The money was made on sugar in those days, certainly the french money, anyway ... for them you might say that sugar was the Oil of their time .... at a peace negotiation forty or so years before, Voltaire had preferred to keep some little sugar island instead of Canada, which he termed 'quelques arpents de neige' ['a few acres of snow'] .... that was good economics, if a bit short-sighted, as you say, because low-cost sugar outweighed high-cost furs by a long shot .... the value of Louisiana to the french, was to supply the sugar islands with necessary commodities, principally grains, but other stuff as well .... it was cheaper to ship in food than to occupy any sugar-growing land with food crops, also this kept the slaves subject as the guvmint controlled food supply quite completely, they emphatically did not want to establish a settler society on any of those islands .... so anyway, when sugar production fell off a cliff due to slave revolts, Louisiana became a net cost to the overall operation of american colonies ..... so, it just happened that as Jefferson was instructed to negotiate for a small part of Louisiana [i think just New Orleans et environs, and probably with right of passage down the river, for trade], he was surprised by a french counter-offer to sell the whole thing, for two or three times the money ..... and in coming to letter-of-agreement status on the deal [or whatever they'd have called it then], he exceeded his orders by quite a lot ... but it got ratified, and the bill paid, and there we were - Tejas was doomed by the yanqui colossus moving to the next square of the chessboard
It's good to see the old thread still ticking .... some Dubya-thread types present, i see, bits of boring babble typed in, but a few of the thoughtful as well ..... where are Steven, Jochen, DJ, Mq, Hawk, tekboy, michael97, kumar, carranza? .... and quehubo, whose idea of slapping a hefty consumption tax on oil is a Very Smart Thing, imho, though it will take political courage to accomplish
The stupid kid who is ready to blow up his baby, you probably need some kind of force there, sounds like you can't reason with him ..... for tools you have Reason, and you have Force, what else is left [maybe i've missed something, this is just dashed off in haste] .... but he's a clear and present danger to his kid, i say strap the suicide belt to him, lash him to a post in the desert, and say go ahead sonny-boy, fill yer boots, flip that switch any time you like
Bush is still wrong .... way wrong, it's not right that a few fantastically powerful men sit around the back rooms of Washington and decide life-or-death matters for all six billions of us ... hard to say if Kerry will be any less arrogant and dictatorial, we can only hope in any case
British columbians and US homebuilders are still getting ripped off by the porkers of the DC lumber protectionist lobby, by the way .... canadian beef, wheat, and steel are, or have recently been, subject to similar sorts of action .... so what ends up happening, is we watch what they do, not what they say .... all those Fine Words Of Liberty, in one ear and out the other, the Gospel a bit tainted from contact with Bushrealpolitik .... <sigh> .... foreign affairs, and even probably the most domestic of affairs, would be a lot easier were they conducted more by precision machinery and less by human beings .... but then, we'd still be stuck voting for/against various mechanics with their Holy Parts 'N Service Books ..... can't you see it, placards in the street demanding like that guy on telly, More Power .... but it should definitely be highly taxed power, to cover its real cost, and keep the consumer's mind fixed on its wise use, eh quehubiera? ...... cheers |
