Henry, it was I who made the baby/bath water remark, and it was intended to be *critical* of free trade. (Shows what happens when one reverts to cliches, I guess.) The "baby" in this instance refers to labor and environmental side agreements attached to free-trade pacts. The "bath water" is the misuse of such side agreements to advance purely capitalist interests in the First World.
I think the only way to put any kind of check on the indisputable evils of free trade is to encumber such trade with requirements concerning labor rights and environmental safeguards. Nathan Newman (to whom I was replying) seemed to indicate that many Third World progressives are opposed to labor/environmental requirements linked to trade agreements, seeing these requirements as a merely tool to hurt workers "historically excluded from employment globally." I understand these progressives' point, but I just do not favor job generation that is fueled by the race-to-the-bottom dynamics of free trade, which clearly encourage exploitation of workers and despoliation of the environment.
Carl Remick