Seems like many of those who provide services to the government are familiar with the Berry Amendment and the implications of the “qualifying countries” list.
I've seen a few comments already pointing out government regulations that are in fact working in other countries (France and Japan were already mentioned).
I'm sure people have many good ideas. Two things that come to mind are: extend the Berry Amendment to the entire US Federal Government and designate certain products such as medicine as critical and require that they be manufactured in the US in order to be sold here.
This is not just a risk to the U.S. Europe, Australia and especially the U.K. look to the U.S. for precedent. If this passes it is likely that they would use it as a basis to extend this nonsense to their respective jurisdictions while justifying it as necessary for protective or economic reasons.
Then these countries will have less of a leg to stand on when criticizing less open countries; who will be able to say: actually you are no different to us, the only difference is that we are more honest about the fact that we prioritize other things above freedom and cultural advancement.
Perhaps not broadly within the US, but certainly by a handful of U.S. congressional representatives .. and seemingly seriously to boot, not just as an affectation of convenience.
The question I have for anyone pushing for this, is do you want a foreign gov't to have the same access? Because as soon as you require this in the US, that's exactly what will happen.
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