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CNN commentator and newly-minted populist firebrand Lou Dobbs has suddenly discovered that American jobs are being shipped overseas because--get this--the labor is cheaper and there's less regulation.

201k was stunned to learn of this from Big Lou, and wonders why the heck, if it's true, he's only getting around to mentioning it now.

Whew Doggy! Listen to Lou rip into evil foreign outsourcer Atul Vashistha, who's taking American jobs to India:

DOBBS:...when we watch and as we document here, literally hundreds of thousands of jobs being shipped to cheap overseas labor markets, those jobs are replaced typically by salaries that are 30 percent lower and there is no migration up the value chain, it's down the value chain. So, how does that help America?

• ...let's talk about those hundreds of thousands of jobs -- people glibly talk about training. Men and women who have trained themselves in a variety of skills who have a variety of educational pursuits and degrees, I hear people start talking about training as if that's a panacea.

What jobs should they train themselves for? We are shipping high value jobs overseas to India, to the Phillipines, to Ireland, to Poland, to Russia, for crying out loud. What in the world are we supposed to train them to do?

• Now, I understand the profit motive, as a matter of fact, no one is more pro business, pro American free enterprise than I am, but I'm also pro American worker. What in the world -- you talk about pain, we're seeing evidence of it every day.

• So what you end up is, a race to the bottom as it's been styled. Because if one company is go over to India to get a job, to pay a salary that is a tenth of what they would be paying in this country. They are forced to compete. Is not free trade. This is not comparative advantage, as envisioned by David Ricardo, this is the wholesale exportation of American wealth.

• Consumption power in this country for the last three decades have declined over the past three years has actually fallen even more dramatically than that average over three decade. It is quite the inverse.

• We created 22 million jobs during the course of the Clinton administration, 1992 to 2000.

VASHISTHA: ...what is happening today is I think this is the next evolution in the global economy.

DOBBS: That's wonderful. Great evolution, if you believe that the United States should be shipping its wealth, its jobs, standard of living and quality of life to third world countries where there are no regulations for environment, no regulations for labor, no standards that is a requirement here in this country.

The logical extrapolation it seems to me, Atul, is that if we are going to compete fairly, with fair trade and a globalized market, it seems to me that India, the Phillipines, Mexico, a Central American nation should have the same standards, otherwise we're competing simply on the price of labor.

• You are not innovating. You are not being more efficient. You are talking about hiring cheaper labor. Those are only code words for cheap labor. McKenzie did a study, as you're aware of, in what is the bulk of the gain for American companies

VASHISTHA: Well, it's...

DOBBS: All in labor savings.

VASHISTHA: A bulk.

DOBBS: The bulk, as in 70 percent of it.

• Atul, I understand your position. I understand the profit motive, but corporations have a stake in this country do they not?

• And they have a stake in the community, in investing in their people. They have a responsibility, because they are the beneficiary of this national American economy.

• I would much prefer to hear business people, men and women in this country running corporation and folks like you trying to make a dollar, you have a responsibility to this national economy. This is not just a market place. It's a nation. Right?

Wow. Lou seems to be bucking for the "William Jennings Bryan Award"--or maybe even a column in The Nation.

Don't get 201k wrong; we're thrilled to hear a national TV business commentator finally state the blindingly obvious, even if it's one who cheered on the "new economy" for years.

But what thrills us more is the suspicion that national TV business commentators only resort to stating the blindingly obvious when their email indicates that their viewers have caught on to it. That's a most encouraging thing.

Now if only Lou would consider the implications of everything he said on current U.S tax policy.