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Path: utzoo!watmath!watnot!watdcsu!dmcanzi
From: dmcanzi@watdcsu.UUCP (David Canzi)
Newsgroups: net.followup,net.politics
Subject: How selling cheap wheat to the Russians actually hurts them.
Message-ID: <2496@watdcsu.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 27-Aug-86 22:08:38 EDT
Article-I.D.: watdcsu.2496
Posted: Wed Aug 27 22:08:38 1986
Date-Received: Thu, 28-Aug-86 19:28:16 EDT
Reply-To: dmcanzi@watdcsu.UUCP (David Canzi)
Followup-To: net.politics
Organization: Secular Humanist Conspiracy, Child Corruption Division
Lines: 21
Xref: watmath net.followup:6975 net.politics:18670

[Followups to net.politics]

If the US sells wheat to the USSR cheap, they deprive the Russians of
the opportunity to produce their own wheat by making it unprofitable
for them to do so.  This creates unemployment and hardship, unless the
government manages to find some other use for those unemployed people.

So, it seems to me that it's perfectly consistent to punish the South
Africans with trade sanctions, and to punish the USSR with cheap
wheat.  Both of those countries damn well deserve it.

(For people wondering if I'm serious -- I'm not saying.  If you think
the argument in the first paragraph is ridiculous, kindly note the
similarity to the arguments, which are usually taken seriously, that
cheap foreign goods harm the US, and that artificially jacking up their
prices is good for the economy.)
-- 
David Canzi

"Freedom of speech does not mean that you can simply say what you
want to say or what you like saying." -- The People's Daily, Peking