President Bush loses his power Saturday to seal "fast track" trade agreements without interference from Congress, where Democrats blame recent deals for sending U.S. jobs abroad.Since 1975, only one other president, Bill Clinton, has been stripped of that trade promotion authority, designed to speed the reduction of trade barriers and open new markets with other countries. Bush won't get it back again, and the next president might not either.
House Democratic leaders, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California and Rep. Charles Rangel of New York, whose Ways and Means Committee handles trade policy, said in a written statement Friday that their legislative priorities "do not include the renewal of fast track authority."
"Before that debate can even begin, we must expand the benefits of globalization to all Americans," they said.
Rather than promoting new free trade accords, the government should concentrate on rewriting old deals such as the North American Free Trade Agreement, going after countries such as China that manipulate their currencies, strengthening product safety and pushing anti-sweatshop legislation, said Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio...
Fast track authority, which dates back to the Ford administration in 1975, gives the president the right to negotiate trade agreements that Congress can accept or reject, but cannot amend. Every president since then has enjoyed it, although the law lapsed between 1994 and 2002, when Democrats suspicious of trade agreements joined with Republicans hostile to the Clinton administration in opposing its renewal.
The revival of the law in 2002 came only after Republicans agreed to Democratic demands to expand a program assisting U.S. workers hurt by foreign trade...
Democrats reached a broad agreement with the Bush administration last month that worker rights and the environment will be core parts of future free trade agreements. That improved prospects for congressional action on several of the accords, although there are still sticking points, such as violence against labor leaders in Colombia and South Korea's restrictions on U.S. auto imports...
But Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., argued that "trade agreements have given us the largest trade deficits in human history." Last year the U.S. trade deficit reached $836 billion.
Thomas Palley echoes many of the populist sentiments expressed by Democratic officials in a recent blog entry of his:
Opponents of TPA renewal have focused on two arguments. One argument is that such ceding of constitutional power is inappropriate, and Congress should reclaim this power as part of restoring a more balanced relationship between the legislative and executive branches.
A second argument is that absence of TPA would make it more difficult to sign new “free trade” agreements. This is because absent an up or down vote, agreements would get bogged down in Congressional special interest horse-trading. This is probably true, but it also constitutes a purely tactical argument for opposing TPA rather than an argument of principle.
An alternative argument for burying TPA concerns its distorting effect on trade policy. Over the last two decades the power of corporations has increased dramatically while that of labor has fallen. That power shift is reflected in the increased numbers of Washington K Street lobbyists working on behalf of corporations, which has increased corporate influence over policy and legislation. TPA plays into and amplifies this power shift.
Trade deals are negotiated by the office of the US Trade Representative (USTR), and then sent to Congress for approval. This negotiating process is stacked in favor of business. First, corporations get front seats at the negotiating table through regular detailed consultations, ensuring their interests are fully represented. Second, the trade bureaucrats who do the negotiating are subject to corrupting influences that bias negotiations.
One problem is that negotiators’ metric of success too easily becomes the number of deals signed, rather than getting good deals done. A second problem is that, as with other branches of government such as the Pentagon, there is a revolving door between USTR and business. Thus, trade negotiators who do good work for business are rewarded with plum K Street lobbying jobs, and Washington’s trade scene is crammed with persons who have followed this route. Furthermore, these lobbyists then have insider access to their former colleagues, thereby amplifying corporations’ representation advantage. The net result is business interests almost always trump those of workers.
TPA reinforces this jaundiced structure by reducing Congressional over-sight of trade, thereby short-changing the electorate’s interest. Bad agreements pass because the political costs of voting them down on account of specific problems are perceived as too high. Moreover, TPA provides individual congressmen with political cover, enabling them to retain favor with corporate sponsors without having to explain to constituents their lack of action.
The bottom line is that the balance of power and process of trade negotiation already favors corporate interests over those of ordinary people. TPA aggravates this pattern, which speaks for burying it and letting TPA rest in peace.
Ah, well, it really doesn't matter now. Stick a fork in it--TPA is done. Will it be renewed in the near future? With a strong isolationist streak in America becoming more and more reflected by its elected officials (even Hillary Clinton, supposedly) don't count on it.
