[mrg]

From Congressman Ron Paul:

Free trade is not complicated, yet NAFTA and CAFTA are comprised of thousands of pages of complicated legal jargon.

All free trade really needs is two words: Low tariffs.

Free trade does not require coordination with another government to benefit citizens here.

Just like domestic businesses don't pay taxes, foreign businesses do not pay tariffs – consumers do, in the form of higher prices.

If foreign governments want to hurt their own citizens with protectionist tariffs, let them.

But let us set a good example here, and show the world an honest example of true free trade.

And let us stop hurting American workers with mountains of red tape in the name of safety.

Safety standards should be set privately, by the industry and by the insurance companies who have the correct motivating factors to do so.



Free trade is not the problem, and pseudo free trade is what is being offered in the wrongly named North American Free Trade Agreement and all its offshoots.

The problem is a government-managed economy and the burdensome regulation that results.

For our economy to remain competitive in the world, we must remember what it is to be truly free.

We must lift the regulatory shackles threatening to sink our industries into oblivion.

Free trade begins with freedom domestically, and we can't afford to lose that.