Michigan was once the manufacturing center of this nation. [View all]

[kentuck]

Especially during the 50's and 60's. After the oil embargo in 1973, people started looking for more economical cars. Toyota was coming into this country faster than they could be produced. The big car companies in Detroit attempted to make cars that could compete with the Toyota, cars like the Ford Pinto or the Chevy Vega. They failed miserably.

Automobiles had been the centerpiece of Michigan's economy for several decades but, the influx of foreign cars, mainly Japanese, took a heavy toll on their economy.

Ted Cruz blamed the failure of Michigan's economy on Democratic liberal policies for sixty years. His audience seemed to accept it as the gospel truth.

However, he never mentioned the passage of NAFTA or GATT or any of the trade treaties that were passed in the 1990's and after? American companies were taking all kinds of manufacturing out of this country. (They blamed the high wages of union workers when in fact, their marketing budgets were larger than than their union payroll.)

Michigan did not have enough of a diversified economy and when they lost their manufacturing jobs, especially automobiles, and their economy nose-dived, along came "voodoo economics". With plans to cut spending and cut taxes, there were added pressures on the cities, like Detroit.

Until we are where we are today. The arguments, that it was some "evil" within the Democratic Party philosophy that caused the collapse, were unsound. Nothing hurt Detroit and manufacturing more than the trade treaties that were negotiated and approved by both political Parties. If the inclination is to blame someone else, then we should understand that these treaties were "bi-partisan" in every respect.