I too was against NAFTA, and Ross Perot said it best, about the "Giant sucking sound" what NAFTA would create and he also explaind how our tax revenues would be diminished.

So don't blame Clinton alone, the American people didn't vote for Perot.

There was an another aspect of the NAFTA rush.

Maybe, someone else can find out.

But my recollection of the times. suggested that the US had to act. The Japanese and others were salivating at the prospect of setting up bases of opportuities in cheap laboring countries.

Imagine for example if Japan was able to bring manufacturing jobs to Mexico, the population would be buying goods produced and benefitting Japan. Japan in turn having fewer costs in delivery to the US market. Distance to market?

On the flip side America rushes a bad agreement, because it forsees the eventuallity, and determines that it is in America's best interest, to have American equipment being placed in Mexico. Buying replacement parts from American concerns. rather than from an outpost of Japan called Mexico.

It is very much a catch 22 with no good answer.

Unless America wants to Isolate herself and say's "no more imports, and the rest of the World tells us where to shove our exports

Posted at February 23, 2008 8:57 PM in response to Sen. Clinton Tries To Disown NAFTA? Good Luck.

Todd,
I may be to cynical, but who really benefitted from this story?

Could this be the reason Huckabee is still in the race, knowing that this story, may have an impact after all?

or could it be a deliberate plant to create a sympathy vote, for the "Survivor"

(Johnny (FairPlay)) McCain.

(For those unfamilar with the TV show "Survivor", a contestant named Johnny Fairplay, told the other members that his poor grandmother had passed away, creating sympathy, amongst the group of jurist. Eventually being exposed as having lied, planting the story for symapthy)

Posted at February 22, 2008 5:33 PM in response to For the Times, Self-Doubt on Image Poses Its Own Risk

Todd

I know how you feel, because that’s how I felt, but this is what I found. I truly believe that the majority of Americans have become arrogant; they don’t care about much, except their own selfish gain.

The media is the tool by the powers to entertain only, or to misdirect people’s minds off of reality.

It takes less effort to be clueless. People really don’t care. Mind you there are some very concerned citizens who moan and groan at what passes as vital information, but the majority are lazy, satisfied with complaining, but never finding a solution. For lack of commitment, to finding out the truth, constantly mislead by liars, leading to the end of their existence. Going so far as to mock the truth or find sport in ridiculing those who tell the truth.

The Mainstream media has the same attitude as Col. Nathan Jessup (Jack Nicholson), the base commander in the movie “A Few Good Men”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You_can%27t_handle_the_truth

Jessup: You can't handle the truth! Son, we live in a world that has walls. And those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You?…… You have the luxury of not knowing what I know:…… ...You don't want the truth….. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom I provide, then questions the manner in which I provide it! I'd rather you just said thank you and went on your way………

Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you're entitled to! "

That Todd, is mainstream media, they don’t give a damn.

Posted at January 20, 2008 7:58 PM in response to A Pause for a Meta Moment

History is repeating itself. During the Hoover administration the nation was on the precipice and were looking to the Congress to head off the inevitable collapse of the Economic engine, that made the American dream possible.

But the Republicans would not intervene, in fact the Chambers of Commerce, wrote a letter to President Hoover and in no uncertain terms told him that Government needed to stay out of the Free market.

6 months later the Chicago Mercantile, wrote to Hoover expressing concern that things were worse than expected and that immediate action be taken. To no avail

Early response Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon advised President Hoover that shock treatment would be the best response: "Liquidate labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate the farmers, liquidate real estate.... That will purge the rottenness out of the system. High costs of living and high living will come down. People will work harder, live a more moral life. Values will be adjusted, and enterprising people will pick up the wrecks from less competent people."[15] Hoover rejected this advice, not believing government should directly aid the people, but insisted instead on "voluntary cooperation" between business and government.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_great_depression#Federal_Reserve_Chairman_Marriner_Eccles:_Inequality_of_Wealth_and_Income

Marriner S. Eccles who served as Franklin Roosevelt’s Chairman of the Federal Reserve from November, 1934 to February, 1948 detailed what he believed caused the Depression in his memoirs, Beckoning Frontiers (New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1951):

Speaking of distribution of wealth

"Instead of achieving that kind of distribution, a giant suction pump had by 1929-30 drawn into a few hands an increasing portion of currently produced wealth. This served them as capital accumulations. But by taking purchasing power out of the hands of mass consumers, the savers denied to themselves the kind of effective demand for their products that would justify a reinvestment of their capital accumulations in new plants. In consequence, as in a poker game where the chips were concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, the other fellows could stay in the game only by borrowing. When their credit ran out, the game stopped. We sustained high levels of employment in that period with the aid of an exceptional expansion of debt outside of the banking system. This debt was provided by the large growth of business savings as well as savings by individuals, particularly in the upper-income groups where taxes were relatively low. Private debt outside of the banking system increased about fifty per cent. This debt, which was at high interest rates, largely took the form of mortgage debt on housing, office, and hotel structures, consumer installment debt, brokers' loans, and foreign debt. The stimulation to spending by debt-creation of this sort was short-lived and could not be counted on to sustain high levels of employment for long periods of time. Had there been a better distribution of the current income from the national product -- in other words, had there been less savings by business and the higher-income groups and more income in the lower groups -- we should have had far greater stability in our economy. ……speculation been distributed to the public as lower prices or higher wages and with less profits to the corporations and the well-to-do, it would have prevented or greatly moderated the economic collapse that began at the end of 1929.

It's not RECESSION we should fear, it's DEPRESSION 

STOP SHIPPING OUR JOBS OVERSEES!

STOP SHIPPING OUR JOBS OVERSEES!

STOP SHIPPING OUR JOBS OVERSEES!

All my screaming will be to no avail, Mad as hell, and I got to take it.

If America goes into a depression will we then, STOP SHIPPING OUR JOBS OVERSEES!

Posted at January 19, 2008 8:28 PM in response to Where Did the Recession Trigger Go?

Notice too, that the Republicans, prior to today’s press releases, were seeking further tax cuts. Now evidently that’s off the table.

Where are all the gurus who claimed 6 years ago that the tax cuts would, bring economic prosperity to America, but oops! They forgot to tell you, that sometime in the future, economic Armageddon, would be upon the US economy.

Now the Democrats want to ingest money to the poor and middle class, the Republicans want to help businesses.

The Republicans just don’t get it. So a restaurant owner decides to buy a new dishwasher, a manufacturing plant decides to buy a new piece of equipment. But if consumer confidence doesn’t rise, those expenditures will have been a waste of money. Those pieces of equipment will be sold for 10 cents on the dollar at the next auction.

Get back to basic priorities; people are now strapped, and are readjusting buying principles. The smart consumer is recognizing, the difference between needs and wants.
Without the consumer, business fails. Ask the retailer.

We are always questioning which is first, labor or business? Chicken or the egg?
Labor first, business second.
Suspend all trade agreements detrimental to the US economy. America first.

I see a direct link with the fears the Fed has about inflation. It’s easy to see, who’ll rape the consumer again and again though. The oil companies, along with the petrol-chemical industry will squeeze every last dime out of fuel and packaging materials.

Unless we come together, as a Nation, represented openly and not by secrecy with Dick Cheney as our representative, and address our dependence on energy. The oil companies will bleed us dry.

This recovery will fail to achieve anything but a quick fix, needing more infusions. The foundation is shaking. and our government is looking for the whitewash.

Posted at January 17, 2008 8:23 PM in response to Where Did the Recession Trigger Go?

BOOKMARK

Posted at December 18, 2007 3:11 PM in response to Greenspan Spins the Housing Bubble

Greenspan had to keep his mouth shut, he had a boss.

$440 billion$ for Iraq, and the President convincing the American people tax cuts are what are needed, an electorate so dumb they put him in power and his cohorts twice!!!!

Posted at September 28, 2007 4:38 AM in response to Alan Greenspan: Ultimate Hedge Man

This Bush Administration is a mirrored image of the Hoover Administration, whose slow and ideological government inaction, brought us the Great Depression.

Stupidity. According to Bush just as Hoover, they both suggested it would be improper role of government to bail out speculation in the market place.

That's like cutting off your nose to spite you're face.

Just like the Great Depression, the banks and the rich will own everything, since we won't have a steady workforce maybe we all could sell pencils and learn to make tomato soup from catsup. Just as the let them "Eat Cake"Nancy Reagan said, catsup was a vegetable.

America reaped what it sowed, put a Republican in office and watch out.

The Rich will benefit from the impending financial crisis, why would they do otherwise. Lower wages, the poor clamoring for less government Regulations like clean air and clean water, because it interferes with job creation.

Cynical? or Planned Domination?

Posted at September 3, 2007 8:54 PM in response to Being the Fed Means Never Having To Say You’re Sorry

Why now? Could it be that the Republican lites = Democrats = = CAPITALISTS have reached an agreement. Throw Gonzalez under the bus and we'll bluster and act outraged, to appeal to our Democratic base.

Besides; the Capitalistic Dems, are just as concerned about homegrown terrorists, that they agree that surveillance of WTO activists, and a possible revolt, by middle class Americans, who might become radical, as many lose their homes and jobs, and Social Security blanket destroyed, an Iraq war taking (costing) billions.

Gonzalez departure is the equivalent of gladitorial bloodletting. Refocusing attention off of lazy and self serving Senators and Aristocrats. who really want to spy and control the masses, for fear the upheaval, could bring them down, from their superior positions.

Gonzalez is the red meat, but no real loss to those in control.

So Gonzalez resigns, does he receive a pension?

Posted at August 27, 2007 10:46 AM in response to Fredo Open Thread

I have no degrees; I am just another American worker trying to put food on the table. Trying to instill in my children the importance of education.

I can relate with certainty, about my experience with hordes of undocumented workers who flooded across the southern Border States.

As a young entrepreneur, I enjoyed landscaping, designs and projects. When I started my own business, I was thrilled at doing what I liked and could expect to be rewarded for all my hard work.

I quickly found out, that my competitors would resort to unfair labor practices.

Someone many years ago opened my eyes to the relationship of Time and money.
The question that made me aware, that I was in a losing battle, as a startup company.

Question? Would you rather have 1 man (myself) giving 100% of the effort, working the business. Or 100 people giving 1%?

I learned how unscrupulous businesses could hire undocumented workers by the hundreds, could undercut my bids for contracts, even at a loss, to drive me out of business, because I wouldn’t hire slaves.

A Government who ignored, an economic system based on slavery.

Reflecting on how Christians could turn a blind eye to the slave traders, who allowed Africans to come to America and do jobs Americans wouldn’t do, Pick the cotton, toil in the fields, sub par living standards, definitely low wages. Rationalizing that the poor slave was better off in America, despite his captivity.

And today how these poor Undocumented are coming to America, for a better life.

A President and followers who preach, Loudly, They do jobs, American workers won’t do. Sound Familiar? Will slaves do the jobs, Americans won’t do?

If Americans refuse to do a particular job, because of the low wage, or possible health effects. Are proponents saying, if Americans won't do the job, give it to some immigrant? He knows no better? They can be exploited?

How could America have allowed slavery to exist in the first place? Easily, look at how it is returning, Economic exploitation.

Our leaders, Political and economic, see one thing only. Bottom line. Oh, they believe in the Golden Rule alright. He that controls the gold, Rules.

Posted at May 31, 2007 3:49 AM in response to Is Immigration a Middle Class Issue?