Trade

RNC Hammering on the Free Trade Issue.

Tommy had a good post up earlier pointing out that there are a lot of shades of grey here. Which is correct. Obama was not nearly as against NAFTA as he wanted certain people to believe, and he is not as pro-NAFTA as Fortune makes him out to be. And therein lies the problem. It is simply that Obama words his issues carefully enough that anyone can read their preferred meaning into them, whether it's pro/anti NAFTA, or pro/anti public financing. It's a nice showcase for his skills as a rhetorician, because each of those statements sounded great as a standalone. It's when you put them together, as the RNC has done here, that you have a problem.

It was reported on these pages yesterday that Barack Obama was backing away from his opposition to NAFTA, based on an interview with Fortune magazine. There was an Obama campaign conference call today to discuss John McCain's positions on trade, but I decided it would be a good time to clear up Senator Obama's, first.

Tommy Christopher: On the subject of that Fortune interview, I understand (Obama's) core position (worker and environmental protections) hasn't changed, but I believe at the debates, he said we should use a pull-out as a hammer to advance that, so without that, where are the teeth in this position? Also, you said there was more context to that interview, can you make a transcript available?

Hari Sevugan: We can get that transcript to you, just send me an email.

Senator Sherrod Brown then chimed in that America is "big enough, strong enough..." and doggone it, people like us? "...that these countries will listen to us."

This is the essence of the flawed logic of the GOP's position on getting these kinds of concessions. They act like we're the weak party, like we have nothing to offer. We have all of the customers! More on that transcript later.

The McCain campaign fired back with this statement, via e-mail:

Obama says, hey, I'm OK with NAFTA after all.

"Sometimes during campaigns the rhetoric gets overheated and amplified," he conceded, after I reminded him that he had called NAFTA "devastating" and "a big mistake," despite nonpartisan studies concluding that the trade zone has had a mild, positive effect on the U.S. economy.

Does that mean his rhetoric was overheated and amplified? "Politicians are always guilty of that, and I don't exempt myself," he answered.

What's interesting about this is that Obama may owe an apology to one Mr. Austin Goolsbee:

Three weeks later, Canada's CTV News reported that a "senior member" of Obama's campaign had phoned Wilson personally to advise him to "not be worried about what Obama says about NAFTA." The Obama campaign denied that story, which (if you believe DeMora's account) was only slightly off the mark, and declined to elaborate. On March 3 the Associated Press released the DeMora memo, which by then had circulated widely within the Canadian government. Asked once again to comment, Obama said his campaign provided Canada no such reassurance while Goolsbee maintained that DeMora "misinterpreted" his comments. For its part, the Chicago consulate smoothed things over with a statement saying, "there was no intention to convey, in any way, that Senator Obama and his campaign team were taking a different position in public from views expressed in private." It looks like President Obama may owe one to our friendly neighbors to the north.

At the time, Obama insisted that Mr. Goolsbee was misinterpreted, or misquoted, but maybe not so much. The bottom line here is that neither candidate, once in office will do much about NAFTA. Tinker around the edges? Maybe, but it was a centerpiece of a Democratic administration, is a counterpoint to the Euro Free Trade Zone, and with the dollar sinking, American manufacturing is gearing up for exports.

The only losers are the Anti-free trade voters who believed the "overheated rhetoric"

When you run for president in America, the basic Number One rule is that you must say, early and often, that "America is Number One" or "This is the greatest country in the world" or some other equally uplifting, patriotic statement that makes it very clear to voters that America is the top nation on Earth, and you are the candidate who best understands the unique glory of the United States.

Also, you must wear a very large "flag pin." Experts say the winning presidential candidate must wear an American Flag Pin that weighs at least seven pounds, and the pin must pierce through the heart muscle (for patriotism).

But the three remaining candidates in the 2008 race are facing a terrible new problem: Everybody's saying America's not really Number One at anything anymore, beyond maybe defense spending and childhood obesity. Even the famous weekly news magazine Newsweek says so in the current issue's cover story!

President Bush lashed out at Congress today over the House of Representatives' vote to block action on the Colombia Free Trade Agreement last week. Speaking after a cabinet meeting, the president singled out House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for criticism for the vote and said that there was a lot of disappointment over the House's action.

I do want to say something about trade. There's a big disappointment around this table about the actions the speaker took on the Colombia Free Trade Agreement.

The free trade agreement is good for American workers, and it's good for American consumers, and this free trade agreement is in our national interests. Yet that bill is dead unless the speaker schedules a definite vote.

This is an unprecedented move, and it's not in our country's interest that -- that we stiff an ally like Colombia and that we don't encourage our goods and services to be sold overseas.

Last week, the House, at Pelosi's direction, voted to change the rules governing how Congress acts on trade deals. Under the fast-track trade rules, trade deals are negotiated by the White House and submitted to Congress for a yes or no vote within 90 legislative days. The House vote delays action on the Colombia FTA indefinitely. Pelosi counters that Congress must first address the sluggish U.S. economy before taking up the trade deal. But this line of reasoning discounts the vital role that trade plays in helping to create jobs in the United States.

The White House held a blogger conference call today to discuss the House vote to block the Colombia Free Trade Agreement. Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Western Hemisphere Affairs Dan Fisk was on the call to provide the Administration's assessment of the House action's impact on U.S foreign policy and future trade agreements. The White House is framing the free trade agreement as a national security issue with real consequences for the United States.

Mr. Fisk began by recounting the history of Colombia. Ten years ago, he said, Colombia was a failed state on the verge of becoming a narco-state. He noted that killings and kidnappings were common and that the average Colombian believed that the country could be lost to armed groups and drug traffickers. Mr. Fisk contrasted that with the Colombia of today, where he said that political stability and constitutional rule have been re-established under the leadership of President Alvaro Uribe. Mr. Fisk said that stability is threatened by a small group of terrorists and extremists, including the FARC rebel group, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, and his allies in Ecuador and Nicaragua. It is this small group that is most pleased with the House Democrats' action to block the trade bill, he said.

Democrats in the House, led by Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) voted to block consideration of the Colombia Free Trade Agreement, sent up to Congress yesterday by President Bush. Democrats did not reject the deal outright, rather they chose to implement a special rule for consideration of the bill. The rule allows the House to waive a provision of the law granting the Administration the right to negotiate trade deals without Congressional input. Deals negotiated under the so-called Fast Track authority are then sent to Congress for an up or down vote with no amendments allowed within 90 legislative days. Democrats voted today to extend that time frame indefinitely.

Speaker Pelosi said that the action was being taken because the president disregarded her advice to hold back the trade deal by sending it to Congress. "If we are going to be successful in passing a trade agreement, we have to first tell the American people that we have a positive economic agenda," she said. Republicans shot back that lowering barriers to trade is part of a sound economic policy. Rep. Jim McCreary (R-LA) highlighted the cost of the Democrats' action to American businesses. "Colombia will buy tractors, mining equipment and fertilizer from Canada, France and Germany instead of Illinois, Georgia and Texas."

Pelosi also claimed that supporters of the trade deal didn't have the votes to pass it. But that claim is called into question by the fact the Democrats chose to use a parliamentary procedure to derail the bill, rather than allow a straight vote on the measure.

It was a busy day on Capitol Hill yesterday. While most were focused on the Senate side of the Capitol for the Iraq hearings with Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker, The Bush Administration and the House of Representatives were setting their sights on the housing and trade markets. President Bush formally transmitted the Colombia Free Trade Agreement to Congress for its consideration, while the House was taking up its version of legislation introduced in the Senate last week to help ease the volatile housing market.

On trade, the president held a White House event attended by members of his Cabinet and the Colombian Ambassador to sign the letter sending the trade deal to Congress. In his remarks before the signing, President Bush said that the deal would strengthen U.S. national security, help the economy, and provide vital support to an important ally. Some Democratic leaders in Congress are skeptical of the deal, and most free trade legislation, because they believe that past free trade deals have worked to send American jobs overseas. Sen. Hillary Clinton, for example, recently said that she would vote against the Colombia Free Trade Agreement. But the trade agreement would open a two-way road between the two nations and builds on agreements already in place with other Latin American nations like Peru, Chile, and Panama. Congress has 90 legislative days, not the same as ninety calendar days, to vote the deal up or down with no amendments.

Mark Penn's recent reassignment within the campaign of Hillary Clinton came after it was learned that Penn's lobbying firm met with the government of Colombia to promote passage of a trade bill which Hillary officially opposes. The appearance of talking out of both sides of your mouth was something that Clinton knew would damage her chances with working class voters in Pennsylvania (and elsewhere), but, oddly, Penn wasn't fired outright for his indiscretion. Why, you may ask, would Clinton keep Penn on the payroll?

Well, as Sam Stein writes in The Huffington Post:

But within the Clinton campaign, Penn is not the highest-ranking adviser with financial ties to groups and individuals supporting the passage of the measure.

Former President Bill Clinton has earned hundreds of thousands of dollars speaking on behalf of a Colombia-based group pushing the trade pact, and representatives of that organization tell The Huffington Post that the former president shared their sentiment.

So you see, how could HIllary fire Penn for an activity her husband was engaged in, as well?

Update: Underground Report from Tibet at the end of the story.

This article was written by Tom Fitzsimmons, a Political Machine reader, and published with his permission.

From The Times of London:

The Dalai Lama responded to charges from China that he orchestrated deadly riots in Lhasa to sabotage the Olympics with a pledge to resign as temporal leader of Tibet's Buddhist people if the violence - on both sides - did not stop.

Amid reports that the Dalai Lama has offered to quit his post over accusations by the Chinese that he has fomented the recent uprisings, and with Tibetans ignoring his calls that only non-violent methods be used in protests, an obvious question arises; can a Dalai Lama resign?