Want proof of market manipulation in the oil industry? Here it is.

[Le Jacquelope]

How much research do you think you have to do?

Just two questions will do it.

1. Does the United States have oil reserves. (Yes, of course--lots of untapped oil)

2. Is the United States dipping into its oil reserves. (No, certainly not)

That does not bolster your claim that it is because the US is waiting until everyone else runs out. That is what I was challenging.

There's absolutely no difference in the sovereign Saudi Arabia manipulating its oil reserves

So my original statement, the opening statement of this thread

that manipulation is going on

is in fact not wrong, but now we are moving on to the discussion of whether the act itself is okay?

I just want to be clear on that.

as it sees fit and the sovereign United States manipulating its oil reserves as it sees fit. The Saudis owe you no oil whatsoever--certainly don't owe you as much of a response/explanation as your own government does.

None of this disproves my original claim that the Saudis - and by extension, OPEC - are holding back oil in order to jack up the price - a clear example of price manipulation. Nothing you have said, has disproved that. In fact, you are boldly bolstering that claim while proclaiming the righteousness of holding back supply to falsely increase demand and therefore prices.

It's true that supply is capped by refining capacity (which the United States has neglected)--but that has nothing to do with where the oil comes from to be refined.

You don't have much experience in international relations/economics, do you?

I have enough experience to know you just thoroughly pissed all over the concept of a "global economy". How's that supposed to work when everyone is free to restrict exports as they see fit in order to manipulate prices?

 

[amicus]

SavannahMann
Really Experienced

Well said...be aware that the rabid left here are not interested in any rational explanation of human individual freedom, they have this collective soul and will neither listen to your arguments nor seek answers, they only wish to attack the free and install the slave.

All rhetoric, no thinking at all, been heard, said and done a thousand times before.

But...nice to have another rational mind and real person along for the ride...thanks...

Amicus...

 

[Le Jacquelope]

SavannahMann
Really Experienced

Well said...be aware that the rabid left here are not interested in any rational explanation of human individual freedom, they have this collective soul and will neither listen to your arguments nor seek answers, they only wish to attack the free and install the slave.

All rhetoric, no thinking at all, been heard, said and done a thousand times before.

But...nice to have another rational mind and real person along for the ride...thanks...

Amicus...

Have you yet been able to find me a country that has applied your principles and has managed to survive to this day and age while still doing so?

 

[amicus]

The methodology of attacking freedom, a relatively new idea in human affairs and not defending slavery, of which there are countless examples, has become so transparent, even the blind can see.

It is almost sad to witness the legacy of the left fail in so many apparent ways, that I am left but to bury the corpse of socialism yet again.

Even the failure of collectivism in its many forms and guises, begs the question you are loathe to answer...which is...by what right do you claim to usurp the personal private lives of people to suit your needs?

The internal combustion engine was and is a marvelous invention and has done much to lift the burden of labor from the backs of men, those willing to give up the yoke of the Guild and the Union and move forward.

It will be replaced, in due time, as a matter of necessity as new inventions replace the old, which would happen faster if your philosophy were weakened and finally retired to history.

It will not be government control, laws, edicts, subsidies, management, bans, or taxes that gives birth to the new energy sources, rather the unfettered mind of free men exchanging their knowledge for wealth.

Perhaps you should just retire from debate and write the memoirs of a failed attempt to achieve Utopia through slavery. I am sure the aging baby boomers would lament right along with you.

Amicus...

 

[Le Jacquelope]

It will not be government control, laws, edicts, subsidies, management, bans, or taxes that gives birth to the new energy sources, rather the unfettered mind of free men exchanging their knowledge for wealth.

Funny, how history is saying the exact opposite - today, with subsidies for alternative energy, and in the past, with roads and the internet.

You wouldn't even be writing this tiresome rant if it were not for Government subsidies of the internet. A little fact that you and other anti-Government people keep running away from.

Laissez-faire is losing ground in the Western world. It is, however, taking strong root in totalitarian dictatorships like China. Perhaps you may one day find living there to your liking. Because that's the only hope you have for achieving your little economic wet dream.

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

My solution is to reduce dependency on oil and throw all we can into alternative fuel research.

My long term agenda is to utterly supplant the oil economy with an alternative fuel economy and leave the Saudis high and dry having lost their biggest customer.

The more the Saudis, and by extension OPEC, squeezes America, the faster we will take action to slip through their fingers. (Yes, Princess Leia wept.)

Forget the research - it's complete. It's called the laws of thermodynamics, the first of which states, "There is no free lunch," and the second of which says, "No magical undiscovered energy source exists."

First corollary of those two laws: "Wind, solar, biofuel etc. all seek to concentrate energy that is very dispersed."
Second corollary: "Industrial civilization requires magnitudes of energy that far exceed the amount that can be concentrated by those 'warm and fuzzy' alternatives."

Conclusion: We can replace fossil fuels, but not with all that granola-eating "alternative energy" stuff. It will require building many hundreds of new nuclear generating plants, and perhaps geothermal might provide another concentrated energy source (there's a place for your "research," but it's really just engineering, not basic science). With those sources in place, a transition to an all-electric economy (with a few exceptions for things like airplanes) can be accomplished with little disruption over 40 years or so.

If one is serious about replacing fossils then one should quit pretending that those two "laws" above don't exist, and get busy on bringing about the rest of what I describe here.

There's a whole bunch of dishonesty goin' on here, with cynical elites telling the masses that those warm-and-fuzzy "alternatives" can replace fossil fuels with no massive decline in their standard of living. They can't, and those cynical elites know it - so what are they really up to, hmmm? Vaclav Klaus is spreading some news about that these days.

 

[amicus]

Again and again you attack freedom because you cannot defend slavery.

Since world war two 120 countries are considered 'democratic', that is to say, honoring human individual freedom and protecting the rights of man.

Knowing that you do not have the economic magnificence of that graveyard known as the Soviet Union to tout as an example of Communism, ala Socialism, you really have no where to turn save Cuba and Venezuela as showcases for the wonderful life of that socialist utopia you dream of.

Every plank in your socialist scheme is rotten and you know it.

Socialized medicine is failing in every nation it has been tried. Failing because of long lines to even sign up for treatment, waiting periods of over a year in England and Canada, saved only by private medicine so those lucky people are robbed by their governments for medical care they can't get and must pay twice, the second to the private market to obtain the service.

Social Security, the great Ponzi scheme of the 20th century, counted on the working young to support the old. Guess what, people stopped having large families and the system is in failure all over the world.

Every time a dictatorship Nationalizes an industry, the industry folds and goes to a free nation.

Public education is a joke and everyone knows it, a good education is obtained at private schools while the public is fleeced twice as in socialized medicine.

If you held a garage sale of socialistic ideas, no one but the young and stupid, too lazy to work, looking for a handout, would buy anything at all.

Your subsidies for art, all of it, produce miserable failures and embarassing efforts and everyone knows that also.

There is not one good thing you can tout about socialism....which is why you attack freedom instead; there is nothing to defend about slavery.

Amicus...

 

[amicus]

Vaclav Klaus ...

Thank you for the link, Roxanne, timely and important.

I respond to your post in somewhat a selfish manner, as in reading the excerpt, I recognize the language and the conceptual construction; it is as though I had written the piece myself.

But, and as you noted, it took a generation to create this problem, it will take another to solve it.

I fear things do not bode well for the immediate future, already life styles are changing and people are beginning to suffer for that 60's generation of current baby boomers who have almost destroyed the industrial world.

Sad.

Amicus...

 

[sr71plt]

That does not bolster your claim that it is because the US is waiting until everyone else runs out. That is what I was challenging.


So my original statement, the opening statement of this thread

that manipulation is going on

is in fact not wrong, but now we are moving on to the discussion of whether the act itself is okay?

I just want to be clear on that.


None of this disproves my original claim that the Saudis - and by extension, OPEC - are holding back oil in order to jack up the price - a clear example of price manipulation. Nothing you have said, has disproved that. In fact, you are boldly bolstering that claim while proclaiming the righteousness of holding back supply to falsely increase demand and therefore prices.


I have enough experience to know you just thoroughly pissed all over the concept of a "global economy". How's that supposed to work when everyone is free to restrict exports as they see fit in order to manipulate prices?

I answered all of that way up the line too. They are manipulating SUPPLY, which is much broader than manipulating price. And they are doing what every other intelligent government is doing--just like the United States. It's practically the Saudi's only cash crop; there is nothing sinister about them controlling it to their best advantage (global economics 101)--and to make theirs last as long as possible. Your "sinister" is self-centered Jingoism based on your own self-centered concept of what you need and are entitled to--and you brush aside any pointing to the United States doing exactly the same thing. And you understand nothing about national sovereignty. It's their oil; they don't have to either make any of it available to you or play to your preferred "rules" of global economy. (and the United States imports a whole hell of a lot more food than it exports by the way--to pick up on another loose string you dropped).

Again you are engaging in avoidance of reality and logic. The United States has reserves and it hasn't dipped into them at all--while putting all of its efforts into using everyone else's reserves. Like, Duh, on the reality charts.

And you are pissing in the wind, anyway. When the Saudis do sell, they now have much more lucrative and solid markets than the United States--China and India. Their managing of their oil no longer has much to do with the United States. Unless we invade them, as Rox notes, it's no longer oil coming exclusively to the United States. (And the United States can't even make that work--we've taken over Iraq, but we're not getting their oil--certainly not at any better price than from anywhere else.)

And, as I already noted. the control on the availability of gasoline is refineries, not oil supply--at any price. And the United States hasn't bothered to up its refinery capacity along with demand.

And all of this is irrelevant to whatever point you thought you were trying to make in the first place. The factor in the price of oil that is making havoc at the moment has little to do with the availability of oil or price manipulation by the oil suppliers. It's mostly a function of the stock market paper speculators who don't actually handle a drop of oil. Have you been under a rock that you haven't absorbed this?

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

The first refuge of a politician panicked by rising prices is always to blame "speculators." So right on time for this election season, Congress has decided to do something about rising oil prices by shooting the messenger known as the energy futures market. Apparently this is easier than offending the Sierra Club by voting for more domestic energy supply.

Futures markets aren't some shadowy dangerous force, but are essentially a price discovery mechanism. They allow commodity producers and consumers to lock in the future price of goods, helping to hedge against future price movements. In the case of oil prices, they are a bet about supply and demand and the future rate of inflation. Democrats nonetheless now argue that these futures markets are generating the wrong prices for oil and other commodities.

And who are these "speculators" driving up prices? The futures market operator Intercontinental Exchange says that an increasing share of its customers are not financial houses but commercial firms that need to manage oil-price risks – refiners, airlines, and other major energy consumers. Another term for these "speculators" would be "American business."

Not ironically, the leaders of Capitol Hill's shoot-the-messenger caucus are among those most culpable for the lack of domestic oil supplies.

more . . .

from "Dubai's Favorite Senators," WSJ, 6/10/08
more

 

[amicus]

I rather appreciate most of your post, except for this:

"...It's mostly a function of the stock market paper speculators who don't actually handle a drop of oil. Have you been under a rock that you haven't absorbed this?"

Less than one percent of market fluctuations are brought about by speculators in the market place and they lose as often as they win in trying to predict future prices.

Not only that, but both the market place and the industry benefit from speculative trading as more investment funds are at play in the market.

I suspect the only alleviation of the tight supply and demand cycle currently in effect will be an easing of demand, which is already down about five percent in the US.

Prices of gasoline at the pump will double over time and demand should ease even more, that is unless this stupid government acts to Nationalize or control the industry with such silliness as 'profit taxes', or more regulation and control.

Amicus...

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

AMICUS

I suspect the government will do something to recoup the taxes its losing from declining gasoline sales. Whatever action they take wont be pretty.

Our local government recently discovered a clause in the law, that allows them to increase property taxes when property values decline. Its not in the constitution, of course, its an enabling law that supposedly enforces the constitutional amendment. Someone slipped it in. So taxes are going up NOT DOWN.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

ROXANNE

I was an architect once upon a time, and its quite possible to re-invent cities and urban areas so that they conserve boatloads of energy. You'll have to forfeit your lawn and street and car, but everything you need will be in the community and public transportation will be practical and convenient. Plus it releases huge areas of land for recreation and agriculture.

So we have options that arent delusions, but I cant see people willing to part with their cars and reside in a multi-level mall.

 

[SavannahMann]

The United States, as though it's a national plan not to use the supplies it has. Who opposes the drilling off the coasts of the United States, both coasts? Is it the Oil Companies? No, it's the Environmentalist Nuts who scream we'll be destroy millions of baby seals if we drill. They predict and promise huge environmental disasters if we allow drilling, utterly ignoring the modern technology which is now going into that activity. Katrina wiped out New Orleans, shut down how many oil wells in the Gulf of Mexico, and how much oil was lost and caused what environmental disaster? Oh that's right NONE.

Yet it's the socialists like yourself who demand we not drill because it's bad for the environment and we'll all die if we drill. Throw the money at alternative energy sources, which is of course, how we have always created new energy sources right?

I mean, at first, it was sail power that propelled man across the seas, wind and wooden ships. Then it was coal fired steamers. More reliable than wind. It quickly became the standard, and what do you know, would be in use today as the international standard except one thing. Oil fired steam propulsion was more efficient, and faster. From there we went to Diesel engines, and then Gas Turbine engines. Nuclear is very efficient, requiring fuel only once every twenty years or so, but that is just so horrible isn't it?

So now, we're screaming about the costs versus the profit for the little guy, the little truckers who take the cargo from the dock to the desitination. What about them you say? Well, most of them have the option of saying NO, I won't carry cargo for that price. You see, as a Trucker myself, with experience driving over the road, kind of how I ended up running heavy equipment. I can tell you that every trucker knows that his or her truck is going to get six to seven miles to the gallon of Diesel. Knowing also the cost of a gallon of Diesel, any trucker with a pencil and a piece of paper, and most of them are actually smart enough and experienced enough to do these calculations in their head on the fly, they know the difference between a profitable load, and a loss load. They calculate out the cost of fuel versus the miles traveled and the costs you don't know anything about as a ranting socialist like road use taxes, tolls, harassment stops by the police every single state has in place to keep truckers in line. Truckers are the only group in our society where every single state, plus the Federal Government, have a police force dedicated to them. Truckers call these cops Diesel Cops, or just DOT, for Department of Transportation. Having been through inspections in Ohio, Kansas, New York, California, and let's not forget my own Georgia, I can tell you that they really are harassing the truckers.

So the independent trucker looks at a load, and knows that the price offered is not enough to make any profit, and he passes it up. That happens all the time by the way. Larger companies have contracts which includes the diesel offset clauses, which allows the company to increase the fee on the load based upon fuel costs.

Again, if you really wanted to help the truckers, then you would be screaming for the Government and the Environmentalist nuts to stop blocking drilling. Only with a greater supply will the truckers have a lower cost, and thus more profit. Yet for some reason, you aren't calling for drilling. If Gas and Diesel go up another dollar here in the US, there are a lot of people who would be willing to drill in Babies if that meant gas would go down.

There isn't a secret shadowy figure somewhere that controls these things just to screw the people. While that makes a good movie, and I admit, one of my own stories, it doesn't happen. I know how much that upsets you, but it's true I'm sad to say.

 

[amicus]

Go get em, Savannah, give em holy hell, they earned it!

Amicus...

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

ROXANNE

I was an architect once upon a time, and its quite possible to re-invent cities and urban areas so that they conserve boatloads of energy. You'll have to forfeit your lawn and street and car, but everything you need will be in the community and public transportation will be practical and convenient. Plus it releases huge areas of land for recreation and agriculture.

So we have options that arent delusions, but I cant see people willing to part with their cars and reside in a multi-level mall.

Nuh-uh, JBJ. Even if we did the things you suggest, which are indeed possible if ultimately silly, the amount of energy required to sustain industrial civilization is at least an order of magnitude greater than what the "warm and fuzzy" alternatives can provide.

The changes you suggest are ultimately silly because they would "only" reduce energy consumption by 25 percent or so, meaning we still need massive amounts of concentrated energy. Take away fossils, and that leaves only nukes and possibly geothermal as the only sources that can meet the need. Once you're burning atoms instead of coal what's the point in undertaking that massive reordering of our way of living - to reduce the number of nuke plants we build over the next 40 years from 400 to 325? Why bother? Build the extra 75 and give me my electric car and electric lawnmower if that's what I want.

 

[champagne1982]

Which government subsidizes the internet? And what does it (the net) need a subsidy to do?

Amicus, lineups for treatment only exist in the realm of "elective" surgery. If you can afford to jump the line, then go and pay for your meds elsewhere... that's free market medicine and is alive and well in most "socialized" medicine providing countries. The caveat being, if you need medical care you will get it, based on your physical well-being and not your ability to pay. If you want medical care before you need it, be assured you won't bump an emergency just because you paid an extra five grand to occupy a bed.

There is nothing slimier than what mortgage and banking service providers do to create profit, not even oil companies and government strategies ...

 

[Liar]

That article has everything to do with the statement I made. Why do you lie so blatantly?


That is absolutely flat out an example of cutting production of a good in order to keep the price high. You can't get more a solid example of what I said, than that right there.

Yes. it's cutting producrtion in order to heep the price high. Never said I was in favor.

But it's one actor - the Saudi State. So it's not a cartel. If this was Opec, you might have had a cartel case.

And it's a politically controlled actor, the Saudi State. So it's not laisses faire.

 

[amicus]

Amicus, lineups for treatment only exist in the realm of "elective" surgery. If you can afford to jump the line, then go and pay for your meds elsewhere... that's free market medicine and is alive and well in most "socialized" medicine providing countries. The caveat being, if you need medical care you will get it, based on your physical well-being and not your ability to pay. If you want medical care before you need it, be assured you won't bump an emergency just because you paid an extra five grand to occupy a bed.

~~~

Champagne82, I have been listening to apologists for socialized medicine for many years now and it is a pathetic defense at best.

I have heard the same 'claim' about elective surgery, a hundred times, but the facts bely your assertion and they do so from hundreds of sources of people waiting months, even years for treatment.

In Japan, highly proud of its system, they find the people go to the doctor three times as often under socialized medicine. Just stop and think with your experience in making appointments and I am sure you will reconsider your comments.

There is of course, the 'principle' of the issue. By what right to you force doctors and nurses to 'perform' for government with fixed fees and controlled treatment?

By what right do you tax an entire population to serve the greater good?

Health issues have always been a concern to young and old alike. To think that with a stroke of the pen, that of forced, mandatory, socialized medicine, you can solve all the problems is foolish and belongs in the world of utopian dreams that seem to be the fodder of a past generation.

Let freedom reign and like McDonalds, you will have an affordable health clinic in every neighborhood.

Instead, you laud slavery.\

I will never understand you peeps...

amicus...

 

[sr71plt]

The United States, as though it's a national plan not to use the supplies it has. Who opposes the drilling off the coasts of the United States, both coasts? Is it the Oil Companies? No, it's the Environmentalist Nuts who scream we'll be destroy millions of baby seals if we drill. They predict and promise huge environmental disasters if we allow drilling, utterly ignoring the modern technology which is now going into that activity. Katrina wiped out New Orleans, shut down how many oil wells in the Gulf of Mexico, and how much oil was lost and caused what environmental disaster? Oh that's right NONE.

Yet it's the socialists like yourself who demand we not drill because it's bad for the environment and we'll all die if we drill. Throw the money at alternative energy sources, which is of course, how we have always created new energy sources right?

I mean, at first, it was sail power that propelled man across the seas, wind and wooden ships. Then it was coal fired steamers. More reliable than wind. It quickly became the standard, and what do you know, would be in use today as the international standard except one thing. Oil fired steam propulsion was more efficient, and faster. From there we went to Diesel engines, and then Gas Turbine engines. Nuclear is very efficient, requiring fuel only once every twenty years or so, but that is just so horrible isn't it?

So now, we're screaming about the costs versus the profit for the little guy, the little truckers who take the cargo from the dock to the desitination. What about them you say? Well, most of them have the option of saying NO, I won't carry cargo for that price. You see, as a Trucker myself, with experience driving over the road, kind of how I ended up running heavy equipment. I can tell you that every trucker knows that his or her truck is going to get six to seven miles to the gallon of Diesel. Knowing also the cost of a gallon of Diesel, any trucker with a pencil and a piece of paper, and most of them are actually smart enough and experienced enough to do these calculations in their head on the fly, they know the difference between a profitable load, and a loss load. They calculate out the cost of fuel versus the miles traveled and the costs you don't know anything about as a ranting socialist like road use taxes, tolls, harassment stops by the police every single state has in place to keep truckers in line. Truckers are the only group in our society where every single state, plus the Federal Government, have a police force dedicated to them. Truckers call these cops Diesel Cops, or just DOT, for Department of Transportation. Having been through inspections in Ohio, Kansas, New York, California, and let's not forget my own Georgia, I can tell you that they really are harassing the truckers.

So the independent trucker looks at a load, and knows that the price offered is not enough to make any profit, and he passes it up. That happens all the time by the way. Larger companies have contracts which includes the diesel offset clauses, which allows the company to increase the fee on the load based upon fuel costs.

Again, if you really wanted to help the truckers, then you would be screaming for the Government and the Environmentalist nuts to stop blocking drilling. Only with a greater supply will the truckers have a lower cost, and thus more profit. Yet for some reason, you aren't calling for drilling. If Gas and Diesel go up another dollar here in the US, there are a lot of people who would be willing to drill in Babies if that meant gas would go down.

There isn't a secret shadowy figure somewhere that controls these things just to screw the people. While that makes a good movie, and I admit, one of my own stories, it doesn't happen. I know how much that upsets you, but it's true I'm sad to say.

I looked up the line, and for the life of me, I couldn't see who the "you" is you are lecturing. I recognize there is an environmentalist viewpoint; I didn't see it brought out here. Who you talkin' too, Mann?

Surely not me. I'd drill in Alaska. And I wouldn't bust a gut to save endangered species--that's what evolution is all about, and it's going to happen anyway (including the passing of humankind). The kicker is to make sure the disappearance of this or that doesn't upset the balance quick enough to strangle off as many descendents as we can imagine.

Of course, in exploitation, I'd look for a balance there too that did as little harm as possible, and I'd get off my ass (if I had a lick of scientific ability) and step up in constructing alternatives to oil dependence, including lifestyles (only in America do we insist on living across town from where we work). Even a little bit helps--I drive a Camry hybrid now rather than a Mercedes, both my wife and I have pulled our workplace back to the house, there is no lawn area on our three-quarters acre, we take burlap bags to the grocery store for bagging, we recycle (only to watch the trashmen throw it all together in one pile), etc. and so forth.

But back to the denial of the effect of speculators on the current oil price crisis. Happily, I'm not burdened with a hard-edge ideology I feel compelled to inflict on others, so I can more easiy recognize reality when I see it.

And it's oh so interesting to see the avoidance here of oil refining as the bottleneck in the process. Guess it's hard to push laissez-faire economics when the problem of that is kicking you in the teeth in a discussion like this, eh? (and this is a comment to the thread in general, not to the quoted passage.)

 

[amicus]

And it's oh so interesting to see the avoidance here of oil refining as the bottleneck in the process. Guess it's hard to push laissez-faire economics when the problem of that is kicking you in the teeth in a discussion like this, he? (and this is a comment to the thread in general, not to the quoted passage.)

~~~

As with exploration and drilling, refinery construction has been forbidden for over thirty years.

Energy suppliers have responded by increasing the capacity and efficiency of existing refineries.

While refineries are operating at near capacity, note the shortfall following the Katrina event, they are meeting the demand even though burdened with forced, 'boutique' fuel mixtures to satisfy the government and environmentalists.

I can only proceed on what you offer on this forum, but it seems to tend towards a command type economy in which private enterprise is highly controlled and regulated.

The sad thing really is that the legacy of the left and the environmental activists is just beginning to take effect.

There is no quick cure for energy problems and as a result of a generation of restrictive regulation and control, they will get much worse.

Hope all you god damned hippies are happy now, you got what you wanted.

Amicus...

 

[champagne1982]

~~~

Champagne82, I have been listening to apologists for socialized medicine for many years now and it is a pathetic defense at best.

I have heard the same 'claim' about elective surgery, a hundred times, but the facts bely your assertion and they do so from hundreds of sources of people waiting months, even years for treatment.

In Japan, highly proud of its system, they find the people go to the doctor three times as often under socialized medicine. Just stop and think with your experience in making appointments and I am sure you will reconsider your comments.

There is of course, the 'principle' of the issue. By what right to you force doctors and nurses to 'perform' for government with fixed fees and controlled treatment?

By what right do you tax an entire population to serve the greater good?

Health issues have always been a concern to young and old alike. To think that with a stroke of the pen, that of forced, mandatory, socialized medicine, you can solve all the problems is foolish and belongs in the world of utopian dreams that seem to be the fodder of a past generation.

Let freedom reign and like McDonalds, you will have an affordable health clinic in every neighborhood.

Instead, you laud slavery.\

I will never understand you peeps...

amicus...

Your argument is as full of holes as mine is proported to be. Nobody is forcing the hundreds of physicians who immigrate to Canada to stay here and wait in interminable lines to be certified and licensed to practice their vocation. In fact, no one is forcing a patient wanting surgery ahead of someone else who needs it, to stand in line. If they can afford it, they are welcome to travel (with compensation from the federal gov't) and get the procedures they need. In fact many health authorities actually pay for the work to be done elsewhere, where the wait isn't as long or where that patient can bump a citizen of the US out of a hospital running on the ability to pay philosophy.

It's not the cost, it's the availability of staff. We can build all the neighbourhood clinics we want, there still won't be certified doctors and nurses to operate them, no matter how much money you offer in payment. Besides, if free market health care is the absolute solution why aren't there affordable and accessible neighbourhood clinics everywhere in your highly touted society?

 

[S-Des]

Besides, if free market health care is the absolute solution why aren't there affordable and accessible neighbourhood clinics everywhere in your highly touted society?

There are a number of reasons, but threat of lawsuit is one of the biggest. The insurance that doctors and hospitals are forced to carry by lawyers looking for the next big payday makes "cheap" healthcare options very difficult. Because of that, the hospitals suffer with the poor and illegal immigrants using the ER as their only source of medical care (which they often aren't able to pay back.....for those who bother to even worry about it), which puts a big financial strain on the hospitals. We just had a hospital here (a big one my mom used to work at) go out of business, with no immediate plans to replace it. Kind of makes you wonder where the sick people are going to go now?

The biggest downfall of our political system is the influence of money on the politicians and the making of laws. There has been a strong resistance to any laws limiting legal damages, so as a result we've had judgments of tens of millions of dollars in cases where they never did find out if the doctor or hospital did anything wrong.

 

[S-Des]

I looked up the line, and for the life of me, I couldn't see who the "you" is you are lecturing. I recognize there is an environmentalist viewpoint; I didn't see it brought out here. Who you talkin' too, Mann?

Isn't he talking to Jacquelope?

 

[amicus]

It's not the cost, it's the availability of staff. We can build all the neighbourhood clinics we want, there still won't be certified doctors and nurses to operate them, no matter how much money you offer in payment. Besides, if free market health care is the absolute solution why aren't there affordable and accessible neighbourhood clinics everywhere in your highly touted society?

Assuming you are sincere in your query....

There are a host of reasons for the medical crisis occuring in industrialized nations.

One stems from world war two and the veterans medical care that was funded by government. Another is that government workers have had access to the best medical care available, That expanded to Union coverage and brought about a demand for quality care for larger numbers of the population.

Another is that people are living longer, thanks to private research facilities and private pharmateutical companies that have perfected and marketed drugs and procedures.

Another problem is twofold, that of poor public education that does not produce people capable of going to PreMed school and secondly, the 'Guild' like mentality of the AMA that limits the number of students in Med schools who might go on to be doctors and nurses.

Another is the arbitrary actions of the FDA, which at any given time is more or less political in nature.

There is also the association with the UN and the WHO, who for example, neglected most health problems to concentrate on a world wide predicted epidemic of heterosexual Aids, which did not happen.

The biggest and most devastating reason is the drift to the left in American politics since the 1960's. The attitude that government has the solutions to all problems.

If you believe that man is basically evil, greedy and must be controlled and regulated, then there is little chance of communicating with you.

And before I forget, there is also the 'feminist' movement of the past half century that wants to be taken care of and nurtured by big government.

The common answer to solve the medical crisis is to turn everything over to the government. There are a thousand examples of why this is a very bad idea.

Aside from the disclaimers of the left who insist that medical personnel are not forced to work for government, that is exactly what socialized medicine entails, the conscription of doctors and nurses into national service, just like the military.

I prefer a free society, one expressed by the original founders of this nation and a concept that I intellectually appreciate.

I suppose, for those of you who have not been exposed, through education or peers, to the basic concepts of individual human liberty and a free market, that my insistence on freedom is a relatively new concept for you.

You can educate yourselves if you choose, I tire of the task, besides, it doesn't pay worth a damn, not even a 'thank you, ami', in most cases.

Amicus...