As is fairly well-known, WTO and other trade rules permit a good deal of protectionism.  For example, when certain conditions are met, "safeguard" measures may be imposed to keep out imports.  With these kinds of measures, governments have some discretion as to how much protection for domestic industry

I was thinking about what I said briefly the other day regarding the benefits of foreign competition in the health care (specifically, health insurance) industry.  I thought maybe someone else had discussed this idea in more detail, so I did some quick web searches.  The best I found was this:

From ICTSD: The International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD), an independent non-profit and non-governmental organization contributing to a better understanding of development and environment concerns in the context of international trade, seeks to recruit a pro-active professional to fill position of Trade Negotiations Insights (TNI) Editor.More at

Adrian Vermeule of Harvard Law School proposes reining in the role of courts: Professor Adrian Vermeule’s newest book is likely to raise a few judicial eyebrows. “Law and the Limits of Reason,” just published by Oxford University Press, is a broad-based criticism of the dominant role played by courts

As many of you probably have heard already, the WTO has established a WTO Chairs Program to support WTO-related research and teaching activities in developing countries. While the deadline for the first round of call for proposals has expired on May 29th, similar opportunities might be offered in the future.

Following-up on the last post, it looks like the Indonesian clove cigarette makers have at least one defender in Congress.  Congresswoman Virginia Foxx gave the following speech in the context of the discussion of the tobacco regulation bill (begins at bottom right of page and continues to next page): Mr.

Remember Indonesia's concern that clove cigarettes (kreteks), which they produce a lot of, would be banned under U.S. tobacco legislation?  (See here and here).  Well, Congress has passed this legislation and it looks like the clove cigarette ban will soon be upon us. The problem is not