International Affairs

Historical Reminder: Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act

January 27, 2017 by Michael Boyle

Being on the brink of a renewed protectionist urge in the US, it’s worthwhile to review the history on this kind of policy.

The Tariff Act of 1930 (codified at 19 U.S.C. ch. 4), otherwise known as the Smoot–Hawley Tariff or Hawley–Smoot Tariff, was an act sponsored by Senator Reed Smoot and Representative Willis C. Hawley and signed into law on June 17, 1930. The act raised U.S. tariffs on over 20,000 imported goods.

The tariffs under the act were the second-highest in the U.S. in 100 years, exceeded by a small margin by the Tariff of 1828. The Act and following retaliatory tariffs by America’s trading partners helped reduce American exports and imports by more than half during the Depression; but economists disagree by how much.

Source: Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act – Wikipedia

Re: Russian Spy Accused of Treason

January 27, 2017 by Michael Boyle

Josh Marshall is following an odd but disturbing bit of news out of Russia. Note that this is going on as Trump officials are being investigated about their ties to Russia. Has someone in the White House “outed” one of the US’s own assets to the Russians?

Last night I noted that a top Russian spy who is the number two person in the FSB department which allegedly oversaw the US election hacking operation had been arrested and charged with treason. Was he a sacrificial lamb and olive branch to Trump? A way for Putin to claim that his spy services had perhaps gone rogue? Or was he suspected of being a source to US intelligence? People who fall from grace in Putin’s Russia are often dealt with with trumped up criminal prosecutions. But treason is a special charge.
Well, now we have reports that Sergei Mikhailov is suspected of being a US asset at the heart of Russian intelligence.

Source: Wow, It Gets Bigger

Andrew Sullivan:

May 8, 2007 by Michael Boyle

Andrew Sullivan:

Re-Thinking The War II. Rethinking the war not in terms of geopolitics or anything, but in terms of the damage it has done to the US. To me, this is one of the most important aspects and always has been.

In Boing Boing today,

October 25, 2006 by Michael Boyle

In Boing Boing today,

Xeni Jardin linked to an article in the IHT: Laptops, please: US law permits search, seizure at the border. On my way home from a recent trip from the US, I had this experience at Canadian customs. I was flagged by the guy and later he made a cursory look-see in my bag, he was most interested in the contents of my laptop. He was pretty chatty and said that one of their main missions at Canadian customs now was porn (along with guns and large sums of cash), which presumably was what he was checking on my machine.

If you haven’t read it yet,

April 11, 2006 by Michael Boyle

If you haven’t read it yet,

Sy Hersh’s new article in The New Yorker is a must-read. It’s all about current US plans related to Iran and it’s nuclear weapons program, subtitled, “Would President Bush go to war to stop Tehran from getting the bomb?” Terrifying, but oh-so-predictable.