Free Republic

DALLAS — Canada’s trade minister said Monday that some progress is being made on a nagging trade issue with the United States, while U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk said a tangled dispute with Mexico over cross-border trucking and California Christmas trees might resolve itself next year. Welcoming Cabinet-level Mexican and Canadian trade officials to the city where he served as mayor, Kirk said language that removed funding for the Mexican truck program has been restored in next year’s budget bill. "We won’t be handcuffed by prohibitory language," he said. When the border was closed to 500 U.S.-certified trucks in a...

LANDMARK CASE BEGINS IN CANADA FOREIGN LAWS CREATE CLIMATE OF FEAR IN U.S. PUBLISHING AND BROADCASTING BIZ By Tracy Hood, No Compromise Media thelastcrusade.org American investigative journalist, and author, Dr. Paul L. Williams, will begin his crusade, October 8, in a Toronto courtroom to answer charges of defamation regarding his explosive investigations into missing radio active material at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. Williams become entangled in a legal jam with the Canadian university while discussing his book The Dunces of Doomsday on the nationally syndicated “Coast-to-Coast AM” radio program with George Noory. According to Williams, “What is unique...

HIDALGO — Autoworkers from Michigan shouted for an end to free trade Monday afternoon on the Mexican-American border, where relaxed trade restrictions have fostered rampant economic growth. As the 18 or so members of the Local 174 of the United Auto Workers union from Romulus, Mich. waved signs at drivers approaching the Hidalgo-Reynosa International Bridge, maquiladora workers in Mexico gathered on a street corner to protest what they say is an unfair dismissal of workers. At one point during the concurrent protests, two American autoworkers crossed the bridge to meet and support the maquiladora workers, in a gesture of conciliation...

Dr. Paul L. Williams & Hamid Mir Dr. Paul Williams Goes on Trial in Canadian Court by No Compromise Media Next week, investigative journalist and author Dr. Paul L. Williams will be tried in a foreign court for his investigative work on reports of al Qaeda terrorists at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. But he broke no American statute and his alleged violation of Canadian law took place not in Canada, but at his home in Pennsylvania.Williams got into a legal jam with the Canadians while discussing his book The Dunces of Doomsday on the nationally syndicated “Coast-to-Coast AM” radio...

After nearly six years in the making, Matamoros’ first wastewater treatment plant was inaugurated Tuesday. The treatment facility, which will clean contaminated water and pump it into the Rio Grande, is the result of a $33 million grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) donated through the North American Development Bank (NADB), a $10 million loan from the NADB, and $33 million more in funding from the government of Mexico. Though the $76 million facility has been in operation for nearly a year, the inauguration ceremony had been put off several times. The lineup of speakers at the ceremony...

China alarmed by US money printing The US Federal Reserve's policy of printing money to buy Treasury debt threatens to set off a serious decline of the dollar and compel China to redesign its foreign reserve policy, according to a top member of the Communist hierarchy By Comment on this article Working for the Yankee dollar: Beijing is said to be dismayed by the Fed's recourse to 'credit easing' Photo: Reuters Cheng Siwei, former vice-chairman of the Standing Committee and now head of China's green energy drive, said Beijing was dismayed by the Fed's recourse to "credit easing". "We hope...

WASHINGTON – A government auditor says more work is needed to ensure the safety of Mexican trucks and buses awaiting permission to drive on U.S. roadways. The U.S. Transportation Department's inspector general's office made public its latest report on Mexican truck and bus safety Tuesday. The audit says some states are not consistently reporting traffic convictions of people driving in the U.S. with Mexican drivers' licenses. Also, bus inspections are not being done, are done infrequently or have other problems.

Note: The following text is a quote: THE BRIEFING ROOM THE WHITE HOUSE Office of the Press Secretary ___________________________________________________________________________ For Immediate Release August 31, 2009 TO ADJUST THE RULES OF ORIGIN UNDER THE NORTH AMERICAN FREE TRADE AGREEMENT AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES - - - - - - - BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA A PROCLAMATION 1. In Presidential Proclamation 8097 of December 29, 2006, pursuant to the authority provided in section 1206(a) of the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 (19 U.S.C. 3006(a)) (the "1988 Act"), the President modified the Harmonized Tariff Schedule of...

As a result of NAFTA, North America is already a well-integrated energy market with Canada and Mexico among the U.S.’s top energy trading partners.  Through the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP), the North American Energy Working Group has further integrated a continental energy strategy.  Other initiatives are also pushing towards a single North American energy policy. The Western Governors’ Association annual conference was held in Park City, Utah on June 14-16, 2009. The meetings were attended by three Canadian western premiers.  Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer and Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall spearheaded plans to develop a cross-border Western Energy Corridor.  Both...

With President Obama expected tomorrow for the North American Leaders' Summit in Guadalajara, Mexico, a coalition of American legislators and activists took a message to the Mexican media, denouncing economic partnerships that would undermine national sovereignty and blasting Obama's failure to keep his promises on transparency and the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement. Howard Phillips, chairman of The Conservative Caucus and head of the Coalition to Block the North American Union, spoke to Mexican print, television and radio media about the summit, which was known in previous years as the North American Security and Prosperity Partnership, or...

PARK CITY, Utah (Reuters) - The U.S. and Mexico must eliminate possible distortions in sweetener trade between them caused by a free trade pact, a senior U.S. sugar industry official said. Under the terms of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the U.S. and Mexico can transport unlimited amounts of sugar to one another. It started in 2008. "If either market is oversupplied, it would be disastrous for producers and government costs," Jack Roney, director of economics and policy analysis in industry group American Sugar Alliance, told Reuters at the start of the group's annual meeting. He said there...

In the early 1990s, U.S. tycoon Ross Perot criticized the proposed North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) for threatening to suck U.S. jobs south. In the 15 years since the trilateral agreement, another giant sucking sound is coming – but from the flow of pesos across the Rio Grande and over the Atlantic into the coffers of foreign banks that are charging millions of Mexicans usurious rates that can top 100 percent. Jorge Sanchez is feeling the effects. A modestly paid government employee in his 40s, Sanchez fell into the plastic trap. Trying to close the gap between a stagnating...

Industrial globalization has contributed to the initiation of shockingly cheap offshore product production in places like China, which surpasses Mexico’s deplorable low cost labor status. Mexico, because of its close geographic proximity to the United States, has been particularly targeted by U.S. industry for wage-slavery and consequential human rights violations. Ross Perot, who opposed NAFTA and ran against Bill Clinton for President, said that the “Giant Sucking Sound, would be the jobs heading south to Mexico.” NAFTA has been a disaster for the working people and the communities in which they live in all three nations. Today we clearly see...

MEXICO CITY -- A Mexican trade association representing more than 4,500 trucking companies is seeking $6 billion in damages from the U.S. government because of Washington's refusal to allow Mexican trucks to carry cargo over U.S. roads. The group, Canacar, filed a demand for arbitration under the North American Free Trade Agreement with the U.S. State Department in April, but didn't publicize the move until Monday. "We want reciprocity," said Pedro Ojeda, a lawyer for Canacar. "The U.S. has notoriously not kept its commitments." Mr. Ojeda said the complaint is the largest such demand made under Nafta, as the 1993...

DAYTON, Ohio - A Florida man is sending a batch of new baseballs. A car filled with gloves, bats and catcher's gear arrived courtesy of a Columbus man. And an Illinois woman who lived through the Great Depression and has a soft spot for baseball is writing a check.

Trucking Headlines U.S.-Mexico trucking plan may resumeBy Jill Dunn The United States may allow Mexican trucks to do business here as early as June, U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood reportedly said May 22. This spring, Congress ended the cross-border trucking program between the two countries. Mexico responded with 90 tariffs totaling $2.4 billion on U.S. products, casting a heavy burden on U.S. producers, LaHood said in a Bloomberg story. Candice Tolliver, the new communications director for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, did not immediately respond to questions. In recent weeks, the FMCSA began work with the U.S. Trade...

The husband of a Harlingen woman who became the first American to die of the swine flu virus wants to know if the operators of the pig farm where it is believed that virus originated are responsible for his wife's death. Steven Trunnell filed a petition Monday in Cameron County on behalf of his late wife Judy Dominguez Trunnell, 33, a Mercedes special education teacher, who died May 5 as a result of the H1N1 virus or swine flu. The Mercedes teacher was eight months pregnant when she developed flu-like symptoms. She gave birth by Ceaserean section to a baby...

A four-year-old boy may hold the key to a swine flu outbreak that is threatening to become a global pandemic. Edgar Hernandez Hernandez, from La Gloria in the east Mexican state of Veracruz was diagnosed with swine flu ealier this month. The village is close to a giant industrial pig farm that locals claim is ground zero for the outbreak. The youngster's case came as more than 450 members of the community claimed they were suffering respiratory problems and symptoms similar to swine flu. They claim they are ill from contamination spread by pig waste at nearby breeding farms partly...

GENEVA (Reuters) – The prompt resolution of a 15-year old dispute over access to U.S. roads by Mexican trucks could be another casualty of the deadly swine flu outbreak, international trade experts said on Monday. Increased health checks to control the virus, which has killed 103 people in Mexico and infected at least 20 in the United States, could also slow the passage of goods across the busy but troubled U.S.-Mexico border, they said. The United States imported around $216 billion of goods from Mexico in 2008, making its southern neighbor its third-largest trading partner after Canada and China, according...

Remember recently how the Smelly One who was caught LYING again about revising the horrible NAFTA=SHAFTA for the citizens of the United States Treaty forced upon the citizens of American by the SWINE clinton? Another horrible reality of the SHAFTA is the meats being sold to you in the big chains across America. Next time you go to pick up some ribs for a BBQ take a look at the what can only be described as the UNTRUTH being told in the so call Truth in Packaging you will note product of USA,CANADA,MEXICO. Do you really want to feed that...

The Obama administration said on Monday that it has no plans for reopening negotiations on the North American Free Trade Agreement to revise its labor and environmental provisions, as then-Senator Barack Obama promised to do during his presidential campaign. “The president has said we will look at all of our options, but I think they can be addressed without having to reopen the agreement,” said Ronald Kirk, the United States trade representative. Mr. Kirk spoke in a conference call with reporters after returning from the Summit of the Americas in Trinidad over the weekend. He said President Obama conferred there...

Anyone worried that, once in charge, Democrats wouldn't be vigilant in protecting our southern border can relax. The grave threat of Mexican long-haul truckers has been shut down. With any luck, Mexicans will never have the temerity to attempt to deliver commercial goods into the United States again. At least such is the fervid hope of the Teamsters, the fiercest adversary the Mexicans have faced since President James K. Polk sent Winfield Scott south in the Mexican-American War. The union can't abide Mexican trucks because they represent competition, and so they must be blocked - legal obligations, economic rationality and...

Former Mexican President Vicente Fox was in San Antonio Friday, delivering a wide-ranging address about U.S.-Mexico relations that touched on trade, the drug war, comprehensive immigration reform and the United States' “mammoth” financial crisis that has spread worldwide. Fox also delivered a message of hope — hope that someday Canada, the United States and Mexico, indeed the rest of Latin America, would function like the European Union. “It's an extremely successful model,” said Fox, whose wife, Marta Sahagún, accompanied him. “My vision is to speed up the process of further integration.” Fox was in town to address the Congressional Hispanic...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Wednesday sent a letter to the California congressional delegation urging it to restore the recently ended pilot program that allowed Mexican trucks to transport goods in the United States. "In this time of economic distress, when more than one in 10 Californians are out of work and the repercussions are felt throughout our great state, we must do all we can to boost trade with our international partners, not stifle it," Schwarzenegger wrote. "And yet I am afraid that the prohibition recently placed on Mexican truckers will do exactly that, with the result being markets functionally...

Talk about shades of Smoot-Hawley, the 1930 tariff act that was designed to protect American jobs but, not too surprisingly, crippled industries relying on international trade when other nations retaliated. Production kept on plunging and unemployment kept on rising, extending the Depression. In today's extremely global economy, we shudder to think how much worse the consequences today might be. The Mexican trade war may just be getting revved up, thanks to the Obama administration and the Democrat-controlled Congress ending a Bush administration pilot program that allowed a limit of 97 Mexican long-haul truck drivers into the United States (whereas, under...

WITH the braying of 328 yahoos House mem bers who voted for retro active and punitive use of the tax code to confiscate legal earnings of a small unpopular group still reverberating, the Obama administration Monday invited private-sector investors to become business partners with the capricious and increasingly anti-constitutional government. This latest plan to unfreeze the financial system came almost half a year after Congress shoveled $700 billion into the Troubled Asset Relief Program, $325 billion of which has been spent without purchasing any toxic assets. TARP funds have, however, semi-purchased, among many other things, two car companies (and, last...

Free Trade: Congressional Democrats have a bad habit of viewing treaty obligations as favors, forgetting that trade is a two-way street. Now that they've broken NAFTA, the Mexicans are about to educate them.Responding to Congress' scrapping of a North American Free Trade Agreement obligation to let Mexican trucks enter the U.S., Mexico's government retaliated with $2.4 billion in tariffs on 89 U.S. goods that had gone to Mexico duty-free since 1994. The Mexicans made no bones about why they were doing it: If the U.S. won't honor the treaty it signed in 1993, then they won't either. Retaliation isn't something...

Text of GM bondholder letter to White House panel (Reuters) - The following is the text of a letter sent by financial and legal advisers to GM bondholders on Sunday raising concern about General Motors Corp's (GM.N) debt restructuring talks to date. The letter was addressed to U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, White House economic adviser Larry Summers and two other members of the U.S. autos task force: Steve Rattner and Ron Bloom, former investment bankers who have been advisers to the White House autos panel. "On behalf of the ad hoc committee of General Motors bondholders, we write today...

When G-20 finance ministers met in England over the weekend to discuss a way out of the global financial crisis, the group pledged to eschew trade protectionism. That sounds good. But some of the governments represented at the meeting aren't walking the walk on global commerce at home. Instead they're taking the side of special interests that want to weaken foreign competition. One culprit that comes to mind is the U.S.

Mexico got tough with the U.S. today, raising tariffs on $2.4 billion in U.S. exports to retaliate for the ending of a pilot program that allowed illegal Mexican day laborers to wait on U.S. curbs for work. President b. Hussein, in his first big trade policy test, immediately wimped out, issuing an executive order that gives a tax break to any American employer who pulls their pickup into the parking lot of a Mexican grocery and flashes five fingers on one hand, then all 10 fingers twice. (Translation: “Five laborers needed, at $20 an hour.”) Tax breaks will be calculated...

MEXICO CITY (AFP) — Mexico on Monday said it would place tariffs on nearly 90 US products after Washington canceled a program that allowed some trucks from Mexico to operate in the United States. There is to be an "increase in customs duty on almost 90 industrial and agricultural products," Economy Minister Gerardo Ruiz Mateos said in a statement. Ruiz said the increase would represent some 2.4 billion dollars, but did not name the products. . . . . . The move drew a sharp rebuke from US Senator John McCain, who said he regretted Mexico's decision and also lashed...

Mexico says it will increase tariffs on about 90 U.S. products in retaliation for decision to cancel program that allowed some Mexican trucks to transport goods within the U.S.

One day after signing the $410 billion omnibus funding bill into law, along with provisions ending the Department of Transportation's Mexican truck demonstration project, the Obama administration has announced intentions to restart the program as soon as possible.

WASHINGTON – The Obama administration will try to reinvent a program to allow Mexican trucks full access to U.S. highways. An 18-month pilot program that allowed a few Mexican trucks beyond a border buffer zone died when President Barack Obama signed a $410 billion spending bill yesterday. The bill barred spending on the program. Debbie Mesloh, a spokeswoman for the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, said Obama has told the office to work with Congress, the Transportation and State departments and Mexican officials to come up with legislation to create “a new trucking project that will meet the legitimate...

THE NEW WORLD DISORDER Canada joins Transatlantic Union effort Working along with U.S for free-trade deal with European Union Canada has decided to join the United States in negotiating a transatlantic free trade agreement with the European Union. According to Canada's daily Financial Post, Canada and the EU have come to an agreement on the areas they would like to negotiate in a free trade deal that Canadian government officials believe could expand Canada's economy by approximately $12 billion. The agreement announced last Thursday concluded "scoping exercises" between Canada and the EU that began Oct. 17. The exercises determined 14...

<p>The Obama administration will try to reinvent a program to allow Mexican trucks full access to U.S. highways.</p> <p>An 18-month-old pilot program that allowed a few Mexican trucks beyond a border buffer zone died when President Barack Obama signed a sweeping $410 billion government spending bill on Wednesday. The bill barred spending on the pilot program.</p>

This poster recognizes there are a lot of very well-intentioned, principled conservatives who believe to the very core of their being, that "free trade" is by definition, a good thing. If trade were in fact free - that would arguably be the case.

Aunschluss is coming to a continent near you! The U.S. Joint Forces Command report on worldwide security threats issued a warning that Mexico could experience a sudden collapse. The report had this to say; “The Mexican possibility may seem less likely, but the government, its politicians, police and judicial infrastructure are all under sustained assault and press by criminal gangs and drug cartels. How that internal conflict turns out over the next several years will have a major impact on the stability of the Mexican state. Any descent by Mexico into chaos would demand an American response based on the...

President Bush is pursuing a globalist agenda to create a North American Union, effectively erasing our borders with both Mexico and Canada. This was the hidden agenda behind the Bush administration's true open borders policy. Secretly, the Bush administration is pursuing a policy to expand NAFTA to include Canada, setting the stage for North American Union designed to encompass the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. What the Bush administration truly wants is the free, unimpeded movement of people across open borders with Mexico and Canada. President Bush intends to abrogate U.S. sovereignty to the North American Union, a new economic and...

Sent: Friday, March 14, 2008 4:20 PM Subject: CLOSED Congress Session Last Night: Only 4th Time In 176 Years ! SPECIAL "CLOSED SESSION" OF U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES DISCUSSED A LOT MORE THAN THE PENDING SECURITY SURVEILLANCE PROVISIONS! This was only the fourth time in 176 years that Congress has closed its doors to the public. What was it that they were discussing that they do NOT want us to know about? Word has begun leaking from last nights special, closed-door session of the United States House of Representatives. Not only did members discuss new surveillance provisions as was the...

Buried in the $410 billion catch-all appropriations bill now before the U.S. Senate is a provision that would end a program that has allowed Mexican truck drivers to deliver goods to destinations inside the United States. A provision in the original North American Free Trade Agreement of 1994 was supposed to allow U.S. and Mexican trucking companies to deliver goods in each other’s country. But opposition from the Teamsters union and old-fashioned prejudice against Mexicans has derailed implementation of the provision. Under current restrictions, goods coming into the United States from Mexico by truck must be unloaded inside the “commercial...

The U.S. Department of Transportation will make no attempt to stop Sen. Byron Dorgan's effort to kill the Cross Border Demonstration Project, The Trucker learned Friday afternoon. Earlier this week, Dorgan, a Democrat from North Dakota, included language in the Fiscal Year 2009 Omnibus Appropriations bill that the senator said would finally bring to an end “the Mexican long-haul trucking program in the U.S. started by the Bush Administration.” The bill, not to be confused with the stimulus package, allocates federal funds for the remainder of the fiscal year. Sources have told The Trucker that LaHood has indicated he will...

Rising violence in Mexico is forcing foreign companies to change their operating procedures and shipping routes, and to tighten security for their employees, businessmen said Tuesday. U.S. security consultant John Baird said his family was robbed in late 2008 for the first time in the six years he has lived in Mexico. "2009 is going to be very difficult" because of rising violence and unemployment here, he added. He said there have been problems both with drugs stowed in freight shipments and with the army checkpoints posted to detect the drugs. One popular highway shipping route to the U.S. border...

"I will make sure that we renegotiate (NAFTA)," then-Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., said during the Democratic debate in Cleveland, Ohio on Feb. 26, 2008. "We should use the hammer of a potential opt-out (of NAFTA) as leverage to ensure that we actually get labor and environmental standards that are enforced." Mr. Obama said he would want to renegotiate the trade agreement in the same way Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., talked about. Clinton had just said "we will opt out unless we renegotiate the core labor and environmental standards -- not side agreements, but core agreements; that we will enhance the...

OTTAWA (Reuters) – President Barack Obama said on Tuesday he still wants to reopen the North American Free Trade Agreement, despite a warning from Canada that this would be a mistake, but he said he did not want to end up curbing trade. In an interview with the Canadian Broadcasting Corp, shortly before his visit to Ottawa on Thursday, Obama also declined to characterize oil from Canada's vast oil sands region as "dirty oil" which should somehow be curtailed. Obama had alarmed Canada during the Democratic primaries last year when he advocated renegotiating NAFTA, and he reiterated this goal on...

Canada keeps WTO option open on U.S. meat rules (Reuters) - Canada stands ready to revive a trade complaint against the United States should Washington reinstate country-of-origin meat labeling rules that Ottawa considers protectionist, Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz said on Tuesday. "Should the Obama administration continue on with protectionism and country-of-origin labeling, we will then reignite our WTO (World Trade Organization) challenge," Ritz told reporters on a conference call. Canada agreed to shelve its WTO complaint last month after the government of George W. Bush revised U.S. rules to allow greater flexibility on labeling of meat sold in U.S. grocery...

Vicious. Extremely vicious. Trade Policy is turned upside down today as it was at the Founding of the American Republic. In his second inagural address, President Thomas Jefferson stated that no American, be he farmer, labor, or mechanic had ever seen a tax gatherer in these United States. How then did government get it's revenue? Through taxes on foreign imports, the only legitimate means of government revenue under the US Constitution. Ambassador Alan Keyes, former two time GOP Presidential Candidate explained this beautifully. He explained that we must not accept this vicious "free trade" as it is a misnomer. It...

Congress Approves Protectionist Measure That Could Spark Trade War Major partners, including the European Union and Canada, say the legislation favoring U.S. steel, iron and manufactured goods for government projects could undermine pledges by the leaders of major economies not to resort to protectionism during the world economic downturn. Congress Passes $787B Stimulus Bill,

EU, Canada encouraged by weakened Buy American plan . The bill still has to be reconciled with the controversial version passed by the U.S. House of Representatives. The European Commission -- which oversees trade policy for the 27-nation EU -- said it was encouraged by the new U.S. stance, but like Lamy and Canada, Brussels said it "will have to wait for the final wording" before taking a final position. The European steel confederation Eurofer said the amendment did not go far enough and it would keep its promise to ask the EU executive to appeal against the U.S. bill...

Top US Senate Republican slams 'buy American' idea The senior Republican in the U.S. Senate added his voice Friday to those of several foreign leaders in denouncing "buy American" provisions of economic stimulus legislation making its way through the Senate. Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader, predicted in comments to reporters that including the provision would cause trade wars. "I don't think we ought to use a measure that is supposed to be timely, temporary and targeted to set off trade wars," McConnell said. "The entire world is experiencing a downturn in the economy," he said. "I think it's...