tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3862216000300765627.post1554010954620472125..comments2024-01-16T03:42:46.705-05:00Comments on The Downward Spiral: Friday Rant: Obama Doubles Down on Clinton’s Bad Globalization BetsBill Hickshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17551954408189665078noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3862216000300765627.post-43176297502474201472011-10-08T21:37:12.444-04:002011-10-08T21:37:12.444-04:00@C0ZMIK - egads, my head hurts. Goldsmith is the ...@C0ZMIK - egads, my head hurts. Goldsmith is the one who is right and, forget that flack Laura Andrea Tyson, there is CHARLIE ROSE singing NAFTA and free trade's praises. I love how Goldsmith has to tell Rose to temper his pro-NAFTA cheerleading by saying, "it's only been a few months." The world has certainly been turned upside down. :(Bill Hickshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17551954408189665078noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3862216000300765627.post-58209453999931383062011-10-08T11:28:13.304-04:002011-10-08T11:28:13.304-04:00@TP - Beyond the globalization issue, I also deplo...@TP - Beyond the globalization issue, I also deplore how the American economy is structured--the endless suburbs with their tract housing and shopping malls. America's natural resources were so abundant at one time that had we ordered our post-World War Two society more like Europe, the average person could have enjoyed a decent standard of living without exporting economic exploitation to the rest of the world. <br /><br />Anyway, that is all water under the bridge as it is far too late to turn back now. My only wish is that by pointing out to my fellow citizens how their livelihoods are being destroyed by the psychopaths they choose to lead them that MAYBE they might wake up to see the larger picture.Bill Hickshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17551954408189665078noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3862216000300765627.post-74064975715628649352011-10-08T08:34:51.295-04:002011-10-08T08:34:51.295-04:00Well, that's only half-true. There are two asp...Well, that's only half-true. There are two aspects of globalization: the products of US labor sold to foreign countries, and the products of foreign labor sold to the US.<br /><br />You're correct that the highly-subsidized mechanized US agriculture has had a devastating impact on some agriculture-heavy societies. I'm not disagreeing with you there.<br /><br />But for the other aspect, I would think that that the products of labor from poorer parts of the world should be encouraged, as it will reduce the poverty in the poorest of places.<br /><br />In your post, you are complaining that cheap foreign labor is replacing more expensive US labor. In other words, complaining that poor people outside US are getting paid at all (admittedly too little) and that that money should instead be given to US workers.<br /><br />In a sense, if you take the super-rich on who you pour so much scorn: they are simply maximizing their wealth for their families. You seem to be taking the position of maximizing the wealth of your country at the expense of other much poorer countries. <br /><br />A more admirable position than those of bankers, but hardly ethical in the true sense of the word.Thomas Painehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05433303201615302254noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3862216000300765627.post-74728382139125248592011-10-07T19:07:51.047-04:002011-10-07T19:07:51.047-04:00@Thomas Paine - globalization has largely been a d...@Thomas Paine - globalization has largely been a disaster on the other end as well. Charles Bowden, in his remarkable book about Juarez called "Murder City," explained how cheap American agricultural products forced Mexican subsistence farmers off of their land so they had to go to work for exploitation wages in the new NAFTA-created factories along the border. Then, when the drug war escalated to insanely violent levels, they were the people often massacred in the crossfire.<br /><br />Globalization is merely the flip side of the coin of aggressive American military imperialism. Get rid of both, and the world as a whole would on average be much better off.Bill Hickshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17551954408189665078noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3862216000300765627.post-50386657920716178202011-10-07T19:01:33.066-04:002011-10-07T19:01:33.066-04:00@Mariette - check out my latest post. :)@Mariette - check out my latest post. :)Bill Hickshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17551954408189665078noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3862216000300765627.post-68724346673946885172011-10-07T10:25:16.118-04:002011-10-07T10:25:16.118-04:00BillHicksWannabe:
Globalization may be the worst ...BillHicksWannabe:<br /><br />Globalization may be the worst thing to happen to American workers, but is that not the proper fair thing to have happened? <br /><br />If some other human being at far end of the world is working harder, more qualified, and can work at lower wages, why does he have to starve while an American tries to get 5-20 times that much wage for the same work? Is that fair?<br /><br />I empathize with your ranting, but as your moral universe is pretty limited, I am finding it harder to take your raging seriously. In the wider set of moral concerns, you're not much better than Homer Simpson :)<br /><br />Some Orwell for your benefit:<br /><br />All left-wing parties in the highly industrialized countries are at bottom a sham, because they make it their business to fight against something which they do not really wish to destroy. They have internationalist aims, and at the same time they struggle to keep up a standard of life with which those aims are incompatible. We all live by robbing Asiatic coolies, and those of us who are “enlightened” all maintain that those coolies ought to be set free; but our standard of living, and hence our “enlightenment,” demands that the robbery shall continue. A humanitarian is always a hypocrite, and Kipling’s understanding of this is perhaps the central secret of his power to create telling phrases… It is true that Kipling does not understand the economic aspect of the relationship between the highbrow and the blimp. He does not see that the map is painted red chiefly in order that the coolie may be exploited. Instead of the coolie he sees the Indian Civil Servant; but even on that plane his grasp of function, of who protects whom, is very sound. He sees clearly that men can only be highly civilized while other men, inevitably less civilized, are there to guard and feed them.<br /><br />TomPaineWannabeThomas Painehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05433303201615302254noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3862216000300765627.post-91867448817553109892011-10-07T10:12:03.750-04:002011-10-07T10:12:03.750-04:00I hear ya Bill. And of course this is a theme tha...I hear ya Bill. And of course this is a theme that resonates internationally. It seems that whenever jobs are exported, it only generates unemployment locally, and sweat shops and environmental degradation for the so-called beneficiaries. Misery at home, misery abroad.<br /><br />However, it was just announced here that this month, 103,000 jobs were created in the USA (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-15217784) - care to comment on that?<br /><br />Mariette (London, UK)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com