New at Reason

Tim Cavanaugh | January 20, 2005

Kerry Howley goes fishing for the logic in our new shrimp tariffs.

Comments

|1.20.05 @ 4:08PM|#

If Bush really wanted to get my attention with his inaugural speech, he would have promised a free market for shrimp. If he can deliver it before Feb. 14 then all the better. I'm going to make my wife a fancy dinner that will begin with bacon-wrapped shrimp, and if W can bring down the price by easing some of the trade barriers, that will sure help me out.

Then again, maybe he's just pandering to his base.

|1.20.05 @ 4:27PM|#

I live in northeast Florida - home to a large number of shrimpers.

Even before imported, farm-raised shrimp became dominant, area shrimpers were going broke right and left because there were simply too many of them...kind of like Forrest Gump BEFORE the hurricane.

But too many of them hasn't stopped new folks from trying to get into the fishing business.

You just want to say, "Jeez...employ some basic economics guys." I can get farm-raised imported tiger shrimp for 6.99 a lb. Local stuff is still more expensive unless I buy it from a roadside vendor.

At this point, cheap shrimp is a commodity. Try to charge me too much and I'll just eat chicken.

I'm sensitive to their problems but it's hard to have sympathy for them. They have fought tooth and nail against any attempts to help them that involves ANY change on their part.

At some point the "Defending our way of life argument" get stomped by the "stop your outmoded way of doing business" argument.

|1.20.05 @ 4:29PM|#

madpad,

I come from a family of shrimpers. Its all about "tradition" and keeping it in the family and very shitty educational oppurtunities.

|1.20.05 @ 4:30PM|#

How perverse that the administration shows generosity on the one hand, with donations of money and manpower, but slaps these third world nations down on the other. As the fine article rightly pointed out, these tarrifs have unintended consequences (anyone remember steel?) by harming related industries. Do these people not understand comparative advantage (it's not Vietnam's fault that US shrimp suppliers are less efficient)? One of the best things we in the first world could do to help rebuild these countries is trade freely with them IMHO. I hope Europe doesn't follow suit (maybe they have and I didn't realise).

|1.20.05 @ 4:32PM|#

I just took a second look and noticed the headline:

All That Have Not Fins and Scales
Imports are an abomination, according to domestic shrimpers

I guess I'm not the only person who's visited godhatesshrimp.com.

Still, as long as the shrimpers aren't gay it's all good.

|1.20.05 @ 4:34PM|#

I hope Europe doesn't follow suit (maybe they have and I didn't realise).

I read today that Europe is going to lift its shrimp barriers for Thailan as long as they buy $1.3 billion worth of the new massive Airbuses. On the one hand, that's worse than the US, because it's even more cynical; on the other, it's not as bad, because at least they can buy their way out. Depressing all around, for sure.

|1.20.05 @ 4:35PM|#

Josh,

Well, at least the Thais will get some benefit from the move (I am not defending it!!!!); whereas they are just screwed by the Bush administration.

|1.20.05 @ 4:47PM|#

Josh, I reckon that reeks just as much as the US policy. Sounds like market distortion to me. BTW, I just checked on Thailand at NationMaster (great site) and it tells me that the total govt expenditures total about USD$21B. These planes would constitute about 6% of their budget (if purchased at the same time). Even if not, at USD$280M each, that's still a shitload of money for a relatively poor country.

|1.20.05 @ 4:49PM|#

AJS,

I would suspect that they would be financed.

|1.20.05 @ 4:51PM|#

Just wait. Willy Nelson will be doing a "Shrimp Aid" concert soon.

The shrimp fishermen are no different than the "family farmers" or any other group advocating for protectionist policies. They would have the whole of society pay to protect outmoded and inefficient economic practices. Unfortunatly, the damage is not restricted to American consumers... as the article aptly observes. These trade barriers harm the economic development of other nations. This is one issue where both Democrats and Republicans have an abysmal record.

|1.20.05 @ 5:01PM|#

Thoreau, the biblical admonition against eating certain kinds of seafood was clearly good, practical advise, as clams in particular can be poisonous due to toxins ingested from red-tide algae. Nowadays we test the clam beds before opening them to harvest. A few thousand years ago public health officials didn't have that technology, so they decided to scare the pants off of everyone by telling them "it's an abomonation."

|1.20.05 @ 5:14PM|#

trainwreck,

The point is of course that Christians are selective in the abominations that they care to acknowledge.

Of course its not just Christians who are selective in this way.

Mike|1.20.05 @ 5:18PM|#

the biblical admonition against eating certain kinds of seafood was clearly good, practical advise, as clams in particular can be poisonous due to toxins ingested from red-tide algae.

Actually, it's much more likely that religious dietary restrictions are based on maintaining a separate culture, rather than health. There are lots of kosher foods (for example) that teem with toxins, and banned foods that are just fine. Seeing Leviticus as a health guide is probably unwise.

|1.20.05 @ 5:22PM|#

Mike,

Also, one wonders what burying the pots and utensils in the backyard has to do with "health."

|1.20.05 @ 5:38PM|#

Has any fundamentalist ever attempted to explain why it's OK to eat shrimp but not OK to engage in homosexual activity?

I know that many people here would argue that all religion is irrational anyway, so it's pointless. Still, it would be interesting to hear how people handle this within the context and assumptions of a commonly-held belief system.

Not to mention that the mental gymnastics necessary to split those hairs could be fun to watch.

|1.20.05 @ 5:43PM|#

I've run across a few fundies and one Christian Identity type who went kosher, or tried anyway.

Wow, Christian Identity, what a trip!

|1.20.05 @ 6:00PM|#

I wonder how much the 'giving aid and then also imposing subsidies' is just the right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing. While I normally have my tinfoil hat on quite snugly, maybe here it's just good ol' fashioned gov't bipolarism, er something.

That's not to say that I don't think subsidies are one of the worse examples of government intervention - I do. And there's nothing wrong with helping out the less fortunate...but when they're cancelling each other out, can it get any worse??

|1.20.05 @ 6:05PM|#

Mike, sorry. For a moment there I thought there might be some rational explanation for a religious edict. but you are probably right, it's probably some irrational response, to the effect of "our superior diet keeps our tribe's members healthy and pure and Godly, unlike those savages on the other side of the river, who will eat anything and worship Satan."

|1.20.05 @ 6:35PM|#

On the topic of religious dietary guidelines, I am reminded of the dialogue between Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta (hired goons) in Pulp Fiction that goes something like this (movie not readily available for me to reference):

"I don't eat pig cause pig is a filthy animal." - S.L.J.

"Ham is good. Porkchops are good." - John Travolta


Sage wisdom from the disco king. But really, considering that perhaps there was (some logic?) in (any?) biblical admonitions, maybe pork tuberculosis was a plague then...were there any banishments on undercooked chicken in Leviticus?

|1.20.05 @ 6:38PM|#

I just had a conspiracy epiphany: maybe this tarriff is secretly supported by an orthodox Judeo-Christian special interest group. (kidding)

|1.20.05 @ 6:43PM|#

smacky,
I know in Islam, pigs are not hallal due to the fact the wallow and eat feces. Same with dogs (which is why you have to clean up thoroughly if you come in contact with dog saliva and need to pray). Of course, with factory farms what they are, I doubt they are alone.

|1.20.05 @ 7:01PM|#

Not to sound facetious, but the religious answer is generally, "Because God said so." If one believes in an all-powerful, all-knowing diety, it is not unreasonable to suggest this diety might have his or her reasons for an edict (if one thinks such an edict exists). In the words of a fundamentalist, how can a finite mind fully comprehend an infinite god? Or, for the more poetic, "Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? declare, if thou hast understanding." Job 38:4

Of course, to the rational readers of Hit and Run, this is not explanation at all... but it is the explanation a religous person might provide.

|1.20.05 @ 7:16PM|#

One on the funnest things to do to any deep believer is to say "Prove it!" repeatedly to any of their Biblical assertions. Believe it or not, many of these folks are rational in their way, and you can just drive them crazy by pointing out their lack of proof. (Most of them believe that they actually have some real-world proof.) I do it to my Christian friends and family members every time they use the Bible to justify their political stances. Then, when they get all control-freaky, I call them primitive. You should see their faces fall.

|1.20.05 @ 7:18PM|#

Not to sound facetious, but the religious answer is generally, "Because God said so."

Which would make it all the more amusing to ask why it's OK to eat shrimp when the Bible quite clearly says that it isn't.

|1.20.05 @ 7:33PM|#

I agree with Isaac. Most of the time there is no government conspiracy, just government incompetence.

Businesses, since they are smaller and more crafty, will often work their own conspiracies through the government, but rarely does the gov as a whole have any idea what is going on.

|1.20.05 @ 8:37PM|#

not to quibble to much but a lot of the prohibitions in leviticus and other old testament books are o.k. (more or less) primarily because of the New Testment.

With out covering every single aspect, simply put, after Paul in the New Testment said that you didn't have to be circumsised in order to attain salvation through Christ, this opened the floodgates (as far as a lot of folks are concerned) and allowed all sorts of secular or cultural practices specifically prohibited under Jewish laws and cultural practices.

The law was no longer about following arcane practices but was now "written on your heart".

That's why it's now generally considered ok to eat ham and shellfish and to mix dairy with meat.

Only rubes justify anti-homosexuality by quoting Leviticus. More up-to-date Christians look to the New Testament where Paul himself declares homosexuality a bad thing.

Still other Christians (such as myself) try to put the issue in historical context and focus on relationships as extensions of God's love. We tend to have less of a problem with it.

The New Testament, generally, has very little of the arcane prohibitions save for the aformentioned homosexualtiy thing and an insistence the women keep their hair covered and remain silent in church.

Again this is the short version...apologies in advance for any pet exceptions I've left out.

|1.20.05 @ 9:40PM|#

smacky, I think you meant trichinosis.

|1.21.05 @ 12:54AM|#

BaBar,

Thanks for correcting me - I believe I meant trichinosis. Still, I bet it would be pretty undesirable (even back then) to eat a pig with tuberculosis - coughing up phlegm all over the slaughterhouse floor, wheezing like mad...it's hardly appetizing, either way.

|1.23.05 @ 7:33PM|#

Wow, a useful conversation about shrimp tariffs to christian bashing in a few posts.
Congratulations lame-o's.