Free Republic

With Marine le Pen transforming her National Front (NF) into a party for the populist era, analysts have been carefully assessing how French elections in May could deal a "severe blow" to the European Union (EU). "It's difficult to imagine how the European Union could function should such a Euroskeptic (as Le Pen) be at the helm of one if its major economies … It would likely precede its fracturing," Michael Hessel, political economist at Absolute Strategy Research, told CNBC via telephone. He said that that low voter turnout would be Le Pen's best hope of securing an unlikely election...

The Improving State of the World: Why We're Living Longer, Healthier, More Comfortable Lives on a Cleaner Planet. . Indur M. Goklany. : Cato Institute, 2007, 516 pp.$29.95 ... Goklany depicts a global economy in which nearly all signs are positive -- and in which the problems that do exist, such as stagnation or setbacks in sub-Saharan Africa and the former Soviet Union, will be solved if economic growth and technological improvements are allowed to work their magic. Nor is this, in Goklany's account, a new phenomenon. He marshals an impressive array of historical data to argue that the trajectory...

DUBLIN: Streets in the capital and other cities of Ireland were yesterday overflowing with people marching to protest against Irish Ferries’ plan to replace its workers with low-paid immigrants. A total of over 70,000 labour union members and their supporters brought Irish cities and towns to a standstill carrying placards, beating drums and singing protest songs. The banners and placards carried various messages like “Equal Rights For All Workers”, “No slave ships on Irish seas” and “Stop Outsourcing” referring to the growing incidence of natives being replaced by immigrants willing to work for low wages. In Dublin, a large mass...

SPIEGEL ONLINE - 20. August 2004, 10:07 URL: http://www.spiegel.de/wirtschaft/0,1518,314042,00.htmlBhagwati interview (English original) "Kerry and Edwards are trying to use scare tactics" Leading globalization scholar Jagdish Bhagwati, himself a Democrat, is highly critical of candidate John Kerry's course on economics, outsourcing and trade. He spoke to SPIEGEL ONLINE about Kerry's anti-offshoring rhetoric, his ideas for reforming company taxation - and George W. Bush's record on job creation. Columbia University Columbia professor Bhagwati: "As you grow older, you attach more importance to worrying about policy; you want to affect society" SPIEGEL ONLINE: Professor Bhagwati, one of the defining slogans of the first Clinton campaign was "It's...

Anti-globalization is the intellectual's Louis Vuitton luggage—a luxury for those living in societies with large social surpluses .... Bob Kerrey, then Senator from Nebraska, sought the 1992 Democratic presidential nomination by advocating protectionism. In one ad, he stood by a hockey net, a trade goalie vigilant to block sinister imports. Voters were unimpressed because, Kerrey insouciantly says now, "they knew I was lying."

October 17, 2003 Bolivia's Poor Proclaim Abiding Distrust of GlobalizationBy LARRY ROHTER LA PAZ, Bolivia, Oct. 15 — The many Indian protesters who choked the streets and highways of this Andean nation again on Thursday may be poor and speak broken or accented Spanish, but they have a powerful message. It is this: no to the export of gas and other natural resources; no to free trade with the United States; no to globalization in any form other than solidarity among the downtrodden peoples of the developing world. The force of that message may yet topple President Gonzalo Sánchez de...

<p>September 12, 2003 -- LEAVE it to PBS to turn the terror and tragedy, the unspeakable crime and pain of 9/11 into a cold, soulless exercise in political self-criticism. If you watched the Ric Burns documentary "The Center of the World" this week, you saw an effort to rewrite the story of 9/11, so it is no longer about murderous fanatics and selfless heroes, not even about life and death.</p>

<p>According to the report "EU Trade Barriers Kill" released Sept. 5 by the Brussels-based think tank, the Center for the New Europe (CNE), "One person dies every 13 seconds somewhere in the world &#8212; mainly in Africa &#8212; because the European Union does not act on trade as it talks."</p>

WTO Protestors Bare Resentments - And Bodies - In Cancun CANCUN, Mexico (AP)--Anti-globalization protesters stripped their clothes off and spelled out the words "No WTO" with their naked bodies Monday, the first of several actions against the World Trade Organization meeting in this Caribbean resort. A mix of radical activists, farmers and labor rights promoters have planned a week of protests to show the harmful effects of free trade and growing corporate domination. Demonstrators say Cancun, whose miles of white-sand beaches are mostly hidden behind high-rise hotels, is a good example of increasing private control. "This is a rejection of...

GALESBURG, Ill. -- More than a year remains before Maytag Corp. finally pulls the plug on its 1,600-worker refrigerator factory here. But already, economic shock waves from the planned shutdown have begun to ripple outward from this prairie town, killing the jobs of hundreds of non-Maytag workers and threatening to claim as many as 2,000 more, including nurses, postal workers, mechanics and schoolteachers whose work has no connection with the appliance maker. For decades, growth-minded rural towns have vied to attract manufacturers by offering tax breaks and other incentives. The expansion strategy is based on what economists call the "multiplier...

That unlovely word "globalisation" may be a new coinage - but it is by no means a new phenomenon. Marco Polo, after all, travelled the Silk Road in the 13th century. He returned to Venice in 1295 with tales of such wonders as the use of paper money. "With these pieces of paper they can buy anything and pay for anything," he recorded. "And I can tell you that the papers that reckon as 10 bezants do not weigh one." I suppose that he would not have been shocked by Visa and MasterCard. Globalisation, then, is not new. What is...

<p>Pushed by the Mexican government, the Bush administration is working on a Social Security accord that would put tens of thousands of Mexicans onto the Social Security roster and send hundreds of millions of dollars in benefits south of the border.</p> <p>White House and Mexican government officials say discussions on an agreement to align the Social Security systems of the two countries are informal and preliminary. But excerpts from an internal Social Security Administration memo obtained this month say the agreement "is expected to move forward at an accelerated pace," with the support of both governments, and could be in force by next October.</p>