Excellent Commentary........ Of course I do not know in detail exactly how to resolve these countries problems with regards to the adoption of CAFTA...and quite frankly nor do the politicians on either side .. I would suggest caution to accept anything if its implications are not fully understood...If one cannot write down who wins...who loses...what are the net benefits...then one does not know and is gambling on a hastily made decision... In terms of what one can control...and have the knowledge of its outcome...I would think should be more of a local sovereign decision...in that these decisions are gray as well... However...what is clear to me ..is that local houses need to be in order before other houses are adjoined....or else the inherent problems fester... What I would denote is that it is clear that until local political corruption is alleviated....then whatever monies or efficiencies created will be marginalized....In some of these countries...the biggest paying jobs are when one is elected into political office...they control many other jobs in the different zones...and efficiency is nowhere to be found... For example...one country orders $140 million in police vehicles which is tagged with a 40% commission....All public buildings are awarded to political cronies...40% of the money ends up in Miami....Banks parley off loans to be forgiven to the local military and political cronies...Property titles on the majority of the land are in question...poor families making $200 monthly have 11 children....schools do not have desks....but the government contracts other less worthwhile projects... In other words it does not matter if it is CAFTA...NAFTA...HAFTA...until these embedded local issues are resolved..other adopted foreign programs that point towards more loaned money for clandestine closed projects will happen regardless of the outcomes ..... And oddly enough...this is one of the reasons I like them....A lot of disorganization also allows for a lot of freedoms...Perhaps it is good that many freedoms exist ...and lessor freedoms do not.... However it is a personal desire not to see CAFTA upset a very very sensitive agricultural sector that is somewhat self sufficient albeit very poor...which also contributes character to the campo and gives the country part of its identity... The US has become less and less free....and quite frankly some of these countries represent some of the most free countries on the planet in terms of everyday living... Freedom is a good thing....and to be pseudo colonized by the US is not attractive in the least...
Quite an interesting post. It made me think quite a bit, about the things that I take for granted at some times. I´ve known for some time that corruption is inevitable, since acording to the second law of thermodinamics: all things decay over time. In understanding this, I got to the conclusion that it´s useless to try and erradicate corruption as many politicians claim to be doing {and yet don´t seem to ever do}. But it is rather more efficient to mitigate corruption, or to optimize it, making processes more efficient, more transparent, easier to audit by anyone with a degree in bussinnes. I was however lacking the variable against which I could optimize it. I´ve never considered the fact that perhaps we don´t want to try and rid ourselves of corruption, simply because in doing so we embarquing in an imposible task. As such a task it´ll have serious repercussions on the life´s of all parties involved, wether it fails or succeds. One of this repercussions, that you point out and it´s perhaps the most important one, is that in order to fight corruption you must impose restrictions against freedom. Freedom is a commodity that we can easily take for granted and undervalue, but also one that is vital if you seek to achieve happiness. As Huxley portraited on his novel "brave new world" there can be no true happiness without freedom, or as portraited by Orwell in "1984" even a drop of freedom can bring happinness to a miserable life if only by a limited amount of time. All fights that limit freedom end up losers, e.g. the war on drugs, the prohibition, migratory restrictions, trade restrictions... in the end the market will overcome the law. So, should we go in a crussade for freedom a´la ACLU, and try to fight any restriction to freedom of moral impossement made by society and God? That would be just as harmfull as the other extreme. Things in nature tend towards equilibriums, we can see those equilibriums in biology, phisycs, chemistry, economics, finance, ingeneering, or the markets. Shouldn´t we seek a political system that creates an equilibrium between freedom and economic efficiency? Regarding CAFTA. I approve of CAFTA for four reasons. 1. There are no better alternatives at the present time for Costa Rica to overcome limitations of trade in the short and medium term. 2. By implementing CAFTA, Costa Rica will be able to rid itself of many deadlocks against the unions that control the state owned monopolies. Is in this point that I see real value to the implementation of CAFTA, even if it implies sacrificing much of the agricultural sector. However, I dont believe that the agricultural sector is going to be wiped out so easily, and that is my third point. 3. The impact on the agricultural sector has been overstated. In CR the industry that is most vulnerable to the CAFTA is the rice producers, and the COONARROZ {which is the insitution that represents all rice producers}, this are not poor farmers that grow enough for their families to eat, no, this are guys who have had regulation in place for over 20 years to create a monopoly on the imports of rice. They are the only party allowed to import rice into our country right now, so they buy the rice at market price on the US, to sell it at cartel prices in CR... CAFTA will bring an end to this scenario, in the next 20 years. However, this guys dont represent the mayority of farmers here, most people grow coffee. The US cant grow coffee. Regarding subsidies we have no weath, or corn, so the subsidies and buying dumping prices is actually a good thing for those markets. On the sugar market, we have plenty of sugar from cane, which is great for making liquors that we can sell to you guys, with a high enough premium to buy your subsidised sugar. On the potatoe market, we´ve had a FTA with canada for several years and our farmers have proveen themselves while compiting against imported potatoes from canada. So we have several agricultural sectors that are capable of compiting against the US farmers, and we can benefit from most of the subsidies that the US gob pays to farmers { thanks in advance for the donation in tax money fellas}. 4. I dont believe that the approval of CAFTA is going to have large repercussions on the level of freedom we enjoy in CR. Laws are simply not enforced here. One of the mayor problems we have in Costa Rica is that we have so many laws that we aint got enough people to enforce them, so nobody enforces anything that doesn´t get denounced. You can drive with a lot of freedom on the street, running over red lights and "creating" a new lane on the highway when there´s a traffic jam {by driving so far to the right that you can pass to the right of those cars that are already on the right lane. You can smoke a joint in front of a gobernment building on a monday morning without nobody making any trouble about it, as long there aren´t any cops around... and there usually aren´t that many, they´re all busy fighting the drug war or something... If anything, Costa Rica is leading towards more freedom, we currently have the 1987 Nobel for Peace as president. We are starting to do some serious research and development in areas like rocket science {NASA just opened a lab in Guanacaste to develop the next generation of rocket engines, that should take men to Mars in some 20 years; once again thanks for the tax $}, on the finantial sector, there are several Wall Street firms that already have r&d operations in Costa Rica, Amba Research and Welligton for example. We are developing new cities in areas that have always had low density, and low development indexes specially near the coastline. We are outsourcing like crazy, since our people are known to have a much better english accent than indian and chinnesse folks, and we are quite knowledgeable in areas related to software development. So I think we are in a good point in history to increase trade with the United States, that way we can catch some of the money that the Bushes are throwing out the window everyday... the way I see it we can follow a model similar to Monaco: come here to gamble away your fortune, with a little of Holland: come here to smoke your fortune, a little of Switzerland: we´ll keep your money with low taxes and few questions, a bid of Bermuda: come play the stock market from here, and a little China: we dont need you to come here, just send your intellectual property so we can copy it and sell it back to you. Merry Christmass.
Trade and Tourism ---- Ever notice how many dollars are poured into inviting millions to come to see one's countrys' natural wonders. That's one thing that is very hard to export, let alone to fabricate in a factor or change into cross-border negotiations on trade. Almost elementry, those statements, but take a gander at a trade and tourism industry show at a convention center, if you have the luxury to do so. Look at the ferverence with which each country tries to distinguish themselves and justify their destination as worthy of an expensive airline flight, hotel stay and other expensive dining and touring services offered with their packages. China has trumped most with their huge range of regions to discover, as well as the other large countries of Brazil, Argentina, South Africa and other African countries offering (expensive) safari trips and the like. Where do the smaller lesser significant countries and protectorates place in those offerings? Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Seychelle Islands, Monaco, Caymen Islands, Iceland, Taiwan and the like. These destinations seem almost irrelevant in comparison to the larger destinations, but they still sell their shores as a destination. That's where trade, manufacturing and the other issues discussed will be going, and fast, and to many extents has already shown signs of going there. Globalization, now that there are fewer countries off limits to most foreigners to their shores has really changed the way everyone views everyone else. Wow!
Meanwhile the Bush has set on a crusade to scare as many tourist away as he possibly can, by threading them like criminals once they set foot in the airport.
China brought propserity to Taiwan? You serious? China has done absolutely nothing for Taiwan, yet wants to claim it as it's own. The Japanese in the 40's revitalized and built much of the infrastructure still around today. The developement of technological products IS due to the very high emphasis on education. oh yeah, falun gong is a cult as much as american media wants to make china look like a big bad brutal government. lol.
. January 18, 2007 SouthAmerica: Today I was watching Lou Dobbs Tonight on CNN and he made such a big deal about Chinaâs new capability and its successful test of an anti-satellite weapon that could be used to knock out enemy surveillance and communications satellites in space. In the last 2 years I posted information on this forum when discussing US defense spending and also Chinaâs defense spending and I said that the United States is preparing the country to fight the last war and the Chinese is preparing China to fight a war of the future with their defense spending being concentrate to fight the next war in space. This is why the Chinese are leap-frogging their space program into the future â the Chinese want to dominate and fight the next big war from space. A few days ago China used a medium-range ballistic missile, launched from the ground, to destroy an ageing weather satellite more than 500 miles into space â and it seems to me that this new development has shocked many Americans. If Americans think that this was a big deal - then just wait until China has the new capabilities such as nuclear weapons and other laser anti-satellite weapons in space that are ready to be used at any time and they also can use laser to destroy other satellites around the world or they can shoot from space nuclear warheads in any target that they choose on earth. It is âPatheticâ how today the United States mindset is back all the way to the cold war years and the US is preparing themselves to fight the last war â in the meantime the Chinese is preparing China for a war of the future. ******* March 29, 2006 SouthAmerica: The Brazilian space program is moving into the future just like the Chinese program. Brazil and China are getting into the space business with the new and latest in technologies - and you will be able to see the results in the coming years. In the other hand: Brazil and China will quickly advance its space program â one designed for the 21st century and not the one that you have in mind. Brazil and China will leap frog its program into the future. In the meantime the US space program is in shambles and represent the past and not the future. http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=66425&perpage=6&pagenumber=2 ************* âChina hails satellite killer - and stuns its rivals in spaceâ · International outcry over first such test since 1985 · Scientists have warned of dangers of debris in orbit Suzanne Goldenberg in Washington Friday January 19, 2007 The Guardian - UK China has given notice of its increasing power in space - and provoked widespread international concern - with a successful test of an anti-satellite weapon that could be used to knock out enemy surveillance and communications craft. In the first such test since the cold war era, the White House confirmed that China had used a medium-range ballistic missile, launched from the ground, to destroy an ageing weather satellite more than 500 miles into space. "We are aware of it and we are concerned, and we made it known," the White House spokesman, Tony Snow, told reporters. The test, on January 11, was the first of its kind since 1985 when Washington halted such exercises because of fears of damaging military and civilian satellites with large clouds of debris. The test was especially troubling because it exposed the vulnerability of America's dependence on low-orbiting satellites, which are used for military communications, smart bombs and surveillance. In theory, last week's exercise could give Beijing the capability to knock out such satellites - a realisation that underlay the protests from Washington. Australia and Canada also voiced concerns; Britain, South Korea and Japan were expected to follow. "The US believes China's development and testing of such weapons is inconsistent with the spirit of cooperation that both countries aspire to in the civil space area," Gordon Johndroe, a White House spokesman, said. "We and other countries have expressed our concern regarding this action to the Chinese." Scientists have long warned of the dangers of space debris - which can remain in orbit for many hundreds of years - on existing space programmes. Among the items lost in space are lens caps, tools and nuts and bolts. Some former Soviet satellites leak fuel which solidifies into balls up to 3cm in diameter. Tiny pieces, including flecks of paint from eroding satellites, can travel at 17,000mph, and gain enough momentum to damage a medium-sized spacecraft. Despite yesterday's protests, the Bush administration has opposed a global ban on such tests, arguing that America needs to reserve its freedom of action in space. Arms control experts said it was not immediately clear whether the Chinese test was a ploy to try to press the Bush administration into a global weapons treaty, or whether China was asserting its own interests in space. News of the test, first reported by the magazine Aviation Week and Space Technology, comes months after the Bush administration unveiled a doctrine asserting America's right to take action against any perceived threat in space. The missile relied on the force of impact rather than an exploding warhead to shatter the satellite. Estimates said the destroyed Chinese satellite could have shattered into tens of thousands of fragments that would remain in orbit for more than a decade. The magazine said on its website: "Details emerging from space sources indicate that the Chinese Feng Yun 1C (FY-1C) polar orbit weather satellite launched in 1999 was attacked by an asat (anti-satellite) system launched from or near the Xichang space centre." Last August, Mr Bush laid out an even more robust vision of America's role in space, asserting Washington's right to deny access to any adversary hostile to US interests, and some arms control experts have accused the administration of conducting secret research on laser weapons to disable and destroy enemy satellites. In public, Mr Bush has sought to revive the national interest in space by calling for Americans to return to the moon in 15 years, and even use bases there as a launchpad for Mars. However, almost all of those costly military space programmes are over budget and behind schedule. .
. January 18, 2007 SouthAmerica: By the way, regarding my last posting - you donât have to be a rocket scientist to figure that one out â all you need it is a little common sense. .
I just returned from two months in China. A few observations: The Chinese are not much different than us (Westerners in general) They may be harder-working.. They may be just as (or more moral) than us "Christians" They are certainly smart They are developing a prosperous middle class rapidly We don't want to even think of a cold or hot war with them. Peaceful engagement is the only way we and they can survice. More to follow....
Well judging for the previous military engagements in the area Japan, Korea and Vietnam... you are probably right...
. January 19, 2007 SouthAmerica: The space arms race has begun with China making the first move towards the new weaponization of space. In the meantime the US, Japan and Australia are surprised with Chinaâs move and they react just like little children. And the United States is so involved fighting a war in Iraq against an insurgency vintage WW II â that they donât realize that the other major countries of the world including the new superpower China are moving into the future and they are building the military of the future that will have all kinds of capabilities fighting from space. It does not look good for the USA when its military canât win a local war in Iraq against an insurgency armed with weapons vintage 1950âs and in the other hand the US space program is also in shambles with the major highlight of the current Shuttle program being - if the Shuttle is going to âBlow Upâ on its way up or on re-entry. And every time a Shuttle is able to manage a return to earth in one piece - it is considered a major victory. ************** AsiaNews â Italy January 19, 2007 âSpace arms race beginsâ Concerns mount in the world after Chinese missile blows up satellite. Satellites are an essential in todayâs daily life and in key component in the worldâs major military forces. Experts believe China is not planning to challenge the US but wants to exert its hegemony in Asia. Beijing (AsiaNews/Agencies) â China has successfully tested a ballistic missile that knocked out one of its aging satellite. The United States and other countries have voiced concerns that it might set off an arms race in space and end peaceful space cooperation. Some experts believe that it was only a demonstration whose significance can only be judged over time. US National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said that on January 11 China launched a ground-based medium-range ballistic missile from or near the Xichang Space Center (Sichuan) against its aging Feng Yun 1C polar orbit weather satellite, placed in orbit in 1999, about 865 km (537 miles) above the Earth. Mr Johndroe said the US "believes China's development and testing of such weapons is inconsistent with the spirit of co-operation that both countries aspire to in the civil space area". Australia also protested. Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said his country did not want to see "some sort of spread, if you like, of an arms race into outer space". Japan's chief cabinet secretary, Yasuhisa Shiozaki, said his government was âconcerned,â saying that he asked China for an explanation of âwhat its intentions wereâ. Some experts are convinced that China has embarked on a long-range plan intended to establish its military superiority in Asia. Its military spending from 1990 to 2005 rose at an annual average rate of 9.6 per cent, after adjusting for inflation. And Beijing's military budget for last year was US$ 35.9 billion, up from US$ 31.3 billion in 2005, but US intelligence analysts estimate that overall military spending is at least twice as much. Most of the money involved in the spending increases has gone into the navy, air force and the nuclear force. Earlier this month Beijing in fact showcased its latest Jian-10 fighter jet and reports indicate that it now has the necessary capabilities to build an aircraft carrier and new air-air interceptor missiles. The capability demonstrated by China was no surprise to the Bush administration, which revised US national space policy in October to assert a right to deny space access to anyone hostile to US interests. The issue of possible hostilities in space became more real in August 2006 when National Reconnaissance Office Director Donald M. Kerr said that a US satellite had been "painted," or illuminated, by a ground-based laser in China. During the Cold War US President Ronald Reagan expressed his intention to build a defensive shield in space with laser technology that would intercept and destroy incoming missiles. But the âStar Warâ programme was abandoned in 1993. Now there are fears that a new âCold Warâ might be in the making that would sideline international and commercial space cooperation. Paradoxically, the Chinese test comes at a time when China itself is leading an effort in the United Nations to set up an international conference to address what many consider to be an imminent space arms race. The United States has been the one space-faring nation to oppose the idea, arguing that it isn't needed because there is no arms race in space. The last US anti-satellite test took place in 1985. Washington then halted such Cold War-era testing, concerned by debris that could harm civilian and military satellite operations on which it increasingly relies for everything from pinpoint navigation to Internet access to automated teller machines. What is more, many sensitive US communications satellites are in a much higher orbit around 35,000 kilometres (22,000 miles) and US officials believe that the recent test does not prove that China has the capability to disrupt those systems. China in 2003 became the third country to send a person into space aboard its own rocket. The communist country, fuelled by the fastest-growing major economy, plans to send a robot to the moon to fetch lunar soil by 2017. (PB) .