Pat Buchanan Agrees with Me

And that is a scary thought. Buchanan writes for Human Events "As GM Goes, So Goes the GOP." He could have had my dining room bugged last night, because I was ranting and raving some of the same things to Ken last night (poor man!)

Some excerpts:

In a good year, like 2005, Americans buy more than 17 million new cars, and West Europeans as many. Tens of millions in Eastern Europe, Russia, China, India and Southeast Asia are now moving into the middle class each year. These folks will all need or want one or two family cars. If we let the U.S. auto industry die, that immense and burgeoning market will be lost forever to America, and ceded to Asia.

"Who cares?" comes the free-traders' reply. Japanese and Koreans are setting up factories here. They can pick up the slack.

But that means Americans will work for and depend on foreign companies for a necessity of our national life as vital as the imported oil and gas on which our cars and trucks operate. All the profits of the mighty automobile industry in America will be sent abroad.

Here's another one Buchanan overheard in my house:

If the GOP blocks these loans, and the industry dies, the party can forget about Ohio, Michigan and the industrial Midwest. For the Reagan Democrats will never come home again. Nor should they.

Actually, the GOP could lose some longtime Republican voters. Looking out for our pocketbooks and all. This isn't just affecting the manufacturers and suppliers. I just heard today that there were additional layoffs at my former company and even more at an advertising agency. If the GOP is willing to flush the Rust Belt down the toilet, maybe we should secede and join Canada.

Comments

[Arthur]

Question:
Did you know that China owns most of the U.S.'s outstanding debts? Would that be an issue of National security, I wonder?

Another question:
With so many of the jobs in both the U.S. and Canada moving to "Third World" Countries like China, Taiwan, Pakistan, Mexico, how long do you think it will be before those countries overtake our nations both in economic and military power?

Not only in the auto industry but in the manufacturing sector as a whole, so many jobs and factories are being lost that, we are losing the ability, or at least the capacity, to manufacture what we need, if and when we need to.

[John]

You are right. I go to all the 'major' conservative blogs and they are all chanting the free trade mantra without thinking about what they are saying. I participated in the excercise of moving technology from the US to Mexico and thence to Asia. Outsourcing is great for a few, but a death sentence of our country.