by Robert M. Traxler

One of the planks in the Republican Party’s platform is free but fair trade. No surprise the folks on the left side of the political aisle are not fans of free market capitalism. Government control of wages and prices is at the epicenter of the destructive and inefficient form of government known as socialism.

If you invent or build a better product, the I-phone being an example, you can charge what the market will allow, what good folks are willing to pay. Competition from other companies with like products will drive the prices down. The old adage, wait a while and the price will go down for a brand new product, is mostly true in a free market but not with a controlled market.

The United States has very few controls on the import and export system compared to all other nations. The majority of our import bans are established to prevent toxic or unsafe products from coming into our country, not to artificially protect American companies. Protectionism causes the cost of products to be artificially high and the quality to be low.

The Republicans have traditionally been the free trade party with the Democrats being the party of government controls, import taxes, customs taxes, duties and tariffs. So why is Mr. Trump advocating import controls on the countries that place taxes, duties or tariffs on American products?

Those of us who have had the honor of serving our nation deployed overseas have seen the “Black Market” in American made goods. The worldwide iconic American made product sold on the black market is Levis blue jeans. A pair of Levis costing $49.00 will sell on the black market for over twice that in most of the world. During my years in South Korea you could purchase an American made car, no problem, you just needed to pay double: the cost a $30,000 automobile with the taxes and tariffs would cost you $60,000. Korea, an outstanding ally, protected its own auto industry. As hard as it is to believe, American-grown rice was very black marketable in Asia and of all things Spam, as both were in demand and heavily taxed or banned.

American-made products such as (but by no means limited to) alcohol products, electronics, and motor vehicles of all types, agricultural products, even golf clubs and tobacco products are sold on the black market for two to twenty times their cost in the United States because of import controls or outright bans.

Mr. Trump has said that it is past time for the United States to negotiate better and less punishing trade deals with our trading partners, no kidding! If we allow Japanese vehicles of all types to be sold in the United States with very limited import taxes, shouldn’t the Japanese also allow Caterpillar, Ford or GM the same courtesy?

American agricultural products are known worldwide for quality and to be fairly priced; however, tariffs and taxes make them prohibitively expensive in most foreign markets. The list of American products priced out of the free fair market in most countries we trade with is very long.

It is not a stretch to say that the trade imbalance we have with most nations in the world is forcing American companies to move offshore to be competitive. If you make it in a country, you can sell it in that nation without paying import fees. An American company moving overseas costs thousands of good solid Americans jobs. If we protect our workers and markets in the same way our trading partners do theirs, just how would that be unfair? If those nations we trade with fully open their markets and we open ours, free, fair, open, markets on both sides of our borders would benefit everyone.

Mr. Trump is advocating we deal fairly and honestly with our trading partners at the same time requiring them to be fair and deal honestly with us, not dictating trade policy to us but working with us as true equal partners.

The left will tell us Mr. Trump is a Nationalist, he is indeed, and the real beauty is that Mr. Trump is proud of it. Time for a real change, time for a President Trump.