For the channeling of the Garonne would encourage the invasion of products from Toulouse to the detriment of Bordeaux and the flooding of products from Bordeaux to the detriment of Toulouse.

Frédéric Bastiat
Economic Sophisms First Series

We are here reminded about the fable of Stulta and Puera when Bastiat compares the economic issues faced by Spain and Portugal with those faced by Bordeaux and Toulouse.

Thanks to this comparison, he indirectly exposes the opposition to free trade, reminding us that economic phenomena do not care about borders that are artificial lines on a map and nothing else from this point of view. Unfortunately, they are indeed way more than that from a nationalist point of view and primarily a source of conflicts. This is the reason why the warriors’s vocabulary is often used (even nowadays!) to describe economic phenomena by those who want to confuse ideas and push forward their nationalist agenda. In the quote above, the emphasis on the words “invasion” and “flooding” show that Bastiat was able to see through it that using a warriors’ vocabulary in economic discussions was somewhat of a fallacy.