Speaking of scales falling from somene’s eyes, in his column in the Washington Post Charles Lane expresses shock that buying consumer goods in massive quantities from China hasn’t resulted in China’s government becoming more liberal:
Remember how American engagement with China was going to make that communist backwater more like the democratic, capitalist West?
For years, both Republican and Democratic administrations argued that the gravitational pull of U.S.-dominated international institutions, trade flows, even pop culture, would gradually reshape the People’s Republic, resulting in a moderate new China with which the United States and its Asian allies could comfortably coexist.
Well, Chinese President Xi Jinping has just engineered his potential elevation to president for life. This is the latest proof — along with China’s rampant theft of U.S. intellectual property, its military buildup in the South China Sea and Xi’s touting of Chinese-style illiberal state capitalism as “a new option for other countries†— that the powers-that-be in Beijing have their own agenda, impervious to U.S. influence.
The notion is and always has been foolish and everyone with a lick of sense or who knew anything about China knew it. What our policies with respect to China have accomplished is undermining U. S. manufacturing employment (not to mention the environmental disaster of delegating our heavy manufacturing to China where problems become intractable). The statistics are very clear. U. S. manufacturing employment collapsed under the one-two punch of granting China Most Favored Nation trading status and the country’s admission to the WTO. China has maintained that membership without ever meeting the commitments it made for admission.
Again, better late than never. Reversing course in our trade policy with China is going to hurt but it’s something that desperately needs doing. I suggest reciprocity as the foundation for future trade policies.
Bad guys are bad guys. But they sure are happy to sell us stuff. And most are happy to buy it.
Funny thing, these foreign countries never live up to their agreements. But of course I’m sure Iran will be different you see.
Countries live up to their treaties when it suits their fancy and don’t when it doesn’t. We have little better track record than most countries in that regard.
I would do it differently. I would enter into very few international treaties or accords and live up to them punctiliously. That way there’s at least a chance that people will believe you. Now no one believes what we say. That’s very dangerous.
There is no trade with China, free or otherwise. Trade implies an exchange of goods.
At the checkout, there is no free-trade between China and the customer with or without Walmart as the middleman. At best, credit card debt facilitates trade with US as the middleman. (US Treasuries facilitates the credit creation required to allow debt to replace lost income.)
The goal has always been unattainable, but I doubt that Mr. Lane understands that. He seems dumbfounded that the means have not worked, but the scales seem firmly attached to his eyes.
Without President Trump, would any of this be discussed?
Well, the consolation is Xi’s power grab has laid to rest the idea China has developed an alternative system of governance superior to democracy. Now it’s revealed it’s the same system that failed multiple times last century dressed up in new garb.