To: craig crawford who wrote (26167 ) 5/16/2002 12:01:02 PM From: TimF Read Replies (1) | Respond to here is your first mistake. the united states is the greatest marketplace on earth. to imply that we need to appease our foreign trading partners by allowing them access to our markets while they close off their markets to us is the type of liberal appeasement thinking that i have been referring to. i didn't say it depends on world government, i said it leads to world government. The truth is, however, that every so-called free-trade agreement requires the establishment of some administrative and bureaucratic mechanism to enforce its terms -- and, to adjudicate disputes that arise concerning their observance and application. These mechanisms can affect many things that today fall under the purview of national and state or provincial legislatures, including things like the terms and condition of labor, health and safety regulations, environmental regulations and so forth. In light of the potential breadth of the free-trade agenda, therefore, people who care about their freedom must thoughtfully consider whether the mechanisms being established to make decisions about that agenda meet the requirements of constitutional self-government. The result is a system in which decisions are taken and agreements fashioned through the executive, which are then handed to the Congress for cursory review and ratification. Under the GATT system, the specific details of each new round of free-trade arrangements were subject to this congressional review. In the new era of the WTO, however, new arrangements can be agreed to and implemented without congressional involvement, including, of course, administrative judgments that our chief executive is treaty bound to implement. In effect, this creates a supra-national legislative process in which the executive branch has the initiative and through which the executive can create facts that the national legislature cannot review or modify. The demonstrators who clamor for greater equity -- and for regulations that address environmental concerns or issues of income and wealth distribution -- may be creating a scenario in which these national chief executives are dragged kicking and screaming in a direction that greatly increases their control of economic and social policy in their respective countries.
