Politicians’ temerity never ceases to amaze us, and here is another example to add to your collection. “German Chancellor Angela Merkel warned . . . that U.S. efforts to prop up its failing auto industry amount to a form of protectionism that threatened to distort the global economy . . .” Simon Hooper, Merkel Warns U.S. Over Auto Bailout, CNN.com/world news, Jan. 30, 2009
So where was Frau Merkel when German automobile manufacturers like BMW and Mercedes-Benz were collecting hefty subsidies in the form of land, tax abatements, and the cost of construction and worker training from American state governments, to induce the Germans to build automobile plants in those states? We don’t recall her lecturing her countrymen on the evils of protectionism then, do you?