Clinton talks trade

[applegrove]

Clinton talks trade
Former president sees Canada/U.S. battles escalating Sympathizes with PM's position in softwood dispute


"GREG BONNELL
CANADIAN PRESS

LONDON, Ont.—The Canada-U.S. softwood lumber dispute is just the tip of the iceberg, and both countries are likely to engage in more acrimonious trade wars in coming years, former U.S. president Bill Clinton said yesterday.

Still, Clinton said he sympathizes with Canada's position in the long-standing lumber feud, and expressed support for Prime Minister Paul Martin's recent strong-armed efforts with the United States.

"In view of the American position, I don't see how your prime minister can be anything but really publicly very tough on this. I don't think he's got an option," Clinton said following a speech on Canada-U.S. relations


.... SNIP"

http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1129585811817&call_page=TS_Canada&call_pageid=968332188774&call_pagepath=News/Canada&pubid=968163964505

[xchrom]

1. and this is in glbt, why?

[MsUnderstood]

3. lumber. . .canada it all ties in . .

[dsc]

4. Yeah I was waiting for talk of pay for play guys

turns out it was just wood.

[xchrom]

5. ok -- now i'm thinking about wood toys and

splinters.

[Upfront]

2. Clinton

Sucks on trade! He gave us NAFTA which is a crime aginst American middle class workers! Clinton can go to hell!

[applegrove]

6. Oh I disagree. In 40 years - China, India, Russian & Brazil will together

have a middle class 10 times greater than the size of the West is currently. You either participate in selling to those new middle classes or not.

And I only mentioned 4 countries. The rest of the less developed nations will make up a middle class economy even greater.

So either US corporations (think microsoft) play into that or not.

Trade does not mean that you have to do it the neocon way.

All "third world" economists and thinkers are for global trade.

Trade does not mean there should be no labour standards or health care or national industries (a la Venezuela).

Do you want to be in the huge new world of trade or not?

And also - the NAFTA is good for the US because Canada has oil reserves second only to Saudi Arabia and you have locked those in. Water too.

The problem is the US mucking with the rules of the NAFTA. Not nafta.

Sad fact is that in the 20th century we all in North America had a huge "pass". We didn't have to compete with Europe after the war (they were rebuilding). Or the Soviet block. Or the third world. Now all these places are going to be competing with the US for resources all over the world. Even if the USA had no NAFTA - or trade agreements - the US still has to compete with these soon to be absolutely huge middle classes. So why not compete and benefit?

And yes - the middle class & the poor are paying for lowered wages in the way the rich have not had to sacrifice. And that is a tragedy. But civil goods are going down in price - because boots are made in China - so ability to buy these goods is going down in cost the same as wages. And because US does not have as many factories they will require less oil. It was a choice that government made - let China worry about getting oil to run a factory - the US will keep Oil for emergency vehicles & defense (I'm not into the defense industry as it stands now - pretty trough-like in a murderous pig-like way - but you do need some defense). And US is going to concentrate on new intelligent industries that come from defense the same as plastic, nylon, computers, etc. came out of the defense industry in the US in the 20th century. Only now - it will be nanotechnology & computer/internet that the US dominates. And I for one will not be sad when the West or the UN has the capability to simply turn off the satellites and the internet of any rogue country when they get bad (but all countries have to be internet & satellite dependant before this can happen or be used as a tool).

The problem is that the middle class and the poor are fighting inflation with less job security and harder jobs (more small business) and the rich in the U.S. are doing dick - but benefiting from all the world trade. That is the issue. Not trade itself. Keep in mind that the price of oil will just rise & rise & rise. So good that you got some "secure access to Canadian oil" for the next 100 years. You'll need it.

Oh - and your aquifer under Nevada that feeds the agricultural industry and the cities in the WEST - that will be empty in 20 years. So water will be a big ******* deal around then.

So huge growth and profits will result from all this world trade. The gortex factories still in the US - will sell all over the world and grow grow in size.

There is simply no other way to face the rising cost of oil (which would turn the US economy into one with hyper-inflation and no market or jobs - like a depression) unless you fight it with lower costs - and outsourcing civil goods - is a way to bring costs down for consumers and offset the fact wages & job security are going down. The crime in your country is that your ability to carry more debt than any other country on the planet is not being used for "health care" that will make American factories more competitive or "excellent science in schools" that would make you rock solid as leaders of innovation for the next 100 years. The crime is that that ability to handle debt is being used to subsidize the rich (who want to be permanently rich) and corporate cronies (who do not have to compete like a healthy company does) or "one time sell offs of assets (like what they tried with SS, selling off gold, corporations leveraging pensions with false estimates of growth, tax cuts, crony perpetual war, etc.).

The big issues in the US would be health care and the like. And reasonable trade practices. And that the rich & crony corporations do their part in sharing the burden instead of selling off America to make profits.

The big issues in the world are that places like Africa need to be able to participate in the world economy or they will turn into the middle east instead of another Europe. And for that - and for the middle east - they all need trade. And they will get trade. And the US either participates pro-actively or not.

Trade is important. Can you imagine any country that didn't get to sell to western countries there products? Man they were very, very poor. You don't want the USA to switch roles with those poor countries who got cut out of the game ... like Cuba, or many parts of Africa and the like. The poor countries in the world are always the ones who don't get to trade with the middle class countries. Seeing as how the 95% of the middle class will now be outside the USA in the next 50 years... you have to sell to them. And you have to concentrate of a few industries.

IMHO

[applegrove]

7. Dam - wrong forum. I thought GLBT was global trade. I'm so embarrased.

:blush:

[Robert Oak]

8. you should be embarrassed

by your lack of understanding of international trade theory.

That is a line by line rhetoric of the multinational corporations.

What is going on now is not strategic trade. There is absolutely
zero justification in destroying the US economy in order to "grow"
middle classes in 3rd world nations..

which as an aggregate is not happening. We are not "selling" to these new 3rd world "Middle class" economies as evidenced by our massive
trade deficit, our massive budget deficit the mass exodus of US jobs
to foreign nations for cheap slave labor.

Japan is an example of a nation who performs strategic trade.

That's not what is going on here, not what NAFTA is (as the results
of NAFTA bear out), now what the China PNTR is.

I personally am offended by some idea that I should live in poverty in order to "help" some 3rd world nation. That is an innane logic in that we must now suffer to "help" others.

[fasttense]

9. Good point Robert, trade implies a two way

proposition. I trade something to you and you trade something to me. What we got is a one way proposition.

The idea was since our huge American Market opened up to Mexico, it would encourage Mexicans to form companies and produce goods to sell in this huge market. And the markets in Mexico would open up and we could sell to them.

What we got is my factory closes and moves to Mexico making the same thing with the same suppliers (with less quality, less wages, less environmental, health and safety controls) then turns around and sells it back to the same market (hoping my credit will hold out to buy it).

Eventually this market will dry up because all the jobs have moved. All we got is a change in labor not any trade going on.