While I agree with you in theory, someone has to decide if its acceptable or not and at some standard. We generally defer that to the government, who has done so, and by which standard China clearly violates.
Yes, absolutely I am against government being involved in trade restrictions, tariffs, etc. I’ve said so many times and I’ll say it again here and now. But I’m not against government being involved in preventing theft and stolen property. If we’re going to have a government that’s one of the fundamental reasons for its existence.
No, you are misunderstanding me. I am not against government taking action to prevent the theft of property, intellectual or otherwise, or the movement or sale of such property.
Besides trade restrictions with said country, what else can a country do. You sound like a big city liberal: "Im against crime" while simultaneously supporting non-existent penalties for the offenders.
You call it trade restrictions. I call it theft restriction. If it isn’t stolen and people want to buy it neither you nor I should object.
I’m sorry, I haven’t written a detailed policy paper on how to prevent the existence of bad actors. One thing I do know, however, is whatever strategy is being used by our government has not prevented them. Are you assuming there is something that can be done about them? If so, what is it?
I assure you the world I live in is the same world as yours. I’m curious what motivation you recommend that will untangle the intermingled abuses. Obviously the methods used to date have been unsuccessful, otherwise you wouldn’t be so upset.
No doubt the world has failed to hold countries and companies accountable. But given the vast sums of money and greed of the principles involved I don't expect anything to change. I just know free trade is a farce, it will never exist in a fair and honest way.
Oh, I agree with you 100%. A pure free market is no more obtainable than is pure socialism. Human nature will not allow either to exist. The struggle is between the two unobtainable desires. I argue that the closer a society drifts to the free market side of the equation the healthier, happier and more robust the society will be, and the better it will deal with the bad actors because there are fewer opportunities for them to hide what they do, and fewer chances for them to manipulate the government officials (who I think are the worst of the bad actors) into doing their bidding.
You say it’s a situation which “is not something that US law enforcement has any jurisdiction to deal with in any fashion.” And then insist I propose means to deal with it. That’s hard to do. Since you say it’s part of global trade I’m curious what you think one government, ours, will accomplish by imposing trade restrictions or tariffs. I’ve said I agree with trade restrictions on known stolen property. But I’m unclear how that stops trade between Yugoslavia and Romania if some of the property has been stolen. It sounds like you are trying to bait me into calling for tyrannical authoritarian “protection” by our government, and I’m not going to do that. As for me being concerned whether you take me seriously, I feel I must tell you I’m not. I’m a radical advocate of individual liberty, and as such I recognize free markets are the only economic system consistent with it. For those of you who demand the government protect you from all the bad actors in the world, which it is incapable of doing since most actions by governments are taken by bad actors themselves, your opinion matters as little to me as mine does to you.
I recognize there is a universal tug of war between those of us radical individualists and those who have a collectivist vision, both concepts that exist only in theory. It’s a tug of war, and as such I will go to my dying day pulling for the individualist side. I do not see it as futile. I see it as a moral obligation to those who come after me to know my generation did not let the light get extinguished.
What does that mean? All trade? Please explain how that would solve the problem of industrial/intellectual theft. The world is bigger than one country. How does the US cutting itself off from international trade help anyone? If the US imports a product from Australia, for example, but some of its components include stolen technology from China, does the US restrict trade of that product, ban the import from Australia? Would Australia not respond in kind and restrict a product it imports from America? So not only would the American consumer of the Australian product be harmed, but now the American producer exporting to Australia who was uninvolved and innocent of wrongdoing is caught up in the pissing match and it is harmed (as well as its employees). You’ve only added to the problem, not solved it. What seemed to you to be a simple solution, restrict trade, turns out to be no solution at all, but only adds to the misery.
That’s exactly how you develop a free society, you aim for perfection knowing it won’t be achieved, but also knowing that keeping society’s eye on the prize is how it remains civil. Your comment is like telling a Christian that there’s no point in trying to abide by Christian ethics because they are only theoretical, human nature sees to it they can never be achieved, so ignore God’s mandate to live according to his theoretical instructions.
I think the analogy stands. You say society should not have a goal of perfection to which it should aspire, because human nature is such it can't be reached, therefore it's not only useless to try it, but counter-productive as well. Christianity lays a groundwork for individual perfection to which all must aspire, knowing human nature will prevent it, but the task is to keep trying despite shortfalls. But using your prognosis there is no point in even trying because it is useless and counter-productive.
