"Free trade" agreements

[JEB]

Published on Friday, January 10, 2014 by TruthDig.com
After 20 Years, NAFTA Leaves Mexico’s Economy in Ruins
by Sonali Kolhatkar

Twenty years ago, on Jan. 1, 1994, a trade deal championed by Democratic President Bill Clinton went into effect. The North American Free Trade Agreement was meant to integrate the economies of the United States, Canada and Mexico by breaking down trade barriers between them, creating jobs and closing the wage gap between the U.S. and Mexico.

What in fact happened under NAFTA was that heavily subsidized U.S. corn flooded the Mexican market, putting millions of farmers out of work. Multinational corporations opened up factories creating low-wage jobs at the expense of organized labor and the environment. This, in turn, drove waves of migration north.

Much more at the link.
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2014/01/10-3

[woo me with science]

1. This is a planned step in the corporate dismantling of democracy.

brought to you by corporatists masquerading as Democrats and Republicans.

This isn't just a trade agreement. It is an assault on jobs, on wages, on internet freedom, on the Constitution, on our national sovereignty.

This is about the transfer of political power from representative governments to global corporate rule.

This is subversion of democracy, brought to you by a government infiltrated by corporatists.

Corporate Republicanism and the corporate Third Way are not just another political flavor. They are an infiltration and subversion of our political system. They are a cancer eating our representative democratic government alive.

[polly7]

3. +1000. A cancer eating many democracies alive. nt

[JEB]

5. Cancer seems to be a pretty good analogy.

What will we use for radiation, chemo-therapy and surgery? Corporate power certainly needs to be pared back. It is so entwined in our society (media, money buying candidates, privatizing all our public institutions, corruption of both major parties, creepy tentacles almost everywhere), it will be hard to eradicate. Like cancer eventually kills the host body, corporatism will kill our world.

[MisterP]

12. the goal is to hollow out democracy--you have elections but even if a reformist gets in it's

Last edited Fri Jan 10, 2014, 06:00 PM - Edit history (1)

set up so it doesn't matter--and if you get a corpo to be labeled as a "reformist" so much the better!

it actually sharpens the rhetoric when candidates' differences exist only to get you to vote for the similarities--besides, how can you say candidates X and Y are identical WHEN CANDIDATE Y OBVIOUSLY WANTS TO MARCH US TO THE GAS CHAMBERS, YOU PAID INFILTRATOR?!

[woo me with science]

19. Spot on.

[FreakinDJ]

2. Good for the 1% - Very Very Bad for the 99%

and in the case of NAFTA - on both sides of the border

[PDJane]

4. The so-called 'free trade agreements' aren't.

They are outsourcing agreements. Free trade would mean that wages, benefits, and subsidies were on a level playing field. That's not what's happening, and it's not what these agreements were meant to do. Business wants us all at the same low level, which is self-defeating.

[Populist_Prole]

6. Bingo. "Free trade" is just a semantics spun/worded to have an ostensibly benign connotation

In the same way "Right to Work" really means "anti-union".

To call them on their hypocrisy, and if they want to use their "comparative advantage" canard, why not outsource to a place like Germany? Their mature industries with skilled and educated workforce give them a huge advantage, which make for trade surpluses: But of course the plutocrats don't want to outsource there because they are all about rent seeking/labor arbitrage.

You are right: This is nothing more than fattening their wallets by exploiting the more desperate, with the ancillary benefit of whatever cash the increasingly poor working class can cough up for the stuff that's built there and sold here.

[bvar22]

7. Ross was RIGHT!

Ross was also right when he predicted the return of Manufacturing Jobs to the USA,
AFTER wages & benefits had fallen to 3rd World Levels.

Yes,
Ross WAS right,
but Bill was smooth.

Bill was so smooth that when he told American Workers that competing with 3rd World Slave Labor
for their jobs would be GOOD for them,
millions believed him.

He was so smooth that even 20 years later,
with all the evidence of a destroyed American Working Class right in front of their faces,
some STILL choose to believe him.

THAT is smooooooth.
President Obama is also smooth, but not in the same class as Bill.
He will probably need Bill's help to sell the same scam again.

The slogan that destroyed the American Working Class needs to be amended.
Do you remember that slogan?
Here it is:

[font size=3]"The American Worker CAN compete with any Worker in the World!"[/font]

That needs to be changed to:

[font size=3]When the American Worker gets hungry enough, he CAN WILL compete with 3rd World Slave Labor for his job.
Hahahahahahahahaha, SUCKERS![/font]


Sorry, Virginia,
but there is no such thing as "Free Trade".
There is no such thing as a "Free Market",
and there certainly is no such thing as an all powerful, at knowing "Invisible Hand" that reaches
down from the heavens and protects the American Worker.

The RICH made that shit up so they could get MORE money,
and sold it to a gullible America that wanted to believe.
Some STILL want to believe.
That is how a scam works.
Don't be a SUCKER.





You will know them by their [font size=3]WORKS,[/font]
not by their promises or excuses.

[pampango]

8. Perot was a libertarian idiot who looked at existing trends and said they would continue.

And the same trends existed in every other developed country, none of which (other than Canada - with which we already had a free trade agreement) had anything to do with NAFTA.

Not much of a clairvoyant there. Certainly not much of a progressive.

[bvar22]

9. You can post as many charts as you want to,

and you can call Ross names,
but you can NOT deny that HIS predictions proved to be valid,
and the predictions of Bill Clinton and the "Centrist" Democrats/Republicans whp pushed "Free Trade" on the American Working Class proved to be WRONG.

[pampango]

10. Predicting that existing trends will continue (and then blaming that continuation on a new cause)

is hardly 'valid' science. No one, not even Perot himself, could pick out the date of NAFTA on that graph. Manufacturing output rose dramatically after 1994 and manufacturing employment continued a 4-decade decline. Blaming that on NAFTA is not 'valid'.

[bvar22]

15. I'm glad I dug out that old video of Ross and Bill.

I had forgotten that Ross had also correctly predicted the return of manufacturing to the US
AFTER Wages and Benefits for Americans had dropped to 3rd World Levels.
In 1992, said that would take 12 - 15 years......um....carry the one...that makes 2007!

Just dumb luck I guess.


Now that word has gotten out about the secret "Free Trade" Deals going on behind closed doors,
and the rush to get this all passed before Americans Wake Up and get organized (Fast Track),
I've been curious about how the Party Establishment is going to try to market this
as something that will be GOOD Working Americans....... again.

I'm sure they will keep their candidate for Bill's 5th Term out of the fray,
and she can fall back on her Campaign Promises from 2008 where she says that NAFTA was BAD for American Workers and would immediately re-negotiate these treaties to give protection to American Workers.
Didn't Obama also agree that NAFTA was bad for American Workers?

Maybe you should send your charts and claims to Hillary and Obama,
because they disagree with you.....
or at least they did in the 2008 Campaign.

I love that line,
"Our Trade Agreements should be good for Main Street,
NOT just Wall Street?"
Wasn't that cool!

...but he really needs to hear from you to set him straight.

[Enthusiast]

16. + a shit load......nt

[pampango]

18. Not surprisingly the republican/libertarian was wrong.

I had forgotten that Ross had also correctly predicted the return of manufacturing to the US
AFTER Wages and Benefits for Americans had dropped to 3rd World Levels.
In 1992, said that would take 12 - 15 years......um....carry the one...that makes 2007!

Ross was a genius, alright. Our average manufacturing wage now is $19.60 an hour. I had no idea that workers in the 3rd World were doing that well in 2013 but, if Ross is "right", they must be.

Didn't Obama also agree that NAFTA was bad for American Workers?

He said NAFTA should be renegotiated. Guess which 3 NAFTA countries are part of the TPP negotiations with its provisions on labor rights and the environment? It will, if passed, replace NAFTA. If it doesn't pass, we will still have NAFTA and the WTO governing our trade.

I love that line,
"Our Trade Agreements should be good for Main Street,
NOT just Wall Street?"
Wasn't that cool!

Cool indeed! We need to make our trade agreements work for our middle class like they do for the middle class in Europe. They have more of them than we do and their middle class is much stronger than ours.

[bvar22]

20. Well Shoot!

I'm just going to have to believe you instead of my Lying Eyes,
and Hillary...and Obama (version 2008)
Have you contacted Hillary and Obama yet to tell them how WRONG they were?

Better Yet, did you tell DU how WRONG Hillary & Obama were about Free Trade back in 2008?
...or is this a recent passion with you now that we have "NAFTA on Steroids" facing us and needing a good grease job.

Good Luck with your campaign telling the American Worker that NAFTA was GOOD for Working Americans.
It was a little easier to spread that around back in 1992 when we had food in our bellies.

[pampango]

25. Can't argue with belief based on your "Lying Eyes".

Do your Lying Eyes tell you there is no global warming because there is snow outside?
Do your Lying Eyes tell you that raising the minimum wage will increase unemployment because employers will want less of something that is more expensive?

Charts and studies can't compete with Lying Eyes.

...or is this a recent passion with you now that we have "NAFTA on Steroids" facing us and needing a good grease job.

I have said many times that I will support TPP only if it has ENFORCEABLE (national sovereignty be damned) provisions on labor rights and the environment. (They are more important than national sovereignty.) That would make it superior to the rules associated with NAFTA and the WTO.

We all know there are chapters on labor rights and the environment in the TPP but who know how strong and enforceable they are.

[Demo_Chris]

22. boom. nt

[woo me with science]

14. I wouldn't call them "predictions."

I would call them Third Way, corporate lies.

Good subthread, bvar22. Thank you for calling out the bullshit.

[Demo_Chris]

21. Boomers didn't BELIEVE Bill, they knew Perot was right, they just figured it was their kid's jobs.

[bvar22]

23. Thats a reach.

It really doesn't make any sense.
Do you have anything to support your claim?

[Demo_Chris]

24. No, but I believe Boomers are capable of recognizing self-evident reality...

Given that, and assuming that they are not imbeciles, there is no other explanation. They voted knowing that throats were going to be cut, they just assumed they had the seniority to avoid the bloodbath and that they would profit. Let's not act surprised, this is the same pattern they did with everything they were given.

Debt, infrastructure, industries, jobs, anywhere you look it's the same. We are talking about the generation that inherited a total national debt that was smaller than our annual defense budget today, and who managed to run it up to 20 TRILLION -- all because they didn't feel like paying taxes. The same pattern goes for war. They were totally opposed to all war, ALL of it including rescuing hundreds of American hostages from Iran, until they were no longer young enough to deploy themselves. And we have been at war ever since, they fucking LOVE war now -- makes 'em feel macho or something.

So yeah, they weren't stupid, they didn't make a mistake, and Clinton didn't fool anyone. They knew what free trade would do to the jobs they had once enjoyed, and to the unions, they didn't care. They were fat and happy, paying nothing in taxes, and coasting towards retirement with fat stock portfolios. No one was gonna outsource THEIR job. Just their kids and grandkids. And fuck them, grandpa needs a new BMW.

[woo me with science]

11. K&R

[reformist2]

13. The corruption of our elections by capitalism is something we have never dealt with - we need to.

I mean Americans have talked about it for decades - over a century now, in fact - but we've never really *done* anything about it. Until we do, there should be no illusions about the fact that we live in a plutocracy.

[Enthusiast]

17. Recommended X 1000!

Stop the horrible TPP!