Senators urged to get tough on trade

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/lawmakers-urged-toughen-trade-talk/story.aspx?guid=%7BE400FDF6%2D60A2%2D4710%2DB6E5%2DE9E8C73E391B%7D


By William L. Watts, MarketWatch
Last Update: 4:53 PM ET Mar 8, 2007

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Lawmakers were urged Thursday to get tough with potential trade partners on textile quotas and labor standards as Congress ponders whether to extend President Bush's fast-track trade authority.
"We have a de facto trade policy that allows foreign governments to subsidize their exports and throw U.S. workers out of their jobs while our own Congress and government essentially look the other way or conveniently provide aid and assistance to China, its businesses and government," said Anderson Warlick, CEO of North Carolina-based textile maker Parkdale Mills and president of the National Council of Textile Organizations, in testimony prepared for delivery to the Senate Finance Committee.
Robert Baugh, executive director of the AFL-CIO's Industrial Union Council, outlined the umbrella trade group's call to scrap fast-track authority, formally known as "trade promotion authority," in its current form.
The administration's trade promotion authority, or TPA, expires on June 30. Under TPA, trade deals negotiated by the administration can't be amended by Congress, and the House and Senate must hold an up-or-down vote on the pacts by a specific deadline.
Without TPA, other parties are reluctant to negotiate with the United States. The Bush administration narrowly won reinstatement of the authority, formerly known as "fast track," in 2002. It had previously lapsed in 1997.
The labor group's proposal would require a review of existing trade agreements before the administration could begin new trade negotiations. It would also see Congress lay out "readiness criteria" that would assess potential trade-agreement partners on the basis of economic opportunities available for U.S. workers, firms and farmers, the country's legal system, and compliance with international labor standards, Baugh said.
The plan would also make congressional negotiating objectives currently allowed under fast-track mandatory rather than optional, Baugh said, and would require Congress to certify that an agreement has met all mandatory objectives before a trade deal can be signed.
House Democrats have threatened to block pending trade agreements with Peru, Columbia and Panama unless they include International Labor Organization standards, and have rejected an administration offer on the subject that they say didn't go far enough.
U.S. business leaders continue to press for quick action on extending TPA.
Failure to renew TPA would sink the Doha Round of international trade talks, warned FedEx Corp. CEO Frederick W. Smith, in prepared testimony, while also endangering potential agreements with South Korea and Malaysia.
"Furthermore, with the U.S. sidelined by its lack of negotiating authority, our international competitors will aggressively negotiate preferential trade deals for their goods and services, putting U.S. companies at a significant competitive disadvantage," Smith said.

FULL article at link.

[Rydz777]

1. The post and the link

Thanks for the post and for the link. Our trade "deals" are sucking this country dry, and they all fly under the radar, and are further concealed by the fog of this bloody war.