Obama indicated that he would be pushing for radical changes in Seoul, saying that "We can't continue in a situation in which some countries are maintaining massive surpluses and other countries are maintaining massive deficits."Doesn't it sound a lot like this?
America is running a huge trade deficit against the rest of the world, with the gap between imports and exports reaching $46.3bn last month. Its trade gap with China alone hit $28bn last month.
"We’re not, we’re not trying to push financial reform because we begrudge success that’s fairly earned. I mean, I do think at a certain point you’ve made enough money."It looks like a completely consistent world view. We want equality of outcome, whether it's personal, corporate or international. Germany and China and Exxon and Microsoft have made too much money. Now they need to pay their fair share and help the less fortunate*. So just how is this working?
German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble lashed out at U.S. pressure on Berlin to rein in the country's surging exports, telling Der Spiegel magazine, "The American growth model...is stuck in a deep crisis."The lecture from America's College Administrator-in-Chief is getting old.
He said, "It doesn't add up when the Americans accuse the Chinese of currency manipulation and then, with the help of their central bank's printing presses, artificially lower the value of the dollar."
* - It's telling that Obama, who doesn't believe in American exceptionalism in the first place, implies that the US is among the "less fortunate."
Obama's comment is part of the whole "double our exports" drive. I doubt he is a deep enough thinker to connect this with his redistributionist tendencies.
ReplyDeleteThis is all so depressing. Can't we all just talk about how cool our 'droid phones are?
Well, speaking of changing the subject, what's all this I'm seeing about a mystery missile launched over the ocean near LA? The military says it wasn't one of theirs. A rocketry hobbyist whose hobby has gotten a bit out of hand, perhaps?
ReplyDelete"We can't continue in a situation in which some countries are maintaining massive surpluses and other countries are maintaining massive deficits."
ReplyDeleteThat, my friends, requires a grapefruit-sized set to pull off.
Well played, Mr. President.
Incidentally, a thought occurs to me: If our economic policies annoy China, Brazil, India, and Germany, that means they are bad for *them*. But, does that mean that they are bad for *us*? Is the purpose of our economic policies to make *other countries* happy?
ReplyDeleteTim, I think the unknown missile incident was debunked. It was an airplane and the contrail was an optical illusion.
ReplyDeleteOur policies are making other countries semi-happy right now. We're importing tons of their goods and paying them, but some of their profits are going to buy our debt. What they don't want is to be lectured by some dude whose policies have made his own country hopelessly uncompetitive. It's like the owner of the Bussalo Bills coming to an NFL meeting and telling everyone their teams need to slow down so his inferior one can win once in a while.
ReplyDelete