36 Replies to “Gaze Into This Crystal Ball”

  1. Well to use an oft quoted expression here, “Well no sh*t, Sherlock!”

    When a country can produce, grow, make, manufacture what it needs then it will produce wealth. When a country depends on imports of products that it refuses to produce itself it creates dependency. Same goes for individuals. When Trump brought the China steel fiasco to the fore everyone criticized him, when he wanted a wall on the southern border he was ridiculed by the Democrats. Well no sh*t Sherlock he was right on both occasions. The point is being driven home now with the medicines and pharmaceuticals, how many Democrats will wake up now and get behind Trump?

    1. Critical products and items should be able to be manufactured locally, when economically feasible. HOWEVER, it is a pipe dream to think your life will not be significantly impacted by returning to the circular economy. That means medieval economy.

      Make no mistake, this is a push to return to the circular, medieval economy.
      How many of your prescription drugs are made in the prairies?
      Do you know where the local Fab is for PCB manufacture, you know, the boards and chips needed in every electronic devices you have?
      What about the mining and refining every exotic mineral and metal needed to produce motors, injectors, bearings, etc, etc, etc?

      Go through almost every modern item in your house, who could make that locally? There are not enough people in western canada, hell in Canada, even if we had all the raw resources, to sustain our modern lifestyle, not even close. We would revert at least 5-8 decades and economic growth would stop dead.

      Think very carefully before your agree with this circular economy thinking being generally applied. This is precisely what all the lefties and enviro whackos are promoting, there is a reason for it.

      Critical items, yes, we should have available locally if we can actually do it, but otherwise let the market do its job. The other way is a disaster. Just ask every older russian out there.

      1. BTW, before someone comes along and says that the market pushed us to China. No, the market did NOT.
        The unions did, gov’t regulation did, corruption between banks and gov’t did. The market just reacted, just as the market will react to the shock of losing its single source supply for many items out of china. If the market is allowed to react, there is huge incentive now for prescription drugs to be dual or triple sourced, the suppliers that can do that will sweep the marketplace. That is how the market reacts, let it do its job.

        If you demand now that the gov’t intervene and bring it all back, well, don’t be too surprised when ‘it all’ just disappears. Trusting gov’t is a fools task. What did you need a car for in the first place?

        Don’t react with fear, think about it logically. This local, circular economy is misleading you, don’t fall for it.

        1. But if all we do is import from China, we run out of the ability to pay for those imports, and we end up a third world country like Maurice Strong and the Libranos want. Right now economic growth is dead anyway, what we have going on is supported by debt. When Trudeau the First came into power, Canada had the highest savings rate in the world, a generation later under Trudeau the Worst we have the highest consumer debt in the world. The fact that not one Ottawashed politician sees a problem with this is one of the reasons I support #WEXIT.

          If you look at the thread rather than the tweet, it is clear that this is talking about maintaining capacity for essential items, and shortening supply chains using friendly countries instead of hostile ones. This will be good for the economy, good for stability, and good for the environment.

          1. “But if all we do is import from China,…” we don’t, we import from all over. Neither do I advocate have China as a supply base. My point is, we CANNOT manufacture and produce everything needed for a modern society in Canada. We need trade and a free market should determine where that trade comes from. No, I am not arguing that we have a free market, particularly with the likes of Trudeau interfering everywhere, but even so it is better than having a board, committee, agency, etc determining our overall supply chain.

      2. Do you know where the local Fab is for PCB manufacture, you know, the boards and chips needed in every electronic devices you have?

        Yes I do there are several in Ottawa alone.

        What about the mining and refining every exotic mineral and metal needed to produce motors, injectors, bearings, etc, etc, etc?

        Certainly not in Canada, thank you Liberals, champagne socialists and eco-fascists.

        But globalism is more or less inevitable; the question is what manner of globalism. One of a universal technocratic government, one size fits all; or a collection of sovereign nation states persuing their own interests.

        1. Google the list of fab plants, they are pretty much everywhere but here. I don’t want to go through the list of every product that is or is not feasible to ever be produced in canada, 80% is simply not. Nor would I want either one of your solutions: technocratic gov’t or sovereign nations in control of the supply chain. I would prefer free market to the greatest possible extent.

          To all who think that we need to return to ‘local production’, please do some research on what the left and the greenies are proposing for implementation, not years from now, but in the next months. The shit is coming and it is coming fast. It has many names, but the circular economy is the most common and essentially is a reversion to the old commie ways. It will be lauded in terms of supporting local suppliers, farmers, etc reducing transport, etc, but what it really implies is that you will earn less and you will simply have less, much less.

          I am no advocate of buying all our crap in China but before you slam global trade you should really consider the team you are joining.

        2. Yes I do there are several in Ottawa alone.

          Those are small scale boutique shops producing very custom PCB for prototyping or small production runs for the tech companies in the Ottawa area. They cannot produce the volume of commodity PCB and SoC that run consumer electronics.

      3. There’s a vast middle ground between growing your own backyard antibiotics and having 100% of them manufactured by a hostile communist dictatorship. Or to be asleep as 85% of IV bags manufacturing is relocated in a building in Puerto Rico. That regulation and other parasitic forces have driven the supply chain in this direction is besides the point, we’re here now and people are getting a big wake up call.

        1. Note Trudeau’s six weeks late answer to the Corona Virus, we will form a committee. Mao would be proud.

        2. Lucky for me, I live in the newly CLEAN SF Bay Area. Yeayyyy! Yes, we used to actually MAKE circuit boards, transistors, and all manner of SILICON based devices … here in Silicon Valley. No more. We’ve made it impossible to build those evil things here where our groundwater was being tainted … so we shipped it all to where the poor people live. To where life is cheap! Aren’t we so smart!? Hell, you can’t even bake bread in the Bay Area because that great-smell it gives off is … uh, toxic? I guess.

          And now we’ve shipped all the nasty bits of EVERY manufacturing chain to countries we don’t give a shit about (sorry Canada). Why? Because we are smarter and better than anyone else in the world! We love our children and will PROTECT them from harm … but we WANT stuff … lots of stuff (like really kewl pollution-Free electric Tesla’s) … cheap … so we let those poor Asian people do our shit work.

          Let’s keep globalism STRONG!

          #proud to be anAmericanPIG
          #we’vebecomeanationofassholes
          /truth-sarc.

        3. Yes They are Kate.

          Having recently spent a week at the Foothills Hosp, I was floored at the amount and wide spread use of “single use plastics” All sourced from China.

          Anything to do with IV (Bags nothwithstanding), but needles, hoses, clamps, and i am going to assume dressings, bandages, nitrile gloves etc…..all 1 time use and in the garbage it goes.

          One wonders what the stock levels are at this very moment and how that will impact any future Surgeries or any other health care for that matter.

          Bring that home..?? Damned Straight.! And maybe just reconsider sterilising re-usable items instead…?? AutoClave Anyone.?

      1. Blood oranges are awesome … and maybe appropriate. I like greens in winter unless they’re covered in E coli.

      2. We have the technology to be building massive green houses and could be doing so instead of covering the landscape with wind and solar farms.
        That would be energy intensive of course, we’d have to do something about the Gang Green 5th Column and Global Warming insanity.

  2. Let’s not forget that being opposed to trade with (red) China was not a popular position among conservatives just a few years back. We were told that it would all work out fine and everyone would get rich.

    Well?

    1. We were also told that we would all be rich because of, first, the FTA (Free Trade Agreement), which was succeeded by NAFTA. “Prosperity is around the corner,” Mulroney promised. I’m still waiting…..

  3. France was / is a good example where they preferred to export rather than import. There are probably many more examples. Keeping the money at home is a good idea.

    It’s one thing to trade goods but vital necessities like pharmaceuticals ought to come from some place close to home. What were they
    t-h-i-n-k-i-n-g? Oh yes, they weren’t.

    Of course bring it all back!

  4. It’s the money, honey.

    People shop at less expensive places like Costco rather than Rodeo Drive in Los Angeles.

    So manufacturers “shop” at less expensive places like China than the U.S. or Canada. (This includes taxes, regulations, and cost of labour.)

    Exhibit No. 1: Apple.

    Because of the short-term window on financial time-frames due to stock dividends, manufacturers look short-term. They couldn’t care less about the long-term anymore. In other words, they gotta make da’ moolah for their stock holders and fast.

    So, off to China it is. With blinders on. Who cares if China “hates” the U.S.? Money is money. (Actually, China wants to CONQUER the U.S. and as many other wealthy countries as they can.)

    But those manufacturers actually do pay for their choice in the long run.

    Exhibit No. 2: Wuhan virus.

    There goes the “supply chain”!

    2. Do you know where the local Fab is for PCB manufacture, you know, the boards and chips needed in every electronic devices you have?

      Yes I do there are several in Ottawa alone.

      What about the mining and refining every exotic mineral and metal needed to produce motors, injectors, bearings, etc, etc, etc?

      Certainly not in Canada, thank you Liberals, champagne socialists and eco-fascists.

      But globalism is more or less inevitable; the question is what manner of globalism. One of a universal technocratic government, one size fits all; or a collection of sovereign nation states persuing their own interests.

  5. But, but, but, we can save 1% on the total costs!!!

    Who cares if we throw a thousand people out of work?!? Move it overseas to China! Or Mexico, Vietnam, Pakistan.

    Those Evil Corporate Robber Barons like Rockefeller, Carnegie, and Ford of the early 1900’s evilly exploited their fellow citizens, by making millions of them rich. They left behind a legacy of schools, libraries, museums, and huge national businesses employing millions. What have the Modern Corporate Managers like Singer done for our nations? A legacy of industries destroyed, cities devastated, and families ruined.

    Who are the real Robber Barons?

    1. The multi-national companies’ desires for “free trade” really comes down to, not an economy of scale of produciton, but an economy of scale of market, Also, the “free trade” agreements are generally not that, but controlled trade agreements, bringing in more regulation, that smaller companies cannot handle, so they are also a means of excluding competition.

      A Free Trade agreement would be a one-liner: “Let there be no duties or subsidies on goods and services between us”.

  6. CNN is outraged this morning that Trump called the virus a “foreign” virus. That’s racist! CNN is also outraged that Trump stated the virus started in China. CNN repeated Chinese propaganda that the virus didn’t start there, and that China is doing wonderful things. China is wonderful.

  7. No-shit Sherlock strikes again.

    She had forgotten about other factors like lost skills and experience that are oh-so-difficult to repatriate. You can build a factory but you cannot instantaneously obtain skilled workforce for it.

  8. There is the impact of publicly traded companies vs privately held.
    Once a company goes public the motivation for profit is moved from those more interested in what a company does and how it profits from but that the value of its stock increases.
    This can lead to decisions that are short term or ill advised.
    A board of directors is motivated more by what the fund managers are telling them and less by the people that work in the company or the people that buy the product.

  9. Some idiot on the thread mentions a $5000.00 I phone. Just not true but its typical. What was Apple’s stock worth 20 years ago? 8 bucks or something?
    I also remember when you could make money on savings in a simple bank account.
    Things are pooched. With mechanization and automation factories are extremely efficient. When a proper product gets undercut by a POS made by slaves till the former is out of business its because you have unfair trade practices.
    The Chicoms steal patents and intellectual property. We shouldn’t even send them food.
    Shareholders – like giant teacher’s pensions – demand massive profits and they could care less about cost to their neighbours.
    I always just wanted to keep ahead of inflation with my ROI and despite the shitshow of consumerism, still pay more to get stuff made above Mexico.

    1. If a country can’t feed itself, supply its own energy and protect itself then its citizen’s live on a precipice.

  10. Unless the regulatory and labor law environment is changed drastically in North America, products now made in China will not be made here at a competitive cost. These costs cannot simply be passed onto the end user. They have the ultimate option of saying “no thanks” and if the cost is beyond what they can afford, that is what will happen.

  11. In the 1990’s globalisation was seen to be successful corporations going multinational. The left disparaged it. Bruce Cockburn loudly condemned it during his acceptance speech for some useless Juno award.
    Now, the left realized globalisation means a one world totalitarian dictatorship. It will do everything it can to promote it.

  12. Anyone here ever read Dean Koontz’s book
    “The Eyes of Darkness”. 1981

    There’s apparently some rather prescient and chilling quotes from damned near 40 years ago NAMING WUHAN, their Bio Lab, predicting a Pandemic in 2020 from a (bio)bug he called Wuhan 400. ~ pages 312 & 333

    Reuters claims its “partly” false as what Koontz wrote is not 100% Identical to our current situation. Cute. Chilling prescience IMO.

    The Narrative we keep on Being FED is that it was a cross jumping Viral prion from dead or live animals in a food market..Bat wing Soup so to speak.

    But so far No one REALLY knows for certain do they.??

  13. well.
    pffft.
    I could have told y’all this back when cretin and mulruin were doing all those jaunts to the forbidden city.
    and I DID warn anyone who fcukin LISTENED, but those were few.

  14. this is also known as ‘whats good for GM’ syndrome.
    ifn ’tis good for GM to farm parts etc production to chirer, then go with it.
    the now glaringly fcukin OBVIOUS downside is what happens *later*. ie happening NOW.
    do I have to spell it out?
    answering in the affirmative EXPOSES THE FCUKIN PROBLEM.

    here’s a BIIIIIIG hint: do NOT (despite what walmart tells us) emphasis PRICE to the *exclusion* of all else.
    etc etc

  15. But can Canada still keep unlimited immigration from 3rd world sh!tholes? I mean what’s an epidemic compared to more cultural “ diversity”? It’s really a no-brainer.

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