This would be a valuable study. The usual muckrakers of the left who try to impute corruption in most Western governments won't touch that one, though. Must hit too close to home.
Neville Chamberlain at the Munich Conference
Posted on 05/14/2006 11:36:36 AM PDT by Mobile Vulgus
George Washington Didn’t Say That
Some of you who follow American History might have heard at one time or another that George Washington warned his countrymen of “entangling foreign alliances” in his farewell address given as he prepared to retire from his second presidential term. You may have heard that he issued a neo-isolationist concept about how the USA should treat its foreign policy ideas.
Here is a relevant section of Washington’s farewell address:
“The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is, in extending our commercial relations to have with them as little political connection as possible. So far as we have already formed engagements let them be fulfilled with perfect good faith. Here let us stop.”Unfortunately, too many view Washington’s warning of foreign entanglements incorrectly. Though it is a very common misconception, Washington was absolutely not saying we should never have anything to do with other nations or that we should forever steer clear of “foreign entanglements”. Washington was not proposing an isolationist policy.
Instead, Washington was worried about the pervasive split between Americans backing England and those standing up for France that had appeared in the US during Washington’s last term in office. This split was causing heavy fractionalization on the American political scene, and faction was one of the chief bugaboos in American political philosophy at the time. It should be remembered that during Washington’s terms the Party system had yet to be created and it was hoped by the Founders that a political system free of Parties could be sustained as a permanent American convention.
Washington meant only to steer clear of European alliances and entanglements only for as long as it took to get the USA consolidated and strong and to strengthen the Federal Union in the face of superior European power.
In a letter to Gouverneur Morris on Dec. 22, 1795, Washington mentioned how he envisioned that the USA would be strong enough to hold its own about 20 years after the country’s birth, that, until that time, he wanted his country to be left alone and clear of European meddling so that the USA’s position would be unassailable.
So, while much of the advice about foreign policy is sound, Washington’s warning was one of the immediate future not one of a permanent nature.
It should also be remembered that the US was fully involved in trade negotiations with every European nation at the time Washington issued his farewell address, so even as he was warning about foreign entanglements, the country was already so entangled.
A clear and concise monograph on this subject can be seen in the book, “To the Farewell Address”, by Felix Gilbert. (1961 Princeton Press)
Lastly, just on a point of clarification, the Farewell Address was initially drafted by Madison, with revisions by both Washington and Hamilton.
-By Warner Todd Huston
Bump. Forgot to include you in a ping since your points are under discussion as well.
I just think you all have it wrong, that is all. Your claims of Washington's squeemishness is clearly wrong with the letter he wrote to Morris (among others). And, it is utopian and ridiculous to imagine that trade alone will mollify nations looking to chose sides in various conflicts.
I don't think Washington was so stupid as to believe the utopian nonsense that you guys ascribe to him.
This places you squarely at odds with the principal current-day advocates for free trade that the Administration has explicitly relied upon, such as Thomas Friedman, and Thomas PM Barnett. They have expounded that very point...which you have demonstrated a more pronounced degree of common sense on than they have!
I agree. I am an admirer of Barnett, but he is wrong to go with the "trade fixes everything" ideal.
Certainly trade is a huge spur to reform and democratization, but it cannot do so by itself. That is why I disagree that we should just mollify China until our trade with them "fixes" things. They are a GREAT danger to us and that danger will come to a head long before trade will "fix" their society.
Another interesting thing about free trade and globalists.
I believe those in England who wanted to keep trading with Nazi Germany in the years leading up to WWII, had much to do with forming the policy of appeasement.
They just couldn't believe anyone, including Hitler, would ever put anything ahead of making more money.
So they were blind to the truth about Hitler until it was too late.
This would be a valuable study. The usual muckrakers of the left who try to impute corruption in most Western governments won't touch that one, though. Must hit too close to home.
Neville Chamberlain at the Munich Conference
Empirically, these are just unassailable facts.
It is a fact that these men have written those words. The words themselves are just opinions.
So I was right to surmise your position, not ludicrous at all. You don't believe in enforcing our intellectual property. And, hence, you don't believe in our country or its future...because you don't believe in our Constitutional Rights to protect our Intellectual property, or the right to control our own market access or regulate trade.
You seem to have a great deal of difficulty separating facts from opinions. You also have trouble with the logical fallacies of False Dilemma and Strawmen. Go back and read it again without your predecided answer. You might discover that what I said was that "intellectual property" cannot be protected, in spite of what you or I would wish. Protection is different from punishment; one occurs before violation, the other after. You can attempt to impose sanctions for violated agreements, but once an idea is "in the wild", it cannot be protected from copy by anyone who has the knowledge and resources to do so. The question becomes, what punishment works without punishing us more than them?
No trade that violates our laws protecting our own Intellectual Property needs be permitted. Especially if a nation wants access to the U.S. market. The Big Enchilada. Not China. The U.S. ...
Simple. Revoke MFN status to both nations. They would both be instantly subject to the automatic imposition of 50% import tariffs, and restrictions on U.S. citizens FDI in those countries. Or if really necessary....outright Ban BOTH violators. Ban both China and India from selling anything into our markets...and you would see some changes...especially by our own companies which have been the only real engines of both countries growth.
See, that wasn't so complicated. It won't be easy or without pain. But it wasn't complicated.
So, you would grant the Fed Govt. full control over with whom or where its citizens may trade. And to punish China for violating MS's patents, you would disallow, say, Mattel, General Electric and Mom and Pop Mfg. from trading with them?
That isn't simple, it's simplistic. You slap a 50% across the board price increase on huge sectors of the economy via tariffs, and you have just caused instant inflation. Everything that used to cost $1.00 now costs $1.50. Manufacturers can't pay for components without raising prices. Retailers must pay more than 50% as supply chain problems inevitably occur. People stop making purchases. Other people who make and sell those things lose their jobs. An U.S. government that did it would find itself voted out on its ear in a flash.
What is needed is a method of enforcing trade agreements that doesn't gut us in the enforcement thereof. Cutting off trade only works if you have an alternate source to replace it at near the same cost.
Lex, meet the U.S. Constitution:
Article I, Section 8.The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
To borrow money on the credit of the United States;
To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;
To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States;
To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;
To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States;
To establish post offices and post roads;
To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;
To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court;
To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations;
To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water;
To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;
To provide and maintain a navy;
To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;
To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;
To exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular states, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United States, and to exe rcise like authority over all places purchased by the consent of the legislature of the state in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings;--And
To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof.
I reprinted all of Section 8 because so much of it is clearly rejected by you, as either an over-reach or unenforceable in your self-styled "pragmatic" universe. None of it is an overreach. And none of its unenforceable...despite your fevered denials.
Nor is your pragmatic position on enforcement of trade a legitimate one...putting the rights of all America and Americans hostage to your having first a lower cost alternative to China.
This is UnAmerican. It is a type of betrayal of our Republic which George Washington explicitly warned us of in his Farewell Address.
But it is a legitimate one, despite your recasting into your narrow worldview. You would have the government impose trade regulation that would destroy large parts of the US economy, without any fall back position to take up the slack. You would have the livelihoods of all Americans held hostage to the protectionism of corporate patents. You need to find some middle ground here. You are advocating burning down the village to save the village.
Some comments on your interpretation of Art I, 8:
"To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;..."
The key word here is "regulate". I asked if you would give the Feds "full control over with whom or where its citizens may trade." If your answer is "yes", depending on this clause, then you feel "regulate" can include complete prohibition. Therefore, the Feds, under your interpretation, could ban interstate commerce between California and Arizona, with or without reasons. Is that your position as well?
Then, we get to a case like Cuba or interstate trade in illegal drugs. I dunno. I think it comes down to the wise exercise of a power. Just because the Fed is empowered to do something doesn't make it automatically a wise solution, which is why I wrote "full power". A power unchecked is ultimately destructive to all it touches.
There is a weird dynamic between the govt. power to regulate commerce and the individual right to property. Each trumps the other at the extremes. How can you have the right to own anything you want if the govt. has the power to ban the buying and selling of things, and vice versa?
"To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;..."
I see nothing here allowing a corporation to own patents or copyrights, let alone into perpetuity. Only real, flesh and blood people for a limited time. Allowing legal "personhood" to be used by fictional constructs such as corporate entities, is what has led us to much of this problem. In post #56, you wrote about individual traders in foreign markets:
But its all at their own risk. We won't rescue their sorry butts if they lose all their wallets to Chinese or Venezuelan pick-pockets. I.e., their capital investments abroad, are all at-risk. They will be on notice that we won't back them up if they put their money where they shouldn't have invested it.
Why, then, are you willing to protect the corporate interests and risks of MS in foreign trade deals, to the tune of 50% protectionist tariffs?
To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin,
Yes, the US Govt. can arbitrarily set the value of the Yen, Pound, or Rupee vs the Dollar. But, it cannot control the trading in those moneys on the international exchange. If the US set the value of the Dollar artificially high vs the Yen, for example, it would cause Yens to be bought cheaply in the US and sold for more Dollars internationally. Dollars would be overvalued and U.S. debt would rise for every Yen exchanged.
You were analyzing Art. I, Sec. 8 where it says: "To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;..."
You said:
The key word here is "regulate". I asked if you would give the Feds "full control over with whom or where its citizens may trade." If your answer is "yes", depending on this clause, then you feel "regulate" can include complete prohibition.
As between our nation and foreign nations, yes, clearly it can. You don't think so? Prove it. Detail your logic. Cite your scholars, call up Alan Dershowitz. Whatever.
Therefore, the Feds, under your interpretation, could ban interstate commerce between California and Arizona, with or without reasons. Is that your position as well?
No. You fail to recognize the key distinctions between internal and external. Yours is therefore an insupportable reading of the Constitution. You fail to read it together. I.e., you miss this modifying portion which precedes it:
and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States.
Anything done to effectuate your hypothetical ban, or even something less, has to be uniform. No ban could be made against one U.S. state, without it being applied to all. Has to be uniform. So the nature of the regulation internally is constrained, so that we have a fair and free internal market. But externally, no, there is no similar requirement. At all.
And quite intentionally so. The Federal control of which was deliberately magnified to strengthen the UNION. United we stand, divided we fall.
You would have the livelihoods of all Americans held hostage to the protectionism of corporate patents.
Patents promote "the useful arts." The country is founded on the promotion of the legal incentives to come up with new and better ideas. Interesting how you apparently regard obtaining Intellectual Property as somehow a criminal enterprise against "Americans". Somehow I don't think you are too worried about Americans. More likely your clients in China.
You need to find some middle ground here. You are advocating burning down the village to save the village.
Nope. That's your hypothetical conundrum...which is unreal in all particulars. And do you really want to get into what is "Best" for the "Most"? The idea is that we want manufactures HERE for very intensely vital national security reasons. Reasons I'm sure you're unprepared to ever accept. So in fact, what you fail to recognize, your profiteers who you fear I would be "burning down their part of the village" for the sake of some others understates and misapprehends the situation. IN point of fact....they are putting the whole village at risk of being burned down by their activity.
United We Stand. Divided We Fall.
It is useless to try to have a civil discussion with someone who takes any disagreement with viewpoint as an occasion to impute evil intent. You are dishonest in your debating methods, viz. your repeated use of insulting strawman arguments. If you wish to continue this with a more civil tone, let me know. Otherwise, I have no time to waste on you.
In the end, Marxism is a parasitic form of economic organization that can only perpetuate itself by swallowing additional resources. It does not have the ability to survive in isolation which makes it a threat to all around it.
Your protestations of umbrage are excessive and not credible. The reason I question your motivations so frankly, as much as you want to characterize them as "dishonest" is because you are so extremist, so far out into left field.
Totally without intellectual merit. Constitutionally, you are the one who was dishonest and unethical. You were busted you on it.
So rather than confront the substance of that misrepresentation you were busted on, you change the subject. You switch to outrage and evasion of further discussion. Typical of Leftist "Hit and Run" argumentation tactics.
You have not responded to me. You have responded to the strawman parodies of my positions, which you set up yourself. Examples from your posts:
"you are so extremist, so far out into left field."
"Totally without intellectual merit."
"More likely your clients in China. "
"You don't believe in enforcing our intellectual property."
"I can only assume from this screed that you oppose enforcement of our intellectual property laws that protect our inventions, trademarks and writings. Admit it. You do. Such opposition by you is definitively unamerican."
It is clear that you are not interested in debating my ideas honestly, but in distorting them so you can masturbate with your own. Look me up when you grow up.
You're the one who said issued these half-baked, juvenile contentions:
You would have the livelihoods of all Americans held hostage to the protectionism of corporate patents.You need to find some middle ground here. You are advocating burning down the village to save the village.
You were debunked on each of these. You are still running for the tall grass.
So if anyone has some growing up to do...well look in the mirror...
Based on this comment, it's clear you are a moron who believes in taking things out of context and pronouncing sweeping judgments.
If you had bothered to read the post you quote in the context of the whole thread, you might discover that it was a comment "in kind" to Paul Ross. He is the one who advocates leaving individual citizens to be abandoned by the US Govt. when dealing with foreign markets, but believes a 50% punitive tariff on all goods coming out of a particular country is the solution when a corporation gets in trouble.
The quote is pulled from a question to him (which he has declined to answer), as to why he wants protection for corporations, but not flesh and blood citizens. The phrasing was a mirroring of the hyperbolic language he used to address me. That subtlely was apparently missed by both Paul and yourself.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.