I am not at all surprised. The entire planet has a trade surplus with the US. This way, we get to eat world resources at a far higher rate than any other nations. But the downside is very obvious and totally horrible: we go deeper into debt, doing this. And the end result will inevitably be the financial collapse of our entire economic system and government.
Then our trade partners and allies will be able to take over all systems here and rule us. All profits will flow to them and we will be a low-wage workforce. And the US will be completely controlled by hostile powers who don’t care about us. As if Bush ever showed the slightest interest in keeping us alive. This is why he was so totally indifferent to the mass murders of 9/11, the hurricane drowning thousands in New Orleans and even the 400 people swept away in Texas in hurricane Ike. We are not important to him or his buddies who run the planet. It is too late to arrest Bush. But we can start yelling about the Democrats who now rule us.
CLICK HERE LARGE PRINT EDITION:G20 ENCOURAGES US SURRENDER TO ‘FREE TRADE’ « Culture of Life News 2
Our new rulers profess to care about us. They are most anxious to give us more medical coverage. This is also so our manufacturing base no longer will have to provide personal health insurance to unions, for example. I have been for nationalized healthcare simply because all our trade rivals at the top ranks of international trade have this. We are the only major manufacturing nation without this service.
Simple competition compels us to imitate our rivals. This is the nature of competition. The US can’t stubbornly run an alternative universe system when all the top manufacturing nations are doing the exact opposite. There is a lot of fear of this in the ranks of unionized workers who got gold-plated health insurance. But they should be able to read the writing on the walls: it isn’t going to be going much longer. There is no escaping this. Status quo situations are tremendously dangerous. They are like quicksand. The more you thrash about, the deeper you sink.
And the US is stuck in a dynamic that is causing our nation to sink into the red ink quicksands of global trade. Now, let’s read the news about the G20 meeting by going to the communists of China, our future dominators:
World leaders vow to undertake coordinated action to tackle financial crisis:_Xinhua
“We are determined to enhance our cooperation and work together to restore global growth and achieve needed reforms in the world’s financial system,” said the leaders in a declaration issued at theG20 summit on financial markets and world economy, which is held Saturday in Washington.
“Our work will be guided by a shared belief that market principles, open trade and investment regimes, and effectively regulated financial markets foster the dynamism, innovation, and entrepreneurship that are essential for economic growth, employment, and poverty reduction,” the declaration said…. “Regulators must ensure that their actions support market discipline, avoid potentially adverse impacts on other countries, including regulatory arbitrage, and support competition, dynamism and innovation in the marketplace.
“Financial institutions must also bear their responsibility for the turmoil and should do their part to overcome it including by recognizing losses, improving disclosure and strengthening their governance and risk management practices,” said the declaration.
The Chinese won. They gained what they wanted. We were forced to send one of the stupidest, most treasonous of Presidents to this global gathering where it was imperative that we have a leader with some sense and sanity. Instead of waiting until Obama showed up, they rushed things forwards. Why is that?
Simple: the Chinese communists have owned the Bush clan since Nixon’s days in office. Bush Sr asked for the Beijing ambassadorship and got it. He worked in China at the same time as my father. He was instantly good buddies with the Chinese communist leadership. They discovered that he was easy to bribe and they followed his instructions as to how to hide these bribes. So the Bush clan, not Bush himself, got all sorts of sweet-heart deals from the Chinese who knew they were buying influence this way.
So when the Bushes bankrupted their businesses, they would be bailed out by the Chinese and OPEC rulers. Bush Jr was saved from Harken Energy scandal by shadowy deals with foreigners coming up to him and volunteering to buy his crummy stocks. This way, Bush Jr could avoid looking like he initiated the sales.
I firmly believe that daddy Bush called his foreign buddies and told them about his son’s economic problems. They, in turn, knew that this was truly a golden opportunity to get the US Presidency in their own back pockets. The SEC investigation couldn’t prove that Bush Sr did this since they had no access to the private phone call records of Bush Sr.
When the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 happened, Bush Sr was ordered by the Chinese to turn over all Chinese students in America who were demonstrating in front of the UN that month so they could be deported and punished. I stood in the way of this and prevented the students from being deported. After CNN raised a ruckus about this and after I got Senators Moynihan and D’Amato on board to resist this outrageous deportation order, Bush Sr. finally backed down.
The US Presidency has been sold off to the highest bidders since Jimmy Carter’s day in office. No longer does this seem to bother anyone. One major reason for this is very simple: our media thinks this is OK. Since there is no manufactured outrage, each successive President toys with greater and greater corruption while in office. And the media is fine with all this since much of our media is now owned by foreigners like Murdoch. They have an agenda: ‘free trade’ or die.
This is why anti-free trade thinkers find it nearly impossible to get published in any of the major outlets. This is why we just went through 25 years of our trade deficit getting worse and worse and under the very corrupt minion, Bush Jr, nearly a trillion dollars a year in the red. Let’s go back to the Chinese communist news media and read what the G20 decided:
As expected by President George W. Bush, who said “The surest path to that growth is free markets and free people,” the leaders attending the Washington summit stressed the free market principles are essential to economic growth and prosperity.
“Recognizing the necessity to improve financial sector regulation, we must avoid over regulation that would hamper economic growth and exacerbate the contraction of capital flows, including to developing countries,” the declaration said.
“We underscore the critical importance of rejecting protectionism and not turning inward in times of financial uncertainty. In this regard, within the next 12 months, we will refrain from raising new barriers to investment or to trade in goods and services, imposing new expert restrictions, or implementing World Trade Organization (WTO) inconsistent measures to stimulate exports.
“Further, we shall strive to reach agreement this year on modalities that leads to a successful conclusion to the WTO’s Doha Development Agenda with an ambitious and balanced outcome. We instruct our trade ministers to achieve this objective and stand ready to assist directly, as necessary. We also agree that our countries have the largest stake in the global trading system and therefore each must make the positive contributions necessary to achieve such an outcome.
“We reaffirm the importance of the Millennium Development Goals, the development assistance commitments we have made, and urge both developed and emerging economies to undertake commitments consistent with their capacities and roles in the global economy.
“In this regard, we reaffirm the development principles agreed at the 2002 United Nations Conference on Financing for Development in Monterrey, Mexico, which emphasized country ownership and mobilizing all sources of financing for development,” said the declaration.
The G20 are united in one major regard: they are very, very anxious that the US be stuck in the present status quo. No tariffs or barriers are to be even suggested, much less, enforced. They expected Mr. Bush to endorse this treasonous response to the US being utterly ravaged by trade partners. This betrayal of our nation didn’t bother Bush in the slightest. Nor did it upset any of our media pundits or people running our media. This was treated as a natural outcome of us being the ‘Leaders of the World’ and being ‘Number One’ and other bizarre and very childish propaganda roaring points.
The only riddle here is the problem our trade rivals have with funding US misspending. None of them want to be the ones stuck with holding the majority of US debts when we go bankrupt. This is why they issued, via Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan’s lawyers, a series of astonishing demands. These are, the US government has to insure and guarantee all principal and interest due on any and all loans written by US bankers and sold overseas. This blackmail was noticed by Bloomberg reporters which is why I learned about it. Thank you, Bloomberg news!
But the US is unable to control our own destiny due to our trade deficit. This is at the core of our internal rot. The banking collapse is due to trade deficits. No one can run in the red to infinity or eternity. The goddesses who control the Cave of Wealth and Death do not allow this. They slay anyone trying this. The fools who think they can do this end up on the scrap heap of history. Any empires foolish enough to think they can do this end badly and seldom recover for sometimes, thousands of years.
The US is in grave danger from the modern mindset that we can accumulate infinite debt and there is nothing wrong with this. We just turn it over and over and keep it as our basis for our economy. This is very dangerous because we can clearly see today, this leads directly to bankruptcy. Our government seriously feels they can sell us down the river, forever. So even the slightest hesitation to overspending has vanished.
This mentality is deadly! We will not survive it as a free people. Debt is slavery. And our nation is being rapidly enslaved even as we use a lot of these debts to fund the world’s most expensive and inefficient and dangerously out of control military machine. More about that in a later story today.
*Bloomberg.com:Textron, AEP Ask for Access to Commercial-Paper Fund
A group of companies including Textron Inc., Nissan Motor Co. and American Electric Power Co. is pressing the Federal Reserve to expand purchases of commercial paper to include them.
The coalition wants the Fed to go beyond top-rated paper and buy debt with the second-highest grade, two people said on condition of anonymity. American Electric Chief Financial Officer Holly Koeppel said the group is seeking to add more companies and preparing a letter to outline its case.
While accepting lower-grade debt could reduce borrowing costs for a broader group of companies, it would also expose the taxpayer to greater risk. The request is one of a number of attempts to get a share of federal rescues, with industries from automakers to heating-oil retailers seeking funds.
“We are really creating a mindset where no one fails,” said Adolfo Laurenti, a senior economist at Mesirow Financial Inc. in Chicago.
Some of the people reading here have contacted me about this story. If this story is true, it simply shows how much contempt Asia has for the US government and systems. At every possible juncture, as the Japanese LDP gang has yanked our chain, the US government obeys the True Masters and doesn’t complain. We didn’t blow up when Koizumi, supposedly Bush’s goodest and bestest of friends, slapped us in the face by honoring WWII war criminals. China and Korea erupted in tremendous fury over this. But not the US.
It would not surprise me at all to see Japan demanding we give them cheap loans so they can expand their anti-union factories here in the US. Since we are enslaved by ‘free trade,’ we can’t simply tell them to take a hike. They get tax breaks and government assistance as they open their facilities here. They then collect all the profits and ship that back to Japan. If they threaten to move their factories to Mexico and flood us from there, we obey them and yield to blackmail. And since our own, native corporations have done this with total impunity, of course, all our trade rivals do this, too.
Not one US factory would have moved overseas if the US government slapped a tariff on the products coming back here. The advantage of using cheap labor would be nullified this way. For centuries, all nations that did considerable trade used tools like this for two purposes: to fund national governments and to protect native markets. Huge wars have been waged by aliens seeking to pry open foreign markets to ‘free trade’. This is a dark history we should heed.
Our trade rivals are very much aware of this history. The US, after WWII, was the only major industrial power that wasn’t even slightly damaged by the war. Indeed, we saw our own industries grow. Since then, our trade rivals have sought to undo this historic boon we won by hard fighting and work. They have been whittling down our industrial base with the assistance of corrupted US leaders and US media overlords seeking ‘free trade’ so Israel could invade our markets and run a huge trade surplus with the US.
Percentage wise, the country whose one-way trade has grown the most this last 10 years, it isn’t China. It is Israel. And this is one reason why our media has struggled to portray China as an export danger but never, ever mentions Israel at all. Never. To keep our post-WWII alliances alive, the US has ceded power to Japan and Germany and thus, has allowed both to run huge trade surpluses with us, too. And allowed both to establish factories here.
Back to the G20: they want some sort of functional international trade finance system set up somehow. This is simple: the US dollar is doomed. They all know this. They have to rig up some sort of system. They all know perfectly well, what that should be.
*FT Alphaville » A ‘paper-gold’ reserve system?
He concludes it is not only possible but necessary to change the global architecture to reflect changing economic weights. The world must also give the IMF more financial resources in support of its new short-term lending facility.
In the original Bretton Woods, of course, it was decided member countries keep currency values pegged to the US dollar and, in the case of the United States, the value of the US dollar be pegged to gold. Those rates could be adjusted only to correct a “fundamental disequilibrium” in the balance of payments and only with the IMF’s agreement.
The system broke down when imbalances threatened to eliminate the gold reserves of the US, and Washington was forced to suspended the dollar’s convertibility into gold. So how could it work this time?
Writing in the FT last week, George Soros said it was time to start thinking about creating special drawing rights or some other form of international reserves on a large scale to sort out the crisis. This system should, he said, be subject to an American veto.
By “some other form of international reserves”, was he referring to gold once again?
This whole business is driving everyone insane. This is all a classic ‘Horns of Dilemma’ business. All choices drive things to the same conclusion. And no one wants this. Everyone wants the present status quo to continue. This is because it benefits all our trade rivals in the G20 and destroys the US. And all are quite content with this destruction. They just don’t want this to end, today! They are not ready for the post-US dominated earth. Our post-WWII allies don’t want this because the people who are rising powers today hate the Germans and Japanese due to WWII. Germany and Japan are quite happy to have the US protect them nearly for free while they hammer us in free trade open markets.
So the US must be funded, somehow. But so far, the Chinese hold the whip in this matter. They have surpassed Japan as the main funder of US misspending. They have a huge trade surplus. Which is now rapidly shrinking. So they have no desire or need to fund US trillions of debts. I said two years ago, Japan can’t do this alone. And Germany, due to having a huge social services government, will not set aside profits for US loans. This leaves OPEC to buy our debts. They will do this only if oil is shooting up in price.
It is going down, so they are out of the game. No one wants our debts. No one wants a gold standard, either. This is because they can’t then give us more credit so we can spend trillions more than we produce. Thus, world trade will continue to spiral downwards until something happens. This G20 conference merely showed the futility of trying to keep the status quo going. The declarations fix absolutely nothing. Indeed, makes the situation much, much worse.
The US should have announced a new regime of closing our markets to outsiders and restricting trade until we balance our trade deficits. And paying down our debts held by a host of hostile foreign rivals. Period. And if they didn’t like it, fine. They can do whatever. But this requires the US consuming less world resources. Something no one here wants to stop doing. We want to feast today and pay tomorrow.
*HSBC reviews American offshoot: The Observer
HSBCis reviewing the future of its HFC consumer finance business in the US after losing $40bn on American mortgage and credit card writedowns since 2006.
Shareholders have demanded that the bank, headed by executive chairman Stephen Green, appoint a financial adviser to mull options for HFC, formerly known as Household. Last week it revealed that it had lost another $4bn.
So far, HSBC has resisted pressure to conduct a formal, strategic review; last night it would only say that HFC’s restructuring plans were ongoing.
However, informally, the bank is looking at several plans that could involve: spinning off HFC into a new arm’s-length company that would blunt the impact of future losses; aggressively running off much of the business; a possible sale in three years when, it is hoped, the housing market recovers; a debt-for-equity swap with HFC bondholders.
Due to epic losses, private banks are exiting the US lending stream. They are giving up. A year of losses is ravaging them. They will extend credit to solvent nations in the future. This game is pretty much over. The US is frantic to restart borrowing. And is borrowing from itself so it can borrow more despite global money no longer coming here to let us consume foreign goods.
*Alternate Universe: No Bailout For GM – Forbes.com
It seems fair to ask what would happen if taxpayers do not rescue General Motors (nyse: GM – news – people ). I suspect that if Americans had a vote, they would turn down GM. The truth is that our people now buy more cars with foreign nameplates than with American nameplates. Another reality: Parts of the country would prosper if GM fell….My opposing viewpoint: An end to GM would not be the end of the world. We are not going to have to walk to work. Other manufacturers will build our cars and trucks. In fact, business will grow for the other carmakers.
GM sells 20% of the vehicles in America. Today’s depressed market is on pace to sell about 12 million vehicles a year in the U.S., which means GM sales of 2.4 million. That is about 10 new assembly plants the others would need to build to replace the lost GM vehicles. Every car plant in the North America would have to run overtime to make up for the shut GM plants….Alabama, Kentucky, Tennessee, South Carolina and Mississippi–and Georgia to come–are the states where foreign companies make their homes. These companies would probably be expanding and building new plants as fast as they could gather up land and excavators. Keep in mind, too, that when auto sales get off that 12 million bottom and return to a more normal 16 or 17 million units a year, manufactures will need to produce an additional 4 or 5 million vehicles….Foreign companies might be reluctant to take over any GM plants or build new factories in places like Michigan. The foreigners like their plants nonunion–in fact, so do their auto workers–and they turn down the union in elections.
Forbes magazine is run by idiots. I am including this monstrous editorial to show everyone how treason thinks: the traitor worries only about himself. So what, if the US doesn’t have an auto industry anymore? Foreign powers will plunk down plants here! And we can toil for aliens who hold the whip hand! Isn’t that a great future.
The poor saps in the Deep South have sucked up high-level manufacturing jobs. They got paid worse than in the North. But the cost of living is or rather, WAS, lower in the South so they felt richer. But that is vanishing. Once all the US unions are dead, the pay levels will decrease and the Japanese in particular, are infamous for working foreigners to death. They work themselves to death!
They will show no mercy when they can get away with it. When the choice is, working in cotton fields or working long, hideous hours at only slightly better pay in a Toyota factory, workers will have to do what Toyota says. And of course, if they vote for a change, Toyota will pull up stakes and depart.
Many a commentator of the mainstream media owners, express satisfaction when workers can’t get pay raises. They are very stupid. They think, if only we squeeze workers to death, the middle class will get richer. This is stupid, of course. The middle class shrinks when this happens. And people at the top of the middle class will find themselves on the exact same ‘down’ escalator workers are on. And already, the gap between the rich and lower classes are at the widest since the Great Depression.
*Economy Is Only Issue for Michigan Governor – NYTimes.com
Morning: Rev up government workers and ministers at a huge conference in Detroit to cope with expanding signs of poverty. Afternoon: Tell a room crushed with reporters here, in the state capital, why a federal bailout is essential for the Big Three automakers, who are also, of course, residents of her state. Evening: Pack for Israel and Jordan, where Ms. Granholm hopes to persuade companies that work with wireless electricity, solar energy and electric cars to bring their jobs to Michigan.
And this is typical: instead of protecting our own shores, the governors of states being ravaged by free trade are being forced to to to Israel or China, seeking jobs. ’Please, open a factory here so we can work for you,’ wail our governors. This is too pathetic. And we get this ridiculous deal. In exchange of losing millions of high-paying jobs, we get a small handful of token jobs at lower wages. This is like the old Bible story about Esu selling his birthright for a bowl of porridge. When I was a child, I found this story totally unbelievable. On the other hand, as an adult, I realize that people can be that stupid. Rats.
FEEL FREE TO EMAIL ME AT emeinel@fairpoint.net
45 Comments
November 16, 2008 at 5:18 pm
Elaine, please keep an eye on this blog:
http://mikeruppert.blogspot.com/
cheers.
November 16, 2008 at 5:37 pm
Well, we can stop buying the foreigners’ goods no?
I only buy gas for my gf’s car, since I don’t even own one anymore.
November 16, 2008 at 6:03 pm
”None of them want to be the ones stuck with holding the majority of US debts when we go bankrupt. This is why they issued, via Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan’s lawyers, a series of astonishing demands. These are, the US government has to insure and guarantee all principal and interest due on any and all loans written by US bankers and sold overseas. ”
A somewhat contradictory statement, as they will be holding MORE US debt! when ‘we’ go bankrupt.
Why guarentee bad paper with more bad paper..
November 16, 2008 at 6:12 pm
Elaine I have written my congressman over this particular editorial. I see no reason for US taxpayers to pay reverse Tariffs on goods purchased especially when they account for 70% of the US economy. Insurance is not free and I would have to agree that a large portion of the CDO’s and CDS’s we currently fret about were funded by futurists at the best. I don’t believe US citizens are crooks but they can commit themselves to a negative determination of future outcomes none of which are free. So I am grateful that you read more than me babe.
http://www.cahrecords.com
vote your paycheck
November 16, 2008 at 6:36 pm
I was beginning to wonder, nah, about your postings. Luckily, I have a tolerant attitude about posters so I didn’t list you as spam. Thanks for talking, at last.
Yes, around 70% of our economy is consuming mostly imported goods, services and commodities. This is utterly wrong and has a bad downside in the future: we go bankrupt.
Ziff, the reason ‘liquidity’ has vanished is simple: the Japan carry trade is dead due to the yen getting much stronger. For Japan’s economy is far, far stronger than the US or UK. And the other problem is China: they started restricting the economic growth rate deliberately starting 16 months ago.
They are now expanding their economy again. But NOT via exports, internally. So they don’t need more US debt to secure more US trade.
November 16, 2008 at 6:42 pm
Uhmerica; commit Treason, get a Mansion!
eyeball-series.org/friedman/friedman-mansion.htm
Mr. Friedman joined The Times in 1981 and was appointed Beirut bureau chief in 1982. In 1984 Mr. Friedman was transferred from Beirut to Jerusalem, where he served as Israel bureau chief until 1988
November 16, 2008 at 6:45 pm
The Bush crime family has been protected by our media for the last 80 years since the old man, Prescott Bush illegally helped arm the Nazis for WW2. Prescott Bush then led an unsuccessful coup against FDR.
http://www.atlargely.com/2007/07/bbc-grandpa-bus.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/history/document/document_20070723.shtml
Bubba Bush, our current dictator, has done more to damage this country than any terrorist group or national enemy could ever hope to achieve.
It is outrageous that after all of Bush’s lies, mistakes and treachery, he is negotiating on our behalf to determine our future enslavement. It was only several months ago that Bush proclaimed, via a video feed at the GOP convention, that the economy was sound. Was he lying or stupid? Does anyone care?
We have in place a constitution that should protect us from maniacal leaders like Bush but we choose to remain silent.
We the people and our congress are accomplices to Bush’s tyranny by simply looking the other way. We are allowing our nation to be ransacked and pillaged because we are too dammed lazy and afraid to get off our asses and actually dissent.
The END the FED national protest will take place on November 22, 2008. All 34 FED banks and offices will be targeted for protests. Will you participate? If not now, when?
http://www.endthefed.us/
November 16, 2008 at 8:16 pm
“Writing in the FT last week, George Soros said it was time to start thinking about creating special drawing rights or some other form of international reserves on a large scale to sort out the crisis. This system should, he said, be subject to an American veto.”
Mr. Soros, in my book, is a Rothschild/Banksters man.
SDR’s (Special Drawing Rights) are, if my memory serves me well, already part of the BIS (Bank for International Settlements) ‘arsenal’, and have been for a very long time (since WWII?)
There have been a couple of articles recently about the (Arabian) Gulf states and China moving into gold in a big way (be still, my beating heart!). A gold related system would, perhaps, provide less instability, but would also run counter to the wonderful world of fiat.
It looks to my little brain that the SDR’s are intended to, or do, act as a kind of über-fiat. I no almost nothing about this, but am of the opinion that they have been taking a back seat in the monetary order for some time. Maybe the ÜberBanksters are now going to try pushing this idea. If the inter-national fiat ponzi scheme is hitting the ceiling, maybe it’s time to bring on the new, improved, supra-national fiat ponzi scheme.
Like those cookery programmes, we could be in for a “Here’s one we baked earlier” moments.
November 16, 2008 at 8:19 pm
er, moment (singular). Bring back the preview.
November 16, 2008 at 10:05 pm
Thanks for keeping us informed, Elaine, though I must say, the more I comprehend the extent of this mess, the sadder I feel for all of us, especialy for my son’s generation. I’ve been following the stories about the Baltic Dry Index and the letters of credit and how shipping has ground to a halt. Right now store shelves appear as full as ever but how long before the larder is emptied? I’ve been paying attention to how many of our food products are imported – a very large amount. I remember reading about people making ersatz coffee from ground acorns during WWII. Probably tasted much like Starbucks …
November 16, 2008 at 10:52 pm
Amazing that they could have such a meeting and not resolve anything — as if they did not already know in advance that everyone attending wanted something contradictory. Why even have such a meeting?
Was it a chance for foreign leaders to meet face to face and exchange direct threats without being recorded or overheard? What could be the point of such a meeting?
I still very much doubt any kind of unity when the G20 cannot agree on anything other than to meet again in six months. Do they think DC will still be around in six months? I guess they must.
In a way, that is a little encouraging: WWIII put on hold for six months. Good.
November 16, 2008 at 11:31 pm
Noticed this line in the Forbes article posted above in Elaine’s latest entry…
“I suspect that if Americans had a vote, they would turn down GM.”
While they didn’t have a vote, per se; there has been opinion polls on the matter.
Editorial: Bankruptcy Watch 189: Poll Position (TTAC)
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/editorial-detroit-polling-its-weight/
Another fun article:
Bailout Watch 197: The Battle Lines Are Drawn Pt. (TTAC)
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/bailout-watch-197-the-battle-lines-are-drawn-pt-3/
November 16, 2008 at 11:54 pm
So how is that those blithering idiots haven’t figured out that the great credit credit card game is over? They want us to keep buying their stuff but at the same time they stop giving us credit. Perhaps each one thinks the other will carry the load and keep buying treasuries.
Obvioiusly, diplomats have little stomach for economic news. They feed from the bottomless well so they don’t worry about such things as the nation being flat broke.
November 16, 2008 at 11:58 pm
G-20 Wants Quick Action on Credit Default Swaps, But Bush Talks Them Into Toothless Regulation Geo. Washington’s blog)
“Credit default swaps were one of the core agenda items at the G-20 meeting this weekend.”
- snip –
“In fact, it was President Bush who pushed the approach of oversight and regulation – instead of banning – of CDS.”
- snip –
“In other words, America’s financial elite – the very people who allowed the exponential expansion without oversight of CDS and other ” murky investment tools”- pushed for an approach which would would not hold accountable those who created the CDS hurricane in the first place . (Paulson and Greenspan were obviously big derivatives cheerleaders. But the U.S. Congress aided and abetted this mess, as did some of Obama’s top economic advisors…”
Full entry:
http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2008/11/g-20-wants-quick-action-on-credit.html
November 17, 2008 at 12:06 am
As for GM and the AFLCIO, democrats are married to them and are slated to make a big push for union expansion to include the japs and krauts. The way to level the playing field is to unionize everything, that way everyone can collect $78/hr in wages and benefits just like GM, Ford, Chrysler. Nobody will be able to afford a car, but hey, the workers will be well protected. Meanwhile, everyone who is not union eats dirt.
November 17, 2008 at 12:06 am
Reposting from this morning in another of Elaine’s entries’ comments section:
Chrysler leaders get millions (USA Today)
“As Detroit’s crumbling auto industry asks Congress for a bailout, Chrysler is in the awkward position of paying about $30 million in retention bonuses to keep top executives while the company cuts thousands of jobs.”
Full article:
http://www.usatoday.com/money/autos/2008-11-14-chrysler_N.htm?POE=click-refer
Daimler: Chrysler worth nothing
Minority partner values its stake in company at $0 (Detroit Free Press)
“As Daimler AG sees it, Chrysler is worth NOTHING.”
“The German automaker has depreciated its stake in Chrysler to zero from $268 million at the end of June, the company said Thursday. A little over a year ago, the company valued its 19.9% stake in Chrysler at $2.2 billion.”
Full article:
http://www.freep.com/article/20081024/BUSINESS01/810240321
November 17, 2008 at 12:07 am
Gnomes are gonna die.
When things get really bad, if I am gonna starve and suffer due to globalists and gnomes, I am taking some of them with me when I go.
Gnomes, balance this shit, or get ready to die.
November 17, 2008 at 12:11 am
WSJ Jenkins: The Volt Sucks, CAFE Must Die and Obama’s a Fraud (TTAC)
“This is a car that, by GM’s own admission, won’t make money. It’s a car that can’t possibly provide a buyer with value commensurate with the resources and labor needed to build it. It’s a car that will be unsalable without multiple handouts from government.”
Full article:
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wsj-jenkins-the-volt-sucks-cafe-must-die-and-obamas-a-fraud/
November 17, 2008 at 12:19 am
Tipping Point: 60% of American Consumers Predict Bankruptcy for Detroit (TTAC)
“Sixty percent say yes, 22 percent say no and 18 percent don’t know. So 78 percent of respondents have a damn good reason NOT to buy an American automakers’ products. So why NOT file Chapter 11.”
- Like Elaine stated, it doesn’t matter if GM goes the way of the dinosaur, there will Asian auto makers just waiting to plant their, um, plants in place of the ‘Walking Dead Three’s”. So be it. They have not been viable for a long, long time. It is due time for them to pack up. Shameful, but the attitude has been incremental as far as the unions and management have been concerned in improving anything. Hasta la vista GM, Ford and Chrysler. You’ve been a pain in the ass for quite some time.
Full article:
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/gm-passes-the-tipping-point-60-predict-bankruptcy/
November 17, 2008 at 12:27 am
My favourite of all the car stories….
Insurers pull cover from GM and Ford suppliers (Financial Times UK)
“Troubled US carmakers General Motors and Ford Motor have been given a potentially devastating vote of no confidence by three big European credit insurers, which have removed cover from their suppliers.”
- snip –
“Euler Hermes, Atradius and Coface, which control more than 80 per cent of the world’s credit insurance market, are refusing to write policies for suppliers trading with GM or Ford on credit.”
Full article:
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ff28c908-b1ed-11dd-b97a-0000779fd18c.html
November 17, 2008 at 12:29 am
in case you missed it:
Freddie Mac says it is worth less than zero (Times Online)
- Emphasis mine…
“Freddie Mac, the US mortgage giant, yesterday admitted that it is so overwhelmed by its liabilities that without government backing (MORE? AGAIN?), it would no longer be a viable business. The company said that it had lost $13.7 billion (£9.2 billion) in the third quarter of the year and begged for $13.8 billion from the US Treasury in rescue funds.”
Full article:
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/banking_and_finance/article5158476.ece
November 17, 2008 at 12:34 am
Banks and other financials are all clamoring for more, then there are cities that are stretched to the max and they too need a bailout.
U.S. Cities, Reeling From Deficits, Seek Bailout Cash (Bloomberg)
“Philadelphia, Atlanta and Phoenix are asking the U.S. Treasury Department for part of the $700 billion financial rescue package to help them finance construction projects and pay bills.”
Chicago just recently announced it is laying off employees and needs money. Hmm, who lives in Chicago….hmm….oh yeah! Owe-bama!
Full article:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aYf6IDsyy874&refer=home
November 17, 2008 at 12:37 am
Inside the AIG-Fed swap meet
Unable to resolve credit default swaps with investors alone, AIG turns to the U.S.
“The new federal bailout plan for American International Group gives the insurance giant the chance at last to shed many of the credit default swaps that have burned a huge hole in its balance sheet.”
Second helping at the Free Money feed trough for AIG. Great.
Full article:
http://www.financialweek.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081116/REG/811149979/1023/OTHERVIEWS
November 17, 2008 at 12:40 am
Bush Presses Congress to Pass Separate Auto Rescue Bill (Bloomberg)
“The Bush administration is “actively calling on Congress” to pass legislation next week that would accelerate getting loans to the troubled U.S. auto industry without using money from the financial-markets rescue plan, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.”
- Pissed yet?
Full article:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601070&refer=home&sid=aRrzli_rSuxE
November 17, 2008 at 12:45 am
From Disinter:
“The engineers of the economic collapse aren’t finished with you yet. There is still a lot of work that needs to be done to scare you into agreeing to more outright theft of your sovereignty, freedom and wealth.”
http://disinter.wordpress.com/2008/11/16/economic-collapse-important-upcoming-dates/
November 17, 2008 at 12:47 am
Thousands of City workers axed in jobs bloodbath (Telegraph UK)
“JP Morgan, the US investment bank, is drawing up plans to axe thousands of jobs across its worldwide operations, The Sunday Telegraph can reveal.”
Full article:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/banksandfinance/3465492/City-workers-axed-in-jobs-bloodbath.html
November 17, 2008 at 12:51 am
A Strange Shortage Illustrates The Global Economy (NPR)
“If anyone needs more proof that we’re all part of a global economy, picture this: A young woman in Philadelphia is trying to decide on a rug for her new home, a mother in Japan is buying groceries for her kids, and a grain farmer in North Dakota is facing a strange and serious shortage. They might be scattered around the globe, but they are all connected.”
Full article:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=97001507
November 17, 2008 at 1:01 am
Elaine,
Great comprehensive insight the sees the situation as a global unity, which it thoroughly is. The one significant place where my view differs from yours is I see the relevance of nation-states as, ultimately, not very important, or even relevant any more. For example, when I see the terms “Japan” or “the US,” I conecptualize nothing more than geographical regions, each of which where some plutocrats live and exert regionalized power. All the rest that anybody may attached to these two terms (and all others like them, such as “Germany” or “China”), and I mean -all- the rest, is nothing more than pure illusion and false-reality produced by the “education” and “media” organs of plutocracy. I believe a much more accurate description, one that much more intuitively evokes a much better mental picture of what is really going on, is that the terms “Japan” and “the US” are labels for regions within the G7 NWO Empire.
The sovereign nation-state as the primary institution in which humans, on the global scale, may already be over. All that’s left now is for this historical transition to become manifestly obvious. Whether it does or not, or any time soon, I believe that the past few centuries of history have made the current situation inevitable. To explain why, I need to get into a little history.
In late middle ages Europe, society and technology was developing in a way that was increasing liberty and weakening the iron-fisted hold on power of the current ruling oligarchy, organized in a form called aristocracy. The aristocracy’s problem was two-fold. First, the modren nation-state did not really exist yet, and a very large number of power centers existed in Europe, each a threat to each of the others. At the same time, greater liberty and opportunity was riding on the back of an explosion of scientific inquiry and its consequent technological advancement. All of this together put each local aristocracy in a Catch 22. Each could either (1) clamp down on liberty, e.g. individual initiative such as technical experimentation, new approaches to material production and survival, and the private market relations and guilds and organizations that were all expanding as well, and consequently risk, and eventually suffer, conquest from another aristrocratic power center that did not clamp down and thus amassed the resources and material power for conquest, or (2) tolerate the expanding liberty and thus see local aristocratic power and control fade away.
Here in the USSA, we are generally “educated” that something like this is what led to the eventual replacement and overthrow of aristocracy by capitalism. It is from this source that all mind-numbingly imbecilic “free market” ideology and propaganda arises. The Holy Invisible Hand, that is (if you think about it a little) always presented anthorpomorphically, which implies some kind of God gently guiding stuff with its Divine “Hand.” Of course, the “market” is itself Divine and Pure Good, having freed “us” and hence saved “us” from all those mean and nasty oppressive nobles. Of course, over centuries this has culminated in the grotesquely convoluted pseudo-science of moden “economics,” with absurdly and unnecessary mathematics, applied as make-up, so that it presents with the image and appearance of something substantive and “intellectual” and “high” and “scientific” and all the rest required to push the knee-jerk unthinking buttons, like the one that knee-jerks flying insects at night to fly towards light.
All the “efficient market” nonsense to justify “free trade” as the best possible results comes directly out of this. The “Duhmerica’s Number One!” type of imbecilic gross childishness come out of this as well, in its utterly dumbed-down form because it is presented for mass consumption and mass regurgitation.
Of course, not only is all the “free trade” stuff obviously psychotic, and I mean literally, clinically, a form of psychosis, it is so because the very “history” cited as “proof” of its viability is fundamentally wrong, and in fact arose as outright fraud, of course at its time (the 1800s) for the purpose of standard political expediency.
I’ll start with Karl Marx. He made the foundational mistake of starting with, and never getting beyond, all his bizarre “scientific” determinism. Only after being set in his philosophic perspective, he absorded Smith and Ricardo. Thus, Marx had incentive to buy into a “natural progression” sort of theory; in fact, he had to. So he developed his theory of ongoing power consolidation in terms of a flaw in capitalism, though still a capitalism that developed right out of “free markets” and depended upon and best operated via “free markets.” As a consequence of Marx’s thought gaining prominence amongst “the left” (the camp opposed to the wealthiest and most powerful), “the left” and “the right” each, for its own reasons, found it expedient to believe the fairy tale. It is now unspokenly taken as fact uniformly throughout officialdom and all aspects of mainstream society.
Actual history is pretty to the absolute, 180-degree opposite of the fairy tale. What really happened in response to the social forces that were eroding the aristocratic class’ consolidation on power was that enough aristocrats in England (they did this first in England) saw what was happening and were able to put aside their own disputes in order to formulate and execute a classwide response. The most well-known piece of this was the Enclosure Act. In addition to taking away resources from the peasants en masse, perhaps even worse this Act created an internal passport system within England, which was really a draconian means of stopping cold the bulk of all liberties and interactions of all persons other than aristocrats. This obviously did not lead to non-aristocrat merchant and trader types (not aristocrats, so almost by definition peasants themselves) overthrowing the aristocracy; what it really did was knock them out in one blow. To fill the void? You guessed it. Very quickly thereafter, in came the aristocrats, as the factory owners, merchants … owners and controllers, of course by the “natural progression” of “free markets” (e.g. kept “free” for aristocrats by the iron boot of State goons enforcing an internal passport system). Yes, as part of this initiative, the aristocracy gave up some birth-rights and other trappings of the middle ages, because it all had to go. The aristocrats became plutocrats.
This is well documented and extensively footnoted by Kevin Carson, at mutualist.org. The best of his books to read (available on-line at mutualist.org) are “The Iron Fist Behind the Invisible Hand” (short) and “Theory of Mutualist Political Economy” (long). The arising of a merchant class to power is pure fairy tale. Nothing of the sort ever happened anywhere. A more accurate myth is to say a bunch of aristocrats noticed that techniques throughout society were advancing very rapidly, and this made them feel uncomfortable and insecure with themselves. So one day a bunch of them decided to get together and get the benefit of one of the new and amazing techniques — a plastic surgery make-over — in order to improve their own self-confidence and success! However, instead of coming out with bigger dicks and bigger boobs, and tighter tummies and lifted faces, they went in as aristocrats, and after the make-over, came out as plutocrats.
Out with aristocracy and in with the new order: Plutocracy. Out with old aristocrats; in with the new plutocrats. As they say, the rest is history. This expanded, until now it covers and completely dominates the entire globe. Of course, the consolidation to monopoly does go on relentlessly, though, to say the least, not quite for the pure “scientific” reasons endlessly droned on about by Marx. In Acts to follow up the Enclosure Act, they sure as hell did get rid of all vestiges of the medievel order and make England a fully modern nation-state. This eventually spread everywhere, and once accomplished, the only place left for further consolidation to happen was supra-nationally. Enter the EU, the G7 Empire, and all the rest.
For those of us in the Angle spere, we’ve lived under plutocracy for centuries now. The motivations remain the same. The cretinous plutocrats, in all “nations” want a global enclosure analogue to the English Enclosure for the same reason; power consolidation and the maximum stability thereof. A Japanese plutocrat is a plutocrat, not a Japanese. Same in the USSA. Japanese plutocrats don’t give a rats ass about “Japan” (and the people who live there!!) any more than USSA plutocrats do (or about the people who live here) … any more than the English aristocrats/plutocrats who did the English Enclosure cared about the widespread damage they did to English society and culture (at all levels) and the incredible suffering and misery they loosed on large numbers of people.
Where everything is heading is simple. The various nation-state plutocracies will consolidate in such a way that each grouping can at least survive in at least a tolerably plutocratic manner, and then the NWO Global Enclosure goes overt. The rest of us? We get enclosed.
.
At bottom, I don’t have any more of a problem with Japan, or China, or Germany than I do with the USSA. I have a problem with plutocracy, and a problem with the inability/unwillingness for more than a rare individual here and there to see it for what it is. Forget about rising up against it. First, a larger number need to at least acknowledge it, as difficult and scary a process as that is in our amazingly propagandized world.
November 17, 2008 at 1:10 am
Ahhhh, bear of lil brain I see you have your head in the hunney pot again! (wink)
November 17, 2008 at 1:14 am
Elaine, I dont think we have a middle class anymore and we certainly are not gonna have one for a good long time the way I see it? Does anyone still breathing even know how to create one? Seriously.
November 17, 2008 at 1:45 am
Not only do nation states exist, they suddenly appear on the scene with tremendous violence.
All it takes is an economic meltdown. EMPIRES are the things that expire. For example, when the Spanish empire crashed and burned, Spanish PATRIOTISM began to grow. When Napoleon invaded Spain in 1800, the Spanish elites surrendered but the Spanish people began to fight with tremendous energy.
So where the rubber hits the road, this is where reality bites: all nations become nations when under fire, when all is well and a great empire protects all and sundry, everyone can be individuals.
November 17, 2008 at 1:49 am
As the US empire sinks and burns, all the buried nationalist feelings will rise to the surface. This is why such time periods [the crashing of empire periods] are so topsy turvy.
A famous historical example is when Napoleon invaded Russia. Russia was very much a top-down nation with the great mass of peasants living under medieval conditions of servitude.
Suddenly, they had to fight for their ‘nation’ and the energy, strength and deep feelings this aroused led to increasing struggles for power between the top 1% and the masses below. Exactly 100 years later, this led to one of the bigger revolutions in the last 500 years.
November 17, 2008 at 1:49 am
Google: Treaty of Detroit..
Many blame this agreement to
the ultimate destruction of Detroit.
November 17, 2008 at 2:09 am
We interrupt this conspiracy with the following important mea culpa:
The End — by Michael Lewis
November 17, 2008 at 2:28 am
The G20 meeting reminds me of WWI generals which advocates cavalry and large scale bayonet charges at machine gun posts as the only solution to winning the war.
It’s all going to end in tears!!!
November 17, 2008 at 2:47 am
Regarding Napolean —-> Russia —> peasant nationalism —> peasant angst toward Russian elites —> revolution, a much better example is from the Napolean in Spain post. Like Russia, it went beyond peasants resisting Napolean, and like Russia, all the way to revolution in the early 1900s. While the Spanish revolution, then civil war, of the 1930s is much less significant than Russia’s in the bullet-point rendition of history, it is drastically more nuanced and interesting, and it is a rare event that gives some reason for hope. The reason is that the anarchists/syndicalists genuinely attempted to create something beyond plutocracy (or any form of oligarchy), not merely replace one elite with a new one.
Despite all their flaws and mistakes, and woeful lack of resources, they controlled a large portion of Spain, and it took 3 years for Franco (read: the german army and air force) to do them in. For a while, the people who lived in this region experienced a much less regimented, hierarchical, jack-booted, and much more free, organic, and genuine an existence. George Orwell experienced this, in the city of Barcelona, and wrote about it. He wrote that while all the red and black flags and so forth all over the place were at first discomforting, the way everything was run on self-organization from the bottom up, without anybodyor anything from up on high setting all sorts of rules, restrictions, and orders, strongly impacted him and it was a profound experience.
Of course, no other center of power of any flavor (all ultimately plutocrat flavored) anywhere else on the planet would support these people. The Nazis gleefully supported Franco, though even after perfecting the Blitzkreig technique and using the German army and air force in direct aid to Franco, it took Franco and the German military 3+ years to get control of Spain and end the civil war.
Ever wonder why Franco was left in power after WWII when all the other Axis dictators were removed? I see the answers to this as blatantly obvious. Had any of the “winners” booted Franco, the anarchists and syndicalists might have made a come back. No Plutocrats anywhere wanted that!!!!! And no plutocrats means not plutocrats, whether USSA flavored or USSR flavored.
When things have fallen apart a bit more, I do realize that nationalism could come roaring back, and in a very intense and violent manner. On this topic, all I’m saying is I am not at all 100% sure, and see a current situation in which the Plutocrats, in a globally unified way, will try to stop it. They do have some control in this area, specifically, making sure there is no Napolean. Take away Napolean, and possibly no Russian revolution … and no Spanish revolution.
No, I do not count them out in their ability to work out their own nation-centered disputes, to a global agreement at least tolerable to all involved. Their incentive is great. Upon agreement, they can enclose us all! Globally! And forever!
Of course, like the rest of us, I don’t have a clue what will really happen. Part of what is so frustrating about the current situation, and all its twisted layers of unreality and deception, is it is pretty much impossible to know for sure what the hell is going on, with anything. While I dread the collapse (I’m not crazy!), one of the few good things that will come with it is a much clearer picture of what is real and what isn’t, and what may likely come next.
I enjoy, appreciate, and value the conversation here immensely. This includes the contributions from all who post here. I only wish I could spend more time with this.
November 17, 2008 at 4:43 am
N. Ron: yes, the conversation here is most useful. I make mistakes, for example, and people here instantly correct me. I can’t thank readers enough for that.
And the thoughts are provocative. I should probably talk about revolutions more. I actually was inside of one, once upon a time, and got to see its innermost workings. It was most amazing. And frankly, fills me with some hope.
People must self-organize and teach each other and yes, debate economic, social and political issues. To me, this is immense fun. We are seeing the entire planet entering yet another historic ‘revolutionary’ period that will see surprises.
I am actually very conservative in odd ways. One way is, I think our ancestors came up with many interesting ideas and systems and their experiments should be taken seriously. We need to have a multiple series of systems. Any situation with total agreement is weak, by definition.
When we have variety, we have a way of coping with inevitable changes.
November 17, 2008 at 6:39 am
Dutch:
Must be senility.
Everyone has moved on, I see, but I’d be interested in a little more detail on the
“Ahhhh, bear of lil brain I see you have your head in the hunney pot again! (wink)”
comment, if it refers to my musings on SDR’s. Especially if it’s total nonsense
If it’s the avatar: it’s only too appropriate; and I’ll pass on the lewd alternative meaning to your comment (ah, memories, sweet memories).
And in re-reading, I can’t believe I wrote “no” for “know”.
All the best
November 17, 2008 at 8:14 am
The rulers of all the various countries have more in common with each other than they do with their fellow citizens. Once we all understand this essential point we can begin to understand the true peril we are in. These bastards pay what they believe to be a steep price to get in power positions [just like the corporate world] and they have no intention of betraying those they associate with….this does not, NOT include their own citizenry or employees & shareholders if corporate. There is a deep, highly ingrained sense of entitlement with this upper echelon and us common folks think that ‘they’ are the only ones infected with the malady……we should all look in the mirror…..especially those in the Anglo-sphere…..we are self interested, nihilistic, lazy, and self centered comfort seekers for the most part….say 98% pure. Those who visit this site and a few others are part of the 2% that are beginning to see what Elaine is talking about….but we are vastly outnumbered and unless we begin to focus on talking to many, many others to convince and educate them of the dangers we face we will lose our freedoms so rapidly we won’t know what hit us. How many times have you [and I] failed to say or write something because we feared being looked at as some form of ‘kook’, or conspiracy nut….in other words, our desire to ‘fit in’ was shutting down our common sense and keeping us silent. Take a page from this wild woman who runs this site and lays her ass on the line every day in order to educate the [partially] ineducable. We have done nothing if it costs us nothing. March on the Fed on the 22nd of November….let the bastards get your picture on file, your license plate number, fuck, give em your finger print…preferably the ‘middle one’!
Just received an email from Jim Willie, of The Hat Trick Letter, he has been threatened with a bullet to the head if he doesn’t shut up about all the things he writes about. He has agreed to change his style and only talk about monetary and market info, will leave all political, military, covert operations and conspiracy themes to others. Sad damn situation to loose his rapid fire pronouncements on our sorry state of affairs. We must fight the battle more vigorously as individuals….they don’t have a bullet for all of us but they will try to convince us they do. Read “Gulag Archipelago” by Solzhenitsyn, you will understand the methodology the elites and the fascists hope to implement on a bunch of scared little rabbits…..they have no idea how to handle a resistance made up of free, informed, vocal, pissed and determined former inmates of a ‘loony bin’. We’ll all ‘Fly Over the Cuckoo’s Nest’!
November 17, 2008 at 10:30 am
While we`re discussing, among other things, the developement of the Plutocracy out of the Aristocracy, another tribute to George Orwell…
Who is “Big Brother”?
Why, he is the eldest son of an eldest son!
November 17, 2008 at 3:27 pm
Elaine, I do love this site and I have been trying to get my head around it for quite a while. I’m not from the US but have a healthy respect for, well, many of the contemporary social norms that have been borne of working class America. I think it’s fair to say that the leadership has always been very outward looking, possibly even gradiose or imperialist, which would explain the love-hate relationship between say the UK and the US when the US was ascendent and the Brits were on the way out.
But reading this last piece, which I thoroughly enjoyed, and others before, I noticed that you raise the spectre of domination from a dark evil force who will come and ravage the States and exploit her people and resources in the name of free markets and opening things up. In fact you say “Huge wars have been waged by aliens seeking to pry open foreign markets to ‘free trade’. This is a dark history we should heed.”
Are you perhaps referring to America’s Admiral Perrry and the Chinese concessions and the Japanese Meijii era (both were forced to open up to the west when they didn’t want to)? If you are, then I can understand your concern. Of the Chinese, the west did make slaves, took it’s land and wealth (Hong Kong) and the Chinese are still pissed/embarrassed (a bad mix when you’re powerful).
So it’s so ironic now that the Chinese are patiently buying up the LSE and that you feel they will be coming your way, because I think you’re absolutely right. A further irony is that America is schooling the Chinese (enrollment of Chinese students in the US is going through the roof) and it might appear to some that you’ve been cuckolded in a way (but that’s been going on for 30 years now). If it were intentional or premeditated, it would be a brilliant plan, but I doubt it, probably just a plain old a case of pop starting to eat itself.
Let’s see what happens. Great blog.
November 17, 2008 at 5:44 pm
Okay so is there anything that can be done? What does an informed citizen do, write your congressman? Buy a better yet affordable brand of lube to make ready for, as George Carlin said the red, white and blue d**k in it’s continued violation of your posterior.
November 18, 2008 at 3:56 pm
“The US should have announced a new regime of closing our markets to outsiders and restricting trade until we balance our trade deficits.”
And, since turnabout is fair play, “outsiders” could then close their markets to us. That would work well – let’s just ban trade altogther.
I wouldn’t have a problem with unionized production if it didn’t seem to lead inexorably to crappy, overpriced products. Oddly ehough, that seems to be a US issue – unionized European companies like the one that made my Volvo produce good stuff; it’s the Americans that can’t be bothered to give a damn.
And if Elaine had her way, I couldn’t buy the Volvo. I’d end up with another Ford or Chevrolet, and once again be a regular at the local garage. No. Thanks.
(I’ve had that Volvo for 5 years and 60K miles, and it has not been in the shop at all save for scheduled maintenance.)
November 23, 2008 at 12:34 am
Yeah Volvos are good…
Well trade can exist if it’s done in a balanced way (you import as much as you export and no more no less). Trade will be set to it’s origin (trading what you have for what you haven’t). Food, water and drugs shouldn’t be traded because they deal directly with the life of people… Every country should be self-suficient in this.
And to help international regulation to monitor real unionized produced stuff. But the US don’t give a damn about international regulations in fact they don’t give a damn for international law. That’s also the problem about being isolationists…
Tenho dito.
December 11, 2008 at 1:32 pm
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