Posted on 11/25/2002 8:15:37 AM PST by SAMWolf
I hope they don't kick me out of the Republican Party for this.
But free trade is a bad idea.
For years it hasn't set right with me, and I've tried to figure out why. And now I know. It's because it violates a simple principle of life.
And that is self-reliance.
International free trade, while certainly necessary and useful to an extent, can easily be overemphasized to such a degree that it jeopardizes a country's economic self-interest and national security.
The United States is a good example.
But first, let's look at Mexico.
Under the North American Free Trade Agreement, all Mexican protections against American or Canadian agricultural imports are about to disappear. That means cheaper Canadian and American farm products are going to flood Mexico.
And Mexican farms are going to close down. The impact on Mexican agriculture is going to be immense.
Which means Mexico is going to be less capable of supplying its own needs. And it means a ton of farm workers are going to be out of work and headed north. And that's not good for anybody.
Just like it's no good that the United States has a dramatic trade deficit, that it buys far more from overseas than it sells. And that there are entire sections of the American economy which are dependent on foreign goods. For whole product lines, there simply are no American manufacturers anymore. From electronic goods to clothing to steel, we don't make things anymore.
And American corporations are closing domestic factories to shift manufacturing overseas.
All of which fits perfectly into the world of free trade.
And all of which screws us royally.
Because independence is good and interdependence is bad. Because interdependence is the same as reliance and that is the opposite of self-reliance.
And history teaches that -- without exception -- prosperity and security require national self-reliance. Americans should eat American agricultural products and use American manufactured products and channel their income back into the economy that produced it -- the American economy. When a nation becomes reliant on foreign products -- as the United States clearly is -- its comfort and peace are held hostage by the producers of those foreign products.
If a nation cannot produce what it needs -- as the United States now cannot -- it is in a precarious position that weakens and enslaves it.
We will be weakened as we exchange our prosperity -- hard currency -- for foreign products, and we will be enslaved as our national policy inevitably must be tailored to preserve our access to foreign goods. These are truths which have been understood and implemented around the world for centuries. To abandon them now is to abandon national self-interest and to doom the United States to premature but certain decline.
And it is to bring the same fate to many nations of the world.
In developing countries, lingering poverty and delayed development are tied directly to a failure to be nationally self-reliant. When nations feed themselves, they do not starve. When they manufacture their own goods, they don't go without.
When they understand that their consumer dollars must be recycled into their own economies, they do not long linger in recession or unemployment.
Free trade serves a very few at the top of international corporations, but it does not serve the average American. Rather, it takes away his job and his nation's strength.
Certainly, the flow of goods and produce around the globe is needful and beneficial, but so is protection, and buttering your own bread first. The sense of national economic identity must not be lost, and neither should the commitment to protecting American prosperity -- even at the cost of limiting free trade.
Our first obligation is to feed, house, clothe and prosper American families. Every thing else comes second. That must be our attitude. Just as Mexico and every other nation must have the same attitude about its people and its economy.
Independence is good, interdependence is bad.
Self-reliance is the key to prosperity -- for individuals and nations.
Deleterious to who? People who choose not to agree to the same employment terms as their competitors?
What???
Who is going to design and build these hi-tech robots? Who is going to build the computer systems to run them?
Yes, labor costs trend downward for a simple reason - it doesn't make any sense to pay someone $20 an hour to operate a screwdriver. Instead take that same "skilled" worker and have them perform "skilled work" (see above robots).
Regards,
An amazing answer for a Christian IMO. You actually believe that God wants you to annoint humans who have been fortunate enough to be born in this country and deny others the basic dignity of free association.
That means, that at the point of a gun, people are to be forced not to deal with other human beings because of their location. They should be left to poverty so the annointed can enjoy a set standard of living. And this is God's way of telling us we have a great country?
This is a warped view. Please refer to the new testament for instructions on how to treat your fellow man.
It must be tiring to avoid so many questions. The effects are only deleterious to those who wish to work without competition.
Thankfully, departments of the government are not the undisputed definers of terms such as that. They call things by all kinds of titles for political purposes.
Try this, "Lord, I know you will be proud of me for screwing my fellow man in the name of keeping more for myself and my countrymen because you chose us as more deserving".
It ought to play well.
Pushing for open standards doesn't define whether you are a monopolist or not. I know of no companies or individuals who try to help their competitors.
A true monopoly, which is the very rarest of things (absent government, or other force), leaves no options or alternatives. Microsoft doesn't qualify. Not to mention that the main thing that got them in trouble with government regulators (under Bill Clinton's direction) was giving things away for free.
Maybe they should get educated and get into computer programming!!
Okay ---we should hope they starve to death but why aren't the 401K plans and the stock markets doing well? You'd think the stock market would be bursting through the top if free trade was working as it was claimed it would.
Exactly. That's all our economy is currently based on.
Given the way technology and markets are progressing, I honestly cannot imagine what the world economy will be like in fifty years' time. Since machines can manufacture finished goods better, faster, and more cheaply than can any human workforce (except for slave labor), and since there are only so many high-end, automation-proof "creative" jobs to go around, I simply cannot imagine what the Average Joe is going to do for a living in the year 2052. Maybe the problem isn't the march of progress; perhaps it's my limited imagination.
In any case, thank God I'm a professional artist. There are some things only a human being can do.
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