President Bush and Colombian President Alvaro Uribe are renewing their push for Congress to approve a free-trade deal before lawmakers leave town to campaign for re-election.

The Queen just read in “Colombia Reports” that Bush met with Uribe today and the two leaders planned to make a joint statement after their talks. In the evening, the White House is hosting a dinner for the Colombian leader. [ I wonder who will be invited?  Perhaps the CEO's from Chiquita and Exxon?]  Congressional Democratic say they are delaying votes on trade deals involving Colombia, Panama and South Korea until the Bush administration resolves questions about the impact on U.S. jobs and other issues. But time is running out on the legislative calendar.

In recent months, the president has tried new ways to bolster his free-trade agenda. In May, a concrete mixer, crates of cauliflower, a Harley-Davidson motorcycle and chunks of cheese were displayed on the White House lawn as examples of a lopsided tariff structure the U.S. has with those three countries.  A White House event in July was billed as a celebration of the day in 1810 when Colombia declared its independence from Spain, but the main message was trade.

As confusing as it may sound, “conservatives” support neo-liberalism and liberals do not.  This is an important distinction that all Democrats should clearly understand.  And further more, being a political liberal does not lead to one becoming a neoliberal–quite the contrary.  A conservative is far more likely to adhere to neoliberal economics than any liberal ever would.

“Neo-liberalism” is a set of economic policies that have become widespread during the last 25 years or so. We can clearly see the effects of neo-liberalism here as the rich grow richer and the poor grow poorer.

Economic Liberalism as Distinguished from Political Liberalism
Economic liberalism is different. Conservative politicians who say they hate “liberals” — meaning the political type [people like me, Liz] – have no real problem with economic liberalism, including neoliberalism [which political liberals like me certainly do].

“Neo” means a new kind of liberalism. The old liberal school of economics became famous in Europe when Adam Smith, an Scottish economist, published a book in 1776 called THE WEALTH OF NATIONS. He and others advocated the abolition of government intervention in economic matters.

But the capitalist crisis over the last 25 years, with its shrinking profit rates, inspired the corporate elite to revive economic liberalism. That’s what makes it “neo” or new. Now, with the rapid globalization of the capitalist economy, we are seeing neo-liberalism on a global scale.

The main points of neo-liberalism include:

I just saw on the television where McCain is traveling to South America to try to carry on Mark Penn's job of pushing the Colombian Free Trade agreement.  I hope that the American people have had enough of such "free" trade agreement to realize that the "free" part is the slave labor that multinational corporation receive.

http://www.democracynow.org/2001/1/24/firings_and_beating_at_mexican_factoryhttp://33months.wordpress.com/2007/05/03/reynosa-mexico-the-new-galesburg/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HFZ3cH1UAI 

http://www.dickmeister.com/id12.html

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/07/26/slave-labor-used-to-contruct-us-embassy-in-baghdad/

http://www.usw.org/usw/program/adminlinks/docs//Pre_Nafta_Facts1.pdf

http://www.usw.org/usw/program/adminlinks/docs//Pre_Nafta_Facts2.pdf

http://www.usw.org/usw/program/adminlinks/docs//Pre_Nafta_Facts3.pdf

Guest worker programs are just another word for human rights abuses—a perfect example of what happens when labor is not represented. 

Workers are left to accept the handouts offered to them by nations and corporations.  If anyone needs a lesson in regard to how well even our government represents its workers, you only need to look at the profit margins of corporations like Exxon and compare them to the current minimum wage of $5.85 an hour. Congress gave the first pay raise to workers by our government in 10 years But this $7.25 rate will not be in effect until July of 2009.

Justice for two Guest workers
http://www.democrats.org/page/community/post/elizabethberry/CRNx

Immigrants issues are but one of the many results of unchecked globalization
http://www.democrats.org/page/community/post/elizabethberry/CNlh

Globalization is sold on the basis that “development” reduces poverty, but this is not always true.
http://www.democrats.org/page/community/post/elizabethberry/CxDY

Slave Labor and Guest Worker Programs—disgusted with Bush and disgusted with Congress.
http://www.democrats.org/page/community/post/elizabethberry/CxD8

Globalization is nothing if not a mass of contradictions.  It creates new markets and wealth and also causes widespread suffering, disorder, and unrest.

Many blame globalization; however, the problem is not globalization but capitalism and the desire of a small group to control it.  I will say this again because it is important. The problem is not globalization, but capitalism.  Of the 100 largest economies in the world, 51 are now global corporations, only 49 are countries.   The top 200 corporations have economies that surpass the economies of 182 countries.  1

The second, and perhaps more frightening, part of this equation is that our government has for years now had as its priority to serve capitalism (corporations) and not people. (If you can’t tell from legislation passed for the past 30 years, then you have not been paying attention.)    Agencies and lobbyists representing corporate globalism are very much involved in pursuing the emancipation of capital and the means by which it is obtained from popular control.  This explains why Washington DC has over 35,000 registered federal corporate lobbyists.  That is about 700 lobbyists for every elected legislator.  Corporations are very serious about gaining complete control over capital and they are willing to put their money behind their efforts.

Between 1995 and 1998, on the Clinton’s watch, an agreement that most Americans have never heard of --The Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI) was negotiated between members of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). 2  (The OECD is an international organization of thirty countries that accept the principles of representative democracy and free market economy.) 

FROM CORPORATE WATCH:

http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=378

Since it was created in 1995, the WTO has ruled that every environmental policy it has reviewed is an illegal trade barrier that must be eliminated or changed. With one exception, the WTO also has ruled against every health or food safety law it has reviewed.

Nations whose laws were declared trade barriers by the WTO-or that were merely threatened with WTO action-have eliminated or watered down their policies to meet WTO requirements.

Supposedly each of the WTO's 134 member countries have an equal say in governance. In practice, decision-making is dominated by the "Quad": USA; European Union; Japan and Canada.

Each member of the Quad represents its corporations' interests at the WTO. These corporations are often directly involved in writing and shaping WTO rules. In the U.S. this is achieved through official "Trade Advisory Committees" which are dominated by the private sector.

For instance, the US International Trade Administration's Energy Advisory Committee is made up exclusively of representatives of giant oil, mining, gas and utility corporations, including Texaco, Enron, Halliburton and Freeport-McMoran.

The top fifth of the world's people in the richest countries enjoy 82% of the expanding export trade and 68% of foreign investment-the bottom fifth, receive roughly 1%.

Women comprise 70 percent of the world's 1.3 billion absolute poor. Worldwide, they bear the brunt of economic and financial transition and crisis caused by market forces and globalization.

Asked at a news conference if he had exaggerated his rivals' claims, McCain acknowledged that he may have misstated their position.

His supporter Phil Gramm, the former Texas senator, also accused Clinton and Obama of practicing protectionism.

HIS STANCE ON THE IRAQ WAR FROM DAY ONE

The IRAQ War is the largest issue. Americans get the direct connection between the Iraq war and our economy.  The war was a mistakeand finally 70% of Americans now know this.  Obama spoke out against the War BEFORE Congress voted to give Bush permission to "use force against Iraq."  Obama is better positioned to take on McCain on the Iraq war. Also, unlike Hillary, Obama voted for limiting the use of cluster bombs in Iraq.

HIS PROMISE TO CLEAR OUT DC LOBBYISTS--MOST AMERICANS ARE FED UP WITH DC LOBBYISTS AND SEE THEM AS A HUGE PART OF THE CORRUPTION AND BUSINESS AS USUAL IN DC

Lobbyists and their corrupt manipulation of our lawmakers is another huge issue with the American people.  John McCain's campaign leadership was saturated with them.  Obama, as well as Edwards, have made their positions clear about the 35,000 lobbyists in Congress.  They have said they will work to rid our nation's capital of them.  Hillary has said that DC lobbyists are "just fine" and that they represent people just like us.  Well they don't. Lobbyists represent the CEOs and shareholders of corporations--not employees who do the work. Any American with two IQ points understands that.  There are of course a few exceptions such as labor union lobbyists.

If you think that labor practices in the USA are not HORRIBLE, then you have not read "Nobodies".  We don't need a "minor adjustment".  We need a paradigm shift.  "Change" is too mild of a word to use in regard to our labor practices.

Following is a link to Jeremy Elton Jacquot, LA Treehugger Interview with John Bowe, Author of "Nobodies: Modern American Slave Labor and the Dark Side of the New Global Economy.  The book has been out for about a year now and likely you could get a paperback copy.

"People who enslave others tend very often to think that what they’re doing is positive. The guy I wrote about in my book in the Tulsa chapter was a good example. He kept telling the media that his enslaved workers had lied, that they had “stabbed him in the back.” They were poor guys, from India, who (he felt) couldn’t get enough food to eat each day. And here, he’d offered them a job, and at least some money and food. What was the problem if he kinda locked ‘em up? "

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2007/09/the_th_interview_john_bowe.php

 Here is a great site to determine where each of the three candidates stand on Free Trade Agreements. This link will begin with where John McCain stands. HE IS THE WORST!  After scrolling all through his votes on free trade, near the bottom are links for Hillary and Barack.  Be sure to look at them too.

CATO, whose purpose is to provide corporate America and its allies with research in 2002 rated congress people according to how well they agree with the Republican (and Bill Clinton's) viewpoint on free trade agreements.  McCain received a score of 100% LOL for these horrible trade agreements.  Hillary, I am happy to report, got a "horrible" score from CATO of 17%.  That CATO study was done before Obama came into the US senate so we don't have a rating for him but judging from his record, he would have gotten an even lower score than Senator Clinton. Remember, the lower the better.  But Hillary score of 17% is ok with me.

Again this just points to the HUGE difference between our two candidates on issue of trade agreements when compared to the Republican. (and also the narrow difference on trade issues between Clinton and Obama). 

I may have been too hard on Hillary regarding her stance on trade agreement.  She really is by proof of her history, of a different cloth than her husband.

http://www.ontheissues.org/2008/John_McCain_Free_Trade.htm

Here are some graphs for you from the US Department of Commerce.  A picture can show you in a few seconds the utter failure of NAFTA. 

Promised production and job creation were based on obsolete assumptions
How many more important decisions will our leaders make based on incorrect data?

http://www.usw.org/usw/program/adminlinks/docs//Pre_Nafta_Facts1.pdf

These obsolete assumptions were wrong in direction and magnitude.
How many more important decisions will our leaders make based on incorrect data?

http://www.usw.org/usw/program/adminlinks/docs//Pre_Nafta_Facts2.pdf

http://www.usw.org/usw/program/adminlinks/docs//Pre_Nafta_Facts3.pdf

About 150 years ago we Americans fought our Civil War.  It was a bloody battle in which more American soldiers died than in all the wars we have since fought. Six hundred thousand American soldiers died in the Civil war.  This count does not include American civilians. To put 600,000 dead soldiers in perspective:   In World War II we lost 292,000 soldiers.  Counts for Vietnam vary, but the highest estimates are placed at 60,000.

Despite our willingness to sacrifice 600,000 to fight the good cause against slavery, our government for the past 15 years with NAFTA has supported a form slavery just across our borders in Mexico.  Now of course there are those who will argue all the fine points as hypocrites often do to defend their position.  No, the NAFTA supported labor situation in Mexico is not “technically” slavery since these workers are not being held against their will.  They are desperate people who are taking advantage of the best that is being offered.

My argument and the argument of a growing number of Americans is that “the best” that American and other multinational corporations, offer is the exploitation of people for the sake of profits to pay the bloated salaries of their CEO’s and dividends for their already wealthy shareholders.  We Americans need to stand up and tell our government to put an end to these trade agreements that give Corporations a free ride at the expense not only of the American worker, and the American consumers, but of workers and consumers world wide.  In countries of South America such as Colombia, their government sends out death squads to murder people who try to establish unions to protect their workers.  Individual American citizens must lead the way in these efforts to defend workers—our workers and the workers of the world.

In Mexico an estimated 2 million Mexicans work in over 5,000 maquiladoras (factories/sweatshops).  These factories are located in border towns in Mexico.  The maquiladoras are owned by the multinational corporations.  Working conditions are not the same as they are in the USA.  Workers, most of whom are young women, earn as little as 50 cents an hour and they work six days a week. 

Don’t think this is some special deal either because the cost of living in a border town averages 30 to 50% more than the costs further into Mexico.  Most of these workers live in desperate situations in huts that don’t have electricity or running water. Many of them are young women who live in shantytown neighborhoods that make Watts look Nob Hill. On any given day several innocents are caught in the cross fire between feuding drug cartels.

 No doubt some Hillary fans will say that this is Bill not Hillary.  To those people, I say: No.  The Bill Clinton 8 years are the bulk of what Hillary claims as her experience.  Either she has this "experience" or she has no experience.  Which is it?

I hope that Americans remember how well Bill Clinton kept his campaign promises while Hillary is throwing everything but the kitchen sink at Obama and at the same time promising everything but the kitchen sink to the American people

BILL CLINTON was elected in 1992 on a platform of "putting people first." His campaign promised health care reform, gay rights legislation and an end to Republican threats to abortion rights.

HEALTH CARE REFORM  --  Health care reform was forefront on his promises. When he took office, 37 million Americans were without any form of health insurance.   Like today, the crisis of the health care "was front-page. Seven of 10 Americans supported a system that would guarantee health care for every person.  The Clinton reform plan died before it even came to vote.

In one of his numerous and brilliant articles on US Labor, “Labor—and a whole lot More”, Dick Meister made many very interesting points. In speaking about the 2006 Democratic political upset, Mr. Meister had this to say:

“Congress’ new Democratic majority owes much to the unions, which spent more than $100 million on the campaign.  They put more than 100,000 members to work registering and turning out voters, distributing leaflets, and contacting an estimated 13 million voters directly.”  Now that’s an unbeatable combination:  Money and lots of people!

Give Congress your own report card, go to this article at Mr. Meister’s site and read Labor’s wish list.  See how well Congress has delivered on that wish list in the past two years.  After you’ve giving Congress a Labor grade, why don’t you send a copy of it to the Democratic legislators (along with the link to Dick’s site) so they can get an education regarding labor and its relationship not only to the Democratic Party, but to democracy itself.

http://www.dickmeister.com/id200.html

If you don’t think labor is important, you might want to have a chat with former President Bill Clinton.  After he was elected in 1992, and barely at that with only 43% of the vote, he forgot about Labor and one of his first accomplishments was to cram NAFTA down the throats of Americans. What happened?  To put it mildly, Labor bitch-slapped Clinton silly for his arrogance.  The Democrats lost both houses to the Republicans in the mid-term elections.  Clinton was only in the White House for two years when he gave away our Congress.

What they do represent are corporate interests.   They do not, as Hillary slyly suggested, “represent people like you and me.”  Lobbyists do not represent employees of corporations.  Instead they represent the 10% (at most) of Americans who comprise the CEOs, the board of directors and the shareholders of these corporations.  In addition, these lobbyists (except for those few who do represent unions) are anti-union.

The USA hasn’t gotten to the point yet where our government sends out death squads (at least not in the 21st century) to murder people who try to start unions but that is part of the evolution of governments who no longer accept the right of workers to organize and strike for improved working conditions.

We have to look no further than Colombia South America to see what happens when anti-unionists are in control of a country.  On Wednesday, April 23 we learned for certain that Mario Uribe who is Colombian President Alvaro Uribe’s cousin and closest political advisor, was arrested for connections with murderous right-wing paramilitaries responsible for assassinations of union activists and who also forced displacements of Afro-Colombian and other citizens off their lands.

If you are a real Democrat, this should make you ready for real change—not a phony watered down Republican version of change but real solid Democratic grassroots change. If you are a real democrat, this should make you think twice about a candidate whose husband has taken $800,000 from a government who condones death squads to murder people who even try to start unions.

For five years the Aviation Transportation and Security Act has given Bush the authority to bar screeners from exercising collective bargaining rights that are granted to other federal employees.  And how does management treat workers who have no union protection?  Well the screeners like other non-union workers for corporations like Wal-Mart can be forced to work without prior notice.  They can face retaliation for complaining.  They can have their shifts arbitrarily changed, and in general they can be harassed any way that management feels like harassing them with impunity.