It is very bizarre to not be in Seattle for the protests, but where are we, Slovkia and Poland, as well as the rest of Eastern Europe. We are in a place which demonstrates to us 300 times a day why Free Trade is such a dangerous, vile and unfair concept. We see the effects all around us. This is the free trade zone. Almost every industry and sector is filled by US, German, Italian or British companies.
Nothing is local.
They are all huge western companies that had the capital and the organization to come in and plop down 10 or 50 or 200 stores in a country. They own it. They dominate the market and no local company can slowly grow to fill the market as the dogma states. Eastern Europe has been bought. So count me among the protesters, even though I was not there.