Just a Gwai Lo fun within prescribed limits [?]

Warren Meyer: “At the heart of every argument that the trade deficit is bad is the mercantilist notion that the US economy is a bank vault leaking funds.  But this analogy that seems to be in everyone's head is flawed.  The supply of money or wealth in the US, in the vault, is constantly growing.  If you really have to think of it as a vault, then think of what's inside as rabbits rather than gold bars.  Does anyone doubt that if you start with a hundred rabbits and every year sent a few to China that you might still have more rabbits than you started with in the vault?  A free economy is like a group of rabbits on Viagra.  Even if the Chinese took billions of dollars they got from selling goods to the US each year and burned the money in a big bonfire, the US still would be growing in wealth.”

Though the writer has a libertarian bent—and yes, I do mean "though", since I find much of libertarian hard-to-swallow (never boring, mind you)—the above article can be read in conjunction with an article by Robert Murphy urging calm about China's economy as it relates to that of the United States. Murphy too is a libertarian, or at the very least, someone writing for a libertarian research institute, so I at least give credit to both articles in arguing that a better understanding of economics is needed when talking about the Chinese economy as a perceived "threat" to the United States' national security.

Warren later draws attention to question I've been wrestling with, especially in light of Dave Pollard's reasons for not to trade with China or Sara Bongiorni's efforts to not buy anything made in China: are those who want to cut off relations from China racist? I can only assume with Sara Bongiorni, but with Dave Pollard, in the hundreds of articles I've read of his, his anti-racism credentials are and never have been in question. But I can't see how not trading with China improves the lot of the Chinese who, yes, slave away in terrible conditions, but at least they have money to send back to the families they left in the countryside so that they can survive. It's a (possibly unresolvable) dilemma in that the Chinese economy has been built on abuses that no-one can reasonably defend (same goes for the political system), but also that Chinese workers deserve better working conditions (and stronger political rights).

George F. Will: “[B]aseball produces -- inning by inning, game by game, season upon season -- a rich sediment of statistics that sustain the arguments that nourish interest in the game with the longest history. If Sosa's slugging -- he is the only player to hit 60 or more home runs in three seasons -- was assisted by cheating, he will be diminished, as will the game's ongoing narrative. And all other players will come under a lowering cloud of cynicism about the authenticity of their achievements.”

Will again plays up how woeful the team (the Chicago Cubs) he is a fan of, and gets a lot of mileage out of the Sammy Sosa Corking Affair. Some black players, notably Gary Sheffield—I saw an interview with Sheffield on Sportscenter when I was in the states, and asked why he thought Sosa was suspended, Sheffield lifted his arm and pointed to his skin—have claimed racism in this case. As this article accurately points out, those claims are ridiculous. Baseball players are probably overpaid, but that's coming from someone who never had to swing at a 95-mile-an-hour fastball.