Airbus proposals fly into a storm as workers walk out.

Times Online ^ | 1 March 2007 | David Robertson

[Vicomte13]

I think you can boil it down to precisely that.

Had America not had protectionist tarriffs, the Americans would have bought their manufactured goods from England - the goods were much cheaper from there, and there were very strong ties to England, especially in the agricultural South. The Midwest, too, would have bought its tools at the English price...if they had been allowed to.
And had they done that, the nascent American industrial base would have been cut off at the knees. It would not have grown up to be what it became, precisely BECAUSE the English at the time mass-produced goods more efficiently and cheaply (they had much greater expertise at it).

Likewise, had America enforced English and French patents, there would have been a lot less American "ingenuity" out there. Americans would have been pre-empted in many fields by the pre-existing patents.

That's how competition really works.
Had America then respected the rules that Britain then wanted, America would have been a great agricultural power, but would not have become the world's number one industrial power in 1880. The English would have squeezed the life out of American competition at the onset, and American manufacturing would have died aborning.

Today, the Chinese and Indians are using approximately the same rules on America that America used on the English. And the end result will be the same: America will diminish, relatively, and India and China will be the greatest manufacturing and economic powers in the world by the end of the century. America relative to China will be what England is today relative to America.

That does not have to happen if we take logical steps to protect ourselves against it. But those steps would cut into the bottom line, especially, of the great traders who make great wads of cash arbitraging the "China Price". Those traders are the moneymen who back the "Free Trade" plank of both political parties in America. Their quest for greater profits currently trumps American national security, and will continue to do so.

We have reached a juncture where unbridled capitalist ideology works at contrary purposes to American nationalist ideology. You are trying to blur the distinction, to suggest that the conflict isn't REALLY there, and that it's all just ignorance on the part of nationalists such as myself. Truth is, wittingly or unwittingly, you are on the side of the capitalists here, over and against the nationalists. Because your viewpoint holds the money cards, it controls the political parties in America. You WILL get your way on these issues. And America will diminish to a second rank power, in a relationship with China roughly akin to France's relationship with the United States.

Doesn't have to happen if we do it the nationalist way.
Absolutely is fated to happen if we do it your free trade capitalist's way.
Both parties are controlled by rich men. So it will be done your way.

[investigateworld]

" 2. Protectionists have no real esteem for the capitalist system or the American worker and his culture. "

You actually believe that?

And when we go through a economic down turn and the laid off folks vote in a Democrat - Socialist gov't, they're not going to perceive they're acting in their own interests?

"Protectionists" are merely trying to stall for a little longer the course of economic history. IMHO