America set to torpedo trade talks at WTO (EVIL AMERICAN ALERT!)

OBSERVER ^ | 09/14/03 | Nick Mathiason and John Madeley in Cancun

[Pikamax]

America set to torpedo trade talks

Nick Mathiason and John Madeley in Cancun Sunday September 14, 2003 The Observer

Fears are growing that the United States could effectively walk away from crucial trade talks in the Mexican resort of Cancun aimed at solving the deepening economic and social crisis afflicting billions of the world's poorest people. As the World Trade Organisation negotiations entered their final hours, business leaders feared that efforts to strike a ground-breaking deal on trade distortions harming the developing world were in the balance.

A high level source in the UK delegation told The Observer said: 'It's difficult to know what the Americans want. They're staying in their hotel. They're behaving like the Soviet Union in the Eighties. It's making it difficult to know what they want.'

This view has been echoed by other senior delegation members. 'It's in nobody's interests to see America going into its shell,' said CBI director general Digby Jones.

If the US walks away from the talks it would plunge the world into a disastrous financial crisis as it sought to strike trade deals on its own terms with individual nations.

Trade Ministers from 146 countries are poised to receive a draft text this morning of an agreement on agricultural subsidies and investment policies. They will have just 90 minutes to respond before negotiators refine a final draft.

It is understood that the European Union has yet to make any significant concessions on agriculture, although these are expected to come later today. The EU is putting pressure on the Americans to conclude a deal on cotton which will see the Bush administration drop its subsidies to farmers.

International power brokers are increasingly pre-occupied with a deepening alliance between Brazil, India and China, representing half the world's population. Senior government officials in Mexico say this will alter the geo-political balance, and it is understood to have made Washington deeply uneasy about a new rival to challenge its economic supremacy.

A statement by ActionAid, War on Want and the World Development Movement said: 'The Brazilians have brought a sense of social justice to this conference which is a great antidote to the faux development agenda of the European Commission and the bullying behaviour by the US.'

[wizardoz]

Bwa ha ha ha ha!! (Evil American Laugh) We are your overlords!!

[BenLurkin]

Brazil's "sense of social justice" is exactly what we don't want. That's just another way of asking for global socialism and everybody knows it.

[Afronaut]

So I guess it is NOW ok to protest the WTO? Like you would need this news? (did i say "Like"?)

[LRS]

I would have read this article, but, I am too busy oppressing billions...

[steveegg]

America set to torpedo trade talks at WTO

You may fire when ready.

[At _War_With_Liberals]

Observer=weekend Guardian

[FITZ]

International power brokers are increasingly pre-occupied with a deepening alliance between Brazil, India and China, representing half the world's population. Senior government officials in Mexico say this will alter the geo-political balance, and it is understood to have made Washington deeply uneasy about a new rival to challenge its economic supremacy.

How can Washington be "uneasy" when it's Washington that is making sure China, India and Brazil become more powerful than the US by sending jobs out of America to these countries? I don't think too many American politicians care if Americans have jobs or if the trade deficit is shrunk.

[greasepaint]

The issue here, is that poor countries want the
rich countries to end agricultural subsidies.
The Democrats love to use this issue as a
hammer against the Republicans, the Dems
line is something like: Welfare for Millionares
(which it is). Behind the scenes,
Democrats desperately oppose repeal of subsidies.
The negotiations are going to be tough.

[JaimeD2]

You're exactly right - ever since FDR started them, the Democratic party has refused to remove farm subsidies for fear of losing those farm states that it still holds. But Republicans are equally afraid of it. It's a side-effect of the electoral college.

I've been thinking a lot about this issue recently, and I honestly am finding it very hard to justify these subsidies and barriers to free trade; it seems that anybody who believes that free trade encourages efficiency, and is therefore desireable, would have a hard time doing it. To put it bluntly, if the developing world is being out-subsidized by the United States and the E.U. in the one area in which it might be able to compete, well, then, what can it be expected to do well?

Just remember how angry a lot of people were when Bush instituted the tariffs on steel in order to get West Virginia's votes. The lingering effects of the New Deal are like that, only on a much larger scale. I think it's a fundamentally conservative position - at least economically - to advocate for the removal of the barriers to free trade.

[singsong]

it seems that anybody who believes that free trade encourages efficiency,
This is called "slave labor" not "efficiency".

[witnesstothefall]

Thank you for posting this. From the overstated Marxist agit-prop, it is very easy to deduce America's wisest move at the talks. Grab yer wallet and run!!