“Buy American”—or Bye-Bye America

There is one major problem. Walmart does not buy American made goods and hence American made products never make it to the consumer. Walmart makes far more profits by buying chinese than good ole USA. Since the Clintons and the Bush's have outsourced our manufacturing base and signed the NAFTA, CAFTA and the World Free Trade Agreements USA has lost its manufacturing base. But its not all the fault of the trade agreements, its the fault of the Greedy CEO's who want to produce the cheapest quality product in the USA for the most profit. American Automobiles for years had the same old built in obsolence year after year. It was the Japonese who produced the quality vehicles and that is the reason for the Automobile industry going broke. Air conditioners that wouldn't work, Electric windows that failed, And the good old fashion exhaust system of the American cars. It was lucky to last six months to a year. Midas muffler made a fortune from this built in obsolence as well as the braking systems. And dont forget AAMCO transmissions. When we started to buy Japonese and Korean cars Midas and AAMCO went bye bye. After WWII the American learned that for every thing made in the USA the Japonese were making copies with more quality and improving it at the same time. There must be some genius in any nation in order to survive with progress with dignity. We Americans lost our dignity when we discovered we could not compete with the outside world using the same old technology. Too we werre held in bondage by many of the cartels of the past. We would still be leasing telephones from AT&T if it were not for the Japonese and of course the Government woke up and broke the hold of the communication companies only to be replace with the slick uncontrolled Verizon's and Sprints etc. But at least we can buy and use the frilless cell phones of Trac, Virgin mobile, etc. But still all of our electronics and chip industry has been outsourced to Asia and the brains once a property of American ingenuity has long vanished. It is almost like we were living in a twentifirst century inquisition. Where modern American ingenuity was forbidden, tabu. Today Obama is calling for this stimulus plan to bring us back. Dream on people. Peter Schiff has it right. Instead of electing inteligentsia in our government to lead us to the front of the line where we have some respect and ability to lead this nation and invite the world to follow, we have nothing but a bunch of empty headed garbage cans who have no idea on how to lead a boyscout troop let alone a nation. When Steve Forbe's was running for presidency I had some hope and faith that the American people might just see that the election of a brilliant economist instead of a run of the mill corrupt politician we just might be able to show the world that there is some sanity and intelligence within the American populace. Hah.. but no such luck. The Americans want entertainment and corruption rather than progress, freedom, Liberty, and justice, constitutional government and rule of law. Today we have brilliant people like Peter Schiff and Dennis Kucinich, Ron Paul to name just a couple who have the ability and the expertise to run this country and provide the skills to bring us back to sanity. But for the next four years it appears to will be worse than more of the same. Good Luck people.

guess canada can shut the oil and water off then... it is not made in america... how about those power plants that are needed.... the fissile material comes mainly come... you guessed it canada....

so does that mean we can not have power? it was made in canada?......

the sky is falling the sky is falling.... nope just a damn acorn

I would like to know too. Esp. for food! I go to Publix and everything is marked thailand, China, etc. I don't want seafood brought from China and refuse to buy it. We are big polluters but MAN, China used antifreeze at one point to make a "tingly" toothpaste. They have been caught several times putting a chemical called Melanine in baby formula which killed some Chinese babies. The Chinese have been catapulted into the 21st century and are like slaves working to produce for the greed of America's crap from toys to foods! America, not much better. Look at the Yahoos who plead the 5th in court yesterday about shipping all the tainted peanuts...NINE dead so far.

I am like a lot of others , I intend to buy from my local farmers market, local seafood, and mom and pop businesses. Support your own communities to save your towns and the people!

We can name a lot of "Progress" we have made. The Atom Bomb was a great one. yep, learning how to split the atom was HUGE...boom.

What is made in the USA that we can buy??

I never said that i necessarily want a global government, especially no time soon, but it is coming. You see like I said before its called progress. There is nothing that can really be done to stop it.

Places like China and India are growing at a tremendous rate and are therefore starting to take a lot more jobs and resources. The American standard of living isnt something that is going to be able to be maintained for much longer.

Were starting to see it already. Rising energy costs and the loss of American jobs are all a part of it... and its only just beginning.

People look at American companies outsourcing jobs as being something evil. Its not, its just CAPITALISM. Companies have to try to stay competitive in order to stay in business. Its rather simple.

The funniest part is how much people complain about prices. If that pair of shoes you are wearing were actually made in America then they would be exorbitantly more expensive. Then people complain about how high the prices are. People are just never satisfied with their current situation.

Because you are probably too young to realize when we had lots of business and industry here. Now with millions laid off (myself included)...we need jobs! One Global Economy and Government??? No thanks! Esp. the government part. Our biggest partner, China, still doesn't allow free speech and has the largest army in the world. The sleeping giant. Thats just my opinion and I am not racist, or against anyone. Its just facts to think about. We cannot get along in our own countries and you want us to become a GLOBAL GOVERNMENT. Good luck on that. Are you going to Africa or Gaza or Saudia arabia?

Whats with people being so against companies going overseas for their production? Its called Globalization. Its a force that cant be stopped. Countries are growing to become more and more interdependent and yes eventually there will be a single one world economy and government. Its called progress.

good points to remember.

Buy America provisions aren't just misguided, they're also dangerous. While the idea of spending stimulus money to help only U.S. workers is superficially attractive, it ignores the deep interdependence that links the world's economies. This interdependence flows both ways: Actions that hurt our partners can ultimately hurt us.

This is dramatically clear for businesses and employees in the Bay Area. Bay Area manufacturers get 60 percent of their revenue from overseas. A semiannual survey of 50 leading companies, conducted by the Bay Area Council Economic Institute, finds their share of revenue from domestic sales progressively shrinking and their share of revenue earned from foreign sales growing.

The bottom line is that the health of many of our leading companies and our economy is tied to the willingness of partners around the world to buy our goods and services.

Buy America threatens to unravel that by setting off retaliatory or copycat responses around the world, restricting both access and opportunity. Other nations are enacting their own stimulus packages, and it's important that they be open to participation by U.S. companies. California's high-tech and aerospace industries in particular depend on overseas markets. If we only sell to ourselves, and our partners close their doors, employment will continue to fall and the world's economy will continue to shrink.

Last year the world's major economies, including the United States, urged global leaders to avoid economic protectionism. In November, Asia-Pacific leaders, again including the United States, did the same. But in these difficult times, that consensus could unravel.

As the world's leading economy, we must lead by example. Major economies are working hard to coordinate their responses to the global economic downturn. Buy America could push economies that should be working together back into their corners, each protecting its own shrinking pie.

Remember the "World Trade Centers"??

We allowed our government to write laws authorizing free trade.Again, its still always "show me the money"!!

We didn't give away the jobs...

The greedy corporations trying to maximize their profit did...

I say fuck any American companies that have moved their operations overseas, to Mexico or wherever. They get no money from any of us. You made your beds and now you sleep in them.

This country got by before you existed and we'll get by after you're gone. The same goes for everyone of these failing companies and banks.

I always try to buy locally, buy from farmers markets and ride my bike, etc.

If you shop at Wal-Mart stop doing so. If you shop or receive services from corporate owned businesses, switch to mom and pops businesses even if you have to pay more. In the end we will all be better off for it.

It is a deep hole that was dug for us. As usual, most of us weren't paying attention closely or we would have been more active in our voices on this.

Now, if we use "buy America", we stoop to a new low in the eyes of the world, some like China whom we owe billions of dollars.

I truly believe that once we lost a lot with world trade. You can't even call about a bill without getting someone who doesn't speak English.

It would be nice to scream "every man for himself" in the Global economy but its not the "right' thing to do now. I think we should back away slowly and start taking care of our own.

It seems like we gave away all our jobs expecting to be "The Information Age".