Friday, January 6, 2012

A short post

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The situation we are in with China is by far the worst threat America has ever faced.


(other than our terrible wars, Civil War, World War II, Korean War, Vietnam War, Iraq War, Afghanistan War, and others)


And, we are giving China the trillions of dollars and our latest technology they need to destroy us.


Further, there is the definite possibility that it will go from an economic war to a shooting war.


Mr. Greg Autry is one of the authors of the book "Death by China".  My comments above are based on some of Mr. Autry's material.  Here are some further comments from Mr. Autry:


He has made the following point to the Wall Street Journal:


“…on its front pages (WSJ) carries good articles about the military threat posed by China.  However on the inside pages the Journal fails to recognize the economic threat”.


Mr. Autry goes on to state:


“What enables China to build high-tech asymmetric weapons like the DF-21D anti-carrier missile is the continued naïve behavior of the American government and multinational corporations that transfer technology and vast amounts of American capital to a very dangerous state…


In any case, outsourcing our entire manufacturing supply chain to a hostile nation has to be about the stupidest strategic move that any world power has ever made.”




Two sides of the issue


An old saying is that there are two sides (at least) to every issue.  In discussing the relationship between America and China, there are two sides.  One side includes people such as Greg Autry and Ed Farkas who believe the relationship is an absolute disaster.  The other side includes people who think the relationship is constructive and should be built upon for the future.


I say it is impossible for a sane person to sincerely believe that there is good in the relationship with China.  I further say that the pro-China people all have an ulterior motive.  In other words, the pro-China people are 100% corrupt.


Here are some of the ways that people are corrupt:


+  Writers, analysts, newsletter publishers, who believe that their material will be more readily accepted if they adopt a pro-China stance.  And, they are correct in their belief!


+  Writers, analysts, commentators, newsletter publishers, who believe they will get many invitations to be on TV talk shows, if they adopt a pro-China stance.  Again, they are correct in their belief!


+  Analysts and commentators who create what I call fantasy explanations (see previous posts August 18, April 23, April 21, 2011, November 26, 2010) to explain our current disastrous economic situation, without admitting that we did it to ourselves by sending our manufacturing jobs away and importing trillions of dollars worth of foreign-made goods.


+  People who simply want to be comfortably on the "winning" side where the money is and where the influence is.


+  Politicians who receive money from China lobbyists or from American companies who hope to do more business with China, and want to avoid any action that might annoy China.


+  People who believe, or pretend to believe, that any action that annoys China, such as commenting on the currency valuation issue, would lead to a "trade war".  Are these people really so stupid that they cannot see that we are ALREADY in a trade war (economic war) and we are LOSING HEAVILY?  These people have one of the ulterior motives mentioned above.


Here is an example.  R. B. Reich was a brilliant man who rose meteorically and was the Secretary of Labor in the first Bill Clinton presidential term.  Now Reich is on a TV talk show or similar event almost every day of the week.  How did he achieve this success?  By dumbing himself down.  Recently he said that China has only a very small effect on the American economy and that China "merely assembles" goods.


What does he mean by "merely assembles"?  If the assembly is so "mere", why don't we have it done here in America by some of the 25 million unemployed?


How can a formerly brilliant man, presumably devoted to America in the 1980s, now change his tune and make the outrageous and untrue statements quoted above?  How can he look  himself in the mirror every morning when he is shaving?  Oh, right, he doesn't shave!


The San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank did a "study" of the involvement of China in the American economy.  The result of the "study" is that China's involvement is only 2.7%, and the good news is that many thousands of jobs are created for truck drivers, ferrying Chinese-made goods around America.


A ten-year-old child could see the nonsense in this "study" result.  Who told the Bank to make this study, and who told them what the result should be?


So here is another case of corruption.  It is exactly the same as the joke about the dictator of a third-world country sitting in his office.  His henchman comes in with an armload of documents.  The henchman says "Here are the results of next month's election."




Another category


There is another category of people who probably have no ulterior motives but base themselves on simplistic statements and labels, as a substitute for opening the mind, looking at what is REALLY happening TODAY, and doing some thinking and understanding.


Examples:


+  People who say that restrictions on international trade caused the Great Depression and other depressions.  These people use the empty scare word "protectionism".  This word means nothing and is a substitute for thinking and understanding.


+  People who say that manufacturing cost is too high in America and unions caused our present problems.  If there was any truth in these statements 50 years ago, there is no truth in them now.  Again these statements are a substitute for thinking and understanding.


+  People who say that Americans don't want to work.   Comment:  No one has data to support this statement.  There are 25 million people unemployed.  No one can say that all these people don't want to work.




A special category


There are people who cannot believe that our business and government "leaders" have messed up our country so completely.  I don't want to be too hard on these people.  The realization that effectively there is no leadership is very frightening and de-stabilizing.


As stated in an earlier post (November 28, 2011), I am afraid that no man or woman who becomes president will be brave enough to stand up and break the chains of China and other low-wage countries.  In a way I can understand the dilemma.  Any president of the United States clearly gets his or her orders from powerful people behind the scenes who really run things.  Maybe the president is even threatened with an "accident" or assassination if he or she stands up and breaks the chains.


At the same time I can't understand why the very wealthy and powerful people behind the scenes want to wreck America.  How will they benefit from a wrecked America?  I think the obvious explanation is that these extremely wealthy and powerful people are not sane.




Another category of illogical statements


People ask "How can we compete with China in manufacturing?"


American Institute of Chemical Engineers (of which I am a member) recently plaintively asked "How can we compete with China in R & D?".


The answer is that we should not even THINK about competing with China.  There is no need to compete with China.  We have a huge market in America of over 312 million people.  Let us do R & D, design, engineering, and manufacturing, to serve this market.  If we engage in trade, let us trade in manufactured goods only, with western countries with similar values, pollution and safety standards, and wage levels.


Speaking of western countries, if America rises up and breaks the chains of China and other low-wage countries, we will also do a great service to other western countries.


Why are the EU countries in such bad shape with huge unpayable debts?  Answer:  They have also lost their manufacturing, lost the employment, lost the wealth-creation, of manufacturing.  If they see us breaking the chains, they will be encouraged to also break the chains.


What about Australia, Canada, United Kingdom?  All in the same boat.  All have lost major portions of their manufacturing.  All have huge unemployment problems.  In March 2011, the Prime Minister of Australia visited Washington and was given the royal treatment, including speaking to the combined Senate and House.  She said, to rousing cheers, that Australia is doing great and the unemployment is only 5%.  That statement is an absolute lie.  The actual unemployment is at least 15%, probably more like 20%.


The behavior of Australia and Canada is analogous to that of people who sold scrap metal to Japan just before World War II.  Australia and Canada are selling raw materials to China and also allowing China to purchase, for example, coal mines in their countries.  So in addition to sending money to China, Australia and Canada are sending the resources that China needs to carry on the economic war.