Unions Press Clinton on Outsourcing Of U.S. JobsSaturday, September 8, 2007; Page A01
When Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton flew to New Delhi to meet with Indian business leaders in 2005, she offered a blunt assessment of the loss of American jobs across the Pacific. "There is no way to legislate against reality," she declared. "Outsourcing will continue. . . . We are not against all outsourcing; we are not in favor of putting up fences."
Two years later, as a Democratic presidential hopeful, Clinton struck a different tone when she told students in New Hampshire that she hated "seeing U.S. telemarketing jobs done in remote locations far, far from our shores."
The two speeches delivered continents apart highlight the delicate balance the senator from New York, a dedicated free-trader, is seeking to maintain as she courts two competing constituencies: wealthy Indian immigrants who have pledged to donate and raise as much as $5 million for her 2008 campaign and powerful American labor unions that are crucial to any Democratic primary victory.Despite aggressive courtship by Democratic candidates, major unions such as the AFL-CIO, the Teamsters and the Service Employees International Union have withheld their endorsements as they scrutinize the candidates' records and solicit views on a variety of issues.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/07/AR2007090702780.htmlHillary: Hypocrite When It's ProfitablePosted Jul 30th 2007 11:47AM by Patrick Casey
Filed under: President 2008, Democrats, Hillary Clinton
In the Los Angeles Times this morning there's an interesting article about Hillary Clinton, the defender of American workers and the poor, seemingly assisting what should be one of her natural enemies -- job stealing Indian companies. Why would she do this, apparently in opposition to her campaign rhetoric? You decide.
To many labor unions and high-tech workers, the Indian giant Tata Consultancy Services is a serious threat - a company that has helped move U.S. jobs to India while sending thousands of foreign workers on temporary visas to the United States. So when Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) came to this struggling city to announce some good news, her choice of partners was something of a surprise. Joining Tata Consultancy's chief executive at a downtown hotel, Clinton announced that the company would open a software development office in Buffalo and form a research partnership with a local university. Tata told a newspaper that it might hire as many as 200 people.
The answer to why Hillary would support an enemy of all of her natural Democratic allies, including labor unions, is simple. Money and political support.
Clinton is successfully wooing wealthy Indian Americans, many of them business leaders with close ties to their native country and an interest in protecting outsourcing laws and expanding access to worker visas. Her campaign has held three fundraisers in the Indian American community recently, one of which raised close to $3 million, its sponsor told an Indian news organization.The problem with Hillary's 2003 deal with Tata Consultancy Services, however, is that it hasn't panned out. Today, four years later, the company project "landed" by Hillary Clinton "might" employ as many as ...10 people. I think that it's safe to say that they've probably outsourced more jobs than that.
Barack Obama's campaign made a big deal of this in June, highlighting Hillary's contradictory positions as savior of the American worker and supporter of outsourcing. Expect more soon.
http://news.aol.com/elections-blog/2007/07/30/hillary-hypocrite-when-its-profitableHillary Clinton stands up for Tatas, outsourcing5 Mar 2004
WASHINGTON: Former First Lady Hillary Clinton on Wednesday defended the general principles of free trade and outsourcing , while rejecting suggestions that she was allowing Indian info-tech major Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) to take away jobs from the state that elected her to the Senate.
The New York Senator was ambushed by CNN’s Lou Dobbs on his show, a daily outlet for anti-free trade rants, with questions about a TCS center she opened last year in Buffalo in upstate New York despite the company’s reputation as an 'outsourcer.'
"Of course, I know they outsource," Clinton retorted. "But they have also brought jobs and they intend to be a source of new jobs in the state."
Outsourcing works both ways, she told Dobbs and his constituency of anti-free traders who tried to corner her on the issue. While not minimizing the problems of job flight, she said free trade also provided opportunities for the US to attract jobs from around the world if they got the domestic diagnosis right.
The administration and the Congress needed to figure out changes in tax codes and trade laws to provide incentives for companies to keep jobs at home and create new jobs instead of blindly striking out against outsourcing.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/538674.cmsSenators form 'Friends of India'31 Mar 2004
WASHINGTON: A new bipartisan group called 'Friends of India' has been formed in the US Senate on the lines of the decade-old Congressional Caucus of India and Indian-Americans in the House of Representatives.
About 20 Senators have signed up for the new caucus, the first country-specific body in the Senate.
It will be led by Texas Senator John Cornyn and co-chaired by New York’s Hillary Clinton. Senate Majority Leader and Tennessee Republican Bill Frist and Minority Leader and South Dakota Democrat Thomas Daschle will also be members of the group, Cornyn said at a Capitol Hill Gala Dinner hosted by the American Association of Physicians of Indian Origin (AAPI) on Tuesday night.
The Senate caucus addresses the long-standing feeling among community activists that while India lobbied effectively on the House side, it lacked punch in the Senate, where lawmakers have often been uncaring or unapprised about India’s concerns. The India Caucus in the House has nearly 150 members.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/593175.cmsHillary clears outsourcing airHillary Clinton made it apparent where she stood on outsourcing during her India visit, in an attempt perhaps to clear the Indian misgivings received during the Kerry campaign. "There is no way to legislate against reality. Outsourcing will continue," she told an audience of Indian big-wigs. She pointed out that there were 3 billion people who feel left behind and are trying to attack the modern world in the hope of turning the clock back on globalization. "It is not far-fetched to imagine ... if the Indian miracle would be the one of choice of those who feel left behind," said Hillary.
Hillary has been at the forefront in defending free trade and outsourcing. During the height of the anti-outsourcing backlash in the US last year, she faced considerable flak for defending Indian software giant Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) for opening a center in Buffalo, New York. "We are not against all outsourcing; we are not in favor of putting up fences," Hillary said firmly, despite inevitably invoking the ire of the anti-free trade brigade.
Hillary further clarified her position during her recent visit as well as solutions that could be beneficial to both countries. She urged Indian industries to invest more in the US to allay negative outpourings over outsourcing of American jobs to India. "I have to be frank. People in my country are losing their jobs and the US policymakers need to address this issue," she said. She ruled out that the anti-India feeling was a reflexive reaction, and explained that the feeling was more because of the imbalance in trade between the two countries, which in turn caused anguish among Americans about the nature of the economic relationship.
"In 2003, US merchandise exports to India was $5 billion, while India exports to the US was $13.8 billion. Though the US understood that the economic vibrancy of India was in its own interest, there are people who feel left behind and might stir up negative feelings against India because they do not understand the economic benefits of outsourcing," Clinton remarked.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/GC01Df03.htmlVideos courtesy of "antigop."http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=385&topic_id=57242http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=385&topic_id=57243I found this to be quite interesting:
Indian companies are learning the Washington lobbying gameThe US-India Political Action Committee has defended outsourcing vendors, most of whose employees are in India. In a sign of their changing approach, the Indian vendors are also imitating a tactic used against them in the last election: putting a human, and preferably American, face on the issue.
In the heat of the 2004 US presidential race, John Kerry likened outsourcing to treason, Lou Dobbs harangued against it from his CNN anchor chair and the Indian outsourcing vendors were left scrambling.
Engineers to the core, their leaders fired back with data-packed PowerPoint presentations. Outsourcing is good for the economy, they said; it increases efficiency; it creates more jobs than it costs. But in the eyes of Americans, those arguments proved no match for vivid tales of laid-off software engineers.
“Telling someone who loses their job in North Carolina or Jacksonville that this is good for the economy doesn’t work,” said Phiroz Vandrevala, Executive VP, Tata Consultancy Services.
Now as the 2008 US election starts to sizzle, the Indian outsourcing firms have returned to win Washington over as veritable insiders, slicker and better connected than ever. They have hired a former high official in the administration of President George W Bush as a lobbyist. They are humanising the issue by bringing Americans they have hired into meetings with politicians.http://www.deccanherald.com/Content/Aug272007/eb2007082621598.asp
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