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Thanks for that article. Its great. It explains why we are where we are economically, and where we are headed.

I HATE Wal-Mart for all the reasons in that article.

I'm 60 years old. I remember when a product made in America was a quality product. It was worth waiting and saving for it - it lasted a lifetime and performed excellently. Quality tools, quality clothes, quality cars.

Wal-Mart represents greed and capitalism taken to an insane level. A corporation with the single-minded goal of an insect. They drive producers to make cheaper and cheaper junk and to do it overseas. They have contributed to the already alarming erosion of our industrial base.

Sure, companies should produce goods in the most efficient manner possible. But those goods should be quality goods and they should be made here in America, giving jobs to Americans and keeping money and capital in the U.S. for investment here.

Free trade is great - as long as the parties involved operate on an equal playing field. There is no way an American company producing a product here can compete with an operation in Red China where slave labor employees receive no benefits, there are no environmental controls, the cost of living is far lower and the prod-cut produced is a piece of crap.

Even more insidiously, not only does this contribute to a trade imbalance with the U.S. becoming more and more an economic fief of the orient, but it is destroying our ability to defend ourselves.

I have a rifle called an Eddystone Model 1917. It was built in a factory originally run by the Baldwin locomotive company. The knowledge and tooling that went into building that rifle came from manufacturing locomotives, not from providing financial or communications services to foreigners. That rifle was the main arm of American doughs in WW1. Nor is that a unique situation. In the Civil War, companies that made all kinds of consumer goods in the north converted to making war material for the northern war effort. One of the reasons the south lost was because they HAD no factories to convert. This was also the case in WW2, and throughout the "Cold War".

Wal-Mart and companies like them which are responsible for marketing cheap junk made overseas for the American market and routing American dollars to places like Red China are the enemy.

The sooner we recognize it, the better off America will be.

Really good post, zulu! That article was enlightening for me too, for all the reasons you so eloquently expressed.

I'm 54 and I remember the way Wal-Mart first came to big cities, promising American-made products. That was how they stole business from other companies like K-mart.

Once they were a stronghold all that has vanished. You'd be hard-pressed to find American products there anymore. I shudder to think what it's done to the garment workers.

Wal-Mart and companies like them which are responsible for marketing cheap junk made overseas for the American market and routing American dollars to places like Red China are the enemy.

The Smoot-Hawley Tarrif was enacted because of similar xenophobic sentiments.

Smoot-Hawley was one of the factors that helped make the Great Depression so Great.

How can you say "quality cars"?

I remember the 60's (we apparently are the same age) when any American car was totally worn out at 50,000 miles.

VW came out with a 60,000 mile warrentee, and Toyota raised it to 100,000 miles, in the 70's. then, and only then did GM, Ford, and Mopar put emphasis on quality production.

Before you say I'm down on American products, I had a GM truck that I put 180,000 miles on it (93 s-15), sold it to a friend, and he has put another 110,000 miles on it. There has been NO mechanical breakdown, not even an alternator. the A/C is gone due to a deer accident and the cost of the freon, however. LOL