CDI Manifesto

taken from http://www.cdi-idc.com/

The Centrist Democrat International on the side of the citizen
In a changing world, where the interdependence between West and East and North and
South is increasing, the Centrist Democrat view of society offers each person the
prospect of being able to thrive as an individual with specific talents, alongside other
individuals in the society. Centrist Democrats have clear answers to the new challenges
facing the international community. Placing themselves alongside the citizen, they are
building a world which also offers prospects to future generations.
The Centrist Democrat International (CDI) stands for the goals of Centrist Democrat
and related People's Parties and movements all over the world. As an international
organisation, the CDI supports the worldwide establishment of a free but socially
responsible market economy, which is the expression of the christian democratic ideal
for the shaping of our society.
The Centrist Democrat International sets out the following basic principles:
The fondamental values of Christian Democratic thinking, i.e. freedom and
responsibility, basic equality for all, justice, solidarité and subsidiarity, are the
keystones of a society in which individuals can thrive in coexistence with others. These
values hold out to the individual now and also to future generations the prospect of a
better world.
The recognition of fondamental human rights is the basis for building a society in which
individuals are able to fulfil themselves. Any attacks upon these rights must be opposed.
The nuclear family is the cornerstone of society, since it provides the best conditions for
the developments of the individual's personality. We must mobilise all available means
to ensure that the family is able to remain the environment in wich our children, the
adults of tomorrow, can grow into responsible people.
Poverty is a form of injustice. The international community must make strenous efforts
to abolish it. It is incombent on the developed countries
to help the less developed. We
must create the requisite conditions to enable countries to achieve their own
development. There is a need for a new set of development aid policies which will also
guarantee the personal safety of the aid providers.
Centrist Democrat and People's Parties, which place a high value on the principle of
solidarity, believe that economic policies must go hand in hand with a set of social
policies which will guarantee the weaker members of society the right to equal
opportunities for self-development. This concept of common responsibility also implies
the duty to integrate and support the disadvantaged in our societies.
Each society develops on the basis of the human resources available to it. Hence CDI
regards it as a priority to develop and support education and education systems.
Human beings ought to live in harmony with nature. CDI attaches great importance to
the development of a world environment policy designed to prevent problems and to
avoid shifting problems on to the less developed countries. Social development must not
lead to environmental damage. The present generation bears the responsibility for
managing our Earth properly and passing it on intact to future generations.
CDI is convinced of the need for cooperative links between countries. They support the
concept of federalism, in the spirit of genuine subsidiarity, and promote the idea of
regional cooperation agreements all over the world. In line with this process of
regionalisation, they strongly support mutual
cooperation between regional entities with
the goal of reducing the discrepancies between the various regions of the world.
The blueprint for cooperation on which the CDI is working is based upon a firm resolve
to establish peace and security across the world's borders. That is why the CDI is calling
for the setting up of efficient structures capable of guaranteeing peace and security.
They are convinced that the United Nations Organisation has a vital task to perform,
together with regional peace-keeping
organisations, in maintaining peace and
guaranteeing security. Dialogue and negotiation in all their forms in use in civil society
must take first priority in order to avert conflicts. In this respect, the process of
disarmament must be taken further, and
the international arms trade must be
discouraged.
In order to initiate, stimulate, and nourish the process of consultation among those who
share our view as to how society ought to develop, the CDI wishes to set up a strong
world organisation for the Centrist Democratic movement. The Centrist Democrat
International, with its President and Permanent Secretariat, must steer this organisation,
support the Member Parties and promote mutual consultation and agreement between
them.

WHAT THE SECOND AMENDMENT MEANS

taken from http://www.verticalpoliticsinstitute.com/index.cfm?Fuseaction=Issues.View&Issue_id=fffe61d4-fc59-4970-a349-5edb944ce3f9

The words of the Second Amendment are really pretty simple: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

Yet, this has been one of the most hotly debated Amendments in our history. The Second Amendment is primarily about tyranny and
self-defense, not hunting. The Founding Fathers wanted us to be able to defend ourselves from our own government, if need be, and from all threats to our lives and property. Second Amendment rights belong to individuals, not cities or states. Gun control should never be based on geography.

Our Founding Fathers, having endured the tyranny of the British Empire, wanted to guarantee our God-given liberties. They devised our three branches of government and our system of checks and balances. But they were still concerned that the system could fail, and that we might someday face a new tyranny from our own government. They wanted us to be able to defend ourselves, and that's why they gave us the Second Amendment. They knew that a government facing an armed populace was less likely to take away our rights, while a disarmed population wouldn't have much hope. As Ronald Reagan reminded us, "Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction." Without our Second Amendment rights, all of our other rights aren't inalienable, they're just "on loan" from the government.

THE CONTROVERSY

Frequently politicians who favor gun control say that it doesn't affect hunting. But the truth is, the Second Amendment isn't really about hunting. It's about tyranny and self-defense. The Founding Fathers weren't worried about our being able to bag a duck or a deer, they were worried about our keeping our fundamental freedoms. Criminals will always find a way to get guns. By disarming our law-abiding citizens, we take away the strongest deterrent to violent criminals - the uncertainty that they don't know who is helpless and who is armed. Our law enforcement officials can't be everywhere, all the time. Lawfully-armed citizens back them up and prevent robberies, rapes, and the murder of innocents. Right after Katrina, with law enforcement non-existent, many victims were able to protect their lives, their homes, and their precious supplies of food and water only because they were armed.

Some politicians believe gun control should be determined geographically, but Second Amendment rights belong to individuals, not cities or states. Your Second Amendment rights don't change when you change your address. Gun manufacturers must be protected from frivolous law suits. Rights must be given to law enforcement officials, such as permitting them to carry concealed handguns.

A major controversy about the right to bear arms is whether that should include assault weapons. Should Americans be allowed to have them? The answer is a resounding Yes!! Americans ought to be allowed to have anything they want to have, as long as they're law abiding, legal citizens. The Second Amendment was not put in our constitution for hunting.

Sanctity of Life

taken from http://www.verticalpoliticsinstitute.com

WHEN LIFE BEGINS

Life does begin at the point of conception. We should protect human life, the foundation of our civilization. It defines us as much as anything does, as to how we treat and how we even view another human life, as to whether it has intrinsic value or worth or whether it does not. Those of us who are pro life believe that we must do everything possible to protect that life, because protection of life is the centerpiece of what makes us unique as Americans. We value the life of one as if it's the life of all. That's why we search non-stop for that missing Boy Scout, or that missing young mother. That's why we search for the 13 miners in Sago, West Virginia after a mine explosion, or the hikers on Mount Hood. We value life and it is part of what separates us from the Islamic jihadists who celebrate death. They have a culture of death. We have a culture of life.

The clear science of when life begins is "When the male sperm and female egg join, a new and unique life form is created." Not at birth or viability, or when a lawyer says so. This happens at conception. This life is either human or something else. Science irrefutably would declare that the life which is starting from that moment is human. It's not a parrot, squirrel, or dolphin. It will never become a tree-it can only become a human. It has the entire DNA sequence that it will have for the rest of its life right then. In days it will begin to take on increasingly observable human characteristics and form, but at conception, it is biologically human.

A FUNDAMENTAL RIGHT TO EXIST

If this life is human, then the only issue left is whether this human life falls under the notion that it has a fundamental right of existence or not. If not, it is because we as a culture have decided that some human lives are simply not worth living. If we can decide that about an innocent and unborn baby, we can also decide it on the basis of less absolute criteria than that. If we make that choice (and this is all about "CHOICE," isn't it?) then someone may decide that a terminally ill person is not a life worth living. Maybe a severely disabled child is a life not worth living; what about a person with a limited IQ?

Some might say that's absurd--that an educated and enlightened society would never be so audacious as to begin to terminate life based on such arbitrary excuses? Well, Germany fell into just such a moral chasm in the 1930s. The murder of six million Jews, and millions of others, was justified because of their religion and millions of others were murdered because of their politics. Germany was not a primitive, superstitious culture. It was filled with those deemed to be intelligent and enlightened. But in the end, the truly good people were overwhelmed by the truly evil people.

THE VALUE OF HUMAN LIFE - FROM CONCEPTION TO DEATH

At the core of our society is the sanctity of human life. It is rooted in who we are as a culture and as a civilization. And should we turn our back on this fundamental truth, we have turned our back on the very essence and foundation of who we are as a people. We should always err on the side of life. We as a society believe life is precious. As Christians we believe that God is the creator and instigator of life.

At the heart of our belief in life is the understanding that if we are indeed equal all of us have intrinsic worth, and no one has more than another. But those of us who are pro life must recognize some fundamental facts. Life begins at conception but it doesn't end at birth. If we're really pro-life we have to be concerned about more than just the gestation period. Real pro-life people need to be concerned about affordable housing, safe neighborhoods, access to a college education. Every child deserves a quality education, first-rate health care, decent housing in a safe neighborhood, and clean air and drinking water. Every child deserves the opportunity to discover and use his God-given gifts and talents. That is what pro-life has to mean.

The issue of right to life is an issue of principle and conviction. If we value each other as human beings and believe that everybody has equal worth, and that that intrinsic value is not affected by net worth, or ancestry, or last name, or job description, or ability, or disability, then the issue of the sanctity of human life is far bigger than just being anti-abortion. Those of us who believe so strongly in the sanctity of life recognize that we became involved in politics because of our strong pro-life convictions. It's about being pro-life and exercising that deep conviction held by our founding fathers that all of us are equal and no one is more equal than another, recognizing that once we ever decide that some people are more equal or less equal than others, then we start moving that line, and it may include us some day. Every human being has value. Every decision we make should always be on the side of life without equivocation.

Obama is back!

taken from http://blog.amitaietzioni.org/2008/05/obama-is-back.html

For a while, on the long and torturous campaign trail, Obama seemed to focus excessively on the easier side of communitarianism: that we are all one; the hope and joy of togetherness. However, during his recent Wesleyan speech he revived the other half of his message: the call for service for the common good, a much more demanding subject.

For a time, we heard a lot of “we are not from red states, not from blue states, but from the United States.” We were invited to join the feel-good politics sprinkled liberally with the holy water of hope which has no cost.

In The Audacity of Hope, written before Obama declared his bid for the presidency, he was more mindful of the other half of the communitarian message, that we should “ground our politics in the notion of a common good.” He wrote, “We value the imperatives of family and the cross-generational obligations that family implies…We value patriotism and the obligations of citizenship, a sense of duty and sacrifice on behalf of our nation.”

On the campaign trail many of these profound insights faded. We heard painless declarations, such as “Our prosperity can and must be the tide that lifts every boat…we rise or fall as one nation,” and such undemanding observations as “…too often, we lose our sense of common destiny; [the] understanding that we are all tied together.”

The nation is upon hard times. Its coffers are empty; creditors are at the gate; the military is exhausted and depleted; the regard in which America is held overseas is at an all time low; and major economic and security challenges pile up like so many storm clouds. The nation demands a prolonged period of restoration, one in which merely replenishing all that was squandered will entail raising taxes and keeping new expenditures on a tight leash. In plain English— restoration means sacrifices and a commitment to serve, to give rather than just to take.

At Wesleyan, Obama re-embraced this theme. He told the graduating class—and the rest of us— about the days in which he first served as a community organizer in Chicago: “…I had worked for weeks on this project. We waited and waited for people to show up, and finally, a group of older people walked into the hall. And they sat down. And a little old lady raised her hand and asked, ‘Is this where the bingo game is?’”

He continued, “It wasn't easy, but eventually, we made progress. Day by day, block by block, we brought the community together, and registered new voters, and we set up after school programs, and fought for new jobs, and helped people live lives with some measure of dignity.”

Better yet, he introduced a new note, one of great import: “I also began to realize that I wasn't just helping other people. Through service, I found a community that embraced me; citizenship that was meaningful; the direction that I'd been seeking. Through service, I discovered how my own improbable story fit in to the larger story of America.”

If you want to read more, go here, but the main point is clear: unless we all put our shoulders to the wheel, America with be stuck in the rut that it is in now. Right on, Obama.

Declaration of Principles agreed by IDU founders, London 1983.

taken from http://www.idu.org/principle.aspx

HAVING REGARD to their common convictions that democratic societies provide individuals throughout the world with the best conditions for political liberty, personal freedom, equality of opportunity and economic development under the rule of law; and therefore

BEING COMMITTED to advancing the social and political values on which democratic societies are founded, including the basic personal freedoms and human rights, as defined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; in particular, the right of free speech, organisation, assembly and non-violent dissent; the right to free elections and the freedom to organise effective parliamentary opposition to government; the right to a free and independent media; the right to religious belief; equality before the law; and individual opportunity and prosperity;

HAVING REGARD to their common beliefs in an open society, where power is dispersed widely amongst free institutions, dedicated to creating conditions that will enable each individual to reach his full potential and to carry out his responsibilities to his fellow man; and where the central task of government is to serve the individual and to safeguard and promote individual freedom; and equally

STRESSING the moral commitments of a free and open society, supporting the institution of the family as its fundamental social and cohesive force, as well as social responsibility towards the weak and less fortunate, particularly by encouraging self-help and individual enterprise and choice in the provision of services;

BEING DEDICATED to a society of individuals working together in partnership for the common good;

HAVING REGARD to their common views that political democracy and private property are inseparable components of individual liberty and that the socially-oriented market economy provides the best means of creating the wealth and material prosperity to meet the legitimate aspirations of individuals, and of tackling social evils such as unemployment and inflation;

BELIEVING that this is the most effective and beneficial way of providing individual initiative and enterprise, responsible economic development, employment opportunities, low taxation and consumer choice;

HAVING REGARD to the threats posed by the extreme Left and the extreme Right;

REJECTING any form of totalitarianism, which brings so much suffering and restricts so many freedoms today;

HAVING REGARD to the important global tasks which render necessary and desirable a closer and efficient collaboration of their parties, inspired by their common conviction;

PLEDGING THEMSELVES to work towards ever-closer co-operation among all the peoples of democratic nations, while recognising the right of each individual nation to preserve its identity and to safeguard its vital interests, to use their influence and above all their political values for the greater good of the world, especially by promoting the mutual responsibilities of all nations for global economic development;

DECLARE their dedication to a just and lasting peace and freedom throughout the world; and

FURTHER DECLARE that the cause of peace will be advanced by adherence to the principles expressed in this Declaration; and in

ACTIVELY INVITING other parties to subscribe to them;

AGREE to create a working association in pursuance of their common beliefs, hereinafter referred to as the INTERNATIONAL DEMOCRAT UNION.

Criminal Justice

taken from http://www.gwu.edu/~icps/crime.html

Thinking about criminal justice has undergone a major transformation over the past decade. At the core of the shift has been a rediscovery of the importance of community. "Community policing" has become the byword of police departments in numerous cities big and small. Many observers argue that these new police methods--which, among other things, emphasize the importance of order in public spaces and rely on stronger cooperation between police and neighborhood communities--bear at least part of the responsibility for the recent significant declines in crime.

Communitarians have long stressed the importance of the community as a powerful "third force" operating in the middle terrain between the individual and the government. Community norms can often be more effective than laws in regulating conduct. Indeed, without the support of the community’s "moral voice," laws and law enforcement can often be unavailing. Transforming a high-crime neighborhood into a livable community usually requires more than police action. The community itself must will a change.

The concept of community policing grew out of an important article by political scientists James Q. Wilson and George Kelling called "Broken Windows" (see below). In recent years communitarian-oriented sociologists and political scientists have contributed to the development of a broader concept of "community justice," which integrates insights from criminology with communitarian themes. An important collection of essays on the emerging concept of community justice was edited by David R. Karp, formerly of the Institute for Communitarian Policy Studies and now an assistant professor of sociology at Skidmore College.

Assemblies of God Perspectives on Social Issues

links taken from http://ag.org/top/Beliefs/topic_index.cfm

The following statements are based upon Assemblies of God common understanding of scriptural teaching.

Abortion: Sanctity of Human Life Including Abortion and Euthanasia, Abuse, Alcohol, Tobacco & Drugs, Balancing Relationships and Responsibilities, Capital Punishment, Civil Disobedience, Counseling and Psychology, Environmental Protection, Family - A Biblical Institution, Feminism and Appropriate Roles for Women, Financial Practices & Credit, Governments and Political Parties, Immigration, Law: Law and Crime, Poverty: The Poor, Racism, War and Conscientious Objectors

Thumbnail Sketch of the FairTax

taken from http://www.fairtax.org/site/PageServer?pagename=about_basics_thumbnail

The FairTax proposal is a comprehensive plan to replace federal income and payroll taxes, including personal, gift, estate, capital gains, alternative minimum, Social Security/Medicare, self-employment, and corporate taxes. The FairTax proposal integrates such features as a progressive national retail sales tax, dollar-for-dollar revenue replacement, and a rebate to ensure that no American pays such federal taxes up to the poverty level. Included in the FairTax Plan is the repeal of the 16th Amendment to the Constitution. The FairTax allows Americans to keep 100 percent of their paychecks (minus any state income taxes), ends corporate taxes and compliance costs hidden in the retail cost of goods and services, and fully funds the federal government while fulfilling the promise of Social Security and Medicare.

Americans take home their whole paychecks.
Not only do more Americans have jobs, but they also take home 100 percent of their paychecks (except where state income taxes apply). No federal income taxes or payroll taxes are withheld from paychecks, pensions, or Social Security checks.

The prebate makes the FairTax progressive.
To ensure no American pays tax on necessities, the FairTax Plan provides a prepaid, monthly rebate (prebate) for every registered household to cover the consumption tax spent on necessities up to the federal poverty level. This, along with several other features, is how the FairTax completely untaxes the poor, lowers the tax burden on most, while making the overall rate progressive. However, the FairTax is progressive based on lifestyle/spending choices, rather than simply punishing those taxpayers who are successful. Do you see how much freer life is with the FairTax instead of the income tax?

No tax on used goods. The amount you pay to fund the government is totally visible.
With the FairTax you are only taxed once on any good or service. If you choose to buy used goods − used car, used home, used appliances − you do not pay the FairTax. If, as a business owner or farmer, you buy something for strictly business purposes (not for personal consumption), you pay no consumption tax. The FairTax is charged just as state sales taxes are today. When you decide what to buy and how much to spend, you see exactly how much you are contributing to the government with each purchase.

Retail prices no longer hide corporate taxes or compliance costs, which together drive up costs for those who can least afford to pay.
Did you know that income taxes and the cost of complying with them currently make up 20 percent or more of all retail prices? It’s true. According to Dr. Dale Jorgenson of Harvard University, hidden income taxes are passed on to the consumer in the form of higher prices for everything you buy. If competition does not allow prices to rise, corporations lower labor costs, again hurting those who can least afford to lose their jobs. Finally, if prices are as high as competition allows and labor costs are as low as practical, profits/dividends to shareholders are driven down, thereby hurting retirement savings for moms-and-pops and pension funds invested in Corporate America. With the FairTax, the sham of corporate taxation ends, competition drives prices down, more people in America have jobs, and retirement/pension funds see improved performance.

The income tax exports our jobs, rather than our products. The FairTax brings jobs home.
Most importantly, the FairTax does not burden U.S. exports the way the current income tax system does. The FairTax removes the cost of corporate taxes and compliance costs from the cost of U.S. exports, putting U.S. exports on a level playing field with foreign competitors. Lower prices sharply increase demand for U.S. exports, thereby increasing job creation in U.S. manufacturing sectors. At home, imports are subject to the same FairTax rate as domestically produced goods. Not only does the FairTax put U.S. products sold here on the same tax footing as foreign imports, but the dramatic lowering of compliance costs in comparison to other countries’ value-added taxes also gives U.S. products a definitive pricing advantage which foreign tax systems cannot match.

The FairTax strategy is revenue neutral: Neither raise nor lower taxes so consumer costs remain stable.
The FairTax pays for all current government operations, including Social Security and Medicare. Government revenues are more stable and predictable than with the federal income tax because consumption is a more constant revenue base than is income.

If you were in a 23-percent income tax bracket, the federal government would take $23 out of your paycheck for every $100 you made. With the FairTax, if the federal government gets $23 out of every $100 spent in America, the same total revenue is delivered to the federal government. This is revenue neutrality. So, instead of paycheck-earning Americans paying 7.65 percent of their paychecks in Social Security/Medicare payroll taxes, plus an average of 18 percent of their paychecks in federal income tax, for a total of about 25.65 percent, consumers in America pay only $23 out of every $100. Or about 30 percent at the cash register when they elect to spend on new goods or services for their own personal consumption. And this tax is collected only on spending above the federal poverty level, providing important progressivity.

Tax criminals don’t make criminals out of honest taxpayers.
Today, the IRS will admit to 16 percent noncompliance with the code. FairTax.org will be generous and simply take the position that this is likely a conservative estimate of the underground economy. However, this does not take into account the criminal/drug/porn economy, which equally conservative estimates put at one trillion dollars of untaxed activity. The FairTax does tax this -- criminals love to flash that cash at retail -- while continuing to provide the federal penalties so effective in bringing such miscreants to justice. The substantial decrease in points of compliance -- from every wage earner, investor, and retiree, down to only retailers -- also allows enforcement to concentrate on following the money to criminal activity, rather than making potential criminals out of every taxpayer struggling to decipher the current code.

What is the FairTax Plan?
The FairTax Plan is a comprehensive proposal that replaces all federal income and payroll based taxes with an integrated approach including a progressive national retail sales tax, a prebate to ensure no American pays federal taxes on spending up to the poverty level, dollar-for-dollar federal revenue replacement, and, through companion legislation, the repeal of the 16th Amendment. This nonpartisan legislation (HR 25/S 1025) abolishes all federal personal and corporate income taxes, gift, estate, capital gains, alternative minimum, Social Security, Medicare, and self-employment taxes and replaces them with one simple, visible, federal retail sales tax administered primarily by existing state sales tax authorities. The IRS is disbanded and defunded. The FairTax taxes us only on what we choose to spend on new goods or services, not on what we earn. The FairTax is a fair, efficient, transparent, and intelligent solution to the frustration and inequity of our current tax system.

What is Americans For Fair Taxation (FairTax.org)?
FairTax.org is a nonprofit, nonpartisan, grassroots organization solely dedicated to replacing the current tax system. The organization has hundreds of thousands of members and volunteers nationwide. Its plan supports sound economic research, education of citizens and community leaders, and grassroots mobilization efforts. For more information visit the Web page: www.FairTax.org or call 1-800-FAIRTAX.

For more information, check out the Research Papers

Episcopal Social Involvement

taken from http://www.episcopalchurch.org/advocacy.htm

The focus of the Advocacy Center is domestic and international peace and justice, giving a voice to the voiceless. The following mission areas serve under advocacy:

Our Mission Areas

• Social & Economic Justice
• Environmental Affairs
• Domestic Policy Advocacy (coming soon)
• Social Justice & Domestic Poverty (Jubilee)

• International Policy Advocacy (coming soon)
• ONE Campaign
• International Peace & Justice Making
• Migration & Refugee Advocacy

• Native American / Indigenous Ministries
• Anti-racism & Racial Justice
• Gender Equality (coming soon)

• Public Policy Network

• Advocacy Resources (coming soon)

Free Trade Is Anything but Fair, and Lousy Economics Besides

taken from http://www.gwu.edu/~ccps/etzioni/B448.html

"Free trade" is God's gift to modern economies, and for a politician to support "fair trade" is tantamount to worshiping graven images.

Dick Gephardt, who dared to touch the free-trade icon, was burned at the stake. John Edwards, who questioned free trade, failed as a candidate, while John F. Kerry, who dances around this issue as if it were gay marriage, now has beaten the Democratic pack. Moreover, when President Bush protected U.S. steel from ruinous competition, he was dumped on as if he were a labor Neanderthal.

But politics aside, is free trade really good economics? Free trade would be all that it was promised to be if we lived in a world in which not just jobs but also goods, people and capital freely flowed from one country to another. In such a never-never land, indeed, everyone would do what he was best at, and we all would be richer for it. Unfortunately, when one country lowers its trade barriers and other countries don't lower theirs as much — making for freer, but not free, trade — who gets what becomes extremely murky. And that is the world in which we find ourselves today.

U.S. corporations love to move their plants and our jobs to other countries — countries that sometimes block our products and services from entering. As we lowered our trade barriers, a good part of our car and television manufacturing was done in Japan. But for decades Japan prevented our financial institutions from serving its citizens, and its corporate culture of keiretsu (close business relationships) still hampers the work of these institutions. American construction companies can bid all they want for public works in the huge Japanese market, but a cabal of Japanese firms decides whose turn it is to submit the lowest bid this time, and somehow it very rarely turns out to be a foreign company. Scores of countries block the import of what we are best at producing: low-cost food.

Many free-market champions believe we should export lowbrow jobs but do the "creative" stuff ourselves, thus keeping our hands clean and our wages high. This notion assumes that God has anointed the United States to be the creator while the rest of the world has been chosen to do the menial work. Perhaps no one told the rest of the world. Israelis and Finns, for instance, are not exactly laggards. Indian engineers and Chinese computer programmers are rapidly bridging the creativity gap. Moreover, the U.S. has a range of talent distribution. What will our less-talented workers do if they are not gifted enough to make "Finding Nemo" or if there are not enough "creative" jobs to go around? Will they move — or be moved — to the nations where their jobs were outsourced, as free-trade theory calls for?

If Americans are not to follow their jobs to Third World countries, they will need to be retrained and relocated within our borders, a transition that, even when it works, generates high adjustment costs.

Every time we pare down an industry because its labor can be performed more cheaply overseas — say, most recently reading X-rays — those who used to work in it here either need to be retrained to do something else or live off unemployment or welfare. Such transitions also entail, as studies have shown, a significant increase in mental illness, suicides and family breakdowns, all hefty human and social costs. Economists tend to ignore all these public costs, which end up in the laps of taxpayers, when they tell people how wonderful it is that they can buy T-shirts at Wal-Mart at a discount.

Organized labor's claim that free trade involves a race to the bottom is valid. As flight attendants and grocery workers recently discovered, the pressure is on to reduce benefits, job security and the wages given to new employees and possibly to old ones.

Remaining competitive in a world in which billions of workers are paid about a dollar a day and have no benefits, and in which corporations need not worry about environmental costs, requires us to drastically lower our own standard of living.

Economists argue that eventually other countries will raise their living standards (as South Korea and Taiwan already are doing) and then we will all compete on equal footing. But there are two ways to get there: lower our standards until the rest of the world catches up or insist that we compete freely only with those countries where companies give their workers a basic basket of benefits and elementary environmental protection. This is what is referred to as "fair trade."

Americans should have the opportunity to vote in November on which form of trade they prefer: the mismanaged variety (masquerading as free trade) or fair trade. They will have this opportunity only if one of the political parties has the civic courage to lift the fog in which economists, big business and naive liberals have shrouded this whole sordid business. Then fair trade will not only be sound economics for America but also good politics.

Amitai Etzioni, a professor of sociology at the George Washington University, is the author most recently of "My Brother's Keeper: A Memoir and a Message" (Rowman & Littlefield, 2003).