Re: Clinton and global economy

From: ausstu (ausstu_at_primus.com.au)
Date: 09/18/04 

Date: 17 Sep 2004 17:02:04 -0700

drr0cket@yahoo.com (Bodhisattvacat) wrote in message news:<4f2532f6.0409121020.fbe6d70@posting.google.com>...
> Bill Clinton was one of the better presidents this country has had. He
> kept what was good about Republican agenda - free trade, global
> economy and ending welfare dependency - while bringing fiscal solvency
> to the country, making the government work efficiently, cutting down
> crime and bringing empowerment to groups that had been alienated and
> disenfranchised before.
>
> So what that he was a horndog. As a poster at the Howard Dean campaign
> office said, "What's worse: screwing an intern or screwing a country?"
> Bill Clinton cared about people. He thought about everyone, even the
> idiots who started militias, said that he killed Vincent Foster and
> claimed, while their states were getting huge subsidies, to want the
> government off their backs. You do not often see that level of
> compassion and patience in a leader. Even after leaving office, he
> worked to fight AIDS - a cause from which he could in no way benefit,
> but which is very important for the world. Like Nixon and Carter
> before him, Clinton received better reviews out of office than in
> office. In his case, it is a case of delayed gratitude.
>
> For the people who voted for Nader, I hold nothing but contempt. If you
> do not see the difference between Bush and Gore, then you must be
> blind; and if you do not see the difference between Bush and Kerry,
> then you must be blinder. So what that Gore lost his native Tennessee.
> I have a certain familiarity with the way people from Tennessee think.
> They are a bunch of wife-beaters and child molesters, and Democratic
> Party is better off - more honorable, more pure, more upright, more
> true to its principles - without Tennessee or West Virginia among its
> constituents. Ohio, Missouri, Florida, Louisiana, Wisconsin, Nevada,
> Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico - these are legitimate battleground
> states, and I wish Kerry the best in getting them to vote for him. Just
> as I will be voting for him in Virginia.
>
> The global economy, under leaders both Republican and Democratic, has
> raised hundreds of millions of people out of poverty all over the
> world. Following economic empowerment came improvement in human rights
> and treatment of women. The media keeps focusing on disasters, but the
> fact is that the world has improved tremendously over the last twenty-
> five years. In East Asia, poverty went down from 32% to 16%; in South
> Asia, from 41% to 31%. With reduction in poverty came options for
> people - options that allow them to get away from people who commit
> atrocities against them and get in control of their destinies. And
> that, I believe, is a result that justifies having some of our jobs go
> overseas even while others are created here or come here from other
> countries. Even as American businesses, through creating these jobs,
> bring home profits which through taxation are invested in public
> sector and go to create domestic jobs.
>
> I stand to say this as someone who, as a computer professional, lost
> my place in the economy over the last three years and am having to
> change professions. Like manufacturing workers in Great Lakes states
> in 1980s, I have experienced much of my industry go overseas. I still
> stand strong in favor of international trade, because I see the
> improvements that it has made in people's lives around the world. And I
> am willing to go through things I never thought I would go through in
> order to make it possible.
>
> What people who knock global economy don't understand is that it is an
> arrangement for creating wealth everywhere, and not only in the
> countries that get our jobs. As Chinese, Indians, Mexicans, etc., get
> wealthier, they buy more goods and create jobs all over the world,
> including (and especially) in this country. The creation of jobs
> overseas leads to creation of better jobs in America; it benefits
> people all over the world, including here.
>
> The people who want to protect jobs that Americans cannot honestly
> compete in at the expense of the American consumer and at the expense
> of workers in the Third World are not compassionate or liberal; they
> are selfish. The true little man is not in America but in the Third
> World, and the true policies that benefit the little man are ones that
> let him rise through his honest efforts, with access to the world's
> markets, out of poverty. For this reason I campaigned against Gephardt
> in the primaries; he tried to destroy an arrangement that has allowed
> hundreds of millions of people around the world better life than
> they've ever had. Right now, Edwards has been saying some of what
> Gephardt had been saying, but in much less strident tones. I certainly
> don't believe in giving tax breaks to companies that move their jobs
> overseas; but neither do I believe in tariffs that keep people in other
> countries who can do the job better than Americans from being able to
> have access to American markets.
>
> Nor do I believe in subsidies for farmers and oilmen who have been
> nothing but ingrates, claiming to want the government off their backs
> while receiving huge subsidies from the government. If they are men,
> as they claim to be, then they would be able to compete without aid
> from the rest of us, whom they despise. Let's get some honesty here.
>
> Ilya Shambat
> http://www.geocities.com/drr0cket

I find your comments to be very astute. If you look at his
performance, Clinton was one of the best presidents ever. Which is
why it is perplexing that people were suckered into trying to impeach
him over a non issue. I suggest that America has a serious problem
with the rise of right wing evangelicals who are not much different
from the rise of the Nazi party in the 30's.

Most of America's great presidents such as Jefferson, Roosevelt,
Kennedy, Eisenhower, had mistresses so it should not have been an
issue that Clinton had an affair.

You are right, the world is better off with a strong global economy
that raises the living standard of all, not just those in western
countries. The economies in western countries will eventually move to
value added products and thrive as they export to emerging markets.
The global economy is a win win for all, although there will be some
pain along the way.

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