed to keep a country's economy and way of life going? Particularly
when such importation requires dealing with, and empowering, people
whose values are very different from your own?


My state grows no oranges, and must import them from Florida, home of the
hanging chad and other values not compatible with "Minnesota nice". Is it
ethical to drink orange juice in Minnesota?

Or maybe ethics hasn't a damned thing to do with it. I like citrus products,
and I'll buy from whoever sells them at a price I'm willing to pay. Meanwhile
we grow some damned good corn, wheat, and soybeans here on the prairie. We'll
be happy to sell it to whoever meets the going price, regardless if their
"values are very different" from ours.

Beep beep
de Hans, K0HB

K=D8HB wrote:
wrote

Is it ethical to import a large percentage of
something - anything -
needed to keep a country's economy and way of
life going? Particularly
when such importation requires dealing with,
and empowering, people
whose values are very different from your own?

My state grows no oranges, and must import them from Florida,
home of the
hanging chad and other values not compatible with "Minnesota
nice". Is it
ethical to drink orange juice in Minnesota?

That depends.

Are Minnesota and Florida different sovereign countries?

Does Minnesota's economy and way of life rely heavily on
imported Florida orange juice to keep going?

I thought of mentioning California as an alternative source
of citrus beverage, but the reply to that is obvious...

Or maybe ethics hasn't a damned thing to do with it.

Ethics has everything to do with it.

I like
citrus products,
and I'll buy from whoever sells them at a price I'm willing
to pay.

So if, say, North Korea was selling citrus products (yes, I know they
don't grow any, but it's the principle of the thing), and the
money was going straight to helping that dictatorship build nuclear
weapons, you'd have no problems dealing with them?

Meanwhile
we grow some damned good corn, wheat, and soybeans here on the prairie.=
We'll
be happy to sell it to whoever meets the going price,
regardless if their
"values are very different" from ours.

So if Osama BL wants some, and can pay the price, you'll sell to him?

---

Back in the late 1930s and very early 1940s, Japan was aggressively
taking over Manchuria and northern China.
(see "rape of Nanking" et al)

The USA was selling all sorts of stuff to Japan at the time -
electronics, oil, steel, aluminum, etc. They paid good prices
and paid in hard currency.

It became clear over time that at least some of those exports
were supplying the Japanese military expansion. So FDR & Co.
moved to cut off those exports - because of what Japan was
doing with them.

Was that an unethical thing to do?

Or should the USA have continued to sell Japan whatever they
wanted, as much as they wanted, regardless of what was done with it?

73 de Jim, N2EY

N2EY:

Isn't it interesting that the feds walk all over states rights?

In california we voted to legalize marijuana (under some condition, i.e.
medical use) the feds seem to think we can't. Since we adopted the law
all we have are fewer lawyers ripping off marijuana users, fewer
marijuana users in jail and less wasted time by law enforcement in
peeking over fences attempt to catch them in commission of a "crime" (the
crime being growing, smoking--and no, I don't smoke marijuana--but did
when I was a teenager for a bit.)

Now the feds are back busting people and wanting to make the california
law enforcement help them... insane... if the feds wanna bust 'em, let
some other state(s) pay for all of it!

John

On Fri, 12 Aug 2005 17:47:50 -0700, N2EY wrote:

KØHB wrote:
wrote

Is it ethical to import a large percentage of
something - anything -
needed to keep a country's economy and way of
life going? Particularly
when such importation requires dealing with,
and empowering, people
whose values are very different from your own?

My state grows no oranges, and must import them from Florida,
home of the
hanging chad and other values not compatible with "Minnesota
nice". Is it
ethical to drink orange juice in Minnesota?

That depends.

Are Minnesota and Florida different sovereign countries?

Does Minnesota's economy and way of life rely heavily on
imported Florida orange juice to keep going?

I thought of mentioning California as an alternative source
of citrus beverage, but the reply to that is obvious...

Or maybe ethics hasn't a damned thing to do with it.

Ethics has everything to do with it.

I like
citrus products,
and I'll buy from whoever sells them at a price I'm willing
to pay.

So if, say, North Korea was selling citrus products (yes, I know they
don't grow any, but it's the principle of the thing), and the
money was going straight to helping that dictatorship build nuclear
weapons, you'd have no problems dealing with them?

Meanwhile
we grow some damned good corn, wheat, and soybeans here on the prairie. We'll
be happy to sell it to whoever meets the going price,
regardless if their
"values are very different" from ours.

So if Osama BL wants some, and can pay the price, you'll sell to him?

---

Back in the late 1930s and very early 1940s, Japan was aggressively
taking over Manchuria and northern China.
(see "rape of Nanking" et al)

The USA was selling all sorts of stuff to Japan at the time -
electronics, oil, steel, aluminum, etc. They paid good prices
and paid in hard currency.

It became clear over time that at least some of those exports
were supplying the Japanese military expansion. So FDR & Co.
moved to cut off those exports - because of what Japan was
doing with them.

Was that an unethical thing to do?

Or should the USA have continued to sell Japan whatever they
wanted, as much as they wanted, regardless of what was done with it?

73 de Jim, N2EY

Mike Coslo wrote:
wrote:
K4YZ wrote:
an_old_friend wrote:
wrote:
What does this have to do with ham radio? Plenty!
For one thing,
ham radio is mentioned in the second article.
mentioned

Yep.


Did anyone besides me actually read the articles I linked?


The Space Shuttle was promoted as the "next big thing"
in space travel
- as a "space truck" that would cut the cost of
getting to orbit,
reducing the waste of one-time rockets, etc. We were
told of turnaround
times of a few weeks, and missions costing 10 to
20 million dollars
total - none of which has ever come to pass, 30
years after the program began.

yea the shutle was and is a failure

Based upon WHAT data, Mark?


It's a fact that the Space Shuttle program has not reached *some*
of the goals set for it. OTOH it has reached and exceeded some
of the goals, too.

The Space Shuttle program is neither a complete success nor a total
failure. It's done many great things, but not everything
that was expected.

But that's not the point I was making.

That people have been killed flying it? So what?


No Americans died flying the Mercury, Gemini or Apollo missions. The
Apollo 1 fire that killed astronauts Grissom, Chaffee and White
happened during a ground training/checkout session.


People die on
commecial airliners on a monthly basis. Are airliners a
failure?


There's a big difference.

The chances of dying in a commercial airliner accident are extremely
small. The failure rate of commercial airline flights (where "failure"
equals "people died") is extremely small. In fact if you drive to the
airport, fly around the world on First World commercial airliners
(returning to your point of origin), and drive home, the most dangerous
part of the trip is the drive to and from the airport, statistically
speaking.

One of the statistics that is trotted out when
speaking of airline
safety is passenger miles. I suspect the shuttle
would fare *very* well
if we applied passenger miles to it! ;^)

Not really.

Let's do the math...

The following are rough numbers. Those willing to do more looking-up
are invited to give more exact numbers, and see how close my
approximations are.

IIRC, there have been 113 Shuttle missions that "went the distance" so
far. Missions last about a week and have about seven astronauts on each
one.

Orbital velocity is about 18,000 miles per hour and a week is 168 hours
long.

So a typical mission is about 3 million miles long. With seven
astronauts aboard, that's 21 million passenger miles per mission.

113 x 21 = about 2.4 billion passenger miles in the entire shuttle
history.

But two missions ended with total loss of the crew - 14 deaths. That's
one death for every 171 million passenger miles. Compare that to the
commercial airliner rate...

Or take a look at another measu Number of deaths per million
aircraft departures. Commercial airlines are well under one per
million. The Shuttle is around 1 in 8.

Of course both measures are a bit off the mark. Most commercial airline
accidents have some survivors.

Perhaps the most accurate measure would be "what are the chances that a
flight will be completed without an accident that results in the death
of a passenger? In the case of the Shuttle, the demonstrated odds are 1
in 57. Commercial airliners are a lot better....

73 de Jim, N2EY

N2EY:

.... I should have mentioned, "I did inhale too." Clinton didn't know what
he was missing... but, a beer is much better!

John

On Fri, 12 Aug 2005 18:10:47 -0700, John Smith wrote:

N2EY:

Isn't it interesting that the feds walk all over states rights?

In california we voted to legalize marijuana (under some condition, i.e.
medical use) the feds seem to think we can't. Since we adopted the law
all we have are fewer lawyers ripping off marijuana users, fewer
marijuana users in jail and less wasted time by law enforcement in
peeking over fences attempt to catch them in commission of a "crime" (the
crime being growing, smoking--and no, I don't smoke marijuana--but did
when I was a teenager for a bit.)

Now the feds are back busting people and wanting to make the california
law enforcement help them... insane... if the feds wanna bust 'em, let
some other state(s) pay for all of it!

John

On Fri, 12 Aug 2005 17:47:50 -0700, N2EY wrote:

KØHB wrote:
wrote

Is it ethical to import a large percentage of
something - anything -
needed to keep a country's economy and way of
life going? Particularly
when such importation requires dealing with,
and empowering, people
whose values are very different from your own?

My state grows no oranges, and must import them from Florida,
home of the
hanging chad and other values not compatible with "Minnesota
nice". Is it
ethical to drink orange juice in Minnesota?

That depends.

Are Minnesota and Florida different sovereign countries?

Does Minnesota's economy and way of life rely heavily on
imported Florida orange juice to keep going?

I thought of mentioning California as an alternative source
of citrus beverage, but the reply to that is obvious...

Or maybe ethics hasn't a damned thing to do with it.

Ethics has everything to do with it.

I like
citrus products,
and I'll buy from whoever sells them at a price I'm willing
to pay.

So if, say, North Korea was selling citrus products (yes, I know they
don't grow any, but it's the principle of the thing), and the
money was going straight to helping that dictatorship build nuclear
weapons, you'd have no problems dealing with them?

Meanwhile
we grow some damned good corn, wheat, and soybeans here on the prairie. We'll
be happy to sell it to whoever meets the going price,
regardless if their
"values are very different" from ours.

So if Osama BL wants some, and can pay the price, you'll sell to him?

---

Back in the late 1930s and very early 1940s, Japan was aggressively
taking over Manchuria and northern China.
(see "rape of Nanking" et al)

The USA was selling all sorts of stuff to Japan at the time -
electronics, oil, steel, aluminum, etc. They paid good prices
and paid in hard currency.

It became clear over time that at least some of those exports
were supplying the Japanese military expansion. So FDR & Co.
moved to cut off those exports - because of what Japan was
doing with them.

Was that an unethical thing to do?

Or should the USA have continued to sell Japan whatever they
wanted, as much as they wanted, regardless of what was done with it?

73 de Jim, N2EY