Trade de cit hurts America

The U.S. trade deficit is close to $1 trillion, and this should be a concern, especially for conservatives.

Our trade deficit with China is $382 billion, and in 2022, the United States imported $538 billion from China. For decades, the U.S. has run large trade deficits as a result of poorly negotiated free trade agreements. Conservatives should be alarmed over the growing trade deficit as it is a sign of our overdependence on foreign nations, but it is also detrimental to our economic and national security.

Since the end of World War II, the United States embraced a policy of free trade, which accelerated with globalization. The idea of establishing free trade agreements was favored by both Republicans and Democrats. Nevertheless, it was Republicans and conservatives in the postwar era that abandoned their preference for protectionism to embrace the ideology of free trade. The Republican Party, with its heritage from the Federalists and Whigs, had been the political party that favored tariffs and a policy of protectionism. Both Presidents William McKinley and Calvin Coolidge campaigned with the slogan the “Full Dinner Pail,” which referred to Republican adherence to protective tariffs. This was a conservative philosophy that promoted economic nationalism and the good of the nation, while the alternative, free trade was advocated by progressives such as Presidents Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D. Roosevelt.

The conservative movement became heavily influenced by the libertarian view of trade. In fact, the free market became similar to a “golden calf” as many worshiped at the altar of global free trade.

The argument was made that free trade not only benefits the consumer, but in the long run it would help workers and make the nation more prosperous. Free trade advocates even argued that granting China most favored nation status would both help the United States economically and democratize China.

in the end, is a good Democrat and nearly always comes through in signing legislation Democrat leaders feel is of vital interest to the party.

PURELY POLITICAL

James Buckley

Today, there is much talk of Mr. Manchin running as a third-party candidate, but I don’t believe that will or would happen. Donald Trump is more likely to head up a third party (but he won’t) than does Sen. Manchin. And Sen. Manchin,

However …

It’s not too late for Joe Manchin to challenge the other Joe — the one in the White House. After all, when Sen. Manchin caved and voted for the so-called “Inflation Reduction Act 2022,” President Biden made promises he failed to keep.

A Wall Street Journal editorial (April 5, 2023) under the heading “Joe Manchin Gets Another Blow,” opined that the West Virginia senator had been snookered yet again by the president. This time by a Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals judgment that struck down a permit for Mountain Valley Pipeline, a natural gas pipeline meant to transport gas from places such as West Virginia to the midAtlantic region that had been blocked.

Because Democrats refused to exclude the pipeline from judicial review, it fell to … judicial review. It certainly made Sen. Manchin look stupid and weak. And it really hurt his chances of re-election in the very red state of West Virginia. It also apparently made him angry. Angry enough, one could surmise, to challenge President Biden in the 2024 primaries.

I believe that’s a course he’ll consider very strongly. Not saying he will, but one can easily imagine the way such a turn could develop.

If it does develop, Sen. Manchin will have a tough time overcoming the hard left’s and the proabortion lobby’s antipathy towards him. After all, he even voted with Republicans against the Democrats’ attempt to enshrine abortion as a federally protected “right.”

The following is also from my column from 2021: “Joe Manchin should announce his candidacy for president as a Democrat in early winter 2023. He would, of course, be pilloried by the far Left. Alec Baldwin has already called Manchin ‘a traitorous Democrat’ for his vote with Republicans against the cynically mis-named ‘Women’s Health Protection Act.’

No doubt other far-Left types in Hollywood — and the Ilhan Omars and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortezes in Congress — would rail against him, but Manchin could possibly garner enough votes from the greater middle and saner contingent of the Democratic Party to overcome the Left’s noisy and likely nasty opposition.”

I did suggest it would be a long shot, but a Joe Manchin at the top of a Democratic ticket could possibly overtake the 2024 Republican Party nominee, whether it be Mr. Trump, Ron

It was former President Donald Trump, who along with other conservatives such as Patrick J. Buchanan, started to urge Republicans and conservatives to embrace economic nationalism. President Trump made trade policy a priority within his administration, and he correctly noted that the United States was not just losing on trade to China, but with other nations as well.

The promised benefits of free trade fell short, especially for the middle class. As a result of trade agreements, the trade deficit not only increased drastically, but the manufacturing sector of the economy was hollowed out along with good paying jobs.

It is estimated that 3.7 million jobs have been lost to China alone. This led to the decline of the middle-class and many communities, especially in

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Bonnie Donovan

Wendy McCaw Arthur von Wiesenberger Co-Publisher Co-Publisher