Posted on 06/30/2007 8:53:32 AM PDT by yahoo
Bush losing 'fast track' trade powers
President Bush loses his power Saturday to seal "fast track" trade agreements without intervention from Congress, where Democrats blame recent deals for sending U.S. jobs abroad.
Since 1975, only one other president, Bill Clinton, has been stripped of that trade promotion authority, designed to speed the reduction of trade barriers and open new markets with other countries. Bush won't get it back again, and the next president might not either.
House Democratic leaders, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California and Rep. Charles Rangel of New York, whose Ways and Means Committee handles trade policy, said in a written statement Friday that their legislative priorities "do not include the renewal of fast track authority."
"Before that debate can even begin, we must expand the benefits of globalization to all Americans," they said.
In the Senate, Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., said he had other pressing trade issues, such as extending relief to trade-hit American workers. "I have always said that it is more important to get trade promotion authority done right than to get it done fast."
Rather than promoting new free trade accords, the government should concentrate on rewriting old deals such as the North American Free Trade Agreement, going after countries such as China that manipulate their currencies, strengthening product safety and pushing anti-sweatshop legislation, said Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio.
Nonetheless, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice urged Congress on Friday to renew Bush's trade promotion authority. Without it, she said, "America will lose an important diplomatic tool that has proven essential to bringing foreign leaders to the negotiating table and advancing our nation's broader foreign policy interests."
Rangel got a similar pitch in a letter from U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab.
"More than 100 bilateral trade negotiations are currently under way among our trading partners," she wrote. "It is important that the United States not sit on the sidelines as other countries lock in new preferential trading arrangements with our competitors."
Democrats say they support expanded trade as long as it's fair to American workers and doesn't exploit developing countries. They complain that Bush pushed too many trade deals at the expense of worker rights and environmental protections.
Fast track authority, which dates back to the Ford administration in 1975, gives the president the right to negotiate trade agreements that Congress can accept or reject, but cannot amend. Every president since then has enjoyed it, although the law lapsed between 1994 and 2002, when Democrats suspicious of trade agreements joined with Republicans hostile to the Clinton administration in opposing its renewal.
The revival of the law in 2002 came only after Republicans agreed to Democratic demands to expand a program assisting U.S. workers hurt by foreign trade.
The expiration of fast track won't affect four outstanding bilateral trade pacts that Congress must consider before they take effect. Negotiations with Peru and Colombia are finished, the United States and Panama signed a deal Thursday, and the free trade accord with South Korea is to be signed in Washington on Saturday, just before Bush's authority expires.
U.S. and South Korean negotiators cleared their final hurdle Friday when the Koreans acceded to new U.S. guidelines demanded by Democratic lawmakers calling for stricter labor and environmental standards.
Democrats reached a broad agreement with the Bush administration last month that worker rights and the environment will be core parts of future free trade agreements. That improved prospects for congressional action on several of the accords, although there are still sticking points, such as violence against labor leaders in Colombia and South Korea's restrictions on U.S. auto imports.
The top Republican on the Ways and Means panel, Rep. Jim McCrery of Louisiana, noted that since Bush took office in 2001, the United States has implemented 10 free trade agreements with countries such as Australia, Bahrain, and Chile, and that the U.S. trade deficit with those countries has fallen by $7.3 billion.
He and other Republicans warned that without fast track, countries leery of congressional tinkering won't come to the negotiating table. "We risk losing market share around the world," said Rep. Wally Herger, R-Calif.
But Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., argued that "trade agreements have given us the largest trade deficits in human history." Last year the U.S. trade deficit reached $836 billion.
After what he did on immigration, trying to shove mexico up our **** TWICE, I don’t have a problem with his fast-track being cut off.
I hope this isn’t just democrat sly rhetoric.....I remember very well what boosh-daddy did with fast-track authority after he LOST re-election in the 92 election......it is called NAFTA. I shudder to imagine what fast-track type surprises boosh 2 has in store for us during the remainder of his very lame lame-duck administration.....like SPP/NAU for instance
Cuts to the very soul of America. Or would if it weren't total nonsense. But, Rs can communicate nonsense just as well as Ds, the difference being it's about different stuff.
I second that! Couldn’t have come up at a better time. I don’t want his people negotiating anything without Congressional oversite right now!
You mean he won’t be able to give away any more to our deadly enemies, the Chinese?
The environmental protections coupled with rights = union demands, has crippled any "fair trade" here and will only get worse with anti-capitalists Democratic Socialists running the show. Wasn't it Ms. Pelosi who just last week to put a WindFall Tax on all stock market profits even Retirement funds, 401K's and Mutual Funds.....the woman clearly doesn't understand economics - she thinks "only the rich" benefit.....the rich Ms. Pelosi, pay the lion's share of federal income taxes.....you would know this IF you are paying your fair share.....hummmmmmmmmmmmmmm?
(1) “THIS [the U.S.] Constitution,” (2) “the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof” (i.e., as permitted by, in conformity with, and to implement this Constitution), and (3) “all treaties made....under the Authority of the United States” (”under” designates that treaties are not over, not above, and not even equal to the authority of the United States granted to it by the States via the U.S. Constitution - but remain under, inferior to its jurisdiction).
A treaty may not do or exceed what the Congress is charged to do or what it is forbidden to do. Constitutional authority supersedes, overrules, and precludes any contrary treaty authority.
Thus, if a proposed treaty would violate any provision of the Constitution, it may not even be seriously considered or debated, much less be ratified and implemented because the same restrictions that were placed by the Constitution on the U.S. Federal government are also imposed on any treaty provision.
Treaty embroilment is so dangerous and so important, that to further limit and restrict their making, Article II, Section 2, Paragraph 2 orders that the President: “...shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; [Emphasis added.]”
This provision accomplishes two things: 1) it prohibits the President alone to commit the United States to an agreement with other nations (the Senate must advise, consent, concur, and ratify). And 2), why is the Senate singled out, and not the House of Representatives, or both Houses? Because the Senate is the branch of the Congress whose Senators’ constituencies are not “my people back home,” but “my State government back home.”(1)
Before the destabilizing Seventeenth Amendment was deceptively promoted and irrationally ratified in 1913, each State Legislature appointed its Senators. A Senator is sent to Washington to uphold, defend, represent, and guard the retained rights, jurisdiction, and interests of his individual State. If a proposed treaty would adversely effect the States, their Senators are to protect their respective States by not consenting/ratifying.
Treaties are potentially so threatening to the sovereignty of the individual States and the Union of These States that two thirds of the Senators are required to be convinced that the treaty under consideration does not contravene the U.S. Constitution and/or adversely impact on the retained functions and interests of the States before they consent/ratify.
http://www.jpands.org/hacienda/article4.html
And who was on the news last night singing the praises of fast track and ALL lopsided trade deals? Republican Wally Herger! After all these years of begging this man to stand up for something, THIS is what he picks! Please let everyone in his district be aware of this. He also only got on the anti illegal immigration bandwagon in time for his last election. THIS should be his last election.
He also voted wrongly the other day on this:
“The U.S. House of Representatives this morning voted to withhold federal emergency services funding for “sanctuary cities” that protect illegal immigrants.
Anti-immmigration champion Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., sponsored the measure, which he says would apply to cities such as Denver and Boulder. He was elated by its passage, which stunned critics and supporters alike.”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1850955/posts?page=115#115
What market share? Seen the trade deficit lately Wally?
Herger always was an empty suit.
Better for Congress to take back its power, than further allow Mr. Globalist, Jr. to give away America to the highest bidder.
We don’t need anymore. Bush is seems to think he is President of the world, instead of President of the USA.
Bush has lost a lot of credibility this second term. Perhaps power corrupts over time, and Bush is just another corrupt politician? Nevertheless, this is more good news on a string of victories.
BTW, notice how silent the media is about the immigration bill being shot down.
I would like Bush to lose all his powers, by resigning. And take those quisling creeps Condi Rice and Robert Gates with him. Let’s see what Cheney can accomplish in the time that remains.
The system appears to be working, albeit slightly.
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