Buy American

[BigBrother]

You want it to stop? Quit buying anything made in a foreign land, that is our only hope. Cabelas, BPS, it doesn't matter, stop the bleeding.

I humbly disagree. We can not stop the bleeding. To fix it, we must slash shit and hemorrhage to the point of death.

Yours is an emotional, and incorrect position.

We are capitalist pigs. It is our bread and butter, it is in our blood.

It is protectionist policies such as that which bastardizes capitalism.

Fix it, we must level the playing field. Stop giving other nations the advantage by making everything here, so expensive. First order of business, is to sanction labor unions. Their very presence and existence are a cancer to free markets. Next, if we must continue with our green manufacturing, (raises costs) levy import tariffs on those nations who pollute. Also if we must suffer the unions, levy tarrifs on nations who pay their help fractions of what we pay ours. The only solution to make us even a semblance of what we were once, is to compete on quality.

Caution: Imposing tariffs will create much higher prices at Walmart.

We do not want to do that.

We, as a nation, dont give a shit about quality. We just want the flashiest, the most, and the newest of whatever walmart has to offer. Some of us will even buy substandard shit if it has a "Made in America" tag on it....never really stopping to ponder the possibilities of where the components were made.

We are teetering at that point where we produce nothing. Our manufacturing is slipping away. We will eventually do away with any and all oil drilling. We will be an economy based soley on debt...(waitadamnedminute, we already are).

Think for a minute on why the Toyota, Honda, BMW, etc plants arent assembling their vehicles in Michigan and OH? Labor unions, higher taxes, and restrictive environmental policies.

I hear there is are descendants of the confederacy somewhere in Brazil...

[duckduckdog]

Word

[Steelin' Ducks]

Where was your computer made?

[BigBrother]

Ouch.

[Swamp Rat]

My brief read of the document tells me that the decision was strategic, not economic. This is for the AFGHAN pilots to fly... not the US. It is important to note that the Afghans are already familiar with flying Russian helicopters of this type, and the lag time associated with getting them current on US birds is seen as unacceptable.

Not everything is driven by money.

As for outsourcing, our military has been using several foreign weapons systems for years.

[boondoggle]

Russian helos are easy to fly, maintain and suit the operating environment (altitude). Another bonus is they are cheaper and readily available without transfer of technology issues as Rat pointed out.

[jwilliams]

I hear you, BB, but instead of restricting labor unions, in the current market place, our government just needs to quit propping them up and they will fall. Most workers in the South realize that they do not need or want a union because unions = shutdown adios amigos moving to ali bama. But, b/c the demorats receive untold millions in funding, scratch my back i'll scratch yours.

SO...no need to sanction them, just quit propping them up. For consumers to buy American made, the prices need to be competitve. ie...just bought some bush hog blades. The manufacturer blades are 3x's the price as an after market knock off. They are better made and will last 2x's as long....So, if I can by three sets of el knock offs for one set of manufacturer's blades....you get the point.

And I agree on some kind of levy/tariff on imports from Countries that don't pay a fraction of wages, work comp, unemployment insurance, DHEC, OSHA, Env Regs, fines, corporate taxes, matching FICA, etc.

No way US can be competitive in those situations. One of the incorrect assumptions with NAFTA was that the "low wage" jobs would go abroad and the "good tech jobs" would stay home....well guess what, those people can learn too...Companies can create machinery that are almost "idiot proof".

When you call to get service on your Sony handycam, can you understand the technician?