[phaster]

If you had 660 billion dollars give or take a few billion, how would you spend it? Basically this is amount of money that I think is being mispent on problems the president and congress kind of got the american people into.

one hundred fifty two billion (of the approximately 660 billion) is the economic stimulus package signed into law last month by President George W. Bush to try to stave off recession amid a deepening housing and credit market crisis

http://mobile.reuters.com/mobile/m/Full ... 4620080317

basically IMHO if conservative money management principals were in place (ie fiscal regulations were in place to only loan money to individuals who have have shown the ability to put 20% down on a property, as was the tradition custom of buying a home), in place of the "creative" financing that was the mantra of housing boom, I'm pretty sure the term "subprime" would have never entered the public lexicon....

five hundred and twelve billion (of the approximately 660 billion) is the amount so far being spent on the "Cost of Iraq War and Nation Building"

http://zfacts.com/p/447.html

I had the good fortune to take a road trip in that area prior to 9/11 (the area always facinated me cause one of my undergrad majors was political science), and I knew that area was and always has been a quagmire, don't understand why any political leader (british, russian or american) would think that their sphere of influence could change the local politics in the middle east or in the "stans"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Game

Anyway, the mind game if you're up to it is "how would you spend 660 billion dollars?" Kinda wondering if you would do anying different, or do ya think the war in iraq and the economic stimulus package is money well spent? BTW one rule of the game is, you are only allowed to spend a million dollars of that 660 billion amount, on personal stuff like hookers

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/ye ... sten1.html

the rest of it would have spent of big ticket items, like a war or a tax rebate or???????

[MacG]

What about Emperors Club? Add a fat yacht and a private A380 and I'm about done.

[heroineworshipper]

Pay off my boss's mortgage. Isn't that what we're supposed to want?

[Tanada]

As I usually say, build 132 Fission power plants in the 2 GWe size and shut down 250 GWe of filthy stinking coal power plants. This would slow global warming while at the same time cleaning up a lot of air pollution.

[emersonbiggins]

Plan for and welcome these all over North America.

[Precipice]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('emersonbiggins', 'P')lan for and welcome these all over North America.

[BigTex]

I would pick a state, probably Texas, because that is my home, and make it my mission to take control of the political process in the state. I would hire every lobbyist in Austin and sprinkle the money around close races, pet projects of leaders and public service announcements in radio, tv and print ads. My goal would be to own the place. With that much money, I could probably do it.

Once I felt like I owned the process, I would set about to start creating a good government from the ground up. Every federal mandate on which federal funds are conditioned would be cut off. I would do my best to create a society in which people were proud to be members, and would use every thought control technique I could come up with to wake up the people of this state from their generational stupor and childish feeling of entitlement.

For example, since Texas has its own electrical grid, we could try a lot of different approaches to sustainability, and those that worked might be a good blueprint for other governments. Punitive taxes on consumption above a certain level per household would be one example of coerced reductions in consumption. This would have a cascading effect through building codes, bulding practices, remodelling for efficiency, home pricing, etc.

This would actually be a fun way to spend that amount of money, and if it worked might actually result in something useful.

I would probably get a big hat and a herd of cattle with the money too.

[Gerben]

Keep a few million and put the rest in the waste incinerator. There are too many dollars out there already. Why spend? It will only make dollars worth less and the crisis bigger.

[bodigami]

I will use all of it minus $50000 for cleaning as much water as possible with all that money and give 90% back to nature and the rest for human consumption. The $50000 will be a pay to me to manage the project.

[Hagakure_Leofman]

i'd think of it as the credit card it is, and go find the scissors.

[Starvid]

What Emerson said. Bring on the 200 mph AGV's!

Or 132 big nuke plants. Yeah, that'd be nice.

[BigTex]

Wait a second, I want to change my answer.

I would buy a fleet of cruise ships and paint them black and start a company called "Doom Cruise Lines."

The cruises would be a combination of vacation/ecological degradation workshop/and post-peak oil survival skills seminar.

Maybe dock at a small port in South America and do a jungle survival skills session as well.

When TSHTF, all of the ships would be converted to pirate work.

Instead of Captain Steubing, every ship would have a captain along the lines of Snake Plissken.

[Euric]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('phaster', 'I')f you had 660 billion dollars give or take a few billion, how would you spend it?

[Ferretlover]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('BigTex', 'I') would pick a state, probably Texas, because that is my home, and make it my mission to take control of the political process in the state.

[gg3]

I'm with Tanada, Emerson, et. al., though a bit differentiy.

I'd put a chunk into building nuclear & renewables using existing & proven technologies, and then invest a chunk into Hyperion (micro-nukes) and another chunk into that new solar PV company in San Jose (darn if I can't remember the name). I'd also be contracting with Toshiba for their version of the micro-nukes, and I'd also be working to set up transmission corridors to unblock stranded renewables.

Another chunk goes into rail: highspeed interurban, and light rail intraurban.

Another big chunk goes into media buys to put advertising on all of the main TV and radio networks. These would be messages tailored to the specific demographics, with the goal of encouraging and reinforcing sustainable behaviors of various kinds, including birth control and energy conservation. They would deliberately avoid being too overtly controversial; some would also be geared toward an emotional tone of encouraging curiosity about the subject matter.

Free distribution of copies of The Limits to Growth (original and revised editions) to public libraries, would not cost all that much as part of the media strategy. Some of the radio & TV advertising would be geared toward encouraging people to read those books.

Another chunk goes into buying land in specific parts of three or four specific states (East, Midwest, and West). Goal state is to constitute a large enough chunk of the local property tax base in each of the various counties, as to make it easier to go asking for planning & zoning permissions to do what needs to be done.

Then populate said land with friendlies who are all up for the Azimov's Foundation scenario. And then start compiling and saving useful knowledge while doing educational outreach for sustainability in the respective regions we're engaged with.

Another decent chunk goes into land purchases and relocalization plans for privately-owned colleges & universities in specific areas. The goal being to build up a farming & industrial base around each of these institutions so as to enable them to continue functioning as centers of knowledge as per the Azimov's Foundation scenario.

[wisconsin_cur]

Start a fund that would provide generous grants for the purchase of 10-40 acre plots by individuals/groups who would commit to produce a min. amount of produce in a CSA project within 3 years.

I would then set up a board to manage it.

Make sure that the first application to be reviewed would be my own.

[RonMN]

I would pay a million people to build a super giant 1500 foot tall statue of ME!

I would be the 8th wonder of the world!!!

[Ferretlover]

" how would you spend 660 billion dollars?"

Couldn't decide on one answer-several came to mind:
a) In another country.
b) As fast as I could!
c) Buy a small, mountainous island "Lost Horizon" type of country.
d) Go shopping
e) build a 24-hour (never allowed to leave their cell) security prison for corrupt politicians of any country.
f) start my own newspaper that would only print the truth, and, would identify e-op items from news items.
g) start a boarding school where all the kids learned Real stuff in the nine-hours-of-classes day.

[Pops]

Spend the biggest portion on buying farmland and small town properties.

A little on hit men to whack the people I'd need to hire to do the deals all at once and real quick who couldn't keep their mouth shut.

I'd then spend the balance funding an apprenticeship program in the various and many skills and professions required for post-oil sustainability.

The graduates, after showing proficiency in their chosen profession would gain the right to an interest-free loan for property and/or tools and/or a stake.



There might even be enough left over to have a a couple good beers.

[The_Toecutter]

1) Use perhaps $2 billion to get electric replacements for our current automobile fleet developed, mass produced, and for sale

2) $200 billion on mass transit development in the U.S.

3) $200 billion ramping up wind/solar electricity in the U.S.

4) $100 billion used to help lift the 3rd world out of poverty and used on a campaign intended to slow and eventually reverse population growth through birth control and other means

5) $100 billion used on a massive media campaign to turn the masses against the power elite

6) ~$60 billion for universities around the world to research how to mitigate as much as possible the negative effects of overshoot, peak oil, and environmental collapse and uses these funds to fight these problems