[Rhodes22-list] P-NO Water Flooding Back In, horse stuff and drinking

[Rik Sandberg]

Bill,

Well, yeah I certainly agree, there are many things the gov't does and 
services it provides that are excellent. Not disputing that at all.

One does have to decide though, when stuff is really essential or is 
just nice to have. When is stuff overdone and overly expensive. What do 
we REALLY need and what do we merely want. We both know that it is a 
rare gov't project that comes in *under budget*. We both also know that 
the number of people involved in gov't and paid by same is getting 
larger all the time. Soon the number of people paid by the gov't will 
exceed the number of people paying the gov't. When that happens, I think 
we can agree, there is going to be a problem. Yep, those gov't nav 
charts, for example, are really nice, but, I'll pay for my own (and many 
other things) from a private provider if that is what it takes to keep 
the size of our gov't affordable. IMHO this is better anyway because 
natural competiton in the market tends to keep prices where they should 
be. Since the gov't has no competitor it can be and usually is, as 
inefficient as it wants. BUT, I also agree, and I know this will come 
up, one has to be careful about going to the moon with the low bidder 
too. I guess it's a hard thing to balance

> Why should truckers get the roads for free?  (Don't answer!

Can't help it :-) Free!!! I hope they are kidding when they say that.

'nuf about that .... on to the horse shit and drinking post :-)

I applaud your care and concern for your students. That is a job I doubt 
I could do.

I know a couple of people quite well that tend to be a bit paranoid 
schizophrenic. I have spent many hours during some of their "episodes" 
trying to convince or teach them that there is no "they" and "they" are 
not really out to get you. Hard as I might have tried, it seemed I 
gained litte ground with them. I can about imagine that this might be at 
least close to the same as trying to overcome some of the attitudes that 
have been driven into some of your poorer students heads since they were 
babies....... it's an extremely frustrating situation to find youself in.

But i always wonder, what ARE those people thinking about???...... must 
be something.... sure can't be what they're doing at the moment though.

Rik





Bill Effros wrote:

> Rik,
>
> I don't argue the budget cut this year issue.
>
> Nor do I know about the self-perpetuating jobs issue because I know so 
> few government employees.
>
> I think everyone has a right to fight for their own projects, and I 
> think that some jobs must be done by governments.  A good example of 
> this, for us, are the outstanding free charts available for virtually 
> all waterways around the US--constantly updated.
>
> Say what you want, but those things are both incredible, and 
> invaluable to our community.  There aren't enough of us to support the 
> number of people required to produce and maintain them.  It's hard to 
> explain to farmers who never sail why we can't just be content with 
> the ones we have, and abolish the agencies that maintain and update them.
>
> Just as it's hard for them to explain to us why we should fund some of 
> the farmer perks they get.
>
> Why should truckers get the roads for free?  (Don't answer!  It's a 
> question others ask about your perks--that's all.)
>
> In theory, we all get advantages from compromising and supporting 
> projects that don't directly benefit us, in return for others 
> supporting projects that do directly benefit us.
>
> It's not a clean process.  Each of us tries to convince others that 
> supporting our projects has more benefits to them than our supporting 
> their projects has to us.  "Politics" we call it.
>
> But it's based on the underlying concept of all being in the same 
> boat, and having to pull together.  When that idea gets lost, we are 
> all set adrift.  That's what really worries me, and why I constantly 
> fight to pull people back to the center--to work for the common good.
>
> Bill Effros
>
>
>
> Rik Sandberg wrote:
>
>> Bill,
>>
>> Honest answer:
>>
>> Yeah, I really can't argue with that.
>>
>> Self perpetuating jobs is the goal of most gov't employees, is it not??
>>
>> I never really argued whether the levees were built right or not. I 
>> simply said that the budget cuts that were made *this year* would 
>> have made very little difference in the outcome. The areas that 
>> turned out to be the problem were not the areas that were even 
>> planned for renovation or improvement.
>>
>> Rik
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Bill Effros <bill at effros.com>
>> Sent: Sep 23, 2005 10:24 AM
>> To: R22 List <rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org>
>> Subject: [Rhodes22-list] P-NO Water Flooding Back In
>>
>> Rik,
>>
>> Not to beat a dead horse, but I just saw the water is flooding back 
>> into New Orleans again.
>> Apparently the water never over-topped the levees in the first 
>> place.  The last I saw, the levees were not built properly, and 
>> simply broke.
>>
>> To me, and I think Brad, we can argue the merits of whether the 
>> levees should be there or not all day; but once that fight has been 
>> fought, and the levees are in place, it is the responsibility of 
>> somebody to ensure that the levees are built properly.
>> I have long had a lot of trouble with the Army Corps of Engineers.  
>> As far as I'm concerned, it's a pork barrel outfit doing a pork 
>> barrel job with port barrel results.
>> Sure, they have done some things well, even admirably.   But you 
>> can't trust a word they say, because their ultimate goal is to just 
>> keep building, regardless of the merits of the project.
>>
>> Pretty fiscally conservative, huh?
>>
>> Bill Effros
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>>
>>
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>>
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