There was a report on Lou Dobb's tonight about the car industry in the U.S. The point made was that everyone talks about Free Trade with China but we don't have it. When they start importing their cars to the U.S. next year the tariff on them will be 2%. The tariff on U.S. cars imported to China is 25%. We're fools. These are trade agreements OUR government agreed to. I think someone got paid off.
Their government refuses to respect intellectual property, for starters. We have to pay for licensing to use patented technology. They get it for free.
They have hordes of political prisoners they can work to death. We have to compete for labor in a free market, on top of paying minimum wage and complying with OSHA.
They are free to pollute to their heart's content. We must comply with burdensome environmental laws.
I wish the free trade crowd would expend a little more effort on promoting free trade within our own borders. I'm sick to death of paying taxes on every g%damn thing I buy and every f-ing dollar I earn, while they have an aneurysm if somebody proposes a tariff on goods imported from one of the world's most flagrant abusers of human rights. All the while the Chinese are waiting to hang us with the rope that we sell them, which shall be paid for with the bribes required to do business in their crappy country.