Get With The Pogrom

None of this fuddy-duddy mommy stuff, we need to look on importing unsafe products from China as companionable world development. Behave responsibly and put the burden of inspection on the American contractor that hired them! (If you think I'm kidding, read on, your economic pundits are hard at work on this one.)

Why worry about the salmonella in the shrimp, the poisons in the kids' toy paint? We have bigger concerns here. And besides, they could retaliate against our U.S. imports of baby bottles that sterilize their kids!

Tainted Chinese imports have become a serious problem. The Chinese government realizes this and has taken swift action, including shutting down 180 food-processing plants since December and executing the former director of its drug and safety agency for corruption.

But because of economic realities beyond that government’s grasp, Chinese imports probably will continue to be a problem in the short term. That’s why American importers need to step up to the plate and assume greater responsibility.

It’s way too easy for American isolationists to use this issue as an excuse to raise protectionist barriers. For example, if we were to ban all food and drugs from China until they could be certified — a potentially political, complicated and very time-consuming endeavor — what do we say about contaminated imports from other countries? And what would other countries say about tainted imports from the United States?

Amazing what a bunch of loose talk will do to your baby's health. Why didn't you think of that when you saw him/her chewing on a poisonous Dora the Explorer? Recklessness to put up barriers to unregulated products just for silly ol' safety concerns.

America’s trade detractors continue to deceive the public by saying Chinese imports are responsible for most American job losses. The truth: Chinese trade benefits American businesses and families enormously.

In fact, by 2010, Chinese trade is projected to boost U.S. real disposable income per household by $1,000 per year, according to Oxford Economics, an economic forecaster associated with London’s Oxford University. And this is on top of current annual income gains of $10,000 for each American household attributable to overall trade and globalization.

In case this makes your head spin, just consider; your income, should you find a way to earn one, goes farther by $1000 because of the cheap Chinese imports from the manufacturers who are farming your former manufacturing job out to prisoners, I mean workers, in their system.

I may not be recognizing all the advantages of sending jobs to countries that do not have protections for their workers, but somehow I never see the economic theorists who defend that practice realizing that $.30 an hour consumers aren't exactly what our manufacturers envision selling to. No, it's you at your former income level they assume will continue to buy their products.

Maybe they're like the GoPerverts in Congress last week who made up families earning $80,000 to get CHIP benefits. Everyone assumed to be buying these $1000 a year less expensive products makes $80,000, don't you see? In a perfect world, we all get ahead. Hey, fellas, your theories are leaving out the factor of vanishing high paying jobs in America. Try putting that into the equation. Then tell me to give the kid some more salmonella. On the other hand, don't, thanks.