Do you care where your tools are manufactured?

[dpb]

Not the "whole story" by any stretch, Leon. See a minimal response to Frank.

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[Jay Chan]

I really don't particularly care before I purchase the tool. I check the country-of-origin of a tool only _after_ I have purchased it.

If it says that it is Made-in-Germany or Made-in-Japan, I will tell myself "I am a good shopper who can spot a good deal."

If it says that it is Made-in-USA, I will tell myself "I have helped the local economy."

If it says that it is Made-in-China, I will tell myself "I am a good husband/father who saves money for his family."

Regardless where the tool was made from, I will always feel good.

Jay Chan

[Brian Henderson]

They're claiming a lot of things, they're just not doing so well in backing up those claims. Most of what they're using are miniscule little scooter-type vehicles that will never survive in the real world.

Let us know when they can run cars that are already on the road with their technology.

[Brian Henderson]

Of course not, the Mexican government is getting rid of their poor and criminals by giving them maps and instructions how to go north. So long as the U.S. allows Mexico to pull this crap, we can't solve the problem. What we really need to do is take a couple million illegals back to the border and push them all across at once.

[Brian Henderson]

You're probably right, although both beliefs are fundamentally faulty. Just because you're there doesn't mean you're going to be successful, you still need to work hard and produce a product that people want to buy for the price you want to sell it at. Fail in any of these categories and you fail as a company, and as an individual.

[Robatoy]

On Nov 28, 2:08 pm, Brian Henderson wrote: [snipped for brevity]

Can't do that... You'd lose the cheap semi-slave labour.

I watched that whole thing go down in Europe. Everybody was too good to work as garbage men and work on the roads. So, in case of the Dutch, they brought in Turks and such. Now there are mosques all over the place and the Dutch are going: "WTF happened here?" If they're not careful, it will be the Dutch who'll be lined up at the border ready for deportation. But the cheap labour was nice ... for a while.

There ain't nuttin' fur nuttin' and payback is always a bitch.

[Frank Boettcher]

I'm not aware of directly paid subsidies. I was in that (oil and gas) industry for twenty years prior to joining the woodworking machinery company. Maybe I missed them.

There are tax breaks, primarily for the production of marginal wells and tertiary recovery, but they are not directly paid subsidies, require profitability to be relevant (not always the case) and some depletion allowances that, I believe, are only available to small independent producers. The big incentives ended in 1974.

was it?

USDA Forecasts Record-Setting Corn Crop for 2007

WASHINGTON, Aug. 10, 2007 ? U.S. farmers are expected to produce the largest corn crop in history in 2007, according to the Crop Production report released today by the U.S. Department of Agriculture?s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS). Corn production is forecast at

13.1 billion bushels, 10.6 percent above the previous record of 11.8 billion bushels set in 2004.

Based on conditions as of August 1, corn yields are expected to average 152.8 bushels per acre, up 3.7 bushels from last year. This would be second highest corn yield on record, behind the 160.4 bushels per acre produced in 2004. Growers are expected to harvest 85.4 million acres of corn for grain, the most since 1933 and 14.8 million more acres than last year.

Wonder how it came out? There was plenty of water in the corn belt.

I would suggest that you graph a few things on top of each other since the incentive for E85. The price of refined diesel and other refined petreleoum products. The price of a bushel of #2 corn. The production of corn in total bushels/year. The amount of corn used for feed stock and the amount diverted to the production of biofuel. And then get a pie chart that shows the impact of energy costs as a percentage of the total price of a pound of beef. See if you still hold the same opinion

I've read a number of studies that agree with your point. "Independent" studies by organizations like the corn growers association. They're for the subsidies, imagine that. If I was a corn grower, I would be too.

Frank

[Leon]

From what I understand, the cars have been on the road for the last 10 years through out the world with 100,000 units sold.

[dpb]

Not as good as those early forecasts -- there was _NOT_ plenty of water in the corn belt in August thru September despite early wet springs. The end of July is about when the rains stopped.

Diesel is an input, not an output. Correlation does _not_ imply causation.

The price of a bushel of #2 corn. The

Check DOE and EIA for latest work on overall energy balance. Not funded by growers' associations.

If I were a petroleum industry maven, I'd be of your viewpoint as well.

Would you have us simply wait and rely on the oil companies to provide all without any other efforts? That seems foolish to me (see earlier note on the local natural gas production company advertising against coal-fired power plant permitting applications on implication of minimizing carbon footprint.)

IMO, a tax break indirectly is no different than a direct break. I don't argue they should be removed from public policy for the oil industry, I simply point out the actual cost differentials aren't as one-side as one might like to imply and there's a lot of infrastructure and other investment in the current petroleum distribution system that has a lot of costs that are hidden in maintaining supplies.

We're producers, but not of corn. Wheat, milo, cattle, all dryland. So far this year, no wheat drilled even; last decent rain was July 4th weekend. There will be no wheat crop on much of the dryland wheat ground next year because it's now too late even if it rained this weekend for it to make much of a crop if it were planted now and what little is in is in such poor condition it is unlikely to make. Last year was a very good-looking year early but spring storms (hail, tornados, a late freeze Easter weekend, then excessive rain through June) destroyed a very significant fraction.

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[Brian Henderson]

Good? I've got no problem requiring American companies to follow American labor laws. That's why they exist.

[Brian Henderson]

Maybe I was unclear, I was talking about the same sort of cars you can buy off any car lot in the country. Not a little 3-wheel piece of crap, an American family car that seats 4-5 people, can carry your groceries home, etc. That's not what they're building right now.

[Dave In Houston]

Don't know where you are but are there no varieties that can be planted on into January? In fact, our rancher was planting varieties as late as mid-January in recent years primarily to reduce the exposure to wintering geese (I never thought a gaggle of geese could pack an ag field so hard).

Karnes County, Texas received more than three times it's average annual rainfall this year, ~65 inches through the end of August. The corn was more than a month late getting in the ground and about the same late getting combined. It was iffy if it was even going to make it to combine, it just did get dry enough to allow the equipment in the field. But because of all that rain it made 84 bushels/acre vs. an average year of 40-50 bushels/acre. And, it brought $3.30/bushel, about a dollar more than previous years. And now wheat is going to be a hot commodity. About six weeks ago the price of wheat for December delivery was $9.42/bushel and that is about double a year ago. Our lessee had to go to Comfort, Texas to lock in enough seed which he intends to drill mid-December. Then he'll have a fight on his hands to keep the hogs, the sandhill cranes, and the geese from helping themselves. Until this past weekend the rains had just about quit at the end of August. But 2.5 inches this past Saturday and Sunday came at just the right time. I'd rather be lucky than good.

[Frank Boettcher]

I don't believe August is early for field corn. However, USDA November report is slightly better than the August forecast. Reckon that corn is in yet?

Didn't say that, just pretty much don't believe in government involvement. And I don't believe that ethanol is the answer. System

80 would have been a good start, but it was killed by the left wing wacko's in the early 70's.

I have no idea what you said there.

[Mark & Juanita]

Yep, if the US had the same rules as the Mexican immigration rules, the government of Mexico would be screaming at how unfair and evil the US rules were.

From what I've read, you had to provide some fairly substantial information regarding your ability to support yourself in order to be allowed to build in Mexico, is that a fair assessment?

[dpb]

Planted, yes. Have enough warm weather, length of days and most critically moisture to make a crop? Not likely. This is SW KS where normal planting time for winter wheat is from September 1 through about October.

Most dryland corn here wasn't able to be planted until too late owing to the early wet field conditions, then after about July 1 the hot, dry winds pretty much killed the fill. The irrigated guys had some reasonable yields, but nothing like were hoping for early and ended up w/ water bills that were higher than average despite the early moisture.

Central/SE KS and OK had wet all spring until about end of June. Much wheat was lost to the Easter weekend freeze, then much of what was left that looked really, really good up to and into harvest time was either hailed out, knocked down by all the rain or simply unable to get cut owing to being too wet to thresh or even get into the field. Some guys tried bringing in rice machines for the flotation problem but most still couldn't thresh it or if could it was so wet it was docked heavily. Much that was cut only tested in the mid-50s for test weights which makes it essentially useless for anything except animal feed.

Far west had one of better yields in years -- for many in NW it was first crop in 5-7 years owing to the continuing drought conditions there. Here in SW, most had gotten enough to cut at least something through all except 2 or 3 of those, but it's been really lean here as well. Of course, you only got a good yield on what you actually had to cut -- there was a lot that didn't make it through the winter or died the previous fall before the rains started in the spring.

We had 1" over the July 4 weekend -- since then, only a few sprinkles and a couple of very light showers -- 10-15 hundredths kinda' things. Had a couple inches of dry snow last weekend after three days of 80+F temperatures w/ dewpoints in the teens and 30 mph winds to makes sure it took every bit of residual moisture we had first. They're talking this next front Fri/Sat has reasonable chances but again, it'll have to saturate the whole atmospheric column to the ground before there's a chance for anything to actually reach the ground so by the time that that happens the actual accumulations will again probably be pretty minimal.

As always, there are the occasional showers -- talked to fella' about 15 miles south of us down in OK -- he got one of them in September we got the sprinkles off of, got his wheat in and up and has cattle running on it. Said there's an area right around him about 3-5 miles wide and 8-10 long where they got that cell. Of course, they're going to have to get some more shortly or it won't last.

If we don't get some good general rains or snow and the winds keep blowing, going to be a dirty winter, enough to remind one of the 50s or even the 30s if one is that old... :(

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[dpb]

Well, "believing in" isn't the same thing as being realistic. The government _is_ involved and they're involved in a big way and will continue to be. They're just as involved in oil and agriculture as anywhere else, it's just a little more convoluted as it's been longer in the making than ethanol itself. Last I checked all the major oil producers are significant contributors to both the "ins" and the "outs" in the political process, maintain significant lobbying staffs and run tremendously expensive ad campaigns to convince the public of the wisdom of their particular choices for tax and energy policies. Right, wrong, indifferent, it's simply the way things work.

Didn't figure you would want to. Can you say Middle East oil has many ancillary costs that aren't on the books of the majors? And that's only the _most_ obvious.

[dpb]

...

...

As I noted earlier, the wheat pricing is owing to world-wide demand and low production. You've heard, I'm sure that Australia is in 100-yr drought. KS/OK/TX panhandle was down significantly this year as well which is large part of why seed wheat is so tight -- many of the certified seed producers were also hit hard. Add to that the Russians were also short as were the South Americans.

Local markets never broke $8.50 on close -- KC was near or maybe even at the $9 mark, briefly, but we get docked pretty hard by the transportation costs out here because there's no competition to the single railroad. It's typically near a 50-cent "tax" for the 200-miles to Wichita difference, even more to major terminals.

Of course, as they say -- it could be $100/bu but if you don't have any to sell, it doesn't matter. That's going to be next year for us, it appears unless miracles happen. We'll probably just keep holding some reserve from this year and "hide and watch" to see what happens.

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[mac davis]

As with other things, the US has TONS of rules... they just don't enforce them..

regarding your ability to support yourself in order to be allowed to build in Mexico, is that a fair assessment?

Hell, it was a bitch just doing the paperwork and stuff just to move here..

Tourist visa, "FM3", (sort of a green card"), bank account with at least $1,500 each in it, passports, itemized list of household and personal possessions being "imported"... which has to be approved by the Mexican consulate in the States..

Just goes on and on... Also, they wanted $1,400 import duty just for the tools that were on the moving van... They (border inspectors) said that I had way too many tools for it to be a hobby... The customs broker got them down to $600 and I thought that we did ok.. Beats buying all new stuff and paying 15% duty on IT..

Oh.. big difference between here and the States: We needed proof of both US and Mexican insurance on all of our vehicles..

As to income verification, we found out that 55 and older can claim "retired" and not need verification, so we put my web and turning income (done on computers and tools made off shore. to be a bit OT) down as my wife's, since she was really the one retiring, not me..

mac

Please remove splinters before emailing

[mac davis]

As much as the illegal immigration thing bothers me, and don't EVEN start on that "undocumented citizens" BS, I think that by not enforcing the laws in the past, we've built a huge part of the economy by using illegal's.. Common quote by farmers when I lived in California was "get rid of 50% of illegal's and 90% of agriculture goes belly up"

mac

Please remove splinters before emailing

[John Horner]

You need to study the facts behind the hype.

Zap claims "over 100,000 units sold". Guess what, the vast majority of those were electric scooters and go-kart type vehicles. They have yet to make a single car if by car one means a vehicle licensed and registered as a car. Their only "cars" are three wheeled vehicles which are licensed and registered as motorcycles to avoid safety rules.

Zap regularly announces great plans, but so far has yet to produce an actual car or truck. Actually they don't MAKE anything as all of their products to date are labels slapped on Chinese products.