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The goods are not the question.

As it stands now, the working definition of 'free trade' is that US Trade Policies (under WTO/NAFTA rules) allow manufacturers to sell their goods in the USA--which is fine, except that the manufacturers are NOT 'indigenous' Chinese, Indian, Filipino, or Mexican firms.

Instead, they are often transnationals whose operation in China (or the others) was set up as a method of avoiding US tax, regulation, or labor costs.

IOW, (and let's not get into a discussion about 'lazy, fat, yada yada Americans--not productive...) the United States, over a period of 100+ years, has created social structures which provide for good working conditions and relatively high pay, in addition to providing for ecological and tax revenues which fund the infrastructure.

Companies find these structures to be costly (and we can agree that they ARE costly.) In order to avoid the costs, they move. This is 'unrestricted capital' at work.

What happens, of course, is that numbers of workers in the US get dumped--as well as their managers, their (former) company's suppliers, etc., etc., etc.

It's not a matter that JoeBlow did a lousy job--and, by the way, in most cases, JoeBlow's production and quality numbers were as good as (or better than) those coming from offshore plants. It's a matter of US Trade Policy. For some reason or other, the US has decided to ignore conditions in other countries which would trigger massive interventions (OSHA, EEOC, EPA--you name it) here in the US.

That's only the beginning. The US also doesn't have a good track record of protecting Intellectual Property (patents/copyrights) in foreign countries, either.

Ironically, then, the firms which are currently manufacturing products in China, (the worst IP violator) will find themselves put out of business by the very country which they thought was their savior.

Completes the cycle, eh?

If it were black-and-white, it wouldn't call for much discussion. It's not that simple.

In the end, however, the Preamble clearly states that one of the functions of Gummint is 'to provide for domestic tranquility...and life, liberty, etc....' meaning that the only defense (and this IS a war) is within not only the power of the Feds, but within their specific charter.