Word: protectionist
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
There is something uncomfortably contradictory about using protectionist rhetoric to sell free trade. And there is something self defeating and hypocritical about exploiting xenophobia to produce global openness...
...like the World Trade Center bombing, Chinese immigrant-smuggling and reports Mexican immigrant soaking up tax-funded service in California have turned public mood against one of America's most cherished traditions: its open borders. The lingering effects of the recession and resentment at Japan's economic "miracle," fuel protectionist desires to think locally, not globally...
Clinton knows the general mood of the country is anti-NAFTA. He knows this well; his whole campaign was based on exploiting fears of economic decline. Indeed, Clinton has tried to spin his support for NAFTA as a protectionist counter to the Japanese menace...
...that threat is to remain credible, from time to time it will have to be carried through--and there will be no dearth of voices accusing Clinton of cowardice if he later backs down. Merely by issuing the threat, the administration shows that it is willing to employ protectionist policies. And in the process, the American government denies itself its best defense: a cogent intellectual argument. For if there are circumstances in which it makes economic sense to grant greater protection to, say, the American car industry (and the threat takes that as its premise), the administration can no longer...
...spite of the Clinton administration's earlier protectionist feints, the exploratory talks show hints that with the right (read Clinton-supported) negotiating strategies the pact may yet be ratified as initially constructed. The weighty appendages of the three supplemental agreements designed primarily to placate opposing labor, industry and environmental groups have not undermined the act's fundamental intent...