Well people, everything was rational and moving along nicely, even with the lies of James Hoffa and Todd Spencer clouding the issue, but they had to pay back the unions and stop the cross border program.
As we know, tariff’s was immediately instituted, American trucks ejected from the country of Mexico and a minor trade skirmish began.
This time though, Mexico is not going to sit back and be America’s lackey, taking whatever crumb the politicians throw to them in appeasement.
Today it was learned that Mexican President Felipe Calderon will urge President Barack Obama at a meeting this week to resolve a trade dispute by pushing Congress to allow Mexican trucks to deliver goods inside the U.S.
We’re not talking another silly ass little pilot project where at the direction of the Teamsters and others who have a history of demanding their political cronies throw roadblock in the way of our obligations.
We’re talking full access! Mexico’s government will ask Obama to allow all of the country’s 18-wheelers to operate across the border, Deputy Transportation Minister Humberto Trevino said in an interview.
“We don’t simply want to re-establish the pilot project we had, but to have a project with a lot more reach,” Trevino said. “We’re very optimistic that this will move forward.”
Mexico’s government sees an opportunity for opening access for its trucks because the Obama administration has shown a willingness to work on the issue, Trevino said. The government is also encouraged by a letter written last week by 140 U.S. business, food and agricultural organizations, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, urging Obama to resolve the dispute, he said.
“As they say colloquially, we feel a good vibe with respect to the issue,” Trevino said. Calderon and Obama are scheduled to meet in Mexico City on April 16 and 17.
“We’re looking for a complete opening in freight transportation,” Beatriz Leycegui, the Mexican economy ministry’s undersecretary for foreign commerce, said in an interview. “That’s what is in the treaty.”
U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said March 24 he would work to resolve the trucking dispute. Trade between the two countries totaled $368 billion in 2008, making Mexico the third-largest U.S. trading partner after Canada and China, according to Commerce Department data.
Perhaps people should have left well enough alone.
Former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk is Obama’s excellent choice for US Trade Representative
The choice of Ron Kirk as the nation’s top trade negotiator disappointed Barack Obama’s union supporters and left trade experts wondering Thursday how hard the president-elect will push against business interests in future deals.
Mr. Kirk, the former Dallas mayor and 2002 Senate nominee, is a pro-business Democrat who has been an outspoken booster of NAFTA and the benefits of free trade. But little is known about his views on forcing trading partners to abide by tougher labor and environmental standards, as Mr. Obama promised voters in Ohio and other Rust Belt states.
And it’s unclear if putting a free-trade advocate in the Cabinet as U.S. trade representative – the announcement of Mr. Kirk’s appointment is set for today in Chicago – means Mr. Obama is backing away from that vow. NAFTA has largely been beneficial for Texas, as trade with Mexico has fueled job growth.
“Not our first choice,” Thea Lee, policy director at the AFL-CIO, said of Mr. Kirk, noting that he has also dismayed unions by calling for normalized trade relations with China. “We have some concerns.”
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Cecilia Munoz Senior vice president for the research, advocacy and legislation at the National Council of La Raza (NCLR)Cecilia Munoz Senior vice president for the research, advocacy and legislation at the National Council of La Raza (NCLR)
President-elect Barack Obama has named a national Latina leader to a top White House staff job.
The Obama transition team today announced the selection of Cecilia Muñoz as his Director of the White House Office for Intergovernmental Affairs. That office directs White House outreach to state and local governments, as well as constituency groups.
The Detroit-born Muñoz currently serves as senior vice president for the research, advocacy and legislation at the National Council of La Raza (NCLR). She has been a prominent voice on civil rights issues, education and immigration.
Muñoz, 46, is the youngest of four children of parents who had moved to the Michigan from La Paz, Bolivia, so that her father, an automotive engineer, could attend the University of Michigan. Muñoz, who grew up in the Detroit suburb of Livonia, attended the University of Michigan and received degrees in English and Latin studies in 1984.
In addition to her La Raza post, she also is the board chair of Center for Community Change and serves on the U.S. Programs Board of the Open Society Institute and the Board of Directors of the Atlantic Philanthropies.
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"Senator Obama will stand with the Teamsters and do as I tell him to do when it comes to fighting against those mean MExican trucks," General President Jim Hoffa said
It was no surprise when FMCSA Administrator John Hill extended the Mexican Cross Border Program for another two years, thus beating the opposition at their own game.
You see, FMCSA has been calling it a “demonstration program” while the opposition called it a “pilot program” which operates under different requirements, requirements that FMCSA has met.
So John Hill, using the oppositions definition of the program, extends it to 3 years as is permitted for a “pilot program”, and Jimmy Hoffa is furious!
I’m mad as hell about it, but I’m not surprised. – Jimmy Hoffa -
What is Jimmy “mad as hell about? That all the money that has found it’s way into the hip pockets of his politicians hasn’t yielded the intended results? Maybe.
I think Jimmy is further pissed because Mexican law forbids him and his union from organizing in that country. Canada allows it and we don’t hear any objections from him about Canadian trucks.
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After the vote tallies are in from today’s primary elections in Texas and Ohio, the presidential candidates should stop talking about gutting international trade treaties.
Both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton supported the North American Free Trade Agreement when campaigning in Texas but promised Ohio voters that they would force Canada and Mexico to renegotiate NAFTA.
The reason for two positions on the same subject can be attributed to pandering for votes in Ohio, which has lost manufacturing jobs in recent years, whereas Texas’ economy has grown significantly since Congress approved the NAFTA treaty promoted by former President Clinton.
Since the three-nation trade agreement became law in 1993, manufacturing jobs have decreased. But that number had been decreasing since 1979.
Actually, U.S. manufacturing output has increased 66 percent since the NAFTA pact was signed, due to improved productivity, mainly from high-tech automation.
Since the signing of the Permanent Normalized Trade Relations pact with China in 2000, China, with wage costs below those in Mexico, has become a worldwide manufacturing giant, along with other Asian economies and India.
Once threats are made to go back on treaties with some nations, treaties with all nations are called into question. This is not the way to win trust and friendship among nations.
While campaigning in Texas, Hillary Clinton said NAFTA has benefited Texas, along with other parts of the nation.
Obama said any talk of repealing NAFTA was unrealistic since the loss of NAFTA “would actually result in more job loss . . . than job gains.”
A few days later both candidates told Ohio voters that they would pressure Canada and Mexico to renegotiate NAFTA’s labor and environmental provisions to better favor the United States.
Understandably, these campaign promises did not sit well with officials in Canada and Mexico. Canada’s trade minister said his country might renegotiate trade agreements that control oil and natural gas coming into the United States.
Mexico could demand new terms for agricultural trade that would hurt U.S. farmers and cost American jobs.
In the 15 years since NAFTA was approved, entire industries have been established that would be wrecked by initiating a process that unravels the three-nation agreement.
NAFTA’s labor and environmental provisions were negotiated by former President Clinton and are similar to agreements included in the more recently approved U.S.-Peru Trade Promotion Agreement.
Pulling out of NAFTA would devastate the economies along the U.S.-Mexico border, make the United States an unreliable trading partner and would do nothing to bring back manufacturing jobs to Ohio.
As the presidential campaign progresses, voters can only hope for less political rhetoric about trade and more political reality.
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