A Conversation With VP Biden on Trade

Senator Hollings, you nailed all the high notes with your commentary on the Huffington Post. Thanks for your insight and persistence. I wish voters could catch your drift and quit buying into this business about free-markets and free trade.

Since May, I've been working way too much (a blessing) to read your posts, but I'm catching up now.

I have to quote a few key sections of your post, so they appear on my blog...they need emphasis.

"After adopting a seal, the first bill to pass the Congress in its history on July 4, 1789, was a protectionist tariff. And we financed and built these United States into an industrial power with "protectionism." We didn't pass the income tax until 1913. In 1900 the colony was richer than the Mother Country by $25 billion and had a GDP double the GDP of Germany and Russia combined, causing Teddy Roosevelt to exclaim: 'Thank God I'm not a Free Trader.'"

"The Obama Administration says the solution for jobs is educate, educate. We in South Carolina need a lot more education, but we have enough to create jobs -- producing the "ultimate driving machine" for BMW and the most advanced aircraft, the "Dreamliner," for Boeing. It's Washington that needs education."

And yes, bring on the VAT to promote domestic industry and exports.

Now, they're blaming President Obama for being anti-business and for not paying down deficits. He should eliminate the corporate tax and replace it with a 2% VAT. This will make him pro-business; bring in more revenues to pay down deficits, and promote exports. The vote in the Senate against McCain's VAT was an increase in taxes. The corporate tax beginning at 39% averages at 27%. A 2% VAT cuts corporate taxes for production 25%. And please call it for a vote. Now! Don't worry about a filibuster. Any voting against a 2% VAT to replace the corporate tax will be voting against the major reason to off-shore jobs; be voting against jobs; against cutting taxes; against promoting exports, against paying down the deficit, and against business. 

All truth, as far as I can tell. Why can't truth ever get traction in the morass of our political and media environment?

Read the Article at HuffingtonPost