European Leaders Screech about "Protectionism" AGAIN!

[Joanne98]

PRAGUE: European leaders say protectionism could prove deadly in fighting the current economic downturn.

EU leaders and experts have gathered here Monday to celebrate the fifth anniversary of the EU enlargement in 2004, which included the former Soviet satellites such as the Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary.

Czech Premier Mirek Topolanek says "protectionism is evil, it is like poison" — echoing fears east Europeans have of being left behind in the global credit crunch as their economies slow down.

EU President Jose Manual Barroso called the crisis "the greatest in living memory" and says a strong single market is the way out of it.

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2009/03/02/europe/EU-Czech-EU-Enlargement.php

[ixion]

1. ahem...a message to the EU leaders:

unless you want to foot the bill and start sending America a trillion a month or so to keep the 'service' economy running on life support, I think you need to STFU.

There is a very serious problem in the US: We don't make much here anymore. That needs to change dramatically. We need to start producing and innovating in the US. We can't get along passing paper to one another and calling that an economy. We need to have farmers producing a variety of foods locally. We need to have people making furniture and clothing and electronics and appliances -- locally. In essence, we need to recreate the "mom and pop" localized economy. And to do that, we need to have local people to buy the product.

It's not "protectionism" which is a silly, politically-charged buzzword that doesn't actually mean much of anything.

What it means is that we need to save ourselves, by producing goods again.

[skoalyman]

2. amen to that

:hi:

[JohnWxy]

3. Some data on our balance of payments which explains why our trading partners are so

concerned about us thinking of America first (with the stimulus money). Roughly $543 Billion net Negative Trade Balance ( 2004) with roughly the top 18 net exporting (to us) trading partners:


http://www.geocities.com/jwalkerxy/Trade_Balance.xls