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There are very few serious scientists who will say global warming in not a serious threat to our way of life.


There are very few serious scientists who say that global warming isn't real, or that a significant part of it isn't anthropogenic. The magnitude and direction of the consequences, and what policy responses are appropriate, are very much at issue.

We are using up oil It may not run out in 10, 25 or 50 years but we will eventually use it up.


And you're quite sure that's a bad thing? Oil doesn't do anything useful just sitting there in the ground, so the prospect of using it up, in the abstract, doesn't bother me at all. And as it becomes more scarce, and thus expensive, it may finally give us not only the economic incentive to find alternatives, but also the social incentive to get past some of the BS and look rationally at our alternatives. Which will have all kinds of good effects. Some of them political, and thus verboten to discuss.

We rip down whole mountains to get coal iron and other minerals and people die in the process of extracting this stuff we all need.


People die driving to work every day to shuffle paper and count beans, too. Shall we stop them? As for the mountains, that's not my concern; it's a decision for the people who own them. My guess is that in a hundred years the Rockies and the Appalachians will still be almost all there.

Being wasteful has always been immoral whatever your background political or religious.


Natural resources aren't the only resources worth husbanding. There's a finite number of ticks of the clock available to me on this earth, and consequently a finite amount of labor that I can perform. My labor is what I have to sell; it's how I produce material well-being for myself and my family. Wasting it by paying more than necessary for the goods I need and want is a little problematic, too. With all due respect, who're you to tell me it's immoral to pay $50 less for a tool so I can use that savings to help one of my kids go to college, or move them to a better neighborhood, or buy them new shoes?

I think we as a country need to start asking for American made goods for our own good. We need jobs,people need to feel proud that they did something worth wile with their day. I also feel we will make these goods in a safer cleaner way than china ever will. If you say we cant I say you are a fool.


Are you familiar with the term comparative advantage?

Just look at Germany they are the worlds second largest exporter. They do it with strict controls, high quality standards and unions too.


And we're the third largest. I don't think it's the value of exports you're worried about; I think it's balance of trade. But I've asked economists about this, and trade deficits per se really don't concern them. (At least not the ones who don't have some obvious axe to grind.)
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I don't have the time to work with cheap crap. Broken tools waste time you can always make more money buy you never get back lost time.


No, you can't always make more money. You'll make a finite amount in your life; the fact that you don't know in advance how much that'll be does not change the fact that it won't be infinite, and the choices you make in how to allocate it will have consequences. Time is money, and it may be that your time is so valuable that it justifies paying more in order to guarantee you won't have to waste on a broken tool. But that isn't true for everyone.
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There's just no decent response to this that doesn't involve discussing subjects most people would consider political.


I think that really depends upon what you consider decent.
I am really with Fe-wood on this. I really dislike crappy tools for a lot of reasons, mostly obvious ones. I don't have a problem at all with my kids inheriting good still usable tools from me. It is possible one of them may inherit an entire viable business, how bad would that be? I also like the fact that I only need to buy them once. With all the good equipment and tools on the used market these days, there is little excuse to buy junk and hope it lasts for the whole job, or even perhaps the next one too.

As much as I respect Grant's knowledge, skill and inventiveness, I take exception to his example of Chambersburg.If the choice were truly only that for 200K or chinese for 20K, fine, but it is not. There are and were many other options, from self built, right on through used, to custom built by other manufactures. Sorry, I am not sold on that. I get that it works for you though.
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There are very few serious scientists who say that global warming isn't real, or that a significant part of it isn't anthropogenic. The magnitude and direction of the consequences, and what policy responses are appropriate, are very much at issue.



And you're quite sure that's a bad thing? Oil doesn't do anything useful just sitting there in the ground, so the prospect of using it up, in the abstract, doesn't bother me at all. And as it becomes more scarce, and thus expensive, it may finally give us not only the economic incentive to find alternatives, but also the social incentive to get past some of the BS and look rationally at our alternatives. Which will have all kinds of good effects. Some of them political, and thus verboten to discuss.



People die driving to work every day to shuffle paper and count beans, too. Shall we stop them? As for the mountains, that's not my concern; it's a decision for the people who own them. My guess is that in a hundred years the Rockies and the Appalachians will still be almost all there.



Natural resources aren't the only resources worth husbanding. There's a finite number of ticks of the clock available to me on this earth, and consequently a finite amount of labor that I can perform. My labor is what I have to sell; it's how I produce material well-being for myself and my family. Wasting it by paying more than necessary for the goods I need and want is a little problematic, too. With all due respect, who're you to tell me it's immoral to pay $50 less for a tool so I can use that savings to help one of my kids go to college, or move them to a better neighborhood, or buy them new shoes?



Are you familiar with the term comparative advantage?



And we're the third largest. I don't think it's the value of exports you're worried about; I think it's balance of trade. But I've asked economists about this, and trade deficits per se really don't concern them. (At least not the ones who don't have some obvious axe to grind.)

Not to start the kind of crap that I am best known for, but you sir, seem to be pushing the political bounds farther and faster than anyone in this thread. Perhaps the moderators should close it.
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Not to start the kind of crap that I am best known for, but you sir, seem to be pushing the political bounds farther and faster than anyone in this thread. Perhaps the moderators should close it.


I don't see how my comments are any more political than many others expressed in this thread. The arguments I'm making are mainly economic, philosophical and moral. It's true that my political beliefs are related to my understanding of those other areas (which is true for just about everyone, I think) and it's probably not hard to figure out what those political beliefs might be. (That's why I expressed some doubt back on the first page that it's possible to have this discussion without getting political.) But I'm not trying to be explicit about them.
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I don't have a problem at all with my kids inheriting good still usable tools from me. It is possible one of them may inherit an entire viable business, how bad would that be?


I don't think it would necessarily be bad at all, just as I don't think it would necessarily be bad if your kids inherit usable tools from you. That's between you and your kids. But can you see how some people might weigh a bunch of factors and arrive at different yet equally valid conclusions when making their buying decisions?
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I second that Ron - Usually I enjoy a good dog fight but this one has run it's course and degenerated into a pseudo-intellectual "IS SO" - "IS NOT" rant.


By all means, elevate it. The few of us who've been participating seem to be talking ourselves in circles. Tell us what we're missing.
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I second that Ron - Usually I enjoy a good dog fight but this one has run it's course and degenerated into a pseudo-intellectual "IS SO" - "IS NOT" rant.


I have to agree here. I figure this is about the time we agree to disagree :D

But I will add one more little bit before I go.

I believe Grant and Matt speek of the same things from different corners. Grant said something about a Chinese vender wondering why americans want so much cheep stuff ( I don't mean cheep from only an economic point either, rather cheep quality too. You do get what you pay for!) Matt would rather have more regardless of the quality. Price is the only factor.

I have inherited many hand tools from my great grandfather and his father. Emagine my joy when I use something that has been used by 5 generations of my family.

Try that with your cheep HF whatever. The plastic won't even last that long.
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Matt would rather have more regardless of the quality. Price is the only factor.


Just for the record, before we get shut down, I never said that. My position is and has been that price is a legitimate factor, and it can make perfectly good sense for some people in some situations to trade quality for price. We all do it all the time, whether we admit it or not. I don't see that we have any right to look down our noses at people when they make that choice. That's all I've been trying to get people to see.
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No, you can't always make more money. You'll make a finite amount in your life; the fact that you don't know in advance how much that'll be does not change the fact that it won't be infinite, and the choices you make in how to allocate it will have consequences. Time is money, and it may be that your time is so valuable that it justifies paying more in order to guarantee you won't have to waste on a broken tool. But that isn't true for everyone.


Actually I can always just make more money. I just work longer hours but in return I give up free time. I have always in my 17 years of blacksmithing had work it may have not been good work but it was always there. I can never remember where I did not have a job that I could not gotten out faster or make something I could have sold to some one. I have a pile of broken chairs I could run out and weld up befor the crew gets to work right now but I would rather relax with my tea. I could forge up a batch of hammers and tongs to sell at the next meet or sit here, make sketches for a client or return scrap metal The list is really endless. Its how you choose to use your time If I want more money I just work harder longer. Give up weekends and evenings and pull 65 hour weeks. I need a tool that just works I don't want to blow my valuable time with junk. I mostly avoid chinese stuff buy good used stuff new European or American products wherever possible.
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I wrote:

Time is money, and it may be that your time is so valuable that it justifies paying more in order to guarantee you won't have to waste [time] on a broken tool. But that isn't true for everyone.


(I originally left out "time" in one spot; I've inserted it above.) Are you saying that you think that second sentence is wrong? That people always and everywhere have more money than time?
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I wrote:



(I originally left out "time" in one spot; I've inserted it above.) Are you saying that you think that second sentence is wrong? That people always and everywhere have more money than time?


I think it is obvious that he, and you and I, all of us in fact, are speaking for ourselves only.
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Just for the record, before we get shut down, I never said that. My position is and has been that price is a legitimate factor, and it can make perfectly good sense for some people in some situations to trade quality for price. We all do it all the time, whether we admit it or not. I don't see that we have any right to look down our noses at people when they make that choice. That's all I've been trying to get people to see.



I suspect Matt is just playing devil`s advocate here and in other threads which is good because it makes the rest of us take an even harder look at our particular lines of thought.
If he really believed all he has been saying he wouldn`t be producing his own work thru blacksmithing,he`d be buying Chinese made scrolls and welding them together using a HF mig welder and selling gates to his friends and neighbors for $50 each.
Thanks for supporting your end of the discussion Matt.

When we make something for friends/family/neighbors we take that little extra time and effort to see they get the best we can produce within reason.The closer to home the better the end product will usually be as we will personally have to live with it and see it every day.It will be a constant reminder of what we did or failed to do.
Likewise,if our work is in the public eye we want it to represent us well and speak of our commitment to quality and longevity.Our work in the here and now says something about how we feel about our own mortality and our responsibility to those who follow after we`re gone.
Those who put forth their best efforts and either buy or make the best tend to think a bit more outside their wallet.Those who follow the bottom line like a dog on a trail tend to see things in a "good enough is good enough for me and everyone else" way.

My point was to get us to look at our own personal "lines in the sand" and to realize that like Native American philosophy says,we should think beyond ourselves and to think about the generations that come after us and how what we as individuals do today will be felt many generations down the line.
It may not seem like a big thing when YOU,personally are standing in Wal-Mart but I can remember when my wife was hired by Sam Walton himself and things at that company and ones like LL Bean look radically different now than they did in those days.The shift and changes made by just the 2 companies mentioned and things like the internet have changed our society and life as we know it even in small semi-rural towns up here in Maine and that`s in only one generation.
There is change coming,none of us can or should stop that.I just hope that everyone understands that we each are a part of the engine that drives those changes.
Like a locomotive pulling a freight train it takes a long time to stop and you are locked in to a direction once you jump on.It`s up to each of us to pick the right train and that it is headed to the departure point we want to raise our children and grandchildren at.

Thanks for all your input and thoughts.
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I just wanted to say I have been avoiding responding to this thread.... I tend to have very strong opinions and want to defend my point of view to the point I usually anger people...


That being said, and trying to stay positive...

I have found that what we need to remember in these discussions is everyone is right about a specific set of circumstances... Every opinion has at least some merit... Every argument has a counter argument... And most important... Not everyone thinks the way you do (or I do)

I have told my wife and kids on several occasions.... If everyone thought like me, the world would be a very diffrent, and likely very unpleasant place.

Anyway...

There is no correct position/agreement here... Whats best for me is not best for anyone else...

What makes me happy...... Is a quality tool at a reasonable price. One of the most cherished items in my shop is a center punch made my Brent Bailey.... It did not cost a huge amount of money... $30 But every single time I use it I admire its beauty and elegant function... It brings joy to my life... Its a pleasure to use... I will search for it when there are other center punches on my cart, even fine punches I have made... Because I like it, Its special... Does it do anything a harbor freight center punch wont do? (well yes, it stays sharp... but you get the idea)

It would be very hard to argue to a person who only sees the tool, not the feeling I get from using it that its a reasonable thing... But its real and important to me...

On a large scale its why I do what I do... I love tools... GOOD tools... There is no worse aggravation (FOR ME) than using a set of Harbor Fright wrenches.. they are a chore to use, they fit poorly, they spread under heavy use... I have several sets of Snap on, Williams Matco, Mac wrenches... but wanted to leave a cheap set out for others to use in the shop..... I finally gathered them all up and threw them in the scrap tub... Because they reduced my quality of life every time I used one...

I see this whole thing as trying to explain art to someone who just does not get it...

How do you explain the beauty of a painting? you can describe the technical aspects but the art and beauty is not about the painting... its about the viewer..

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I just wanted to say I have been avoiding responding to this thread.... I tend to have very strong opinions and want to defend my point of view to the point I usually anger people...








It would be very hard to argue to a person who only sees the tool, not the feeling I get from using it that its a reasonable thing... But its real and important to me...

On a large scale its why I do what I do... I love tools... GOOD tools... There is no worse aggravation (FOR ME) than using a set of Harbor Fright wrenches.. they are a chore to use, they fit poorly, they spread under heavy use... I have several sets of Snap on, Williams Matco, Mac wrenches... but wanted to leave a cheap set out for others to use in the shop..... I finally gathered them all up and threw them in the scrap tub... Because they reduced my quality of life every time I used one...

I see this whole thing as trying to explain art to someone who just does not get it...

How do you explain the beauty of a painting? you can describe the technical aspects but the art and beauty is not about the painting... its about the viewer..




I could not agree more. Thankyou for expressing so elegantly and succintly what I couldn't find the words for. The tools themselves are an end, not just a means. Like a lot of blacksmiths, many of my everyday working tools are OLD. like very old. Older than my greatgrand father would be if he were still around, and they work WELL, as good as I can make them work. I hate crap tool. I throw them away when they apear in lots. I had a cousin who worked in my shop once. It was his self-apointed role to ensure nothing "good" got thrown away. My time is far to presious to waste with garbage tools in my hands, and I finaly had to take to total destruction of certain tools, to be sure I wouldn't ever have to hold them again after they mysteriously reapered for the nth time.
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Thank you Larry for getting it! I couldn't get the words right on my end either.....

On the work end of it-
When I was a T/A in my Sculpting classes I used to talk with the other students about the support tools and sets-ups and how they were "part" of the art work. If one surrounded a piece of art they were creating with flimsy, ugly, hard to work with support tools and set-ups then chances are the "finished" work would show that too.

Yes, it is a personal choice! I for one enjoy the ride as much or in some cases more than the destination.

As far as looking down my nose at people who buy cheep junk? I don't. But then, I don't even look either.

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As much as I respect Grant's knowledge, skill and inventiveness, I take exception to his example of Chambersburg.If the choice were truly only that for 200K or chinese for 20K, fine, but it is not. There are and were many other options, from self built, right on through used, to custom built by other manufactures. Sorry, I am not sold on that. I get that it works for you though.


The discussion was about "buying American or buying foreign". You can make your own wrenches too, not relevant to the discussion. If you want a new 200lb self-contained hammer those were the options, just comparing like for like.
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The discussion was about "buying American or buying foreign". You can make your own wrenches too, not relevant to the discussion. If you want a new 200lb self-contained hammer those were the options, just comparing like for like.


Sorry if i muddied the water. This is a big subject and self expresion can be difficult at times. You and I have been at this before, on another forum, I repect your veiwpoint, but repectfully disagree.
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Glad to see I`m not the only one with a spiritual connection to some of my tools. :)

Some of my friends look at me like I have 3 heads when I talk about how tools with soul just produce better work.
What they do is inspire me to do my best and that is really what makes the work better.
It really is like trying to explain the difference between art and craft though.

Thanks for taking the time to post your thoughts Larry.
Oh,and congrats for selling that sportster for that incredible price.You guys deserved both the recognition and the cash.

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Some of my friends look at me like I have 3 heads when I talk about how tools with soul just produce better work.
What they do is inspire me to do my best and that is really what makes the work better.
It really is like trying to explain the difference between art and craft though.


Yep . . .smile.gif


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