Friday, September 5, 2003
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Chris Bertram overreaches
Crooked Timber's Chris Bertram thinks InstaPundit is slanting his posts. Glenn linked to a Guardian article on agricultural subsidies with the header, "WHY DOES THE EUROPEAN UNION hate the world's poor so much?" Chris observes:
Brad DeLong provides a similar interpretation. Lord knows I've been hard on the Bush administration's protectionist leanings as of late, but Chris and Brad are making a bogus allegation with this post. The Guardian story that Glenn linked to focused entirely on some belligerent quotes from European officials, including this one from Franz Fischler that manages to top anything Donald Rumsfeld has said:
As for the agreement that Chris and the Guardian reference, the reason that it stinks is not the U.S., which has pressed for further liberalization in agriculture. The culprit is the E.U., which has been dragged kicking and screaming into making only minimal concessions. You can blame the U.S. for not bargaining better with the Europeans (or the Japanese) on the issue of agricultural subsidies, but that's it. I've got no love for U.S. agricultural subsidies, but what's driving the potyential impasse at Cancun is not the Bush administration, but the European Union's intransigence -- a point the Guardian's blog emphasizes. Glenn's framing of the story was correct -- Chris's (and Brad's) wasn't. NOTE: I've updated this post since Chris Bertram's comment below in order to respond to his points. Comments: A bogus allegation? So it isn't true that Fischler was defending a joint proposal?? And Instapundit's coverage was fair and balanced? FWIW, Brad DeLong drew the same conclusion as I did. posted by: Chris on 09.05.03 at 08:26 PM [permalink]Post a Comment: |
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