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McCain’s Colombia Trade Policy Hurts Workers Here and Abroad |
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While Sen. Barack Obama campaigns in America’s heartland over the Fourth of July holiday, Sen. John McCain is heading out of the country. He’s on his way to Colombia, where he plans to stump for anti-worker trade deals like the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement (FTA).
Apparently McCain decided, in the midst of a hot presidential election season, his time is best spent showing he’s on the side of Big Business—by supporting trade deals that send family-supporting jobs out of the United States.
Why is McCain so strongly opposed to standards in trade agreements that would not send jobs overseas? Maybe it’s because his campaign is deeply entwined with the lobbyists and corporations who are the real winners in these unfair trade policies. According to reports by The New York Times and the Huffington Post, many of McCain’s top advisers and funders have actively lobbied for the Colombian government and corporations in support of the U.S-Colombia FTA.
He’s so out of touch with America’s workers, he actually touted support for the anti-worker deal in front of a shuttered Ohio factory. He’s claimed that America’s voters are discontented primarily because the Colombia deal hasn’t passed. He’s traveling to Colombia next week to tout the deal. And he’s even put out a television ad showcasing his support of the U.S.-Colombia FTA and other free trade agreements.
McCain plans to meet with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe. In his meeting, McCain should ask Uribe what he is doing about finding the killers of the more than 2,500 trade union members who have been murdered in Colombia since 1986, including 39 murdered in 2007 and another 24 killed so far in 2008—at a rate of more than one a week. Because, so far, the Colombian government has obtained convictions in only a handful of cases and has done little to stop the bloodshed or guarantee worker and human rights in the country. While meeting with Uribe, McCain should tell him the United States will not reward murder by granting Colombia a trade deal.
AFL-CIO President John Sweeney says McCain’s insistence on a bad trade deal with Colombia shows he just doesn’t get it when it comes to what working families need.
Sen. John McCain’s trip to Colombia and Mexico is yet one more example of how out of touch he is with working families, and how close he is to corporate special interests. Working people have seen bad trade deals send their jobs overseas and decimate their communities, yet McCain enthusiastically supports the proposed U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement and celebrates the effects of NAFTA.
The business leaders McCain will talk to on this visit have done very well under these deals, not surprisingly. However, working people in Canada, Mexico, and Colombia have borne the brunt of these failed corporate trade policies – just like workers here in the United States.
The Alliance for Responsible Trade and the National Security Network also have released statements opposing McCain’s warm embrace of the anti-worker U.S.-Colombia FTA and the Bush administration’s Colombia policies. When it comes to trade, McCain is pursuing the same failed policies of the Bush years.
Learn more about McCain’s trade policies here.
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McCain says that the people of Canada, the US, and Mexico like NAFTA and other [horribly-flawed] “free trade” agreements.
Huh? What people? I am yet to run into a working stiff that likes any of the FTAs.
So once again, what people?
Ah-ha! The “people” he represents belong to the corporatocracy that has taken control of our government. That 10% must not be allowed to dictate to the 90% of us who comprise working class America. That sure as hell isn’t “democracy”!
It is as plain as the nose on your face: If the scarcity of living wage jobs is fine with you; if you’re ok with the health care crisis; if the unending war on Iraq meets with your approval; if you agree with the assaults on our civil liberties; if $4.00 + per gallon of gas is acceptable; if under-funding public education is your cup of tea; if you support tax breaks for the already filthy rich; if the mortgage disaster passes muster with you, vote for McCain. (You’re either one of the 10%ers, or else you’ve been propagandized beyond any hope.)
If, however, you agree that America’s working class should get a fair shake, and that the horrible problems mentioned above need to be corrected, VOTE FOR OBAMA!
It is my opinion that union members who support enemies of labor like McCain are turncoats, and are collaborating with the 10% who believe working class people are mere serfs.
Just goes to show how wrong John McCain will be as President of the U.S.A, he will surely be “McSame”.
I don’t remember exactly how he phrased it but one of the guests on the Lou Dobbs show last night said, in essence, that he hated to see either McCain or Obama win this race. I must say I agree wholeheartedly! I don’t like either of their stances on illegals. In addition I don’t like McCain’s free trade agenda. And I DO NOT TRUST Obama. No matter which choice I make, for me personally, it’s a lose, lose situation! I just hope it doesn’t turn out that way for the country. I WILL vote. I’m just going to keep watching and listening (to the candidates themselves, not the pundits) and when I enter that voting booth in November I know I WILL be choosing the one I view as the lesser of the two evils!
McCain wants Americans to be on the unemployment list same as George Bush.
McCain Campaigns in Colombia for Trade Agreement
Commentary By: Ronald L. Cain
July 2, 2008
McCain will visit Colombia this week to promote the Colombia Free Trade Agreement.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/07/01/politics/main4222252.shtml
These trade deals have cost America jobs. No one probably knows exactly how many American jobs have been lost but job loses have been in the millions. I have documented, here in the Middle Georgia area, over 60,000 job loses. Not all but most have been directly or indirectly related to trade deals.
Losing one’s job can be a very traumatic experience. Plant closings devastate not only workers, but also the entire community.
During this presidential election year, trade deals and job losses have come to the forefront, particularly in states like Ohio which, according to published news reports, has lost over 200,000 jobs during the past few years.
A Los Angeles Times article reported, “During a campaign stop in Texas, the GOP front-runner (McCain) says he wants to assure Canada, Mexico and other trading partners that he would negotiate and conclude free trade agreements.”
McCain blasts Obama’s and Clinton’s attacks on NAFTA
Bush the second has continued to ram trade deals through Congress during his eight years in office. The latest being the Columbia Free Trade Accord.
Now McCain is in Colombia to meet with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe to promote the Colombia Free Trade Accord. Negotiating a trade deal with Colombia raises many questions. Uppermost is the “human rights” issue.
It has been reported that more than 2,500 trade union members have been murdered in Colombia since 1986, including 39 murdered in 2007 and another 24 killed so far in 2008.
Then there is the issue of the “gorillas” kidnapping people including Americans.
We cannot become isolationist. The United States has to engage in trade with other nations. Rather than so-called “free trade,” trade agreements should focus on “fair trade.” Requiring the countries we trade with to raise their standards to our levels rather than the United States lowering its standards.
It is time to say “No more trade deals” until the current trade deal’s debacles are straighten out to assure “fair trade.”
We do not need anymore job destroying trade deals, particularly with countries like Colombia, considering their record of human rights abuse.
Considering the adverse impact these trade deals are having on American families — millions of jobs lost — McCain appears to have lost touch with the heartland.
Please forgive my derogatory remark but McCain has a rich wife. McCain does not have to worry about skyrocketing gasoline prices, skyrocketing food cost, mortgage foreclosures and a host of other economic problems families in the heartland are confronted with daily.
(Cain is a free lance writer and a resident of Houston County Georgia. Cain was formerly a featured columnist with The Macon Telegraph newspaper in Macon, Georgia and other local newspapers in the area. Ronald56_98@Prodigy.net )
No Amnesty-
Why would you hate to see Barack Obama president if you truely work for your living (and I’m sure you do!)
Obama is PRO Union, McCain is ANTI-Union
McCain wants to reduce or freeze social security benefits and raise the age to collect them along with privatization of the system. Obama wants to strengthen social security and improve benefits.
McCain wants to keep us mired down in Iraq. Regardless of the out come, the cost is too great in loss of life and dollars. Our deficit is already spiraling out of control. The double whammy would occur when he INCREASES corporate tax breaks (welfare for the already rich.)
The cost of the war pushes the deficit through the roof at the same time the amount of tax revenues decrease to the wealthiest individuals. And who pays? YOU DO!
Obama wants us out of Iraq as quickly as it’s possible. (Which could take several years.) McCain has said we’ll stay 100 years if necessary!
Obama wants health care for all Americans. McCain wants to tax you if you’re fortunate enough to have insurance. Boy! that’s helping the middle class! McCain really wants to help his cronies in the insurance lobby that are helping pay for his election.
The list goes on and on. One thing is certain. If McCain is elected you’re going to find out he’s not the moderate republican he claims to be. With the deteriorating condition of this country, how could anyone consider any more free (slave) trade agreements in light of the disaster NAFTA has turned into?
Lesser of two evils you say, there isn’t any comparison.
Despite all the fact spinning done by McCain and friends and the promises of benefits for the Americans the facts still remain:
Though there have been decreases in recent years, Colombia still leads the world in deaths of union members.
Impunity is terrible – imagine that if your union relative is murdered that there is a 97% chance his killer will never be brought to trial.
After over $5 Billion in US aid to fight drugs (making it the 3rd largest recipient of US taxpayer money). Colombia still is the largest supplier in the world of cocaine.
International reports and even reports by the US State Department show its government to be massively corrupt.
It is the most violent country in the Western Hemisphere.
It has one of the most unequal distributions of wealth in the world (no wonder McCain likes it)
Report after report shows that it has failed to strengthen its institutions that protect its citizens. Here is a good article about that:
http://www.worldpress.org/Americas/2949.cfm
Colombia suffers from massive human rights abuses especially against workers. Actions constantly happen there that would not be allowed in the USA. President Bush and McCain keep referring to Colombia as an ally (though the only ally thing they did is support Bush’s invasion of Iraq). But to quote former US ambassador to Colombia, Myles Frechette, “The United States should never betray its own values, not even to assist an ally.”