I’m Buddy Roemer – a Republican candidate for President of the United States.

The issue is jobs – now and in the future. The issue has been growing for about a dozen years and longer, but no president or candidate for the office of president has addressed the real problem, in my opinion. It’s like there is a meeting about jobs and there is a big bear in the meeting room. And the bear is eating the jobs, but no one in the room acknowledges the bear is even there. They try to ignore him.

To make matters worse, the bear only eats the really good jobs – manufacturing jobs. The bear doesn’t want the poor-paying jobs anymore. He wants the best jobs only.

Everybody in the room talks about deregulation, technology, marginal tax rates, budget scrubbing, free trade, loophole closing, but these are the symptoms. The bear is the problem. Get the bear out of the room, and then we can deal with the symptoms – those few that remain.

All my life I’ve built jobs. As a private citizen the last 20 years helping build and run two successful business banks, profitable with no bailouts. As a public servant working as a congressman with president Reagan to pass tax reform which ignited jobs, and as governor of Louisiana, where we took the highest unemployment in America at 12 percent plus and cut it in half in four years.

I’ve never retired from the jobs business, and I will get the bear. From others, I hear a lot of temporary, indirect, band-aid talk, but they all dance around the bear. Meanwhile, the bear is fat with our jobs, and the room is quiet. There is no action. No plan. No priority about jobs.

I have re-emerged from political retirement after 16 years in private life, private business because our nation is in grave danger. Neither our president, our congress, nor any candidate for president, seems to understand the problem that is destroying our nation and they have not presented any viable solutions. I am old enough to know what to do. I am still young enough to get it done.

When I finish a short history review, you will know and understand what no other candidate or politician is daring to tell you. You will know the true problem that has caused America’s crisis.

Finally, I shall tell you my cure for the disease – my unique solution to the problem. The solution I shall give you will create an instantaneous economic boom. You will see a dramatic surge in production similar to the change that occurred after the attack on Pearl Harbor, when Americans left behind welfare and unemployment of the Great Depression and went back to work.

I seek to lead this country to an American rising.

These are the symptoms of an America in decline: Millions of Americans are out of work. According to labor statistics, America has lost two-thirds of its manufacturing jobs, in all states and in all industries. Some of these manufacturing jobs have been replaced by lower paying services, like waiters, or distribution companies, or by unproductive jobs working for our bloated and inefficient government.

Unemployment is destroying our future and sense of hope and sense of community. What incentive is there to obtain a degree of higher education when even university graduates cannot find work at their stated profession? When a family becomes unemployed, it affects their marriage and their children’s welfare and future. Unemployment is silently but irretrievably tearing apart the fabric of our society. The despair does not stop at a family’s front door. They cannot pay their bills, and with over 10 percent of a community unemployed, many local businesses are losing their customers and they are not being paid for their sales on credit. The businesses are shutting their doors, putting more employees out of work – round and round it goes. The tax collections of the local governments are falling. Local, state and federal governments suffer a sharp decline in their tax income, and their expenses for providing welfare for the unemployed are steeply rising. The cloud of bankruptcy spreads first from families to small businesses to business in general, and then to the governments. Some may be unhurt in the first few years, but it is spreading.

America’s decline will continue to accelerate. Let me say it again – America’s decline will continue to accelerate. Within five years, the federal government’s national debt will rise to be equal to the value of all goods and services produced in our economy annually. It may already be there, in full account. The only way to pay off that debt, in the form of U.S. Treasury Bonds, will be to allow the dollar to fall in value, creating enormous inflation so that the national debt can be paid off with cheap, devalued dollars.

It is already happening, America. The value of the American dollar is moving toward a catastrophic collapse. If we do not reverse this decline, it will wipe out the value of your savings, your pensions, your banking system and America’s small businesses. When millions of Americans in the middle class lose the value of their salaries, their savings and their pensions, the losses and despair will soon affect us all. Eliminate the middle class, and America is gone.

Some people think that because they still have their jobs, their savings accounts and their homes, they are safe. But their sense of security is only a delusion. All Americans depend on one another. When the bell tolls for other Americans, it rings for you.

Knowing American history, I think, will help guide us out of this crisis. When our constitution was adopted in 1789, England was the world’s industrial leader – a clear number one. It produced goods at low prices by exploiting the poverty of its low-paid workers, who lived in slums, as described in the Dickens novels.

America, on the other hand, was a nation of farmers. It had little, if any, manufacturing industry. Our first U.S. Treasurer, Alexander Hamilton, argued that if we hoped to defend ourselves in the event of another war with England, we had to have our own industries and be economically independent of England. We had to be able to produce our own clothing and boots, wagons, plows, guns, cannons and warships, he argued. But how could we develop American factories when our citizens, who had come to America to escape the poverty of the English slums, would not work for the cheap labor wages of the English factories? How could an American factory compete against the cheap labor prices of the English factory?

Hamilton’s answer was to persuade our first Congress to adopt a tariff duty on English products alone, imported here. The tariff made all English products more expensive. It added to the cost of the imported goods to make up for England’s competitive advantage from cheap labor. Sound familiar? By pushing up the cost of imported goods, the tariffs allowed Americans to produce the same goods using American labor and the cost to the consumer would be less than the cost of buying the foreign goods – cost as measured in the real cost. This would encourage Americans to create factories and industries to produce all of the goods that America might need, while paying a decent wage to our workers.

Establishing and maintaining a tariff system protected our emerging factories from cheaper foreign competition that would have otherwise driven our industries out of business or prevented anyone from trying to start a factory in America. Protective tariffs allowed our country to change from 13 colonies of farmers and small merchants to a country of thousands of factories and mills. Protective tariffs allowed our nation to develop and become the industrial giant of the world, a clear number one, providing millions of jobs at good pay, forming the economic base the most affluent society in the history of the earth. Adopting protective tariffs was the most successful economic policy in the history of America.

During the 160 years when America used tariffs to build and protect our manufacturing industries, we had the factories necessary to supply our armed forces with everything they needed to fight a war - the War of 1812, the war of the North against the South, and American could not have won World War I or World War II without that industrial capability.

From 1790 until the 1940s, throughout those 160 years of America rising from thirteen small agrarian colonies to the most successful and powerful nation on earth, we had no income tax - zero! Our federal government operated mainly on the revenue from tariffs. It was not until 1913 that the Constitution was amended to allow an income tax, but it took 25 additional years, until the late 1930s, for Congress to apply the income tax and make it a significant part of the budget. When we used the protective tariff, we had no need for an income tax, because the tariffs raised all of the money that the federal government needed.

As America emerged from WWII at the height of its world economic and military leadership, however, and follow me closely, our political leadership decided to abandon the protective trade policy that had given America its prosperity and its independence. At first it did not hurt us because our manufacturing industries were so dominant in the world that they did not need any protection or insulation. But in 1971, America’s balance sheet started to change. The resurgence of the Japanese and European industrial economies and our growing dependence on foreign oil caused our international balance of trade to change from a positive trade surplus to a negative trade deficit. At first it was small, but then it grew, and then China became a major producer in the late 1990s and our trade deficits grew astronomically. Today we are spending $200 billion a month on foreign imports. Two hundred billion. How did we allow it to happen?

Using tariffs to protect our industries made the USA great, but tariffs were abandoned out of ignorance and greed.

After WWII, all of the major industrial nations in the world were devastated or significantly damaged, except the U.S. At that time, we did not need tariffs to protect our industries from cheap foreign competition, because there was no serious foreign competition. Global free trade without tariffs was our idea – not the Chinese. That was our idea. Economic experts taught that global free trade without tariffs would benefit the entire world with the highest output of goods at the lowest possible price. They expected that if we could persuade everyone to eliminate tariffs, American businesses would supply all the goods for the entire world. Global free trade became the sacred cow of America’s economists, its largest corporations and its own government.

Global free trade did not work, because other countries did not accept it. They put up barriers to our products, while the U.S. allowed foreign unfair competition to kill our industries. We got out of balance.

There were two major industrial nations that did not accept the global free trade idea – Japan and Germany. After WWII, they both adopted high trade barriers to protect their industries from U.S. competition.

While we lowered our trade barriers, Japan and Germany, whose factories had been totally wiped out, increased their barriers. For decades, and even today, it has been almost impossible to sell an American industrial product to Japan or Germany.

This policy is what brought the Japanese economy from total collapse to become the second largest in economy on earth. Japan and Germany applied the tried and true protective policies of Alexander Hamilton rather than the new, untested idea of global free trade.

Taking advantage of America’s open trade policy, Japan started eliminating our industries, and you can mark them off one by one. They wiped out most of America’s camera and optical industries – they had no special advantage. They just protected theirs, and ate ours. Then our toys, television and consumer electronics, then musical instruments, motorcycles, bicycles, steel, and finally the dominant American automobile industry, and the USA allowed Japan to do it without trade retaliation. We allowed their products into America while the Japanese would not allow our products into Japan.

Like Japan, Germany imposed a broad spectrum of economic barriers to protect its re-emerging industries. As a result of Germany’s protectionist trade policy, Germany today has the highest wages and the highest trade surplus and the strongest economy in all of Europe, while America has the worst trade deficit in the history of the world.

Protecting their industries with tariffs and other trade barriers worked for Japan and Germany with the same fantastic success that it had worked for America. No surprise – it works!

By protecting their industries that were totally destroyed in WWII, Germany and Japan have recovered world manufacturing dominance while America’s manufacturing sector has been devastated. If you look now at the results of WWII, it looks like Japan and Germany won the war and America lost. But out industrial sector was not devastated through war. It was by our own misguided economic policies. Japan and Germany beat us economically and wiped out our factories without anyone firing a shot.

Blinded by greed, we tried to exploit the poverty of China, but allowed China to exploit us instead. Let’s look at it - the story gets worse. The biggest disaster for the American economy arose out of our opening up trade with China in the 1970s. When President Nixon sent Henry Kissinger to China to normalize relations and open up trade, his idea was that this would be an economic bonanza for our advanced industrial society. China’s one billion people, four times the size of the U.S. population, lacked modern appliances such as washing machines and toasters, automobiles and refrigerators and lacked the wide variety of consumer goods that our department stores and supermarkets were filled with. Our politicians and our leading economic experts promised us that America would attain unprecedented wealth selling our products to that enormous untapped, deprived consumer market in China. American factories would work day and night to supply the Chinese demand.

China had a different idea. China was smart – we were stupid. They set up trade barriers to prevent the importation of American products. The Chinese government insisted that if American wanted to sell in the Chinese market, we had to send them our technology – no harm. In fact, we had to send them our managerial skills. We even had to send them a prototypical factory, which they proceeded to copy and spread all over the country. And they wanted us to produce not only products for the Chinese market using cheap Chinese labor, but they wanted us to supply products for the American market using cheap Chinese labor.

Our economists, our corporations and our politicians promised America – I can remember the speeches - that it was for our own good. They said “we don’t need to employ millions of Americans in blue-collar jobs.” Instead, American labor would move up into higher paying, skilled jobs in high-tech, in international finance, in corporate management. So there’s where blue collar’s going to end up. Let the Chinese have those tedious, dirty factory jobs. Americans will prosper as we become the world’s entrepreneurial engineers, the world’s economic managers, the professional innovators of the New World Order. The old rules of trade and economics that had made America the number one economy in the world were cast aside as being unnecessary and obsolete.

Why did they not understand that not every American can be an Eli Whitney, or a Thomas Edison, or a Henry Ford, or a Bill Gates or a Steve Jobs? We need employment for those Americans who want and need to work in factories – it is their best labor. We need to produce our own goods so that we are not dependent upon other countries and do not send our money to other countries whenever we go shopping.

Our political and business leaders should have seen that moving America’s factories overseas would be a threat to our economy and to the security of our nation. Indeed, some American corporations saw this as an opportunity to make fantastic profits by moving their factories to China, using cheap Chinese labor. They didn’t care that two-thirds of the industrial workers in America would lose their jobs. That’s the number – two-thirds. They had no concern about what this would do to the families of unemployed American factory workers. They had no concern about the effect of closing thousands of factories throughout the United States – New Hampshire, Iowa. They didn’t care about the billions in tax revenues that would be lost to our federal, state and local governments from the lack of a booming economy. They did not care about the burden upon our society to provide unemployment support to the millions of workers who lost their only means of earning a living.

Our politicians and economists looked the other way when small businesses faced bankruptcy, as their customers disappeared and big-box discount chain stores that had set up manufacturing and exporting divisions in China moved into town selling cheap Chinese merchandise. Store fronts became vacant with “For Lease” signs and Main Streets across America became ghost towns.

The only concerns of the big businesses moving their factories to China were the huge profits that they could make working with the Chinese, as they transformed America from a land of prosperous, independent producers to a declining nation of dependent consumers. They didn’t care what this would do to the American economy, our national defense, or to life in the industrial cities. That’s not their job – their job is profit.

The only concern of the politicians, by the way, were the huge campaign donations they received from these very same corporations giving them the legislation that they so desperately wanted to make this happen. How convenient.

How could a U.S. factory survive unfair competition from China? Let me describe it. I’ve been to China many times. Our factories are subject to minimum wage laws and collective bargaining that assures a high standard of living for blue-collar American workers. Chinese factories exploit the poverty of their own people, employing up to 50 workers for the same cost as one U.S. worker. Chinese children work 60 hours a week and more, paid nothing but room and board. Chinese prisoners are forced to work for nothing. Chinese factories operate with no rules and no expense to protect the health and safety of the workers nor any penalty for polluting the environment. You can see China before you get there. If necessary to destroy our factories, the Chinese government subsidizes its factories to dump goods on the American market at a price even lower than the Chinese cost. Currency manipulation, hidden trade barriers, unfair trade tactics in which the Chinese government specializes.

What happened to our American factories that did not move their operations to China? They couldn’t compete with that unfair competition. They disappeared. They went broke. They folded up.

Worshipping an untested ivory tower theory of global free trade, our political leaders abandoned the tried and true, successful policies of tariffs. They failed to protect our factories from unfair competition. Competition is one thing, but manipulative, unfair, government-run trade is something else. These political leaders betrayed and abandoned the millions of American workers who paid taxes, supported our small businesses and formed the foundation of a prosperous nation.

Now we find growing, unending unemployment. Are you surprised? That’s how we got here. Our factories and small businesses are closed and our commercial districts in many towns and cities are empty or in decay.

Now you know what the problem is. We have become the biggest fools in the world, adopting global free trade while other countries impose trade barriers against our products. We have abandoned the simple common sense of our founding fathers – they were so naive, those founding fathers – it’s amazing how they could even write a constitution! We have abandoned the simple common sense of our founding fathers, who knew that America could never achieve greatness unless it protected our manufacturing industries from cheap foreign labor and unfair competition.

For 160 years we did not tax our factories that used American labor and produced goods here, but we placed a heavy tariff tax on factories outside America that tried to import their products into this market.

Now we do just the opposite. We place a heavy tax on factories operating in America, but we essentially have eliminated any tax on factories that produce goods abroad and import those goods into America, flooding America with products, destroying our industries, and we allow them to do it for free – no income tax, and no tariff. We’ll tax our guys, you come beat us to death! By doing this, we have not only allowed our manufacturing industries to move outside the country, we have encouraged them to leave America and go overseas. It’s cheaper, and it’s tax free. And now overseas where they can make even more profit than if they had stayed here and employed American labor and paid American taxes. This is not a mystery, folks. Follow the numbers.

Now we have lost not only our factories and jobs, we have lost our military independence. Remember Rosie the Riveter? When Japan suffered the tsunami earlier in the year and nuclear reactor meltdown, Caterpillar could not produce a tractor, not one. Boeing could not produce an airplane, not one, and the few remaining American automobile factories could not produce a car, because all of them did not have the parts and materials they needed from Japan.

Alexander Hamilton 200 years ago warned us that this would happen if we did not protect our manufacturing sector. America today is dependent on China, on Japan, on Mexico and other countries to make the clothes and the parts we need to supply our armed forces.

Sadly, our president has no clue as to what the problem is. He looks at the symptoms and thinks that they are the problem. He does not understand why throwing more and more “stimulus” money into the economy does not stimulate any improvement. Here’s why. He thinks we must send hundreds of millions of dollars retraining the unemployed workers.

Retraining them for what? There are no jobs! Our jobs are in China. Is he going to retrain Americans to speak Mandarin so that they can move to China and work a ten hour day for a fine wage of fifty cents an hour? Respectfully, Mr. President, I say, “No, thank you,” to your jobs plan.

And when our president talks about increasing federal spending to stimulate the economy and create jobs, he does not understand that the people who receive the money use most of it to buy everyday consumer goods made in foreign countries. The money doesn’t go to our people – the stimulus money flows out to the foreign countries where the consumer goods are made. When we went into recession three years ago and reduced our spending on consumer goods, China lost 40 million jobs. China did. By increasing our national debt and putting more stimulus money into the economy so our consumers can spend, the jobs Mr. Obama will create will be in China.

The global free trade experiment has been tried. It has proven to be a disaster to our economy. I am the only presidential candidate who is speaking the truth about global free trade – the only one. Why are the other politicians and many economists at the major universities supporting this disastrous experiment that is causing so much suffering to the American people? Why is President Obama pushing so hard for more free trade policies with Colombia, Panama and South Korea? Does it create any net new jobs in America, Mr. President? That is the question.

I cannot pretend to tell you what is in the hearts and minds of others. They will have to answer for that themselves. But I can tell you the facts. From those facts you can make your own conclusions.

The fact is that this experiment with global free trade has now been tried and has failed miserably. Contrary to what the advocates of global free trade predicted, when it was put into practice, it destroyed our positive trade balance, it destroyed our factories, it destroyed the livelihood of American workers, it wiped out industrial cities – visit Detroit – and it rendered our nation dependent upon China and other foreign countries for the necessities of life.

For some people and corporations, however, global free trade has been a bonanza. While our nation is in great danger, certain corporations and a small group of people have profited fantastically from our failed policies. They have moved their production offshore, free of our taxes, free of our wages, free of our standards and free of regulation. They have made more profit moving the factories to other countries than they ever made in America. They have used their enormous wealth to finance political campaigns and gain influence over our government. They have bought our political system as they sell jobs out of America.

Even our newspapers, television networks, political commentators, pundits and economic experts are totally blind to what is right in front of their noses. Everywhere they look they see labels that say “Made in China” or “Made in Mexico” or made in some other Asian country or some other Latin American country, but they seem not to notice. When they talk about our economy they complain about the little details. They make partisan criticisms about spending too much or too little. They speculate with elaborate charts and facts about monetary policy, as if the Fed were the problem, or about fiscal policy, or they blame America itself on the grounds that we should be more competitive – superhuman – or we should accept the fact that we are no better and no more entitled to prosperity than any other country.

Can’t they see what the problem is? There is a big bear standing in the room, eating our jobs, using as his tool, his fork, unfair trade practices. These experts complain and bicker over why there is no place to safely stand or sit in the meeting room, but no one notices that there is a bear in there. In 1993 Ross Perot argued against NAFA, contending that it would eliminate America’s factories and jobs. Al Gore ridiculed him. Most of the country cast him off as a crotchety old man.

Now almost all Ford automobiles have a label that says Made in Mexico. There have been a woefully few others bring it up, such as Pat Buchanan and Donald Trump, who argued that we need to protect our industries by tariffs, but they were ridiculed and not taken seriously. Why is it that I am the only presidential candidate who can see the bear?

America desperately needs a crotchety old man like me who has a clear vision of the facts and the wisdom to notice that there is a reason that there is no room in the meeting to sit safely - there is a bear in the room eating our jobs, eating our future. Could it be that I am the only one who has not sold himself out to the big corporations, PACs and their campaign money? We need one candidate who is free to lead – lead America back to prosperity. Now, let’s solve it. Without using tariffs, we can bring American factories back home.

Remember when everything you bought was made in the USA? Didn’t you feel proud and secure that America had the factories with the technology and efficiency to out produce any nation and every nation on earth? How do you feel now, when almost everything you buy has a label that says “Made in China”? That Chinese label is a sad symbol of America’s decline.

Aren’t you annoyed when you call a local business and the phone is answered by someone overseas who can only provide limited assistance, if at all? Why isn’t there an American technician on the other end?

Doesn’t it break your heart to see once-thriving factories and businesses closed, empty, with broken windows, defaced with graffiti that mocks and insults their death?

Has your family been torn apart and scattered because you or your children or brothers and sisters had to move away to find a decent job or a place where they can afford to live on reduced income?

Let’s bring our factories back home. Let be proud as Americans again when you shop, because you are helping other Americans earn a living and helping the entire economy of America rather than China. In the future, when we buy clothes and tools and appliances, cars, televisions cell phones and other electronic devices, they should all be labeled, “Made in the USA.”

Elect me president and we will bring back to America the most productive, efficient, clean and safe factories that the world has ever known, operated by skilled American labor producing the highest quality goods at affordable prices, with each product proudly proclaiming “Made in the USA.”

The way to restore jobs in America is by restoring America’s industrial prominence. Almost everything that we buy in America must be produced by Americans employed here, not only to provide jobs for Americans, but also to prevent sending our wealth to foreign countries and devaluating of the American dollar. The only way to do that is to establish legitimate and reasonable economic barriers to unfair competition from abroad. We must adopt protective economic policies that will induce the factories to come back home, and more importantly to induce new factories to emerge from the industrial ruins of our nation.

Give me the privilege to serve America. Let’s not only bring back the factories, but let’s bring working families back to empty homes. We don’t have a housing problem – we have a jobs problem. Housing will follow. Let me bring back the businesses to empty buildings. Let’s restore the nation to the land of freedom, security and prosperity.

Yes, I am in favor of an economic policy that protects our workers against unfair trade. And in times of scarcity and unemployment, our first duty should be to protect America.

Protecting our American industry from unfair foreign imports is not a radical or untested idea. It worked for 160 years to make America the industrial giant of the world. It worked for Japan and Germany and China, and Taiwan, and South Korea and Malaysia, to allow them to rise from poverty to prosperity. In fact, every nation in history that has had a significant sustained positive balance of trade has become prosperous, while every nation in history that has had a sustained negative balance of trade has become or remained poor. Watch America. We must protect America from this road to ruin. Special interests have corrupted our political system and are profiting while America declines. We must not let the story of America end this way. If the communist nation of China becomes the new economic world leader, the noble ideal of American democracy will be relegated to the dustbin of history. Another nation that couldn’t compete.

Now let me be specific about the three things we need to do.

I’m not a tariff guy. They worked fantastically for 160 years, but they were characterized by back-room, political dealing, with some Congressmen arguing for unusually high tariffs to protect their districts. Tariffs protected America, but I wanted something better.

I wanted to apply a means of protecting our industries based on economic necessity, to allow factories to survive with a small profit but not reward them with undeserved profits. I wanted to protect our industries using economics rather than politics. You knew I was different.

We have created two simple methods to save and revive the economy and bring America’s industries and jobs back. Each method has its own advantages.

I want to emphasize that these solutions will not end foreign trade. We will still import billions of dollars of goods from China and other manufacturing nations. But it will allow our own manufacturers to compete against unfair foreign producers, and it will encourage foreign manufacturers to move their factories here, using American labor, in order to compete more effectively in the U.S. market.

Number one – I call this the Tax Deduction Solution. I would allow a tax deduction only when businesses employ and buy American. Sections 162 and sections 212 of the Internal Revenue Code allow a deduction against income for ordinary and necessary business expenses. Sections 167 and 179 of the Code allow a depreciation deduction for business equipment purchased. It’s a clear law.

My solution will amend those sections and the definition of costs of goods sold to state that “any expenditure for any goods or services located and/or produced outside the United States shall not be deductible.”

This simple amendment to the Internal Revenue Code means that a business is free to buy and trade wherever it wants to. But if it employs or contracts with anyone in Manila or New Delhi to answer the telephone for technical support service, or hires radiologists in India to read x-rays, the expense would not be deductible. Also, any business equipment, such as a tractor, or a computer or office furniture made in Japan or China would not be a deductible business expense and would not be depreciable.

Likewise, any materials, components, parts or goods purchased that were produced outside of America would not be allowed as costs of goods sold and would not be deducted from income under the Internal Revenue Code.

This will encourage American businesses to buy “American,” even if it costs a little more, so they can deduct the full expense. American retailers would want to fill their shelves with American products, so that when they made a sale, they pay tax only on the profit – the difference between the sale price and their wholesale cost, rather than paying tax on the entire sale price.

It will reverse the effect of the policy that China imposed on America. It will encourage foreign manufacturers to move their factories here, using American labor, so that they can enjoy a better chance to sell to American retailers or businesses and to obtain investors to buy their stock.

Two – I would eliminate the Foreign Tax Credit. That’s Section 27(a) of the Internal Revenue Code that gives a tax credit for taxes paid to a foreign country. Elimination of the foreign tax credit would close a major loophole – spell it with a capital “L” - that allows large corporations and wealthy individuals to avoid U.S. income taxes by moving their businesses and their investments out of the country. It is unfair to Americans, those that pay taxes, those that support the country, that these wealthy corporations and individuals receive this tax credit. They receive all the benefits and protection of U.S. citizenship, but they do not pay their fair share to support the country that supports and protects them. I hate to use their name, but this solution would eliminate a major trick used by such corporations as General Electric, always a good company, but it’s a trick using the tax code, allowing it to escape paying any U.S. income tax on its net income of $14.2 billion.

This tax deduction solution can be adopted immediately. It will require no additional federal bureaucracy, no government expense, because the provisions would be implemented and enforced by the same staff that is already in place.

The tax deduction solution, which consists of adding one sentence to the Internal Revenue Code and deleting one paragraph, will have an enormous effect. It will restore America’s industrial sector. It will generate millions of jobs. It is eloquently simple, yet profoundly effective.

Number three, and the final part of my solution, operates as follows. I call it the Fair Trade Adjustment Solution.

A new way to level the playing field and protect American industry from unfair foreign competition is to require importers to pay our government an adjustment equal to the unfair advantage they gain by using cheap foreign labor and avoiding America’s health, safety and environmental standards.

I shall ask Congress to adopt a statute that no product may be imported into the United States of America unless it is accompanied by a fair trade adjustment form, completed and certified by a foreign analyst who has been trained and authorized by the U.S. government but would be paid by the importer. The analyst will charge a fee to this importer to complete and certify the form. When the goods arrive in the U.S., the importer must pay to our customs agent the total certified adjustment in order to obtain a release of the goods into our country.

The fair trade adjustment form will contain blank fields where the analyst will enter the calculations to value the difference between labor costs here and labor costs in the foreign country of origin, showing differences between such costs as OSHA and the EPA here, and the costs there. There will also be an adjustment for unequal tariffs or other costs of import and for any export subsidies given by the foreign country.

The adjustment is simply an economic calculation. No politics are involved. It will cost the U.S. government nothing to implement it, all administration costs effectively being paid by the importers who will pay the certified analysts to complete the form.

For countries that have a wage structure and business regulations similar to ours, such as Canada, Germany and England, there will be no adjustment. But for China, for the bear, the adjustment could be substantial. It will raise the cost of Chinese imports to match the cost of producing the goods here. This will give our manufacturers a chance to compete.

This fair trade adjustment will level the playing field, but it will only reduce, not end, the billions of dollars of imports from countries with a lower standard of living, such as China. Trade will continue, but it will be fair.

The revenue generated by the fair trade adjustment and by the restoration of our industrial sector, growth, will balance our budget, pay down our national debt and still allow us to reduce income taxes. It will also allow our factories to compete fairly and will restore prosperity to America while eliminating our trade deficit and saving the value of the dollar. Growth is the key element in solving our current economic dilemma. This approach yields solid growth.

Let me close. We need a president to defend our jobs against unfair trade, to level the playing field. We need a president to get the bear out of the room. It takes guts. It takes the truth. It can’t be political. We will not stop trade. We will defend our jobs from unfair trade. It is the right thing to do. It is fair. It is necessary. I will be criticized by the giant corporations and their “free trade” chorus as they sell our jobs. I refuse to take their money, folks. That’s why I have a $100 limit – you wondered why. I accept no PAC money and you wondered why. That’s why I have no Super PAC, and that’s why I practice full disclosure. Buddyroemer.com is where you can find me. I need a million families to stand with me – a million – we need to stand against the bear. I started it, but I need you to finish it. I need to stand against not only the bear but also the people who allow the bear to be in the room, unchallenged. One hundred dollar limit. You won’t be the first giver. People from all 50 states have already done it. Don’t be the last. This is about you.

Buddyroemer.com is where to find me. I cannot do this without you. There is a bear in the room, it’s fat and it’s eating our jobs. Let’s take action.