Posts Tagged → nation
Fair trade, not free trade
When I ran for Congress (at that time the PA 10th inhabited by Democrat Tim Holden, which included about all of Schuylkill County and parts or all of Berks, Lebanon, Dauphin and Perry counties) in 2009-2010, I remembered and repeated a phrase from my long ago 1980s political activism days in Centre County – Fair trade, not free trade.
Despite being fifteen years ago, this phrase caught on with our voter audiences. They really liked it, and many voters I met while campaigning had personal stories about their family’s various jobs in then-shuttered factories. And I was reminded of watching a high tech glass and industrial mirror factory close up shop in State College, PA, around 2000. It was the old Corning branch there on the Benner Pike. Literally sat there and watched the workers carefully, lovingly package up their machinery for its trip to the “new” factory in China. Some of the workers went over to train their Chinese counterparts, before returning to State College without a job.
Funny thing that President Trump’s tariff policy amounts to this exact summation of the more or less running bank account that every responsible nation keeps with all other trading partners. The fact that only most nations are tariffing American made goods at high rates, while enjoying very low tariffs on their products imported into America, is a sign of what ails us Americans: We think we can give give and give away everything we have, and we are too big to fail from it all. Which is nonsense.
Interestingly, we see the same argument about illegal immigration and endless government spending: No limits, America must take and absorb all of the costs that the world places on us…Everything is “free free free” except, of course, it isn’t free. These policies come with huge costs to Americans.
Free trade, as in giving away our trade imbalances for free, which enriches everyone else and impoverishes Americans, is a sign that our policy makers and indeed our own voters falsely believed that America is such a huge fountain of bounty and wealth that it can endlessly sustain this. What a silly and dangerous fantasy.
Sending our factory jobs, indeed our actual factories with all of their equipment and machinery, abroad to be re-born in China, Vietnam, India and elsewhere was nuts. It sent our means of production, our workers, our jobs, and our money out of America. All America got in return was maybe cheaper and junkier versions of what we had once made here, at a high quality. And yet this “free trade” thing picked up steam as big American corporations and their pet politicians began to take on a global view of trade. No longer were companies based in Delaware “American.” Rather, many of these companies’ senior leaders considered them to be global citizens that just happened to find a perch in America.
This off-shoring of everything America makes, grows, produces went on unchecked for a good thirty years, until everyone began to notice the downside, the cost. Just about every East Coast and Mid West state now has its own “rust belt” area. Areas filled with hulking, empty brick buildings and over-grown parking lots next to rivers and highways tell the sad tale of America’s economic downfall, and our nearing ruin.
Sure, we had a lot of government spending in the past twenty years to temporarily make up for the job losses, the depressed wages, the looming home foreclosures. But that spending is unsustainable. It is “robbing Peter to pay Paul.” It is simply printing Dollars for the sake of printing them. Less and less stands behind them. And yet someone standing way back there in the background was making a ton of money off of this screwy policy, while the rest of us Americans lost from it.
And so now we have a bold and very natural pro-America policy, the equalization of tariffs, making trade fair, not free, and the whole world is suddenly going upside down. My 401(k)! My dog’s retirement account! Oh my God, what will happen?
Folks, relax. Do a bong hit or have a glass of red wine. Our American world is not only not going to end, it is going to return to our glory days. Yes, it takes time, it will take time, so don’t be a bunch of prissy little Gen Z weenies demanding immediate gratification. America is worth fighting for, and these dueling tariffs are the opening salvo. Round One.
You know what is kind of oddly funny about that Fair trade, not free trade slogan? As apt as it is right now, I got that from some 1980s Centre County union workers, which trade or factory or coal mine they were in, I no longer recall. But they were right. And Trump is right. And we Americans are all aligned together on this to Make America’s Economy Great Again…
All together now, breeeaaathe…
You are a Zionist, so am I, the Irish especially
Whether you think you are a Zionist, or not, you absolutely surely are one if you love your country. And it turns out you are in good company, because literally everyone else around the world is also a Zionist, albeit in shades of grey that suit each person and nation. The Irish are especially Zionist, they who have been exhibiting intense nationalistic pride and fervor lately in defense of their homeland.
The Scots, on the other hand, are nowhere near being Zionist, as they have completely given up on their own nation and turned it over to people who violently hate them. How sad; pathetic, really. They of Highlander and Claymore fame have no self pride, no sense of their own fantastic history. The irony here is that the nation that once dominated Scotland so brutally, England, is right behind them, also swirling down the “diversity” toilet bowl and throwing national pride and defense of homeland over the side of the boat filled with foreign invaders who hate them.
What is Zionism, this strange sounding word? Why call nationalism Zionism? Good question!
Zion is the ancient Biblical word for Israel, and in its most essential form Zionism is just simple old nationalism for Zion, which is simply a national pride in and defense of one’s homeland. Here it is Zion (Israel, Jerusalem, the Holy Land), but you can have nationalist feelings like Russiaism, Francism, Chinism, Brazilism etc. All the same thing about different places.
Generally speaking, that is all Zionism is, and literally everyone around the planet has some degree of national pride in their own country, whether they are from Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Canada, Russia, France, or especially Japan and China. Thus, it follows that everyone has their own form of Zionism, though they might call it something different than that exact word. It is really simple:
Zionism = nationalism = universally felt love of and pride in one’s own country. Everyone feels it, everyone is it, everyone is Zionist. Everyone, especially the Irish. Go Irish!
The fact that Israelis are also proud of their nation and devoted to its defense like everyone else around the world is devoted to their own country is no surprise or deviation from the international norm. Israeli nationalism is no different than anyone else’s nationalism, except that Israel’s nationalism, called Zionism since the 1850s, is recorded throughout the Bible and begins about 3,500 years ago. That is a pretty old claim on a piece of real estate! Especially when we think of the Franks claiming what ended up becoming France only a thousand years ago, at most.
Recently I saw a video of some goofball lout yelling at participants in a pro-Israel rally, “Zionism isn’t even a part of Judaism,” he said over and over.
Really? I don’t think he is right about this.
If anything, the historical and Biblically commanded devotion of Jews to living in and militarily controlling Zion AKA The Holy Land AKA Israel AKA Judea is one of the most fundamental tenets of Judaism. In the very beginning of the Bible, and repeated again and again throughout the Bible with different characters, God promises to Abraham that his Jewish descendants will inherit Israel. So strongly did Jews feel their Zionistic nationalism 1,960 years ago, that they ended up in a war (year 67 CE) with the world’s leading superpower, Rome. And then again, seventy years later (year 131 CE) the Jews rose up and duked it out with the Romans again. And then again in the 1940s with the British Empire, and now again with the Islamic Empire.
So yeah, Jews are super nationalistic and Zionism is fundamentally a part of Judaism. Always has been, always will be.
True, there are Jews who say they are not Zionists, but hey, there are chickensh*t traitors in every group, people looking for what they think is the easiest way out of whatever situation they find themselves in. Those Jews decrying Zionism and Israel are, no surprise, the least involved, least devoted, least Jewish Jews you can find anywhere. So for them, attacking the most visibly Jewish thing, Israel and Jewish nationalism, is their way of trying to disassociate from being Jewish. After all the hell that Jews go through for simply being Jewish, I can’t say I blame them for wanting to check out.
Interesting, then, that Christian America has SO MANY PLACES named Zion!
In the Bible, Zion was always the Promised Land, and to America’s European founders, America was the new Promised Land. And so they named thousands of places in America and across America after Biblical places, including Hebron, Zion, Jerusalem, etc.
America has a Zion National Park, and my area of central Pennsylvania has a ton of places named Zion (see some of the photos I took below).
The point is, when a person opposes Zionism they are opposing just one country’s nationalism. Now why would any person oppose just one country’s nationalism, and not everyone else’s? I mean, I don’t think I have met anyone who loved French nationalism who did not also grudgingly recognize German nationalism and pride. Lots of us Americans are nationalists for America, but we understand why others feel strongly about their own country. Right?
So why are only the Jews being singled out for attack and de-nationing among an entire planet filled with people and nations? Why is only Jewish nationalism such a terrible thing?
I think we all know why. Zionism is being singled out because the same evil envious loser people who always hate Jews have simply found another way to show that they hate Jews. And so Zionism is attacked by people who themselves have tremendous Zionism for their own country.
Oh, the irony of people claiming that Zionism is a “colonial settler ideology,” when Zionism is simply the 3,500-year-old unbroken Biblical and modern history of Jews living in their ancient homeland, Judea/Israel/Zion. Jews cannot possibly be strangers or colonists in their own homeland, and so it is richly ironic that it is the land-stealing Islamic imperialists and Arab and Turkish colonialists who oppose the Jews. Across the planet, jihadi imperialism has spread Islam (Two Billion People total) by force and violence far beyond the Arabian Peninsula, and yet these same colonists covet this tiny little sliver of land held by the smallest of peoples, the Jews (Ten Million People total).
The Han Chinese ethnic group numbers somewhere close to a billion people, in one of the largest nations on the planet, and yet they maintain a sincere fear of being replaced, and so the Han Chinese maintain one of the most aggressive, largest militaries on the planet, and they are in a constant state of imperial expansion.
If we have to render unto Caeser what is Caeser’s, and if the Han Chinese get to keep testing everyone else’s boundaries, and if political and jihadi Islam never stops trying to take over other people’s lands, can’t we just let the tiny Jews enjoy their tiny little Zion, their ancient Promised Land? Is that really too much to ask? I don’t think so. You yourself don’t want to give up your own Zion, either, wherever that happens to be.
Every human being is a Zionist for their own Zion, whether that Zion is actually in Zion or is in France or China or Russia, America, or Italy.
Zion PA, Centre County
Zions View PA, York County
Mount Zion in Zion, the original site of Zionism 3,500 years ago
The Jewish deed to Israel is 3,500 years old and says “Zion” on it. Blessings to all Zionists
The end of the Internet as metaphor
As intriguing as the thought of artificial intelligence may be, the truth is always so much more prosaic and humble.
The last frontier and the only real outpost of true free speech, the Internet was never broken, it needed no fixing. And yet the Obama administration, through the FCC and FEC, is planning on regulating it like a utility and then regulating its content.
If you have a website, like this blog, you will have to apply for a license, just like a radio or TV station. Imagine some government bureaucrat not liking the message of smaller, more accountable government on this or similar websites, and then not issuing the necessary license to have it in the first place. Your free speech, my free speech, is shut off, shut down, by the very government that is supposed to guarantee the First Amendment.
That is the FCC role.
And then if I write things that are supportive of one candidate over another, it’ll count as an in-kind contribution to that candidate’s campaign. Imagine an army of government bureaucrats monitoring free speech on the Internet, and writing down and tabulating what people say and write on their blogs as campaign contributions.
That is the FEC proposal, and it is none too supportive of free speech, either.
And mind you, the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, CNN, NPR, MSNBC and other establishment and legacy media will all get passes. They can continue to be active arms of one particular political party, and their writings, their endorsements, will not count as in-kind campaign contributions.
While all this government interference and control in our private lives seems insane to the normal freedom-loving American, it is, in fact, what is happening right now. “Net neutrality” sounds, well, neutral, and it is anything but that.
Tempting as it is to say “And then add this to the IRS political suppression and NSA spying scandals…,” the truth is that few people seem to care, no matter what Obama does. Americans are willingly giving up their freedoms, their control of government, their tax money, their security, to a man who clearly does not like America as it has been founded and run since 1776.
Apparently, government control of Internet content and our individual personal lives fits into that general malaise. Sad.
What is even sadder is that so many people so much want one particular party to have complete control that they will do all of this, plus grant amnesty to illegal aliens to overrun the established voters who built the nation. None of this is sustainable. No nation can withstand this.
On Being a Dinosaur
I am a dinosaur.
In so many ways, my beliefs, ideals, values, education, outlook, hobbies, lifestyle, and behavior seem as outdated and as uncommon as the dinosaurs that died out long ago.
Put another way, I am one of the Last of the Mohicans, certainly not THE last, but one of a dwindling group that sees the world differently than the corrosive pop culture fed daily to Americans by Hollywood.
And I am proud to be this way, to be a patriot, to exalt individual citizen rights and liberties above government intervention, to take risks and make sacrifices in a free market capitalist society that rewards hard work and penalizes laziness. American Sniper, Act of Valor, and Lone Survivor are the only movies that moved me in many years because I believe in military heroes, although the Lord of the Rings productions are highly entertaining.
Meanwhile, pop culture would have every American equally unhappy, equally deprived of their rights and liberties, equally planted on a couch eating junk food and watching mindless TV shows that are at war with the underpinnings of Western Civilization.
(A short, hard-hitting article about Hollywood’s destructiveness by one of its most famous writers is here.)
And I am also an old-fashioned “Hook-and-Bullet” conservationist, a hunter, life-long gun owner and fisherman, an NRA member and even more so, a FOAC member who means it when I say “You can have my guns when you pry them from my cold, dead hands.”
But did I mention that conservation is a huge part of my identity? You know, farmland preservation, wildlife habitat protection, forest land acquisition for public ownership, and wilderness areas where I can hunt, fish, camp, and hike without seeing or hearing another human being for as long as I am out there.
And why is it so hard for so many traditionalists to see that traditional American values are directly tied to, and derive from, rural landscapes? And that our remaining rural landscapes are precious fragments of the great American frontier, on which our national identity and Constitution were forged?
So why wouldn’t a conservative want to conserve those rural landscapes that gave birth to his identity and values, that enshrine Constitutional rights and self-reliance?
For some strange reason, an increasing number of gun owners are not hunters, and do not really show that they care about wildlife populations or wildlife habitat, or about land and water conservation. When I attend meetings at different sportsmen’s clubs, like Duncannon Sportsmen, and I hear the Conservationist’s Pledge, my heart wells up and I nearly get as teary-eyed as when I hear the national anthem, or the Pledge of Allegiance. It doesn’t help that most of us in the room are sporting lots of white in our beards and on our heads. The next generation seems to have taken a lot for granted, because all of the battles we fought decades ago bore such abundant fruit.
All this makes me a dinosaur, and although I recognize it, I am not happy about it. I feel like I am watching the greatest nation on Planet Earth disintegrate under my feet, and it scares me, makes me sad, and makes me want to do what I can to try to prevent it from happening.
I do not want traditional American values to go extinct, like the dinosaurs, because although those values may not be in vogue right now, America was founded on them and the nation cannot successfully continue on without them.
Love your mother, love America
It’s Mothers Day, and you should love your mother. America is our mother. Show her love, support her, fight for her. And if you don’t like her the way she has been taking care of the American family since 1776, then guess what, she’s not your mom and you should probably go find a different place to call home, a different country to call the Motherland. She doesn’t need to be transformed and you aren’t appreciating her.
Challenging modern sensibilities
Yesterday, the distant father of one of our bear hunters texted his cell phone, urging him to retreat from the cold descending upon central Pennsylvania.
“Too cold! Go home!” read the text, which included several other adjectives supposedly describing hunting conditions.
The dad is not a hunter. He’s a very nice man, a hard worker, a veteran of Vietnam War infantry battles that earned him two Purple Heart medals. He’s no wimp. He is, however, a member of a materially comfortable society that increasingly believes food comes from the market, heat from the switch, and clothes from China.
Luxury is the standard for most Americans. By international standards, our ubiquitous cell phones, big screen televisions, cars, and expensive clothes are unimaginable expenses in days filled with constant quests for food and shelter around the planet.
Hunting for us makes us human, and quintessentially American. Hunting connects us to a human tradition predating anything surrounding Americans today. Cold weather is part and parcel of hunting. It challenges our artificially padded modern sensibilities for a few days, something that everyone needs. Couch potato nation, arise!