What to do when everything is ‘Made in China?’

[Robson]

Source: Associated Press

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. - Poisoned pet food. Seafood laced with potentially dangerous antibiotics. Toothpaste tainted with an ingredient in antifreeze. Tires missing a key safety component.

U.S. shoppers may be forgiven if they are becoming leery of Chinese-made goods and are trying to fill their shopping carts with products free of ingredients from that country.

The trouble is, that may be almost impossible. Chinese exports have been in the spotlight since the deaths of dogs and cats in North America attributed to tainted Chinese wheat gluten, followed by this week’s recall of Chinese-made radial tires and an alert Thursday by the Food and Drug Administration, warning about contaminated Chinese seafood.

snipped

Photo caption: A 2002 Farm Bill passed by Congress mandated country-of-origin labeling for seafood, beef, lamb, pork, fish, fruits, vegetables and peanuts, but the Bush administration has delayed its implementation for everything except seafood until October 2008.

Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19508453/

---

Why do we not have country of origin labeling on all food products and anything that is taken internally? The law although incomplete was written years ago.

Wait….I think I know why. Some of the same corporate whores in Congress and the Whitehouse that want an unending river of illegal immigrants to suppress the wages of Americans have delayed its implementation.

The problem with Bush and many members in Congress is they put self interests and booty from K Street ahead of the country’s interests.

[4dsc]

1. The Chinese OWN US!!

Not to mention they are the most greedy nation on earth today. They could care less about the condition of the planet too!!

[brokensymmetry]

4. Fact.

And we keep buying their stuff...on credit...digging the hole deeper.

[barb162]

22. Yes they do. They were pretty uppity about the seafood contamination

Like we owe it to them to buy their seafood. I will not buy any seafood from here on it without finding where it comes from.

[Rebellious Republican]

2. Oh, but the Chinese have found a way around having to put....

"Made in China Labels" on their inferior products, and save them selves some tariffs to boot. Did you say NAFTA!
:grr:

Take your pick of which story to read about.........
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&sa=X&oi=spell&resnum=0&ct=result&cd=1&q=Chinese+to+build+auto+manufacturing+in+mexico&spell=1
:grr:

[Robson]

5. These trade agreements

such as NAFTA and other trade agreements are destroying our country. I blame Clinton for not vetoing NAFTA it as it set the stage for more of the same.

The Security and Prosperity Plan (North American Union) will transfer more of the same where good paying USA jobs on California docks will be replaced by Mexicans in Mexico and Mexican drivers on our highways hauling more Chinese products from Mexico or China.

I suspect that US citizens may be required to illegally immigrate to Mexico at some point in the decline of the USA.

Lou Dobbs has said it many times. Where is it cast in stone that "Free Trade" is good for US citizens? That's just an economic opinion that so far (over the last 30 years) has proven itself totally wrong. Our economy is flourishing on our nation's debt obligations and borrowing from China.

We need a strong anti-corporatist in the Whitehouse not a DLC corporate puppet.

[Rebellious Republican]

7. Well said Robson, I agree!

:toast:

[CrispyQ]

12. We need fair trade, not free trade.

Bush was right. It is us against them -- us being the human collective & them being the corporate behemoths and their traitorous minions. They were created to serve us, not the other way around. They should not be allowed to pursue profit at the expense of human welfare.

[depakid]

15. "I blame Clinton for not vetoing NAFTA"

Hell, he was one the biggest proponents!

(As, unfortunately- Gore was at the time).

[Manifestor_of_Light]

17. I fell out of the middle class in the 90s. I blame Clinton too!!!

:grr:

Fat lot of good it did for my unemployed tokus to go to college for twelve years and bust ass learning stuff.

[anitar1]

18. Our very own sterling pols are responsible for the non labeling. n/t

[Lerkfish]

3. I"m old enough to remember "Made in Japan"

It was on all products you ran across, and it become synonomous with crappy or dangerous products in the 50s and early 60s.
We all know how that ended up: our purchasing of their inferior goods allowed them to capitalize better and better production until they supplanted our own manufacturers.

[Robson]

6. Exactly

We are not only capitalizing China but we are borrowing to do it. It is really frustrating to see our corporate whore leaders sell us out.

Who benefits? A few capitalists and the Chinese.

Who loses? The American citizens economically, and the world at large environmentally as China's production is based upon the cheapest and not using environmentally friendly methods.

[Cobalt-60]

33. Now its a relief to find made in japan

I still support a number of die hard vhs users.
I've had to recommend used vcrs, preferably pre 2000AD, over modern Chinese production.
My most reliable units are an old Sanyo (Malasia, 2000) and a GE (Japan, 1995)

[J R]

8. If I Were Prez-Nut...

I'd push a "Self-Sustaining" nation that produces everything possible within its borders... Only trade for things we can't produce, like chocolate or honest Republicans.

[Rebellious Republican]

9. Honest Republicans, is there such a thing. The Neocons have

driven all of them out. I should know, I used to be one!

:kick:

[SKKY]

10. I go to great lengths to buy American-made products...

...or at least those made in the European Union, since I do live in Spain and all. For example, I used to run in Brooks Beast running shoes. But, knowing that New Balance are made in the US (or at the very least, assembled in the US), I have now switched
to those. It was a very hard change for me because I run a lot and have emotional attachment to my shoes.

[bronxiteforever]

11. The American public has been told to fear everything but their food.

The scary quote of the article-"Products in nonfood aisles communicated their origins better than their edible counterparts."

The GOP IS responsible for this. This is one issue we should run on. While the Reich Wing Radio nuts work the country up to a lather about Mexicans, the food their listeners are eating may very well contain poison. For every border fence cry, respond with "do you know where the food that made up your child's breakfast came from?"
Seems to me that food safety is a very powerful and real Democratic party issue. TR started the FDA and look how far the GOP has run from one of its historical superstars. Americans expect their food to be grown in the States not in China.

[Robson]

16. Seems like a no brainer

Seems to me that food safety is a very powerful and real Democratic party issue. TR started the FDA and look how far the GOP has run from one of its historical superstars. Americans expect their food to be grown in the States not in China.

I agree that this is certainly a core Democratic and American issue like motherhood and apple pie. We should have our food grown here under our control and using our standards. However Parties change and what were the core planks of the Democratic Party (like unambiguously improving lot for the US worker and middle class) is compromised by the big picture and the economic needs of big business.

Teddy Roosevelt is an example of how parties change. He certainly doesn't represent the values of the current day neocon Republican Party.

The RNC is a shill for corporate America and Wall Street, and to be honest the corporate wing of the DNC, the DLC isn't far behind.

[electricmonk]

13. A book coming out next month on the subject

U.S. family tries living without China

SEATTLE (Reuters) - Lamps, birthday candles, mouse traps and flip-flops. Such is the stuff that binds the modern American family to the global economy, author Sara Bongiorni discovers during a year of boycotting anything made in China.

In "A Year Without 'Made in China,'" (Wiley, $24.95) Bongiorni tells how she and her family found that such formerly simple acts as finding new shoes, buying a birthday toy and fixing a drawer became ordeals without the Asian giant.

Bongiorni takes pains to say she does not have a protectionist agenda and, despite the occasional worry about the loss of U.S. jobs to overseas factories, she has nothing against China. Her goal was simply to make Americans aware of how deeply tied they are to the international trading system.

"I wanted our story to be a friendly, nonjudgmental look at the ways ordinary people are connected to the global economy," she said in an interview before the book appears in July.

http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSN2425061320070628

[blitzen]

20. hey, the author is a friend of mine...

I work with her husband...They live a few blocks from us. They are DU types, but she intentionally kept the book from being overly polemical. I'm glad to see that Sara's book is getting some press.

[Zorra]

14. I'll pay a little extra for anything that has the "Made in the USA" label on it -

Because globalists, outsourcing, NAFTA, and Chinese pieces of crap totally piss me off.

I wish there was a chain of stores that sold nothing but merchandise made in the US, so I could give them my business and support American workers.

[ozymandius]

19. So would I dammit!

I remember my mother's Rubbermaid products and my father's Craftsman hand tools lasting decades - with guarantees on their service. Try to find that guarantee on a cheap import.

The knowledgeably thrifty Scottish side of my lineage asks the question: "How many times do you want to pay for that item?" You get what you pay for.

I would also pay higher prices for products while knowing that I am diminishing welfare and unemployment enrollment among people I know and care about. At the same time my family buys its coffee and chocolate from the organic and fair trade market because of the cost benefit to the in-the-trenches producer. The lower cost at Wal-Mart and other retailers is not worth the product and the peripheral casualties that result from my money going toward corporate crap.

[barb162]

23. I'm with you.

People in this country better start waking up.

[barb162]

21. I cannot agree with you more.

When this country is almost completely unemployed, watch all these rich jerks head off to Switzerland, Monoco, etc.

[bleedingheart]

24. It is time folks started talking to the local co-op farms and

perhaps turning up that front lawn they have into a garden...rather than paying someone to pour poisons on their lawns to keep them green and wasting water on something like grass...why not grow squash..beans, tomatoes...you name it...

[chknltl]

25. Oh Hell, it's perfectly clear to me now:

bush has "Made In China" stamped under his wig! Woo hoo, now that the truth is out, maybe we can elect an American into office this time.

ps: (that wig on the other hand was made from soft testicle hair of the finest camels of Saudi Arabia...making bush a true man of the world)

[DarkTirade]

26. I've noticed something interesting about most americans...

if you ever mention MAKING something yourself, most americans think it's the craziest thing they've ever heard. Back when I was in college, and didn't have enough free time for a regular job, I used to make prop lightsabers to sell on ebay. All I used was some metal tubes and a few plastic and rubber things for grips and buttons. And for a while, (at least when Star Wars was still popular) people were willing to buy things from me, even though it would cost about half as much to make it themselves. (Counting the cost of shipping in there, I didn't charge that much for them. :) ) After Episode III came out and interest died down, I dabbled in doing leatherwork and chainmail. It didn't sell as well, but it was something else that some people were willing to buy, but never imagined doing for themselves. My most recent project was to start brewing my own mead. The fact that I chose mead over wine or beer aside, just about everyone who I've mentioned it to was amazed. No one I know, other than my close friends and family have ever thought of doing anything like it. The idea of actually making something yourself is becoming more and more foreign to americans. In the old days, people learned to do things for themselves. People learned to sing or play a musical instrument. People learned to cook, to sew, all of those things for themselves. Now if someone wants music, they buy a CD or turn on the radio. If they want food, they buy it pre-made. The idea of growing your own food has become so foreign to many people that you end up with situations like this one
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x1221888
where someone is being FINED for growing his own food. He's not distributing without a liscense or doing anything illegal, he's just trying to grow his own veggies. And that's such a foreign thing to suburban america that it's just plain not allowed in many neighborhoods. We're living in a country where people will pay EXTRA money for pre-worn jeans, rather than buying jeans and wearing them out themselves.
As long as americans CAN go out and buy things the way they want them, they will feel no need to do it themselves. Which is fine with me, it means the next crazy idea I have to go make something could earn me extra money. :) But as a whole, I don't think it's all that good for americans.

[Robson]

29. Just thinkof it....

if we all started growing our own food and making our own stuff we wouldn't have time to watch the mindless Nancy Grace, Paris Hilton, Faux, American Idol crap put out by the MSM on the TV.

We'd be healthier from the exercise, from tending our own food and caring for our bodies and companies such as ADM would go out of business. There'd be less pollution from lawn mowing and Scotts fertilizer especially if we did it organically.

[Locrian]

30. prop lightsabers to sell on ebay

>>prop lightsabers to sell on ebay

That's cool - my 9 yr old son and I make lightsabers too. He's really into acting, lots of fun father and son project! We have a collection of about half a dozen or so.

[DarkTirade]

31. Ever tried using plasti-dip to make the grips?

It's great stuff... basically liquid rubber that dries onto whatever surface it's put on. :) Then you can either carve bits off to make a shaped grip, or one of my favorate things to do is lay down a series of rubber bands or rubber o-rings underneath to get a cool ridged grip.

[kurth]

27. Slap a sticker with a skull-and-crossbones on every product that comes from China

or contains Chinese ingredients.

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/opinions/articles/0701sun1-01.html#

[getmeouttahere]

28. Economic power - the only power we have left......

For those of us who can afford it, pay a little extra for products made locally or in U.S. or worker-friendly countries. If money is tight, I suggest if you have a Trader Joe's nearby, shop for food there. Local Co-op groceries and the like. And here's a great example for union-made, sweatshop-free clothes:

www.justiceclothing.com

Shifting our spending to worker-friendly companies and countries is the only way I can see for us to affect change.

[DarkTirade]

32. If only we could k&r comments too... :)

[getmeouttahere]

36. If that was meant for me, it is greatly appreciated....

I was hoping my comment would start some discussion on how we can really start doing this, big time!

[DarkTirade]

37. It was. :)

That's a nifty site right there.

[getmeouttahere]

38. Yes, I've been wondering if there are more like it....

but of course, we should also be looking locally for things like this. 20 years from now, local will be even more important, with peak oil forcing us into it. Might as well get ahead of the curve.

[Vidar]

34. Die in agony, still worshipping the boy king.

[reprobate]

35. An example of 'Made in China'. Email I sent to Bissell.

In the last 18 months I have bought two of these POS machines. Both have failed the same way, ie the clean solution pump stopped working. Following the troubleshooting tips in the user guide did not help in either case.

As our brain dead President said: Fool me once shame on me, fool me twice, well, you can't fool me again.

The label on this model claims to be made in China. It should say 'Mis made in China". What a great management decision, ship our jobs overseas to save a buck and a half in labor so management can take home huge bonuses. Meanwhile you lose longtime customers. Makes sense, right?

I have instructed my wife that if I ever look like I'll buy another Bissell product to rush me to the nearest mental health facility.