As a result, CEI experts have encouraged and supported trade-enhancing policies and treaties over the years, including “fast-track” Trade Promotion Authority, specific trade deals, and multilateral efforts such as the Doha round of the World Trade Organization. We have opposed increased tariffs, attempts to increase regulation through trade deal language, and the trend toward bilateral rather than multilateral deals. CEI continues to make the case for free trade in the face of increased bipartisan hostility to the idea.
CEI’s experts also work with like-minded colleagues abroad to oppose harmful initiatives, such as working with British colleagues to stop that country’s competition agency from blocking mergers between American firms based on speculative reasoning.
Featured Posts
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Biden says his steel tariffs totally different from Trump’s, speculates uncle was eaten by cannibals
President Joe Biden vowed Wednesday that he would get tough on China’s steel dumping by tripling tariffs on imports. He argued this was totally different…
Blog
Free the Economy podcast: Paying for organs with Pete Jaworski
In this week’s episode we cover the future of AI and employment, why we shouldn’t trust Chinese economic statistics, and how the…
Daily Caller
Fresh Report Explains How International Climate Treaties Benefit China At America’s Expense
CEI’s Ben Lieberman is cited in Daily Caller on the Kigali Amendment: “China’s status as a developing nation in U.N. treaties has created an unfair…
Search Posts
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Russia introduces strict new antitrust law
Russian President Dmitriy Medvedev has signed into law amendments that will bring increased penalties for price collusion and unfair competition. The new amendments will allow…
Blog
UBS v. IRS saga continues
Today, Wall Street Journal reports that a Miami court has set meeting Friday between the IRS and UBS to look at…
Blog
Movement on the U.S.-Korea FTA?
It looks like things may be moving – slowly — on the trade front. The U. S. Trade Representative has published a notice in…
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Obama Backs Imperial Presidency
Obama is backing an imperial presidency in Honduras. When Honduras removed its ex-president and would-be dictator, Obama demanded his reinstatement, even though he…
Op-Eds
Now an Obama Adviser Criticizes Health Care Reform
Obama’s health-care plan is drawing criticism from one of his own advisers, Harvard University’s Martin Feldstein. In today’s Washington Post, Feldstein warns that “For…
Blog
The People’s Phone
Venezuela’s increasingly ridiculous strongman, Hugo Chavez, would be funny if not for the misery and repression he continues to impose upon his own citizens. From…
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Obama Health-Care Plan Would Take Away 5 Important Freedoms, CNN Says; Obama Would Also Raise Taxes, End Affordable Plans, and Break Promises
CNN notes that there are “5 freedoms you’d lose in health care reform” as promoted by the Obama Administration: the freedom to choose your…
Blog
The Washington Post’s Conflicted Take on Honduras and the OAS
That the Organization of American States has squandered whatever credibility it had should be obvious to all by now — and it’s not just right…
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CEI Weekly: Attack of the National Broadband Plans
CEI Weekly is a compilation of articles and blog posts from CEI's fellows and associates sent out via e-mail every Friday.
Blog
Obama Health-Care Plan Destroys Cheap Health-Care Options, Raises Taxes, Breaks Promises
In 2008, Obama promised not to raise taxes on anyone making less than $250,000 a year. But he is now breaking that promise by…
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Santacruz in Forbes: “Toxic Revenge”
In today’s Forbes, CEI Warren Brookes Fellow Silvia Santacruz talks about the lawsuit against Chevron-Texaco in Ecuador.
Blog
1+1=2
By introducing new regulations the Congress together with major airlines are discouraging us to travel. While the Congress is deciding on how to regulate the…
Blog
In Which the Case for Antitrust Action against Telecoms Weakens
New research finds that U.S. telecoms are charging, on average, ten cents less per minute than their counterparts around the world. Tell me again why…
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“Farming” for dollars in the EU
Most of us knew that the European Union’s system of farm subsidies, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) gives out huge amounts to farmers in the…
Blog
CEI Weekly: Response to EPA Cover Up Increases
CEI Weekly is a compilation of articles and blog posts from CEI's fellows and associates sent out via e-mail every Friday. Also included in the…
Blog
Yeatman: “A Real Choice on Climate Change: Do Nothing”
In today’s RealClearWorld, CEI Energy Policy Analyst, William Yeatman, talks about international attempts at climate diplomacy. Read…
Newsletter
White House Science Czar, Catfish Imports and Gingrich’s “Real” Stimulus
Critics question the controversial beliefs of White House science adviser John Holdren. U.S. catfish producers try to block inexpensive fish imports from Vietnam. Former House…
Blog
Cold friendship
It has been almost 20 years since the end of the Cold War yet the agenda of the U.S.-Russia summit remains unchanged. In the middle…
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Fishy Politics May Harm US Consumers
The various US attempts to hobble the Vietnamese farmed-catfish industry is no less underhanded. And, in order to prevent a trade war with Vietnam, it…
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Obama’s “Willful Disregard of Political Oppression” by Anti-American Dictators Is Admitted by Liberal Washington Post
Obama has demanded that Honduras allow its anti-American would-be dictator, Mel Zelaya, to return to power, arguing that President Zelaya’s removal by the Honduras…
Op-Eds
What About Trade
RE: “Obama and Medvedev pledge to scale back nuclear arsenals" (Page A1, July 7). It has been almost 20 years since the end…
Blog
Church Leaders, Senators Oppose Forcing Honduras to Reinstate Ousted President and Would-Be Dictator
Honduran church leaders, and 17 U.S. Senators, are now opposing outside pressure on Honduras to reinstate the corrupt president that it ousted…
Blog
Forza Italia!
Italy’s Senate has overturned a 1987 ban on nuclear power, passed in panic after Chernobyl. This is good news for Italians, as they face…
Blog
CEI Weekly: Firsthand At the Tea Party
CEI Weekly is a compilation of articles and blog posts from CEI's fellows and associates sent out via e-mail every Friday. Also included in the…
Blog
Leading trade lawyer: real problems with carbon tariffs
Leading trade lawyer Gary Horlick testified yesterday on carbon tariffs before the Senate Finance Committee. As the Senate prepares an energy suppression/global warming bill,…
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Obama Nominee: Corrupt Foreign Rulers Have Right to Remain in Office Until They Receive “Judicial Process”
Arturo Valenzuela, Obama’s nominee to be Assistant Secretary of State, falsely claims it was an illegal “coup” for Honduras to remove its corrupt would-be…
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Igniting Agricultural Innovation
"Biotechnology applied to agriculture has enormous potential to enhance our ability to develop seeds for improved crops and for enhanced livestock to enable us to…
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Antitrust Irony
Microsoft is having a tense antitrust discussion with the EU. Meanwhile, Google is readying an operating system to directly compete with Windows. Compare and contrast.
Blog
Blight Hits East Coast, Capitalism Saves the Day
There are many reasons for free-market advocates to be unhappy about current affairs. With numerous pieces of legislation being proposed to put shackles on our…
Blog
Obama: “Universal Principle” Gives Presidents the Right to Keep Ruling Even If They Violate the Law
Honduras removed its would-be dictator, President Mel Zelaya, for violating his country’s constitution by seeking to extend his term in office, and replaced him with…
Blog
Killing Bill
In today’s Washington Examiner, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce ran an ad where its President and CEO Thomas J. Donohue warns that the Waxman-Markey climate…
Blog
Regulation of the Day: The Price of Shrimp
The ITA has been upset for some time that a Thai shrimp exporter is selling shrimp cheaply; hungry consumers have had no complaints.
Blog
Will Obama Blackmail Honduras Into Installing Would-Be Dictator?
Obama is quite wrong to claim that the removal of Zelaya was "illegal." The Honduran president forfeited his right to rule under the Honduran Constitution.
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“Obama stands with tyrants,” “Sides with Chavez, Castro against Honduran Democracy,” Newspapers Say
“Obama stands with tyrants,” writes the Washington Times. “When thousands of Iranians flooded the streets of Tehran protesting a rigged election and were…
Blog
Alexis Arguello, RIP
Three-time champion and Boxing Hall of Famer Alexis Arguello was found dead of a gunshot would this morning, at his home in Managua, Nicaragua, of…
Blog
Obama Backs Dictatorship in Honduras
Honduras removed its bullying, autocratic President after he began behaving as a dictator, and its Congress replaced him with a less power-hungry member of…
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“Saving the world?”
So many people declare that they want to “save the world!” A candidate for Miss Universe declared that to be the main purpose of her…
Blog
Obama Blunders in Honduras and Afghanistan
The U.S. is meddling in Honduras to prop up an anti-American ruler backed by Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez. After Honduran president Manuel Zelaya attempted…
Blog
Companies to China: Don’t profit-block us bro
An article in this morning’s wall street journal commends a coalition of business associations and councils that sent a letter to China’s Premier…
Blog
WTO-UNEP report gives the nod — sort of — to carbon border taxes
Today, the World Trade Organization, together with the UN Environment Programme posted a report on trade and climate change that outlines…
Blog
“Take My Voice with You”
Thus tells an Iranian woman to a journalist passing through her town, in the new film, The Stoning of Soraya M., which opens…
Newsletter
EPA Censorship Exposed, the Trade War with China and Tracking Stimulus Spending
CEI releases the full global warming report that was suppressed by the Environmental Protection Agency. Climate change legislation in the House could lead to a…
Blog
“Leveling the playing field” with border taxes (read “bring down the economy”)
In Washington, beware any proposal that attempts to “level the playing field.” What is usually meant is hobbling competition with restrictive rules and regulations…
Blog
Obama Administration’s Anti-Travel Policies Hit New Low
A few weeks ago, I wrote about the new passport requirements implemented at the U.S.-Canada border. As I noted at the time, most Americans–including…
Op-Eds
Ecuador’s Counterproductive Fight Against Illegal Immigration
Ecuador’s government has devised a new way to discourage illegal immigrants, mainly from Cuba and China, from entering into fake marriages with natives in…
Blog
Stimulus = Welfare + Quotas + Corruption
Obama’s $787 billion stimulus package is now being used to force states to adopt racial quotas in government contracts, even if their state constitution…
Blog
Obama Administration Gives Miranda Warnings to Enemy Combatants in Afghanistan, Even Though They Are Not Legally Required
The Obama Administration is now requiring investigators to give Miranda warnings to some “captured foreign fighters” in Afghanistan, advising them that they…
Blog
The Stoning of Soraya M.
The Stoning of Soraya M. is a difficult film to watch, but worth taking the time to do so. The film . . . depicts…
Op-Eds
Obama Stimulus Package Is Destroying Jobs
The Examiner was right to protest President Barack Obama’s firing of inspector general Gerald Walpin after he exposed wrongdoing by prominent Obama supporter Kevin…
Blog
HHS Secretary: Health Insurance Industry Needs Competition… With Government
In an AP interview on Tuesday, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius called for competition in the health insurance market. No, not between…
Blog
Tourism Bill to Be Combined With Anti-Civil-Liberties Hate Crimes Bill
If you were a tourist, would you like to come to a country where you could be tried twice for the same crime — even…
Blog
Public Wants Wasteful Stimulus Package Canceled
By a margin of 45% to 36%, the American people want to cancel the $787 billion stimulus package, reports pollster Rasmussen Reports. Economist…
Blog
Stimulus Package Kills Jobs, Drives Up Unemployment
Unemployment is now even higher than the Obama Administration said it would be if there were no stimulus package. At least 1.5 million…
Blog
Twenty Years since Tiananmen Square
China is a very different place than it was twenty years ago. It was on this day in 1989 that one anonymous, brave soul halted…
Blog
NYT: “Buy American” angers allies, loses jobs
The New York Times opined today that the so-called stimulus bill’s “Buy American” provisions are having some unintended consequences –…
Blog
Stupid Border Tricks
Beginning today, American and Canadian citizens will now be required to carry new forms of government identification in order to cross the shared border. Former…
Blog
Obama Panders to the UAW: $30 Billion More for Wasteful Auto Bailout
The federal government is giving another $30 billion in taxpayer money to General Motors to allow it to operate without having to cut…
Blog
Stimulus Package Shrinks Economy, Destroys Private Sector Jobs
Most of the $800 billion stimulus package has yet to be spent, but it’s already harming the economy, both by triggering trade wars that have…
Blog
Anti-GMO Zealots vs. Starving Zimbabweans
In Zimbabwe, the most food aid-dependent country in the world, officials and self-styled “consumer activists” have begun raiding shops suspected of selling genetically-modified food,…
Blog
Retirees, Taxpayers Ripped Off to Subsidize UAW
Obama accused critics of his decision to give control of Chrysler to the United Auto Workers Union of being “speculators.” But it turns out…
Blog
Calling All Liberty-Loving Writers
Our good friend and CEI alumna Kendra Okonski is looking for writers and journalists to enter the distinguished and lucrative Bastiat Prize Competition, presented…
Blog
Victory for Capitalism in World’s Largest Democracy
India’s Congress Party was responsible for many mistakes when it turned India into a corrupt socialist state in the 1960s and 70s, but it changed…
Blog
Stimulus Ignites Job-Killing Trade War With Canada
The $800 billion stimulus package pushed through by Obama has ignited a trade war with Canada, reports the Washington Post. In response to vague…
Blog
Klaus vs. the Eurocrats
In The American Spectator, former CEI Bastiat Scholar Doug Bandow (now at the Cato Institute) describes how “[o]nly the Irish people and Czech President…
Blog
Taxing Away American Jobs
Obama’s plan to raise taxes on the foreign operations of U.S. businesses may destroy management and professional jobs in the U.S., will put American business…
Blog
The Road to Serfdom
On Hayek’s brithday, the following brief speech from internet megastar Daniel Hannan MEP should remind us that there are all too many paths leading to…
Blog
Destabilizing Afghanistan: the Quagmire Expands
The anti-American Taliban extremists are resurgent not only in Afghanistan, where they once sheltered Osama Bin Laden, but also in neighboring Pakistan (which has nuclear…
Blog
David, Goliath and Chevron
How is little Ecuador going to collect from big Chevron? In 2007, investigative reporter Greg Palast posed the question to Ecuador’s president Rafael Correa regarding…
Blog
The Economics of Pirate Deterrence
How can we stop pirate attacks? By applying the law of demand. If something becomes more costly, people consume less of it. How to do…
Blog
North Korea Adopts Floral Basket-Based Economy
Isolated from the rest of the world, Kim Jong Il’s bankrupt North Korean regime appears to have stumbled upon a new gimmick to stay afloat:…
Blog
Torture Prosecutions for Thee, But Not for Me
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wants Bush Administration officials prosecuted for facilitating torture. Fair enough. But if they get prosecuted, she should get prosecuted,…
Blog
Diamond in the rough?
Hmm. A Papua New Guinea tribesman is suing the The New Yorker magazine over an article penned by MacArthur “Genius” and Pulitzer…
Blog
¿Can We Be Amigos?
The Fifth Summit of the Americas held in Trinidad and Tobago on April 17th shed light on America’s new role in the Western Hemisphere. The…
Op-Eds
The war on mining: Fighting back
Gold has become a safe haven as jittery investors move away from weakened stock markets, and currencies are threatened by inflation. But the allure of…
Blog
Americas Summit: Two Views
Abajo! (“Down!”) was the response given by the friendly, bronzed-skinned middle-aged Cuban man who chatted with my husband and me over Cuban coffee on Calle…
Blog
Between the Headlines:”Sustainability” Means Sustainably Poor
“Mars Sets Goal for Sustainable Cocoa Sources” Another Washington Post story suggests that “sustainability” –whatever it may mean — still can…
Blog
Between the Headlines: “Russian Voting Tinged with Green”
“Russian Voting Tinged with Green” This Washington Post headline from earlier this month illustrates one of worrisome side-effects of authoritarian rule. …
Newsletter
Hemispheric Diplomacy, Greenhouse Gases and Anti-Tax Protests
President Obama attends the Summit of the Americas with other leaders from North and South America. The Environmental Protection Agency declares greenhouse gases to be…
Op-Eds
Treaty Supported by State Nominee Coddles Pirates
Quin Hillyer is right to criticize Obama’s nomination of Harold Koh to be chief counsel for the State Department. Koh’s appointment would make…
Blog
Whither Hemispheric Trade?
In his post-Summit of the Americas remarks in Trinidad and Tobago today, President Obama stated his administration’s commitment to improving relations with countries around the…
Blog
Tech is Key in Ideas Battle
Earlier today, Competitive Enterprise Institute President Fred Smith delivered an informative but lively, entertaining speech about the role of NGOs. The speech was delivered at…
Blog
The Liberal War on Science
Christina Hoff Sommers writes about a looming liberal war on science. Based on a campaign promise Obama made to feminist groups in October…
Blog
We Wouldn’t Have Teaparties If It Wasn’t For Rentseeking
Those who say we tried the free market and it failed should research the history of the Boston Tea Party a little. We didn’t even…
Blog
Federalism and Opposition to Illegal Immigration Are Signs of Subversion, Obama Administration Claims
The Obama Administration’s Department of Homeland Security has developed new profiles of potential terrorists. Its definition of “right-wing extremism” is so ridiculously broad that…
Blog
Sacrificing Safety and Freedom for “International Law”
Piracy has flourished in the crucial shipping lanes off the coast of Somalia partly due to a treaty that the U.S. has not…
Blog
Supreme Inconsistency on Foreign Law
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg says that American courts should look more to foreign court rulings in interpreting our Constitution. But she herself does so…
Blog
Liability Gone Haywire Down Under
An 82-year-old Australian grandmother says she is prepared to go to jail rather than pay a A$1-million (US$731,000) bill to clean up toxic chemicals…
Blog
LOST to Pirates
The celebrations and congratulations over the U.S. Navy’s rescue of Capt. Richard Phillips are well deserved and proper all around. Yet even after the…
Blog
Liberal Bootlicking
Members of the Congressional Black Caucus recently visited Cuba and licked Casto’s boots, calling him an “inspiring” visionary and an “amazing human being.”…
Blog
One Down, Six to Go!
Oh the Worries of Our Modern Malthusians! In Washington this week, the Anarctica and Arctic Councils met for…
Newsletter
Green Tariffs, Foreign Aid and The End of Environmentalism
India warns the U.S. and EU not to enact “green” tariffs on products that create carbon dioxide emissions. President Obama’s foreign aid policy receives criticism…
Blog
India calls carbon tariffs protectionist
At the Bonn, Germany, UN meetings on global warming issues, India urged rich countries not to use “green” protectionism by imposing carbon tariffs on…
Blog
The Growing Chorus against Foreign Aid
In today’s Wall Street Journal, Mary Anastasia O’Grady takes on the Obama administration’s approach to foreign aid, which, she argues, amounts merely to maintaining…
Blog
That G20 Communique
Yesterday’s communiqué from the leaders of the G20 – a motley collection of democracies and dictatorships – has some good points, but in general…
Newsletter
G20 Stimulus, A Plan for Carbon Dioxide and Mark-to-Market Reforms
World leaders pledge to spend an additional $1 trillion to stimulate the global economy. Global warming activists call for policies to lower the concentration of…
Newsletter
Cancer Drugs, Voting Rights and Cap and Trade Controversy
Author Virginia Postrel details her successful battle against breast cancer. The Justice Department re-considers whether the proposed D.C. voting rights bill is constitutional. States with…
Blog
Obama Follows in Hoover’s Footsteps
During the Great Depression, Herbert Hoover damaged the economy, and impoverished the American people, with costly, artificial attempts to stimulate the economy through…
Blog
Energy bill — “first shot” in carbon trade war?
In the wake of the release of the Waxman-Markey energy bill, many commenters have pointed to the drastic restrictions on domestic energy use to…
Blog
“Robbery of the American People”
“Nobel Prize-winning liberal economist Joseph Stiglitz points out that the Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner’s plan to have the government subsidize investments in ‘toxic assets’ creates…
Blog
Capitalist-David rally versus Goliath-protests for Socialism
During the G20 summit something like 40,000 plus protesters slated to descend upon London. Of that number, there is a small but growing and…