BigRedBuster

Amen..... If our defense has an average game, we win this game fairly easy. Our defense (especially the pass coverage) was absolutely awful. I don't know if I have ever seen a game where Nebraska defenders missed more tackles. Many times the players were in position to make the play only to fail to finish it off.

I thought Compton played a good game. He is also being mentioned as a possible Big Ten Defensive player of the year. http://www.athlonsports.com/college-football/big-ten-post-week-2-power-rankings

I am not putting this loss on the O line. For the most part, I thought they did a decent job on Saturday. When you are going against a very athletic and well coached D line, you are going to have some break downs. This was a close/hard fought game and there were many plays that were very well blocked.

I am not a person who follows recruiting heavily. At most, I follow it at arms length simply because I refuse to get emotionally tied up with decisions 18 year old kids make. However, recruiting is a big factor in the future chance a program has of winning big games. You have to have play makers. Here are the last 5 recruiting class rankings for these two teams: UCLA NU 2012 12 50 2011 55 19 2010 8 29 2009 5 33 2008 10 21 Average 18 30.4 How much of a factor does this have when a program has that much more talent coming in over a 5 year period? Now, I'm not saying we can't beat UCLA. BUT, if this is the case, then we need to out coach the other team and run better schemes that put our players in a position to succeed. We aren't doing that.

If Nebraska never plays the 2 gap system again, I will be happy. It makes no sense to me to have your D line dancing with the O line all day long. Ever since I have started watching football and playing it when I was young, the job is to GET OFF the block. It wasn't the D line's job to stay in contact with anyone. Get free and make a play!!!!!

I am absolutely totally baffled by our defensive scheme up front. If we go against a mobile QB, he either has all day to make a play or if one person gets loose to get at him, all he has to do is get away from that one guy and he is gone because everyone else on the line is dancing with the O line. You want to know why Martinez is rushed to throw many times (even though it's better than last year)? It's because the d line is shooting gaps and getting in his face FAST. If Nebraska never plays a 2 gap system again I would be very happy.

I firmly believe we are going to win. The wild card is how much are they going to improve from week one to week two?

Great...I had a response all typed out and my browser crashed. I'll try to do it again. Wages = Like you said, they are a HUGE portion. I'm not arguing that it is. BUT, government regulations like minimum wages play a big part in that. Environmental laws = This is with everything from my raw material suppliers to us. If our entire distribution chain doesn't have to give a crap about anything, it drops the cost. When my suppliers not only have to spend many millions of dollars to even start to build a plant and then have huge amounts of legal fees to fight environmental regulation and activist threats, that all add costs. Employee safety regulations = These all add costs and China has very little of these. I've already spoken about the lead as an ingredient issue. The Chinese government isn't a regulation here in the US but it plays a big part in this. If all I had to do is break even and then the government would take care of me, I could sell at a much lower price. I'm sure there are others I'm not thinking about. Like I said, I'm not necessarily apposed to all of these but it causes us to not compete on a level playing field.

What was I implying? (Not a smart@$$ comment. . .) That was aimed at your comment about freight eating up at least some of the discrepancy. My point was that it doesn't do very much.

Carl.... Here is a good example of what you are implying. We tried bringing on a product line that compliments ours. We weren't going to manufacture it. We wanted to be a distributor of it and sell it along with our products. We reached a distribution agreement with a company that makes probably the top of the line products in that market. They have both manufacturing here in the US and in China. Making the same product in China, I think was around 25-30% cheaper than in the US even after freight. This product is sold with maybe a 10% margin. So, simple math shows you that there was no way we could buy from the US manufacturing and make it work. Our supplier basically just used the US manufacturing for specialty products and orders they had to get out in a very short lead time. Probably 90% of their products were shipped from China in bulk.

Just noting that if you chose to manufacture in China and your primary market is the US . . . your shipping costs would probably go up. That'd partially offset (a small amount, I'm sure) the increased profits from cheaper materials and labor. True....but, the chinese products are still being shipped here and sold at a cheaper price than I can even make them. That wasn't a typo. They are being sold to the customer cheaper than I can make them.

Wrong.... Yes, your wage issue is a real issue. BUT, if I have a manufacturing plant that has to abide by very strict environmental regulations in the US which would greatly increase my costs, why wouldn't I build it in China where I don't have to worry about that at all and the government doesn't give a crap what I do unless the Olympics come to town and all they will have me do is close for a month? And, I didn't say ending regulations is the answer. I said level the playing field. I quoted you poorly, I'm sorry for that. And I didn't mean to imply that wage equality is the primary reason. Certainly regulations have a role to play. I just think the wage thing (and employee benefits, etc) is a larger slice of the pie. The wage (and employee benefits) issue is a huge problem. But, I don't think people realize how big of an issue the other regulations are. My example of my raw material suppliers building plants in other countries is a prime example. That has nothing to do with wages. They WANT to build them here because there is a demand here and they can make better product here. BUT, environmental regulations (and I should include environmental groups fighting them) keeps them from doing it. That is jobs right there that we should have here but they aren't for no reason other than political.

Not sure why that matters but I do ship some internationally.

This is why I refuse to watch the conventions. How can anyone wade through the total BS spewed out by both parties at these elections. All it results in is the base getting all emotionally tied up in knots and wanting to go kick the other side's ass at all costs. 99% based on falsehoods, innuendos and total BS.

Wrong.... Yes, your wage issue is a real issue. BUT, if I have a manufacturing plant that has to abide by very strict environmental regulations in the US which would greatly increase my costs, why wouldn't I build it in China where I don't have to worry about that at all and the government doesn't give a crap what I do unless the Olympics come to town and all they will have me do is close for a month? And, I didn't say ending regulations is the answer. I said level the playing field. Would you save more money by using lead or by paying your employees $5 a day? I guess probably the labor but I really don't know. It could be close. BUT, it really doesn't matter. Both situations make our company less competitive.

I agree. But, it is impossible to get changed. I have personally been involved trying. AND, that only takes into consideration that one aspect of it. It still doesn't settle the issue with wages, governmental subsidies and other environmental regulations my company and domestic industry must face. Another example that is in my industry. We need more capacity in my industry to manufacture raw materials. My raw materials come from natural gas. We have HUGE amounts of that in the US. We should be building more manufacturing of that raw material here. We aren't. Why???? Environmental regulations either prevent it or make it so expensive to get through the process that those companies are building plants on the Pacific Rim and Europe. They make this product there out of oil and coal. Natural gas makes a better product, but we can't increase our production here because of the government. FYI....My industry hasn't had an environmental or health problem from our products and production in probably 60 years. There is no reason why not to build more here.

Wrong.... Yes, your wage issue is a real issue. BUT, if I have a manufacturing plant that has to abide by very strict environmental regulations in the US which would greatly increase my costs, why wouldn't I build it in China where I don't have to worry about that at all and the government doesn't give a crap what I do unless the Olympics come to town and all they will have me do is close for a month? And, I didn't say ending regulations is the answer. I said level the playing field.

I would be better described as someone who is for certain regulations in certain situations but I am a firm believer that most of the time the are poorly written and implemented.

My view is it that you can't have it both ways. You can't have all these regulations in the US and then expect companies to compete with companies that don't have it. IF....the US is going to not force other countries who import products to the US to raise their standards, AND, the US wants manufacturing to come back to the US, then we must reduce regulations. I would prefer that other countries raise their standards to ours. Example.....I don't want products like ours made in the US with lead. BUT, I also don't want to have to compete with products made OUTSIDE the US cheaper because they can use lead. So, when I say that we are over regulated, I am mostly referring to "compared to other countries" who compete with US companies. Now....I do believe there are some regulations in the US that go too far.

Here is what pisses me off and it's a midwest thing. Usually people from the midwest are much nicer than people from the coasts. UNTIL they get behind the wheel. When you are driving and all of a sudden you realize you must merge, you put on your blinker and do everything necessary to get over a lane....BUT....people don't let you in. They will actually speed up to make sure you don't get in front of them. If you are driving in say New Jersey or New York, people realize you must merge and they also realize that if you keep all traffic going in all lanes then everyone gets to where they need to go. So, they will let you in. Not here. It's like a race and screw you if you are going to get in front of me.

Martinez used to be the only one then we recruited him.

I am a firm believer that the only reason why Obama picks Old Uncle Joe as his running mate is for security. As bad as Obama is, NOBODY wants him to be shot so that Bidumb would then be President.

You want America to be like the rest of the world? What about American Exceptionalism? Rabble rabble. No.... Right now, we have the worst situation. We have a government who puts the toughest regulations on it's industry with high taxes compared to the rest of the world. On top of that, we have free trade agreements with our biggest competitors in these industries. On top of that, these competing countries have little to no regulations and pay their employees pennies compared to what even the minimum wage is in the US. Let me give you a real world example. Our company competes with products made in China. Our industry can make our products using lead as an ingredient much cheaper than we do. However, it is illegal for us to use lead because of environmental regulations. Ok...I agree with that regulation and am not against keeping it. HOWEVER.....the same products can be made in China WITH lead and imported into the US and sold to the public and nobody knows and the government doesn't care. That's because it is not illegal to SELL lead based products, it is just illegal to PRODUCE lead based products like ours in the US. On top of that, up till now (I think it's slowly changing) the industries in China are subsidized by the government as long as they break even. I am totally against government subsidies for almost all industries so I am not asking for that. So.....as it turns out, WE have to make a profit to stay in business. If the Chinese company simply breaks even, the government subsidizes them to give them a profit. On top of that, they have the cheap labor that everyone knows about. And people wonder why industry is leaving the US for China? The public doesn't give a crap (or doesn't even know or care to ask) where the product is made, all they care is that it's cheaper. So....with all that, we have a party in power who preaches that these big evil corporations need to be paying more to employees, stricter environmental regulations and paying more taxes because after all.....they are owned by big mean evil rich people who don't care about little people. It is always packaged as..."That big mean company shipped your jobs over seas." It's survival. Why are they looking at us???? Why isn't our government looking at imported products that compete with us and saying HEY.......If you are going to sell that stuff here without a tariff, you have to play by our rules as far as wages, environmental and employment law." BUT....no...the public wants cheap products, high wages, clean air and water, and no taxes because those evil rich companies can pay them. I want a level playing field. So far, neither party is giving that to us but at least there is one that is less a threat than the other one. You know what would make me vote democrats??? If they would come out and say...."Hey....industries....I am not going to push for higher minimum wages, more environmental regulations...etc. We already have some of the highest standards in the world. What we are going to do is require your foreign competitors to play by those rules also if they want to sell those products in the US." EVERYONE would win with that strategy because you then take away the reasons why jobs are going over seas and more manufacturing jobs come back to the US.

THIS is what I love to hear. I have read several quotes from UCLA coaches where they are talking about trying to slow down our passing attack. THIS is when our running game is going to explode.

unregulated markets, that is an old idea of predictable disastrous results. Did I say that it was a good idea? Let me check, nope I didn't. But over regulated markets are empire killers. USSR, Rome, the UK to name a few. Our economy needs to have some regulation, but I would argue over regulation is more harmful than under regulation to a nation's economic longevity. Over regulation kills an economy when you are in a world market and the rest of the world don't have those regulations that drive up costs.