re: How do you balance free market capitalism with what Saudi Arabia and China are doing?

You are missing everything.

First off trade with China has not cost us jobs. At the end of December we had more people working than ever before and making the highest wages ever. That is simply fact.

We have a large growth in service jobs AND very large growth in service job wages due in no small part to the fact that most high tech jobs are service jobs.

You are simply wrong when you say we depend on them for everything.

On oil—no one economy is being harmed more by cheap oil than is Saudi Arabia. They are doing a foolish thing and they will not do it long. Demand is off big time and inventories are huge. National oil companies working to influence oil prices is nothing new and is just a part of the industry. (It is really strange to hear Americans complain about cheap gasoline.) Capitalism will fix this.

I do not want Trump or Obama attempting to manipulate supply and demand or American freedom to own and operate businesses.

If you want to whine then whine about the massive government bureaucracy that burdens our nation’s companies with every changing policy with no less than three layers of government.

Some things to point out—capitalism is the reason for the economic miracle in China. Over 70% of their GDP now comes from private companies. Old style communism will never return to China. Today’s communist in China is not a communist Mao would recognize. Power has moved and will continue to move from the State to the private economy. When 1.5 billion people become capitalists we should expect their economy to exceed ours.