Posted on 01/27/2011 5:52:17 PM PST by jfd1776
President Barack H. Obama has announced his administration's commitment to advancing American exports -- to double America's exports by 2014. Now, there's a daring position to take: advocating a goal easily supported by the entire country, regardless of politics or demographics.
The question is how to advance exports. The United States is already a huge exporter; ships and planes depart daily, fully laden with millions of dollars' worth of export cargo. There could be more -- there can always be more -- but it's not like we're embarking on some great trip to the unknown.
When John F. Kennedy called us to the goal of space travel, it had never been done before. It was a quest, a path untraveled, even unexplored.
Similarly, when Ronald W. Reagan called us to the goal of rolling back communism -- not just to settle for détente, but to free other nations from the death-grip of dictatorial socialism -- it had never been done before. Many believed it an impossible goal -- that the most we could hope for was to stand athwart history, yelling, Stop!, like National Review's William Buckley -- but Reagan's vision paved the way to free Eastern Europe and her other vassals all over the world from the Bear's lethal control.
No such complexity is present in the call for increased exports. It's been done before -- heck, it's being done all the time. We're always exporting. We just need to export even more. That's manageable. The question is whether Obama's prescription will actually contribute to the goal or just do more damage around the edges, as his prescriptions so often do.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Every cure he proposes is worse than the illness.
“The question is whether Obama’s prescription will actually contribute to the goal or just do more damage around the edges, as his prescriptions so often do.”
Great line...American Thinker is a great source.
Interesting read, but far too many words for those who’d rather blame our problems on NAFTA.
When did we ever come out on the good end of an export deal? No matter what we do or how many promises we get, there’s always a deficit it seems.
America needs to get back to manufacturing for our own needs and let the Chinese keep their poison toys, toothpaste, pharmacuticals, mystery fabric, etc.
The unions need to be put in their place so we can manufacture goods at an acceptable price for consumers. I’m tired of paying for cheap, inferior junk that isn’t worth half what I pay for it, even if it is relatively “cheap.”
“Buy American” was ridiculed and shouted down years ago as “isolationist”. We have raw materials, oil, gas and land that is doing us no good because we are being denied the right to use them by green nuts.
And last but not least, we have a great, untapped and unused resource available to us here to do that work and produce those goods if we could ever get it into motion. It’s able-bodied, young, strong Americans that won’t work because they are handed all the things they need to live by the dwindling and soon to be extinct numbers of American taxpayers.
My hope is that, before I die, I’ll see the “Made in America” brand become what it once was.
NAFTA is not the problem. Trade with China is.
Quite right.
Free Trade Agreements are truly mutually beneficial for all members... NAFTA, DR-CAFTA, the US-Australia FTA, the US-Israel FTA... they’re all great for all partners. The more they’re utilized, the more they help grow commerce for all.
The problem is China. We’re losing tons of manufacturing to a country with ICBMs pointed at us. And we’re shipping them boatloads of cash to spend on more and more missiles.
Selling them the rope...
Politicians the world over have an irrational fixation on exports. They are willing to do significant damage to the non-export portion (which usually is 90 to 95%) of their economies in order to help exports just a little bit. And their tool of choice is usually currency devaluation, and though some may call me an optimist, I think Obama can do that.
You’re right, it was a great read. For a leader who wants to double our exports in five years, it’s disgusting to see him deny Columbia what should have been signed years ago just to keep his goon squad in heel.
Aleya2Fairlie wrote: “
When did we ever come out on the good end of an export deal?”
Answer - From about the early 1840’s onwards, actually.
Off the top of my head, there was “King Cotton” in the 19th century. Then there was the vastly successful WW1 period during which the US made a fortune selling war materiel to the Entente powers, and then a period of two decades post-1945 when the USA was the only major nation with an intact industrial base supplying a world rebuilding from the ruin of WW2.
The problem is not with the concept of international trade (I’ve been in the field for forty years). Even today, this country still does well exporting raw materials, agricultural products and foodstuffs. The problem is in the manufactured goods sector. That is where this country falling badly behind the competition. Di Leo is spot on in his analysis - our labor costs are too high, our corporate taxation levels are too high, Wall Street is more interested in quarterly profits than in R&D, our myriad governmental regulatory costs are completely off the sanity scale, our infrastructure is old and paralyzed by draconian environmental restrictions, our shipping regulations are out of touch with reality, and our public education system is producing a work force of very mediocre quality in comparison to our major global competitors.
Don’t take this as hectoring on my part. I basically agree with your assessment. Frankly speaking, our biggest problem is getting ourselves out of our own way.
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