Ubuntu & the underdeveloped world

[poptones]

-Capitalism in itself is not the problem... it's an ethics issue ---
Noblesse Oblige. It's Ferengi (ala Star Trek; the critters with the
big
ears) Anti-union management vs socially and environmentally
responsible
providers of utilitarian goods and services. Making a profit isn't
wrong, but ripping people off and under providing for the labor that
creates it is.-

But how do you define "under providing?"

Fact: the unions have fallen to the same sickness as the government at
large. They allowed their leadership to become so corrupt (at least in
image) that they lost all credibility with the greater population. They
allowed themselves, within their own ranks, to repeatedly re-elect this
unpopular leadership. Result: they have little or no power within the
community at large, and they have zero power within a government that
is able to spin the news however it wants.

My father used to refuse to shop at Kroger because they had so many
union problems. Now he's old and it took me years of nagging just to
get him to stop spending half his pension check at wal-mart. In fact,
were it not for Bill Moyers I have little doubt he would still be
shopping there week after week. People just don't care anymore. The "me
generation" wasn't just a generation - it was a widespread cultural
shift that took place in this country, and the only way it will correct
itself is when enough people realize what was lost and say "enough." 

-Taking jobs off American soil to places where they can get away with
exploitation of more naive workers or less restrictive environmental
regulation that would not be tolerated here is also wrong ---
immoral.-

There was a time when the same would be said about the US. We had
plenty of factories that worked children like slaves, locked employees
inside for their shift, and used physically violence to keep their
workers in line. 

The people in the lesser industrialzed places need economic
empowerment. They're not going to get that if they don't have the
ability to work instead of selling their children into prostitution or
begging in the streets. Weren't you just commenting on how some people
need to feel "more enlightened" than others so they can feel better
about themselves? So do you see how you're doing it yourself?

I don't have a 9-5. It's not that I can't work - I just choose not to.
I sell stuff on ebay,  perform it services for folks, and live in a
place where I don't need much money. I don't have health insurance but
if I were faced with some life threatening illness I have no doubt I
could still get assistance at any state hospital. I have far more food
than I need, I have a warm bed that's as tidy as I'm willing to keep
it.

How many peasants in asia will simply drop dead before they reach
thirty due to lack of health? How many children in the FSU states will
freeze to death tonight in doorways and under bridges because freezing
on the street is better than the life they face in abusive and
unpoliced homes? How many don't even have homes?

There's much to dislike about megacorporations, but those overseas jobs
are not the problem - they're a major part of the solution. They're the
promise that was held out a decade ago when this whole "revolution" was
just getting started. And as they become more sophisticated they'll be
cutting out the megacorp  middlemen, too - or at least displacing those
we have with something far more efficient. 

What is presently missing is the localized entrepreneurial attitude,
and a truly open international free trade system. When a factory closes
everyone complains about it, then the plant sits idle. Why do the people
of the community not pass local legislation that will empower them to
utilize that resource? These plants get built with Millions of dollars
of grant money from the local community, but when they get closed who
owns them? Why is it "economic development" when it benefits
corporations, but the evil curse of SOCIALISM when it benefits the
individual? 

If you're an american, try exporting something yourself to Canada and
see how well NAFTA works for you. Those "free trade" laws were
carefully crafted to preserve the money for those at the top, not to
lower the barriers to entry for the little guy or the individual. 

We as a nation allow our natural resources to be exported by the
shipload only to reimport those resources as finished goods. We ship
logs to china and get back furniture - why do we not price our trees so
it is cheaper for those megacorps to purchase the logs in China? China
has Millions of acres of old growth forest and nearby russia Millions
more.. so why are we exporting timber? All those acres in the amazon
basin that went up in smoke just to make CHARCOAL! Why were those trees
not exported? Because that was too expensive to justify the effort.
Meanwhile we chop down our own national parks and stick them on
container ships.

Why are the locals in our own country not using those resources to
produce high quality goods with that high quality lumber? With all the
Millionaires we have in this country, you cannot say there is no market
for higher quality, more expensive goods. But rather than try to compete
with the megacorps when they forced one plant closing after another, the
people shrugged their shoulders and turned away from the problem instead
of taking (literal) ownership of the resources right in their own
communities. 

We are killing the Gulf of Mexico with fertilizer to keep the price of
refined sugar at ten cents a pound, meanwhile we are the fattest nation
on the face of the earth... why? Because the sugar lobbyists want us to
buy sugar. It is in the economic interest of this nation for all its
citizens to be obese, because fat people use more. They use more drugs
to stay healthy, they use more food, they use more cloth to clothe
themselves, they use more energy to move around because the only cars
they fit into weigh four thousand pounds and get 19MPG.

The problem isn't globalisation. The problem is us.


-- 
poptones