Treaty Neg Stuff

W/D From NATO is Good.

The United States Should Withdraw from NATO
Bruce Fein, 8-29-2016, "The United States Should Withdraw from NATO," HuffPost, https://www.huffingtonpost.com/bruce-fein/the-
united-states-should_b_11762584.html

We should not be in the business of pledging to send our brave soldiers to risk that last full measure of devotion to defend Estonia, Latvia, or
Lithuania from Russian aggression, or Croatia or Albania from Serbian attack. Their sole duty is to defend the citizens of the United States who
pay their salaries and owe allegiance to the United States, which Estonians, Latvians, Lithuanians, Croatians, and Albanians do not. For that
reason among others, the United States should invoke Article 13 of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to withdraw. Our
NATO
membership contradicts the Constitution’s foreign policy of billions for invincible self-defense, but not
one cent for Empire or entangling alliances. NATO was established in April 1949 not in self-defense, but to provide military
protection to Europe (including the French colonial appendage in Algeria) and the world generally at the beckoning of the British Foreign
Secretary Ernest Bevin. That Empire objective hearkened back to President Woodrow Wilson’s starry-eyed aim to make the world safe for
democracy by employing United States military force under the League of Nations auspices to defend every border on the planet. President
Harry Truman, in signing the NATO treaty, echoed Wilson: “By this treaty, we are not only seeking to establish freedom from aggression and
from the use of force in the North Atlantic community, but we are also actively striving to promote and preserve peace throughout the world.”
(Truman economized on the truth. Portugal, a founding member of NATO, was then governed by dictatorial Prime Minister Antonio Salazar.) To
reiterate, self-defense did not push us into NATO. In 1949, we were the most militarily and economically dominant nation on the globe. We
enjoyed an atomic bomb monopoly, and Europe was militarily unified under the 1948 Brussels Treaty Organization. No invasion from any
quarter was threatened—including from the Soviet Union. Even during the depths of World War II, neither the Wehrmacht nor the Imperia
Japanese Army set foot on the continental United States. We joined NATO as part of a gratuitous, preoccupation with containing Soviet power
no matter how irrelevant to protecting us from attack. It
was no accident that our NATO membership was soon
followed by President Truman’s unconstitutional Korean War, the overthrow of democratically elected Iranian Prime
Minister Mohammed Mossadegh the overthrow of Guatemala’s President Jacobo Arbenz, executive agreements to defend Franco’s Spain, and
the attempted assassination of Patrice Lumumba of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. These undertakings were calculated to check the
Soviet Union. Our NATO and post-NATO quest for Empire and global domination made a mockery of the bravery and sacrifices of Lexington and
Concord in 1775. Our glory had previously been liberty, not world leadership whatever that means. Our march had previously been the march
of the mind, not the march of the foot soldier. Our greatness had previously been a fair opportunity for every citizen to develop his faculties
and to pursue his ambitions free from domestic or foreign predation. Our summum bonum had never previously been a multi-billion dollar
military-industrial complex bestriding the world like a colossus chanting, “We are the chosen people.” Suppose the Soviet Union had invaded
Western Europe without NATO despite the BTO military alliance. That would not have disturbed the safety and security of the United States.
Indeed, the invasion would have been a blunder which would have accelerated the disintegration of the Soviet Empire and weakened its ability
to threaten us in the interim.. Conquests or occupations of hostile peoples weakens rather than strengthens the conqueror or the occupier, for
example, Napoleon in Haiti or Spain, or the United States South Vietnam, Iraq or Afghanistan. . The point may seem counterintuitive, and
requires elaboration. Colonization, conquest or foreign occupation loses money for the national treasuries of the colonizer, conqueror, or
occupier, although particular individuals or companies may be enriched by state-created monopolies or crony capitalism. The military costs of
occupation and control of hostile populations dwarf any offsetting expropriation of property. Thus, post-World War II decolonization in Africa
and Asia lifted economic albatrosses from Britain, France, and the Netherlands, among other nations. The fall of the Berlin Wall and the
disintegration of the Soviet Union were precipitated substantially by the prohibitive costs of subsidizing and militarily occupying and controlling
its Eastern and Central European satellites. The USSR was required to suppress a 1953 Uprising in East Germany, the 1956 Hungarian revolt,
Prague Spring in 1968, the 1970-71 Uprising in Poland, and the Polish Solidarity Movement in 1981, among other manifestations of chronic
foreign restiveness or resentment. The costs of ruling over a hostile population are staggering. Russia, for instance, spent $30 billion from 2000-
2010 to prop up its rule in the Muslim North Caucasus, including Chechnya Another $80 billion will have been forthcoming by 2025 for a
population of only 9 million. The Eastern and Central Europe and North Caucasus examples demonstrate that Soviet aggression against Western
Europe after World War II would have weakened it and probably failed. In 1949, Western Europe was far stronger militarily than was the
mujahideen that thwarted Soviet aggression in Afghanistan in 1979 or the North Vietnamese who defeated the United States in Vietnam. At
that time, Europe had already united militarily under the BTO to defend itself. If the Soviet Red Army secured temporary victories, the military
resources expended in the endeavors would nevertheless have lessened its ability to attack the United States in the same way that Operation
Barbarossa in World War II lessened Hitler’s threat to Great Britain by squandering Third Reich military resources in fighting the Soviet Union.
Notwithstanding these truths, our overwhelming military victories in World War II fueled a psychology of Empire that found expression in NATO
membership. The chief earmark of that psychology is world domination for its own sake—even when it promises self-ruination. NATO enabled
the United States to dominate Western Europe. We were NATO’s torso, while the Europeans were NATO limbs. The Supreme Allied
Commander in Europe has always been an American. At present, the United States pays 75 percent of NATO’s budget, and deploys 65,000 to
70,000 troops in Europe. But domination
for the sake of domination is treasonous to the Declaration of
Independence and Constitution. The United States was an anti-imperialist creation. The exclusive purpose of government,
according to the Declaration, is to secure unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, not to race abroad in search of
monsters to destroy. The Constitution repudiated the global projection of force or wars not in self-defense—no matter how benignly
motivated—because the results would subordinate liberty and transparency to coercion and secrecy by concentrating limitless power in the
executive. The Roman Republic had been destroyed by endowing dictators with limitless power to fight wars. The Constitution’s war powers
were entrusted to Congress, not to the President, to prevent the emergence of a warfare state underwritten by a military-industrial complex.
James Madison explained in a letter to Thomas Jefferson: “The constitution supposes, what the History of all Govts demonstrates, that the Ex. is
the branch of power most interested in war, & most prone to it. It has accordingly with studied care, vested the question of war in the Legisl.”
Abraham Lincoln echoed: “The provision of the Constitution giving the war making power to Congress was dictated, as I understand it, by the
following reasons: kings had always been involving and impoverishing their people in wars, pretending generally, if not always, that the good of
the people was the object. This our convention understood to be the most oppressive of all kingly oppressions, and they resolved to so frame
the Constitution that no one man should hold the power of bringing this oppression upon us.” Then Secretary of State John Quincy Adams
made the case against wars not in self-defense no matter how glorious the immediate objective in a July 4, 1821 Address to Congress: “[The
United States] well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she
would involve herself beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which
assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom. The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force....
She might become the dictatress of the world. She would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit....” NATO marked an unprecedented break in
American history. Not only was it the first peacetime alliance ever, but it was the first time promoting and preserving peace everywhere in the
world became a United States objective. NATO flouted President George Washington’s Farewell Address warning against entangling alliances or
dividing the world between angles and devils. The treaty tied our fate to the vicissitudes of West European politics and played favorites among
nations. But the Farewell Address admonished: “[N]othing is more essential than that permanent, inveterate antipathies against particular
nations, and passionate attachments for others, should be excluded; and, that in place of them, just and amicable feelings towards all should be
cultivated. The nation which indulges towards another a habitual hatred or a habitual fondness is in some degree a slave. It is a slave to its
animosity or to its affection, either of which is sufficient to lead it astray from its duty and interest.” President Washington also warned that any
military engagements or alliances with Europe would impair our safety and other national interests: “Europe has a set of primary interests
which to us have none; or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies, the causes of which are essentially
foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves by artificial ties in the ordinary vicissitudes of her
politics, or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities.” Adhering to Washington, Madison, and John Quincy Adams,
the United States prospered and spread across the continent for 70 years. We uniformly refrained from foreign entanglements. Among other
things, we remained aloof from the Central and South American rebellions against Spain and Portugal, the Greek War of independence against
the Ottoman Empire, and Hungary’s 1848 revolutionary ambitions against Russia. As regards the latter, Senator Henry Clay explained: “Far
better is it for ourselves, for Hungary, and for the cause of liberty, that, adhering to our wise, pacific system, and avoiding the distant wars of
Europe, we should keep our lamp burning brightly on this western shore as a light to all nations, than to hazard its utter extinction amid the
ruins of fallen or falling republics in Europe.” The cornerstone of national security is the willingness of citizens to fight and die for their country
in self-defense. We enjoy that patriotism in abundance. Moreover, we confront no existential or other threats that could arguably justify NATO
or any other defense treaty. What Abraham Lincoln said in 1838 before the Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois is equally true today: “At
what point shall we expect the approach of danger? By what means shall we fortify against it?—Shall we expect some transatlantic military
giant to step the Ocean, and crush us at a blow? Never!—All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined; with a Bonaparte for a
commander, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the Blue Ridge, in a trial of a thousand years. At what point then
is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction
be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.” NATO is more
ill-conceived at present, having expanded to 28 members, than it was in 1949. Among other things, we are committed to defending the Baltic
States, Hungary, the Czech Republic, the Slovak Republic, Poland, Romania, and Bulgaria from Russian aggression. The previous occupation or
domination of these nations by the Soviet Union during the Cold War weakened it financially and militarily. Why should we seek to prevent
Russia from repeating that blunder? We are also absurdly committed to defending Slovenia, Albania, Greece, and Croatia—none of which have
relevance to our self-defense. NATO advocates argue that the spread of democracy makes the United States safer; that we know how to spread
democracy; and, that tyranny anywhere is a threat to our security. They substantially echo President George W. Bush’s counterfactual Second
Inaugural gospel: “Across the generations we have proclaimed the imperative of self-government, because no one is fit to be a master, and no
one deserves to be a slave. Advancing these ideals is the mission that created our Nation. It is the honorable achievement of our fathers. Now it
is the urgent requirement of our nation’s security, and the calling of our time. So it is the policy of the United States to seek and support the
growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world.” The
NATO-Bush doctrine is unconvincing. The United States was born and has flourished amidst tyrannies. They include the French Empire, the
Romanoff Empire, the Ottoman Empire, the Chinese Empire, and the Austrian-Hungarian Empire. Today, tyranny in Belarus or Zimbabwe,
among other nations, is no danger to the United States. Our peaceful co-existence with tyrannies has been the rule, not the exception.
Additionally, we can no more create democracies from cultures and institutions with no democratic DNA hostile than we can build a perpetual
motion machine. We have failed spectacularly attempting the impossible in South Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen
despite a staggering investment of resources. South Sudan is conclusive proof of our impotence to give birth to democratic dispensations. We
midwifed its 2011 independence from Sudan, but It quickly succumbed to a grisly ethnic civil war between President Salva Kiir and the Dinka
against Rick Machar and the Nuer featuring tens of thousands killed and millions displaced. South Sudan was a failed state on arrival, and
remains so today. Our efforts to collaborate with its leaders and people to steer a democratic course were predictably futile. The evidence is
mixed as to whether democracies are inherently less threatening to the United States than are authoritarian or tyrannical nations. Hamas was
popularly elected in the Gaza Strip, but is listed as an international terrorist organization by the United States. Egypt’s former President
Mohammad Morsi was a greater danger to United States interests than is his less democratically elected successor Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. The
United States has refrained from clamor for free elections in Saudi Arabia for fear of the results, i.e., victory for Wahhabism. Tyranny by the
majority is tyranny nonetheless. In any event, the evidence is far too inconclusive to assert that wars against non-democratic nations are, ipso
In leaving NATO, the United States would dramatically lessen tensions or
facto, justifiable wars of self-defense.
conflicts with Russia and strengthen our security against external aggression. Among other things, the
stage would be set for a new treaty to reduce the nuclear arsenals of the two countries. Russia would
probably claim a sphere of influence over its neighbors, but that would be unalarming. The United States has
acted in the same way for more than two centuries, including the Monroe Doctrine, the Mexican-American War, the Spanish-American War,
the Panama Canal, and military ventures in Cuba, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Mexico, and Nicaragua. To maintain that all nations are equal,
but that the United States is more equal than others is to encourage war. To make the nation more secure in its safety, wealth, and liberty,
NATO should be made a museum piece along with other artifacts of the American Empire.
 NAFTA BAD
5 Reasons Why Trump Should Withdraw the US from NAFTA & Put America First
Spencer P Morrison, 6-14-2018, "5 Reasons Why Trump Should Withdraw The US From NAFTA & Put America First," National
Economics Editorial, https://nationaleconomicseditorial.com/2017/04/26/america-should-wiWSthdraw-from-nafta/

Today US Senator Charles Grassley said that he believes Trump is leaning towards a trilateral renegotiation of the North American Free Trade
Agreement, between the US, Canada, and Mexico. This would be a mistake—the economic asymmetries between the three countries are so
profound that it’s impossible to craft a set of rules between them that will not privilege or disparage one against the other. Bilateral
negotiations would result in better all-around deals, both for the States, and its trading partners. Here’s why Trump should withdraw from
NAFTA. Why Should Donald Trump Withdraw The US From the North American Free Trade Agreement? It’s been reported that Donald Trump’s
cabinet is in the final stages of drawing up an executive order to withdraw the US from the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
This comes after the resurrection of the softwood lumber dispute with Canada, and Mexican resistance over the border wall. But it shouldn’t
come as surprise, renegotiating, and even scrapping NAFTA, have long been a centerpiece of Donald Trump’s economic policy. On the campaign
trail he described NAFTA as the “worst trade deal ever signed” by any nation, much less America. There’s no doubt his criticisms were popular,
especially with blue collar workers in the “rust belt” states, who’ve suffered tremendously under the NAFTA regime. But this all begs the
question: are those criticisms valid? Is NAFTA a bad trade deal? Should the US scrap NAFTA and pursue independent deals with Canada and
Mexico (provided it’s to our advantage to do so)? Yes. Donald Trump should withdraw America from NAFTA. Here’s why. 1. NAFTA Costs
America A Net 700,000 Jobs Perhaps the most important point is that NAFTA costs America jobs. Lots of jobs.
Roughly 700,000 net jobs are lost to Mexico. This number is calculated by looking at the number of jobs displaced by Mexican
imports, vs the number of jobs created by exports and so-called “cheaper goods” that we import from Mexico. It’s a net loss in terms of jobs
because we’re running a giant trade deficit with Mexico. Basically, it means we’re importing more from them than they’re buying from us, thus
boosting demand for Mexican products (and workers) at the expense of American products (and workers). The end result means fewer
American jobs. But let’s be honest. Even if trade was balanced, American workers would still lose out. Why? Well, one of the primary costs for
any business, particularly in manufacturing, is the cost of labor. People are expensive, especially in America. But, they’ll work for cheap in
Mexico (because Mexico is a poorer nation). This means that labor-intensive industries are the first to be offshored, while we tend to retain
capital-intensive industries. This means that even if we exported just as much as we imported, we’d still lose more jobs than we’d gain. The
detriment to American workers alone is enough of a reason for Trump to scrap NAFTA, and fulfill his campaign promise. 2.
NAFTA Lowers
Wages For US Workers There’s more to a sound economic policy than maximizing efficiency: we also have to look at its human and
social impact. When we sign deals like NAFTA, or KORUS (with South Korea), we put American workers out on their ass,
and their options are limited. Sure, lots of them get new jobs—but their new jobs tend to be in lower-paying
service industries. This means they have less money to raise families, and do what they like. Not only that, but it means that those
workers are now competing with everyone else for those jobs: basically, as the labor pool expands, there are more people chasing fewer
jobs. This shifts the bargaining power away from employees to employers, and therefore lowers wages. For example, how likely are you to get
a raise if your boss can threaten to move the factory to Mexico at a moment’s notice? Not very likely. In fact, if we look at overall US wages, we
find that wages have stagnated in real terms since 1973, when economic globalization (this includes offshoring, and mass immigration) began.
NAFTA is a drop in the bucket when it comes to trade with places like China, but its impact has been the same: foreign competition lowers
wages for US workers. Sure, maybe it increases our GDP: but all of those gains go to the top. For most Americans, life gets harder. Let’s scrap
NAFTA, and the rest of the bad trade deals, and get wages growing again. 3.
NAFTA Led To Bigger Government & Higher
Taxes Once the factory moves to Mexico, lots of people get new jobs. But lots don’t. In fact, unemployment
in America has been growing steadily for decades, especially since 1994 (when NAFTA was signed) and 2001 (when China
joined the WTO). Right now, 23 million Americans are unemployed (the government says it’s 8.3 million, but that’s not even close). NAFTA, and
other trade deals, are the primary culprit. But what does a large unemployed population have to do with big government? Simple. Unemployed
people collect government welfare, be it subsidized housing, food stamps, or welfare checks. Many collect disability (even though they’re not
disabled) etc. A man needs to eat, after all. And when the government takes the bread from his mouth by allowing America’s industries to be
offshored to Mexico via NAFTA, he doesn’t really have a choice but to go on the dole. This is why offshoring leads to big government. And what
does big government lead to? Higher taxes. The people who benefit from offshoring end up paying more taxes to care for the millions of
displaced workers. So are the goods really that much cheaper? Not really. In total, some 10 million Americans have lost their
jobs due to offshoring (and 700,000 are directly due to NAFTA). All in all, this situation isn’t good for anyone. The government should
focus on getting people working, rather than picking up the pieces that bad trade deals like NAFTA leave in their wake. This is perhaps the most
compelling reason for withdrawing from NAFTA. 4. NAFTA Eroded America’s Manufacturing Industry America’s
manufacturing industry has been gutted, and NAFTA’s done its fair share of damage. Many US companies simply picked up and moved
their factories to Mexico, and then imported the products tax-free. After all, labor in Mexico is significantly cheaper
than in America, and there was no penalty in place for doing so. And for those who want to blame robotics rather than offshoring, you’re
wrong. Automation doesn’t cost us jobs. Why? Because productivity is only one side of the equation: yes, jobs are lost when we automate,
but not if we also make more stuff. To fully understand what happened to US manufacturing employment, we need to look at both
productivity and output. As it happens, NAFTA led to offshoring to Mexico: basically, new output was made in Mexico rather than
the US. This meant that output grew relatively slower than the pace of productivity, which led to job loss—people mistakenly blame
automation because it’s the proximate cause, without looking deeper. For example, since NAFTA was signed, US manufacturing grew more
productive by about 3.9% per year; however, output only grew by only 1.2% (one third what it grew in the pre-NAFTA era). Sure, it’s not all due
to NAFTA, but free trade with Mexico didn’t help. 5. NAFTA Was A Bad Trade Deal, Even In Theory Anyone with a working brain
could’ve seen the disastrous impact that NAFTA would have on American industry, particularly in the Mid-West. Why? Wealth is a lot like
water: if flows to the lowest point, until all plains are eventually equal. This happens because people with money like to save said money, and
tend to chase higher returns in cheaper jurisdictions—money flows into the poorer area until it eventually catches up with the wealthy one. An
equilibrium point is reached. This is what happened between the US and Japan in the post-war era: US dollars flowed into Japan until it wasn’t
profitable anymore (because Japan caught up). Then they started flowing into China. It’s also one of the main reasons why the wealth
distribution between regions within a nation is far less volatile than the distribution between regions on a global level (not individuals,
regions). Just consider how the difference between the poorest and richest US state is nothing compared to the poorest US state and countries
like Gabon, or Chad. This observation generally hold true across the board (consider Canada’s provinces, or Australia’s). The reason for it is that
most country have domestic free trade, but place various restrictions on international trade. This ensures that a domestic equilibrium is
reached. However, once said restrictions are removed on the international level, this basically expands the domestic market: wealth will flow
from the richer region into the poorer one, until the level is equal. This is why an
enormous amount of money has flowed
from the US to Mexico sign NAFTA was signed: both in terms of a growing trade deficit, and in terms of foreign direct
investment (FDI). Of course, this didn’t really happen with Canada when the Canada United States Free Trade
Agreement was signed in 1988, because Canada and the US are economies of comparable wealth and
development. The below graph illustrates all you need to know: it shows America’s trade deficit (red) or surplus (blue) with its top 20
trading partners, according to whether they’re developed or developing. As you can see, trade with developed countries is pretty balanced on
the whole, whereas trade with developing countries is nothing but parasitic—Mexico is one such developing country. The US should withdraw
from NAFTA, and all the other agreements with developing countries. Donald Trump Should Scrap NAFTA, Just Like He Did TPP President
Donald Trump’s been making good on his word to pull America out of bad trade deals. First he scrapped TPP, which would’ve been the worst
one yet, and now he’s on the verge of withdrawing the US from NAFTA. He should do it—and while he’s at it, he should withdraw from
the Trade in Services Agreement too (which is a back door for TPP). We need to start putting America first, and recognize that free trade
doesn’t always work (especially when we’re the only ones playing by the rules.

7 reasons why leaving NAFTA wouldn't cause Armageddon

MICHAEL STUMO, 5-2-2017, "7 reasons why leaving NAFTA wouldn't cause Armageddon," http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-
blog/economy-budget/331587-7-reasons-why-leaving-nafta-wouldnt-cause-armageddon

The media was aghast last week that some Trump administration drafted a proposal to withdraw from the North American Free Trade
Agreement (NAFTA) as well as a proposal to renegotiate it. Later reports said the White House was not going to advance the proposal to end
NAFTA, after powerful business interests called in to object. If a “withdrawal from NAFTA” proposal emerges, it could either be a negotiating
ploy or it could be serious. Even if withdrawal is off the table now, U.S. negotiators should have the power to walk away from negotiations if
they truly want a strong negotiating position. While the Coalition for a Prosperous America does not have either an “end NAFTA” or “save
NAFTA” position, here are some reasons why NAFTA withdrawal would not cause Armageddon. 1. Tariffs would not
skyrocket. Assuming for the moment that tariffs are always bad, which I do not, it is clear that tariffs would not increase to punitive levels.
The U.S. has a pre-NAFTA trade agreement with Canada which was negotiated in 1989 and has never been repealed. The Canadian free trade
agreement was supplanted by NAFTA but is positioned to snap back into effect. All three NAFTA countries are members of the World Trade
Organization (WTO) as well. They agreed to lower tariffs as a condition of membership. While NAFTA tariff levels are even lower, the WTO tariff
levels are pretty low as well. The WTO tariff levels apply to U.S. trade with WTO countries with which we do not have a free trade agreement,
including the European Union countries. While there is likely to be some change in the location of production, any post-NAFTA tariff rises would
not be destructive since our WTO-regulated trade with the EU and others is substantial. 2.
Competitive advantage for U.S.
supply chains. If you are a carmaker, you care most about your position in relation to competitors. Today, all major carmakers use a post-
NAFTA, multi-country supply chain, so all of them would have to make adjustments if the U.S. left NAFTA. But some carmakers might welcome
NAFTA withdrawal because their supply chain is more concentrated in the U.S. than their competitors’ supply chains. Washington policymakers
might rationally want to reward companies with a higher proportion of their supply chains in the U.S. as well and provide a financial incentive
for other companies to shift more of their supply chains here in the future. 3. Net job loss won’t occur. During the last big trade
agreement debate, the one surrounding the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), the pro-globalization economists were forced to admit that trade
deals do not create jobs. Manufacturing jobs are lost, but other jobs are created, they said, for no net change. The Obama administration thus
dropped “job creation from tariff cuts” from its suite of arguments. If downward changes in tariff levels do not create net new jobs, upward
changes would not destroy jobs. Even globalist Paul Krugman admitted that a trade war would be a “wash” in the job market because reciprocal
tariff increases would create jobs for U.S. workers producing goods previously imported. That result would be offset by jobs lost to the extent
exports slowed. That said, the trade and jobs relationship hinges upon balance of trade, not tariff levels or the volume of trade. The rule is that
if a country has underutilized workers and plant capacity, then a trade deficit kills jobs. 4. Our trade deficit won’t worsen, but
trade will still occur. I cannot think of, nor have I heard, any argument that our post-NAFTA trade deficit will grow. Canada and Mexico
both sell us more than we sell them. Canada’s population is about one-tenth that of the U.S. at 36 million. It is relatively wealthy, but not
numerous. Mexico’s population is 40 percent of ours, but they are poor. Our trade balance was better with both countries before NAFTA
because the agreement spurred more imports than exports. We traded with Mexico and Canada before NAFTA, and we will trade with them
after NAFTA. If NAFTA goes away, it is unlikely that our trade balance would get even worse, because the incentives to produce there to supply
the U.S. market would be lessened. As I argued above, any change, small as it may be, would provide the advantage to U.S. supply chains. 5.
The non-trade crony capitalist goody bag would go away. Only a portion of trade deals’ language addresses conventional
trade issues, i.e. tariffs and quotas. The rest of the of the language gifts multinational corporations with a grab bag of opportunities to overturn
domestic laws — those they could not get Congress to change — and to bypass domestic courts. For example, NAFTA includes the investor-
state dispute settlement procedure that allows foreign companies to sue the U.S. for laws they do not like, bypassing American courts. It
prevents the U.S. government from buying American-only goods for defense and infrastructure projects. It has rules of origin that require us to
give low-tariff treatment to NAFTA goods partially produced in third-party countries, like China. It restricts us from increasing food safety
standards governing imported food. 6. NAFTA has little to do with free trade. NAFTA is technocratically-managed trade. Mere
tariff-cutting, as we now know, does not provide a free-trade nirvana. Foreign governments distort markets in ways trade agreements are ill-
suited to stop. Mexico’s currency devalued after NAFTA passage and eliminated any tariff-cut benefit for U.S. exporters. Canada’s forestry
industry and several agricultural sectors are targeted by subsidy programs and supply management regimes, measures which have recently
been criticized by the Trump administration. Even though they called it a “trade agreement”, government trade negotiators created legislation
that supplanted and amended many U.S. laws. Congress passed their “bill” with no changes pursuant to the Fast Track trade authority in effect
in 1992. A post-NAFTA world would be no further from “free trade” than we are today. 7. Domestic regulatory agencies and
American legislation can do the job. People forget that we are the largest market in the world and possess the world’s reserve
currency. We don’t use that power. On tariffs, for example, the U.S. government could set high tariff levels, but then set lower ones for
countries who reciprocate. That reciprocity could be based upon tariff levels only, or a combination of tariffs, subsidies, border taxes and
currency manipulation. The U.S. courts are perfectly suited to handle disputes, as they have done so since the Constitution
established them. Our federal agencies are equipped to handle food and product safety issues and could thus set, without fear of global
tribunal interference, standards requiring foreign products to meet the same standards as domestic products. Every topic and policy covered in
NAFTA simply modified or supplanted the agencies and rules that existed before. Jobs and trade existed before NAFTA, in many cases on terms
better for America. But NAFTA did not magically deliver some optimal new economic equilibrium. Rather, it delivered trade deficits and job
losses. While it may not be on the table now, withdrawing from NAFTA would not cast us into the economic abyss.