Quote:
Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
Another pro-free-trade Dem explains why CAFTA is bad news.
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I agree with this one. It is too bad more Democrats don't think like this:
"Though this does spring off an idea I read in the Economist (the train to work is very long), I think they make a good point: the CAFTA treaty provides a signal to the rest of the world that the US is willing to negotiate on the Doha Round, which is really what we should be worrying about. This whole CAFTA deal (as Cowen notes in point 7) is really pretty small potatoes; the real deal to watch is the deal (in whatever form it takes) that comes out of Doha. But here I think many of the moderate Dems that Matt was talking about should be perking their ears up. This may in fact be the first trade deal that actually benefits third world countries, an issue that should reverbrate strongly in the Democratic party. There's a reason that this round is also known as the "Doha Development Agenda." After the Uruguay round, third world countries began to realize just how shafted they really were from the deal, especially from the agreement on agriculture that was attached to it 1995. The point here is that there is this great issue right here that is waiting for Dems to poach from Repubs. It's fiscally conservative (in the sense that free trade is "conservative"), but socially liberal in its effects on the third world and other developing countries. And the Republicans haven't touched it. So that's the import of CAFTA, IMO, that it is a stepping stone towards stealing the Doha round right out from under the noses of the Repubs."
The one I think you were referring to is simply saying that the Administration did not suck up enough to the Dems. Didn't make them "feel good". This is such BS. Either the treaty is good for America or it is not. They are there to pass laws that are good for America, they are not their to not have their egos bruised.
What I think Tyler and the other "pass CAFTA or we'll never trade again" folks are failing to understand is that while many Democrats are never going to meet a trade deal they like, many others feel very awkward about being backed into opposition by a White House that's unwilling to throw liberals the merest bone while tossing off huge hunks of steak to the intellectual property industry. Lots of factors drive this discomfort, including high-minded ones, petty pride (nobody likes appearing to have surrendered in a long-run intra-party fight), and most crassly simple fundraising.
Moderate Democrats would, I think, be thrilled to help the administration out and re-assert their historical centrality to trade policy debates if the GOP were willing to meet work cooperatively."
Here is a development that offers hope:
"What's more, the dread AFL-CIO is, for those who haven't been paying attention, in the midst of splintering with a big block of unions whose workers are overwhelmingly in non-tradeable sectors (or, in the case of the Teamsters, who's trade-related issues relate exclusively to Mexico -- nobody going to drive a truck here from Australia or Chile) preparing to seceed and focus more on organizing in growing economic sectors rather than using politics to defend jobs in shrinking sectors."
