David New: Buy American; it's good for your pocketbook, society, the Earth

As part of the restructuring of our nation's exuberant credit society, there is a chance that all of us will look through the fog of media, past the political rhetoric and finger-pointing, to recognize that a big part of the situation we find ourselves in today is part of our own doing.

Our great nation, through our own personal spending habits, is silently being taken over. Take a moment to think about the situation we face. For 232 years of our nation's independence, dominance through two world wars and rejuvenation following worldwide depressions, was forged on the foundation of our virtual self-sufficiency in food, energy, fiber and steel production. Steadily, our international free trade also grew. This occurred, however, in a trade environment in which our circle of needs was largely inside our own borders or within a circle of trading partners of shared values.

Much has changed over the last 40 years - and especially over the last few months. As reported in the Statesman earlier this year, for each dollar spent by Americans today on fuel, durable goods and food, nearly 60 cents ultimately leaves the nation in payments for imports. As T. Boone Pickens rightfully pointed out in his recent television ads, almost 70 percent of our nation's vital oil needs are now supplied by a variety of nations who are neither our allies nor within our international circle of shared values.

I challenge my fellow Idahoans to take 10 minutes and look around any room in their homes to investigate how many products are largely or totally made (or have materials that originate) in America. Sadly, they will find few.

Although I grew up in rural Indiana, the majority of my career experience has been spent outside the United States working in the forest products sector throughout the southern hemisphere. While I remain a strong advocate of free trade and the vital relationships it brings, I have learned that free trade often does not equal fair trade. Today, our individual purchasing decisions result in importing products from nations where corruption, child labor, absence of minimum-wage regulations, and lax environmental and worker safety laws are prevalent. We are, in fact, mortgaging our nation and our children's future to endorsing these values and forcing our own primary industries to continue to migrate to the lowest-cost geography.

Our nation is entering a challenging era of sustained global increases in energy and commodity costs, a declining U.S. dollar value, declining global influence and increasing international outsourcing of manufacturing and service jobs. The time has come to stop leaning on the well-intended but largely unachievable promises of politicians for solutions. We must take personal accountability for our everyday purchasing and investment decisions.

In the end, the renaissance of our nation will come from our own pocketbook patriotism and its simple responsibility to, as much as possible, buy American, buy Idaho, buy local and buy environmentally responsibly.

David New of Boise is the former Boise Cascade vice president of timberlands resources and current president of Growing Excellence Inc.