yoshie wrote:
>Well, you don't expect Buchanan to be serious about what you call his
>'isolationism,' do you? Which American politician today, liberal or
>conservative or whatever, would ever seriously implement
'isolationist
>policies'? They only talk the talk. The only thing we'll get out of
>Buchanan or his likes is lots of racist hot air.
catching up on this thread....
I agree with Yoshie, and maybe I would go a step further...
a few points:
1. there is no free trade, only a series of agreements which regulate trade and labour and capital, with the most movement being accorded to (in this order) capital, trade and labour. i.e.., to put it provocatively, from the perspective of workers, there is no globalisation, only a heightened form of economic nationalism which is shaped and enforced by international agreements that seek to bind workers to national and regional competitions against eachother.
2. the reasons which make Buchanan announce his commitment to protectionism in bad faith are the same reasons that will reduce any left opposition to free trade to its nationalist and racist premises: capital flight has made social democratic redundant at a national level, so the only real effect of calling for social democratic measures within national borders as the response to so-called globalisation is to enhance the increasingly racist character of US and Aust politics.
angela