Posted on 07/03/2005 7:57:02 AM PDT by Willie Green
For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use.
The Washington Post- ABC News Poll conducted June 23-26 has gotten considerable attention because it appeared to show flagging American support for the war in Iraq. By a margin of 56-42, respondents indicated that they disapproved "the way Bush is handling the situation in Iraq." But if one looks deeper into the entire survey, it would seem that it is not the war itself, but, as per the lead question, President George W. Bush's handling of it that has the public concerned.
By a margin of 52-46, people agreed that "the war with Iraq has contributed to the long-term security of the United States." And by 58-41, support was shown for keeping U.S. military forces in Iraq until civil order is restored, "even if that means continued U.S. military casualties." Where Bush loses majority backing is on questions about getting bogged down and taking too many casualties already. As in past conflicts, the American people want to win and expect their officials to lead them to victory. Bush's popularity was at an all time high (around 80% approval) when American tanks were rolling in triumph towards Baghdad. It is when leaders seem not to be paying enough attention to the war effort or are following the wrong strategy that the public starts to turn away.
Poll results like these give a strong warning to the Republican Party. The GOP has always done well when the issues at stake involved national security. Liberals, with their reluctance to use force, fear of patriotic passions, and reflexive sympathy for the enemy – as shown currently by their ardent concern for imprisoned terrorists, do not poll well when the country's survival is on the line. Yet, there is also an influential segment among Republicans who are abandoning the national security base of the party in order to cozy up to transnational corporations – whose weakness on defense issues is just as marked as that shown by the political left.
The case in point is policy towards China. CIA Director Porter Goss has warned that Beijing is tilting the balance of power against the United States across Asia. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has made the same case in Congressional testimony and at an international conference in Singapore, June 4. Yet, the Pentagon's annual report on China's military modernization has been repeatedly delayed as the State Department and other agencies in the Bush Administration try to water it down.
Rumsfeld's Singapore remarks set off alarm bells among those who favor the appeasement of China. One of the more notable comments came from former Secretary of State Colin Powell speaking at a forum organized by Business Week magazine on June 13. "I, for one, do not see China as an enemy that is emerging as a threat, but as a nation taking its rightful place in the world," said Powell.
What is propelling China upward and outward is the pace of its economic development. But this development is almost entirely the result of massive foreign investment in new industrial capacity and infrastructure, supported by open access to rich, overseas markets. The transfer of technology, either through the device of "joint ventures" with foreign firms, or by the outright theft of intellectual property, has advanced Chinese capabilities in both commercial and military competition. When attending the Zhuhai International Airshow last November, I saw first hand the ambitions of Beijing to become a high-tech Superpower and the eagerness of American and European firms to profit by helping China achieve its strategic goals.
The power of this pro-China business lobby is very strong among the Republican leadership in Congress, where the lust for campaign funds rules the agenda and the powerful House Ways and Means Committee (which controls trade policy) serves as the legislative arm of the Fortune 500. Consider the recent behavior of the committee's chairman, Bill Thomas (R-CA) in regard to House initiatives to curtail Beijing's advance.
The House voted on two measures to block the state-owned Chinese National Overseas Oil Company from buying out the American oil producer Unocal as part of its global strategy to gain control of natural resources. One was a non-binding resolution (H. Res. 344) stating the obvious: that "a Chinese state-owned energy company exercising control of critical United States energy infrastructure and energy production capacity could take action that would threaten to impair the national security of the United States." This resolution passed 398-15, but Thomas was one of the 15 "no" votes. Also among the 15 were Rep. Tom Davis (R-VA), chairman of the Government Reform Committee, and Rep. Chris Shays (R-CT), chairman of Davis' National Security Subcommittee.
A more substantive action was an amendment to the Transportation, Treasury and Housing and Urban Development appropriations bill (H.R. 3058) "to prohibit the use of funds from being made available to recommend approval of the sale of Unocal" to CNOOC. This passed easily enough, 333-92, but 71 of the "no" votes were Republicans, including Thomas. This means that as a party, the Democrats showed more concern about Beijing than did the GOP.
Thomas used a parliamentary tactic to block consideration of another amendment to H.R. 3058 that would have required the Secretary of the Treasury to submit a report defining currency manipulation and how U.S. trade law could deal with it. Beijing's use of currency manipulation is blatant and has been the subject of world-wide complaint. But Treasury Secretary John Snow is, like Thomas, in the China appeasement camp. Corporations that have located export platforms in China benefit from Beijing's market distorting practices, even as they victimize the American economy.
The House GOP leadership knows something must be done to meet the raising concerns of its rank-and-file conservative members regarding the Chinese onslaught. But they want to do as little as possible, and nothing that will upset the Fortune 500. According to the National Journal's Congress Daily, the leadership effort on China is being directed by Chief Deputy Majority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA), a member of Thomas' Ways and Means Committee. Cantor is meeting with "business lobbyists" to determine what is acceptable. Yet, it is this very notion that U.S. foreign policy has been outsourced to corporate interests, who care nothing about the security implications of their actions, that has so many conservative House members upset.
A leading piece of China legislation is a bill sponsored by Rep. Phil English (R-PA), that would grant explicit authority to the Commerce Department to use countervailing duties to combat subsidies from non-market economies like China (H.R.1216). But Thomas said on June 29 that English's bill was "too aggressive" even though it did not mandate any action, only allowed action to be taken if needed. Thomas has also bottled up H.R. 1498, a bill that would make exchange-rate manipulation by China actionable under existing U.S. trade laws. H.R. 1498 has 102 co-sponsors and was introduced by two members of the House Armed Services Committee, its chairman Duncan Hunter (R-CA) and Tim Ryan (D-OH).
Though Beijing's friends are a minority, they hold key positions in the Republican Party hierarchy and have the backing of rich corporate patrons. They pose a threat both to the country and to the GOP, as the American people do not take kindly to those who would sell out the nation's security for private gain.
ping
Is the dragon laughing at us?
Another way to look at the "trade imbalance" (cash imbalance) is, China now has a big pile of "legal tender"--really IOU's--with "United States of America" printed on them. Are they going do something now to make all that valuable paper worth nothing? or even worth less? I don't think so.
They use them to purchase debt issued by our Treasury to finance the administration's irresponsible deficit spending. As a result, a growing proportion of American tax dollars go directly to China as interest payments on that debt, rather than to support the legitimate functions of our own government.
Regarding currency manipulation, China is not the only country with a peg to the dollar. Hong Kong did it for about 30 years. Further, the US dollar will trade in a certain range and if it goes outside, there will be massive intervention. You can count on that.
I think at one time, your friend Pat Buchanan advocated a return to fixed exchange rates that was the norm for most of the 20th century.
Regarding Unocal, where were you when england's BP bought out Sohio ? or when Shell got bought out or when Mecedes bought up Chrysler, etc.
You want the free lunch, a legislative change to fix the problems.
There is no free lunch. There is no wave of a magic wand via legislation that will make everything right. The closest might be a sales tax replacing an income tax but you hate that idea.
The real problem is simple. Americans spend too much and save to little. Save more and spend less and the trade deficit shrinks, foreigners will have less cash to buy up US companies, interest will go to US citizens and not foreign ones, and US citizens will be the stockholders, not the Chinese.
Except for the military budget that the corporate lobby uses to guarantee safe delivery of goods and protection of "American interests" abroad.
There are a lot of assumptions wrapped up in that accusation. Can you not conceive of any situation in which a 100% Laissez Faire approach might be inadequate to defend our national security? Are you convinced that any corporate decision should be tolerated in the name of economic freedom?
Once you use your imagination and realize that market forces are not always guaranteed to serve our national sovereignty, and that there could arise critical moments where market pressures might need to be redirected with regulations, it's just a matter of judgment as to when and where those regulations are needed. If market forces might arise that could hurt our security, there could be some that might cause massive or irreparable damage. We could lose an economic war, and in the process, lose our freedom after a shooting war finishes the process of destroying us.
Even if you don't think we need to invoke any regulation now, only a fool would say that regulations would never be required to protect America against hostile trade intent on the part of our foreign "partners."
Those who say that China isn't threatening us now, and hasn't even come close to hurting the core of our national security should consider Alamo Girl's Clinton Treason Timeline. We are men, not "masses." We can see the enemy at our gates. He's inside the gates right now, and he's using trade against us, shoving the knife deeper. Laissez Faire capitalists are apologizing for leaving open the drawbridge while the enemy continues to march his forces inside our walls.
Still pushing the Economic Isolationist propaganda huh Willie? Perhaps you can explain to us why Americans should make themsevles economic serfs paying extremely high prices for shoddy goods to economic monopolys just because the extreme right has a hysteric fear of anyone even a shade darker then them?
China is likely going to be the death of many of our young people, and it could spread back to our country to take out our citizens of all ages. I support massive tariffs of Chinese goods. Use the proceeds to support our side of the news arms race. If China won't give up it's communist government and pursuit of power, then we must be prepared to defend ourselves.
It was legislation that expanded the federal regulatory bureaucracy that places our domestic industries at a competitive disadvantage. It will require legislative action to correct that inbalance and establish a level playing field.
The closest might be a sales tax replacing an income tax but you hate that idea.
The abomination that you're referring to originated as a fraudulent tax avoidance scheme, initiated by Scientologists. I don't endorse such convoluted, pseudo-economic tripe.
That is a weird opinion. I don't care if China was made up of white communists, they are extremly dangerous to our future and the future of freedom. BTW, I have met a lot more racist liberals, than I have met racist conservatives. Take that to the bank.
It apears that it is acceptable to lose our country to Mexico or China, but not to Islam. I haven't quite figured out the logic yet, but I'm working on it.
For about 10% of "conservatives", it does matter. However, I loathe to even call them conservatives.
When the subject of "what to do about China" comes up on FR, the answers are usually about revalue the currency, impose tariffs, embargo, boycott, it is all china's fault.
Very rarely does anyone say, it is over regulation of the US, too many lawyers, too many stupid lawsuits, lack of a work ethic, lack of a saving ethic, etc.
Fact is that if China decided to give us back every dollar spent from here on forward, we would still be running a 450 billion dollar a year trade deficit. The results are the same or worse if bilateral trade with china dropped to zero.
The US spends too much and makes and saves too little. But no one wants to hear the message that you should worker harder, and spend less.
Racists are EVIL. They will destroy this country before any Chinese communists could even muster the force.
Do you seriously think that over-regulation compares with direct state sponsorship, as China clearly offers its industries?
You rush to China's defense while America loses jobs, know-how, and its own technological advantage over an arch enemy. It is America and its people who need your support, not the Chinese. Stand with us instead of them.
The enemy simply adapted. It was painfully clear to them that the west won the Cold War with superior economics. The statists in China recognized that and moved to save their own skin as they watched the Soviet union fall. They've adapted well. They recognized that the west could be persuaded to sell itself out for the right price.
We're partly victims of our own success. We knew how to win the Cold War but not how to secure the victory. We'd better learn quickly before it's too late.
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