Two weeks ago the worst fear of Canadian opponents of neoliberal ‘free trade’ agreements came true.
Surprisingly, there has been almost no reaction from the political parties, unions, and other organizations that warned these agreements would be used to undermine Canadian law, even though this is exactly what happened.
In what is becoming a tradition, Chinese troops have again crossed the border into Indian territory, this time in Sikkim. Indian and Chinese soldiers are facing off at the border, trying to see who blinks first. As usual, politicians and people on social media are calling for a boycott of Chinese goods. Forget the impracticality of the whole proposition for a moment – there is another good reason for not boycotting Chinese products.
Free trade, debt and war are all part of the same package, each feeding off the other. They are – each of them – rackets in their own right and they are all symptoms of the same problem. That problem has to do with the fact that our government – along with the rest of the world – has entirely forgotten the basic concept of how a national economy actually “earns” its way to prosperity.
Former Conservative Chancellor George Osborne, now editor of the London Evening Standard, calls Theresa May “dead woman walking”. Another former minister Anna Soubry says: “She is in a desperate position. It is untenable….”, while according to former Education Secretary Nicky Morgan she cannot lead us into another election and a leadership challenge is possible during the summer.
Every one of the transactions making up these national totals represented a free and voluntary exchange.
The first stage of U.S. President Donald Trump’s plan to restore America’s former dominance as a manufacturing country will be announced this coming weekend in Riyadh Saudi Arabia and Washington DC, but its outlines are now already more than clear. The biggest-ever foreign sale of U.S.-made weaponry will be announced at that time, and, according to a little-noticed report by Reuters on May 12th, an unidentified U.S.
Greek membership of the European Union continues to hurt The Hellenic Republic on many fronts. Greece and Russia have been historic allies, sharing a fraternal Orthodox faith and a mutual respect for each other’s cultures. Greece partly owes is independence from Ottoman imperialism to Russian support.
READ MORE: NATO is trying to draw Russia into a new Balkan war
World leaders, including Russia’s President Putin have been attending meetings in Beijing as part of the ‘One Belt–One Road’ initiatives launched by China in 2013.
The ambitious project aims to set up transport and trade corridors that will help connect East-Asia, Eurasia and Europe, using both rail and maritime links.
China’s goals represent the most ambitious project to re-define the logistical and financial nature of world-trade since the creation of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in 1995.
(ZHE) The trade war between North America’s two biggest economies is just getting started as the United States and Canada begin tit-for-tat trade retaliations.
My chances of being PM are about as good as the chances of finding Elvis on Mars, or my being reincarnated as an olive.
— Boris Johnson, UK Foreign Secretary
