globalization

[calbert at tiac.net]

Teufel:

 > As for your
> facts, I do not dispute them. They can be selected and interpreted in
> many ways to great pleasure or severe apoplexy. Or they can be taken
> as personal attacks and not addressed at all.

Absent facts - what do you propose we use? It ain't all lies, damned 
lies, and statisitics.....even you social mechanics use data when it 
suits your purposes?

> Let me restate: We are in a global economy, from which we surely
> benefit.

No kidding.......ask anyone why Cuba remains a fetid hole and they 
will scream (entirely justifiably) about the cruel and inhuman US 
embargo, as if open and free trade with the Great Satan would 
somehow contribute to a Fidelian/Socialist utopia....
 
 > Anyway, the challenge is
> to continue to improve the regulating of such an economy to the
> benefit of the people on both sides of the deal,

Agreed, but lets keep the tools out of the hands of those who would 
deny the salience of facts in evaluating such benefits........

> FTAA and the like
> sidestep that challenge with the belief that where industry is made
> more free to pursue profits, only good will follow.

This represents a fundamental misunderstanding of the 
process....you equate the establishment of CLEAR and 
CONSISTENT rules with license - that's your hang up...will certain 
agents in the process seek unfair advantage in the course of 
negotiations? Of course, this is still the real world...but those involved 
are motivated to operate in reasonably good faith because - and this 
is critically important - what is negotiated will need to be ratified in 
the deliberative bodies of the participating nations. This is one of the 
reasons why Cuba is on the outside..... 

 Governments turn
> over their social responsibilities to capitalists. I don't think that
> is good. It is the opposite of progress.

This is nonsense. Government reps don't yield their territory so 
readily - they too have their ambitions, and it is in the conflict 
between their interests and those of "capitalists", mediated to a 
degree by the public, that greater good will be served.....

love,
cfa