History of the United States

Thirty-Fifth Word: Mercantilism
Category: Foundation

Short Answer - - Does this have a short anwer?

Ming's Answer

American school text books define mercantilism as if it is an obsolete idea about government economic policy. A history text?s attitude about mercantilism resembles a biology text?s attitude about spontaneous generation or physics textbook?s attitude about astrology. The science textbooks explain that biogenesis has replaced spontaneous generation, and that astronomers no longer do horoscopes. In the same manner, economists no longer believe in mercantilism.

The philosophers who argued in favor of mercantilism wrote books in the fifteenth to seventeenth centuries, so another term for mercantilist might be Renaissance economist. They thought that a nation?s wealth comes from encouraging exports and discouraging imports. During the Enlightenment, some philosophers wondered if maybe imports might be a good thing if the price of the imported goods were less than the domestic goods.

Edit per post #63

In April, the United Steelworkers union filed a petition asking President Obama to restrict tire imports from China. The petition said the imports are destroying the domestic tire industry. President Obama promised during his presidential campaign last year not to routinely reject petitions restricting imports from China, as had his predecessor, President Bush. source

End Edit

So maybe economists have abandoned mercantilism, but it is not an obsolete economic policy. Merchants, or at least unions, and politicians still call for limiting imports.

You should add an example of a modern politician calling or limiting imports or encouraging exports.

Thirty-First Word: Puritans
Category: Foundation

Short Answer - - English Christian denominations who founded the New England colonies, which became Connecticut, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island.

Ming?s Answer

I?ve read some to try to answer the question: What is or was a puritan? I?m surprised at how complicated the answer could be. Maybe that?s why American history books don?t talk much about the Puritan?s political and religious ideas. The school texts focus on the different kinds of religious groups, Puritan, Catholic, Quaker, Huguenot, Anglican, Presbyterian and nationalities, English, French, Dutch, Spanish, Swedish, Indian that formed the original British Colonies. One observation, which I have made and which won?t normally be discussed in any discussion of Puritanism is that as a group, they could be the most innovative. One might come to that conclusion by counting the number of patents granted to people in New England in the nineteenth century.

Whitney and Lowell lived in New England. Were they Puritans?

You mean that I should make a list because you know that I have a list of innovations that correlates with location, but not with religion. Okay, why not?

You might as well start with Chauncey Depew. He wrote your list. The Wikipedia says that he was a member of a committee to complete the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine in New York City, and he was a member the Huguenot Society, and Saint Thomas' (Episcopal) Church, New York. He must have been an Espicopalian.

Forty-Second Word: Monopoly
Category: Ubanization

Short Answer - - Organization, which can sell a product at a price below cost: For example: public schools.

Ming's Answer

American school text books imply that monopolies are a phenomenon of the United States in the nineteenth century, but they must have been fairly common in the Renaissance. China and India both had state controlled salt monopolies. Shakespeare's bio usually includes a line about how his father ran afoul of the English wool monopoly. The American Revolution involved a tea monopoly.

Kurlansky, your favorite communist, said in Salt that the Phoenicia, Carthage, Rome, and Venice had salt monopolies. I bet that the West African kingdoms like Ghana might have had salt monopolies.

Forty-Ninth Word: Social Gospel Movement
Category: Urbanization

Short Answer - - Protestant Christian intellectual movement that was most prominent in the late 19th century and early 20th century. The movement applied Christian ethics to social problems, especially poverty, inequality, liquor, crime, racial tensions, slums, bad hygiene, child labor, weak labor unions, poor schools, and the danger of war. per Wikipedia

Ming?s Answer

Social Gospel Movement? What?s that? Until I found it on the study guide, I had never heard of it. I had heard of parts of it like settlement houses, Jane Addams, Hull House. One can find information about it in odd places. For example the biography of Theodore Roosevelt, which relates how the women in Roosevelt?s family demanded that New York change labor laws to protect workers after the Triangle Fire in New York City killed 146 workers.

The sources I have read, suggest that the Social Gospel Movement no longer exists, or if it does exists, it has morphed into other forms, Civil Rights Movement etc. That could be, but I still live right in the middle of it. My father helps operate a settlement house. He doesn?t use the word, but seems to me that is what it is. He wants to help people who are down on their luck. Chinese people worry a lot about luck.

I have a new avatar. I'm no expert on characters, but I think my avatar is pung yo, which, if I remember correctly, was the name of your cat.

So you think American entrepreneurs are puritans. Could the Social Gospel Movement be puritans?

There is a short answer.
America = good idea got out of hand.
We only let you win the war of independance because we felt sorry for you.

Yes i know, this post is a piss-take.

And I suppose the same could be said for Australia, Bahama, Bangladesh, Belize, Calais, Canada, Ghana, Hong Kong, India, Iraq, Ireland, Jordan, Kenya, Malaysia New Guinea, Nigeria, Normandy, Pakistan, Scotland, South Africa, Sudan, Trinidad, West Berlin, and Zimbabwe, [my goodness them bloody limeys was busy] but not California, which was a Spanish colony. Viva Morelos! 8)

Ahhh someone gets the idea!

If Zung He had come to England, Shakespeare would have written in Mandarin or maybe because Zung Xian Sheng followed the Koran, the Bard would have written in Arabic. And instead of Hong Kong being a British colony . . . I think Americans secretly wish they were still British. Why else would we, at least the white among us, be so ga-ga over British royalty. Prince Harry. Total hunk.

Yes, my kitty was Peng You. I miss kitty. Both peng and you mean friend, but Chinese people can't say single syllable words, so they say friend-friend, or good-friend or boy-friend or girl-friend. The character for peng is a picture of two moons, but it was originally a picture of the Phoenix Bird. Ideographically, it represents the idea that friendship survives even fire. The character for you (edit: pronounced yo) is two hands, a right and a left hand, joined. Sorry for the long winded answer, but my grandfather might read this, and he will lecture me if I don't explain the characters.

Interesting speculation about Puritans. Puritans wanted to live the life of Christ. Actually, living Christ-like may have begun with the Jesuits. We should look for a common ancestor. 8)