Leon Fisher
The Dismal Failure Of 'Free Trade'
Tue Jan 6 09:44:24 2004
67.1.154.137

http://www.rense.com/general47/failure.htm
The Dismal Failure Of 'Free Trade'
By Leon Fisher
Unknown News
1-5-4


Our representatives in Washington DC, voting in favor of the
Fortune 500, have for many years assured American workers that free
trade is going to be beneficial for them. If indeed free trade has been
so good for America, as the politicians have promised, how come we've
lost millions of jobs paying a living wage and are in danger of losing
millions more?

With trade treaties in place for some time now, no-one can say
that free trade has not had enough time to kick in and deliver what Wall
Street and Washington promised the American worker many years before.

The truth of the matter is that free trade is a complete failure
for the American worker, but successful beyond all expectations for the
wealthy corporate elite. They have, in implementing these treaties,
gutted and uprooted every industry in America which created and
sustained a strong and prosperous middle-class, critical to the economic
and political future of our country.

Not only have labor-intensive jobs paying a living wage
disappeared, but now hi-tech jobs - previously thought to be secure -
are at risk.

The abuse of the economy, which somehow is acceptable if you
call it capitalism, as many proponents of free trade would like the
working man to believe, is in reality grand theft on a world wide scale.
These corporate crooks, along with co-conspirators in the White House
and in Congress who do their bidding, are rapidly bringing the American
worker to his knees, creating an even bigger distance between what used
to be the middle class and the wealthy, and throwing millions more into
poverty.

In order for these evil, greedy men to undermine the American
worker they had to first ruthlessly exploit those impoverished workers,
including children, in third world nations, forcing millions to work
long hours in unsafe conditions for sweatshop wages. The average
American is not aware of this brutal exploitation, as all the major news
media in America are owned and controlled by the same banks and
corporations who are responsible for this misery in the first place - so
not surprisingly, major media makes no mention of it.

As a result, every time we buy a product made in a third world
country we not only perpetuate this misery but also put our own economic
welfare here at home in further jeopardy. It has taken labor here in
America a hundred years, fighting the robber barons for a bigger piece
of the pie, to earn safe working conditions and health care benefits,
and all this is being undone in a fraction of that time.

These, then, are the rewards of free trade: no job security,
unemployment, a lower standard of living, no health care or any other
benefits, and for those of us who are aware of it, the human rights
abuses of workers in third world countries will continue, all in the
name of free trade.
If this situation is allowed to continue, however, the fat cat
corporate crowd will eventually kill the goose that laid the golden egg,
the American consumer. If large numbers of Americans become unemployed
or have jobs which pay little more than minimum wage, there is little or
nothing to spend in a consumer oriented economy. The result will be
economic collapse.

So, the next time someone tries to convince you of the benefits
of free trade, tell them to shove it where the sun don't shine.

And don't vote for any of the Washington traitors, because
without them the corporate crooks would never have been able to screw
the American worker in the first place.
© 2003, by the author.