Your Congressman Voted for Permanent Normal Trade Relations (Most Favored Nation) status with Red China but for continuing an embargo with Cuba!

I think we'd all agree with two simple aphorisms: "the past is the best guide to the future" and "I don't know about Y'ALL, but where I'M from, if SOMETHING DOESN'T WORK, you STOP DOING IT!" You'd think that if you wanted to guide Red China into less military build-up and aggressiveness, and less violations of everything from patent laws and international labor standards to grotesque human rights violations, you'd look at how Reagan brought down the USSR. We DIDN'T do it by trading with them on the same level that we did with Japan, etc. We instead had Jackson-Vanik to stop the USSR from getting a free pass on human rights violations and military build-up. Indeed, Shcharansky said that the two larger-than-life Americans who inspired dissidents in the USSR were Reagan and Scoop Jackson. When we had done the opposite of that with the Japanese prior to WWII, e.g., trading them our scrap metal, we got a lot of it back in our boys in WWII. Thus, avoiding Most Favored Nation status is a necessary condition. However, it's not purely through trade negotiation that we brought down the USSR but by doubling the defense budget. Once we were threatening the USSR with Star Wars and so forth, and had doubled our percent of GDP from 1 to 2 percent, the Soviets were forced to give us Gorbys and Yeltsins instead of Brezhnevs, Andropovs and Chernenkos. You'd think that a guy who fought in Korea and Vietnam would be bright enough and patriotic enough to follow his own mind and heart (or at least the lessons of history) instead of being a lap dog for Dubya, much less draft-dodger and Moscow-protester Bill Clinton. You'd be wrong! Instead, Sam Johnson voted at least as early as July 10, 1991, when he was first elected, for Most Favored Nation Status with Red China. On September 30, 1992, he temporarily regained sanity on this issue and voted the correct way, although that's not surprising since the vote went 345-74. He lost his sanity or morals again on June 27, 1996 and voted once again for Most Favored Nation Status for Red China, once again on July 27, 1999, and again in May 2000 and July 19, 2001. What was he thinking?

First, trade with China is disastrous for our district since Red China is notorious at ignoring patents, and the 3rd District is a high tech zone! It's also disastrous for the Chinese people and our own labor since Red China regularly uses slave labor camps to do their work, and this also depresses the wages of Chinese who are not explicitly in a 'real' slave labor camp but merely live elsewhere in China, arguably itself the world's largest slave labor camp. Tens of millions of people in China are at any one time in a slave labor camp. They may be a Pentecostal who handed out a tract, a political dissident with a provocative web site, a Falun Gong member who merely exercized in public, or a guy unlucky enough to have an attractive mother, wife, sister, or daughter (or simply some property). Imagine 10 million slave laborers competing with your labor. Imagine how much the Communist government there values them compared to how the North Vietnamese valued an American P.O.W. as a negotiating chip. In other words, not out of the kindness of their alleged hearts, but out of Realpolitik, Sam Johnson, McCain, Leo Thorsness et alius were better treated than the average slave laborer in Red China, or Cuba, or North Korea, or Indochina today. Imagine that you have a government that is trying to make its nation better off (as well as its military budget) by the equivalent not only of 'real' capitalism and 'crony' capitalism but also outright kleptocracy of a sort, e.g., the equivalent of selling stolen cars in the form of slave labor and ripped off patents. Is this good for the US? Not necessarily. As ripped off patents become the norm, the implicit demand curve for inventions (and inventors) goes down. Is this good for the inventors or their corporations, such as in the 3rd District? Let me think about that.....NO! If Red China has a high growth rate AND a high savings rate, isn't it conceivable that we are building up their military even if we DON'T explicitly trade them the equivalent of scrap metal? With their bigger pie (especially this is true when there's a big growth rate and savings rate) they can get whatever they want wherever they want. Thus, even without selling them the strategic equivalent of scrap metal, we are (in Karl Marx's own words) selling the hangman the noose with which to hang us! Recall China's recent aggressive actions towards Japan? What if they decide to get even for WWII? And what if we're next? A House of Representatives Committee chaired by Rep. Christopher Cox released a National Security report in May 1999 known as the ‘Cox Report.’ The report detailed how the Chinese government spied on US nuclear facilities over the last two decades and as a result was able to improve their nuclear capabilities. A secret version of the report was released to President Clinton in January 1999. Note that Sam Johnson voted for MFN status for Red China despite having the results of the Cox report available, despite having fought in Korea and Vietnam, and despite having been in a Communist prison camp for seven years. Can we say 'sell out' boys and girls? If you read this Washington Times article about Red China's military buildup, you'll wonder how it's possible Sam Johnson could have been allowed to remain in office at all given that he's effectively been a traitorous Benedict Arnold the entire time, selling out his nation for 30 pieces of silver campaign contributions.

Let's say that I've convinced you of the idea of 'going slow' with Red China. What about the other extreme - our 'going too slow' with Cuba? If China knows we're going to trade with them no matter what they do, what incentives do they have to stop building up their military, their aggressiveness towards Japan or Taiwan, their illegal use of our patents, or their immoral (and arguably illegal) use of slave labor for traded goods? By the same token, let's say that Cuba knows that we're NOT going to trade with Cuba no matter what they do. What incentives do THEY have to improve THEIR act? Also, NONE! Well, we've tried that with Cuba for almost my entire lifetime. I don't know about y'all, but where I'M from, if something doesn't work, you stop doing it. In other words, rather than MFN for China and an embargo for Cuba, why not the equivalent of Jackson-Vanik for both? Let's look at some of the potential benefits of trade (and especially tourism) in helping Cuba towards freedom. Imagine loads of American tourists (especially those whose native language is Spanish) unload at Havana, and trade in what passes for a market in a Communist dictatorship like Cuba. The traders are likely to say, "Dang! Look at that wad of cash! You don't SOUND like a doctor or lawyer or MBA." "No, I'm just a truck driver who got to the USA from Guatemala - I've got good stamina and don't drink and so I do well, but I didn't even finish High School." "And what about that capitalist State Department propoganda book?" "WHAT?! That's just a mail order catalog. It's not Neimann Marcus, LOTS of folks can afford this stuff." After enough such encounters, and after enough internet connections, etc. are established, it may only be a matter of time before the Cuban people THEMSELVES overthrow Castro and Communism. Compare what we do to Cuba to what North Korea does to itself. They BOTH produce the same economic results, namely, isolation and thus economic misery for the people - but permanent power AS A RESULT OF THE ISOLATION for the leaders. Just as Kim Jong Il has kept HIMSELF in power by continuing his dad's trade isolationism, perhaps it is the trade embargo that is, evidently, keeping Castro IN power. As I said, I don't know about y'all, but where I'M from, if something doesn't work, you stop doing it. yet, sadly, Sam Johnson repeatedly votes even for travel bans (e.g., HR 2989 Roll Call 483 on September 9, 2003), though they are finally beginning to pass. However, his votes against the embargo more generally succeed (e.g., HR 2590 Roll Call Vote No. 271 in 2001, HR 4871 Roll Call Vote No. 424 in 2000).

So if the trade I've mentioned is good for pushing Cuba over the brink, why not for Red China? Well, first, I'm not advocating MFN for Cuba, I'm advocating the in-between status of Jackson-Vanik. Second, size matters. Imagine the impact of 300 million Americans and their money on 11 million Cubans. They'll be blown away. Compare THAT to the impact of 1.3 billion Chinese of less than a quarter that number of Americans. WE'LL be blown away, just as is actually happening. To paraphrase Perot, the large sucking sound you hear is not only your jobs but your military pre-eminence going to Red China.