There are many concerns with China (that's why I just listed China).

1. China is in a position to become the dominant world power in our lifetime in my opinion. If they were to ally themselves to a substantial degree with North Korea, this would be the first step in that direction.

2. With China's complete disregard for human rights, the country will continue to flood world markets with cheap goods that at some point could cripple the economies of other nations (US included).

3 Numbers. China has nearly 10x the population of the U.S. (I may be a little off on the amount but it is significant). In a conventional war of attrition, we would be in trouble.

4. China has a very strong military. They could wipe out Japan in the blink of an eye and basically roll over the countries comprising the former Soviet empire. With a little work, they could control nearly the entire Asian continent (that is a lot of natural resources at their disposal friends and neighbors)

 

While China's military might is an obvious concern, I do not believe that the conquest of Asia, in a conventional sense would be tenable for China. Here is why:

 

Despite their numbers, China's air and sea technology remains inferior to both the United States and Japan. Any attempt at conventional warfare with Japan and, perforce, the United States, would keep a large segment of China's military forces occupied on their Eastern hemisphere in order to match the Pacific powers technologically.

 

China might be able to commit large troop movements to their Eastern borders. However, conquest of Asia would be made extremely difficult from manpower because of 2 things: 1) the impossible terrain to the south and southwest and 2) the number of people in India. India remains a technologically inferior but militarily sizeable country due to sheer population size. They cannot be taken from the ocean to the south because of the military support of the United States at Diego Garcia.

 

China is likely to be a world power, but Asia is an enormous land mass subject to assault from too many areas. I worry more about the economic prowess than the military.

Poverty

Equal Opportunity - minorities and women

Terrorism

Corporate Greed

Education

This nations energy dependence.

 

Partison Politics (party over country)

 

Islamic Extremists.

 

This nations obesity.

 

Childhood obesity.

 

Lack of quality labor (my Fathers generation of worker).

 

TMI society.

I realize that I may be misreading this, Hearsay, but are you espousing the withholding of educational opportunity to some of our population? If so, what criteria would we use to select which children should be afforded the opportunity to be educated?

 

 

Frances

 

Its not an egalitarian concept, to be sure. However, I believe over the next 100 years, in order to remain globally competetive, I believe we will have to identify which children can be challenged to succeed at continually higher levels in scientific and technological ideas, and which children have limited skills and ambitions that are better suited toward "trade" or "service" educations. Its a simple question of scarcity of resources. There are only so many educators and resources availalbe and qualified to continually push the bar higher. We spend so much time "bringing up the rear" for the sake of equality that we under-utilize and under-prepare those who would become the idea generators of tomorrow.

 

The fact remains that not all potential and talent levels are the same.

 

In terms of criteria, that really becomes the question. I am not the one to answer it. It is identified at a fairly early age (middle school). There will be cross-overs (late bloomers). However, I have bought into the discussion of this afforded by Friedman in his book "The World Is Flat".

While China's military might is an obvious concern, I do not believe that the conquest of Asia, in a conventional sense would be tenable for China. Here is why:

 

Despite their numbers, China's air and sea technology remains inferior to both the United States and Japan. Any attempt at conventional warfare with Japan and, perforce, the United States, would keep a large segment of China's military forces occupied on their Eastern hemisphere in order to match the Pacific powers technologically.

 

China might be able to commit large troop movements to their Eastern borders. However, conquest of Asia would be made extremely difficult from manpower because of 2 things: 1) the impossible terrain to the south and southwest and 2) the number of people in India. India remains a technologically inferior but militarily sizeable country due to sheer population size. They cannot be taken from the ocean to the south because of the military support of the United States at Diego Garcia.

 

China is likely to be a world power, but Asia is an enormous land mass subject to assault from too many areas. I worry more about the economic prowess than the military.

 

I do agree with your observations regarding the status of China's military technology; however, with today's rapidly developing technologies and the unrest in N Korea and the Middle East I still feel it's a "concern" that should be on our radar.

Intolerance........... at every level of mankind.

 

Intolerance keeps......

politicians from compromising to do what is right

religions from even trying to understand one another

people hungry throughout the world

countries from trusting each other

Publics from liking Privates and vice versa :lol:

 

In the immortal words of Rodney King "Can't we all just get along?"

I do agree with your observations regarding the status of China's military technology; however, with today's rapidly developing technologies and the unrest in N Korea and the Middle East I still feel it's a "concern" that should be on our radar.

 

No question. Particularly with all of the commercial and industrial interests and stakes that our countrymen hold in Southeast Asia. A military shutdown of that region would be a devastating loss of capital for our country.

Here's what we have so far:

 

Bandit29

Islamic extremists

 

Habib

1. The genocide, mass murders, and essential child enslavement found in the failed and quasi-states in Africa.

2. The effects of globalization. (See Post 13)

3. The Islamic "Reformation."

 

Frances Bavier

In politics - the influence of money on our legislators.

In religion - intolerance, born of bigotry.

In science - the search for total understanding of our own DNA (the answer almost certainly holds the key to eradicating so many diseases and conditions).

In economics - our (America's) national debt.

 

titletownclown

Poverty amongst the exploding populations of 3rd world nations.

Rogue nations' ability to develop nuclear weapons.

China (See Post 12)

 

Hearsay

The loss of sustainable fresh water supplies at various points around the globe

Halting the spread of social post-modernism, or the "truth-is-what-you-make-of-it" crowd

Radical militant Islamic Extremists

For Americans, the inability to choose which children to educate and not educate in order to keep up with the world becoming flat, economically.

 

STRIKE3

Poverty

Equal Opportunity - minorities and women

Terrorism

Corporate Greed

Education

 

GusMcRae

This nations energy dependence.

Partison Politics (party over country)

Islamic Extremists.

This nations obesity.

Childhood obesity.

Lack of quality labor (my Fathers generation of worker).

TMI society.

 

Jumper Dad

Intolerance........... at every level of mankind.

 

Great stuff... let's not get too tied down to specifics just yet, let's keep the list growing. :thumb:

I agree with Hearsay regarding education. But, first I'll say that I am biased in that my wife is a teacher in the public schools. Every year without exception there are 3 or 4 "very disruptive" students to put it nicely that inevitably end up holding the entire class back due to the unending attention that must be given to those disruptive students. In the public schools too much emphasis is put on trying to mainstream students that will never achieve academically and too little is put on helping the gifted students to excel. While I don't believe in denying an education to anyone, we need to be more attentive to the needs of our gifted youth. If you look through the CFDA (Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance) you will find that the VAST majority of federal funding is directed toward helping the lower rungs of the education ladder and VERY little is directed toward "gifted" programs.

Great stuff... let's not get too tied down to specifics just yet, let's keep the list growing. :thumb:

 

My bad. I was typing my post when your post posted.:cry:

Its not an egalitarian concept, to be sure. However, I believe over the next 100 years, in order to remain globally competetive, I believe we will have to identify which children can be challenged to succeed at continually higher levels in scientific and technological ideas, and which children have limited skills and ambitions that are better suited toward "trade" or "service" educations. Its a simple question of scarcity of resources. There are only so many educators and resources availalbe and qualified to continually push the bar higher. We spend so much time "bringing up the rear" for the sake of equality that we under-utilize and under-prepare those who would become the idea generators of tomorrow.

 

The fact remains that not all potential and talent levels are the same.

 

In terms of criteria, that really becomes the question. I am not the one to answer it. It is identified at a fairly early age (middle school). There will be cross-overs (late bloomers). However, I have bought into the discussion of this afforded by Friedman in his book "The World Is Flat".

 

I agree. I see another problem with education today. We know that potential and talent levels are not the same for various reasons. It seems to me that our system today expects all student to progress the same...it's impossible. What bothers me is, it seems our gvt, principals, teachers and society as a whole want to cram a college education down every students throat. In the meantime it's making students that know they're not college material think they are second class or not as important as a college grad. Imagine a nation full of college grads. What if every student wanted to be a lawyer, doctor or pharmacist? Who would do the work? I think students can be identified by the 5th grade where I live. It may sound communist, but I think they should be catagorized then. If we start the students that are identified as "non college" in the 5th grade on vocational/technical training, by the time they graduate high school they should be prepared to at least do something.

My bad. I was typing my post when your post posted.:cry:

No problem Bro... it's all good, and for what it's worth I agree with your previous post 100%. :thumb:

 

I guess I'm just looking to nail down some of the most significant issues we face, and then we'll get into kicking them around in separate threads to give each the attention they deserve.

 

I'm on a mission to build a solid list.

I agree. I see another problem with education today. We know that potential and talent levels are not the same for various reasons. It seems to me that our system today expects all student to progress the same...it's impossible. What bothers me is, it seems our gvt, principals, teachers and society as a whole want to cram a college education down every students throat. In the meantime it's making students that know they're not college material think they are second class or not as important as a college grad. Imagine a nation full of college grads. What if every student wanted to be a lawyer, doctor or pharmacist? Who would do the work? I think students can be identified by the 5th grade where I live. It may sound communist, but I think they should be catagorized then. If we start the students that are identified as "non college" in the 5th grade on vocational/technical training, by the time they graduate high school they should be prepared to at least do something.

 

I'm going to share some anecdotal evidence of this, just for fun, so we don't get to detailed for Fastbreak just yet.

 

I have a cousin who lives in Baltimore. Very bright as a kid, but had no ambition, and no work ethic for taking traditional tests, etc. Also a bit of a revolutionary, so he often told teachers where they could stick their assignments, etc. For this he earned about a 2.2 GPA in high school. Now his brothers and sisters were go-getters and all went to very good colleges. He got a ration from everyone in his family about at least going to Stroudsburg St. teachers college or some such nonsense, but instead, he went a different way. He had always been very good at little electronics, soldering boards together, good with the school media, etc. He moved out of his dad's house, and got a journeyman electrician's license. Hooked on with a large contractor as a low-level electrics guy. Now, his work was so good that he got better and better assignments for a couple years until they had him actually designing electrical blueprints more suited for an electrical engineer. Of course, he wasn't earning as much, so one day he told them to take a hike, ventured out on his own, and started his own business doing contract electrical work, fixing old ladies' VCR's at $150 per visit. Wiring for industrial electrical equipment. Whatever someone needs him for. He gets all the work he can handle and charges what he wants BECAUSE NOONE WANTS TO DO LOW-LEVEL ELECTRICAL WORK ANYMORE. Now, he's 48 years old and a millionaire. Does what he wants, when he wants. He doesn't get named to Who's Who. He doesn't get honorary degrees, speaking engagements, or named to the Board of local charitable organizations. He just makes his way in life, carving out superiority in his own little piece of the universe. My proudest moment with him, though, was when his own intelligent 16 year-old son, at a rebellious stage, pointed to HIS own background as an excuse for why he didn't need to study and go on to college. My cousin insisted that his control of his own little world would have been wasted if his son didn't go on to use it to have a bigger and better impact. His son is now in his second year at Virginia . . .

 

Another: went to high school with a guy named Sean. Now, our high school was located in the third richest zip code in the United States. It had a 99% graduation rate, and over 85% of each senior class went on to 4-year colleges. This was a public school. There was incredible pressure to succeed academically and incredible ambition and competition among the students to achieve. Sean got lost. He barely cleared a 2.0, didn't even bother taking any post-grad tests. But this school had a small, vocational section for community support and it included an auto garage, and Sean was Da Man when it came to fixing cars. I'm not just talking about working on the stereo systems and hot paint body work, I'm talking opening up the electronic engine controls and re-distributing power. When he graduated (barely), he's got about $9K to his name for odd jobs he took fixing cars. He takes $7500 and enrolls in a 2-year automotive technical school in Wyoming in the middle of nowhere. You've heard of ASA-Certified, this is the type of school that teaches those yahoos and puts crew chiefs into NASCAR. He graduates with distinction and in the meantime has parlayed some money he earned into about $10K. Comes back home, goes to work for a local garage, and earns a rep as a dependable car guy for all the owners of Mercedes, BMW's, and Jaguar owners who are driving the high-priced rides into the city. After about a year or two, asks one of the owners if he would put a stake into him starting up his own garage. Guy gives him $50K to do it. He starts a garage. Long story short, this former 2.0 student now owns over 50 garages in the greater Bay Area, has turned the grease work that noone else would learn to do over to somebody else, and uses his company's $750K annual distributions to him to drive all over the country to NASCAR events which he quietly enjoys in his own time.

 

Not everyone needs to go to college.

Energy dependence

Tightening immigration standards

Unions and how they have gotten away from their original reason for existence

Making sure that health care stays in the hands of the free market

Islamic extremism(not sure diplomacy will ever work with people who have such little value for life)

Arab/Middle eastern hatred of the Jewish people and clerics who preech and reinforce this hatred

Editorialization of the "News"

Great post Hearsay.

 

That would lead to one from me.

 

There needs to be more WANT based youth education in this country. I look at the Jefferson County system with envy. Most kids know what they want to be very early in life, and I think we miss trying to put them on that path...