>Sounds to me like a
>left-wing justification for old-fashioned economic chauvinism.
>An example of the union movement making common cause with its own ruling
>class to fight off the yellow peril's 'unfair' imports.
Except to repeat for the Nth time- THE RULING CLASS IN THE US SUPPORTED PNTR. The AFL-CIO was opposing the US ruling class when it opposed PNTR.
>Any real socialist would welcome China's economic development as the
>precondition for the emergence of a working class movement there.
I've noted that I am anti-protectionism but fighting for trade deals that require labor rights attached to trade is not protectionism-- in fact, it was te fight US labor fought in this country in fighting for national labor standards, stopping child labor, and cutting the work day. The rightwing Supreme Court struck down laws both at the state level and nationally that tried to impose those standards on goods shipped into pro-labor states. By your logic, that Supreme Court was the friend of labor and development of the anti-union Jim Crow South.
I am all for economic development in China and it will move faster if workers are full partners in the increasing wealth, rather than having more and more diverted into the hands of the Chinese elite, as is increasingly happening.
-- Nathan Newman