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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: George Coyne who wrote (252123)	4/30/2002 8:02:13 PM
From: ThirdEye	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

I would certainly agree that there is some faulty thinking in the post you were responding to, but some of your response makes me squirm. The causal relationship between freedom and trade is not so cut and dried. The free flow of ideas is "trade" and clearly creates freedom if allowed(China). The rest of your response is pie-in-the-sky because the essence of free citizens pursuing their goals in a capitalist system is competition. The essence of competition is to tilt the playing field in your favor. You could argue that in a broad sense it all evens out, but the reality we know in this country is that corporate "citizens" seek and often get special legislative relief that affords them a very "un"-level advantage. And if you think the result is that the best products will then benefit the most people, you should check out some of the deals ENE had going around the world.

To: George Coyne who wrote (252123)	4/30/2002 9:35:59 PM
From: GST	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

"free trade leads to socialism" If only Karl Marx was alive to hear such an astonishing conclusion! I am amazed by the depth of your analysis. I wonder how generations of economists the world over failed to conclude that economies whose main institutional arrangements are based on markets are in fact a front for government ownership and control -- what a stunning conclusion! Only somebody of your intellectual ability, backed by the world-renowned economist Alan Keyes -- could ever root-out such a well-hidden discovery! I smell something -- hmmmmm a Nobel prize perhaps? Or a pile of dog excrement from a two-bit politician?

To: George Coyne who wrote (252123)	5/1/2002 5:09:30 AM
From: craig crawford	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

>> Free trade does not "cause" freedom << quite the contrary. free trade leads to socialism and tyranny. >> Freedom leads to free trade << so you wouldn't be opposed to boeing selling cruise missiles to saddam hussein? after all, that is freedom! how about when toshiba sold silent propeller technology to the soviets back in the eighties while american taxpayer dollars were subsidizing japan's defense! is that all about freedom? how about narcotics and other illegal drugs? shouldn't they be freely traded? should we allow boeing the freedom to sell F-15's to arafat? how about a few tanks? can general dynamics practice true free trade and sell some tanks to the palestinians? apparently our founding fathers understood that the government needs the ability to regulate foreign trade, or they wouldn't have reserved the power to congress in article I section 8 of the constitution: The Congress shall have power to lay...duties, imposts and...To regulate commerce with foreign nations perhaps they were concerned that "a nation whose citizens are free to pursue their own personal goals" might sometimes be detrimental to the nation as a whole when people choose not to exercise discipline, responsibility, and accountability. "Some of the worst crimes in history have been committed by those who have exercised their liberty without a sense of responsibility or accountability." --Margaret Thatcher "That government is best which governs the least, because its people discipline themselves." --Thomas Jefferson