Express route to poverty: U.S. policy already gives foreign competitors almost every advantage in trade, yet our government is working hard to make shipping foreign imports cheaper than ever before.(SPECIAL REPORT: NAFTA SUPERHIGHWAY)

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For a variety of reasons, the United States is getting creamed in world trade. In trade with China alone, America's trade deficit jumped from $6 million in 1985 to $201 billion in 2005. Most U.S. trade ills are the result of negligent U.S. policy decisions--allowing other countries to severely penalize American manufacturers via a Value Added Tax, actually funding the transfer of U.S. assets overseas through the U.S. Export-Import Bank and Overseas Private Investment Corp., insuring U.S. companies against loss for failed business ventures in foreign countries, etc. Now, as countries that provide what equates virtually to slave-labor wages ...