With the recent toy recall for AquaDots due to the chemical compound GHB--the so-called date rape drug--we are once again reminded of the hidden dangers of goods produced in China. The past few months have seen recalls due to lead in such children toys as Curious George and Thomas the Tank Engine. Food has been recalled. Hygiene products have been recalled. When will our own government step in and declare "Enough!"?

I wouldn't wait for our "representatives" in Washington to do anything. You see, they are firmly in the pocket of the multi-national corporations. To those corporations, China, with her bugeoning population of over 1.32 billion people, represents the final frontier for predatory capitalism. Not only can the corporations exploit China's lax environmental and labor laws, they can sell products back to the exploited workers at a tidy profit. China's common people get it coming and going from our government in the hands of the corporations and from their own government, happy to line its own pockets while Chinese people suffer and die, often in anonymity.

While many watchdog groups wail about China's human rights abuses, our own government cannot say anything without a common phrase involving the words "kettle" and "black" being invoked. For all of the handwringing going on now about lead and other chemicals we have found in the products, how many people have taken the time to think about the Chinese laborers who have been exploited and exposed to the harmful chemicals in far greater quantities than one toy or one can of dog food? Hmm? Who weeps for their deaths?

Looking back, the foundation has long been laid for this to happen, arguably since Richard Nixon's 1972 visit to China, which normalized relations between our two countries. All the corporations needed was the right time and for our nation to become apathetic and unconcerned about the source and quality of our consumer products. "Who cares where it came from," we declared, "as long as it is cheap." Somebody forgot to distinguish between cost and quality and now we are paying for it.

Yes, sir, we reap what we sow.