Strap yourself in because we may be in for a new wave of rhetoric that tries to tar some of us as…egads…”isolationists.” That’s a term that is used by people who favor so-called “free trade” as a way of discrediting the opposition.

The February 11th issue of The Economist has a piece entitled “The isolationist temptation.” As you can tell, the article is quite concerned about this temptation. Here’s a key paragraph:

Many Americans wish to disengage from the world in one or more of four ways: by fighting fewer wars, by trading less freely, by allowing fewer foreigners into their country or by giving less foreign aid.

Hmmmm…let’s look at each of those points. The war question arises, obviously, because of Iraq. Well, yes, a lot of people think it’s a bad idea to attack countries that pose no threat to the United States. I would venture to guess that most of the world would be quite happy if our country restrained its military adventures. While I’m against reducing countries to rubble, I’d be for dispatching our helicopters, for example, to rescue Pakistanis freezing to death in the mountains after the devastasting earthquake last year. That’s a good kind of foreign aid–along with providing real money (not the pittance our country provides) to other countries less fortunate than ours.

It’s a bit of sleight of hand–and disingenous–to put people who oppose the war in the same framework as people who are anti-immigration. My own view is that opposing the war is a position arrived at by many who don’t like to violence against others–and, for the same reason, those same people want to protect immigrants, particularly in the places they work, no matter how the arrived here.

I left the “trading less freely” issue for last because it’s one of my favorite myths to explode. C’mon, we have to end this flimsy argument. People who oppose so-called “free trade” are all for trading goods between countries. Right now, “Trading freely” means moving stuff around the world based on corporate interests. “Trading freely” means finding the lowest wage possible–and driving down the wages of everyone else.

Opposing that kind of trade is not isolationism. I’d call it humanistic, collective preservation–trying to make sure that everyone can have a decent living.

So, prepare yourself: the idelogical rhetoric is intensifying. Don’t be fooled.