Bush pushing CAFTA

Date: Thursday, April 21, 2005 8:43 PM

JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER

by Rob Sanchez
April 21, 2005 No. 1238

President Bush is urging Hispanics to support CAFTA, but pay attention
to specifically which Hispanics he is appealing to:

"To create jobs and to strengthen democracy in our
hemisphere, the Congress needs to pass the Central
American Free Trade Agreement," President Bush said
yesterday to the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.

Mr. Bush and Mr. Gutierrez's message on CAFTA was
welcomed by Hispanic businessmen.

The keyword here is "Hispanic businessmen". For all but rich ruling
elite of Mexico NAFTA has been a very bad deal - especially for Mexican
farmers. NAFTA is partly responsible for the massive economic problems
in Mexico that leave their impoverished farmers with no choice but to
sneak across our border in order to survive. Bush is unlikely to
convince rank and file Hispanics to support CAFTA because so many of
them are victims of NAFTA. Bush's public relation ploy is a deliberate
attempt at shifting attention away from the ones that will support
CAFTA - the wealthy families that control almost all of the wealth in
Latin America and the multi-national corporations that want to exploit
Central America's cheap labor pool.

To find out more about how NAFTA fuels illegal immigration from Mexico
there is no better authority than Philip Martin at the University of
California Davis. Go to this webpage for more:
http://www.iie.com/publications/papers/nafta-migration.pdf

CAFTA is a danger to our nation so I urge all of you to read more about
it. If Congress approves CAFTA we will not only suffer massive job
loss; our sovereignty will be threatened. Newsweek editor Fareed
Zakaria explains why:

Unlike the United Nations, the WTO can actually require
that a country change its laws, regulations and precedents -
not simply national laws but often state and local laws.
Its rulings on disputes between nations are binding.
It is undemocratic and filled with technocrats.

To learn more about CAFTA and it's implications for our nation, use
this link to watch a video by William Norman Grigg:
http://www.stopcafta.com/caftavid.html

Grigg is an expert on these free trade agreements and recently wrote a
paper on CAFTA that is very worthwhile to read:
http://www.stoptheftaa.org/artman/publish/article_279.shtml

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7529338/site/newsweek/

Conservative Contradictions
Capital, goods and services move freely across borders. In such a
world, to rant and rail against the erosion of sovereignty is
pointless.

By Fareed Zakaria
Editor, Newsweek International
Newsweek

April 25 issue - In the debate over John Bolton's nomination as
ambassador to the United Nations, his defenders have repeatedly
delighted at the prospect of a real discussion on the issues. "Senator
Frist should schedule a floor debate without time limits," William
Kristol argued in The Weekly Standard. If Democrats want this debate,
Kristol wrote, "let Republicans make them pay a price" for it. David
Brooks, one of The New York Times's conservative columnists, agreed,
explaining that Bolton's disdain for "global governance" has little
support in the country. "We'll never accept it... because it's
undemocratic... Multilateral organizations look like meetings of
unelected elites, of technocrats, who make decisions in secret... [W]e
will never allow transnational organizations to overrule our own laws,
regulations, and precedents."

Perhaps the debate should center on the globe's most powerful
international body, the World Trade Organization. Unlike the United
Nations, the WTO can actually require that a country change its laws,
regulations and precedents - not simply national laws but often state
and local laws. Its rulings on disputes between nations are binding. It
is undemocratic and filled with technocrats. And it was an American
creation that conservatives supported wholeheartedly. (Well, not all.
Some conservatives, like Pat Buchanan, have been consistent and have
argued passionately against it from the start.)

It's strange. Most of our debates about multilateral bodies seem to
involve those organizations that are really talking shops, with few
actual powers. The ones that have real clout are almost all in the
economic realm. And they surely are the most significant for most
Americans. After all, average Americans don't much care about the exact
structure of the (powerless) U.N. Disarmament Committee. But they do
care about the regulations governing their local economy. The WTO has
ruled against the U.S. on scores of issues, from cotton to textiles to
steel. On all of them, the United States has quietly abided by its
rules, which are pretty much "international law." And you don't hear
John Bolton or his defenders objecting to any of this.

Don't get me wrong. I think the WTO has been hugely beneficial to
Americans - and the rest of the world. It has expanded trade, opened
markets and made our economy far more productive. It is not really that
undemocratic. The president and Congress voluntarily signed up for it
and could withdraw from it at any time. They agreed that in the event
of disputes with other countries, an arbitration panel would decide
what to do. That's delegation, not dictatorship, and democracies do it
all the time.

The WTO was America's idea, a way to make other countries open their
markets and increase trade. We agree to bind ourselves to these rules
because it means that everyone plays by them as well. The organization
has forced change in all its member countries, in most cases far
greater change than anything the United States has had to do. Across
the world, countries like Brazil, Turkey, India and China are altering
their laws and practices to open up and come into compliance with the
WTO. The reforms are not always as quick or comprehensive as one would
hope for, but they represent a sea change from where these countries
were 20 years ago.

American firms understand that sovereignty has been breached anyway.
Capital, goods and services move freely across borders. And now, with
the new technologies of communication, even labor is mobile. People
cannot go to where the jobs are, but jobs can go to where qualified
people are - whether that's Shanghai or Bangalore or Warsaw. In such a
world, to rant and rail against the erosion of sovereignty is
pointless. Far better to manage this process in a way that benefits
all. That usually means some system of (gasp) global rules. Take a
burning issue for American companies like Microsoft and Disney: they
want China and India to crack down on pirating software and movies.
That's why we're trying to get a global agreement on
intellectual-property rights that becomes the "international law"
governing this realm. This means that America will lose some control on
these issues. But so will everyone else in order to create a system
that is better and more predictable.

Trade is not somehow completely alien from all other realms. The same
reality, of a world in which borders are being crossed and sovereignty
eroded, applies in many other areas, though not all. And there is
increasingly the reality of a world in which other countries want their
interests taken into account. That means that for many issues, though
by no means all, the only durable solutions will be ones that involve
some rules that everyone agrees to - which is a simpler way of saying
(run for the exits!) "global governance." Consider the area least
amenable to such a transnational approach - high politics. The United
States wanted to punish the perpetrators of the horrific atrocities in
Darfur. But to do so, it had to find some system by which such
judgments could be made. It could not be a purely American process
because that would look like imperialism and would lack international
legitimacy. So Washington reluctantly (and quietly) agreed to refer
Darfur to the International Criminal Court, which we have been actively
trying to kill and that exists despite strenuous American objections.
Does John Bolton approve of this? All this would indeed be worth a long
debate.

Write the author at comments@fareedzakaria.com.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

http://www.washingtontimes.com/business/20050420-093237-7476r.htm

President urges U.S. Hispanics to support CAFTA

By Jeffrey Sparshott
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Published April 21, 2005

The Bush administration is asking U.S. Hispanics to support a Central
America Free Trade Agreement, an appeal that has won some backing but
alienated others in the fast-growing community.

"To create jobs and to strengthen democracy in our hemisphere, the

Congress needs to pass the Central American Free Trade Agreement,"
President Bush said yesterday to the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.

Mr. Bush's appeal, a brief mention in a speech focused on energy

policy, was made shortly after Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez
outlined the administration's case for the pact at the gathering.

CAFTA would lower tariffs and cement investor rights for U.S.

companies selling to or operating in the Dominican Republic, Costa
Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua --
Spanish-speaking nations that by 2000 had sent more than 2.2 million
immigrants to the United States, according to census figures.

CAFTA is also known as DR-CAFTA, after the inclusion of the

Dominican Republic last year.

The administration is stepping up efforts on Capitol Hill and in

the business community to win support for the pact, which appears to
have insufficient backing to pass Congress.

Hispanics made up more than 13 percent of the U.S. population in

2002, according to the Census Bureau, and are the fastest-growing
ethnic group in the country. They are seen as a potentially powerful
lobby on behalf of CAFTA, which the administration touts as a boon for
U.S. businesses, a step toward economic prosperity in Central America
and a way to strengthen young democracies in the region.

Mr. Bush and Mr. Gutierrez's message on CAFTA was welcomed by

Hispanic businessmen.

"Over the coming days and weeks, we will be actively working to

encourage Congress to adopt this important trade pact," said David
Lizarraga, chairman of the chamber, which says it represents about 1.2
million Hispanic-owned businesses.

Mr. Lizarraga set an ambitious goal. Most members of the

Congressional Hispanic Caucus and others in the Hispanic community are
either against or appear to be leaning against CAFTA.

"There are great concerns about how it will affect the Latino

community," said Rep. Grace F. Napolitano, California Democrat and
chairman of the 21-member caucus. Mrs. Napolitano said she would vote
against CAFTA.

The administration likely will need at least 20 House Democratic

votes to pass the pact, which faces some opposition among Republicans
worried about provisions related to sugar and textiles.

Democrats often cite labor-related concerns. Rep. Xavier Becerra,

California Democrat and a member of the caucus, has said CAFTA does too
little to protect worker rights, such as the right to organize and
collectively bargain. That would leave Central Americans vulnerable to
exploitation and drive down wages.

Mrs. Napolitano's and Mr. Becerra's concerns are echoed elsewhere

in the Hispanic community.

The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), a civil

rights group, yesterday cited the North American Free Trade Agreement,
the pact with Mexico and Canada that passed Congress in 1993, as a poor
precedent to CAFTA.

NAFTA has not led to the development, improved environment or

greater prosperity for workers that was promised, said Gabriela Lemus,
LULAC's director.

www.ZaZona.com
Support this Newsletter and ZaZona.com by donating:
www.zazona.com/Donations.htm

To Subscribe, Unsubscribe or to view the Archive go to:
http://www.zazona.com/shameh1b/JobDestructionNews.htm

Back to archives