Pandemic Exposes Liberalism’s Free Trade, Open Borders Road to National Suicide
The comments below are an edited and abridged synopsis of an article by Martin Sieff
Open borders and free trade induce national suicide gradually, without the victims knowing what is going on until it is too late. But Covid-19 has brought home that societies need governments and regulated borders for their own survival. Societies that have had open borders (like Italy) have suffered badly.
Countries that have allowed industry to decay have found they cannot produce the equipment they need (masks, respirators). Countries with strong manufacturing bases (China) or that are prepared for emergencies (Russia) have done better.
While some US states are almost free of the virus, infections have soared in metropolitan areas, especially in sanctuary cities where illegal immigrants congregate. These are where free trade and open borders flourish. These are also the places where the costs of those policies are most evident.
Countries like Russia and China, which have reacted quickly and decisively to shut down international and domestic travel, have been able to keep their numbers of infections and rates of spread down.
In Europe, the impact of the virus has been appalling. Leaders like Macron, Merkel and Johnson waited until it was too late. In Italy and Spain, the political splintering of societies has added to the chaos.
Economic history shows that developing industrial societies that protected their manufacturing with strong tariff barriers flourished in terms of foreign trade and balance of payments surpluses.
In contrast, free market societies that are too powerless (dumb?) to protect their economic borders get swamped by cheap manufacturing, and their domestic industries are decimated.
The more the US embraced global free trade, the more its own domestic manufacturing suffered. This didn’t bother the liberal elites. Having inflicted ruin and despair on hundreds of millions of people for generations, they despise their victims as ‘deplorables.’
Covid-19 should serve as a wake-up call to the peoples of the West. They need to start following Russia’s example of self-reliance, prudent preparation and maintaining strong borders.
The ravages of liberalism have already stripped the West of all its defenses—social, demographic, industrial and economic. We are out of time: The audit of pandemic has been taken, and the reckoning is now due.