I grew up in Michigan during the late 70s and early 80s, when the economic xenophobia of the day was directed at cars that came from Japan. (The iconic symbol of this was the evil beating to death of Vincent Chin -- a Michigander of CHINESE ancestry attacked by extremely ill-willed and otherwise geographically miseducated autoworkers who thought him to be Japanese and thus the source of their employment problems.)

Fast forward to today, and we're now afraid of minivans from ALABAMA?!?! And during her State of the State speech a few weeks back, Gov. Granholm mentioned that we should wean ourselves off of coal from places like Montana. Enemies are everywhere!

Where does the nonsense end? Is the economic policy of Michigan going to be that Ypsilanti should not trade with Ann Arbor?

The big fear thirty years ago was that the middle class would vanish because we were importing the cars from overseas. We were supposedly going to ship our money and our standard of living across the oceans and all be left flipping burgers and having nobody who could afford to buy them. This was the future spelled out to me in high school when I actually believed the "don't buy Japan" nonsense.

Guess what? Those dastardly foreigners started re-investing billions in factories RIGHT HERE that employed middle-class AMERICANS to build cars, all on the assumption that MOST Americans would be open to buying them.

But they didn't put those factories in Michigan, the supposed car capitol of the world. Ever wonder why that might be?

Perhaps we worked a bit too hard at building that "DO NOT ENTER" sign. Makes a lot more sense to invest in building cars where the people will be open to buying them, rather than openly hostile to your product. Go figure.

So now, the panic changes with the facts so as to justify our self inflicted misery. Now, the horror is supposed to be that the furriners are what... investing TOO MUCH in America as a way of making a buck for their shareholders (many of whom are also ... ahem ... Americans)?

Once upon a time, our capital was flying away. Now, we're upset because it's coming back. People invested in fear have been betting on the demise of the American middle class for decades.

But people investing actual money -- namely those foreign auto companies -- have spent that time placing bets that this same middle class will be around to both build and BUY their cars.

Guess who won? Just about everybody involved in the trade. States with virtually no manufacturing base 50 years ago -- such as Alabama -- may soon eclipse Michigan's average standard of living.

Who lost? Poor, silly, xenophobic, over-unionized, Michigan, got left shivering in the economic cold.

This is a great place to live. It took an awful lot to screw it up.

(Also posted at Charlie Marlow's War)