{"id":43774,"date":"2018-06-12T05:00:33","date_gmt":"2018-06-12T09:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=43774"},"modified":"2018-06-18T13:57:07","modified_gmt":"2018-06-18T17:57:07","slug":"g7-minus-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2018\/06\/12\/g7-minus-one\/","title":{"rendered":"G7 minus one"},"content":{"rendered":"

Justin Raimondo<\/a> on the well-shared image of Angela Merkel and her associates apparently trying to browbeat Donald Trump at the G-7 meeting (this version from Raimondo’s article):<\/p>\n

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All the Very Serious People are tweeting and retweeting this \u201ciconic\u201d photo of Trump surrounded by the Euro-weenies, with Angela Merkel seeming to lecture the President while the rest of our faithless \u201callies\u201d look on. It\u2019s \u201cAmerica Alone\u201d \u2013 the visual representation of the internationalist worldview: Trump\u2019s policy of \u201cAmerica First\u201d is \u201cisolating\u201d us, and, according to clueless leftists like Michael Moore<\/a>, Merkel is now the \u201cleader\u201d of the \u201cfree world.\u201d<\/p>\n

This last is good news indeed, for if Merkel is the new leader of the \u201cfree world\u201d then the stationing of 35,000 US troops in Germany \u2013 at a cost of billions annually \u2013 is no longer required and we can bring them home. This also means Germany, rather than the US, will be sending troops all over the world to fight \u201cterrorism\u201d \u2013 a move that is sure to cause consternation in certain regions with a history of German intervention, but hey, some<\/em>body has to do it!<\/p>\n

The political class is screaming bloody murder over Trump\u2019s performance at the G-7 meeting in Canada, where he reportedly spent most of the time detailing how much the US was paying for the defense of our vaunted \u201callies,\u201d not to mention the high tariffs imposed on American goods. He then proposed a \u201cfree trade zone\u201d in which member countries would drop all tariffs, subsidies, and other barriers to trade: the \u201callies\u201d didn\u2019t like that much, either. Nor did the alleged advocates of free trade here in the US give him any credit for ostensibly coming around to their point of view. Which reminds me of something Murray Rothbard said about this issue: \u201cIf authentic free trade ever looms on the policy horizon, there\u2019ll be one sure way to tell. The government\/media\/big-business complex will oppose it tooth and nail.\u201d<\/p>\n

Of course the Euro-weenies don\u2019t want real free trade: after all, they practically invented<\/a> protectionism. What they want is a free ride, at Uncle Sam\u2019s expense, and the reason they hate Trump is because they know the freebies are over. However, what really got the Usual Suspects frothing at the mouth was Trump\u2019s insistence that Russia be readmitted<\/a> to the G-8:<\/p>\n