AP: Obama's Nike stop puts focus on outsourcing, labor standards (TPP)

[Omaha Steve]

The POTUS used to wear things Made in the USA.

http://apnews.excite.com/article/20150508/us--obama-trade-3c466bf848.html

May 7, 10:09 PM (ET)

By JIM KUHNHENN and GOSIA WOZNIACKA

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — No doubt President Barack Obama is fond of Nike. Golf outings often find him decked out from head to toe in apparel featuring the emblematic company swoosh. Now the president is putting the company logo on his trade agenda.

On Friday, the president will visit Nike headquarters in Beaverton, Oregon, to make his trade policy pitch as he struggles to win over Democrats for what could be a last major legislative push of his presidency. But in choosing the giant company that makes sneakers and athletic wear as his backdrop, Obama has stirred a hornet's nest.

Nike, a major exporter, employs more than 8,500 workers in Oregon, many in well-paying design, research or marketing jobs. But of Nike's slightly more than 1 million factory contract workers, more than nine out of 10 are in Asia, with the largest number in low-wage Vietnam.

"It is a perverse place to try to go and sell a trade agreement that the American public thinks would make it easier to offshore our jobs and push down our wages," said Lori Wallach, the director of Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch.

FULL story at link.



President Barack Obama smiles as he greets people in Portland, Ore., Thursday, May 7, 2015. On Friday, the president will visit Nike headquarters in Beaverton, Ore., to make his trade policy pitch as he struggles to win over Democrats for what could be the last major legislative push of his presidency. (AP Photo/Don Ryan)

[MannyGoldstein]

1. Is this intentional performance art,

or has the President lost his marbles?

He's attacking people who are against the TPP, saying that if people only read the secret agreement they'd know how great it is.

Now he's off Nike to spotlitght the benefits of free trade?

WTF?

[TDale313]

2. Yeah, truly bizzare.

maybe he actually wants to sabotage it? Or is enjoying giving those of us on the left the finger too much to care how it looks? I dunno, it doesn't make much sense to me

[nadinbrzezinski]

3. I do not find this bizarre

or performance art. Sadly this is zero sum politics in the United States at this point.

Want a weird one, that will actually summarize what is going on here?

My fair city has an infrastructure problem. This is a 1.3 billion short of money needed to fix the stuff we own. Yet, that same city council that is about to approve 35 million to fix stuff (annual budget, but are selling that drop in the proverbial bucket as a great thing, with most press helping)... Yet, they approved half a million to try to keep in town an NFL team. (The county put the other half, lawyers and consultants are expensive after all)

This is not unlike the TTP... this is about theater, on a grand scale. The actual effects of the team leaving are not that bad, but the political cost of the team leaving could be severe for all members of the city leadership. Add some in county for good measure.

To translate this to the President. this is about his friends, in high places, who he made promises about trade. Say what you wish but right now this is a fight between the more populist and the less populists, and what we all think, and truly believe, is good for the country.

For the record, TTP is a bad idea. But this is what the theater is about... pure and absolute zero sum...politics.

[AZ Progressive]

4. Maybe Obama was forced by TPTB to get TPP passed as a condition for reelection?

[Pauldg47]

5. I've thought of that too.

[Wilms]

6. ^

[countryjake]

7. K&R!