Comments by "Nicholas Conder" (@nicholasconder4703) on "Quick Fire Q&A" video.

  1.  @lovablesnowman  I'm afraid my father had some very pithy things to say about economics. One was that economics was a science based on self evident truths that are neither self evident nor true.
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  2. Mind you, given how thorough TIKs research is, he might have some rather interesting things to say about Totalize, Falaise, and other actions. I wouldn't mind seeing his perspective on this.
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  3. It helped Napoleon that he inherited a French Army that was adopting tactics that had been proposed following the American Revolution but only partially implemented prior to the French Revolution (skirmish lines, massed artillery, infantry column, etc.). Napoleon's innovations were (I think) creating the division and quick-step marching, and (most definitely) moving units at the operational level to maximum effect. It was the latter that allowed Napoleon to concentrate his forces against opposing armies with great rapidity, achieving local superiority in the face of overwhelming odds at the strategic level. His fatal flaw was often underestimating his opponent. He also did not figure out a way to adapt the basic infantry tactics when faced with someone who knew how to use terrain to their advantage (i.e. the Duke of Wellington and Archduke Charles). This lead the Duke of Wellington to comment once, "They came on in the same old way and we defeated them in the same old way". He also forgot that people learned from their mistakes, and would adapt to counter his way of waging war. Finally, as with the Germans in WW2, he forgot that he might have a large pool of men to call on, but it was not inexhaustible. Attrition from disease and fighting would inevitably wear his armies down to nothing.
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  4. I would disagree about your comments on government. Good government (please note I said "good government") works to protect people from the excesses of capitalists. It has resulted in clean water and air; London no longer stinks to high heaven from sewage in the Thames or has smogs like those in the 1950s. I doubt corporations would care at all about these things, or do anything about them. Without government intervention we would still have 12 year olds going to work in the coal mines, or cleaning chimneys. Our road networks were all paved and improved using tax dollars. People often forget the benefits that good government grants us, and only complain about the regulations that were often written to protect us.
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  5.  @sean640307  I totally agree. The issue is the balancing act between how much regulation versus how much capitalism is given free rein. Or to put it another way, how you balance societal needs versus economic ones. Of course, one shouldn't forget that without a society (producers and consumers), there is no economy. Sadly, many people put the cart before the horse, so to speak.
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  6.  @TheImperatorKnight  However, without oversight, capitalists tend to become avaricious and you end up with the same situation that lead to the collapse of most Chinese dynasties, brought about the French Revolution, etc. The theory of economics also tends to ignore two factors. First, every system, no matter what it is, has a carrying capacity. With the marketplace, there is a limit to what you can sell (as Gateway computers discovered the hard way). Second, theory tends to overlook reality, most importantly, base human nature. Most people who end up in the top echelons become detached from their workers, and so begin to exploit them by cutting wages, etc., in order to benefit themselves. There is a good reason why the Greeks said four of the deadly sins released by Pandora were Greed, Envy, Gluttony and Lust. That being said, socialism in all its forms is a fools dream, because socialism blithely ignores base human nature completely. At least capitalism embraces reality. Capitalism works, and it does, and quite effectively. Indeed, if you read the Bible you find Christ uses a lot of marketplace analogies in the parables. However, unless there is oversight capitalism degenerates into one form or other of slavery. Many CEOs and company presidents would like nothing more than to run their companies like plantations or the Potosi slave mines. After all, you get rich, there is little overhead, and you have product to sell. Who cares about the people working for you? After all, they don't buy your product. Also, government is responsible for the vast majority of infrastructure that empowers industry. The road network is one example, water and sewage another. I know of only two dams in the world that were built using private funds alone, Boulder (Hoover) dam and the dam at Whitehorse, Yukion. The vast majority are government projects, either directly or indirectly. Same with many power stations. Stating that the market is independent of government also ignores the whole issue of tariffs, trade agreements and the like. And without government intervention, companies and nations would go bankrupt as cheap offshore products flood the markets. Industrialized nations would rapidly lose their farms which is the basis for any economy or nation, as the Japanese well know (which is why they don't allow foreign importation of rice). So, I guess we will have to agree to disagree on this one.
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  7.  @richardmartin7904  Actually, their tactics were more reminiscent of people like Frederick the Great. A good book to read on this is "The German Way of War".
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