Congressional Democrats have often been frustrated by his lack of attention to their concerns, but they’ve been especially disturbed lately that in his grand pivot to Asia and push for a 12-nation trade pact dubbed the Trans-Pacific Partnership, they and the rest of Congress largely have been cut out of negotiations.
“We want transparency. We want to see what’s going on there,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told reporters. “We have a problem with that.”
As a result, many Democrats fear the actual terms of the deal do not reflect traditional Democratic Party policy priorities.
“This is a big problem now,” said Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee. “There is inadequate engagement on the substance of what will be in an agreement or out of an agreement.”
Democrats in the House and Senate have complained for years about the secrecy standards the Obama administration has applied to the TPP, forcing members to jump over hurdles to see negotiation texts, and blocking staffer involvement. In 2012, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) complained that corporate lobbyists were given easy access while his office was being stymied, and even introduced protest legislation requiring more congressional input.
The issue came to a head Thursday in two ways. In one case, Obama’s new nominee for China ambassador, Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), angered his party by introducing fast-track trade legislation backed by the White House. The bill would ease the passage of the TPP and is co-sponsored by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) and House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp (R-Mich.). But most Democrats oppose the bill, and ultimately, Baucus and the administration introduced the legislation without a House Democratic co-sponsor — a public embarrassment that prompted House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) to declare Obama needs to get his act together on trade policy.
Also Thursday, U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman met with Democratic members of the Ways and Means Committee, and got an earful, lawmakers told HuffPost.
“We had a very frank discussion,” said Rep. Sander Levin of Michigan, the top Democrat on the committee.
“They’ve said that they welcome congressional input,” said Van Hollen, who also attended the meeting. “But in terms of actually establishing the mechanisms, they haven’t put forward a proposal. But we should be putting those proposals on the table. Any administration is going to try and maintain maximum flexibility. It’s up to the Congress to insist that we have an important role in the process.”
Democrats are especially determined to win a role in negotiations because the bill introduced by Baucus, the departing chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, would grant the administration the ability to present Congress with trade deals that could not be amended, leaving lawmakers to take it or leave it, including on the TPP, which is opposed by many progressive groups and some tea party activists.
With opposition from the right, the administration needs to shore up support from Democrats to move the trade agenda ahead. And the Baucus bill didn’t help. Even Democrats like Oregon Rep. Earl Blumenauer, who are more open to free-trade deals with the right protections, think Baucus’ effort does little to improve the last fast-track bill Congress passed in 2002.
“I think it’s a mistake. I think it’s going to make it very hard to pass, and frankly, I don’t think it should,” said Blumenauer. “I’m a little disappointed that something’s dropped [introduced] that was never discussed with Democrats in the House. As I understand it, it wasn’t actually discussed with Democrats in the Senate.”
“It’s interesting Baucus introduced his bill without any — I think a couple senators endorsed it — but without any other Democratic senator on it,” Levin said.
“And most of them hadn’t seen his bill when he introduced it, including the new chairman,” he said, referring to Wyden, who is replacing Baucus at the head of the Finance Committee.
There’s a lot at stake for Democrats and the president in working out their rough spots. If they don’t, Obama’s trade agenda stalls. And for Democrats, giving the White House too much authority could undercut the centerpiece of the 2014 election argument — that they are the party that will deal with income inequality and help the middle class. That’s because many in their own party, especially grassroots activists and unions, blame flaws in previous grand trade deals like the North American Free Trade Agreement for siphoning off middle class jobs.
“We have had a trade deficit that has exceeded $350 billion every single year for the past 13 years. We have this enormous staggering problem with our economy called the continuing trade deficit, and this is a measure that would make that worse,” Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) said. “The classic example of this is NAFTA. NAFTA has managed to hurt American workers and Mexican workers at the same time.”
And most Democrats don’t think the pending TPP deal addresses numerous labor, environmental and other issues adequately. Like NAFTA, the TPP would empower foreign corporations to directly challenge the laws and regulations of a country before an international tribunal. Under other trade frameworks, like the World Trade Organization treaties, only nations themselves are permitted to bring trade cases before an international arbiter, meaning companies must first win support from a government before attacking a law. Exxon Mobil, Dow Chemical, Eli Lilly and other corporations have used NAFTA to attempt to overturn Canadian regulations regarding offshore oil drilling, fracking, pesticides, drug patents and other issues.
Progressives like Grayson have long been critical of free trade deals because of their empowerment of corporations. But even members of the House Democratic leadership who have traditionally supported such pacts are upset over the current deal and worried about its impact on their 2014 message.
“No one should believe that negotiations on TPP are over, because almost — again — all the key issues remain,” said Levin.
“Congress must have a robust role in the oversight of any trade deal,” said Rep. Steve Israel (D-N.Y.) chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. “I will continue working with my colleagues to ensure any trade deal reflects 21st century realities, protects the American worker and is only agreed to after adequate and necessary consultation with Congress.”
Still, boosting trade does fit into the Democrats’ agenda if it helps boost exports and create new jobs in America.
“We need to deal with trade. I don’t think there’s a member of Congress who isn’t pro-trade, but it’s got to be pro-American worker, pro-American consumer, pro-American business,” sai
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ep. Xavier Becerra (D-Calif.). “Otherwise, why are we opening up our markets to people if we’re going to get raped?”
Becerra and others acknowledge there is a great deal of pressure, in general, to take steps that promise economic growth with the economy still limping along and producing too few jobs. Crafting a trade deal that pleases their base, however, won’t come easily, and almost certainly not before the election, especially if the Obama administration offers Democrats little more than token input.
“This place doesn’t work on amorphous pressure. It works on touch-and-feel pressure. Unless we can come together on something that collectively, bipartisanly, we think can work, I think it’s going to be tough,” said Becerra. “It won’t be fast. It might be on a track, but it won’t be fast.”
The Reason 600,000 U.S. Manufacturing Jobs Vanished
in Jobs, Manufacturing, Skills Gap/by MAM TeamEven so, we’re now manufacturing more and more stuff in the United States. It’s not that manufacturing left the U.S. Instead, the manufacturing jobs did.
Read more
As Overseas Costs Rise, More U.S. Companies Are 'Reshoring'
in Uncategorized/by MAM TeamKim Freeman, a spokeswoman for General Electric Appliances, walks into a sprawling plant in Louisville, Ky. Machine noise is thunderous in the brightly lit room. The finished product, a hybrid water heater, is not much to look at — tubby, about 4 feet tall, with a few knobs and levers. But it’s actually a high-tech, energy-efficient appliance.
For years, GE outsourced manufacturing of the water heater to a company in China. In 2009, GE did the math and, considering rising wages overseas as well as climbing transportation costs, decided to bring production back to the U.S.
The company wanted more control of the product, especially the technology that goes into it, says Freeman. To maximize savings, the appliance had to be completely redesigned.
GE ripped apart one of six massive factories at the complex in Louisville, and built a water heater assembly line. It worked out a new, lower-wage structure for employees, and brought in experts to help reduce waste and time. Everything was geared to reducing costs.
A month later, GE also began producing high-end refrigerators domestically, the type with the bottom drawer freezer. Until then, GE had produced that type of refrigerator in Mexico.
Mike Chanatry, the head of manufacturing for GE Appliances, says the decision to bring some of the manufacturing back to the U.S. was a risk — but one worth taking. He says GE faces stiff competition from LG Electronics and Samsung, up-and-comers in the world of appliances.
A Broader Trend
Other major companies — Ford and Whirlpool among them — have also brought back some of their products. But so have many smaller companies, says Harold Sirkin, a senior partner at Boston Consulting Group who has been surveying companies about reshoring.
“In the beginning of 2011, for the most part, most people thought that this was just impossible, that there would be no reshoring to the U.S., that everything was going to China, manufacturing was leaving the country and will never come back,” says Sirkin. “And I think the striking thing is how much that’s changed in the last three years.”
Sirkin says at least 200 companies have already returned, and there’s been a dramatic jump recently in the number of companies saying they’re seriously thinking about it. Sirkin says a huge factor has been rising wages overseas. Pay in China has risen at least 15 percent annually for the past few years. Wages in China are still comparatively low compared with the U.S., but there are other important factors.
“You went to China because it was just so cheap you couldn’t help it,” he says. “But if you’ve got the engineers and people in the U.S., and the customer base in the U.S., you’d like to be close to the customer. It gives you a shorter supply chain.”
Also, the cost of shipping has shot up, while domestic energy prices are low.
If this trend continues, Sirkin believes 20 to 25 percent of products that were sent offshore will eventually return to the U.S.
But the challenges in bringing back manufacturing can include finding enough skilled labor, says professor Arie Lewin, director for the Center for International Business, Education and Research at Duke University.
Harry Moser, president of the Reshoring Initiative, which helps companies figure out if it’s worth bringing manufacturing back to the U.S., agrees that making the move can be a challenge. And, he says, “There’s challenges of getting the consumer to understand that the product is made in the USA and to give a little extra preference to that product.”
Moser says Wal-Mart’s decision to put $50 billion more worth of American-made goods on its shelves over the next 10 years is dramatically important, even if Wal-Mart qualifies that by insisting those products don’t cost more than versions made overseas.
China's Moon Rover "Jade Rabbit" in Trouble
in Uncategorized/by MAM TeamThe rover landed in December as part of China’s Chang’e-3 mission – the first “soft” landing on the Moon since 1976.
It was expected to operate for around three months.
Earlier this month, the Beijing Aerospace Control Centre said that Jade Rabbit, also known as Yutu, had successfully explored the surface of the Moon with its mechanical arm.
Lunar nightThe malfunction emerged before the rover entered its scheduled dormancy period on Saturday, Xinhua reported, citing the State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence (SASTIND).
Scientists were organising repairs, the news agency added, without providing further details.
The rover was due to become dormant for 14 days during the lunar night, when there would be no sunlight to power the rover’s solar panel, reports said.
The malfunctioning rover presents the first public mishap China’s ambitious space programme has experienced in years, following several successful manned space flights, the BBC’s Celia Hatton in Beijing reports.
Xinhua said the news of the rover’s troubles had generated extensive discussion on Chinese social media.
“People not only hailed the authority’s openness to the accident, but also expressed concern,” it said.
On Sina Weibo, China’s largest microblog provider, users began tagging their posts with the hash tag “#hang in there Jade Rabbit”.
Users also circulated comic strips depicting a rabbit on the Moon, and rabbit-themed pictures, while expressing their support for the rover.
User Jessica_S_AC_USK wrote: “I want to cry. Go Jade Rabbit, even if we fail this time, we still have next time – our Chinese Jade Rabbit’s goal is the sea of stars! We will not give up easily.”
Referring to a Chinese folktale about a rabbit on the Moon, another microblog user wrote: “Whatever happens, we must thank Jade Rabbit. When our generation tells stories to our children, we can confidently say: ‘There really is a Jade Rabbit on the moon!'”
Patriotic style: Team USA reveals Olympic Opening Ceremony Uniforms
in Uncategorized/by MAM TeamWhile the prices might seem a bit steep, it should be noted that 100 percent of the proceeds of the Limited Edition Team USA Opening Ceremony Cardigan will be donated to the U.S. Olympic Committee, an organization supporting our nation’s best athletes.
The emphasis on having the uniforms manufactured domestically came in the wake of controversy over the Team USA outfits from the London 2012 Olympic Games. Ralph Lauren was heavily criticized for having manufactured the clothing in China. The U.S. Olympic Committee announced that while it was too late to change the outfits ahead of the London Games, it had agreed with Ralph Lauren to make apparel for the 2014 Olympic Winter Games domestically.
This partnership marks the fourth time Ralph Lauren has been an official outfitter of the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic teams. Last fall, the brand revealed the Team USA’s Sochi 2014 uniforms, including wool peacoats adorned with a red banner stripe and patriotic patch, fair isle sweaters, and wool turtlenecks with reindeer and snowflake motifs.
The U.S. apparel is available online on the Ralph Lauren site and the Team USA site, as well as in select Ralph Lauren retail stores and department stores.
President Obama’s 2014 State of the Union Address
in Uncategorized/by MAM TeamIf you plan on watching from home, we will be streaming an enhanced version of the speech on WhiteHouse.gov/SOTU that features graphics, data and charts that help explain policies and the issues. You can also tune in live on Facebook, YouTube, Google+ and through our mobile apps
In the mean time, here’s how to stay updated, and learn more about how you can watch, share and discuss the speech.
China's Exports Linked To Western U.S. Air Pollution
in Uncategorized/by MAM TeamOutsourcing manufacturing to China may have resulted in less pollution in some parts of the United States, but other regions have lesser air quality because of U.S.-bound Chinese products, a new study in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences finds.
In the western United States, Chinese pollution related to exports contribute up to 12% to 24% of daily sulfate concentrations, the study said.
Because of the United States outsourcing manufacturing to China, the eastern United States saw a decrease in sulfate pollution, but an increase was seen in the western part of the nation.
Because of pollution from China, the Los Angeles area and other U.S. regions violate national ozone standards one extra day per year, the study said.
U.S. consumer goods such as cellphones and televisions are often produced in China. Although Chinese manufacturing isn’t causing most of the U.S. pollution, winds called “westerlies” can send chemicals across the Pacific Ocean in a matter of days. Valleys and basins in western states can see accumulations of dust, ozone and carbon.
“We know that the efficiency of industry in China is not as it is good in the U.S.,” Wuebbles said. Higher efficiency of U.S. manufacturing, combined with controls on emissions and outsourcing, have made strides in reducing U.S.-based emissions.
Does that mean that outsourcing manufacturing to China is bad for American public health? The study suggests that for the United States as a whole, there’s a net benefit, because the population density in the eastern United States is higher than in the West.
But the West still suffers.
Average sulfate, carbon monoxide and black carbon concentrations went down by 0.3% to 0.9% when looking at population-weighted averages. But this all comes at a cost: In the western United States and populous Chinese regions, air quality went down.
Black carbon has been linked to asthma as well as diseases such as cancer, emphysema, and heart and lung disease. Rain doesn’t easily clear it from the atmosphere, so it hangs around and travels far.
Researchers found that 36% of anthropogenic sulfur dioxide, 27% of nitrogen oxides, 22% of carbon monoxide and 17% of black carbon from Chinese emissions were linked to producing goods for export.
About 21% of export-related emissions from China, for each of these pollutants, came from exports that went from China to the United States.
Production of goods for export has rapidly expanded in China, with volume growing 390% between 2000 and 2007, although there has not been as much growth since the global financial crisis. China has generally become a “large net exporter of energy-intensive industrial products,” the study said.
Behind this economic growth is a rise in combustion of fossil fuels, particularly coal, a big culprit in carbon dioxide emissions rising worldwide.
Previous research has shown the substantial carbon dioxide emissions that result from Chinese trade, but this study focused on more other air pollutants. Researchers constructed a model using data on economics and emissions.
Over the last decade, China has seen a huge increase in the use of coal-burning power plants, Wuebbles said. Coal use for generating electricity is a big part of why carbon dioxide emissions have nearly doubled their rate of growth worldwide, according to a leaked report from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, obtained by CNN.
High carbon dioxide atmospheric concentrations are projected to cause a 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) increase in temperature by 2100. Agriculture, forestry, ecosystems and human health are all expected to suffer as a result of trends in climate change.
To decrease pollution from China, Wuebbles recommended increasing the efficiency of manufacturing processes and re-examining energy production. Scrubbers can reduce emissions from coal-burning power plants.
“Consideration of international cooperation to reduce trans-boundary transport of air pollution must confront the question of who is responsible for emissions in one country during production of goods to support consumption in another,” study authors wrote.
US Consumers To Blame For Some Air Pollution From China
in Uncategorized/by MAM Team“We’ve outsourced our manufacturing and much of our pollution, but some of it is blowing back across the Pacific to haunt us,” said co-author Steve Davis, a scientist at the University of California, Irvine.
“Given the complaints about how Chinese pollution is corrupting other countries’ air, this paper shows that there may be plenty of blame to go around,” he added.
The research was led by Jintai Lin of Beijing’s Peking University, along with co-authors from the United States and Britain.
The study found that 22 percent of carbon monoxide and 17 percent of black carbon emitted in China were associated with the production of goods for export.
Black carbon is a concern because it lingers in the atmosphere, doesn’t wash away with rain and can travel long distances. Exposure can raise the risk of cancer, heart and lung disease and asthma.
The study also examined sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide.
“For each of these pollutants, about 21 percent of export-related Chinese emissions were attributed to China-to-US export,” said the study, which appears in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Made in China for us: Air pollution tied to exports
in Uncategorized/by MAM TeamThe study is the first to quantify how much pollution reaching the American West Coast is from the production in China of cellphones, televisions and other consumer items imported here and elsewhere.
“We’ve outsourced our manufacturing and much of our pollution, but some of it is blowing back across the Pacific to haunt us,” said UC Irvine Earth system scientist Steve Davis, a co-author. “Given the complaints about how Chinese pollution is corrupting other countries’ air, this paper shows that there may be plenty of blame to go around.”
Los Angeles, for instance, experiences at least one extra day a year of smog that exceeds federal ozone limits because of nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide emitted by Chinese factories making goods for export, the analysis found. On other days, as much as a quarter of the sulfate pollution on the U.S. West Coast is tied to Chinese exports. All the contaminants tracked in the study are key ingredients in unhealthy smog and soot.
China is not responsible for the lion’s share of pollution in the U.S. Cars, trucks and refineries pump out far more. But powerful global winds known as “westerlies” can push airborne chemicals across the ocean in days, particularly during the spring, causing dangerous spikes in contaminants. Dust, ozone and carbon can accumulate in valleys and basins in California and other Western states.
Black carbon is a particular problem: Rain doesn’t easily wash it out of the atmosphere, so it persists across long distances. Like other air pollutants, it’s been linked to a litany of health problems, from increased asthma to cancer, emphysema, and heart and lung disease.
The study authors suggest the findings could be used to more effectively negotiate clean-air treaties. China’s huge ramp-up of industrial activity in recent years, combined with poor pollution controls, has unleashed often fierce international debates.
“When you buy a product at Wal-Mart,” noted Davis, an assistant professor, “it has to be manufactured somewhere. The product doesn’t contain the pollution, but creating it caused the pollution.”
He and his fellow researchers conclude: “International cooperation to reduce transboundary transport of air pollution must confront the question of who is responsible for emissions in one country during production of goods to support consumption in another.”
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Jintai Lin of Beijing’s Peking University is the paper’s lead author. Others are Da Pan, also of Peking University; Qiang Zhang, Kebin He and Can Wang of Beijing’s Tsinghua University; David Streets of Argonne National Laboratory; Donald Wuebbles of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; and Dabo Guan of the University of Leeds in England.
About the University of California, Irvine: Located in coastal Orange County, near a thriving employment hub in one of the nation’s safest cities, UC Irvine was founded in 1965. One of only 62 members of the Association of American Universities, it’s ranked first among U.S. universities under 50 years old by the London-based Times Higher Education. The campus has produced three Nobel laureates and is known for its academic achievement, premier research, innovation and anteater mascot. Led by Chancellor Michael Drake since 2005, UC Irvine has more than 28,000 students and offers 192 degree programs. It’s Orange County’s second-largest employer, contributing $4.3 billion annually to the local economy.
Why it's Time to Unleash Manufacturing Innovation
in Uncategorized/by MAM TeamCompared to service businesses, manufacturers are nearly 10 times stronger exporters; their employees contribute twice as much to national productivity as workers in other sectors; and each job inside a manufacturing facility can spur the creation of an additional three to five jobs outside it.
In countries around the world, manufacturing’s multiplier effect has gone to work – creating jobs, boosting productivity, fueling innovation, and balancing economies. In the United States, for example, manufacturing made the largest contribution to GDP growth of any sector in 2012 and has expanded for each of the past seven months. That is how the manufacturing renaissance is driving recovery today – and helping businesses and nations prosper for many tomorrows to come.
Advanced manufacturing is replacing smoke stacks and shuttered factories with high-tech laboratories and state-of-the-art plants. These new, 21st-century models for prototyping and innovating enable the manufacturing industry to generate up to 90 percent of business R&D spending.
Generations ago, companies like Dow created and marketed new products entirely on their own. Products like Saran Wrap and Ziploc Bags went from the lab bench to the factory floor entirely within our company. Today, the breakthroughs we seek – game-changing ideas like self-healing materials and self-driving cars – are so complex that they will never materialize if we all stay within the boundaries of our sectors or our companies.
Innovation does not – and cannot – happen in silos anymore. The best products and industries of tomorrow will be born at what I call “the intersections.”
That is why, more and more, we need to work to form partnerships to unlock progress. We need collaboration among the brightest minds in business, science, and engineering. In the same spirit, we need active collaboration between the public and private sectors as well.
For businesses to succeed – for economies to grow – governments must create the conditions for innovation ecosystems to develop and flourish. This requires renewed focus in three key areas.
First, human capital. Machines may do the heavy lifting on factory floors, but it is human beings – specifically, scientists, engineers, and other highly skilled professionals – who turn advanced manufacturing clusters into centers of innovation. Governments must do more to educate young people, whether in universities or through skills training at community colleges, and to retrain experienced workers – particularly in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.
Second, the business climate. In countries like the United States, a complex environment of regulations and tax provisions determines if and where companies scale up and invest. Too often, these regulations add costs and, worse, uncertainty to these calculations.Forward-thinking countries are seeding the ground for manufacturing growth by shifting to smarter regulation. Through competitive tax rates, streamlined permitting processes and other reforms, these countries enable government to operate at the speed of business, increasing predictability for companies that are looking to invest.
Third, a smart, balanced energy policy. Manufacturers gravitate toward regions where energy is affordable and accessible – not merely because we consume energy, but also because we create so much more with it. We use natural gas, for example,as a feedstock – as the building block that transforms our innovations from ideas into reality.
More than 95 percent of the world’s synthetic materials would not be possible without our industry: from pharmaceuticals to smartphones to lighter, more efficient vehicles. When natural gas is used in the manufacturing process instead of burned or exported, it generates eight times more value across the economy.
In this way, advanced manufacturing expands economies when they are healthy and helps them recover when they are not. It creates competitiveness in a way no other sector can – encouraging countries to invest in their work forces, laying the groundwork for further innovation, and making far better use of natural resources.
But again, this virtuous cycle cannot set itself in motion. If we create an ecosystem in which innovators can work together – at the intersections between business, government, academia, and civil society – then the current manufacturing renaissance can become a revolution. Far from the so-called demise of manufacturing, we will instead see the rise of a new era of investment, innovation, job creation, and prosperity that will improve lives around the world.
Andrew Liveris is Chairman and CEO of Dow.
Original article can be read here: http://www.cnbc.com/id/101349128
Why House Democrats Might Kill Obama's Big Trade Deal
in Uncategorized/by MAM TeamWASHINGTON — President Barack Obama’s international trade agenda is dead in the water if he doesn’t do a better job engaging with Democrats in Congress, and his administration appears to be getting that message, Democrats said Friday.
“We want transparency. We want to see what’s going on there,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told reporters. “We have a problem with that.”
As a result, many Democrats fear the actual terms of the deal do not reflect traditional Democratic Party policy priorities.
“This is a big problem now,” said Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee. “There is inadequate engagement on the substance of what will be in an agreement or out of an agreement.”
Democrats in the House and Senate have complained for years about the secrecy standards the Obama administration has applied to the TPP, forcing members to jump over hurdles to see negotiation texts, and blocking staffer involvement. In 2012, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) complained that corporate lobbyists were given easy access while his office was being stymied, and even introduced protest legislation requiring more congressional input.
The issue came to a head Thursday in two ways. In one case, Obama’s new nominee for China ambassador, Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), angered his party by introducing fast-track trade legislation backed by the White House. The bill would ease the passage of the TPP and is co-sponsored by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) and House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp (R-Mich.). But most Democrats oppose the bill, and ultimately, Baucus and the administration introduced the legislation without a House Democratic co-sponsor — a public embarrassment that prompted House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) to declare Obama needs to get his act together on trade policy.
Also Thursday, U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman met with Democratic members of the Ways and Means Committee, and got an earful, lawmakers told HuffPost.
“We had a very frank discussion,” said Rep. Sander Levin of Michigan, the top Democrat on the committee.
“They’ve said that they welcome congressional input,” said Van Hollen, who also attended the meeting. “But in terms of actually establishing the mechanisms, they haven’t put forward a proposal. But we should be putting those proposals on the table. Any administration is going to try and maintain maximum flexibility. It’s up to the Congress to insist that we have an important role in the process.”
Democrats are especially determined to win a role in negotiations because the bill introduced by Baucus, the departing chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, would grant the administration the ability to present Congress with trade deals that could not be amended, leaving lawmakers to take it or leave it, including on the TPP, which is opposed by many progressive groups and some tea party activists.
With opposition from the right, the administration needs to shore up support from Democrats to move the trade agenda ahead. And the Baucus bill didn’t help. Even Democrats like Oregon Rep. Earl Blumenauer, who are more open to free-trade deals with the right protections, think Baucus’ effort does little to improve the last fast-track bill Congress passed in 2002.
“I think it’s a mistake. I think it’s going to make it very hard to pass, and frankly, I don’t think it should,” said Blumenauer. “I’m a little disappointed that something’s dropped [introduced] that was never discussed with Democrats in the House. As I understand it, it wasn’t actually discussed with Democrats in the Senate.”
“It’s interesting Baucus introduced his bill without any — I think a couple senators endorsed it — but without any other Democratic senator on it,” Levin said.
“And most of them hadn’t seen his bill when he introduced it, including the new chairman,” he said, referring to Wyden, who is replacing Baucus at the head of the Finance Committee.
There’s a lot at stake for Democrats and the president in working out their rough spots. If they don’t, Obama’s trade agenda stalls. And for Democrats, giving the White House too much authority could undercut the centerpiece of the 2014 election argument — that they are the party that will deal with income inequality and help the middle class. That’s because many in their own party, especially grassroots activists and unions, blame flaws in previous grand trade deals like the North American Free Trade Agreement for siphoning off middle class jobs.
“We have had a trade deficit that has exceeded $350 billion every single year for the past 13 years. We have this enormous staggering problem with our economy called the continuing trade deficit, and this is a measure that would make that worse,” Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) said. “The classic example of this is NAFTA. NAFTA has managed to hurt American workers and Mexican workers at the same time.”
And most Democrats don’t think the pending TPP deal addresses numerous labor, environmental and other issues adequately. Like NAFTA, the TPP would empower foreign corporations to directly challenge the laws and regulations of a country before an international tribunal. Under other trade frameworks, like the World Trade Organization treaties, only nations themselves are permitted to bring trade cases before an international arbiter, meaning companies must first win support from a government before attacking a law. Exxon Mobil, Dow Chemical, Eli Lilly and other corporations have used NAFTA to attempt to overturn Canadian regulations regarding offshore oil drilling, fracking, pesticides, drug patents and other issues.
Progressives like Grayson have long been critical of free trade deals because of their empowerment of corporations. But even members of the House Democratic leadership who have traditionally supported such pacts are upset over the current deal and worried about its impact on their 2014 message.
“No one should believe that negotiations on TPP are over, because almost — again — all the key issues remain,” said Levin.
“Congress must have a robust role in the oversight of any trade deal,” said Rep. Steve Israel (D-N.Y.) chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. “I will continue working with my colleagues to ensure any trade deal reflects 21st century realities, protects the American worker and is only agreed to after adequate and necessary consultation with Congress.”
Still, boosting trade does fit into the Democrats’ agenda if it helps boost exports and create new jobs in America.
“We need to deal with trade. I don’t think there’s a member of Congress who isn’t pro-trade, but it’s got to be pro-American worker, pro-American consumer, pro-American business,” sai
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ep. Xavier Becerra (D-Calif.). “Otherwise, why are we opening up our markets to people if we’re going to get raped?”
Becerra and others acknowledge there is a great deal of pressure, in general, to take steps that promise economic growth with the economy still limping along and producing too few jobs. Crafting a trade deal that pleases their base, however, won’t come easily, and almost certainly not before the election, especially if the Obama administration offers Democrats little more than token input.
“This place doesn’t work on amorphous pressure. It works on touch-and-feel pressure. Unless we can come together on something that collectively, bipartisanly, we think can work, I think it’s going to be tough,” said Becerra. “It won’t be fast. It might be on a track, but it won’t be fast.”
Original article can be read here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/11/fast-track-trade-democrats_n_4580720.html