Free trade. Class warfare.

Editor,

Characterizing opposition to "free" trade as class warfare, as in the editorial "Trading Down," is disingenuous in the extreme and the height of irony because "free" trade -- which isn't trade at all but unregulated capital flows across international borders -- is itself class warfare. "Free" trade is designed specifically to maximize international investors' returns at the expense of workers everywhere on the planet. A handful of billionaires are made as millions are plunged into 30-cent-an-hour jobs, spending on social programs is curtailed, and the right of workers to organize is crushed. Most obviously, as regulations have been lifted on the movement of capital across borders, restrictions on the movement of labor have been tightened. "Freedom" for the rich, slavery for the poor. This is the definition of class warfare.