Well, if you listen to Chicken Little Radio or do most of your reading at
www.theskyisfalling.net, you're gonna be upset over the SPP. But the fact is, no agreement was ever signed by anyone regarding the SPP. Not by Bush, not by Fox, and not by Martin. The only "agreement" that was made was they agreed to further promote the agenda of the Security and Prosperity Partnership of the three North American countries.
The world is a global market economy and the US cannot just sit back and play the isolationist game and expect to survive in it. No matter how badly people want it to be so, it's never gonna be 1954 again. It's a new world and we have to get in it. Yes, that means some changes.
Among some of the many changes, one of them will be to eventually open the Mexican border up in the same manner as the US/Canadian border is now, only, hopefully, both of them will be in better shape than the Canadian border is now. Faster, easier border crossings will mean lower costs, which will allow North American manufacturers to better compete in a world market. Yes, that will almost certainly mean that freight coming out of Mexico will be fundamentally changed insofar as how it is transported and delivered. That will mean better things for some drivers, worse things for others, but overall it will be better for the North American countries trying to compete in a world market.
People don't like change, especially those who can only look at the short term 'what's in it for me' picture. But that same short term picture is why Detroit is in the shape it is in, for example. Instead of taking responsibility for their actions, many would rather shift the blame onto whoever is in charge and whine "Buy American" as if that's gonna make it all better. Well, it's not gonna make it all better, and there's nothing the people in charge can do to turn back the clock to the old days.
The clock keeps on ticking, just as it has been since the 1960's when the first jobs quietly began moving overseas. Instead of recognizing and correcting the problem, the unions, by and large, couldn't get past that short term picture and instead they rallied "Buy American!", which is Spanish for "Spend more for less innovative and inferior products in order to keep my paycheck coming to me!"
People say that the leaders, the Congress, the President, whoever, did nothing to stop this takeover of the US by the world markets. But the fact is, there is nothing they could have done, and everything they did try, to impress the voters back home, mostly, was a Band Aid on a broken back. It's all good until the next election, and the short termers have their paycheck. Whoops. Next thing you know, we're in the shape we're in now, and unless something is done very quickly, we're on the fast track to a Third World status.
Something will be done, but it won't be to keep the status quo, and it won't be to roll things back to Wally and the Beav. It will be to make radical, sometimes painful changes that will benefit the many at sometimes the cost of the few. Welcome to the New World, the Real World. Welcome to Reality.
Incidentally, the infrastructure of this country, roads, seaports, airports, railroads, are all utterly inadequate today. It cannot handle the flow of goods in an efficient manner as it is, and it's only going to get worse. People have been discussing major Interstate improvements and additions between the Mexican and Canadian borders for more than 40 years. Now all of a sudden, infrastructure improvements are bad, because, well, if NAFTA can benefit from it in any way, then it's just gotta be bad.
Wake up America! The rest of the world is sick and tired of putting up with your BS. Put away your buggy whips and lead, follow or get out of the way!
