British Weltpolitik. Similarly, it may be at some point that annAmerican trade-ofF between protectionism and total economicnutility will be worth making—but only in the contextnof an overall political program, for example if the US decidesnto retreat into a hemispheric fortress. Getting the tradenbalance off the evening news, or even protecting sensitivenRepublican constituencies, is probably not good enough.nEconomic nationalists might not think much of thisnconcession. But Libertarians will immediately detectnheresy too: I’m not treating free trade as an end in itselfnThat’s right. I’ve never understood why we are supposed tonbe so upset at the idea of tariffs (taxes) on trade, whilenaccepting taxes on income, which seem to me to be just asndisruptive to the free play of market forces. This paradox isnparticularly clear in the case of Joseph Chamberlain, sincenhe proposed to use tariff revenues to finance the variousnsocial programs favored by contemporary opinion. In thenevent, Britain’s welfare state has been financed by increasesnin income tax, then virtually nonexistent, that would havenbeen unimaginable at the time.nOne current example of the pros and cons of economicnnationalism: South Africa. Successive Afrikaaner governmentsnhave always been interventionist, not to say socialistic.nDismantling their misguided economic controls is produc­n18/CHRONICLESnAdmit Impedimentsnby fane GreernInto the ark of sleep descend our breaths,nsmall coupled animals. Our several deathsnflung us this evening headlong heavenward, and earth’snfiner distinctions between love and sinnperished too, briefly, as the sweet, hard-wonnpleasure we labored over came and went. We learnnnothing from non-success, cry out and thrash,nbeasts in a snare, to make ourselves one flesh —nas though we really could. Today the priest smudged ashninto our foreheads as we gravely knelt,nadmonished us to search ourselves for guilt,nbanished us to the garden Second Adam built.ning a surge of growth, much of it off the books and in thenblack community, that has gone no small way to alleviatingnthe effects of sanctions. But at the same time, protectionismnhas contributed to building up the country’s industries,nnotably armaments, which although strictly speaking uneconomicnhas in the event allowed South Africa to survive thenchoking of key imports by sanctions. So the policy has beennboth bad and — given the extraordinary circumstances —ngood.nEconomic nationalists tend to think of economics as thenclash of armies. Actually, it’s more like the clash ofnnavies — under sail. You can maneuver to a certain extent.nBut you can only do so if you understand and respect thenmarkets winds, tides — and storms.nI’ve said I no longer brood about Britain. But it’sninteresting to contemplate the very different situation innwhich my poor birthplace now finds itself The British elite,nwith the possible exception of Margaret Thatcher, nownwants the country to repress its nationalist impulses — in thencause, however, not of free trade but of the Brusselsnbureaucracy and its ambitions for a unitary (and, incidentally,nanti-American) state.nAmerican conservatives may be wavering on free trade.nBut at least they show no signs of this self-immolatingnEurofanaticism. <^nThere will we also lie like strangers after passion?nOr will the word be flesh, the flesh forgivennits driven, unholy hunger? Will I learn who you are in Heaven?nnn