It's been nearly a week since the Nancy Pelosi-led press conference where they announced they had come to agreement with the Bush administration on future trade agreements.
Let's not forget that ALL fair traders within the Democratic party were left out of the negotiation. Also, they STILL haven't released the final text of the deal and continue to keep it a secret even from members of their own party - why is that? Why did Rahm Emanuel cancel the debate that was supposed to take place within the Democratic caucus?
I'll tell you why, because Emanuel is a sell out. He's the same clown that helped push NAFTA through Congress with the help of K Street lobbyists for the Clinton administration. He also supported our free trade deal with China and demanded Democrats support it. How did that turn out for us?
Listening to the DLC Democrats on trade policy is like listening to the American Enterprise Institute on Iraq policy. They have both been PROVEN to be wrong SO many times that why would anyone take them seriously? These guys are in it for their own pocketbook and they don't give a damn about the middleclass or the majority of the Democratic party.
EVERY SINGLE trade deal that's been passed has been a disaster for the American worker - every one of them. Idiots like Tom Friedman don't even read the agreements or even understand the acronyms (see CAFTA) before they pen cheerleading editorials supporting them. These people are destroying our country and WE allow them to do it.
Well I've had enough, and if they continue down this path then I will no longer support the Democratic party. It doesn't mean that I won't support certain candidates but I cannot and will not prop up a party that only serves to undermine this country and its citizens.
The DLC and its supporters can go to hell...
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4 comments:
We need more Democrats like you Jeff...
I helped move a local factory to China and I have seen what our trade policy has done to America first hand.
It is getting worse and neither the Republicans nor the Democrats seem to care.
As a Libertarian I also have to admit that most Libertarians are on the wrong side of this issue as well...
Mike Sylvester
Thanks Mike.
Libertarians are probably on the wrong side of the issue because they actually believe our "free trade" agreements are comprised of free trade principles. Once people start to look into these things they soon see them for the farce that they are.
Even Paul Krugman, a long time advocate of free trade agreements, has started to rethink his position:
Fears that low-wage competition is driving down U.S. wages have a real basis in both theory and fact. When we import labor-intensive manufactured goods from the Third World instead of making them here, the result is reduced demand for less-educated American workers, which leads in turn to lower wages for these workers. And no, cheap consumer goods at Wal-Mart aren't adequate compensation.
So imports from the Third World, although they make the United States as a whole richer, make tens of millions of Americans poorer. How much poorer? In the mid-1990s, a number of economists, myself included, crunched the numbers and concluded that the depressing effects of imports on the wages of less-educated Americans were modest, not more than a few percent.
But that may have changed. We're buying a lot more from Third World countries today than we did a dozen years ago, and the largest increases have come in imports from Mexico, where wages are only about 11 percent of the U.S. level, and China, where wages are only 3 percent of the U.S. level.
Great post, Jeff.
I have been against Free Trade Agreements for many years now. Free trade agreements are one of the worst nightmares that could have happened to American workers and farmers. Many workers and farmers were sold on the notion that opening up foreign markets would be good for them.
What a sell-out. I am disappointed and angry that neither the Democrats or Republicans seem to care one whit about the American workers.
As I keep saying, when was the last time you turned over a product or looked at a label, and it said "Made in the USA?"
Charlotte,
Thanks. The good news is that nearly all the newly elected Democrats, to my knowledge, are fair traders. We just need to rid the party of those that support the DLC trade position...
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