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Posted on 12/17/2021 5:38:25 AM PST by Kaslin
Do you remember Armand Hammer? If you're over 50, you may. Hammer was a business tycoon who died in 1990. He was most famous for his deal-making with the Soviet Union. Hammer would cut business deals directly with the Kremlin. This was unusual; most U.S. businesses had very few dealings with America's greatest adversary. Today, by contrast, many American multinational businesses see their growth as much or more tied to China, our new primary adversary, as they do to America.
I began my career as a young lawyer on a special congressional committee set up to investigate the transfer of sensitive U.S. missile technology to China in the 1990s. As a result of our investigation, two of America's top satellite companies -- Hughes and Loral -- were forced to pay record multimillion-dollar fines for transferring dangerous missile technologies to China. As you read the news that China has now launched hypersonic nuclear-capable missiles around the globe, remember where it all started. American businesses helped them along the way.
Hughes and Loral were just the tip of the spear. In the 1990s, after the Soviet collapse, there was a sense that the world was entering a period of total U.S. supremacy. There was no world peer. As we now know, this didn't last very long. China filled the void quickly. Unlike the days when Hammer was noteworthy for his singular business exploits in the Soviet Union, China figured out how to use the top corporate powers of its greatest adversary, the United States, to fuel its own growth.
The first major step American business executed was taking down trade barriers to China. Open trade, they argued, would lead to a more open China. A more internationally intertwined China would lead to human rights reforms, the argument continued. Interestingly, Hammer had tried to make the same exact arguments about the Soviet Union: ''The Soviet leadership is gradually coming to see trade, rather than confrontation with the West, as the way to improve economic conditions." Luckily, most Americans didn't buy it. President Ronald Reagan certainly didn't. The U.S. did not trade extensively with the Soviets. What trade existed was heavily regulated, especially in the technology area. Corporate America, as a general matter, was on the sidelines.
With the Soviet collapse, attitudes seemed to change. The lure of the huge Chinese marketplace and the promise of cheap Chinese labor was too much for corporate America to resist. Finally, in 2000, the U.S. permanently normalized trade relations with China and voted to allow China into the World Trade Organization. Everything since has been a total disaster.
Drive across small-town America and you will see hollowed out communities, boarded-up main streets and shuttered plants that used to employ thousands. This decay has led to skyrocketing drug overdoses, increasing crime and a political upheaval that's still playing out. It's too simplistic to pin everything bad that's happened in America on China's rise and our China policies. It's just as naive to pretend it hasn't had a big effect.
Nothing predicted by those who promoted free trade with China has come true. Proponents said normalized trade relations with China would reduce our trade deficit. The deficit has instead skyrocketed, led chiefly by a tripling of America's trade deficit with China. Proponents said normalized trade with China would benefit America's economy. Instead, a full one-third of American manufacturing jobs have disappeared, with studies showing many moved to China. Proponents also famously predicted that opening trade would ease China toward a period of political liberalization and respect for human rights. This prediction by so many so-called experts was so wrong that it should be at the top of the list of why Americans have lost faith in national institutions and leaders. You can't be this wrong about things this important and retain the trust of the people. China, of course, didn't liberalize. They are running slave labor camps right now.
Free-market believers love free trade for good reason. It makes sense. It adds efficiency and increases total economic output. What we did not debate enough is how free trade works with a country like China. When one side is a free capitalist market and the other is still a closed, corrupt mercantilist market willing to use slave labor, how will things work out?
In total, it's hard to argue that the normalized trade relations with China have been a net positive for average Americans. They have definitely been a net positive for some multinational American businesses, Wall Street and the very wealthy. American businesses have used cheap Chinese labor to great benefit. How much of that benefit conveys back to the American people is debatable. Americans who invest in equities benefit from higher stock valuations for some American companies. Others benefit from cheaper goods made in China. The downsides include lost jobs, broken communities and weakened national security due to dependence on a foreign power.
With the benefits from U.S./China relations flowing to a small segment of the American population and the detriments flowing to the masses, the political ramifications of America's huge China mistake of the past 20 years are still playing out. The U.S. government is finally getting around to taking action against China's use of slave labor many years after evidence of it was first uncovered. America is also thinking more clearly about its dependence on China for crucial goods and services. We are debating how to decouple ourselves from this dependence on a repressive and largely adversarial China. This debate is long overdue. The politicians who figure out how to do this while minimizing harm to the economy will be rewarded. Those who continue to ignore it will be punished.
He gets paid for so,ething I’ve been saying for years.
No mention of the Ports America deal.
Wonder why they left that out...
... and the clintons.
I recall when Loral was allowed to sell missile technology to Red China. It came in connection with a large cash transfer to Bill Clinton. At the time, it enabled the Chinese to engineer multiple warhead missiles, which had eluded them until Loral showed them how to do it.
We were thinking "more clearly" about that for decades before strict prohibitions of relying on China for anything were ended and politicians and trans-national corporations scrapped it all and brought us to the current situation.
“...China figured out how to use the top corporate powers of its greatest adversary, the United States, to fuel its own growth.”
CHINA BRIBED THE CORRUPT CRIMINAL KLINTOONS.
Rush Limbaugh stained his otherwise good reputation with his pro globalist Bushie libertarian offshoring “Free Trade” propaganda.
Most Freepers are anti US worker free traders. They don’t care. They see a union thug behind every blade of grass...
Liar....... you are the American traitor spouting your left wing trade union views that are in restraint of trade.
America is strong because it is capitalist and not socialist like you feed us every post.
The business of America is business and you should be proud we put up with antibusiness riff raff like you
You idiot only 7% of the work force is in a union. Yes we can off shore every job to the 3rd and that will kill the unions and the USA also you buffoon.
The 7% is irrelevant. The goal is 0%
The 7% has nothing to do with anti trade yahoos like you imposing union values and attempting to destroy trade that is the very basis for our national existence
Fu--ing stupid. You would kill off all industry to get even with a tiny minority of workers you hate. My God you are dumb as a rock. Imbecilic.
The solution to promote domestic industry and to increase the revenue/decrease govt debt is with an ACROSS THE BOARD import tariff. Works every tome.
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*Rush Limbaugh stained his otherwise good reputation with his pro globalist Bushie libertarian offshoring “Free Trade” propaganda.* Think sucking sound.
Our hero, the late Walter E. Williams was against trade sanctions and supported only one politician-Rand. What that means is this discrepancy will not get solved on our side.
I recall when Loral was allowed to sell missile technology to Red China
—
Loral did not sell anything. The US had a missile launch in China - perfectly harmless, except the missile filled and crashed on Chinese soil. Its guidance package was recovered and reverse engineered - the crash was later determined to be deliberate. China now had he ability to accurately hit targets to within 500 feet.
Clinton went on to sell them even more military secrets, secrets which everyone seems to have forgotten - among the how to make silent submarine props, giving them a boost ; most egregious was the free hand over of a miniature klystron switch used to ignite a thermonuclear missile warhead.
China now had not only the guidance to hit targets accurately, but the tech to make thermonuclear warheads that could be MIRVed. Previously, China’s missile accuracy was withing 1/2 mile of target, and had no missile capable of lofting the weight of a thermonuclear warhead, let alone multiple ones.
A few other ‘improvements’ and China not only had ICBMS on par with the US, but capable of hitting anywhere in the Continental US. And now they are on their way to producing more warheads than the US and Russia combined, mostly for their 300 fully MIRVed DF-21s with 10 warheads each (100 road mobile and 200 silo based).
When one side is a free capitalist market and the other is still a closed, corrupt mercantilist market willing to use slave labor, how will things work out?
To consider, with an abundance of slave labor, and little value to individual human life, China has a virtual endless supply of cheap labor, cheaper than robots, which have an inherent cost of being made. The only thing China needs is a Customer.
And cheapest is destroying all other companies
Can i just ask, if this is all you have to offer, this morning or many others, why are you here?
I will listen to ANYONE presenting even a non-cogent argument of a point, until ad hominem attacks begin. Even BLM, Planned Parenthood, Antifa….
Sometimes you just need to….NOT.
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