🚀 go-pugleaf

jgardner@convex.com (John B. Gardner) writes:
	...
:Hold on a minute.  As easy as it would be for me to do flag waving about
:American jobs and so forth (which I believe in), I believe there's a logical 
:reason for the U.S. government to mandate U.S. manufactured supercomputers
:for many installations.
	...
:Now i hardly expect we will ever go to war with Japan, but lines of 
:comunication and shipping capabilities could be seriously hampered if we
:were at war with _anyone_.

Wonderful.  I'll be sure to forward your line of argument to the European
Commission to try and convince them to block any import of hardware and
software from the United States, for "reasons" identical and symmetrical
to the one you give:

- flag waving about European jobs and so forth (which I believe are so
  much hogwash), and

- lines of communications and shipping capabilities (to/from the USA) could
  be seriously hampered if we were at war with _anyone_

so anything as critical to the conduct of war as, say, food (did you know
an army marches on its stomach?), must definitely be only purchased
domestically... 

FYI, the US is currently exporting far more to Europe than it is importing
from it, so, while a full-scale protectionist trade war such as you seem
to be advocating will certainly make EVERYbody poorer, you should definitely
be the ones getting the worst from it; and in the computer field expecially,
as Bull and Siemens and Olivetti get a boost from a suddely re-protected
market.  BTW, have you checked what fraction of its profits Convex is making
from sales overseas, before spewing out your protectionist "logic"?  Or
did you simply fail to take into account that reprisals are sure to follow,
that there are two sides to every protectionist assault...?
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