Tag: free trade

In modern times, we have been raised to believe that England is a wonderful Country, that is our ally, and our good friend.

The fact that both the Revolutionary War, and the War of 1812 were about obtaining autonomy, independence, and separation from the British oligarchy, that wished to dominate us and control us, is conveniently forgotten. What follows here is a video documentary that shows the origins of the decline of the American experiment, and the on going power struggle that continued to remain between the British oligarchy and American people, which is responsible for that decline.

It reveals that the Civil War (that followed in the mid-1800s) was, in fact, about much more than just simply “Slavery”.  It reveals the origins of so-called “Free Trade” agreements (which are aggressively promoted today) that have hollowed out American manufacturing, and depressed the wages of American workers. It shows how Franklin Roosevelt came close to outmanuvering the European Establishment, and embarked upon a strategy that would have strengthened, not only the prosperity of America, but of the whole World.  Tragically, Roosevelt’s health failed him before he could see any of that through. Finally, the video also reveals, in the end, what a tool   Harry “Orwellian National Security State” Truman was, who sowed the seeds of our modern ruthless American Empire, and our current disintegration.

This is, unfortunately, a long video (over 1 hour), but it is well worth it to watch all the way through (the last 30 minutes are the best part).

Documentary:

Lincoln and FDR and the British Empire

Upset about the massacre of Peruvian indigenous people?

Please consider voting at progressive.org to have this question asked at their next Q&A session:

What do you intend to do about the massacre of Peruvian indigenous people?

What do you intend to do regarding the Peruvian Free Trade Agreement which is being used as justification for the massacre indigenous protestors who have been protesting the oil and mining projects in the northern Peruvian province of Bagua.

With the Peruvian Free Trade Agreement as excuse, the Peruvian government is now taking away indigenous rights and creating a threat to the Amazon rainforest by taking away land from indigenous people and allowing that land, rainforest, to be reclassified as agricultural land so that biofuel companies can move in with plantations and to allow oil companies and mining companies to be able to work in the area without having to negotiate or speak to the local communities before using THEIR lands.

How can we stand by and allow this to happen in the name of “free trade?”

If enough people vote for this question, it will be answered on the floor of the House of Representatives by members of the Progressive Caucus live on C-SPAN and also be recorded as part of the official Congressional Record.

Admittedly it’s a small step, but IMO anything that adds visibility to this issue is a good thing.

Current pivotal dates are September 30 then October 9 to the 13th.  I do plan on extracting as much cash as humanly possible once the severance check hits the bank. Anybody who knows what that limit is before setting off the bells and whistles at the FBI please let me know.  I do have to talk to my daughter about how after my employment termination I access my own money(direct depostit) via the computer I have not built yet.  She and apparently the entire world knows how to look at my finances but I do not.  

Hopefully we have until spring of 2009 before the nukes(not from missles BTW) start taking out major cities.

http://www.projectcamelot.org/…

Now why do I have to search the internet to find interesting people reportedly coming from high places.  Well the cognitive dissonance of corporate America that I have experienced is massive and I hope to write the Naomi Klein type of book documenting all of it.  My personal and up close history of me, the first generation to be born outside of the family farm.  That means in only a single generation a shining nation and hope of the world has been erased and all of mankind slinks back into the dark ages.

I reflect upon and entire career and how the stuff you buy is just not what it could be. In order to make money making something there is a pieces per hour count which must be made.  Out of that the CEO has to have a mansion in Boca Raton and bonuses for the cannibalization of the core business functions to make the bottom line look good have to be paid out.

Remember those innocent days when Martha Stewart had to go to jail simply for lying to the Feds?  Well these days anyone can rape and pillage the entire village and nobody but nobody goes to jail.

An Illumati salute to you all.  Stand at attention and click your heels together as the Nazis did.  Extend your right arm in a conventional military salute position but instead of bringing four fingers toward the forehead use two fingers to cover your upper lip.  You are supposed to do this mocking Hitler’s moustache and the ideals he represented.  Fascism, a super race of superior humans with their manifest destiny to control all others.  Hmmm….sound strangely familiar.  

In the timeline of man’s history, Adolph for all the destruction he did reign upon man did not last for an extended period of time.  I can not fathom why the United States, both political parties included seeks to emulate and repeat the 1940’s and 1929 concurrently.  Could we avert their bullshit by letting them know a majority of Americans know the real score?  Well I think not because there is a value to the negative powers of TeeVee and keeping the peasants occupied with below the belt issues like pigs and lipstick.

Given my survival I will know after looking into your eyes if I should or should not waste my time helping you hook up twelve volt battery systems.  I do think it might become that desperate.  I started my activism with this guy and to this day it is more appropriate than ever.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G…

http://www.freedomfiles.org/wa…

Sorry for all the doom and gloom and let’s hope the benevolent aliens and meditating monks can affect real “Change” in the world without depopulating 90% of the planet.

Yeah, well the main one was to do something constructive that I liked and put food on the table for my loved ones.  I had a career, a twenty two year career but the business assholianism of globalization and “free” trade is about to end all of that.  I am offered an early retirement package at the height of my skill set mainly because they can do it in China for 1/9th the cost.  People wonder why I have watched zero minutes of the Beijing Olympics and their carbon exempt smog laden air.  The seats are empty mainly because China don’t like large numbers of people getting together.  Their system BTW is THE model for OUR dystopian New World Order corporate fascist future.

I am almost destined to take the lump sum now and run or face the prospects of a non-existent pension from a company with a future potenial of Enron.

You’re talking history, right? I’m talking now. Because down here, it’s still “Who’s your old man?” ‘Til you got kids of your own and then it’s, “Who’s your son?” But after the horror movie I seen today… Robots! Piers full of robots! My kid’ll be lucky if he’s even punchin’ numbers five years from now. And while it don’t mean shit to me that I can’t take my steak knives to Dibiago and Sons, it breaks my fucking heart that there’s no future for the Sobotkas on the waterfront!

~Frank Sobotka, The Wire

One of my favorite concepts in economics is the Theory of the Second Best.  While it can be a bit technical, in summary, the theory is that if, for whatever reason, the required conditions for the optimal outcome are impossible to achieve, the second best outcome may require deviating from the conditions which were required to make the optimal outcome possible.  To use an analogy, most Democrats preferred ranking of the last three candidates for President was Obama, Clinton, McCain.  But one of the required steps to the optimal outcome of Obama’s election was his nomination, which made the second best outcome impossible.

The second-best problem is one which has particular resonance for me as a libertarian.  Many libertarians allied themselves for years with the Republican party, to try and establish the required conditions for a libertarian state.  However, the outcome of a libertarian state is further away than ever; responsibly, a libertarian must consider which of the desired conditions for our optimal outcome are negotiable in order for us to achieve our second-best outcome.  Of course, this is hardly only true for libertarians.

Don argues in the book and in the podcast that to point to an American steel worker put out of work by imports of Brazilian steel and say that he is “harmed by trade” is to misunderstand the nature of trade and its winners and losers. He says it’s like saying that a man whose wife leaves him for another man is harmed by love. After all, the man married because of love. The man is the product of his parents who were touched by love. So it is with the steel worker. His steel job exists because of trade. His whole life is supported by trade of various kinds. So in what sense is he “harmed by trade?”

It’s a profound point. It forces you to see just how trade and specialization and the division of labor create the incredible lives we lead, lives of wealth and health unimagined by previous generations.

But having said that, I think there is something else to add, something about the way our self-worth and pride and satisfaction are tied up in our work. An out-of-work steel worker still has a very good life compared to generations past and the success of his life up until the loss of his job is indeed due to trade (and sometimes to the protectionism that worker would like to see made stronger). But there’s no denying that it’s very tough on a person who has invested most of his life in a particular skill to suddenly find that there’s no demand for that skill. Yes, it’s the price of progress and it’s a price worth paying. Yes, it’s not particular to foreign trade, as Don points out, but is the result of all kinds of economic change. But there is something deeply poignant about it, nevertheless.

It is a mistake to use protectionism to keep that worker from having to deal with change. But that doesn’t change the potential sadness of the situation. I’ve argued that the real consolation for that worker who loses his job and struggles to find another that is as satisfying is knowing (if he knows any economics) that his children and grandchildren will lead better lives because we tolerate economic change.

Russell Roberts, Café Hayek