Why Ted Cruz is Right on TPA

Reclaim DC ^ | May 22, 2015 | David Serenda

[SoConPubbie]

It has been said that politics makes strange bedfellows. Well, there is no finer example of that statement than the recent votes on the Trade Promotion Authority. Free trade has long been advanced by conservatives who understand the need to expand our markets beyond our borders. On the other side stands the democrats and the radical left who fear competition and doubt America’s exceptionalism. Yesterday, the Senate cleared the 60 vote hurdle to bring the Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) up for a vote. I for one, welcome President Obama to the side of common sense solutions, to help solve the economic disaster that his domestic policies have created. I only wish that he would use that common sense more often.

 

If you have listened to Ted Cruz speak on the economy, you will hear him promote the idea of free trade. One of the many reasons I support Ted Cruz for President is his common sense solutions to solve America’s economic problems. America has experienced a trade deficit for as long as I can remember. A large part of that stems from poorly negotiated trade deals in the past, high tariffs being placed on American products by foreign governments, and currency manipulation. The TPA is a step in the right direction to resolve many of the trade imbalance issues and will provide a set of strict guidelines for negotiations.

 

What exactly is TPA or fast track? I am glad you’ve asked. Trade Promotion Authority, TPA, and Fast Track all refer to the same piece of legislation. First, it is important to note that TPA is not a trade agreement in and of itself, but rather Congress establishing a set of requirements that the President must follow in every trade deal he submits through the TPA “fast track” legislation. By Congress authorizing this legislation they are able to have a part in the terms of the negotiations that take place with foreign governments. In addition to controlling the outline of any trade deal, they are able to force the President to share with them the details of any trade deals as he is negotiating. There are many opportunities for Congress to read and be involved in these negotiations if they really had a desire. There is also a requirement for public summaries to be released throughout the process of the negotiations. Once the trade agreement is completed it must be made available to the public before Congress is able to vote on it.

 

Without the TPA the President is able to negotiate any trade deal without any input from Congress or the American people. Even more alarming the President has the authority to conduct these negotiations in secret and only make them public when he submits them to Congress for approval. Once in Congress the process of buying votes and adding poison pills to the legislation corrupts the entire process. If we know anything about Washington, it is that its corruption runs deeper than the oceans. For these reasons previous Congress, both democratic and republican, have authorized “fast track” legislation.

 

As with anything in politics there are groups who, in an effort to promote their ideology of isolationism, will put out misinformation in order to derail legislation that they oppose. As with anything you read or hear about legislation coming out of Washington, familiarize yourself with not only the facts of the legislation, but any potential bias or agenda the author may be hiding.

 

[Stentor]

No one seems to wonder why Dems voted against TPA and conservatives voted for it.

Why would anyone wonder. It's all about who's paying you for your vote.

[central_va]

do you actually believe those jobs will come back?

Oh yes they will. In any case income taxes should be reduced proportionally to any revenue generated by a tariff. How unprogressive of me....

[conservativejoy]

So now, Dems are paragons of virtue who would never vote based on personal gain? Hogwash. I don’t for one minute believe that Ted Cruz is corrupt and sold his vote.

[Stentor]

Why would anyone wonder. It's all about who's paying you for your vote.

So now, Dems are paragons of virtue who would never vote based on personal gain? Hogwash. I don’t for one minute believe that Ted Cruz is corrupt and sold his vote.

I posted the first sentence. You posted the second. How did you get that from what I posted. The uniparty is for hire. All of them. Has anyone besides me accused you of being dim.

[AlanGreenSpam]

-—”Study history and politics before you post.”

I have already. And you?

Please respond to the content of my post stating that Anti-free-trade folks (I presume you too, by the negative tone of your post) are no different than Labor Unions in the US.

You both do NOT believe in FREE markets. You’re both naive about the realities of economics and the markets.

Please explain how you think you can live in a “labor bubble” in this world economy and enjoy high wages indefinitely. It’s unsustainable. I thought Freepers are conservatives.

If you don’t support free markets, you’re starting to sound like a Democrat.

[FourtySeven]

Seems to me a fourth condition must be shared in common between countries that engage in “free trade” : Equal amounts of labor/union laws and regulations (and equal enforcement of same)

Actually I’d argue that’s the only thing that needs to be kept in common. Because that’s really the only thing that drives the cost of products ultimately anyway. In today’s economy. Which is our problem.

We are really the only country that has both a mighty economy and strict labor laws and regulations. This latter fact is being exploited by the less scrupulous to weaken and drain the former fact. It’s indeed what causes much of the trade disparity we see today. It’s pretty hard to compete with another country that produces a widget for 10% of the cost because they are willing to let their kids work in sweatshops 7 days a week.

And you can’t put “tarrifs” on that either, because they will just sell their widgets to other unscrupulous countries (or corporations really). The only way to level the playing field is to level the amount of labor regulation there is globally.

Ideally to a level lower than what we have here. God knows an autoworker doesn’t need free healthcare for life AND a 90k+ salary AND paid vacation of more than 2 weeks a year on top of sick leave that never expires. Yeah, I think “labor” can give a little in this drive to compete. It’s way out of control. On top of all the ca$h the labor bosses and race hustlers bring in refunding the Democrat machine.

But, Good luck doing that. It ain’t gonna happen. So the ones who have no compunction about working children to death will keep stealing the jobs we can never create because of our own oppressive labor laws, laws that go entirely too far to “protect the working man”. They only end up protecting the rich in charge of the entire shakedown enterprise known as the “union” and their federal allies in the Department of Labor.

A moral outrage on both sides of the economic spectrum with no solution. None, and only one outcome: eventual economic collapse.

Have a nice day!

[central_va]

Protectionism has nothing to do with labor unions. So answer this question:

What is the percentage of the manufacturing labor force in a union?

1. 10%
2. 15%
3. 20%
4. 25%

[central_va]

The obvious solution here is to offshore all manufacturing to the Communist Third World, import it back duty free and sell it at first world prices. With the additional profit going to the corporations stockholders. < /SARC >

[conservativejoy]

So who paid for the Dems vote? You said that both sides are for sale. What proof do you have that conservatives voted for this bill based on being paid to vote that way?

[Brour1929]

Corporations run our country. They give donations to politicians who in turn do their bidding. They shape public opinion so that people start blindly supporting something without even knowing the reason why.

And if you protest or point this out, you are quickly shot down as an agitator.

The only thing you can hope for is that maybe 10% will be actual governing and passing the legislation that actually means something to the common American.

[zeestephen]

Re: “Your argument is based on no facts, simply conjecture.”

Since the details of the TPA are secret, so is your argument.

[zeestephen]

Re: “...there are a whole host of other causes that are involved in the high unemployment rate, many of them can be laid at the feet of rampant Illegal immigration...”

The most important cause is LEGAL immigration.

Our current rate is 1.25 million Legal immigrants per year, the highest of any country in the history of the world.

Most of those immigrants have limited work skills and limited education.

The claim that one third of new immigrants have a college education - which is slightly higher than native born Americans - is deliberately deceitful.

Almost all college educated immigrants have received their “degrees” from Third World universities and were employed by their local government or a government sponsored enterprise.

They have no work experience in a competitive business environment, and their degrees are not accredited by USA companies.

Massive LEGAL immigration, and about 1 million LEGAL work visas each year, have crushed the wage scale in low skill American jobs and in Information Technology jobs.

[jsanders2001]

> One of the good things we did in Michigan was to eliminate the business property tax.

Its ridiculous that a company should pay a tax year after year simply because they own a machine that produces parts or a desk where business is conducted.

Thank you for articulating what I have always thought was one of the most blatant ways for a Mafia styled government to strongarm money for nothing from business owners, esecially when you bought and paid for the equipment and are then forced to continuously pay many more taxes than what its worth over the years simply because they say so. And you provide the info to them then pay taxes on it! It really is money for nothing.

[cripplecreek]

Back in the 90s I found some screw machines in operation that my great grandfather had operated in the 1930s. That’s 60 years of taxes right there and they’re probably still in use.

[Rich21IE]

No...Ted Cruz is dead wrong on this issue. The TPP amounts to a serious abandonment of US Sovereignty and will result in the typical loss of American Jobs just as NAFTA did. But worse, it will open up the US to unregulated and unchecked immigration. Worse, it turns trade matters over to an anti-American panel of foreigners.

As might be expected, Cruz, in an election cycle, has sided with the Corporate interests as has the rest of the Republican establishment.

I fail, so far, to find any integrity in the Republican slate of candidates.

[AlanGreenSpam]

Do we have a choice? The alternative is to use FORCE on those corrupt countries to get them to “behave” the way we want them to.

If we are getting a good price for foreign products (lower than we can produce them here), one positive is that’s more disposable income in the pockets of Americans.

If foreigners make products cheaper than we do, then we find something else to make better/faster than they do.

Doing protectionist trade tariffs invariably backfires.

There is no perfect solution.

[AlanGreenSpam]

You’re completely missing my point:

Trade protectionists HAVE THE SAME PRINCIPLES OF LABOR UNIONS. Get it? I’m drawing a parallel: Both want to use FORCE to control the FREE market. Unions by their peer pressure and thuggery and protectionist by FORCED tariffs.

True, LABOR UNIONS can be somewhat regionally successful in using their “collective” power to raise wages in localized economies — BUT UNFORTUNATELY TRADE PROTECTIONISTS have very little ability to prop up wages and prices for American goods BECAUSE THIS IS A GLOBAL ECONOMY. Tariffs just don’t work.

Until Americans vow to not buy ANY foreign-made products (UNLIKELY), we are subject to healthy global competitive forces. Yes, that means lower wages and lower prices for American goods unless we innovate faster than them.

Wake up and smell the coffee. Simple economic forces are not difficult to understand.

[AlanGreenSpam]

—”The obvious solution here is to offshore all manufacturing to the Communist Third World, import it back duty free and sell it at first world prices. With the additional profit going to the corporations stockholders. < /SARC >”

Again, these sound like words of a Democrat (woe me, the “Evil Corporations”).

Let’s for a moment ask yourself WHERE does that “additional profit” going to the evil corporations and stockholders GO IN THE AMERICAN ECONOMY?

That money is used to buy goods and services or investments — probably a lot of which is in our local economy to buy houses, cars, etc.

In economics, one has to think of all net results, not just the surface.

[central_va]

Let’s for a moment ask yourself WHERE does that “additional profit” going to the evil corporations and stockholders GO IN THE AMERICAN ECONOMY?

Tell that to the millions of unemployed manufacturing workers, most of whom were non union. The devastated towns all over in ever state. All to make the 1% even more secure at the expense of the entire manufacturing sector. No thanks,, it is not sustainable.

[central_va]

You still didn’t answer the question. Coward.