Right, this is something the "Open borders" people have been told a bill of goods. Immigration, or anything that overall affects labor supply can negatively impact native (people already here), wages and jobs.
It's true, basic law of supply demand show it's true, but that's all things static, i.e. the economy is not at full-employment, high demand, expanding rapidly.
If you want to get into unsustainable, population generally is unsustainable. No one is allowed to mention reality that increased population is using up the globe's resources, increases global warming, crowding and on and on.
Over the past year I've been seeing more and more that it really is the numbers -- it doesn't matter whether who they are, when you are taking in the huge numbers we are, year after year, we burden ourselves greatly and unnecessarily.
The relatively few really gifted people, the migrant farm workers, are a small percentage of the whole pie. The rest, let's face it, are so much addition competitors for jobs that Americans have done, can do and want to do for a living wage and without fear that they'll lose their job to a foreigner worker here or overseas.
If we take in 1 million permanent legal immigrants a year, in 20 years that's how many more people that we wouldn't have had otherwise?
Conservatively speaking, I'm figuring
20 million immigrants
40 million offspring
10 million foreign spouses
--
70 million more Americans to take care of, first generation
]
How about second, third, four generation, plus remember, every year, another 1 million plus given green cards and work visas. Also because it complicates things and I'm hoping we'll end it, there's extended family immigration of parents-sisters-brothers.
I wonder how much we pay for Medicaid/Medicare for sponsored parents who never worked here a day here? Whatever it is today, it will be far higher in the years to come.
For a lot of people, legal immigration is automatically OK. And that's a great danger, because the sheer number admitted is unsustainable.
When the new UK government saw how much immigration had increased under Blair/Brown, they automatically said, oh no, we can't do this. We're going to go from hundreds of thousands a year to tens of thousands. That's the kind of thinking that should be going on here.
you're not supposed to talk about the costs of illegal immigration. ;)
I'll do a post on the "foreign born" from Census data soon. There is a totalization agreement with Mexico where the requirements to obtain social security benefits are less than U.S. citizens. Totalization agreements are treaties that count work of foreigners and exchange benefits. Of course Americans get the shaft, I know I worked abroad and couldn't get a lost penny attributed.
I think the evidence in LA at least is clearly illegals are receiving social services benefits already. 60% of LA is on social services and the illegal population is very high.
Don't quote me on those numbers, I'm recalling from memory of some research, but it was so overwhelming.
but more to the point, with 14 million officially looking for work and construction unemployment is around 20%, why isn't making sure these jobs go to U.S. citizens instead going on?
Seriously, the first thought is to kick older workers under the bus and no mention of the 8 million illegals who are part of the workforce, never mind the NIVs?
About sponsoring parents-brothers-sisters, the thing there is that all that comes under the cap, doesn't it? Currently, I think it is still 1,000,000 persons per year.
Any country that is serious about full employment reduces their cap to zero during periods of endemic unemployment. People have to wait, or they can come in on visas that specifically do not allow employment. The basic question isn't immigration -- it's whether the Congress and the People recognize need for a full employment policy, or not.
About under-the-table employment (the underground economy) resulting in people receiving benefits through food stamps, Medicaid, 'Section 8', etc. -- that's certainly true not only for illegals but also for USA citizens who like the 'dead presidents' in their younger years. If we had a rational social safety net system, well-administered to prevent scamming through fake identities and the like, plus full employment and zero tax on incomes up to $100,000 ($200,000 couples), an adequate minimum wage, and a rational single-payer medical care system -- probably best based on a dedicated sales tax (that would replace all the other sales taxes rather than add to them, so a general tax reform is indicated here) -- there'd be no need for any programs requiring that applicants establish minimal 'need'.
In the Netherlands, they pay very high taxes at progressive rates, but every citizen is entitled to every benefit from medical care to higher education and whatever other programs they may have, without discrimination as to differential 'need'. People I know in Holland love that system, and they even tell me that it works better for small businesses than does the US system. (Medical care, for example, isn't based on insurance required to be purchased from private insurers by employers.)
The US system of requiring that you establish your 'need' first is based on the false premise that all programs established for the general welfare are stop-gap things, set in place to patch up around the edges of what is supposedly a perfect system. The theory is that 'our' system is so perfect that there is no systemic need to establish publicly supported higher education, medical care or rational allocation of residential housing. The rationale is that since people are imperfect, they falter sometimes and need a little hand out. But 'our' system of corporatist capitalism, within this wonderful WTO world, is perfect and 'normally' never requires anything like publicly supported higher education, medical care, etc..
Of course, in reality, 'our' system is inefficient, unfair and basically prone to abuse and scamming. Also, it resembles a political patronage approach in its implementation, rather than a truly democratic 'every citizen is entitled' approach.
I don't know the answer to the question about differential costs of retirement. Statistical analysis would be very problematic, if the database exists. I do know that people come here, following family members, and immediately go on SSI either by reason of age or of disability. That means also that they immediately receive the 100%-tax-supported version of Medicaid (distinguished from MediCare which is operated separately). Another not uncommon practice has been for multi-national individuals (and their surviving spouses) to double dip from US Social Security and, at the same time, from the German or Canadian equivalents. This latter practice may have been reduced by appropriate legislation in recent years, I'm not sure.
About non-documented (illegal) workers not paying into Social Security, what often happens in agriculture is that one worker (the honcho) will collect a paycheck for himself and several illegals -- he builds up a handsome retirement income (maximum SS pay bracket) while the others get nothing, although they probably try at some point to receive something, SSI or whatever, or they just return to their home country to beg. In other words, many illegal workers pay in, but that doesn't mean that they are credited with their payments. In some cases, of course, workers use some other SS account (some number that went with a set of IDs purchased on Avarado in L.A. for maybe $100) and pay into someone else's retirement even though there is only a random connection between the worker and the person who ultimately benefits.
What I advocate about illegal employment is that we approach it more from the point of view of employment law than immigration law. Yes, I support E-Verify, but I have much more than that in mind!
For example, let's say a parcel of agricultural land in the San Joaquin Valley is operated by a management company which hires out the planting, cultivation and harvest to subcontractors, including labor contractors, who hire illegals preferentially over legal residents or citizens. This happens all the time, but who gets busted? Probably nobody, but if somebody does get busted it's the workers and, possibly, the labor contractors. The workers are replaced by other illegals, working for the same but 'legally' reorganized labor contractor outfit. So that continues on and on.
To me, that is the quintessential case that justifies seizure of the land under RICO. In fact, this approach has been tried by one assistant county attorney in a rural county in Idaho, but it just hasn't caught on ... wonder why?
Same thing with that meat-packing plant that was busted in 2008 in Iowa, (where there also happened to be, in operation, a very big methamphetamine lab). There wasn't a single US citizen working in the whole place, from the bottom up to the top management. Nobody knew anything about the meth operation, but here's the interesting part ... the plant wasn't subject to RICO confiscation.
If the US government would start seriously applying RICO in cases of repeat violators of employment law, large-scale illegal employment would quickly disappear.
The hell of it is that the employers who really want to hire and comply with all labor and employment laws are essentially discriminated against by way of competition from employers whose policy is, in fact, to hire powerless persons who are in the country illegally, avoiding every form of labor regulation and taxation -- whatever scamming that may require.
IMO, the solutions are at hand, and many enforcement people know that, but their hands are tied by political forces allied with global capital and supportive of the globalist plan to destroy communities everywhere in pursuit of short-term profits (that is, politicians and party apparatchiks in the pockets of corporations). We need to return to a full employment policy, including implications for immigration and international trade, but otherwise we don't need legislation ('immigration reform') so much as we need to enforce the laws that are already on the books.
Even though I am theoretically opposed to public employee unions (at least as to striking) and also would prefer to see vigorous anti-trust against unions as well as against corporations, what we need in the real world today is a return to much stronger labor organization laws, supporting stronger democratic (rather than corporate) models for unions. I would like to see strengthening of the NLRB, and I think that unions can and have been the means whereby anti-discrimination in employment can best be implemented in politico-economic conditions currently and back into the 1990s.
People forget that aging workers were formerly protected by trade union traditions and negotiated contracts -- but much of that was done away with in the name not only of deregulation but also of equal opportunity. Thus, inherent conflicts within the developmental EEOC system of preferences were exposed back in the 1970s and 1980s, with consequences for electoral politics.
I am pretty much opposed to the current thrust of anti-discrimination policy through what are essentially reactionary and inefficient preference systems. Failure of the EEOC system is exposed in the fact that compliance with the ADEA (Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967) is a bad joke -- and has been for years now.
The first problem is that you cannot establish equal opportunity in employment without a full employment policy. Without full employment, all you can get is equal opportunity to be unemployed. That is, the right to starve is spread around without regard for race, creed or color. How wonderful!
The second problem is that a system that made sense in the 1964 Civil Rights Act (considered in light of the history of the Fourteenth Amendment and subsequent events, although I do not want to get into Brown v. Board issues here) has been extended beyond all reason by way of making an absurd principle out of inequality in pursuit of strict equality.
The reality today is that the overwhelming majority of the labor force is part of one or another 'protected minority'. It's all gotten out of proportion: a small minority remain without theoretical 'minority rights'. Of course, the system is a failure. You cannot establish equality on the foundation of 'some are more equal than others'!
This imbalance, created by attempting an impossible balancing act through systemic judicial intervention, is similar to the way that states like California started out to print ballots in Spanish, considering that the first legal language in California was Spanish, which is recognized in California courts. So that made sense. But, over time, a principle has arisen leading to California ballots being printed in about 20 languages.
Rather than acknowledge the historic uniqueness of Spanish, California has created an absurd principle that even one person who would like to vote and cannot read English requires a complete translation of the ballot, all the ballot measures and explanations and arguments thereof and thereto. The whole thing makes a mockery of the Civil Rights Act, seen in historical context.
So while I would like to see labor relations law greatly beefed up, I think that EEOC and related systems of preferences set up in pursuit of anti-discrimination in employment and government contracting are absurd, basically unconstitutional and economically inefficient. (There is substantial case law that even veterans preferences in public employment are unconstitutional, although that line of precedent is almost completely forgotten today.)
Power of EEOCs (state and federal) to attempt world-saving miracles has been reduced by the courts in recent years, and I would be content to let much of that stand. On the other hand, I would never support undercutting rights of plaintiffs, including class-action standing, or limiting contract-law rights of plaintiffs and their attorneys to proceed on a contingency basis.
In 2009, Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D - Ohio) introduced legislation to lower the minimum Social Security retirement age to 60 from 62, to be paid for out of the stimulus package. People who said they would otherwise have wanted to take advantage of the Kucinich bill, if enacted, objected that they could not consider it because MediCare doesn't kick in until age 65. Intent of Kucinich's proposal was to create jobs for younger people in the work force -- it was specifically a jobs proposal in response to the recession, so lowering of the minimum retirement age would not necessarily have been permanent, with implications for the trust fund.
At that time, of course, Kucinich was actively promoting the Conyers-Kucinich single-payer medical insurance legislation. (Kucinich was opposed to the 'ObamaCare' bill to the extent of being the one Democrat to oppose it in the vote when it went to the Senate, although he ultimately threw in the towel and announced that he would vote for it in its final version, no doubt with substantial misgiving.)
BTW: About Dennis not being a viable Democratic candidate for president, everyone can relax -- he has recently announced that he is going to run in the district that reapportionment has left him, to the west of Cleveland, where he is a resident.
China indeed is planning something other than taking care of it's own.
For far too long the Chinese have been hemmed in by foreign imperialists
to their thinking. Now it's their turn to rule inspite of any international
objections.
As the world slumbers to this fact, China is muscle building in every
direction - economic, military, and scientific. Their boarders are too
slender to accommodate their population and will have to expand in the
future. Question is where and how?
To continue the fast pace of economic expansion China has to acquire raw materials
at bargain basement prices to ensure their high profit margin. Best way to do
this is to become a "colonizer". Anyone interested in giving up their homeland to
China?
That's the point, no one planned for their careers to end right when they expected to be stuffing up their retirement accounts. That's the majority. Even worse, people now need to work til they die, i.e. 80 years old because they don't have anything for retirement.
The people who could retire early are few and also the idea that somehow age should be a reason to deny someone a job, be they 22 or 65 is a huge problem, by discrimination.
Has anybody ever run the numbers on the cost of immigrants' retirement? We always hear how much they contribute to Social Security but not how much they'll take out when they retire.
A couple of things come to my mind:
1. Legalizing illegals. It will happen, eventually. [The question in my mind is will we just legalize OR will we legalize and do what's necessary to minimize future illegal immigration and family-based immigration. Examples: No more automatic birthright citizenship, no more sponsoring parents-brothers-sisters]
Many illegal works may have paid something into Social Security, but many work for cash and did not. So many will only contribute to Social Security for 10-20 years.
2. I also expect many newly legal immigrants will continue to get much if not most or even all their income under the table.
I expect lots will end up getting SSI Because their income will be below poverty level, they'll be on food stamps, Medicaid, housing subsidies, etc. too -- the whole range of available government benefits to the the max.
3. Lots of legal immigrants are low income folks. How much more do they cost US during retirement, vs. cost of native born Americans who retire?
Let's say we have 30 million Americans born overseas and 30 million native born Americans reaching age 65 between 2045-2070. Wouldn't the 30 million born overseas cost the government far more than the native born?
Teachers and other public employees get offered early retirement all the time.
I think there'd be people who would volunteer to stop working earlier. I don't know how many. People still working who are over 65 could be offered a financial incentive if they retired. But would most of the people who took $$$ be those who were going to call it quits in a year or two anyway?
These are slippery questions. Another factor would be what would happen to those who changed their minds or couldn't make it financially.
Congratulation, you just personified age discrimination. What do you think these people are going to live on if they are denied work by claiming they should "retire" to "make room for younger workers"? Hmmm???? How are they going to eat, live? Or do you think there is some magic happy place, similar to dogs being euthanized where older people go to?
I see it all the time and make movies about it. U.S. Trustee Larry Sumski in NH is a complete bum, Google his name + "Mortgage Movies," the guy hates my movies about this kind of fraud. Watch them here and see why.
deals. I'm just assuming they will pass them, like they always do because they are bought and paid fors by MNCs, GE and Caterpillar, et. al.
I'd be shocked if the Senate didn't. While we know about most GOP, although there area few not completely corrupted yet, most of the Democratic Senators are from the same bird.
I know Sherrod Brown, Bernie Sanders and probably a few others are trying to do something but the ethical honest person is just outnumbered.
What was that about corporations controlling both parties?
Tonight's documentary was swapped. This site tries to make sure all economic related documentaries we highlight are online with the ok, knowledge of the copyright owners. Honestly I could not figure out if the below Academy award winning Documentary on the financial crisis, Inside Job, was known to be available online or if it was ok. It's been on some major sites which honor copyright, then taken down, then put back up.
I decided to embed it in the comment, which means it shouldn't be easily found by search engines on this site yet still bring it to people's attention. Obviously it's a fantastic documentary so perfect for this site, but if it's not supposed to be online, I can also take it down more easily with a simple comment deletion.
If you don't already know this, pretty much everything under the sun, which we know is not only copyright protected but actually in theaters or hasn't even been released to DVD, never mind TV, is available on various Chinese servers. I never highlight anything from those servers since it's clearly IP theft by China, but in this case, this documentary is not from Chinese servers, so we'll see.
Til then, just for us, enjoy. This is the best documentary on the financial crisis out there.
"Congress might get serious about confronting China's currency manipulation, so what's the next move for the Chinese? Why remove the dollar as the reserve currency, of course." -- Robert Oak
The USD still has billions of friends out there beyond our borders. The strange thing is how friends of the dollar have dwindled in number here in the homeland! Stranger yet is that psychological undermining of the USD is often promoted by those who would like to style themselves as somehow the last of the patriots!
IMO, the best way to bolster the dollar, short of thorough-going reforms that would include monetary reform, is --
(a) through real tax reform (not the Norquist 'rax revolt' fraud), eliminating loopholes and implementing the Buffet rule; and,
(b) through financial regulation reform, with teeth.
My reasoning is that solid currencies like the Swiss Franc have well-managed and stable governments to keep an eye on the banks -- thus requiring, without hypocrisy, good management and stability from banks. Switzerland proves it can be done in a multi-cultural society with democratic traditions and institutions.
Stability, in and of itself, should be a major priority. But there is no stability in such 'reforms' as 'just eliminate the IRS', 'do away with regulation (and national sovereignty)'. 'all government is inherently evil (except the WTO)', 'no disclosure of political donations by government contractors, including foreign corporations', 'SSA equals Communist socialism', and, 'gold standard or bust' (the bust coming before the gold standard).
Nor is there any stability in continuing along with the 'free trade' agenda without first accomplishing thorough-going reform of the WTO system. There just is no stability in stupidly pursuing the 'free trade' agenda -- for the USA or for the world. That appears, however, to be the dominant belief among what are increasingly known as the 'ruling élite' in Washington!
The good news is that it ain't over till it's over, and it ain't over!
But the good news is murky and anything but unambiguous. It's clothed in layers of disguise and secrecy, going back to origins of the whole 'free' trade charade as a huge political-diplomatic-idealistic left-right anti-Communist and now anti-Terrorist ... projection of USA power around the world.
It all started with the 'national interest' of the USA back in the days of the 'Washington Consensus', but somehow our national interests became exactly identical to the transnational interests of transnational corporations and the unimpeded flow of global capital ... to wherever it gets the best treatment by local authorities. First, you beat the stuffing out of the Communists, then you knock yourself out for the grand finale.
Votes in Senate and House, September 2011
All we have so far is that the Senate (22 September 2011) has invoked cloture on HR 2832, which was passed (7 September 2011) in the House by voice vote with no record of how your representative did or did not vote --
BTW: Do you have any issues with Speaker of the House Boehner and crew?
Or is the House voting in secret your idea of representative government at its best?
There was no Democrat opposed to invoking cloture (even among those who are opposed to the FTAs themselves), and there was substantial opposition on cloture from the GOP, including Grassley of Iowa, Hatch of Utah, McCain of Arizona and even the GOP Senate leader McConnell of Kentucky, who later described the deal in glowing terms (?).
I have one source, dated 17 September 2011, cited below, that claims Republicans are flat-out down with the FTAs, so who knows? Since then, many Senate Republicans have voted Nay on cloture for HR 2832 ... so what the article is really saying is that the Republican House leadership is for the FTAs, but the Senate may be a whole 'nother ball game ... anyway, that's a possibility.
About all I know for sure at this time is that GOP 'leaders' in the House are okay with secret votes on crucial issues and MSM will go to any lengths to protect us the People from looking at that fact. From that, I continue my disgust with GOP House 'leadership' and most of MSM. I also conjecture that 'insiders' do not want any of us out here to track what they are doing. (Think not only Boehner but also Bill Clinton, who is deep into the distraction nonsense that somehow if USA workers suffer, that's good for the poor in undeveloped nations.)
So what is HR 2832 anyway?
HR 2832 is the trial balloon. It combines the TAA with something called an extension of GSP or 'Generalized System of Preferences'. Personally, that would not take me more than a New York minute to decide to vote against it, just on its name alone.
Look at it: 'generalized' means applying universally, but 'preference' means applying in some cases but not universally. I'm not saying that it's all zero-sum, but an oxymoron is a contradiction-in-terms by any name.
Anyway, apparently the 'generalized system of preferences' was about to expire -- OMG! -- and then the sky would fall for sure. I mean, this is a sacred cow, you know. It's basic to WTO since way back in Uruguay Round. And, of course, what's good for WTO is good for America, right? Or is it? See, 'WTO Serves Its Own Interests, Not U.S. Interests' by Karl Rusnik at EP-linked Economy in Crisis.
GSP exempts WTO member countries from the usual rules in order to lower tariffs for countries identified as 'least developed' -- basically stiff-arming the issue of equal tariffs for everybody.
What's interesting is that GSP gives the lie to any idea that the WTO system is somehow seeking to rise above mere politics for the sake of establishing a level playing field around a 'flat' world. You get it, don't you? If you want to establish equality, you start with the premise that some are more equal than others. Of course!
What is this anyway? I thought the idea was to eliminate preferences, which are, after all, discriminatory trade barriers by definition.
But no, we must have some preferences because a poor nation should have a little advantage because their work force is much more vulnerable to exploitation by MNCs, right? So, we want to assure higher profits for companies that exploit that cheap labor source, right?
Actually, it's just that nobody could talk Third World 'leaders' into joining into the WTO system and abandoning their tariffs if there wasn't something like this GSP thing. Some of these new countries somehow had the idea that borders were an important element in becoming recognized as real countries. We had to convince them of the error of their thinking ... basically because we had to have these countries in on the deal since that's where the seriously cheap labor is. Also, in the back of our minds, we were still thinking, these huddled masses ... they might all become Communists or even socialists! Plus there's the spiritual side of it -- like Bill Clinton, we could just feel the pain something terrible of these poor people around the world
So, essentially, a vote against GSP is a vote against the entire WTO world system ... and such a vote guarantees, if you are opposed to it, that you are a dirty dog of a racist
After all, you are actually insisting that jobs for USA working people are as important as jobs for people in Third World countries that have no chance of any employment standards anyway ... so who would want to be seen as taking such a terrible stand? Especially when it's a building-block component of the whole WTO thing?
But it gets denser than that ... USA retains the privilege to exempt some nations from the exemption because they are just too Communist (Cuba, although not China) or they are just too friendly toward terrorists (Libya at one time, although neither South Yemen nor North Korea), or, they don't sufficiently enforce intellectual property rights of Disney so then USA could (oh, goodness) retaliate or even (goodness gracious) file a case with the WTO ... but that doesn't really happen, because problems can always be worked at the 'czar' level by the US Trade Representative ... just a friendly little chat among the good old boys ... no need to get working people or their elected representatives involved.
Whatever happens, we must not let the 'politicians' get into it! Just us WTO technocrats. We know best.
The bad news ... or is it spin?
The bad news is that informed opinion calls the whole thing 'Obama's Trade Agenda' and says, flat out, Republicans are down with it. So it's NAFTA redux all over again.
About the Obama part of it, who knows what his agenda is, other than raising campaign funds for 2012? But he's always been a 'free' trade kind of guy, so the odds are short that he would ever refuse to send the FTAs (first negotiated by Bush) over to the House if the Senate does pass on HR 2832.
Supposedly, even though many Senate Republicans voted against it, and some Senate Democrats are opposed ... it's destiny. You know, like 'free' trade was always just inevitable and now it's too late anyway.
But then there's the other shoe -- are Senate Democrats down with this? That's the question -- how many Democratic senators will go along with how many Republican senators to nip this FTA crap in the bud?
As for the FTAs after the GSP/TAA, we can be assured that the House will at least try to pull off another secret vote ... barring serious public outcry. (Meanwhile, there's a MSM blackout on the whole thing -- distraction, distraction, distraction.)
Senate vote coming up very soon (cloture clock is ticking)
It would appear that the Senate vote, soon-to-be held, is the test balloon for the FTAs. However, it's conceivable that a few senators would vote Yea on HR 2832 and yet vote Nay on the FTAs. The problem is that there's probably language in HR 2832 that makes the TAA dead-on-arrival without the FTAs. So what would be the point of opposing HR 2932 unless you are opposed to the FTAs?
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid will take the first step in pursuing Obama's trade agenda by introducing the TAA bill. According to spokesman Adam Jentleson, Reid hopes to pass it by the end of the week and move on to the three FTAs.
Not all Democrats will cooperate.
Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), a labor ally and a staunch Obama backer in 2008, has lambasted the three trade deals even as Obama has pushed for them. "I continue to believe it is a dangerous mistake to pursue the same kind of trade deals that ballooned our deficit and led to massive job loss," he wrote in December [2010].
Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) spoke out against the trade deals in July [2011]. "I think this is a road we shouldn't take," he told the Pittsburgh Gazette.
... In the Senate, Democratic leaders have not yet begun to whip the trade deals, according to a senior Democratic aide, so it's difficult to tell how many will support the deal. In the House, resistance could be more significant.
HATE TO GET POLITICAL, BUT IF YOU CARE ABOUT THIS ISSUE, NOW IS THE TIME TO CALL YOUR CONGRESS CRITTURS!
Give the friendly representative in the House a good piece of your mind about passing stuff in secret!
Then unload on your favorite senators about their working for foreign interests.
Here's how the WTO system 'works' for USA working families today -- we get to lick up the crumbs that fall off the negotiating tables. It's called Trade Adjustment Assistance. (Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!)
Yes, snakes are once again on the move in the grass where we desperately crawl among the crumbs looking for survival! Talking about what is currently before the United States Congress here!
One last hope is the White House. But the White House has set itself up to look treacherous and partisan if deciding, at long last, to take an unambiguous stand for American working families by refusing to send the three pending FTAs over to the Congress for approval! If this is to be the final and ultimate sell-out, then so be it! Obama will fall in 2012.
Otherwise, our last and final hope will be the United States Senate and/or the House of Representatives.
(Reuters) - The Senate on Thursday handed President Barack Obama a victory by passing a program to help workers displaced by foreign competition, paving the way for action on three long-delayed trade deals.
The Senate voted to approve a bill containing a revamped Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) program, which Obama has demanded as his price for sending [pending three] free trade pacts ... to Congress.
"Today's vote is a major victory for American workers and a key step forward in our efforts to approve the job-creating free trade agreements," Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, a Democrat, said in a statement.
Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell urged Obama to now show some "trust" in Republicans by submitting the agreements to Congress before the House of Representatives has voted on the Trade Adjustment Assistance bill.
"The Senate today will have acted on trust in passing TAA even before we received the agreements. But the White House has refused to show the same trust in Congressional Republicans who've assured them that TAA will move along with the FTAs (Free Trade Agreements), McConnell said on the Senate floor.
In case you didn't catch that, we're quoting the Democrat Chairman chief snake of the Senate Finance Committee, and also the official Senate Republican leader chief snake for 'the minority' -- and they are in the minority on this issue, if on no others, as far as We the People are concerned! Or has your favorite talking head been telling you about a recent poll showing popular support for 'free' trade deals? No? Didn't think so.
"Hello, White House? I want to talk to the President ... Congressional switchboard, put me through to Senator _____________ ... okay, let me have the honorable Representative ______________, I'm calling from out here in ___________ where us voters live ... Remember me? What's the matter with you? Haven't you learned not to trust snakes? Don't do it! Turn thumbs down on these dummass trade deals! We've had enough! More than enough! Or maybe you'd like to find out what a 'Don't Tread on Me' snake can do. So, PLEASE! Got it? Yeah, put that through immediately. I'll get back to you in November next year. Count on it. ... What's that? Training? Look, train this -- okay?
Lincoln never said that the house wasn't divided already, before his famous "House Divided" speech! And that's where we are now with 'free trade' here in the USA ... hopefully! Hopefully, the House will be so divided that the three pending FTAs will fail or will not even be sent over by the President. But essentially and absolutely, the House must be clearly seen as divided in fact on this issue of the 'free trade' agenda ... just as the American people, in reality, are united against it!
More than two years before becoming president, Abraham Lincoln said:
A house divided against itself cannot stand ... I do not expect the Union to be dissolved — I do not expect the house to fall — but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the other. -- Abraham Lincoln, 16 June 1858, accepting Republican Party nomination for US Senator (Illinois)
It's only in the last few days that we have heard ANY members of the GOP acknowledging that there might be something to be said for compromise with the Democrat enemy for the sake of a good greater than a temporary victory in the supposed take-no-prisoners cultural war. Meanwhile, none dare criticize capitulation to the free-trade agenda that has nearly destroyed America and is leading inexorably to crowning of the Chinese renminbi ("the people's currency") as the global reserve currency!
Do recent GOP gestures of interest in bi-partisanship mean anything -- beyond a stubborn willfulness to enact three more FTAs at any cost to American working families?
Meanwhile, there's no talking head in all of MSM discussing the worst kept secret in the USA -- that partisan warfare must be put off briefly while these FTAs are snuck through under the guise of the GOP compromising ("for the good of all") by overwhelmingly voting for the FTAs.
May voters visit pure hell on any member of Congress, or any other candidate for federal office, who votes for, or does anything but vote and speak out clearly against, the three pending FTAs!
(Left: "Dont Tread on Me" image from various historical USA flags)
They say that everybody has a price. Today, the price demanded by the American people is notably improved performance by politicians of either major party and/or of both of them together ... or, if necessary, not of either major party and a pox on both their houses!
Whatever they call it, however they attempt to disguise it, this is legislation pure and simple. The idea is to entangle the legislation in trade complications such that any future attempts at reform can be combated as impossible -- beyond the legislative purview of the United States, regardless of what the Constitution clearly states. As Robert Oak has pointed out, these so-called 'trade agreements' are legislating tax and money-laundering loopholes, undermining the constitutional rights of creative inventors and innovators, and, accelerating the race-to-the-bottom for working people everywhere!
Am I suggesting that there is a de facto ruling élite here in USA that must significantly fracture along lines of UP OR DOWN WHERE DO YOU STAND on these three treasonous 'agreements' ... or be rejected in toto by determined anger of the American people?
The White House is trying to keep the happy face up, so as not to lose face.
Of course, the same rhetoric has been used before Obama -- during the Bush administration and the Clinton administration. However, Bush and Clinton have already retired into the world of the multi-nationally rich and famous, so right now Obama is all we have to kick around
The Obama administration has made enhanced "trade enforcement" (read: defending U.S. interests in dispute settlement) a key part of its rhetorical attempts to build legitimacy for deeply unpopular trade policies. It seems hard to make that case if you don't use any and every opportunity to invoke the exceptions, or ... push for amendments to the WTO to strengthen them.
One other factoid to leave you with: the Obama administration is trumpeting its decision to appeal the adverse rulings in the recent attacks on consumer safety. But in only five out of 167 settled cases have appeals resulted in “losses” turning to “wins” ... over 95 percent odds against ...
Right, this is something the "Open borders" people have been told a bill of goods. Immigration, or anything that overall affects labor supply can negatively impact native (people already here), wages and jobs.
It's true, basic law of supply demand show it's true, but that's all things static, i.e. the economy is not at full-employment, high demand, expanding rapidly.
If you want to get into unsustainable, population generally is unsustainable. No one is allowed to mention reality that increased population is using up the globe's resources, increases global warming, crowding and on and on.
Over the past year I've been seeing more and more that it really is the numbers -- it doesn't matter whether who they are, when you are taking in the huge numbers we are, year after year, we burden ourselves greatly and unnecessarily.
The relatively few really gifted people, the migrant farm workers, are a small percentage of the whole pie. The rest, let's face it, are so much addition competitors for jobs that Americans have done, can do and want to do for a living wage and without fear that they'll lose their job to a foreigner worker here or overseas.
If we take in 1 million permanent legal immigrants a year, in 20 years that's how many more people that we wouldn't have had otherwise?
Conservatively speaking, I'm figuring
20 million immigrants
40 million offspring
10 million foreign spouses
--
70 million more Americans to take care of, first generation
]
How about second, third, four generation, plus remember, every year, another 1 million plus given green cards and work visas. Also because it complicates things and I'm hoping we'll end it, there's extended family immigration of parents-sisters-brothers.
I wonder how much we pay for Medicaid/Medicare for sponsored parents who never worked here a day here? Whatever it is today, it will be far higher in the years to come.
For a lot of people, legal immigration is automatically OK. And that's a great danger, because the sheer number admitted is unsustainable.
When the new UK government saw how much immigration had increased under Blair/Brown, they automatically said, oh no, we can't do this. We're going to go from hundreds of thousands a year to tens of thousands. That's the kind of thinking that should be going on here.
you're not supposed to talk about the costs of illegal immigration. ;)
I'll do a post on the "foreign born" from Census data soon. There is a totalization agreement with Mexico where the requirements to obtain social security benefits are less than U.S. citizens. Totalization agreements are treaties that count work of foreigners and exchange benefits. Of course Americans get the shaft, I know I worked abroad and couldn't get a lost penny attributed.
I think the evidence in LA at least is clearly illegals are receiving social services benefits already. 60% of LA is on social services and the illegal population is very high.
Don't quote me on those numbers, I'm recalling from memory of some research, but it was so overwhelming.
but more to the point, with 14 million officially looking for work and construction unemployment is around 20%, why isn't making sure these jobs go to U.S. citizens instead going on?
Seriously, the first thought is to kick older workers under the bus and no mention of the 8 million illegals who are part of the workforce, never mind the NIVs?
About sponsoring parents-brothers-sisters, the thing there is that all that comes under the cap, doesn't it? Currently, I think it is still 1,000,000 persons per year.
Any country that is serious about full employment reduces their cap to zero during periods of endemic unemployment. People have to wait, or they can come in on visas that specifically do not allow employment. The basic question isn't immigration -- it's whether the Congress and the People recognize need for a full employment policy, or not.
About under-the-table employment (the underground economy) resulting in people receiving benefits through food stamps, Medicaid, 'Section 8', etc. -- that's certainly true not only for illegals but also for USA citizens who like the 'dead presidents' in their younger years. If we had a rational social safety net system, well-administered to prevent scamming through fake identities and the like, plus full employment and zero tax on incomes up to $100,000 ($200,000 couples), an adequate minimum wage, and a rational single-payer medical care system -- probably best based on a dedicated sales tax (that would replace all the other sales taxes rather than add to them, so a general tax reform is indicated here) -- there'd be no need for any programs requiring that applicants establish minimal 'need'.
In the Netherlands, they pay very high taxes at progressive rates, but every citizen is entitled to every benefit from medical care to higher education and whatever other programs they may have, without discrimination as to differential 'need'. People I know in Holland love that system, and they even tell me that it works better for small businesses than does the US system. (Medical care, for example, isn't based on insurance required to be purchased from private insurers by employers.)
The US system of requiring that you establish your 'need' first is based on the false premise that all programs established for the general welfare are stop-gap things, set in place to patch up around the edges of what is supposedly a perfect system. The theory is that 'our' system is so perfect that there is no systemic need to establish publicly supported higher education, medical care or rational allocation of residential housing. The rationale is that since people are imperfect, they falter sometimes and need a little hand out. But 'our' system of corporatist capitalism, within this wonderful WTO world, is perfect and 'normally' never requires anything like publicly supported higher education, medical care, etc..
Of course, in reality, 'our' system is inefficient, unfair and basically prone to abuse and scamming. Also, it resembles a political patronage approach in its implementation, rather than a truly democratic 'every citizen is entitled' approach.
I don't know the answer to the question about differential costs of retirement. Statistical analysis would be very problematic, if the database exists. I do know that people come here, following family members, and immediately go on SSI either by reason of age or of disability. That means also that they immediately receive the 100%-tax-supported version of Medicaid (distinguished from MediCare which is operated separately). Another not uncommon practice has been for multi-national individuals (and their surviving spouses) to double dip from US Social Security and, at the same time, from the German or Canadian equivalents. This latter practice may have been reduced by appropriate legislation in recent years, I'm not sure.
About non-documented (illegal) workers not paying into Social Security, what often happens in agriculture is that one worker (the honcho) will collect a paycheck for himself and several illegals -- he builds up a handsome retirement income (maximum SS pay bracket) while the others get nothing, although they probably try at some point to receive something, SSI or whatever, or they just return to their home country to beg. In other words, many illegal workers pay in, but that doesn't mean that they are credited with their payments. In some cases, of course, workers use some other SS account (some number that went with a set of IDs purchased on Avarado in L.A. for maybe $100) and pay into someone else's retirement even though there is only a random connection between the worker and the person who ultimately benefits.
What I advocate about illegal employment is that we approach it more from the point of view of employment law than immigration law. Yes, I support E-Verify, but I have much more than that in mind!
For example, let's say a parcel of agricultural land in the San Joaquin Valley is operated by a management company which hires out the planting, cultivation and harvest to subcontractors, including labor contractors, who hire illegals preferentially over legal residents or citizens. This happens all the time, but who gets busted? Probably nobody, but if somebody does get busted it's the workers and, possibly, the labor contractors. The workers are replaced by other illegals, working for the same but 'legally' reorganized labor contractor outfit. So that continues on and on.
To me, that is the quintessential case that justifies seizure of the land under RICO. In fact, this approach has been tried by one assistant county attorney in a rural county in Idaho, but it just hasn't caught on ... wonder why?
Same thing with that meat-packing plant that was busted in 2008 in Iowa, (where there also happened to be, in operation, a very big methamphetamine lab). There wasn't a single US citizen working in the whole place, from the bottom up to the top management. Nobody knew anything about the meth operation, but here's the interesting part ... the plant wasn't subject to RICO confiscation.
If the US government would start seriously applying RICO in cases of repeat violators of employment law, large-scale illegal employment would quickly disappear.
The hell of it is that the employers who really want to hire and comply with all labor and employment laws are essentially discriminated against by way of competition from employers whose policy is, in fact, to hire powerless persons who are in the country illegally, avoiding every form of labor regulation and taxation -- whatever scamming that may require.
IMO, the solutions are at hand, and many enforcement people know that, but their hands are tied by political forces allied with global capital and supportive of the globalist plan to destroy communities everywhere in pursuit of short-term profits (that is, politicians and party apparatchiks in the pockets of corporations). We need to return to a full employment policy, including implications for immigration and international trade, but otherwise we don't need legislation ('immigration reform') so much as we need to enforce the laws that are already on the books.
Even though I am theoretically opposed to public employee unions (at least as to striking) and also would prefer to see vigorous anti-trust against unions as well as against corporations, what we need in the real world today is a return to much stronger labor organization laws, supporting stronger democratic (rather than corporate) models for unions. I would like to see strengthening of the NLRB, and I think that unions can and have been the means whereby anti-discrimination in employment can best be implemented in politico-economic conditions currently and back into the 1990s.
People forget that aging workers were formerly protected by trade union traditions and negotiated contracts -- but much of that was done away with in the name not only of deregulation but also of equal opportunity. Thus, inherent conflicts within the developmental EEOC system of preferences were exposed back in the 1970s and 1980s, with consequences for electoral politics.
I am pretty much opposed to the current thrust of anti-discrimination policy through what are essentially reactionary and inefficient preference systems. Failure of the EEOC system is exposed in the fact that compliance with the ADEA (Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967) is a bad joke -- and has been for years now.
The first problem is that you cannot establish equal opportunity in employment without a full employment policy. Without full employment, all you can get is equal opportunity to be unemployed. That is, the right to starve is spread around without regard for race, creed or color. How wonderful!
The second problem is that a system that made sense in the 1964 Civil Rights Act (considered in light of the history of the Fourteenth Amendment and subsequent events, although I do not want to get into Brown v. Board issues here) has been extended beyond all reason by way of making an absurd principle out of inequality in pursuit of strict equality.
The reality today is that the overwhelming majority of the labor force is part of one or another 'protected minority'. It's all gotten out of proportion: a small minority remain without theoretical 'minority rights'. Of course, the system is a failure. You cannot establish equality on the foundation of 'some are more equal than others'!
This imbalance, created by attempting an impossible balancing act through systemic judicial intervention, is similar to the way that states like California started out to print ballots in Spanish, considering that the first legal language in California was Spanish, which is recognized in California courts. So that made sense. But, over time, a principle has arisen leading to California ballots being printed in about 20 languages.
Rather than acknowledge the historic uniqueness of Spanish, California has created an absurd principle that even one person who would like to vote and cannot read English requires a complete translation of the ballot, all the ballot measures and explanations and arguments thereof and thereto. The whole thing makes a mockery of the Civil Rights Act, seen in historical context.
So while I would like to see labor relations law greatly beefed up, I think that EEOC and related systems of preferences set up in pursuit of anti-discrimination in employment and government contracting are absurd, basically unconstitutional and economically inefficient. (There is substantial case law that even veterans preferences in public employment are unconstitutional, although that line of precedent is almost completely forgotten today.)
Power of EEOCs (state and federal) to attempt world-saving miracles has been reduced by the courts in recent years, and I would be content to let much of that stand. On the other hand, I would never support undercutting rights of plaintiffs, including class-action standing, or limiting contract-law rights of plaintiffs and their attorneys to proceed on a contingency basis.
In 2009, Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D - Ohio) introduced legislation to lower the minimum Social Security retirement age to 60 from 62, to be paid for out of the stimulus package. People who said they would otherwise have wanted to take advantage of the Kucinich bill, if enacted, objected that they could not consider it because MediCare doesn't kick in until age 65. Intent of Kucinich's proposal was to create jobs for younger people in the work force -- it was specifically a jobs proposal in response to the recession, so lowering of the minimum retirement age would not necessarily have been permanent, with implications for the trust fund.
At that time, of course, Kucinich was actively promoting the Conyers-Kucinich single-payer medical insurance legislation. (Kucinich was opposed to the 'ObamaCare' bill to the extent of being the one Democrat to oppose it in the vote when it went to the Senate, although he ultimately threw in the towel and announced that he would vote for it in its final version, no doubt with substantial misgiving.)
BTW: About Dennis not being a viable Democratic candidate for president, everyone can relax -- he has recently announced that he is going to run in the district that reapportionment has left him, to the west of Cleveland, where he is a resident.
China indeed is planning something other than taking care of it's own.
For far too long the Chinese have been hemmed in by foreign imperialists
to their thinking. Now it's their turn to rule inspite of any international
objections.
As the world slumbers to this fact, China is muscle building in every
direction - economic, military, and scientific. Their boarders are too
slender to accommodate their population and will have to expand in the
future. Question is where and how?
To continue the fast pace of economic expansion China has to acquire raw materials
at bargain basement prices to ensure their high profit margin. Best way to do
this is to become a "colonizer". Anyone interested in giving up their homeland to
China?
Get ready the dragon is ready to fly.
That's the point, no one planned for their careers to end right when they expected to be stuffing up their retirement accounts. That's the majority. Even worse, people now need to work til they die, i.e. 80 years old because they don't have anything for retirement.
The people who could retire early are few and also the idea that somehow age should be a reason to deny someone a job, be they 22 or 65 is a huge problem, by discrimination.
Has anybody ever run the numbers on the cost of immigrants' retirement? We always hear how much they contribute to Social Security but not how much they'll take out when they retire.
A couple of things come to my mind:
1. Legalizing illegals. It will happen, eventually. [The question in my mind is will we just legalize OR will we legalize and do what's necessary to minimize future illegal immigration and family-based immigration. Examples: No more automatic birthright citizenship, no more sponsoring parents-brothers-sisters]
Many illegal works may have paid something into Social Security, but many work for cash and did not. So many will only contribute to Social Security for 10-20 years.
2. I also expect many newly legal immigrants will continue to get much if not most or even all their income under the table.
I expect lots will end up getting SSI Because their income will be below poverty level, they'll be on food stamps, Medicaid, housing subsidies, etc. too -- the whole range of available government benefits to the the max.
3. Lots of legal immigrants are low income folks. How much more do they cost US during retirement, vs. cost of native born Americans who retire?
Let's say we have 30 million Americans born overseas and 30 million native born Americans reaching age 65 between 2045-2070. Wouldn't the 30 million born overseas cost the government far more than the native born?
Teachers and other public employees get offered early retirement all the time.
I think there'd be people who would volunteer to stop working earlier. I don't know how many. People still working who are over 65 could be offered a financial incentive if they retired. But would most of the people who took $$$ be those who were going to call it quits in a year or two anyway?
These are slippery questions. Another factor would be what would happen to those who changed their minds or couldn't make it financially.
Congratulation, you just personified age discrimination. What do you think these people are going to live on if they are denied work by claiming they should "retire" to "make room for younger workers"? Hmmm???? How are they going to eat, live? Or do you think there is some magic happy place, similar to dogs being euthanized where older people go to?
the statistics only break out the older employed and unemployed. 55-64 employed 21,874,000 unemployed 1,630,000
If we lowered the retirement age (even just temporarily) how many jobs would that free up for younger people to move into?
If we lowered the retirement age (even just temporarily) how many people would that take off unemployment compensation?
There is no statistical survey to answer this question, but I think it needs to be looked into.
I see it all the time and make movies about it. U.S. Trustee Larry Sumski in NH is a complete bum, Google his name + "Mortgage Movies," the guy hates my movies about this kind of fraud. Watch them here and see why.
Wells Fargo Ethics Complaint
http://mortgagemovies.blogspot.com/2011/09/nh-supreme-court-temporarily-...
Occupy Wall Street
http://mortgagemovies.blogspot.com/2011/09/kingcast-and-mortgage-movies-...
Peace.
deals. I'm just assuming they will pass them, like they always do because they are bought and paid fors by MNCs, GE and Caterpillar, et. al.
I'd be shocked if the Senate didn't. While we know about most GOP, although there area few not completely corrupted yet, most of the Democratic Senators are from the same bird.
I know Sherrod Brown, Bernie Sanders and probably a few others are trying to do something but the ethical honest person is just outnumbered.
What was that about corporations controlling both parties?
Tonight's documentary was swapped. This site tries to make sure all economic related documentaries we highlight are online with the ok, knowledge of the copyright owners. Honestly I could not figure out if the below Academy award winning Documentary on the financial crisis, Inside Job, was known to be available online or if it was ok. It's been on some major sites which honor copyright, then taken down, then put back up.
I decided to embed it in the comment, which means it shouldn't be easily found by search engines on this site yet still bring it to people's attention. Obviously it's a fantastic documentary so perfect for this site, but if it's not supposed to be online, I can also take it down more easily with a simple comment deletion.
If you don't already know this, pretty much everything under the sun, which we know is not only copyright protected but actually in theaters or hasn't even been released to DVD, never mind TV, is available on various Chinese servers. I never highlight anything from those servers since it's clearly IP theft by China, but in this case, this documentary is not from Chinese servers, so we'll see.
Til then, just for us, enjoy. This is the best documentary on the financial crisis out there.
"Congress might get serious about confronting China's currency manipulation, so what's the next move for the Chinese? Why remove the dollar as the reserve currency, of course." -- Robert Oak
The USD still has billions of friends out there beyond our borders. The strange thing is how friends of the dollar have dwindled in number here in the homeland! Stranger yet is that psychological undermining of the USD is often promoted by those who would like to style themselves as somehow the last of the patriots!
IMO, the best way to bolster the dollar, short of thorough-going reforms that would include monetary reform, is --
(a) through real tax reform (not the Norquist 'rax revolt' fraud), eliminating loopholes and implementing the Buffet rule; and,
(b) through financial regulation reform, with teeth.
My reasoning is that solid currencies like the Swiss Franc have well-managed and stable governments to keep an eye on the banks -- thus requiring, without hypocrisy, good management and stability from banks. Switzerland proves it can be done in a multi-cultural society with democratic traditions and institutions.
Stability, in and of itself, should be a major priority. But there is no stability in such 'reforms' as 'just eliminate the IRS', 'do away with regulation (and national sovereignty)'. 'all government is inherently evil (except the WTO)', 'no disclosure of political donations by government contractors, including foreign corporations', 'SSA equals Communist socialism', and, 'gold standard or bust' (the bust coming before the gold standard).
Nor is there any stability in continuing along with the 'free trade' agenda without first accomplishing thorough-going reform of the WTO system. There just is no stability in stupidly pursuing the 'free trade' agenda -- for the USA or for the world. That appears, however, to be the dominant belief among what are increasingly known as the 'ruling élite' in Washington!
The good news is that it ain't over till it's over, and it ain't over!
But the good news is murky and anything but unambiguous. It's clothed in layers of disguise and secrecy, going back to origins of the whole 'free' trade charade as a huge political-diplomatic-idealistic left-right anti-Communist and now anti-Terrorist ... projection of USA power around the world.
It all started with the 'national interest' of the USA back in the days of the 'Washington Consensus', but somehow our national interests became exactly identical to the transnational interests of transnational corporations and the unimpeded flow of global capital ... to wherever it gets the best treatment by local authorities. First, you beat the stuffing out of the Communists, then you knock yourself out for the grand finale.
Votes in Senate and House, September 2011
All we have so far is that the Senate (22 September 2011) has invoked cloture on HR 2832, which was passed (7 September 2011) in the House by voice vote with no record of how your representative did or did not vote --
BTW: Do you have any issues with Speaker of the House Boehner and crew?
Or is the House voting in secret your idea of representative government at its best?
But back to the Senate. The vote to invoke cloture was 70 to 27. See, www.GovTrack webpage following this bill in Congress. For how your Senators voted on cloture, see Senate Vote Number 150.
There was no Democrat opposed to invoking cloture (even among those who are opposed to the FTAs themselves), and there was substantial opposition on cloture from the GOP, including Grassley of Iowa, Hatch of Utah, McCain of Arizona and even the GOP Senate leader McConnell of Kentucky, who later described the deal in glowing terms (?).
I have one source, dated 17 September 2011, cited below, that claims Republicans are flat-out down with the FTAs, so who knows? Since then, many Senate Republicans have voted Nay on cloture for HR 2832 ... so what the article is really saying is that the Republican House leadership is for the FTAs, but the Senate may be a whole 'nother ball game ... anyway, that's a possibility.
About all I know for sure at this time is that GOP 'leaders' in the House are okay with secret votes on crucial issues and MSM will go to any lengths to protect us the People from looking at that fact. From that, I continue my disgust with GOP House 'leadership' and most of MSM. I also conjecture that 'insiders' do not want any of us out here to track what they are doing. (Think not only Boehner but also Bill Clinton, who is deep into the distraction nonsense that somehow if USA workers suffer, that's good for the poor in undeveloped nations.)
So what is HR 2832 anyway?
HR 2832 is the trial balloon. It combines the TAA with something called an extension of GSP or 'Generalized System of Preferences'. Personally, that would not take me more than a New York minute to decide to vote against it, just on its name alone.
Look at it: 'generalized' means applying universally, but 'preference' means applying in some cases but not universally. I'm not saying that it's all zero-sum, but an oxymoron is a contradiction-in-terms by any name.
Anyway, apparently the 'generalized system of preferences' was about to expire -- OMG! -- and then the sky would fall for sure. I mean, this is a sacred cow, you know. It's basic to WTO since way back in Uruguay Round. And, of course, what's good for WTO is good for America, right? Or is it? See, 'WTO Serves Its Own Interests, Not U.S. Interests' by Karl Rusnik at EP-linked Economy in Crisis.
GSP exempts WTO member countries from the usual rules in order to lower tariffs for countries identified as 'least developed' -- basically stiff-arming the issue of equal tariffs for everybody.
What's interesting is that GSP gives the lie to any idea that the WTO system is somehow seeking to rise above mere politics for the sake of establishing a level playing field around a 'flat' world. You get it, don't you? If you want to establish equality, you start with the premise that some are more equal than others. Of course!
What is this anyway? I thought the idea was to eliminate preferences, which are, after all, discriminatory trade barriers by definition.
But no, we must have some preferences because a poor nation should have a little advantage because their work force is much more vulnerable to exploitation by MNCs, right? So, we want to assure higher profits for companies that exploit that cheap labor source, right?
Actually, it's just that nobody could talk Third World 'leaders' into joining into the WTO system and abandoning their tariffs if there wasn't something like this GSP thing. Some of these new countries somehow had the idea that borders were an important element in becoming recognized as real countries. We had to convince them of the error of their thinking ... basically because we had to have these countries in on the deal since that's where the seriously cheap labor is. Also, in the back of our minds, we were still thinking, these huddled masses ... they might all become Communists or even socialists! Plus there's the spiritual side of it -- like Bill Clinton, we could just feel the pain something terrible of these poor people around the world
So, essentially, a vote against GSP is a vote against the entire WTO world system ... and such a vote guarantees, if you are opposed to it, that you are a dirty dog of a racist
After all, you are actually insisting that jobs for USA working people are as important as jobs for people in Third World countries that have no chance of any employment standards anyway ... so who would want to be seen as taking such a terrible stand? Especially when it's a building-block component of the whole WTO thing?
Well, bless them, Republican senators, that's who!
But it gets denser than that ... USA retains the privilege to exempt some nations from the exemption because they are just too Communist (Cuba, although not China) or they are just too friendly toward terrorists (Libya at one time, although neither South Yemen nor North Korea), or, they don't sufficiently enforce intellectual property rights of Disney so then USA could (oh, goodness) retaliate or even (goodness gracious) file a case with the WTO ... but that doesn't really happen, because problems can always be worked at the 'czar' level by the US Trade Representative ... just a friendly little chat among the good old boys ... no need to get working people or their elected representatives involved.
Whatever happens, we must not let the 'politicians' get into it! Just us WTO technocrats. We know best.
The bad news ... or is it spin?
The bad news is that informed opinion calls the whole thing 'Obama's Trade Agenda' and says, flat out, Republicans are down with it. So it's NAFTA redux all over again.
About the Obama part of it, who knows what his agenda is, other than raising campaign funds for 2012? But he's always been a 'free' trade kind of guy, so the odds are short that he would ever refuse to send the FTAs (first negotiated by Bush) over to the House if the Senate does pass on HR 2832.
Supposedly, even though many Senate Republicans voted against it, and some Senate Democrats are opposed ... it's destiny. You know, like 'free' trade was always just inevitable and now it's too late anyway.
But then there's the other shoe -- are Senate Democrats down with this? That's the question -- how many Democratic senators will go along with how many Republican senators to nip this FTA crap in the bud?
As for the FTAs after the GSP/TAA, we can be assured that the House will at least try to pull off another secret vote ... barring serious public outcry. (Meanwhile, there's a MSM blackout on the whole thing -- distraction, distraction, distraction.)
Senate vote coming up very soon (cloture clock is ticking)
It would appear that the Senate vote, soon-to-be held, is the test balloon for the FTAs. However, it's conceivable that a few senators would vote Yea on HR 2832 and yet vote Nay on the FTAs. The problem is that there's probably language in HR 2832 that makes the TAA dead-on-arrival without the FTAs. So what would be the point of opposing HR 2932 unless you are opposed to the FTAs?
From The Atlantic (17 September 2011), article by Chris Good, 'Republicans Support Obama's Trade Agenda. Do Democrats?' --
HATE TO GET POLITICAL, BUT IF YOU CARE ABOUT THIS ISSUE, NOW IS THE TIME TO CALL YOUR CONGRESS CRITTURS!
Give the friendly representative in the House a good piece of your mind about passing stuff in secret!
Then unload on your favorite senators about their working for foreign interests.
That should do it.
Raise hell. It's fun.
Here's how the WTO system 'works' for USA working families today -- we get to lick up the crumbs that fall off the negotiating tables. It's called Trade Adjustment Assistance. (Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!)
Yes, snakes are once again on the move in the grass where we desperately crawl among the crumbs looking for survival! Talking about what is currently before the United States Congress here!
"Snake in the grass" -- from PublicDomainPictures.net
One last hope is the White House. But the White House has set itself up to look treacherous and partisan if deciding, at long last, to take an unambiguous stand for American working families by refusing to send the three pending FTAs over to the Congress for approval! If this is to be the final and ultimate sell-out, then so be it! Obama will fall in 2012.
Otherwise, our last and final hope will be the United States Senate and/or the House of Representatives.
Here's the crappy news (22 September 2011) from Reuters.com, story by Doug Palmer, 'Senate okays ... trade deals"
Excerpted for review purposes --
In case you didn't catch that, we're quoting the Democrat
Chairmanchief snake of the Senate Finance Committee, and also the official Senate Republicanleaderchief snake for 'the minority' -- and they are in the minority on this issue, if on no others, as far as We the People are concerned! Or has your favorite talking head been telling you about a recent poll showing popular support for 'free' trade deals? No? Didn't think so."Hello, White House? I want to talk to the President ... Congressional switchboard, put me through to Senator _____________ ... okay, let me have the honorable Representative ______________, I'm calling from out here in ___________ where us voters live ... Remember me? What's the matter with you? Haven't you learned not to trust snakes? Don't do it! Turn thumbs down on these dummass trade deals! We've had enough! More than enough! Or maybe you'd like to find out what a 'Don't Tread on Me' snake can do. So, PLEASE! Got it? Yeah, put that through immediately. I'll get back to you in November next year. Count on it. ... What's that? Training? Look, train this
-- okay?
Lincoln never said that the house wasn't divided already, before his famous "House Divided" speech! And that's where we are now with 'free trade' here in the USA ... hopefully! Hopefully, the House will be so divided that the three pending FTAs will fail or will not even be sent over by the President. But essentially and absolutely, the House must be clearly seen as divided in fact on this issue of the 'free trade' agenda ... just as the American people, in reality, are united against it!
More than two years before becoming president, Abraham Lincoln said:
It's only in the last few days that we have heard ANY members of the GOP acknowledging that there might be something to be said for compromise with the Democrat enemy for the sake of a good greater than a temporary victory in the supposed take-no-prisoners cultural war. Meanwhile, none dare criticize capitulation to the free-trade agenda that has nearly destroyed America and is leading inexorably to crowning of the Chinese renminbi ("the people's currency") as the global reserve currency!
Do recent GOP gestures of interest in bi-partisanship mean anything -- beyond a stubborn willfulness to enact three more FTAs at any cost to American working families?
Meanwhile, there's no talking head in all of MSM discussing the worst kept secret in the USA -- that partisan warfare must be put off briefly while these FTAs are snuck through under the guise of the GOP compromising ("for the good of all") by overwhelmingly voting for the FTAs.
May voters visit pure hell on any member of Congress, or any other candidate for federal office, who votes for, or does anything but vote and speak out clearly against, the three pending FTAs!
They say that everybody has a price. Today, the price demanded by the American people is notably improved performance by politicians of either major party and/or of both of them together ... or, if necessary, not of either major party and a pox on both their houses!
Whatever they call it, however they attempt to disguise it, this is legislation pure and simple. The idea is to entangle the legislation in trade complications such that any future attempts at reform can be combated as impossible -- beyond the legislative purview of the United States, regardless of what the Constitution clearly states. As Robert Oak has pointed out, these so-called 'trade agreements' are legislating tax and money-laundering loopholes, undermining the constitutional rights of creative inventors and innovators, and, accelerating the race-to-the-bottom for working people everywhere!
Am I suggesting that there is a de facto ruling élite here in USA that must significantly fracture along lines of UP OR DOWN WHERE DO YOU STAND on these three treasonous 'agreements' ... or be rejected in toto by determined anger of the American people?
Oooops! Am I ranting?
The White House is trying to keep the happy face up, so as not to lose face.
Of course, the same rhetoric has been used before Obama -- during the Bush administration and the Clinton administration. However, Bush and Clinton have already retired into the world of the multi-nationally rich and famous, so right now Obama is all we have to kick around
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