the pollution I saw in Beijing last month was horrid and a reminder that the west are destroying China's environment while protecting their own turf...

So it would be good to send those back to local manufacturing.

Use straw and reed baskets instead of plastic. There are many bio-degradable (and more attractive) ways to make everyday items, than using plastic. Volvo uses hemp hurd as cushioning for their car seats. Just one of a thousand examples.

What are the Chinese doing to try and find wholesome substitutes for plastic and foam, paints and sealers, etc? They've got 1.3 billion people, but how many are focused on practical solutions like that? My guess: close to zero. Why am I pessimistic? Answer: Name one such improvement (degradable substitute for plastic) which has come out of China. I can't either.

USA is hardly a broke country by any means ..however it is stopped in its progress by party politics and interest groups that cannot see beyond what's important to them.

The Chinese would eventually have to stop making junk that is ordered by their western clients...that I support...the pollution I saw in Beijing last month was horrid and a reminder that the west are destroying China's environment while protecting their own turf...

About time this type of manufacturing is sent back to the USA and they can re-start jobs, local economy ...i seen enough part- time / seasonal packers in amazon warehouses to know these jobs are still needed and wanted by the american people to feed their families and pay their bills.

So it would be good to send those back to local manufacturing.

Interesting that we now see your true colors. You do wish evil and bad on others. Most of the posters here don't seem to wish ill on China or the Chinese. They wish they would improve, but they don't wish bad on them.

You on the hand, are actively wishing for bad things. Well, in most western countries we have environmental laws and with care, you can have manufacturing and a decent environment. Or....you can be content to poison the children and pets of others with melamine and slowly poison your own people with pollution.

Now we see you for who you really are.

I find that an ironic statement to make.

I am pointing out some hard truths that are hard to be accepted among the western fronts

The reality is the cheap contract prices offered by western companies are the main reason why china is polluted

So in wishing that's these manufacturing return back to the west it's not wishing the west anything and just sharing the load of the over pollution in china or any of the countries that are at times economically too weak to resist any trade that may harm their environment on the long run

Look at Malaysia rejecting plans for Australia to store their waste on Malaysia ...I am unsure where the irony lies if the pristine laws protect Australia and yet have little regard in trying to export their hazardous waste for storage to somewhere else ?

So like you I want to see china increasing price and send some of these needed jobs back to the west ...the unemployment rate in Europe and USA needs a hard injection of jobs and I know its hard and ironic to swallow but it's the truth these jobs are needed

USA is hardly a broke country by any means ..however it is stopped in its progress by party politics and interest groups that cannot see beyond what's important to them.

The Chinese would eventually have to stop making junk that is ordered by their western clients...that I support...the pollution I saw in Beijing last month was horrid and a reminder that the west are destroying China's environment while protecting their own turf...

About time this type of manufacturing is sent back to the USA and they can re-start jobs, local economy ...i seen enough part- time / seasonal packers in amazon warehouses to know these jobs are still needed and wanted by the american people to feed their families and pay their bills.

So it would be good to send those back to local manufacturing.

You say "the West are destroying China's environment."

You need to look again at who is the government of the CCP-PRC - I can already tell you the government of the PRC is the dictatorship of the CCP, not "the West."

The CCP dictators need to enact and enforce a Clear Air Act.

A PRChina Clean Air Act can only be enacted by the government of the People's Republic of China. Its citizens are choking and gagging in the CCP's shinny urban centers that no one can see any more - centers of a recurring miasma.

Also a Clean Water Act to get the dead pigs out of the rivers, and the human bodies out too. And a Clean Land Act so farmers can grow food that isn't full of industrial chemicals and the like.

That and more are the responsibility of the government of the People's Republic of China. If the CCP had cared about the people of the People's Republic, it would have enacted these and other material laws at least 20 years ago.

After all, to cite just one instance, you had the West to copy from in this very matter - a hundred years ago 12000 Londoners died in a wicked smog.

But the dictators in Beijing blew it.

Or is it that the CCP dictators don't care.

Edited December 14, 201312 yr by Publicus

This has become a China vs UK battle

Both countries are plagued with serious problems. The majority of Chinese people still live on less than a dollar per day. China is filthy from pollution, and Unchecked Immigration has destroyed many parts of the UK. Political Correctness is the state mandated religion in the UK, China has it's own free speech problems.

If I had to choose to be of English or Chinese DNA I would choose English, but I think I could more easily deal with the pollution in China than the horrible things about the UK, I would rather have my children in Chinese school as well.

The UK was once great, China is yet to be great, don't think it will ever be great, maybe it was great back in the time of the great wall....probably only for kings....but then again...the English empire was never great for the common man either, so food for thought.

This has become a China vs UK battle

Both countries are plagued with serious problems. The majority of Chinese people still live on less than a dollar per day. China is filthy from pollution, and Unchecked Immigration has destroyed many parts of the UK. Political Correctness is the state mandated religion in the UK, China has it's own free speech problems.

If I had to choose to be of English or Chinese DNA I would choose English, but I think I could more easily deal with the pollution in China than the horrible things about the UK, I would rather have my children in Chinese school as well.

The UK was once great, China is yet to be great, don't think it will ever be great, maybe it was great back in the time of the great wall....probably only for kings....but then again...the English empire was never great for the common man either, so food for thought.

An honest effort to attain a balanced outlook is commendable and important, but Brits shouldn't be beating up on themselves quite so much.

Even at the time of the American Revolution Great Britain had its parliament and parliamentary system, the Westminster Model, which continues to be utilized throughout the world. That the British parliament and the crown had to learn the hard way their imperial attitudes towards the 13 North American colonies was dated speaks more about the fallacies of imperialism than of democracy.

British democracy yielded a great deal that is central to the successes of the modern world, to include abolition of slavery, representative government, the rise of the bourgeoise.

Government models from ancient China and, indeed, China of the past thousand years to the present CCP-PRC, either no longer exist or exist today only as censoring and punishing dictatorships in the reprehensible "model" of Stalin, Hitler, and now Mao. The Chinese Communist Party has closed the circle of political economy to become a 21st century fascist dictatorship which soon will also be added to the proverbial trash heap of history.

These are opposing legacies, one of which always fails while the other, democracy, sustains itself on the strength of mass participation and due to the direct accountability of the government to the governed.

For all its flaws and skewed processes, democracy remains fundamentally rational. The rationale of dictatorship, which believes the intelligence of the ordinary person is low, is both dated and dangerous.

Wow, nothing like insulting the hell out of a guest.

The assessment might be correct, but it's not very nice.

As you said, not very nice . . . but accurate to quite a degree

Pretty accurate assessment of Britain by the Chinese newspaper.

Indeed, so why the hullabaloo . . .

^^ Lemme guess, stateside?

Nice way to sum up a country that has benefited the world more so than any other. And what is China worthy of other than to flood the world with more junk, annoy/threaten everyone off and churn out another billion lemmings?

"benefited the world more so than any other"?

That would have to rank among the most ridiculous statements I have every heard . . . ever.

Industrial revolution certainly a major force . . . no doubt about that.

Next? Benny Hill?

US & UK should stop importing their cheap junk. Slap tarriffs on them. Then watch their economy crumble. Their power is based on nothing more than mercantilism.

Umm, you do know that China doesn't manufacture goods just willy-nilly, don't you? Hmm, you may have three guesses on who bases themselves in China to have their 'cheap junk' manufactured.

Anyway, I guess power based on mercantilism is far worse than power based on weapons and sheer destructive force

I can agree that the consumer has some responsibility, albeit indirect, for what he/she choose to purchase. I rarely buy leather goods, because I don't like how leather gets to market. Similarly, I don't buy tuna for similar reasons. However, there's the other side of the equation. Chinese cannot blame their pollution on westerners who order their products. Chinese have a choice whether to produce products which are in demand, and thereby oblige to do particular businesses. We all would like to see them use cleaner manufacturing methods and materials. Both buyers and manufacturers can be part of that process. Even so, I rather doubt that, for example, if a US or UK company suggested a better manufacturing method that didn't use oil-derived plastic, ....whether Chinese manufacturers would want to comply. Here's just one of a hundred examples: US and European researchers are coming up with new, cleaner, better ways to make batteries - particularly they big type which are needed to go hand 0n hand with alternative energy. Are the Chinese contributing to any of that research? Doubtful. They don't appear to be doing any R&D, but simply sit back and use polluting methods to make products - many of which are copies (often inferior quality) of western devised products. Polluting is seen differently by Asians and Europeans/Americans. Asians will toss trash out the window or all over the ground at outdoor events. Westerners are a lot less prone to do so. Similar comparative attitudes manifest - on up the ladder - to smokestacks, polluted rivers, trashed beaches and oceans, etc. Chinese would do well to teach their children that littering and polluting are bad - on all levels - in all applications - from walking in a park to being president of a manufacturing business.

This has become a China vs UK battle

Both countries are plagued with serious problems. The majority of Chinese people still live on less than a dollar per day. China is filthy from pollution, and Unchecked Immigration has destroyed many parts of the UK. Political Correctness is the state mandated religion in the UK, China has it's own free speech problems.

If I had to choose to be of English or Chinese DNA I would choose English, but I think I could more easily deal with the pollution in China than the horrible things about the UK, I would rather have my children in Chinese school as well.

The UK was once great, China is yet to be great, don't think it will ever be great, maybe it was great back in the time of the great wall....probably only for kings....but then again...the English empire was never great for the common man either, so food for thought.

Quick fact check...

As of 2009 11.8% of the Chinese population lived on less than $1.25/day (well short of a "majority")..

http://povertydata.worldbank.org/poverty/country/CHN

Which parts of the UK have been "destroyed by unchecked immigration"?.....

Quite how is PC the "state mandated religion in the UK"?.....

Doubt your kids would last long in Chinese education.

No empire is run for the "good of the common man"...why should it be?

PS the Scots, Irish and Welsh might prefer to call it the British Empire to reflect their considerable input...

Just a couple of questions/observations. First, as the US gets closer to energy independence, is it anticipated that world prices will drop or will continued rising demand mean continuing higher prices?

Does China have a strategic oil reserve?

The PRC runs a trade deficit with just about everyone - to include Asean - except the United States. Its trade surplus against the US more than offsets the deficit with just about everyone else.

This over-reliance on exports to the US is however obstructing economic reform in the PRC, because the needed reduction in exports in favor of domestic consumption would put the CCP into a severe current account crunch, hence the CCP's $3.5 trillion in forex reserves (of which $1.2tn is in actual USDollars). A current account overall deficit would severely impact the RMB, which the CCP will avoid to the bitter end.

Not accurate....have a read of this

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/china/balance-of-trade

Just a couple of questions/observations. First, as the US gets closer to energy independence, is it anticipated that world prices will drop or will continued rising demand mean continuing higher prices?

Does China have a strategic oil reserve?

Er, I'm no energy expert

The US is expected to be energy independent by 2018 while also becoming a greater exporter of energy than Saudi Arabia.

True and not true...

US is now the largest producer of oil plus unconventionals, LNG and biofuels, but lags Saudi in terms of conventional oil production and is certainly not the world's largest exporter due to the scale of domestic demand. There is also growing domestic opposition to energy exports from the USA at all..

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/10/15/us-oil-pira-idUSL1N0I51IX20131015

Just a couple of questions/observations. First, as the US gets closer to energy independence, is it anticipated that world prices will drop or will continued rising demand mean continuing higher prices?

Does China have a strategic oil reserve?

Er, I'm no energy expert

The US is expected to be energy independent by 2018 while also becoming a greater exporter of energy than Saudi Arabia.

True and not true...

US is now the largest producer of oil plus unconventionals, LNG and biofuels, but lags Saudi in terms of conventional oil production and is certainly not the world's largest exporter due to the scale of domestic demand. There is also growing domestic opposition to energy exports from the USA at all..

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/10/15/us-oil-pira-idUSL1N0I51IX20131015

Yes, it will take two more years for the US to pass Saudi as the world's largest producer of crude oil, at which time it will become energy independent, and after which it will become a net exporter of oil.

All of this new oil is on private land. The environmentalists have the Fed's land tied up including not only the continental US, but off shore and in Alaska. There are huge reserves there which will remain untapped as long as the US has its current mindset.

Any dreams of opposing energy exports from the US are just that. The oil and gas are privately owned and we live in a global economy. Private companies would have to stop pumping and leave oil in the ground to stop exporting and that would be a bad thing for the US's balance of payments overall, and for tax receipts.

This has become a China vs UK battle

Both countries are plagued with serious problems. The majority of Chinese people still live on less than a dollar per day. China is filthy from pollution, and Unchecked Immigration has destroyed many parts of the UK. Political Correctness is the state mandated religion in the UK, China has it's own free speech problems.

If I had to choose to be of English or Chinese DNA I would choose English, but I think I could more easily deal with the pollution in China than the horrible things about the UK, I would rather have my children in Chinese school as well.

The UK was once great, China is yet to be great, don't think it will ever be great, maybe it was great back in the time of the great wall....probably only for kings....but then again...the English empire was never great for the common man either, so food for thought.

An honest effort to attain a balanced outlook is commendable and important, but Brits shouldn't be beating up on themselves quite so much.

Even at the time of the American Revolution Great Britain had its parliament and parliamentary system, the Westminster Model, which continues to be utilized throughout the world. That the British parliament and the crown had to learn the hard way their imperial attitudes towards the 13 North American colonies was dated speaks more about the fallacies of imperialism than of democracy.

British democracy yielded a great deal that is central to the successes of the modern world, to include abolition of slavery, representative government, the rise of the bourgeoise.

Government models from ancient China and, indeed, China of the past thousand years to the present CCP-PRC, either no longer exist or exist today only as censoring and punishing dictatorships in the reprehensible "model" of Stalin, Hitler, and now Mao. The Chinese Communist Party has closed the circle of political economy to become a 21st century fascist dictatorship which soon will also be added to the proverbial trash heap of history.

These are opposing legacies, one of which always fails while the other, democracy, sustains itself on the strength of mass participation and due to the direct accountability of the government to the governed.

For all its flaws and skewed processes, democracy remains fundamentally rational. The rationale of dictatorship, which believes the intelligence of the ordinary person is low, is both dated and dangerous.

It's not a case of "Brits beating up on themselves" (whatever that may mean in proper English!), more a case of being realistic and in command of the facts rather than relying on nostalgic day-dreaming. Gone are the days of Rule Britannia but the Brits can certainly excel in high-end fields from finance to engineering to education. Sadly the mass-market versions of the same are not a forte of the British.

At the time of the American War of Independence Great Britain was hardly a democracy despite having a parliamentary system. Only some 250,000 of the male population were able to vote (the female segment were to remain disenfranchised for another 140 years) at a time when the GB population was around 11 million.

British imperialism, and the power that its economic extraction produced, enabled the slave trade to be quashed courtesy of the RN's West Africa Squadron, enabled the spread of the Westminster System (see below for an interesting if somewhat outdated critique), enabled the spread of English as the global language, and it was the Industrial/Agrarian Revolutions, again fueled by imperial produce and capital, that led to the emergence of the bourgeoisie. The Westminster System only operates/operated in countries that were colonies of the UK.

http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/archives/3781

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westminster_system

Far from imperialism being dated at the end of the 18th century, it was only just getting in to its stride and was not to peak for another century plus. The loss of the American colonies was more a case of inadequate forces on the ground, poor quality military leadership, an over-reliance on naval power and most decisively the supporting and ultimately leading role played by the French, Spanish and Dutch who saw an opportunity to recover losses from the Seven Years War (1757-63). Ironically while France's assistance enabled the Americans to win their independence, the financial cost was one of the main causes leading to the French Revolution.

Also it would be a big stretch to claim the American War of Independence was a victory for democracy given the fact that all women, all slaves, all native Americans, and around 50% of white males, due to the property ownership stipulation, had no right to vote. Some states even disenfranchised potential voters due to their religion. Jews in Maryland had no vote before 1828.

Thus the War of Independence replaced rule by an overseas-based elite with rule by a domestically-based elite. Hardly a triumph of democracy!

Democracy....

“Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."

(WS Churchill, Speech in the House of Commons, 11 November 1947)

“Elections belong to the people. It's their decision. If they decide to turn their back on the fire and burn their behinds, then they will just have to sit on their blisters.”

Abraham Lincoln

“A vote is like a rifle: its usefulness depends upon the character of the user.”

Theodore Roosevelt

“The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.”

WS Churchill

Just a couple of questions/observations. First, as the US gets closer to energy independence, is it anticipated that world prices will drop or will continued rising demand mean continuing higher prices?

Does China have a strategic oil reserve?

Er, I'm no energy expert

The US is expected to be energy independent by 2018 while also becoming a greater exporter of energy than Saudi Arabia.

True and not true...

US is now the largest producer of oil plus unconventionals, LNG and biofuels, but lags Saudi in terms of conventional oil production and is certainly not the world's largest exporter due to the scale of domestic demand. There is also growing domestic opposition to energy exports from the USA at all..

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/10/15/us-oil-pira-idUSL1N0I51IX20131015

Yes, it will take two more years for the US to pass Saudi as the world's largest producer of crude oil, at which time it will become energy independent, and after which it will become a net exporter of oil.

All of this new oil is on private land. The environmentalists have the Fed's land tied up including not only the continental US, but off shore and in Alaska. There are huge reserves there which will remain untapped as long as the US has its current mindset.

Any dreams of opposing energy exports from the US are just that. The oil and gas are privately owned and we live in a global economy. Private companies would have to stop pumping and leave oil in the ground to stop exporting and that would be a bad thing for the US's balance of payments overall, and for tax receipts.

The poster folium's quote of me is a gross misrepresentation of what I wrote.

I believe the misrepresentation of me by the poster folium to be willful and deliberate to serve his own purposes.

I think we can get back to the topic.

There is commentary that near term US energy independence forecasts are a falsehood; from the URL below:

At a (probably conservative) 10%/year decline rate for existing U.S. crude oil production, in order to simply maintain current U.S. crude oil production, the industry would have to put on line the productive equivalent of every current oil field in the U.S. over the next 10 years,

Citi Research [an arm of Citigroup] puts the decline rate for existing U.S. natural gas production at about 24%/year, which would require the industry to replace about 100% of current U.S. natural gas production in four years, just to maintain current production.

http://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/US-Energy-Independence-The-Numbers-Dont-Add-Up.html

There is commentary that near term US energy independence forecasts are a falsehood; from the URL below:

At a (probably conservative) 10%/year decline rate for existing U.S. crude oil production, in order to simply maintain current U.S. crude oil production, the industry would have to put on line the productive equivalent of every current oil field in the U.S. over the next 10 years,

Citi Research [an arm of Citigroup] puts the decline rate for existing U.S. natural gas production at about 24%/year, which would require the industry to replace about 100% of current U.S. natural gas production in four years, just to maintain current production.

http://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/US-Energy-Independence-The-Numbers-Dont-Add-Up.html

And the author's views couldn't be at all slanted now, could they? He's a certified member of the Tin Foil Hat Society, as is that web site. It's all doom - we're all doomed - "...peak oil and climate change, primarily in the areas of food, transportation and housing."

"Biography

Kurt Cobb is a freelance writer and author of the peak oil-themed thriller Prelude. He speaks and writes frequently on energy and the environment and is a columnist for the Paris-based science news site Scitizen (pronounced like “citizen”). His work has also been featured on Energy Bulletin, 321energy, Le Monde Diplomatique, The Oil Drum, EV World, and many other sites. Kurt is a founding member of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil and Gas—USA and serves on the board of The Arthur Morgan Institute for Community Solutions which is focused on solutions for peak oil and climate change, primarily in the areas of food, transportation and housing."

Link

As interesting as the discussion is, it is off-topic. If you wish to discuss tangential issues, you will have to incorporate them into the current topic.