SOUND-OFF!

"The same article informs us that "Tainted and counterfeit toothpaste with a Chinese origin has been discovered in Canada, in Massachusetts, and in prison systems in the southern United States. A temporary halt to the import of Chinese toothpaste has failed to eliminate the threat, as Canadian and U.S. communities are discovering evidence of tainted toothpaste already in the market. Health authorities began to warn consumers in early July after tests conducted on counterfeit toothpaste sold under the Colgate brand name turned up evidence of harmful bacteria. ... Despite an FDA warning posted in early June, contaminated products continue to surface, typically in independently owned grocery and convenience stores.

"Tea leaves, the iconic Chinese export, can now be added to the list of suspect food products. William Hubbard, former deputy commissioner of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, told National Public Radio about one Chinese manufacturer’s practice of drying tea leaves by using truck exhausts. “To speed up the drying process, they would lay the tea leaves out on a huge warehouse floor and drive trucks over them so that the exhaust would more rapidly dry the leaves out,” said Hubbard. “And the problem there is that the Chinese use leaded gasoline, so they were essentially spewing the lead over all these leaves.” Hubbard noted that the FDA only inspects about one percent of all food and food ingredients coming into the country, and tests only about half of one percent.

"As if contaminated food products were not enough of a concern, American consumers are now faced with the realization that Chinese-produced toys pose a health threat nearly as serious as contaminated or tainted food. In mid-June of this year, more than 1.5 million Thomas & Friends miniature wooden railway sets were recalled because of lead paint. Neither the Thomas & Friends manufacturer, RC2 Corporation of Chicago, nor the British license holder, HIT Entertainment, knew that the popular children’s toys contained lead paint.

"Lead paint has the potential to damage developing nervous systems, and anxious parents now wonder how many other Chinese-made toys might contain the dangerous material. Preschool children, precisely the group that is most attracted to these types of toys, routinely put playthings in their mouths. A toy containing a lead base then becomes a vehicle for dispersing the harmful substance into a developing child. That type of exposure may eventually lead to reduced IQ, severe learning disabilities, kidney damage, and stunted growth, among other adverse effects."

According to various cable news programs 80% of toys sold in the USA are made in Red China. You would think that this would make us see Red as patriotic Americans. Until something goes very wrong we do not seem to care. There is always a trade-off [pun not intended] when we decide to purchase a product at a reduced cost so that we can have more and more instead of less, made safely by our neighbor for his own neighbor as well as his own family. Let us use an analogy.

I am traveling by car by necessity to city B for a conference. There are two roads, one a major highway where I have to pay a toll and pass through a few red lights on the way, and the other a little used country road that is circuitous but free of the toll booth and the traffic lights. Now morally I am free to choose either one. I am trying to cut expenses because fuel is so costly and I have a fixed retirement income, so it is tempting to use the country road. There is a trade-off though: I cannot afford a cell phone and drive an old car. In the event of the car breaking down I would be stranded until someone passes by, if at all. My family would be worried when I did not show up at the hotel where I am registered. Thinking it through I opt for the safer, more expensive course, the major highway. There is more to life than saving a buck to save a buck. I will have less money to spend at the conference but my family will have peace of mind and that is priceless.

We Americans need to see our country as our extended family, instead of thoughtlessly purchasing more junk toys that will be discarded soon as our over-stimulated high-tech kids grow bored. It ought to be the American, patriotic, thing to do, buy less, buy better, buy American, to help other Americans. Sure the American middleman may be hurt, but if that is what it takes, this is the price of owning our own country. We will all pay more in the end if we don't because of the trade deficit, which means more taxes for sure. Moreover, whether the food is poisonous and the toys toxic or not, one of the piercing questions we have a moral obligation to ask before we buy a product from China, is this an absolute necessity, as in life-sustaining, and is this the only country I can get it from at all? Otherwise, why am I morally free to help sustain a regime that half-starves its own people and forces them to kill their children? A regime that imprisons Catholic bishops and priests and others who do not go along with the "Chinese Patriotic Church". They could not operate as they do without our help as they would have already collapsed. Feeding money into their supply chain has not reduced the brutality of the regime, it has merely extended it to our shores. The regime is openly hostile, with missiles aimed at us, as those in power jockey for position and bide their time. Meanwhile Chinese businessmen are investing in American banks, buying debt and at the rate they are going with our indifference that is more than reckless, they will have an economic vise with which to strangle us into submission.

The New American article goes on:

"What is the underlying problem behind unsafe and hazardous food from China? Is the problem largely localized to a few local or regional officials in the vast country? Is China experiencing growing pains as it rapidly increases its market share over the food that we consume? If it’s bureaucratic ineptness, can that ineptness be corrected through more regulation and oversight from the central government in Beijing? Or is the Beijing regime itself the problem? Put simply: should we trust the communist giant to make and keep its food imports safe as it amasses more and more control over our food supplies on the way to monopoly control? ...

"Despite China’s integration into the world economy, it remains a communist model of brute authority and moral ambiguity---one that, by the way, is openly hostile to the United States.

"Chinese ethical transgressions are mainly designed to gain an unfair advantage over the West, and they show the disdain communist leaders have for people. Since instituting market reforms, China has manipulated currency (which forces them to keep the bulk of the populace at poverty wages), erected importation roadblocks (which lead to higher prices of Chinese goods for already poor people), and employed slave labor camps to reduce labor costs, the most recent example discovered in China’s northern Shanxi province that involved 576 involuntary workers.

"Communist China is arguably one of the most brutal “post-Cold War” regimes. The central government persecutes Buddhists, Roman Catholics, and other religious groups, and Beijing imprisons an estimated eight million persons---many of them political dissidents. In a display of utter brutality, Chinese authorities openly engage in organ harvesting. According to the BBC, the British Transplantation Society maintains that the organs of executed prisoners are routinely harvested without consent. China’s brutal “one child” policy and its practice of forced abortions are well known and require little elaboration here. But it is part and parcel of the lack of respect for human life that seems to permeate Chinese political will, extending to their trade dealings with the West. ...

" “Why is our government sitting on its hands while we give a monopoly on production to China for items ranging from food to drugs to clothes---all to a country that is an avowed enemy of the United States?”

"Despite our efforts to engage China, first starting with President Nixon, and carried on by successive administrations, the communist giant remains a military threat. The People’s Liberation Army has developed and published plans that include an attack on Taiwan. The PLA plan includes threatening the United States with nuclear war to sway public opinion before staging an attack on Taiwan. The plan includes strategies that seek to isolate the United States from its Pacific allies, leaving Japan and others defenseless in the face of Chinese aggression. According to Philippine authorities, the Chinese have begun to establish outposts on uninhabited islands near the island nation. Meanwhile, Los Angeles and Alaska remain in the sights of a highly advanced Chinese cruise and ballistic missile system. In a perversely ironic twist, it is American trade dollars that subsidize China’s military build up. Joint venture investments allow the Chinese to enter the U.S. bond market. There they borrow millions from U.S. mutual and pension funds and invest the cash in their armed forces.

"The world sees that the Chinese are capable of monstrous acts of brutality such as forced abortions, organ harvesting, religious and political persecution, and deliberate food contamination. Likewise, their push for Pacific Rim hegemony and global trade domination is manifest. Given those realities, is it paranoia to question the prudential nature of allowing such a nation to gain control of much of our food and drug supply?

Country-of-origin Labeling

"As already indicated, you cannot escape consuming contaminated Chinese products by avoiding those marked with “China” as the country of origin. This is despite the fact that five years ago President Bush signed into law the Farm Security and Rural Investment Act, which included a provision establishing the requirement for country-of-origin labeling for beef, lamb, pork, seafood, perishable agricultural commodities, and peanuts. Republicans, prodded by retailers who claim the provision is burdensome, delayed implementation.

"President Bush, supported by a Republican majority, effectively nullified the provision by delaying its implementation until September 2008. Political pressure in the wake of the recent scandals appears to have moved Congress to revisit the provision. Until it is revisited, however, there is simply no way of knowing whether your food item originates in China. Not long after the pet food scandal receded from the news cycle, Food and Drug Administration officials reported that rejections of Chinese food products reached 257 for the month of April. In contrast, Mexico and Canada had 140 and 23 respectively. Among the offending Chinese food items were salted bean curds, which were rejected for being “filthy,” and frozen channel catfish, which were infected with salmonella and laced with “a new animal drug” considered unsafe for consumption! The FDA refusal-actions list includes dried fruits, apple flavored jelly, olives, frozen seafood, and sardines.

"The government’s reluctance to enforce labeling laws has encouraged savvy farmers and independent ranchers to take matters into their own hands and to market farm-direct products in the wake of the Chinese import scandals. By marketing directly off the farm, owners can eliminate the middle man, thereby reducing mark-up. While farm-direct sales have always existed, increased consumer awareness about Chinese food products has led to an increase in activity throughout the country, and many Americans are taking control of their food sources.

"One U.S. health food company has taken the country-of-origin label concept a step further. Orem, Utah’s Food for Health International intends to label its products “China-Free.” President Frank Davis recently told Reuters that “It is a response to the (headlines) coming out, and we are taking a position that we are not the only ones reading them.”

"A comprehensive country-of-origin law would greatly enhance the consumer’s ability to choose, and might even result in a voluntary boycott of Chinese goods, providing a boost to domestic producers. But country-of-origin labeling would not be a panacea. For starters, false labeling, a favorite trick of the Chinese, was discovered on boxes marked “tangerine candy,” and in a number of other instances. In May, U.S. officials warned Americans to beware of imported fish labeled as monkfish. It seems that the Chinese exporter mislabeled puffer fish, whose flesh contains deadly toxin, as the popular monkfish. The tail of the monkfish is especially prized for its delicate flavor, while ingesting puffer fish flesh can lead to serious illness or even death from tetrodotoxin poisoning. According to an FDA press release, a total of 282 22-pound boxes labeled as monkfish were distributed to wholesalers in Illinois, California, and Hawaii beginning in September 2006. These fish were then sold to restaurants or sold in stores.

Degrease the Skids

"But even more important than requiring country-of-origin labeling, or labeling products “China-free,” is changing those U.S. government policies that have greased the skids for China’s rapidly increasing market share of what we buy from toys to food. Those policies include encouraging American corporate interests to do business with China and to establish operations there, and providing U.S. taxpayer-subsidized and -backed loans and loan guarantees through agencies such as the U.S. Export-Import Bank and the World Bank.

"Meanwhile, operations that remain in the United States are compelled to comply not only with an unfavorable tax situation but with a massive regulatory system that squeezes profits and forces owners to pass the costs on to the consumer. The Competitive Enterprise Institute recently released a report entitled Ten Thousand Commandments 2007: An Annual Snapshot of the Federal Regulatory State. Its preparator, Clyde Wayne Crews, lays out a picture of a federal regulatory system that cost Americans $1.14 trillion last year!

"America has traditionally been committed to maintaining a policy of competitive enterprise. In 1952, Harold R. Bruce, government professor at Dartmouth, wrote in American National Government: “This policy has its roots both in the democratic political tradition of equality of opportunity and in the belief that economic progress and efficiency are promoted by the spur of competition.” Unless America returns to its tradition of “equality of opportunity” by de-regulating the business environment and seeks to seriously address the trade imbalance, it will become increasingly dependent upon China at its own peril.

"The stakes are high. The ease with which the Chinese are now able to flood our market with substandard and highly dangerous consumer and food products gives rise to the question---how hard would it be to use the current import system to introduce harmful elements into the food supply as an asymmetrical warfare technique? Given China’s record of brutality and military aggression, is there any reason to believe that China might not employ such measures in the future, particularly if its market share of our food supplies continues expanding? For Americans the possibility seems less fantastic with each new headline. Until the United States strengthens its ability to prevent the importation of dangerous goods, and significantly reverses the trade imbalance through a reduction in regulatory requirements and other measures, American consumers will be left to their own devices."

Mark well what you have just read from the New American. The next time you are tempted to purchase that trinket or toy or toothpaste, check the package carefully. No more Chinese take-out, please, unless from Taiwan. Knowing what we know, we will have reaped what we deserve, self-annihilation. Let's declare the USA a Red-free zone, beginning with each one of us.