BACK IN APRIL, James A. Baker, III, the former U.S. secretary of state who now lives in Houston, published a nice op-ed in the Wall Street Journal on why Congress should pass the Colombia Free Trade Agreement.
[T]his spring, the world is watching to determine if the United States will remain committed to embracing a free-market global economy [or] display a growing isolationist attitude that can befuddle and vex our allies around the world.
Since then, sadly, Congress has turned its back on Colombia and on free trade. If Senator Obama wins the presidency, a form of protectionism will become national policy for the first time since Herbert Hoover.
Jus think, the past thirty-five years the American people have added more than $20 trillion dollars in debt to their pocket book. All them ther fat farmers of years ago came to this new land to get away from being up to their eyeballs in debt and Washington even address to the few people tat attended his farewell address to cherish the Union, support the public credit, be alert to the "insidious wiles of foreign influence," respect the Constitution and the nation's laws, abide by the results of elections, and eschew political parties of a sectional cast. Asserting that the United States and Europe had different interests, he declared that it "is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world," trusting to temporary alliances for emergencies. He also warned against indulging in either habitual favoritism or habitual hostility toward particular nations, lest such attitudes should provoke or involve the country in needless wars.
There is no such thing as "Free Trade." Forty-nine nations were here before the few fat farmers with the penmanship of a poet wrote down on tat piece of paper the "white man" American dream and look what it cost them.
Posted by: madmilker | August 1, 2008 at 11:36 AM