What You Say In Ohio, Does Not Stay in Ohio

A couple of days ago on The Daily Show, Madeleine Albright talked about how one of the most dangerous things U.S. politicians do is pander to their base while forgetting that the rest of the world is listening in as well. I immediately thought of Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton's fight in Ohio over who opposes NAFTA more. Ms. Albright could very well have been referring to this exchange as well because she was Secretary of State for the man who made the passage of NAFTA a priority. The Free Exchange has a post on the international waves that Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton's fight in Ohio is making. Here's what Free Exchange has to say on the Get of rid of NAFTA idea:

It is a bad idea, to say the least. Not only because of the economic benefits of greater economic integration, but for geopolitical reasons as well. In the wake of Democratic statements on the trade deal, government leaders from Canada and Mexico expressed their deep displeasure at the rhetoric, and at the possibility that an American president would go back on his country's word and ignore the concerns of valuable trading partners, just to secure a few votes.

There is a solid discussion of the goods and bad (plural and singular intentional) of NAFTA at that post, plus a post from a couple of days earlier, An unfortunate lack of clarity. The author at FX offers hope that "once the campaigns move beyond Ohio, the rhetoric on trade will mature."

Over at China Law Blog, Dan Harris writes some words that I have had a hard time convincing a friend of mine is true:

Many (most?) in China believe the rest of the world (the United States, in particular) do not want China to rise.

This friend has a background in Middle East foreign policy, so he's got some chops on the world. He says there is no reason for them to believe this, and I say well look at all the smack talking our presidential candidates do about China, and he replies that it is highly unlikely the Chinese are paying close enough attention to everything coming out of our politician's mouths. He thinks that it is our actions towards China, and not our words that should matter. But words do matter, and a country founded on the ideals of a Manifesto written by a couple of Prussians almost exactly one hundred years before its establishment knows just how much words do matter.

My policy is usually to never assume too much of a government, but China certainly has the manpower to monitor the China-words being exchanged in Washington. The majority of those China-words are negative nonsense about how if China is not out to poison our pets and children, then they're stealing all of our jobs and IP (Stan Abrams at China Hearsay keeps a chronicle of this stuff). If the Chinese think that we distrust them then they are wise to pursue strategies and tactics under the assumption that we will become adversaries, such as anti-satellite weapons and computer hacking brigades. But if we can bring a higher level of discourse that assumes friendship rather than competition, then less time and money is going to be wasted by both sides.

National-level politicians in the U.S. are quite intelligent people, but many of them have gotten to their position by success at pandering to their electoral base. They must know America has 150 years of thriving under and fighting for free trade. If they had the cojones to speak candidly on the benefits of working with China for most of America and the unfortunate consequences for our basic manufacturing industries, rather than their current cowardice in bashing China and free trade when it is politically expedient, then we could go a lot further towards the warm and fuzzy goal of creating a more prosperous Earth (cojones/cowardice in tribute to Ms. Albright).


Hilarious Side Comment
One of the comments at the FX Post by world citizen has a great description of what IP piracy is and why developing nations can't justify exploiting it, and how cutting subsidies to our own industries might encourage our trade partners to step up their IP enforcement:

Intellectual Property is what the U.S. produces. Piracy is akin to someone stealing a container of oranges from Mexico, another container of bananas from Brazil, a container of nuts from Africa and a truckload of bowls from China and sell fruit salad on the street at 50 cents a cup. Poor countries produce raw materials, richer countries produce technology. I agree, however, that inorder to protect intellectual property rights, we must respect the agricultural needs of our trading partners, be it Sugar cane or Ethanol from Brazil to allow corn from the U.S. to be exported to Mexico or allowing avocados and onions to freely come from Mexico while they pay full price for CDs and DVDs. This is specialization and that is what makes trade work.