The Kiss Law

This preface of this thread is extreme oversimplification of a complex topic in order to generate controversial discussion. The OP first needs to define the terms being used in this oversimple statement: “If you cannot make it without polluting, no matter where in the world you make it; you cannot sell it in this country.”

It sounds really nice if you are 5 and dreaming of puppies and rainbows. Let's be adults for a moment. We need to define the following terms simply to begin the debate:
"make"
"polluting"
"sell"
"country"

Let's look at these one by one:
"make" = to manufacture, easy right? So coal must be OK? Nobody makes coal! It is dug out of the earth and burned. No problem there. How about cow and pig manure? We don't make those, so they must not be pollutants?

"polluting" = nasty chemicals like the carbon dioxide mentioned in the OP, except that carbon dioxide is a natural component in air. In fact the natural composition of air is: This is composition of air in percent by volume, at sea level at 15°C and 101325 Pa.
Nitrogen -- N2 -- 78.084%
Oxygen -- O2 -- 20.9476%
Argon -- Ar -- 0.934%
Carbon Dioxide -- CO2 -- 0.0314%
Neon -- Ne -- 0.001818%
Methane -- CH4 -- 0.0002%
Air is nasty stuff. After spending 20 years in environmental compliance I can attest to how clean the earth is getting. Many of our water pollution laws now have limits below the natural background levels. We used to use river water for cooling, and under our NPDES permit the water we released was cleaner than the natural river water we used.

"sell" = exchange for compensation. No problem with that definition, but what about a government defense facility that isn't selling anything? What about an intermediate that consumed within the company? I know your answer, we use life cycle analysis to determine ALL of the inputs and outputs of any given product being sold in this country! All innovation just came to a screeching halt. No new product will ever be developed.

Finally, we come to the crux of my argument: "this country". Unfortunately, pollutants don't obey man made boundaries. So you just drove ALL manufacturing overseas (not that we haven't already done a great job of that) and the pollutants will still find their way here in the air or water. Oh, you say, but they can't sell it here if it caused pollution "over there". Yeah, I guess we can trust them to tell us the truth about their manufacturing processes. No way they would lie on a government form just to win a multi-million dollar contract. The flip side of your KISS rule is even more interesting. I can continue to make it here, and pollute the environment as long as I don't sell it here. So my cheap dirty product must be exported because I can't sell it in "this country". Too bad, so sad.

Look, I'm not trying to rain on your tree hugging parade. It's a beautiful concept, but the EPA has had the same agenda since 1970. That's 43 years of writing ever stricter rules, with ever higher costs of compliance, and ever lower returns on investment. Trust me, the EPA shares your dream. They too have no concept of a cost/benefit analysis. It's all or nothing and ---- the torpedoes. Has anyone ever noticed that there is no end point to the EPA's function. When is the environment "clean enough"? I can tell you this, when WE decide enough is enough, there will be thousands of bureaucrats looking for work. The US no longer has a pollution problem (partly because most manufacturing has been forced out of the country. I'm not naive enough to believe we can make the products we use without pollution), but the rest of the world has picked up our slack. They now want what we have and they will get it just the way we did. Displace the natives, steal the land, burn the forests, build the factories, and make the money. Our laws won't mean a thing to them.

Puppies and rainbows are so nice.

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The government can't give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
--Dr. Adrian Rogers

Puppies and rainbows are not the reason I made the post. The intelligent ideas and discussion are a delight and a great distraction during some difficult times. So thank you for all your input. But here is a heads up: I am planing another post soon. So be prepared!

What are you dong to get rid if pollutants? Are going to have your electricity cut off and get rid of air condition and ruining water and electric lights or are you gong to do what other people do just complain because I don't do it.

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God must have loved stupid people because he made so many of them.

What have you got against puppies and rainbows, I think they are both pretty cool. Ok, so rainbows get a bad rap because they are often associated with nasty stuff like rain that erodes our mountains and washes them out to sea.... but puppies are just simply cute and cuddly.

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"Nothing so needs reforming as other peoples habits." Mark Twain

It is amusing if not hilarious how the environmental Luddites decry the degradation of the environment while cooling/heating their environments with that evil electricity, transporting themselves in doomsday internal combustion machines, spreading their particular madness using every environmentally destructive method at their disposal. Yeah hilarious, ironic or perhaps more to the point hypocritical.

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“The power of accurate observation is often seen as cynicism by those who do not have it”. George Bernard Shaw.

A segregated, second class citizen of HT

Just goes to show that extreme ideas often lead to extreme results. Everything is good in moderation. Another way to say this (as taught by my old toxicology professor) "the dose makes the poison".

Many things which are essential to life are poisons at high doses. Many poisons are natural elements.

The simple idea that we can eliminate all pollution is just as dangerous as the simple idea that all regulation should be eliminated and that our pollution can't hurt the earth. As usual, the truth lies somewhere in the middle, and finding that balance is what this debate should be about.

I can't wait for the next chapter.

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The government can't give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
--Dr. Adrian Rogers

I will soon be living out of my truck; I am going to loose the house. Solar on the roof, one light light bulb, and one burner, wash up in gas station bath rooms. And try to start debates. We can do what ever we decide to do. As long as we are afraid to to take a chance, afraid of what may change, afraid to do anything at all our children are doomed to pay outrageous taxes to pay off our national debt, and breath the toxic air we leave for them.

There are those of us that do not use AC even though we live in S. FL. and until we make a law that will force the changes we want we will need a car for transport.

The question is what will you be willing to do with out until business can find a way to make it with out polluting?

This is a terrible recession. I swear, I'll never forgive Bush for letting it happen.

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Ask Me About Linux System Administration

Yep complaining about what I do.

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God must have loved stupid people because he made so many of them.

1. Coal is not made true but it is used to make other things and if it cannot be used without polluting then you do not sell it in the USA.



2. We already know how to recycle manure, though I cannot say the same for some of the “BS” that gets dumped here LOL.


3. As for all the nasty chemicals you mentioned, yes they are all natural but are the ratios? Too much of anything is not good.


4. The air may be cleaner but why spot there? They have found anti-depressants in the fish. http://toxics.usgs.gov/highlights/an...ants_fish.html


5. By the way can you define cleaner?


6. As for an intermediate, it is part of the manufacturing process, if it pollutes you cannot sell the final product here.


7. I said nothing of the life cycle analysis, only the manufacture of the item. Let’s take it one step at a time.


8. Innovation will bloom, as soon as business understands they cannot do it the old way, they will find a new way. New ways to recycle and manufacture almost everything.


9. No matter where they make it, if the manufacture of it causes pollution (by US standards because it is a US law) they will not have the USA as a market. If they have no market why would they make it? Even a businessman in China will try to find a way into an open market. Our advantage is we have already started to clean up, China is way behind, and if we have any doubts the door stays shut.


10. The EPA attacked the problem from the wrong end. If you try to force a change people will fight it; Prohibition showed us that. Business will make the change with money as the motivator.


11. “Displace the natives, steal the land, burn the forests, build the factories, and make the money.”
Why bother if the market is less than half of what it was? They won’t sell it here!

Take a look at this picture do you really want to leave this to your kids?
http://apnews.myway.com/image/201306...ocid=DA6TLLRG1

Yes it is China, but will it continue if half the market is closed to them?

Sounds like Obama at a fundraiser party.

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God must have loved stupid people because he made so many of them.

Has nothing to do with the depression. The bank was set up with a direct payment plan. One year later they asked for an odd amount $99.05 more than mortgage payment. They never took another payment, in spite of the fact the money was in the bank.
A year later the bank went under, and was absorbed by another bank. Still no comment about payment. The house is my daughters so 4 years later when I became aware of the lack of payments I tried to tell the new bank. (I had been living on a boat. ) They told me No we were all paid up. They even gave me the account number of the account they were taking money from. It was not ours!!
It is now 5 years since a payment was made. We went through 2 more years of letters claiming the bank needed time to do more research. Then the day before Christmas, almost 7 yrs since the last payment, we got foreclosure papers from yet another bank.
2 months ago we were informed we are again dealing with the previous bank. We are once again getting letters claiming they need more time to research the problem.

If the management of the banking industry would remove the uppermost extremity of their body from their rectal orifice we would all be better off.

Did you send any payments when they failed to take out the mortgage payments? If not, haven't you saved up the missing payments? I'm not clear on why you didn't make payments knowing that none were automatically made from the bank account. If the bank refused your payments via check, then it would have been an easy fix at that time.

Regardless, all you have to do now is bring the mortgage current. They can't foreclose without serving you with the lawsuit and, in that lawsuit, will be the amount that is due and owing and lists all the missing payments.

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"Challenges are what make life interesting -- overcoming them is what makes life meaningful."

What you describe is a lawsuit waiting to happen. This is so egregious you would have a free house, spending money, and your attorney would be laughing all the way to his/her bank.

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“The power of accurate observation is often seen as cynicism by those who do not have it”. George Bernard Shaw.

A segregated, second class citizen of HT

I wish!! The attorneys are buried in cases and they claim the case is not worth taking. So I fight my own war.

Something is not right then. Attorneys would love this case and it would be an hourly rate (this type of case would never be a percentage -- which by the way would end up being paid for by the mortgage holder; so them getting their money is a sure thing). This is what law firms call a 'slam dunk', so there would be no reason any attorney wouldn't jump on it. It's really an extremely easy case if all is as you said and takes one Motion to the court to end it.

If you answer my questions in the previous post, I might be able to help to let you know what you might be able to do. You really do have many options available.

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"Challenges are what make life interesting -- overcoming them is what makes life meaningful."

Check out some of TNHermit's problems with various lenders and his mortgage. It's taken him about 3 years with records in hand to show his lawyer what the problem is and about that long before the lawyer got it.

He's been truely messed with.

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"Live your life, and forget your age." Norman Vincent Peale

At last, we get to the bottom of it.

You lost your house, piddled away the payments instead of setting them back, then had no way of bailing yourself out when the chickens came home to roost. Soon to be dwelling in a pickup and laying your waste on the property of others, so now the rest of the country is supposed to do the same.

Thanks for clearing that up. Excuse me for living in a house, driving a truck wherever I want, making a product and selling it for enough money to live on, instead of being a vagrant. Also, please excuse me for not feeling a twinge of guilt about it....Joe

If you know of someone let me know!!!