# h.ross perot time is now **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 20, 2006, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168 "2006-10-20T01:26:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/1 "2006-10-20T01:26:57Z")
[Answers - The Most Trusted Place for Answering Life's Questions](http://www.answers.com/topic/ross-perot) he ran for president in 92 and 96. He said the giant sucking sound you hear will be jobs being sucked out of the US if NAFTA gets passed. Do we need a rich man with a concience today. We are thick with thieves taking all. ---
**Author:** ![Caridwen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c89c15/32.png) [@Caridwen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caridwen)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/2 "2006-10-20T01:29:41Z")
Ralph Nader was against NAFTA. He’ll probably run again. [http://www.ontheissues.org/2004/Ralph\_Nader\_Free\_Trade.htm](http://www.ontheissues.org/2004/Ralph_Nader_Free_Trade.htm) ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/3 "2006-10-20T02:03:34Z")
[QUOTE=gonzomax] Do we need a rich man with a concience today. We are thick with thieves taking all. [/QUOTE] This statement, in a post that appears to be promoting the candidacy of Perot, (or even someone _like_ Perot), just broke every irony meter on the continent of North America. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/4 "2006-10-20T02:04:13Z")
Perot wouldn’t be more successful today than he was 15 years ago; third parties usually fade after one major election result. Nader’s high-water mark was in 2000, and he wasn’t nearly as successful in '04. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/5 "2006-10-20T04:02:07Z")
Not Perot he is politically gone,but someone like him might be an option. Nader doesnt get the financing or play. When he was preching his presidency ,thinking people had to see his viewpoint had some logic. I do not like what corporations have done to America. There are some corpoprate leaders with honesy. I am looking for one. ---
**Author:** ![Caridwen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c89c15/32.png) [@Caridwen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caridwen)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/6 "2006-10-20T04:25:24Z")
Jim Sinegal, the owner of Costco isn’t a bad guy. > **[How Costco Became the Anti-Wal-Mart (Published 2005)](https://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/17/business/yourmoney/how-costco-became-the-antiwalmart.html)** > > JIM SINEGAL, the chief executive of Costco Wholesale, the nation's fifth-largest retailer, had all the enthusiasm of an 8-year-old in a candy store as he tore open the container of one of his favorite new products: granola snack mix. ''You got to try... ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/7 "2006-10-20T04:52:03Z")
[QUOTE=gonzomax] Not Perot he is politically gone,but someone like him might be an option. [/QUOTE] You did say “h. ross perot time is now” in the title. 😛 There’s something that bothers me about the way you’re saying America needs a rich guy to come along and save it. Why does it have to be someone like that? ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 5:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/8 "2006-10-20T05:50:58Z")
[QUOTE=gonzomax] [Answers - The Most Trusted Place for Answering Life's Questions](http://www.answers.com/topic/ross-perot) he ran for president in 92 and 96. He said the giant sucking sound you hear will be jobs being sucked out of the US if NAFTA gets passed./QUOTE]And he was wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Rigamarole](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/77aa72/32.png) [@Rigamarole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rigamarole)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 5:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/9 "2006-10-20T05:55:53Z")
[QUOTE=Marley23] There’s something that bothers me about the way you’re saying America needs a rich guy to come along and save it. Why does it have to be someone like that? [/QUOTE] Come on Marley. Poor people can’t afford to be saviors. How would they be able to keep buying liquor/child support/lottery tickets? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/10 "2006-10-20T14:34:32Z")
[QUOTE=Askance] [QUOTE=gonzomax] [Answers - The Most Trusted Place for Answering Life's Questions](http://www.answers.com/topic/ross-perot) he ran for president in 92 and 96. He said the giant sucking sound you hear will be jobs being sucked out of the US if NAFTA gets passed./QUOTE]And he was wrong. [/QUOTE] Eh? Haven’t we lost a lot of jobs to outsourcing since NAFTA was enacted? ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/11 "2006-10-20T15:40:09Z")
We have lost tons of jobs. Most of them requiring skills or education. NAFTA didnt enforce any wage or environmental rules. It allowed India and later China to take over our industries. (automotive,steel,textile) The unemployment stats are bs. Once unemloyment runs out you are no longer counted. I know all admins have found ways to underreport the rates ,but this one has done it the best.Check with Ohio,Mich,Illinoois and Indians to see what has happened. China uses prison labor .How do we beat that. ---
**Author:** ![Renob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8c91f0/32.png) [@Renob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Renob)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/12 "2006-10-20T15:47:49Z")
[QUOTE=gonzomax] We have lost tons of jobs. Most of them requiring skills or education. NAFTA didnt enforce any wage or environmental rules. It allowed India and later China to take over our industries. [/quote] You do realize, don’t you, that neither India or China are in North America and thus cannot be part of the \*\*North American \*\* Free Trade Agreement? > [@](#): > > The unemployment stats are bs. Once unemloyment runs out you are no longer counted. That is false. > [@Bureau of Labor Statistics](#): > > Because unemployment insurance records, which many people think are the source of total unemployment data, relate only to persons who have applied for such benefits, and since it is impractical to actually count every unemployed person each month, the Government conducts a monthly sample survey called the Current Population Survey (CPS) to measure the extent of unemployment in the country. The CPS has been conducted in the United States every month since 1940 when it began as a Work Projects Administration project. It has been expanded and modified several times since then. As explained later, the CPS estimates, beginning in 1994, reflect the results of a major redesign of the survey. You can easily read more here: [http://www.bls.gov/cps/cps\_faq.htm](http://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_faq.htm) ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/13 "2006-10-20T15:57:19Z")
[QUOTE=gonzomax] We have lost tons of jobs. Most of them requiring skills or education. NAFTA didnt enforce any wage or environmental rules. It allowed India and later China to take over our industries. (automotive,steel,textile) The unemployment stats are bs. Once unemloyment runs out you are no longer counted. I know all admins have found ways to underreport the rates ,but this one has done it the best.Check with Ohio,Mich,Illinoois and Indians to see what has happened. China uses prison labor .How do we beat that. [/QUOTE] What the hell does NAFTA have to do with China and India? Please explain this wonderful piece of logic to us all? I actually would love to curtail outsourcing overseas, but you cannot pin this on NAFTA. [QUOTE=Marley23] Perot wouldn’t be more successful today than he was 15 years ago; third parties usually fade after one major election result. Nader’s high-water mark was in 2000, and he wasn’t nearly as successful in '04. [/QUOTE] I do not completely agree. Many that voted for Nader in 2000 (like me) were scared shitless by Bush’s first term and voted for Kerry despite not liking him in '04. I would have voted for Nader again, like many of my friends, but we were assuming every vote for Kerry would help. It was not enough, but I think it hurt the green party in '04. Jim ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/14 "2006-10-20T17:09:48Z")
[QUOTE=What Exit?] I do not completely agree. Many that voted for Nader in 2000 (like me) were scared shitless by Bush’s first term and voted for Kerry despite not liking him in '04. I would have voted for Nader again, like many of my friends, but we were assuming every vote for Kerry would help. It was not enough, but I think it hurt the green party in '04. [/QUOTE] That describes me also, although I didn’t dislike Kerry (some of which I blame on Stockholm Syndrome). Nader isn’t with the Green Party anymore, so he now has no infrastructure and is running on name recognition. He basically lost 90% of his votes between 2000 and 2004, which is what happens to third parties after they make an impact. In 2000, he seemed like a viable protest vote; by 2004 he seemed like a self-centered dick. It hurt both him and the Green Party, since the Democrats and Greens became so hostile. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/15 "2006-10-20T17:27:35Z")
God forbid we do business with India. The world would be a much better place if the USA never did any trade with them and let them all starve to death. Hey, wait, I’m in Canada. Fuck us too, I suppose. How silly for the USA and Canada to do business. Everyone would be so rich if they just closed the borders. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Corrado](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a88e4f/32.png) [@John\_Corrado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Corrado)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/16 "2006-10-20T17:45:47Z")
Wait, so it’s time for a new anti-NAFTA candidate? A position that won 18% of the vote in 1992, 9% of the vote in 1996, 3.2% of the vote in 2000, and 0.5% of the vote in 2004? Yeah, ridin’ the wave of the future, there. I’m going to trot out a theory that I’ve held for quite a while now: while major 3rd party movements prior to the Great Depression in many cases heralded the direction of the future (from the Free Soil party heralding the Republican anti-slavery movement to the Progressive movement being split up between Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson), _ **every** _ major third party run since then has been a defeated movement taking one last run for relevancy. 1948: Strom Thurmond runs on a straight segregationist platform in an attempt to keep Democrats from continuing to move desegregationist; the next twenty years is practically defined by a destruction of segregation. 1948: Henry Wallace runs on a leftist platform stating that Stalin and the Soviet Union would be true allies for world peace if we just left them alone. We know how well _that_ turned out. 1968: George Wallace runs on a platform trying to convince conservative Southerners to stay out of the Republican Party and possibly to roll back desegregation. Neither occurs. 1980: John Anderson runs on a platform trying to make a place for liberal Republicans in what is becoming more and more Reagan’s party. That worked well, didn’t it? Given that, and given how quickly Perot’s political support got pissed away, it seems to me likely that his runs in 1992 and 1996 were pretty much the last gasp of the protectionists. Hell, even Gephardt got shellacked in the 2004 primaries. The only thing I haven’t decided yet is whether the Green and Libertarian parties fall into this mold. It’s tempting to say they don’t because they’re not big enough to really have gotten attention, but at that same point, they’re not getting the attention of the major parties, either. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/17 "2006-10-20T18:03:20Z")
[QUOTE=gonzomax] We have lost tons of jobs. Most of them requiring skills or education. NAFTA didnt enforce any wage or environmental rules. It allowed India and later China to take over our industries. (automotive,steel,textile) [/quote] NAFTA doesn’t have anything about trade with India or China. Did you mean to say Canada? Or maybe Mexico? Jobs lost to Canada or Mexico might be blamed on NAFTA. But, see, India and China are not members of NAFTA. What ARE the members? The US. Canada. Mexico. > [@](#): > > The unemployment stats are bs. Once unemloyment runs out you are no longer counted. Flat out wrong. Total urban legend. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Please retract this statement. > [@](#): > > China uses prison labor .How do we beat that. While some factories in China use prison labor, the vast majority of them don’t. I don’t have a problem prohibiting the import of goods produced by prison labor. Once we do that, what are we going to do about the 99% of Chinese goods that are NOT produced by prison labor? Refuse to trade with China? Refuse to trade with India? The economic development of China over the last twenty years has been the largest sustained decrease in human misery for the largest number of people in human history. The best thing for the planet since the Allies won WWII. We benefit slightly, they benefit greatly. If cutting off trade with China would benefit the US slightly then we could argue about it…but the reality is that trade with China enriches the US. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/18 "2006-10-20T19:07:18Z")
We _do not_ benefit. **Period**. Our economy gets worse all the time, & neither China nor India abides by the terms of our trade agreements. Currency manipulation & intellectual theft are the least of those violations. China uses their growth to build a dangerous military force. And **we** see our strength vanish. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/19 "2006-10-20T19:14:49Z")
American GDP is decreasing? Really? When did this happen? Why wasn’t this in the Wall Street Journal? ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2006, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168/20 "2006-10-20T19:21:48Z")
[QUOTE=Bosda Di’Chi of Tricor] We _do not_ benefit. **Period**. Our economy gets worse all the time, & neither China nor India abides by the terms of our trade agreements. Currency manipulation & intellectual theft are the least of those violations. China uses their growth to build a dangerous military force. And **we** see our strength vanish. [/QUOTE] Can you back up any of this with some valid cites? Especially the portion about our economy getting worse all the time. It is an interesting statement, but much of it appears quite false. Jim [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/h-ross-perot-time-is-now/377168.md?page=2)