For keeping our Longshoreman busy offloading all of those shipping containers:
http://www.htsol.com/Photos/ContainerYard.jpg
For keeping the teamsters busy transporting them:
http://www.gatewaylogistics.biz/images/Truck%20Container%20Picture.jpg
For keeping the rail lines packed with them:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2333/2083729196_a96bd67e5a.jpg
For the chance to store them once emptied of foreign goods as there is no point in returning them with nothing in them:
http://www.gatekeeperusainc.com/wp-content/themes/livingos-upsilon-20/smoothgall ery/images/gatekeeper/port-shipping-containers.jpg
But most of all for our factory workers and their families:
http://www.ridenbaugh.com/photo/DignityVillage006.jpg
If we are stuck with them, maybe we should put them to good use:
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1427/1406431849_7e93d3082e.jpg

But that would be adding insult to injury. The factory worker put out of work by lower labor costs from overseas given a house to live in made of those same containers that carried the goods here that put him or her out of work.

Ok, Ok....that's the grim side. I know there are a few positives but this is what comes to mind about the current US trade system. The head corporate schmucks make more money all while layoff's at plant's are putting people on the streets. I say reinstate some trade tarriff's and make our US workforce once again employed.

All of this is of course MHO and the way I see it.

Counterpoints?? Agreement??

I'm far from being an economist, but with the dollar falling so dramatically in value, aren't we headed for cheap labor in the US compared to the rest of the world? Is the pendulum swinging back to where the rest of the world buys our goods because their currency buys so much more of it?

I'll add, without embellishment, that I have always been opposed to NAFTA. I never could see how we could win. I'm with Ross Perot's original statement "that giant sucking sound you hear is our jobs being sucked out of the country".

NAFTA and all these free-trade agreements are all bi-partisan piles of shit.

Yeah they help - they help every other nation that is in the agreement with us.

Deane - the problem is, even with our dollar falling to record lows in value, that it is STILL cheaper for these corporations to produce the product overseas, ship it here, distribute it and sell it here than it is to make it here. There is no tariff whatsoever on the product that a US company made overseas to sell here, and there is NO penalty on that US company whatsoever. They avoid billions in income and payroll taxes paid to the federal, state and local level, they avoid workmans comp insurance and other fees and insurance, they avoid paying wages here when they pay pennies comparatively in other countries ... and to be honest, how much lower is that retail price to the consumer? And at what cost IS that "lower" price if people don't have the types of jobs here that can afford them the luxury of those products?

It's a big giant cycle of crap. I want to hear ANY AND ALL of the candidates address this. NAFTA, GATT, all of these free-trade treaties need to be burned at the stake.

Mr. Clinton helped push NAFTA through...now Mrs. Clinton is trying to distance her prior support of it.

Herb

Herb, as usual, you're a tad cloudy on your facts about NAFTA:

NAFTA was initially pursued by politicians in the United States and Canada supportive of free trade, led by Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, U.S. President George H. W. Bush, and the Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari. The three countries signed NAFTA in December 1992, subject to ratification by the legislatures of the three countries. There was considerable opposition in all three countries. In the United States, NAFTA was able to secure passage after Bill Clinton made its passage a major legislative priority in 1993. Since the agreement had been signed by Bush under his fast-track prerogative, Clinton did not alter the original agreement, but complemented it with the aforementioned NAAEC and NAALC. After intense political debate and the negotiation of these side agreements, the U.S. House of Representatives passed NAFTA on November 17, 1993, by 234-200 vote (132 Republicans and 102 Democrats voting in favor; 43 Republicans, 156 Democrats, and 1 independent against),[7] and the U.S. Senate passed it on the last day of its 1993 session, November 20, 1993, by 61-38 vote (34 Republicans and 27 Democrats voting in favor; 10 Republicans and 28 Democrats against, with 1 Democrat opponent not voting -- Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND), an ardent foe of NAFTA, missed the vote because of an illness in his family).[8]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Free_Trade_Agreement

http://www.multied.com/Documents/Clinton/SigningNaFTA.html

Cloudy?

Nice try.

Herb

Are you immune to the truth? Clinton doesn't create the law, Congress does.

The only thing that's cloudy is how you can solely blame Clinton when GHW Bush pursued it, and GOP members of both houses supported it more than the Democrat members did BEFORE it reached Clinton's desk.

How many times in one day can you get your ass handed to you? Next time, come armed with facts or STFU.

Ya, Herb. Can't you understand? Anything bad that happens is the Republicans fault and anything good is the Democrats doing.

"Clinton doesn't create the law, Congress does."

What weasel words.

You want it both ways.

When your impotent democrat-led congress can't do the job, it's blame Bush.

When your slick democrat president signs into law something that hurts workers, it's blame congress.

What a sick and pathetic joke.

Zell Miller is right. The democrats are a national party no more. Exactly for reasons like this.

November can't come too soon.

Mr. Rove will be tan, rested and ready.

Spin on you leftists.

Herb

"November can't come too soon."

Be careful what you wish for.

Despite the current distraction caused by a real contest between two qualified candidates that their constituencies support, when we get to the real race the Democratic nominee will have no trouble pointing out that McSame is just four more years of the shrub, whose negative rating is even higher than Hillary's.

So fantasize about the overturn of Roe v Wade all you want, Herb. It's not going to happen. All this brou-ha-ha over whom the Democratic candidate will be is just a distraction. Bush's failures have doomed the McSame candidacy not because of anything more than McSame's flip flop from positions that would have made him a viable choice to positions that will be overwhelmingly rejected by both halves of the Democratic party.
And don't bore me with your pointing out April polls about who won't vote Democratic if its not their choice on the ballot. That's not going to last once the nominee is in place. Dream on Herb.
Dream on.

Absolutely.

We all know what happens when we vote for Republicans.

"a real contest between two qualified candidates"

Now that's reaching a bit.

No, it's not reaching at all. Compared to the lack of accomplishments the Republican party has produced, the future under new leadership will not be easy, but it will take us off this course of disaster shrub has led us into.

Yeah, isn't it just great how low the bar has been lowered by the Republicans?

Qualified isn't saying much these days is it Deane?

Guys, Bush isn't running. How hard is that to understand.

"Bush isn't running."

That's an easy co-op. Not running, not responsible.

You and Herb seem to enjoy the same liquid refreshment under the old oak tree I see.

I wish shrub would pull a Nixon and just get the hell out of Dodge!

And don't bore me with your pointing out April polls about who won't vote Democratic if its not their choice on the ballot. That's not going to last once the nominee is in place.

Actually, Andy, I heard them mention this exact thing on a CBS report last night. The reporter said that some percentage, I didn't hear what it was, said that if their candidate didn't win they were likely to vote for McCain.

Remains to be seen if they actually will or not, but it was mentioned.

Ya, Herb. Can't you understand? Anything bad that happens is the Dems/Independents/Libertarians fault and anything good is the EXTREME RIGHTs doing.

"I wish shrub would pull a Nixon and just get the hell out of Dodge!"

Unlike Mr. Clinton, neither was impeached.

Herb

Skybill, talk is cheap. Democrats supporting either Hillary or Obama WILL NOT be voting for McSame if their candidate of choice doesn't win.

And Herb, do you want to challenge my assertion that Congress makes the law, not the president? Do yourself a favor and review your history before you try to revise here at PDXradio. But you are correct in that November can't come fast enough. Bigger majorities in both houses and a Presdient Obama will be good news for our country, but bad news for you.

True but the DAMAGE that Nixon did will NEVER be undone. A BLOWJOB never hurt anyone but you Herb.....

I will give Dick Nixon this, He was smart enough to cut and run before impeachment porcedeings got started, and you can bet your ass they would have! So this "Nixon was never impeached" Don't hold water HerB.

He was gonna go down HARD! Just like Clinton....

Skybill, talk is cheap. Democrats supporting either Hillary or Obama WILL NOT be voting for McSame if their candidate of choice doesn't win.

I'm only repeating what I heard.

I guess if it doesn't fit the liberal's way of thinking it won't happen or can't be right.

Either that or we can’t believe the reporters on that darned right wing CBS!

If Obama does not get the nod I will vote for an Inde on the ticket in leu of those other two.

Yes, the sky has opened up to a host of flying pigs wending their way over the frozen barrens of hell, but on this point, I agree wholeheartedly with Herb:

"Mr. Clinton helped push NAFTA through...now Mrs. Clinton is trying to distance her prior support of it."

This very moment, Hillary is telling a whopper of a lie about free trade to the good folks of Indiana.

Northern Ireland was a jig. Bosnia was a snipe hunt. For Hillary, this is new territory in the high snowiest reaches of misremembering. Clinton is telling the very workers that lost their jobs to Clinton economic policy that they did not lose their jobs to Clinton economic policy and that Clinton economic policy will bring those jobs back:

Clinton Criticizing Closure of Indiana Factory That Clinton Helped Close

Huffington Post
April 28, 2008

Clinton is airing this advertisement in Indiana, bemoaning the closure of defense contractor Magnequench's manufacturing plant in Valparaiso (she is also echoing this line in her stump speeches). Looking at the camera, she tells us she's upset that the 200 jobs were sent to China, and that "now America's defense relies on Chinese spare parts." And then comes the kicker: She tells viewers that "George Bush could have stopped it, but he didn't."

Clinton is certainly right that it is a tragedy that 200 American jobs were killed in a corporate deal that also exported sensitive military technology to China. But she forgets to mention that it wasn't George Bush who was in the key position to stop it -- it was Bill Clinton.

Back in 1995, a Chinese consortium, which included two Chinese state-owned companies, made a bid to take over Magnequench. Because the company makes key parts for smart bombs, the takeover had to be approved by the Clinton administration's Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States. Despite the national security and economic problems with selling off such critical manufacturing capacity to the Chinese -- and despite the knowledge that such a deal would likely end in a domestic mass layoff -- the Clinton administration approved the deal. This same deal -- not surprisingly -- paved the way for those 200 Indiana jobs and that sensitive military technology to be shipped to China.

The Clinton administration's move was not surprising. This was an administration whose NAFTA and China PNTR record more than proved it was intent on helping Big Money interests face as little resistance to international financial transactions as possible -- consequences be damned. But the move was very controversial, raising the ire of key Hillary Clinton surrogate Sen. Evan Bayh (D-IN). As the Los Angeles Times reported in 2005, "Bayh was particularly disturbed by the committee's decision in 1995 to approve a Chinese consortium's takeover of Magnequench Inc." In 2006, Bayh specifically slammed the Clinton administration's approval of the deal to the South Bend Tribune, saying "It's not smart to put ourselves in the position of relying on the Chinese for a critical component of a vital weapon system, and yet that is what the CFIUS process has allowed."

Unfortunately, as he has campaigned around Indiana with Hillary Clinton listening to her decry the Magnequench fiasco, Bayh has suddenly gone silent on the matter. Apparently, the power-worshiping pursuit of the vice presidency is enough to silence a senator whose constituents were so brazenly sold out and who had previously feigned outrage at the situation.

David Sirota

Does anyone else hear the irony of a Clinton-Bayh ticket? Say it out loud a few times, and before long, it sounds a lot like Clinton Bye!

I'm with you Darktemper.