America's Death Wish...

It appears that America has a death wish regarding products imported from China. A death wish is a conscious or unconscious desire for self destruction, and I believe we have it.

I remember as a child not wanting to finish my supper only, to be told by my mother that there were poor people in China that didn't have enough to eat. This was during the 1940s when China was engaged in the Chinese Civil War that ended in 1950, resulting in a split country with two States, The People's Republic of China and The Republic of China, now known as Taiwan.

Books have been written on China's progress since those hard times. It came back strong. We did okay after World War II as well, with our economy developing and only a few minor bumps in the road. That is, until the real estate bubble collapsed, which drove our economy into a ditch. I'm not sure if the blame can be conveniently placed on the market alone. Somehow I believe there are contributing factors, one being the outsourcing of our manufacturing factories and jobs. The worm has turned, and China now has many jobs that once belonged to us. We Americans are enriching China's economy while still stuck in that ditch and suffering the losses at home.

As if that isn't bad enough, China is adding salt to the wound by taking our money and poisoning us with their inferior products in return. Literally! China exports lead poisoning from eye shadow to glazed pottery. Children's metal jewelry has been found to contain high levels of lead. Toy drums, action figure toys and children's gardening gloves had lead in the stamp-painted logo; some hard candies and sidewalk chalk also had high amounts of lead.

More problems: Consumers developed eye conditions from using "Complete Moisture Plus." Chinese-made toothpaste contained diethylene glycol, a solvent used in antifreeze that killed 107 Americans years ago.  Some monkfish turned out to be toxic pufferfish. China also exported drug-laced frozen eel and juices that contained unsafe additives for color. Melamine, a chemical, was added to baby formula and mixed as a powder with milk products. China has been found to export much of the seafood we eat -- raised in raw sewage water that was then treated with drugs and chemicals banned by the FDA. 

China added rat poison (aminopterin) to ingredients for pet foods, causing kidney failure and death to our animals. Wheat gluten tainted with melamine has also been blamed for the deaths of cats and dogs. The FDA's top veterinarian at the time said that finding melamine in so many products "would certainly lend credibility to the theory that maybe it was intentional."

Many medicines made in China contain the posion diethylene glyol, including cough syrup, injectable drugs and fever medications. Hemlock wooly adelgids, which are insects, and the carcinogen Cadmium, which is a substitute for lead, have been found in 50% of bed sheets made in China. Then there was a problem with toxic sheet rock that caused thousands of newly-built homes to be gutted because of health dangers. I'll stop here, but the list goes on and on.

We are not the only country with this China problem. Panama, Haiti, Bangladesh, Argentina, Nigeria and India have reported problems. The British Medical Journal spoke to the problem and stated that the deaths from poisoned medications "must be in the thousands or tens of thousands."

Let's take stock: We currently have a huge unemployment problem, but yet we continue to send our jobs out of the country. Our economy is tanking, but we continue to shore up other countries on the other side of the world. We pride ourselves with the belief that we have the best workers and make quality products here, but we import goods that are killing us. We are all on a tight budget and if we don't have jobs we don't have money, but we send what money and jobs we do have to places like China. We owe China a lot of money because we can't pay cash for their junk due to the trade deficit leaning in China's favor.

To me, this appears to be a form of self destruction, as though we have a death wish. With money not circulating in our counrty, foreclosures, bankruptcies, along with taxes going higher, businesses leaving the country and local and federal goverment making cuts and going deeper into debt, we will only get poorer. Something's got to give. What would happen if we all just stopped buying products made in China? Give it some thought. We need to start someplace...

Did you know:

• 13% of people in the U.S. live in poverty.
• Almost one in four children live in households that have difficulty putting food on the table. That's 16.7 million children.
• 51.4% of Americans will live in poverty at some point before age 65.

I can almost hear the voices of those mothers in China saying, "Finish your supper. Think about those poor hungry people in America who don't have enough to eat."

 Stop buying China...    Buy American...     Buy local...    Buy Connecticut...

Jimmy Halloran is Co-Owner of ConnecticutHandiworks.com, an online retailer featuring handcrafted items made in Connecticut.

jimmy130@live.com  /  860.942.7571  / 

PO Box 26 Hampton, CT.

  06247

Buy Connecticut...

When I started my campaign to promote Buy Connecticut I had two thoughts in mind. First was that the quality and reasonable prices of the items produced by the local artists and handicrafters in my community should be available to everyone. The second was, well, read on...

The history of Connecticut is found in many forms all around us.  I see it as I drive around and notice the large, old, abandoned brick factories that are now closed and boarded up.  These were huge thriving businesses built along rivers that powered the machinery that made wonderful products used locally and sold across the country. Those were the days when everybody had a job. Companies would provide housing for their workers and their families and pensions for their retirement.  It was not uncommon for employees to spend their entire lives working for just one company. Whole families were known to work there as well, one generation after another. These were good jobs.

What the heck happened? We didn't stop using the products that were made at these factories. So what was it? Was it the decisions of business leaders to have their products made in another country for less money? Could be. All I know is that it wasn't all that long ago that this happened. What I notice now is that we no longer manufacture many products here and that too many of our residents are unemployed and can't find work. People don't have the money that they once had. They don't have the jobs.

Politics is not my strong suit, and it seems like the more I learn about economics, the less I know. Even the experts aren't sure how we got into this mess and no two people think alike on how we are going to get out of it. This leads me to think that we cannot afford to wait around for others to fix our problems. We must "go for self" by taking responsibility for our actions, our decisions and the choices we make. Asking ourselves, "What can I do about it?" is a good place to start.

First, let us identify the problem, if we can, and then provide some possible solutions. Without asking why the real estate bubble burst, or why the banks aren't lending or whether we have hit the bottom on foreclosures and bankruptcies or when the jobs will return, let's focus on the issue of today's money. Our money. The money we work hard for. The money we spend on purchasing. Where is this money going after we buy something? Will it be circulated among our neighbors? Or, will it go to people in other countries? Are we giving our money away? Simply put, when money is spent on products imported from foreign countries, our hard-earned dollars leave this country to pay the wages and improve the economy in other parts of the world. That said, I don't know about you, but I was taught that charity begins at home. This is my second reason to Buy Connecticut. Yes, all that I mentioned above are contributing factors to the overall problems we are experiencing. Yeah, the jobs are gone but that doesn't mean our money has to follow them.  Why don't we keep our money here allowing for circulation?

Let me be clear, this is not a push for boycotting. What I am saying is that there is a need for a heightened awareness to a problem that exists, and so far we are not doing anything about it. So what can be done about it? Where to start? We are talking about the potential for change here.

The analogy I would like to start with is that of recycling. Not long ago we all just discarded our recyclables with the garbage and threw everything into the landfill. Remember that? Now we are aware of the need to protect the environment. We reuse our paper and cardboard; we find other uses for our plastic, aluminium and glass containers. Recycling businesses opened up for second-hand items like wood, windows, metals, fixtures, and so on. We look at recycling differently now with our new sense of awareness. What we are doing, each of us, is protecting our environment, trying to make Mother Earth a better place to live for ourselves and our children. We are all working together, doing our part, pitching in for a common goal. We have also created new jobs with this recycling concept.

Is putting effort into changing our spending habits and bettering our local community any different? We are always faced with choices. Whether to buy that item, made by someone on the other side of the world or from your neighbor is your choice. The folks that make products here, the artists, farmers and handicrafters, their job is to make something available for you to buy. They offer you something of quality for a reasonable price. We can't afford to lose these jobs. I can only ask that before you buy, read the label to see where it was made and think about where you want your money to go.

Don't discard your money,  recycle it...  Buy American/Buy Connecticut.

Jimmy Halloran is Co-Owner of ConnecticutHandiworks.com, an online retailer featuring handcrafted items made in Connecticut.

jimmy130@live.com  /  860.942.7571  / 

PO Box 26 Hampton, CT

  06247