What is Bernie's position on these trade deals of Clinton1 and Obama?

[RiverLover]

Does not support ANY free trade agreements
Q: What do you think about the new TPP trade deal, the Trans-Pacific Partnership?

SANDERS: I voted against NAFTA, CAFTA, PNTR with China. I think they have been a disaster for the American worker. A lot of corporations that shut down here move abroad. Working people understand that after NAFTA, CAFTA, PNTR with China we have lost millions of decent paying jobs. Since 2001, 60,000 factories in America have been shut down.

We're in a race to the bottom, where our wages are going down. Is all of that attributable to trade? No. Is a lot of it? Yes. TPP was written by corporate America and the pharmaceutical industry and Wall Street. That's what this trade agreement is about. I do not want American workers to competing against people in Vietnam who make 56 cents an hour for a minimum wage.

Q: So basically, there's never been a single trade agreement this country's negotiated that you've been comfortable with?

SANDERS: That's correct.
Source: Meet the Press 2015 interview moderated by Chuck Todd , Oct 11, 2015

China trade has led to loss of 3M American jobs so far

Q: What does Bernie's track record look like with regard to Chinese trade policy?

A: Time and time again, Bernie has voted against free trade deals with China. In 1999, Bernie voted in the House against granting China "Most Favored Nation" status. In 2000, Bernie voted against Permanent Normal Trade Relations with China which aimed to create jobs, but instead lead to the loss of more than 3 million jobs for Americans.

Q: Maybe these trade agreements aren't all great for Americans, but don't they provide millions of jobs for Chinese workers?

A: Bernie firmly rejects the idea that America's standard of living must drop in order to see a raise in the standard of living in China.

Q: So what does Bernie propose we do?

A: Instead of passing such trade deals again and again, Bernie argues we must "develop trade policies which demand that American corporations create jobs here, and not abroad."
Source: 2016 presidential campaign website FeelTheBern.org, "Issues" , Sep 5, 2015

Priority of trade deals should be helping American workers

Bernie Sanders believes that the top priority of any trade deal should be to help American workers. Unfortunately, as Bernie has warned year after year, American trade policy over the last 30 years has done just the opposite. Multinational corporations- who have helped to write most of these trade deals--have benefited greatly while millions of American jobs have been shipped overseas. American trade policy should place the needs of American workers and small businesses first.
Source: 2016 presidential campaign website FeelTheBern.org, "Issues" , Sep 5, 2015

Base trade policy on working families, not multinationals
Q: The president says that expanding trade helps service industries & opens new markets. You talk about workers that would lose their job from trade. They say this will open up markets that will increase jobs.

SANDERS: I have been hearing that argument for the last 25 years. I heard it about NAFTA. I heard it about CAFTA. I heard it about permanent normal trade relations with China. Here is the fact. Since 2001, we have lost almost 60,000 factories and millions of good-paying jobs. I'm not saying trade is the only reason, but it is a significant reason why Americans are working longer hours for low wages and why we are seeing our jobs go to China and other low-wage countries.

And, finally, what you're seeing in Congress are Democrats and some Republicans beginning to stand up and say, maybe we should have a trade policy which represents the working families of this country, that rebuilds our manufacturing base, not than just representing the CEOs of large multinational corporations.
Source: CBS Face the Nation 2015 coverage:2016 presidential hopefuls , Jun 14, 2015

Wrong, wrong, wrong that trade deals create jobs here

Q: As secretary of state, Clinton said she favored a trade deal with our 11 Pacific partners & fast track authority to make that happen. Is that an issue for you?

SANDERS: In the House and Senate, I voted against all of these terrible trade agreements, NAFTA, CAFTA, permanent normal trades relations with China. Republicans and Democrats, they say, "oh, we'll create all these jobs by having a trade agreement with China." Well, the answer is, they were wrong, wrong, wrong. Over the years, we have lost millions of decent paying jobs. These trade agreements have forced wages down in America so the average worker in America today is working longer hours for lower wages.

Q: So, is that a litmus test for you, to see whether or not Clinton is going to come out against the TPP?

SANDERS: I hope very much the secretary comes out against it. I think we do not need to send more jobs to low wage countries.

I think corporate America has to start investing in this country and create decent paying jobs here.

http://www.ontheissues.org/2016/Bernie_Sanders_Free_Trade.htm

I believe this is the number one reason the Democratic Party is losing members & the largest voting block is now Independents.

The trade deals that have decimated the middle class and have made the US a service economy, leaving retail jobs that don't provide a living wage.

We can thank Bill Clinton for bringing third way (republicanism) into the party and tanking the country with his trade agreements. Then Obama's deals with Clinton2 paving the way. Korean, Columbian, and the coming TPP.

Pragmatism. Getting things done with republicans.

Corporations have bought our representatives in every branch and their reward is being able to pay slave wages and make massive profits from exploiting workers in foreign countries.

Want to see a blast from the past (con job) in action? Watch Obama & Clinton2 in 2008 talk about how bad NAFTA is and how they both want to change it (not)~

GO Bernie!!!

[RiverLover]

1. "Bottom line: electing a DINO president in 2016 is risky, given the future of work is at stake."

Hillary's Biggest Challenge Isn't Just Bill's Outsourcing Record, It's Hers
2014

........As Economic Policy Institute founder Jeff Faux observed in a recent post, New Year's Day 2014 marked the 20th anniversary of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which "opened the door through which American workers were shoved, unprepared, into a brutal global competition for jobs that has cut their living standards and is destroying their future."


..........Clinton went on to outsource jobs to China, says Faux. "Clinton and his Republican successor, George Bush II, then used the NAFTA template to design the World Trade Organization, more than a dozen bilateral trade treaties, and the deal that opened the American market to China

-- which alone has cost the U.S. another net 2.7 million jobs. The result has been 20 years of relentless outsourcing of jobs and technology."

As Richard McCormack observed in the American Prospect, between 2001 and 2009 the U.S. lost 42,400 factories and 32 percent of all manufacturing jobs -- a devastating drop that the "lamestream media" has failed to cover.

The last time fewer than 12 million people worked in the manufacturing sector was in 1941.

.......snip..........In 2002, Clinton helped Tata land an agreement to open an office in Buffalo and to create at least 100 jobs in the depressed community. But five years later Tata employed just 10 workers there. Tata is one of the largest users of the temporary worker visas that have allowed U.S. technology companies to fill jobs with high-skilled lower-paid Indian workers.

"The India issue is still something people are concerned about," AFL-CIO policy director Thea Lee told the Washington Post. "Her financial relationship, her quotes -- they have both gotten attention."

While Republicans may contend that most Americans support outsourcing because it's "free enterprise," a recent survey by Consumer Reports showed that 78 percent of Americans would rather buy an American product than an identical one made abroad.

More than 80 percent of those people cited keeping American manufacturing strong in the global economy as very important reasons for buying American.

Bottom line: electing a DINO president in 2016 is risky, given that the future of work is at stake.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-white/hilarys-biggest-challenge_b_6175008.html

[Nitram]

2. If anyone is a DINO, it is Sanders.

He has never been a Democrat.

[RiverLover]

3. Only in Spirit.

That's a thousand times more valuable than a meaningless label.

Made in the USA should be protected by Dems, not shipped to Asia.

[Nitram]

4. If you believe being a Democrat is a meaningless label, I understand better why you choose Bernie.

[RiverLover]

6. You really can't see this? Do you really not know what DINO means????

Democrat In Name Only.

A meaningless label when one is actually a conservative enacting republican policies while calling oneself a Democrat, rendering the label Democrat meaningless.

Democrats need to BE Democrats for it to be meaningful.

Like this guy (my hero)~

[RobertEarl]

11. Another low information specialist, eh?

Well, you tried to provide real information so they could get up to speed, but whether it sinks in or not, who knows?

You think they'll come back and say thanks?

[RiverLover]

13. ha!

That's as likely as them going outside the skewed news of corporate media to learn what is really going on in the world. Without the manipulations & propaganda.

RobertEarl

[Nitram]

16. Thanks, Lover, for stating the obvious.

I'll return the favor. Sanders ran as a Democrat ONLY because that would be the only path to the presidency. He has been an independent all his life, but he could never win as an independent. TRunning as an independent would split the Democratic Party and guarantee a Republican president. If Bernie's not a DINO, then the term has no meaning.

[JaneyVee]

5. Dear Bernie Sanders,

Reality: Bill Clinton created 25 million jobs. Longest stretch of peacetime in US history. Lowest black unemployment rate in US history. Nominated the 2 most liberal justices in US history. Raised taxes on the rich. And handed over a budget surplus.

what have you done?

Oh and by the way, Bernie, trade deals werent the problem, the rise of robots and technology during the millennium was. Technology. Say it.

[RiverLover]

7. Bill Clinton, our original third wayer, when Democrats began to lose their way

...Just as a preface, I want to say no one was a bigger Bill Clinton fan than me back in the day. He and Al Gore both walked on water. Clinton was my first vote, my very proud first vote...

It wasn't until Jan 2009 when a casual comment by a very smart lady starting a small bank mentioned that it was Bill Clinton who caused the 2007/2008 banking crisis by ending Glass-Steagall woke me up & forever ended my low information days. I went home & started googling away. One thing led to another (& another) thing he did under the cover of clever rhetoric & media cover which I had no idea.

Now, today, I believe he is responsible for a majority of what is wrong with America today. He's the reason I wanted so badly for Elizabeth Warren to run for president & to be our president....& for Hillary not to be.

Here's the article~

15 Ways Bill Clinton’s White House Failed America and the World

Many Americans do not associate Clinton with his dark legacy.

By AlterNet Staff / AlterNet
June 22, 2015

Bill Clinton remains one of America’s most popular presidents. A national poll last March by NBC and the Wall Street Journal found 56 percent of Americans had a clearly favorable view of Clinton. That’s long been true for African Americans—from novelist Toni Morrison famously calling him the “first black president” while in office, to books explaining his appeal after his presidency ended.

Clinton has used this popularity to build his enormously ambitious global foundation, collecting $2 billion in assets for many anti-poverty and health initiatives, as well as building a personal fortune from speechmaking estimated at $30 million or more. In recent years, most of the public has forgotten what Clinton did as president, even as he has steadily been in the news.

But for more than a year before Hillary Clinton launched her latest presidential campaign, Bill Clinton has been selectively telling media outlets that he made some mistakes as president and might have acted otherwise. He's even tried to recast actual events and been taken to task by fact-checkers who recall his leading role in what became major crises, such as the 2008 global financial implosion....

What follows are 15 ways Bill Clinton’s presidency did not serve America or the world, and in many ways deepened and perpetuated the problems we face today. This article was prepared by AlterNet staff members Janet Allon, Michael Arria, Jan Frel, Tana Ganeva, Kali Holloway, Zaid Jilani, Adam Johnson, Steven Rosenfeld, Phillip Smith, Terrell Jermaine Starr and Carrie Weissman.

1. Prison-loving president.....SNIP'd a lot of good, referenced info, please read if you have time...

2. Punitive welfare reform....SNIP'd a lot of good, referenced info, please read if you have time...

3. Wall Street’s Deregulator-in-Chief....SNIP'd a lot of good, referenced info, please read if you have time...

4. Gutted manufacturing via trade agreements....SNIP'd a lot of good, referenced info, please read if you have time...

5. No LGBT equality: Defense of Marriage Act....SNIP'd a lot of good, referenced info, please read if you have time...

6. Expanded the war on drugs....SNIP'd a lot of good, referenced info, please read if you have time...

7. Expanded the death penalty....SNIP'd a lot of good, referenced info, please read if you have time...

8-15~

http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/15-ways-bill-clintons-white-house-failed-america-and-world

They missed The Telecommunications Act which allows Cable & Cellular monopolies to merge & end competition & fair pricing from small competitors. Just another way he pissed on FDR's legacy to make America a more republican place to live, while calling himself a "Democrat"~

The Telecommunications Act of 1996 was the first significant overhaul of United States telecommunications law in more than sixty years, amending the Communications Act of 1934. The Act, signed by President Bill Clinton, represented a major change in American telecommunication law, since it was the first time that the Internet was included in broadcasting and spectrum allotment.[1] One of the most controversial titles was Title 3 ("Cable Services&quot , which allowed for media cross-ownership.[1] According to the FCC, the goal of the law was to "let anyone enter any communications business—to let any communications business compete in any market against any other".[2] The legislation's primary goal was deregulation of the converging broadcasting and telecommunications markets.[3] However, the law's regulatory policies have been questioned, including the effects of dualistic re-regulation of the communications market [4] [5]

wiki

And another (my #17) missed~ He made it so Corporations could tie CEO pay to stock prices for writing off executive pay for lowering their taxes~

...The story begins during Bill Clinton's earliest days in the White House. Soon after his election, he worked with Congress to limit corporations' ability to deduct executive compensation from their taxes, as they do for ordinary workers' wages and other expenses of doing business. A limit of $1 million was set for deductions for executive compensation. There was a big exception, though. Compensation that was dependent on the firm's performance was exempt from the threshold.

...As a result, the new limit didn't prevent executives from receiving ever fatter paychecks -- but they got the money in stock and options, rather than in cash. Clinton and Congress had failed to solve the problem.

"My cynical opinion is that they were trying to look like they were doing something," said Steven Balsam, a professor at Temple University.

Some, like Warren, say the provision was worse than useless. In a speech last week, she called on her colleagues in Congress to change the rules, although without discussing how they'd come about.

"This tax incentive has encouraged financial firms to compensate executives with massive bonuses – bonuses that too often reward short-term risk-taking instead of sustained, long-term growth," she said. "We can close that loophole and stop pushing companies to reward short-term thinking."

Lynn Stout, a law professor at Cornell University and an outspoken skeptic of today's corporate governance, says the Clinton-era shift led executives to try to boost stock prices in the near term by laying off employees and spending less on research and development. These measures, according to this line of thinking, made firms more profitable in the short term because their costs were lower, which resulted in high stock prices, but less able to generate value in the long term for investors and the economy....

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/04/27/bill-clinton-tried-to-limit-ceo-pay-but-elizabeth-warren-thinks-he-made-it-worse/

Can't believe that, like Alternet, I forgot this doozy,...#18~

China's Entry Into The WTO 10 Years Later Is Not What President Clinton Promised
Manufacturing & Technology News
June 15, 2010

It has been 10 years since the U.S. Congress and President Bill Clinton paved the way for China to enter the World Trade Organization (WTO). Most all of the predictions from those pushing the deal at the time have proven to be wrong, according to an analysis done by Robert Lighthizer, former deputy United States Trade Representative during the Reagan administration and head of the international trade department of the Washington firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & From LLP.

Bill Clinton, the country's most ardent booster of opening trade with China, looks especially imprudent 10 years later. During a press conference on March 29, 2000, Clinton said that granting China permanent normal trade relations (PNTR), which allowed China to gain entry into the WTO, would be a great deal for America. "We do nothing," Clinton said. "They have to lower tariffs. They open up telecommunications for investment. They allow us to sell cars made in America in China at much lower tariffs. They allow us to put our own distributorships there. They allow us to put our own parts there. We don't have to transfer technology or do joint manufacturing in China any more. This a hundred-to-nothing deal for America when it comes to the economic consequences."

It didn't quite work out that way. Since 2000, the trade deficit with China has surged by 173 percent, from $83 billion in 2000 to $227 billion in 2009. The United States has lost more than one-third of all its manufacturing jobs -- 5.6 million; U.S. wages have declined; the country has suffered a financial meltdown; it has spent $14 trillion on economic stimulus, only to experience the highest unemployment rates in generations and annual federal budget deficits of more than $1 trillion. These trends are not "likely to end," says Lighthizer.

Granting PNTR to China would "increase U.S. jobs and reduce our trade deficit," Clinton promised....

http://www.manufacturingnews.com/news/10/0615/WTO.html

[JaneyVee]

9. Im definitely not reading that.

Again, when we say Bill Clinton created 25M jobs, its usually met with chants of "dot com dot com!", yet you guys really cant connect the dots to "dot com" and the rise of technology?

We have microchips and robots that do the job of 10 people. Did you really think they would keep the humans? Instead of shouting outdated slogans from the 90s, we need to create an economy that can adapt. Bernie is not the candidate that can do that. Especially if he's going to limit open markets. What the hell does he expect people to do for work?

[RiverLover]

14. Funny, a huge Hillary co-worker of mine just sent me an article about Japan & their robots.

To say see? It doesn't matter if we've lost all of our jobs and corps are paying slave wages, they're going to replace us all with robots anyways. The new Hillary meme.

That will happen if she's in charge, that's for sure.

I say that's one helluva reason to get some populists in office, quick.

Who is going to buy all of their sh*t if no one has jobs?

[JRLeft]

17. He didn't create the tech jobs. By the way that was a bubble economy

a lot of the jobs are now in China, Korea, and Vietnam.

[Jitter65]

8. the trade agreements haven't worked as promised. But trade agreements can be re-negotiated or

rescinded. We just have to be ready to pay the price. Good won't be cheap, inflation will soar, and consumers will be bitching agains. What really needs to happen to grow jobs here, raise wages is that stock holders have to become more active with their stock boards. We can make good quality stuff here and create more jobs with good wages BUT that means prices of goods will soar, stock dividends will have to decrease, and corporate profits will have to come down. Stockholders will have to stop expecting those huge returns on investments as profit margins for companies will necessarily go down. Of course, the government could always subsidize the stockholder profits and dividends...but then that would be capitalism, would it? We can close our markets to China and other countries forging our trade deficits...but then you have explain to the very people who are angry about trade agreements that Wal Mart is no longer the place to shop... and those cheap goods are no longer available.

In short, it's complicated. Realistically, since the consumer will never give up their cheap goods we have to come up with creating an economy of the future including the relevant training and education systems needed to fuel it. That is going to take time and no one that I know is patient. There is a future in building things to support a green environment and solar energy. We could invest in newer, cleaner, safer, and more efficient rapid transit and rail systems. Problem is, rail systems are largely privately owned...(here we go Ayn Rand). We could build all the parts to such systems right here in America instead of from manufacturers abroad. But who is going to do the work if our citizens are not educated or trained for working in those areas. Like I said, it's complicated.

But for sure, just yelling about how bad the trade agreements have been (and in some cases they have been good for many businesses) without planning on how to recover from them is not good enough. And just saying we need to keep the jobs here and buy America doesn't get it done either. WE need the investment, the knowledge, the unity, and the will to build our economy which is still better the most of the world's.

[RiverLover]

10. Excellent post. Thanks.

It would take massive unified effort, agreed. I love your ideas.

[Armstead]

12. kick

[AzDar]

15. Bill Clinton and his Republican-lite policies (like NAFTA) started us on the long road to ruin. Now

his wife wants to finish the job... NO THANKS.