Archive for category Foreign Trade
SNL Recalls Its Mission-Better Late Than Never
Posted by Tom in Foreign Policy, Foreign Trade, Humor on November 23, 2009
Mark Toomey alerted me to this very funny Saturday Night Live opening skit. Funny, unless of course you name is Barack Obama. (Parental Discretion Advised)
Add Italy to the Shit List
Posted by Tom in Defense, Foreign Policy, Foreign Trade on November 6, 2009
Where will Obama’s Eurocentric worldview lead? Yesterday’s news tells of Italy’s conviction, in absentia, of 23 Americans (CIA agents) charged with kidnapping Osama Mustafa Hasan Nasr and taking him out of Italy and eventually to Egypt. No question of Nasr’s terrorist connections as Italian security forces were cooperating with our CIA operatives. The conviction violates a long-standing principal of international law that officials of foreign governments operating within a country with official consent are immune from prosecution.
Today’s WSJ editorial makes the cogent and obvious point that if American intelligence officials can’t safely cooperate with their in-country counterparts, the both nations are less safe.
We saw in May the results of the Obama worldview when Spain’s top investigative judge launched a new criminal investigation into allegations of torture at Guantanamo Bay indicating that he would investigate high-level Bush administration officials!
Has Obama’s bowing and scraping and apologizing for America taken us to this new low? Does he intend to completely sacrifice US sovereignty to the filth of the UN?
I fear for our nation and our security under this president. And like the 23 US intelligence operatives “convicted,” I will no longer travel to Italy nor will I buy any of its products. Italy, Spain…the shit list is getting longer! Wonder who’ll be next?
Tom Motherway
Dollar Reaches Breaking Point
Posted by Tom in Foreign Policy, Foreign Trade, Monetary Policy on October 12, 2009
Who will fund the record breaking Obama deficits? The dollar is falling as it should with anticipated Obamaflation. Of course Obama and the Democratic Congress are not helping by taking the strong protectionist tack that their union owners demand. This from Bloomberg:
Policy makers boosted foreign currency holdings by $413 billion last quarter, the most since at least 2003, to $7.3 trillion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Nations reporting currency breakdowns put 63 percent of the new cash into euros and yen in April, May and June, the latest Barclays Capital data show. That’s the highest percentage in any quarter with more than an $80 billion increase.
World leaders are acting on threats to dump the dollar while the Obama administration shows a willingness to tolerate a weaker currency in an effort to boost exports and the economy as long as it doesn’t drive away the nation’s creditors. The diversification signals that the currency won’t rebound anytime soon after losing 10.3 percent on a trade-weighted basis the past six months, the biggest drop since 1991.“Global central banks are getting more serious about diversification, whereas in the past they used to just talk about it,” said Steven Englander, a former Federal Reserve researcher who is now the chief U.S. currency strategist at Barclays in New York. “It looks like they are really backing away from the dollar.”
via Dollar Reaches Breaking Point as Banks Shift Reserves Update3 – Bloomberg.com.
Obama’s post American world will be dramatically weaker and much poorer.
Tom Motherway
Costs of “Rent Seeking” Behavior?
Posted by Tom in Foreign Trade, Government Regulation on August 22, 2009
We are in the midst of an economic recession, people have lost jobs, can’t make mortgage payments, and some can’t afford groceries. Yet, in the USA the rent-seekers profit by destroying food AT THE CONSUMERS EXPENSE! This is nothing short of a hidden tax benefiting the rent-seekers.
Two articles in this weekend’s WSJ stand out in this regard. The first pictures 72,000 pounds of tart cherries, one farmers allocation, rotting because he was forced to dump them under a price-stabilization program. The second suggests that Obama’s Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilasck will maintain the current import quotas to support the price of sugar despite warnings that there is an impending sugar shortage, even though sugar is used in many of the foodstuffs we consume.
Now, I’m not suggesting that this is an Obama originated problem, it’s an age-old problem indeed. But, it is a horrible economic drag, not only in the USA but worldwide.
I wonder if our economic think tanks can publish a listing of the rent-seeking drags on our economy and attempt to quantify the economic effects on our society, both here and worldwide. This should be a worthwhile education process for the voters and the taxpayers.
Tom Motherway, tom@renohayek.com
Is the System Broken? Where is the Common Good?
Posted by Tom in Foreign Trade, Politics on August 6, 2009
Today’s (8/6/09) WSJ editorial page discussed Obama’s courtship of Republican Chuck Grassley’s vote on the Obamacare package. Seems like a straightforward persuasion attempt. But in a totally off-point issue, Grassley’s desire to support the flagrantly protective tariff against Brazilian sugar based ethanol in favor of the less effective corn ethanol supported by the tariff for his constituents, becomes the trading point, the political point, the unseen point of so-called “compromise.” The editorial hopes that Grassley won’t make Americans pay twice! Good luck!
There is no more common good. This ingrained political behavior is economically called “rent seeking.” For the fat cat corn growers the mandates and tariff bases price supports feed the revenue that would otherwise be non existent. Growers would otherwise need to get an honest, read “economic,” job. That’s too much trouble when the government is there to fund them! For the politicians, the Grassley’s of this world, this “rent seeking” is “contribution seeking” and ultimately “vote seeking,” to sustain them in office.
The Republicans are just as bad as the Democrats in this regard. Frank Murtha logically argues that if he didn’t get the earmark for his district some other Congressmen would get the money for his! It’s a way of life. I fear, it’s unchangeable. The lesson: join the rent seekers or perish? No, that’s not morally correct. That’s not competitive. That will not bring out the best! And, in the end, we will ultimately lose.
By the way, in the same August 6th WSJ, Chad P. Brown has a good op-ed called “Protectionism Exposed.” In it he touts a World Bank website which he helped organize that set outs the various protectionists measures which if unchecked will bring the demise to world trade. It’s worth the look.
Tom Motherway, tom@renohayek.com