[Jaysun]

CAFTA has nothing really to do with sugar. Sugar is just a convenient boogeyman for the mainstream media to use to make the people angry and support CAFTA out of anger. If you read form USTR Robert Zoellicks speech of May 16 you will see that the purpose of CAFTA is to merge the the Central American countries with the North American Community, and ultimately the whole hemisphere. If our sellout leaders accomplish this, what form of government do you think the US will take? Certainly the Constitution will no longer apply because the "traders" are implenting through treaty and foreign aid a type of "civil society" where a corporatist fascism reigns and the voice of the people becomes the voice of the NGO.

This corporatist fascism is apparent in the lack of enforcement of US borders, the governmental elites( and it galls me that in America we have come to have an elite "class" in our government contrary to the purposes of our founders)find it convenient to ignore their duty to protect the country from invasion, and to uphold laws that they passed that deal with immigration and the permission to work in this country.

I agree with respect to our borders and the shameful performance of the government in that area. However, I disagree about the sugar and the purpose of CAFTA in general. I'm all for free trade and taking some of the power away from the environmentalist nuts and the "workers rights" socialist (which is what I believe CAFTA does).

[mr_hammer]

I thought this was a trade agreement, didn't realize it was a way to reduce others political clout or ability to negotiate ones future earnings. (Sarcasm!)

You see that is eaxctly the point. This thing is being touted as again, a wealth creator, but in your own words seeks to undermine another's political point of view by "rule of law"

[B4Ranch]

Open the CAFTA document and go to page 20 to read what it says about 'sugar'.

Article 3.15: Sugar Compensation Mechanism
1. In any year, the United States may, at its option, apply a mechanism that results in compensation to a Party’s exporters of sugar goods in lieu of according duty-free treatment to some or all of the duty-free quantity of sugar goods established for that Party in the United States’

Schedule to Annex 3.3. Such compensation shall be equivalent to the estimated economic rents that the Party’s exporters would have obtained on exports to the United States of any such amounts of sugar goods and shall be provided within 30 days after this option is exercised. The United States shall provide the Party with 90 days prior notice of its intent to exercise this option and, upon request, will enter into consultations with the Party regarding the application of the mechanism.

2. For purposes of this Article, sugar good means a good provided for in the tariff items listed in subparagraph 3(c) of Annex 1 to the U.S. Schedule to Annex 3.3.

Further search to read what it says about 'sugar'.

1806.10
A change to subheading 1806.10 from any other heading, provided that such products of 1806.10 containing 90% or more by dry weight of sugar do not contain non-originating
sugar of chapter 17 and that products of 1806.10 containing less than 90% by dry weight of sugar do not contain more than 35% by weight of non-originating sugar of chapter 17.

Annex 4.1-12 DRAFT
Subject to Legal Review for Accuracy, Clarity, and Consistency January 28, 2004 subheading except from heading 22.03 through 22.09;
A change to sugar syrups of subheading 2106.90 from any other chapter, except from chapter 17;

[hedgetrimmer]

DR-CAFTA will turn sugar into a dumped commodity on international markets. Unlike other major U.S. commodity programs, the sugar program actually prevents dumping on the world market at below the cost of production. The sugar compensation mechanism in the DR-CAFTA allows the U.S. government to either pay DR-CAFTA countries in cash or sugar to compensate for blocked imports. This unsound provision quickly could turn the U.S. sugar program from a nondumping into a dumping program.

Another thread on CAFTA and sugar

CAFTA is a bad law written by a multinational group and an unelected, unconstitutional "trade minister" to advance the control of multinationals in the sugar market, not to protect individual rights as our legislators are directed by the US Constitution to do.