Sponsored by the US Chamber of Commerce to echo through various Politician puppet mouths.

They ran that on the 1st stimulus in order to weaken and loophole the buy American clause.

Also, other nations who think America is their toilet, i.e. their consumer market lobbied heavily.

When will we ever learn? (I know, I know, it's the oil!)

WTO 'Uruguay Round' -- "Agreement on Government Procurement ('GPA')"

USA has been bound by this agreement since it entered into force 1 January 1996. China (including Hong Kong) have been parties to the agreement since 19 June 1997.

"Most Parties have been bound by the Agreement since its entry into force on 1 January 1996. For some, it entered into force at a later date. Some Parties have joined the Agreement by way of accession."

From the text of the GPA (btw: note Art. III, ¶ 3) --

Article III: National Treatment and Non-discrimination

1. With respect to all laws, regulations, procedures and practices regarding government procurement covered by this Agreement, each Party shall provide immediately and unconditionally to the products, services and suppliers of other Parties offering products or services of the Parties, treatment no less favourable than:

    (a) that accorded to domestic products, services and suppliers; and
 
    (b) that accorded to products, services and suppliers of any other Party.

2. With respect to all laws, regulations, procedures and practices regarding government procurement covered by this Agreement, each Party shall ensure:

    (a) that its entities shall not treat a locally-established supplier less favourably than another locally-established supplier on the basis of degree of foreign affiliation or ownership; and
 
    (b) that its entities shall not discriminate against locally-established suppliers on the basis of the country of production of the good or service being supplied, provided that the country of production is a Party to the Agreement in accordance with the provisions of Article IV.

3. The provisions of paragraphs 1 and 2 shall not apply to customs duties and charges of any kind imposed on or in connection with importation, the method of levying such duties and charges, other import regulations and formalities, and measures affecting trade in services other than laws, regulations, procedures and practices regarding government procurement covered by this Agreement [i.e., when such customs duties and charges are general, not particular to government procurement].

..........

Article VIII: Qualification of Suppliers

  In the process of qualifying suppliers, entities shall not discriminate among suppliers of other Parties or between domestic suppliers and suppliers of other Parties.

@Bob Hall said "Consumer spending is 70% of our entire economy"

Ahh, but the top 5% account for 37% of that outlay (see link), maybe the top 20% most of the rest. Hence you can easily see it is reasonable to allow 80% of the population to live in tent camps in the desert.

http://blogs.wsj.com/wealth/2010/08/05/us-economy-is-increasingly-tied-t...

Good post.

We all should look in the mirror. Consumer spending is 70% of our entire economy, and most of our economic suicide takes place at the cash register. We vote with our dollars. Every time we make a purchase, we vote for "Made in USA" -- or we vote for something else, like the People's Liberation Army.

Put a pencil to it. If everyone in the U.S. simply reallocated one dollar per day, from foreign-made to U.S.-made, we'd create a lot of jobs. Ten dollars or more per day and our troubles could be over.

Please see my "College Girl, Economy, Jobs" video, then, if you like, my platform at:

www.facebook.com/BobHall2012Campaign

Sign seen posted in front of closed factory:

"This year's company picnic will be held in Mexico"

Detailed analysis by Phil of Phil's Stock World (posted by Ilene) at Zero Hedge ...
titled "Monday Market Momentum - Down is the New Up"

Especially impressive is Phil's account of fundamentals, Phil being a chartist par excellence.

Pointing out that the Financial sector (thanks to Congress and the Fed) is sitting on over $1Tn of excess reserves. and quoting, with approval,  a PDF (2010)  International Institute for Labor Studies paper (Sameer Khatiwada) 'Did the Financial Sector Profit at the Expense of the Rest of the Economy?, Phil continues:

So the Financial Sector makes investing in anything else a bad idea yet investing in the Financial Sector is treated like it’s a bad idea too!  A logical person might conclude that the Financial Sector, on the whole, does MUCH more harm than good to our economy and must be taken down – obviously it just doesn’t work on any level.

A less logical person (like us) might conclude that investors are idiots and that BCS or XLF are fantastic buys at this price for the PATIENT investor, who is willing to scale into a position over time and would be happy to double down should the Financials fall another 50%, rather than bail out with a 50% loss.

It's a long read, but what else do you have to do while unable to get to sleep anyway, sweating out the hours between London's closing and New York's open? Or ....

... just buy gold and hold onto it for dear life, so much easier than thinking ... sleep well, 'nighty night'!

"Did you really mean to suggest that bankers only lend real money, not the stuff the Fed cooks up in its basement?" --Frank T.

NO. Anyway, not exactly my view of things. The Fed can create currency, but the Fed does a terrible job of managing that monopolistic authority, because the Fed is owned by and for the benefit of fractional-reserve privately-owned banks. See, American Monetary Institute webpage on the Federal Reserve system.

I support the American Monetary Act, which has been proposed in Congress by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio).

Link to download PDF --

http://www.monetary.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/hr6550bill.pdf

See also, 'The 1930s Chicago Plan and the American Monetary Act' by Stephen Zarlenga (American Monetary Institute) --

Why is monetary reform so critically important? Because the money power has more impact on citizens day to day lives than the Executive, Legislative and Judicial branches. It’s really a fourth branch of government – or should be – and leaving it in private hands is dangerous and unacceptable – it negates the balancing of powers principle of our constitution and creates an aristocracy – a plutocracy – the rule by wealth.  ---  Stephen Zarlenga

I am a democratic monetarist, meaning that 'printing up' money is just fine, if you are needing a medium of exchange. The thing is that money needs to also be a measure of worth, applicable to planning over a period of time measured in years, not days.  It's a matter of maintaining a sane and well-governed monetary system.

There is no need whatsoever for currency to be a lasting store of value, like over centuries. Indeed that idea, except in times such as the period of exploitation of American resources by the Spanish Crown, tends to result in a disincentive for investors who might invest in the real lasting store of value, which is river of life itself. In any event, such systems as the gold standard inevitably become, if they do not always originate as, entrenched systems designed for the exploitation of labor by militaristic imperialists.

Gold standard isn't the answer, never was the answer. For the USA now to adopt a gold standard would accomplish nothing but the resurrection of William Jennings Bryan from his grave. One of the best moves FDR ever made was his EO 6102 (3 April 1933), aka "gold confiscation order" -- but that option was bequeathed to Roosevelt by the populist campaigning of William Jennings Bryan some decades previous.

Having said that, it may be that a return to silver certificates (and coins with silver content) would be a good idea. But I would prefer to see a multi-metallic system than a bimetallic. It could be a good idea for the USA to institute a basket of commodities approach as has been famously proposed by the economist Hayek. (Gaussian copula theory could be put to good use here!) Such a move shouldn't be necessary, since really the basic thing is mutual trust among intelligent citizens believing in themselves, in working and living in a democracy -- and understanding what that means. But as a practical matter, an intelligent citizenry can decide to make use of the basket approach as part of an overall monetary plan based on control of the money supply under a system of democratically enacted law.

Objections to monetarism as the fundamental truth of monetary theory are really, at their core, objections to democracy. For example, the von Mises Institute -- with which the goldbug Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) is generally associated -- is openly anti-democracy.

I acknowledge that democracy has its pitfalls. But, from the point of view of individual liberty requiring the avoidance of concentrations of power, is there any honorable way around it?

You take on democracy as a matter of faith, or you don't.

American Monetary Institute

_________

Excerpts from William Jennings Bryan's 'Cross of Gold' speech (1896) --

There are those who believe that if you just legislate to make the well-to-do prosperous, that their prosperity will leak through on those below.  ....

My friends, we shall declare that this nation is able to legislate for its own people on every question without waiting for the aid or consent of any other nation on earth  ....

I shall not slander the ...  people [by saying that they] will declare our helpless impotency as a nation to attend to our own business. It is the issue of 1776 over again. ....

If they dare to come out in the open field and defend the gold standard as a good thing, we shall fight them to the uttermost, having behind us the producing masses of the nation and the world. Having behind us the commercial interests and the laboring interests and all the toiling masses, we shall answer their demands for a gold standard by saying to them, you shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns. You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.

----  William Jennings Bryan, addressing the Democratic National Convention, 1896

"It seems better to pay low wages to workers in this country, even if those workers have bee imported than to send the jobs overseas." -- BDaddy

Depends on whether you are paying the low wages or trying to live on them. Also depends on whether you plan to sell products and services in this country or in your community, or not.

What the US public fails to understand is that the bankers WANT us unemployed. And they WANT the US wrecked and they WANT the Chinese to be our overlords. Why? Because Americans are too productive and create TAX SURPLUSES like we did in the late 90s, which allow Americans to pay CASH for cars and houses. Paying CASH means NO NEED for bankers' loans!