The education industry has given us pre school, pre pre school, pre kindergarten, summer school, longer school days, longer school weeks, homework, more homework, and even more homework. What we got in return for these "innovations" is a system that regularly fails the students and society. The positives of this failed system are we have record numbers of employees and administrators per student. In the past those employees served us now it's the other way around. Until once again the education industry is made to serve us the problem will never go away or get better.

Education is too important to be left in the hands of insular ivory tower dwelling big egoed educrats whos politically correct intellectual fantasies on how education should be always fail when reality sets in. With budget cuts happening all across the country now is the time to revamp the system where quality not mediocre quantity is the norm. Teachers are employees who can only teach what their bosses allow them to. The teachers are being used as scapegoats for the out of touch education industry.

Go to college or your a loser. A perfect example of education industry propaganda creating demand and failing to deliver a quality product. Now we have kids all around the world with huge loan debt and no job prospects while the colleges crank the tuition and build more and more buildings as monuments to themselves. Along with hefty pay raises.

As far as stick it to the banks and let'em go out of business, has anyone who believes this ever given a thought of life without banks? Doubt it. No mortgages, credit cards, debit cards, no credit at all except for the local loan shark. The guy who breaks your legs when the payment is late. No online bill pay, no direct deposit. The financial system would collapse and we would be back to subsistance living and barter. Back to the caves and survival of the meanest and fittest. I'd love to see the Wall Street and banker types roasted over a spit but not at the cost of sending this country and it's people back to the stone ages.

If we could actually get them to tell the truth a large segment of home owners foreclosed or underwater would admit they knew the house was overpriced when they bought it. They figured to live in the house for a year or so and flip it to some sucker for a profit. Turns out they were the suckers. Now that they got the short end it's everyone elses fault but their own. Unless the bank dragged you in off the street and held a gun to your head and made you sign the papers it's your fault. It's called the free market. If you are stupid, greedy, or unlucky in your purchase time to man up and admit your error. When you blame Harry Reid or Obama for your poor decisions it just tells the world you really are too stupid to learn from your mistakes and too ignorant to educate yourself.

As far as principle reductions, no way. If you can't afford it, lose it. If the banks start giving priciple reductions it would cascade into another disaster for the financial system as droves of underwater home owners would quit making their payments hoping for a reduction. It would also bring home values down further thus creating more underwater homeowners looking for reductions. Then the first reducers would then be underwater again and they would apply for another principle reduction. A merry-go-round that only stops when the financial system collapses and our way of life goes back to the stone ages.

Hyundai, Toyota, Mazda, Kawasaki, Honda, Michelin, BMW, Volkswagen (in the process of building in Tennessee), Bridgestone, Yokahama, Siemens, ABB, Subaru, all huge multi national companies with plants in the US employing Americans. Foreign manufacturers have a huge presence in the USA putting the lie to USA CEO's making every excuse in the world to outsource. For the most part outsourcing can be explained in one word, lazy. It's far easier to outsource and let someone else have the headaches of setting up plants and staffing them. American CEO's complain about lazy American workers but in fact it is they who are the lazy ones. Problem is they pay themselves and their bloated staffs top dollar along with extravagantly furnished offices and airplanes. Many experts predict there will be a resurgence of manufacturing in the USA but it won't be the American CEO's doing it.

All that stuff from overseas has to be handled and shipped which is not cheap. Most people act as if this stuff magically appears in our stores. Transportation is oil based and will be for a long time. When the world gets back to somewhat normal supply and demand, along with the speculators on Wall Street, will drive oil and the price of shipping to the moon. Businesses highly dependant on overseas goods will be paying the price for their short term profits. High oil prices will force manufacturing back to the USA.

Overseas may have cheap wages but they would rather use slave labor than buy machinery. Germany, a country of only 80 million people, is one of the worlds largest exporters. They pay top dollar wages and benefits but make up for it by automating and actually knowing how their business works. Most American CEO's don't have a clue what's going on in their factories except for what's in the reports from their staff. They wouldn't be caught dead in their factories except for PR work.

When we talk about the cost to society of offshoring jobs all we ever hear about is the people cost. Which our "educated" bretheren sweep under the rug because it only affects the "unskilled", "stupid", "inferior" people. Oh really?

The Great Lakes are infested with quagga and zebra mussels brought in from overseas in ship ballast. Lake Mead too. Besides costing billions of private and taxpayer money to fight, boat owners in many parts of the country must thoroughly clean their boats before moving to another lake to prevent the spread of pests. In the midwest MILLIONS of trees have been lost due a bug brought in from China, the Emerald Ash Borer. BILLIONS of taxpayer dollars have been spent trying to contain the losses and the fight, and the expenses, are far from over. If one were to do research on the subject odds are they will find many more pest invaders brought in by hiding in shipping crates from overseas costing countless taxpayer dollars to fight.

If any one were to do a real, thorough analysis of how much tax payer money is spent through pest control, port operations, highways, tax breaks, etc to support imports it would be a staggering sum. It's another way the private sector is eating at the public trough with the taxpayer picking up the tab.

It's obvious the Walmart bashers don't shop there. Afraid to rub shoulders with the "unwashed" masses? If you did one would find many thousands of made in USA made items. Prove me wrong. In the meantime visit any major retailer and find them full of imported stuff.

Unless we are talking something very labor intensive like cars and machinery, labor is NOT a major cost in a product. If labor costs are too high here why do foreign manufacturers like BMW, Hyundai, Toyota, Michelin, Siemens, Nissan, Kawasaki, Honda, Subaru, Yokahoma, and many many others have plants in this country paying good wages and benefits and are happy to be here. It's only lazy American CEO's who don't want to manufacture here. Cheap wages cannot make up for inefficient foreign factories, the shipping, handling, warehousing, overstocking, and long lead times. The Chinese miracle, and the miracle of most offshore countries, is currency manipulation to under value the currency, making their goods cheaper. In the near future oil will again skyrocket in price causing prices of imported goods to explode higher.

What is a skill? Many people have menial jobs that they do for years while standing on their feet all day. Yet the "educated" people complaining about those poeple not having skills quit jobs at the first sign of boredom and sit on their hind ends all day. Many menial jobs are hazardous to the workers long term health and takes years off their lives. Instead of being grateful this guy is making a sacrifice so the complainers can sit in an airconditioned office and live a long and healthy life, they are derided and scorned. Many complain they have a degree but a non degreed dealer makes more money. A good dealer not only protects the game and produces revenue his personality and being able to deal with people of all spectrums is what brings the customers in. Skills a great many degreed people don't have and are too arrogant to develop. In other words, skills are varied and encompass more than the mental ones. It's just that those who have a piece of a paper they think qualifies them as being smart, but doesn't it only denotes a course of study has been completed, pick and choose what they consider a skill and physical skills are never counted. If those jobs are so easy anyone can do them, you do them and and see how long you last. Let's start with something simple. Go out to a road constuction site and direct traffic holding the sign that says stop or go. Pay no mind to the blazing sun, broiling heat, dehydration, 8 to 12 hour days standing on your feet. Piece of cake for superior people such as yourselves.

The rich are getting richer at the expense of the rest of us. Now that people are squawking the PR campaign of the rich keeping theirs while taking yours is in full swing and it's working. Those of us at the bottom are beating each other up because now it's our fault. Education is bad because of policy and self serving leadership but the teachers and their unions are getting the blame. Manufacturing is going away because of CEO greed and incompetence but it's the working man and the unions who are getting blamed. States made bad policy and laws and are in dire straits but the public employees and their unions get blamed. Welfare mothers too. Wall Street greed almost sent us back to the stone ages but the PR has us blaming the unemployed for being unemployed. 5 people looking for every job opening but it's those darned unemployment checks keeping us from going back to work.

There are plenty of good teachers out there. Even if every one was fantastic there is no way they could make up for bad policy and lousy leadership.

From the boardrooms to congress to the ivory towers of academia, no one has a clue. Until such time as the decision makers who are sending this country on the road to ruin get some reality in their lives nothing will change for the better. We used to manage and make policy after making human contact but now we do it by reports and executive meetings. Years ago even company presidents could be found doing the rounds in their factories. Now they wouldn't be caught dead in them except for PR purposes. Ask a teacher how often those in administration, the ones who decide what will and will not be taught, ever visited a classroom except for PR and asked and geuinely respected that teachers opinion. Not much if at all. In your own personal jobs how often does your boss come out of his hidey hole to ask your opinion or how he could make things work better? Rarely if at all, right?

Back in the days when the USA had a great manufacturing base and great education those at the bottom did the work while the supervisors gave them the tools and support they needed. Each layer of management was there to support those below it. It was all about the product and customers. We have turned that around to where each level of management is there to support those above it. The higher the level the bigger the egos and the bigger the desire to get everything you think you deserve because your so special. We no longer care about the product or the customers. That is why this country is in a mess and things will only get worse until this kind of self serving ignorant thinking is turned around. There is an old saying. "Your attitude determines your altitude in life." Without a change in the "it"s all about me attitude" from the decision makers we're all on a plane heading for the crash site.

Too late. The people who want these things will buy them in the aftermarket if car makers don't supply them. It's either make this stuff illegal or live with the results.

I think it's ironic that while American manufacturers can't wait to move overseas foreigners are moving in and putting up factories. I've listed many of them before. Many experts claim that we will have a manufacturing rivial but it will be by foreigners not our home grown people.

The real problem in this country and why we have so much outsourcing is attitude. We look upon our employees not as assets who helped build a strong company but as disposable trash to be used up and discarded. We glorify the rape and pilaging of our economy and retirement accounts by Wall Street at the push of a button. We look upon the working man as some kind of disease that needs to be stamped out. Some of you people posting here complain about how Las Vegas sucks because of the "uneducated" people. Yet almost 40 million people a year come here to be treated quite well by those "uneducated" and "unskilled" people. We have all seen many letters from people saying they love the Las Vegas experience but won't be back because of management greed.

It's not about cheap wages, never has been. It's all about taking the easy way out. Even a small American corporation has the power of life and death over a foreign supplier. Better to let him build the factories, pay the bills, make the payroll. The Chinese government helps out by currency manipulation and making payments to companies that export. We have a technological edge but refuse to use it as it would mean having to reinvest and actually make hard decisions. Instead we are outsourcing the technology too. Selling our future for short term profit and bonuses. Akin to a farmer giving away his seed corn.