Free for whom?

While the Secret Trade Deal of 2007 has been put on the back burner for now (see David Sirota's great coverage, there can be no rest in the fight to replace the word free with fair when it comes to international trade agreements.

The thing is, however, "free" trade is just a buzzword, because it bears a real cost for about 99% of the American populace. And in this week's most prominent example, it's two and three year olds footing the bill that makes corporate heads of outsourced labor-produced goods so rich:

Mattel, the maker of Barbie dolls and Hot Wheels cars, is recalling nearly one million toys in the United States today because the products are covered in lead paint.

According to Mattel, all the toys were made by a contract manufacturer in China.

The recall, the second biggest this year involving toys, covers 83 products made from April 19 to July 6. Many of them feature Sesame Street and Nickelodeon characters — including the Elmo Tub Sub, the Dora the Explorer Backpack, and the Giggle Gabber, a toy shaped like Elmo or Cookie Monster that toddlers shake to hear giggles and funny noises...

...This is Mattel’s 17th recall in 10 years. Most recently, an infant swing made by its Fisher-Price division was taken off the market because of a risk children could be trapped in its moving parts. And in its largest consumer action involving toy safety, in 1998, the company recalled more than 10 million Power Wheels cars.

Tom Friedman's world is flat, I suppose, because his precious no holds barred, anti-regulatory, anti-safety and anti-worker trade policies steamrolled over pets, children and manufacturing workers. Or maybe it just slowly poisoned them.