That's why they passed it in the dead of night, held the vote open until it passed, then quickly gavelled the proceedings closed as soon as it did.

7/28/2005 10:44:19 AM

YAY!!!!

7/28/2005 10:45:01 AM

Bravo! Thank god the senate has finally done something useful!
If only they could have cut out the 90% of CAFTA that has nothing to do with liberating trade.

7/28/2005 12:24:13 PM

fuck some fair trade. bring on the immigration!

7/28/2005 12:25:15 PM

You mean the House. I believe the Senate actually passed it with little difficulty, running 54 to 45.

7/28/2005 1:17:20 PM

It's just painful watching all the contortions of the anti-CAFTA Republicans like Walter Jones. On the one hand, brown-skinned immigrants are evil b/c "dey took ur jurbs!!1" (and they're all terrorists, don't pay taxes, let their chickens run loose in the yard, etc)...

...on the other hand, helping improve brown-skinned economies so brown-skinned immigrants don't come here is evil b/c "dey took ur jurbs!!1"

---

(as DirtyGreek and teh L3ft just get pissed b/c they can never get these things to include labor regulations above and beyond what we've got here in America...that and W keeps getting pretty much whatever he wants out of Congress)

[Edited on July 28, 2005 at 2:27 PM. Reason : terrorists / taxes / chickens / etc]

7/28/2005 2:25:10 PM

Quote :

"they can never get these things to include labor regulations above and beyond what we've got here in America"

?

Explain.

7/28/2005 2:32:35 PM

Have you seen some of the amendments that get offered on these free trade agreements?

Contrary to the DNC spin, we're not talking about "providing minimal labor and environmental standards" here...

7/28/2005 2:34:19 PM

^^^ I'm actually more pissed about the lack of environmental protections, but labor protections and human rights are also important. They just aren't in as much trouble as the environment when it comes to these kinds of agreements.

if what nafta or cafta did really just promote "free trade" and did nothing else, it'd be better, but as they stand these agreements are set up to allow business free reign over the people and places they are now able to have access to, and almost promote bad human rights and environmental practices

[Edited on July 28, 2005 at 2:42 PM. Reason : .]

7/28/2005 2:42:31 PM

I think he is talking about the lefts insistance upon implementing something they call "fair trade" instead of "free trade" which is what people traditionally think of.

Fair trade would place environmental and labor restrictions on our trading partners. Republicans argue that placing such draconian restrictions on undeveloped economies would be detrimental.

7/28/2005 2:43:11 PM

draconian?

did you just call protecting the environment and people of a foreign country where yo uset up a business draconian?

i'm pretty sure that the whole idea of something being draconian is that it's old fashioned and terrible, not that it's progressive and protects people and wildlife.

[Edited on July 28, 2005 at 2:52 PM. Reason : .]

7/28/2005 2:51:41 PM

Quote :

"DirtyGreek: if what nafta or cafta did really just promote "free trade" and did nothing else, it'd be better"

You realize that would mean not putting in those labor and environmental regulations, right?

Since an agreement that "just promote[d] 'free trade'" would only involve tariff reductions...

7/28/2005 2:52:39 PM

Quote :

"I think he is talking about the lefts insistance upon implementing something they call "fair trade" instead of "free trade" which is what people traditionally think of."

Actually dumkopf, when people think of free-trade, they are actually thinking of fair-trade.

7/28/2005 2:54:06 PM

yeah, free trade is "Trade between nations without protective customs tariffs." that's all free trade means.

if you aren't instituting "fair trade," then you're instituting unfair trade.

7/28/2005 2:57:12 PM

Quote :

"...on the other hand, helping improve brown-skinned economies so brown-skinned immigrants don't come here is evil b/c "dey took ur jurbs!!1""

Explain to me how TRIPS and competition with subsidized US agriculture will help central American economies.

7/28/2005 3:23:17 PM

^

Quote :

"GoldenViper: Explain to me how TRIPS and competition with subsidized US agriculture will help central American economies."

Beyond the spin, you're telling me CAFTA won't improve Central American economies right? just wanted to clarify that before continuing.

---

Quote :

"DirtyGreek: if you aren't instituting "fair trade," then you're instituting unfair trade."

Paging Gamecat to do the even-handedness thing here in the spirit of the "On the use of sarcasm" thread...

[Edited on July 28, 2005 at 3:33 PM. Reason : ---]

7/28/2005 3:32:02 PM

um, it seems to me that NAFTA wasnt exactly a run-away success, why bother with another free trade plan?

7/28/2005 3:34:43 PM

Quote :

"Beyond the spin, you're telling me CAFTA won't improve Central American economies right? just wanted to clarify that before continuing."

Dodge much? But yes, I'm saying the losses from TRIPS and US subsidies could easily outweigh the gains from increased trade.

It's certainly not going to cause growth to take off in central America... just look at growth in Mexico after NAFTA. It's still shit.

7/28/2005 3:35:21 PM

Quote :

"GoldenViper: Dodge much?"

No, not at all. Just wanted to make sure you got pinned down to your response, b/c I know you people on teh L3ft like to come back after-the-fact to amend your answers.

---

Quote :

"GoldenViper: But yes, I'm saying the losses from TRIPS and US subsidies could easily outweigh the gains from increased trade."

1) you make it sound like the US has a monopoly in IP...

2) trade is a two-way street, competition is not direct. there's a reason, just using one example, why we still export US Flags even as we import several orders of magnitude more from China.

3) do we even have a trade surplus with anyone?

4) if we accept that US agriculture subsidies (which aren't universal across all crops btw) are a factor, and that comparable subsidies also are not provided by the receiving country, where does the spare money go that the receiving country's customers would no longer be paying for their food?

---

Quote :

"GoldenViper: It's certainly not going to cause growth to take off in central America... just look at growth in Mexico after NAFTA. It's still shit."

Because there are no other factors at all influencing Mexico's economic growth, of course...

7/28/2005 3:54:21 PM

^and they are?

i hate when people say something like that and dont give the proof.

you fail thus far.

7/28/2005 3:55:45 PM

Quote :

"Luigi: ^and they are? i hate when people say something like that and dont give the proof. you fail thus far."

You're kidding, right?

7/28/2005 3:59:32 PM

um, no you fucktard, im interested in the subject and would like to see the factors that you mentioned. this isnt some kind of stupid leftist insult.

give me the damn facts. i dont know a ton about this. all i said was that it doesnt seem that NAFTA has been a success.

7/28/2005 4:02:12 PM

Quote :

"you make it sound like the US has a monopoly in IP..."

So TRIPS won't cost central American governments and people money? They could end up paying for tons of stuff that can currently make on the cheap. And the goverment has to pay for enforcement and so on...

Quote :

"if we accept that US agriculture subsidies (which aren't universal across all crops btw) are a factor,"

Pretty everyone accepts that are a factor... especially folks in rural Mexico...

Quote :

"where does the spare money go that the receiving country's customers would no longer be paying for their food?"

Yeah, that's true. I guess in my economics book it said trading with someone with subsidies was always a good thing. But it still could end costing many farmers their jobs...

Quote :

"Because there are no other factors at all influencing Mexico's economic growth, of course..."

Of course there are other factors, but there's very little evidence to suggest that NAFTA was a success, and even it was a success, it was a very minor one.

7/28/2005 4:03:52 PM

yeah, this all seems pointless to me.

If NAFTA didnt do what it was supposed to do, then why start another plan?

7/28/2005 4:05:07 PM

haha I haven't had someone call me a "fucktard" since high school...

taking your post in good faith though, Luigi, among other things you've got:

1) high levels of corruption in the government at-large that hold back business investment and entrepreneurship;

2) equally high levels of corruption in the judiciary;

3) equally high levels of corruption in the police force, including police-sponsored kidnappings for ransom;

4) dozens of state-run enterprises left over from Mexico's Communist days, particularly in the electric and telecommunications sectors;

5) a poorly educated and unskilled labor force and a poor educational system;

6) broken-down physical infrastructure, including an inability to provide guaranteed water supplies in a number of states (one of the political lessons right here in the Triangle is that water reigns supreme when it comes to business, that's why you've got people buying water rights from the City of Raleigh);

7) exploding population growth straining the few resources that do exist.

etc. Arguing that NAFTA is a failure b/c Mexico can't get it's shit together is intellectually dishonest at best, wrong at worst (although I try not to expect much more from GoldenViper so I probably shouldn't bitch).

[Edited on July 28, 2005 at 4:14 PM. Reason : ---]

7/28/2005 4:12:42 PM

Quote :

"although I try not to expect much more from GoldenViper so I probably shouldn't bitch"

Wow, you didn't last long. It's been a while for you, hasn't it?

If you asserting that NAFTA has helped, then you must also be asserting that growth would have worse if NAFTA had not passed. How much worse? You realize there's only so long you can go here... The effect of NAFTA on growth was likely negligible. And CAFTA has TRIPS stuff too, so...

It's funny, though, of the folks I went down to Mexico with, I had, by far, the most respect for trade and captialism... got me into trouble, too...

7/28/2005 4:24:09 PM

Quote :

"GoldenViper: So TRIPS won't cost central American governments and people money? They could end up paying for tons of stuff that can currently make on the cheap. And the goverment has to pay for enforcement and so on..."

Not to repeat myself, but you make it sound like the US has a monopoly in IP...

Enforcing IP rights costs American government and people money too, but I don't see many folks arguing it's a net loss for us.

---

Quote :

"GoldenViper: Yeah, that's true. I guess in my economics book it said trading with someone with subsidies was always a good thing."

Quote :

"GoldenViper: Dodge much?"

---

Quote :

"GoldenViper: Of course there are other factors, but there's very little evidence to suggest that NAFTA was a success, and even it was a success, it was a very minor one."

So how are we measuring the success of a free trade agreement? If the idea is to liberalize trade, wouldn't actually liberizing trade be illustration of "a success"?

7/28/2005 4:32:37 PM

Quote :

"GoldenViper: Wow, you didn't last long."

How's that?

---

Quote :

"GoldenViper: It's been a while for you, hasn't it?"

Debating with you? Yes.

Debating with the anti-free market left? No.

---

Quote :

"GoldenViper: If you asserting that NAFTA has helped, then you must also be asserting that growth would have worse if NAFTA had not passed. How much worse? You realize there's only so long you can go here... The effect of NAFTA on growth was likely negligible."

So was it actually negligible, or just likely negligible?

And if it was actually negligible, why oppose it so vehemently? Why not just let the capitalists sleep better at night, with you knowing everything else will stay as pure and untouched as the wind-driven snow?

---

Quote :

"GoldenViper: It's funny, though, of the folks I went down to Mexico with, I had, by far, the most respect for trade and captialism... got me into trouble, too..."

That's not exactly saying much.

Out of the folks I went down to Mexico with, I had by far the most respect for trade and capitalism too. Most of the natives I actually met in Mexico seemed to have a taste for it also.

7/28/2005 4:38:16 PM

why not try a more fair trade policy in some cases to save some of these 3rd world economies? is it because you have proof that it wont work, or do you just have such a hard-on for capitalism that you dont want to think about it?

i mean, yes, there are more factors that cause desperate situations (leaders for one). but how is free trade going to help solve that? i mean, what can you do about them? not much, so why not try to benefit them in whatever small way you can?

7/28/2005 4:43:59 PM

Quote :

"Luigi: why not try a more fair trade policy in some cases to save some of these 3rd world economies? is it because you have proof that it wont work, or do you just have such a hard-on for capitalism that you dont want to think about it?"

Ah, so you are part of the fringe L3ft. Didn't realize that earlier, otherwise I would have stuck with the "You're kidding, right?" response...

Where exactly has "fair trade" worked?

---

Quote :

"Luigi: i mean, yes, there are more factors that cause desperate situations (leaders for one). but how is free trade going to help solve that? i mean, what can you do about them? not much, so why not try to benefit them in whatever small way you can?"

Political and economic liberty are both prerequisites for prosperity. They're also interminably linked; you can't have one without the other for a substantial length of time.

Ergo, opening up economic activity is one of the best options to increase living standards and inculcate democracy (next to overthrowing a government like we did in Iraq of course... )

7/28/2005 4:50:27 PM

where exactly has fair trade not worked? should growers in one country be allowed to dominate a market while growers in another struggle to get by.

i mean, its one thing to read textbooks and watch tv, its another thing to actually experience what is going on. i dont believe anyone here is an authority on that.

fringe left? i guess. im a social libertarian (social in the sense that i dont believe in the totally free world market as a solution) liberal? yes, positive progress is natural and should be welcomed. i dont vote in national elections, so i dont matter, really. never had anyone to vote for.

i like guns, i dont hunt, i like the environment, and i dont like government.

anyway, im through with politics for now. carry on.

ps: ill agree with you on this point:

go Red Hat 9

[Edited on July 28, 2005 at 5:01 PM. Reason : .]

7/28/2005 4:57:35 PM

"Fair Trade" has not worked because the 3rd world governments that it was offered to said "Hell No" and walked out of the room. The governments of these countries sayed that they would never sign away their sovereignty on such important matters as labor and environmental regulation.

You see, if the US signed a "fair trade" deal with Mexico, it would set minimum allowable labor and environmental standards in a country ill-equiped to implement them. In a country where much of the work-force is unemployed the last think you want to do is make it harder for companies to hire workers. Yet, this is exactly what "Fair Traders" want to inflict upon them.

7/28/2005 5:09:02 PM

^
just to tack on to that, Western & Central Europe is pretty much one big example of the marvels of "fair trade"

7/28/2005 5:35:18 PM

um....ok. theyre sure looking terrible.

IF IT AINT MURRICA IT AINT GOOD

7/28/2005 5:43:24 PM

Quote :

"TGD: Have you seen some of the amendments that get offered on these free trade agreements?"

Nope. That's why I was asking for some explanation.

7/28/2005 5:49:50 PM

Quote :

"Not to repeat myself, but you make it sound like the US has a monopoly in IP..."

Have you ever looked at the predicted losses from TRIPS? Often one to twenty percent of GDP...

Quote :

"Enforcing IP rights costs American government and people money too, but I don't see many folks arguing it's a net loss for us."

http://www.cepr.net

Quote :

"So how are we measuring the success of a free trade agreement? If the idea is to liberalize trade, wouldn't actually liberizing trade be illustration of "a success"?"

Depends what your goal. I'd prefer growth without trade to trade without growth.

Quote :

"And if it was actually negligible, why oppose it so vehemently? Why not just let the capitalists sleep better at night, with you knowing everything else will stay as pure and untouched as the wind-driven snow?"

You realize this goes both ways, right? Also, while the overall effect on growth amounts to very little, it hurts certains quite a bit (and, of course, also helps certain groups quite a bit). Perhaps I think the groups it hurts are more worthy than the groups it helps. And CAFTA has TRIPS tacked on, which makes me quite nervous...

Quote :

"Most of the natives I actually met in Mexico seemed to have a taste for it also."

Uh uh... yeah, NAFTA is real popular down there.

Obviously I got a biased sample, but the folks I met weren't big fans of US genetically modified corn, to put it mildy. Others said NAFTA was bad for labor movements and so on...

Btw, when I so much as suggested that the folks at Cato might - just might - be right about Mexico, that more "opening up" was needed, my Latin American history prof laughed in my face. I'm not nearly as "anti-free trade" as some folks.

I don't hate freedom, I just mildly dislike it.

7/28/2005 6:05:55 PM

What are we going to be able to sell to Guatamalans who make $2/day? CAFTA is just another dildo stuck into the ass of the US worker.

[Edited on July 28, 2005 at 10:11 PM. Reason : US]

7/28/2005 10:11:33 PM

Geez, you guys should hear yourselves. Either CAFTA will hurt Americans or it will hurt hondurans. Pick one.

If they cannot afford American, then they will not import anything. If they cannot compete against Americans, then we will not import anything. Nothing happens! So why object to CAFTA if its effects are NIL?

7/28/2005 11:22:24 PM

I see, so it can't hurt both? Or some of each? Mostly hondurans and not much americans?

black

white

i see.

7/28/2005 11:23:30 PM

Sure it could, but none of you have said it that way.
pryderi says it is "just another dildo stuck into the ass of the US worker," saying nothing about 3rd worlders.

GoldenViper says it has devastated the Mexican economy, but very little about Americans.

7/28/2005 11:30:32 PM

Quote :

"DirtyGreek: I see, so it can't hurt both? Or some of each? Mostly hondurans and not much americans? black white i see."

Quote :

"DirtyGreek: if you aren't instituting "fair trade," then you're instituting unfair trade."

[/irony]

---

Quote :

"Luigi: um....ok. theyre sure looking terrible. IF IT AINT MURRICA IT AINT GOOD"

more like "can beat 'Murrica' on at most a handful of benchmarks by teeny tiny margins in exchange for rampant unemployment, sky high taxes, and general impotence"

GoldenViper and I already had this long debate in a thread replete with OECD statistics, CIA factbook references and all kinds of other shit. Yes, Western & Central Europe (excluding the UK, and maybe Scandinavia depending how far you want to lower the bar) look pretty fucking terrible compared to us.

---

Quote :

"Gamecat: Nope. That's why I was asking for some explanation."

Well yeah I had a feeling, that's why I tacked on the explanation after the rhetorical question

[Edited on July 28, 2005 at 11:35 PM. Reason : ---]

7/28/2005 11:34:19 PM

GoldenViper: are you seriously citing CEPR? That's like me pulling out some Cato white papers and calling it a day...

---

Quote :

"GoldenViper: Depends what your goal. I'd prefer growth without trade to trade without growth."

wtf is up with you lefties and all the false dilemmas floating around? Just a few months ago it was the conservatives always resorting to the weak fallacies...

7/28/2005 11:38:17 PM

this one NC rep said he talked with the president about voting against cafta, and he said that his grandma worked in a textile factory, and when he hears women textile workers telling him to vote against it, it's like his mawmaw talking to him.

7/29/2005 12:19:41 AM

tgd,

Quote :

"DirtyGreek: if you aren't instituting "fair trade," then you're instituting unfair trade."

is not black and white, and you know it.

If something is not fair, it's unfair. That's not black and white, it's english. Also, it was meant to be more sarcastic than serious, but it's true, is it not? If something's not fair, can you give me an explanation of how it's not unfair?

Quote :

"Either CAFTA will hurt Americans or it will hurt hondurans. Pick one. "

That is, however, black and white. There can be an inbetween there, can there not? CAFTA could hurt both americans and hondurans, or it could hurt just one or the other, or it could hurt mainly hondurans but hurt some americans as well.

I'm sure you know this, because your trolling is getting completely obvious.

[Edited on July 29, 2005 at 8:57 AM. Reason : .]

7/29/2005 8:55:50 AM

or it could help both

7/29/2005 9:06:32 AM

well yeah, it could do that too. I didn't leave that out on purpose, I was just taking the original wording of "either it hurts one or the other"

7/29/2005 10:37:10 AM

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/07/index.html#007241

Quote :

" The 217 to 215 vote came just after midnight, in a dramatic finish that highlighted the intensity brought by both sides to the battle. When the usual 15-minute voting period expired at 11:17 p.m., the no votes outnumbered the yes votes by 180 to 175, with dozens of members undeclared. House Republican leaders kept the voting open for another 47 minutes, furiously rounding up holdouts in their own party until they had secured just enough to ensure approval. Let’s pause for a moment to recall, for the umpteenth time, the centerpiece of the old Republican minority’s critique of the pre-1994 Democratic majority’s arrogance and abuse of power: Speaker Jim Wright’s 1987 move to hold the voting period open another 15 minutes to round up a straggling Democratic vote on a bill, a then-unprecedented extension of the voting time that a certain congressman Dick Cheney called “the greatest abuse of democracy” he’d ever seen. "

I did a bit of research on that vote and found

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/899.html

Turns out that the actual quote from Cheney was "the most arrogant, heavy-handed abuse of power I've ever seen in the 10 years that I've been here." What happened was this:

Quote :

"Once a bill is prepared for a floor vote, the House traditionally sets a 15-minute limit for voting. When it came time for the floor vote for the Medicare bill, the Dems initially won — 216 members had voted for the bill, while 218 had voted against it. But instead of banging the gavel and marking the end of voting, Republican leaders ignored traditional House procedures and extended the voting window to three hours, leaving plenty of time to strong-arm GOP members who were inclined to vote against it and force Republicans who had voted with the Dems to change their votes. (In 1987, when then-House Speaker Jim Wright (D-Tex.) kept a floor vote open an extra 15 minutes in a similar stunt, Republicans acted as if he had shredded the Constitution."

I'm sure Cheney, now our VP, will quickly denounce Tom Delay's similar action as an abuse of power as well.

7/29/2005 11:17:09 AM

waaaaah kind of like democrats changing their story on questioning supreme court nominees huh

7/29/2005 11:37:47 AM

you're kind of new, so let me give you a leg up here

i dislike the fucking democrats, too. they just happen to not be in power right now

so yes

just like that

[Edited on July 29, 2005 at 11:38 AM. Reason : .]

7/29/2005 11:38:47 AM

yea i'm sure that if the democrats were in power you'd be as hostile to them as you are to the republicans

7/29/2005 11:43:39 AM