Hi, my name is MadHound, and I use a (insert electronic device here) made in China.

[Pholus]

24. I think that's what shocks me because the answer leans "yes."

I would argue that corporations, the government and international trade are interlinked and that corporations are the driver in a non positive direction. If this somehow buys into a right wing free trade argument I would counter that even a broken clock is right twice per day so it shouldn't be surprising that the right wing could make an intelligent statement on a single issue.

Sorry, but I have seen LITTLE benefit to our country from free trade in the sense you describe. We run huge trade deficits which drive us into debt, place our population into an underemployment situation and transform our society from doers and builders into people who sell stuff. I am old enough to remember the initial outrage about outsourcing and the corporate PR blitz that claimed when the grunge jobs move overseas we were all magically going to turn into white collar jobs and become "the information society". That prediction didn't come true on a scale sufficient to be a net benefit to our country. I find the ability to buy a $0.99 piece of plastic crap at the local Walmart to not be worth the mom-and-pop shops forced out of business to make it happen -- I knew those people and I think their lives are worse off now.

When government tries to regulate international trade in a vacuum, those decisions would tend to be initially made with the national interest at heart. If these decisions impede the goal of a corporation, which is to provide a return on an investment, a conflict is formed. At that point, corporations can exert money through proxies to try to buy a more sympathetic government through bribes or campaign contributions. So, I think I've isolated the fundamental player in our current woes and it is the corporation and it's quest for maximizing returns in the short term.