Chamber of Commerce Leading Congress Astray (petitioned Congress to drop “buy American” clauses )

[Omaha Steve]

http://populistdemocrats.blogspot.com/2009/01/chamber-of-commerce-leading-congress.html

Fighting for America's working families
Saturday, January 31, 2009

January 30, 2009
Economy in Crisis ww.economyincrisis.org
by Craig Harrington

The United States Chamber of Commerce is supposed to represent the best interests of American corporations and act as their legislative lobby. Unfortunately many of its efforts are counterproductive and effectively work to undermine the overall competitiveness and stability of U.S. companies. In the past week the Chamber of Commerce has petitioned Congress to drop “buy American” clauses from the newly approved Obama stimulus package – which is already wrought with wasteful spending. It has also increased its efforts to stimulate the development of new broader “free trade” agreements (FTAs) with nations around the world.

The reason the Chamber of Commerce is against so-called “buy American” clauses is due to its belief that such measures would increase the cost of projects while simultaneously creating a “trade war” with those nations who were left out of the bidding. The concept it fails to grasp is that there already is a trade war and the United States is being severely beaten.

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFSXtWrZGEg&eurl=http://populistdemocrats.blogspot.com/2009/01/chamber-of-commerce-leading-congress.html

The Chamber of Commerce's reasoning for even more FTAs is the misguided belief that the agreements actually result in surpluses for the United States. They highlight the fact that the U.S. is running surpluses with 9 of the 10 nations it entered into FTAs with since 2004. Unfortunately this statistic is misleading. The nations with whom we have established FTAs in the last four years are marginal developing economies; the nations which we run deficits with are massive and well developed economies. For example, the United States has a $10 billion surplus with Australia (one of the 9 successes) – and our largest surplus was $14.5 billion with the Netherlands in 2007. No export surplus exceeds $15 billion annually.

Meanwhile, the U.S. runs simultaneous import deficits with dozens of other countries and our 20th largest deficit (Thailand) roughly cancels out our largest surplus – our deficit to Thailand is $14.3 billion. We were in deficit $256 billion to China alone in 2007. If you add up our five largest surpluses you get roughly $58 billion gained. If you add up our five largest deficits you get roughly $522 billion lost. That is a net loss of $470 billion from just five countries. (Trade Stats Express)


FULL story at link.

[stillcool]

1. Reminds me of this...

http://www.usacc.org/content.php?type=page&id=2χ=5&par=3
U.S. - Azerbaijan Chamber of Commerce

1212 Potomac Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20007

HONORARY COUNCIL OF ADVISORS
James Baker III
Zbigniew Brzezinski
Henry Kissinger
Brent Scowcroft
John Sununu
CO-CHAIRMEN OF THE BOARD James A. Baker, IV
Partner, Baker Botts, L.L.P.

some members of the board of Directors..
Scott Blacklin Vice President, Cisco Systems
Charles Koontz Senior Vice President, SAIC
Robert Livingston President, Livingston Group
Albert Marchetti Vice President, Hess Corporation
Greg Saunders Director, International Affairs, BP
Diana Sedney Manager, International Government Relations for Chevron
Michael White Azerbaijan Country Manager, ExxonMobil International Limited
Gregory K. Williams Strategic Security Manager, Coca Cola

FORMER MEMBERS OF THE ADVISORY COUNCIL AND THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS
The following individuals of high distinction have previously served on the Advisory Council and the Board of Directors:
Dick Cheney Vice President of the United States of America
Richard Armitage Deputy Secretary of State

Thomas J. Donohue
President and CEO, U.S. Chamber of Commerce

Thomas J. Donohue is president and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Since assuming his position in 1997, Donohue has built the Chamber into a lobbying and political force with expanded influence across the globe.

Donohue established the U.S. Chamber Institute for Legal Reform (ILR), which has won significant legal reforms in the courts, at the state and federal levels, and in elections for state attorneys general and Supreme Court judges.

The Chamber’s lobbyists, policy experts, and communicators have helped secure many legislative victories, including major tax cuts, more sensible workplace and environmental regulations, and increased funding for transportation. The Chamber has advanced the business argument on outsourcing and the need for balance in applying new capital markets and accounting rules, among other issues.

On the international front, the Chamber has become a leader in knocking down trade barriers, winning new free trade agreements, and fighting protectionism both at home and abroad.

Under Donohue’s leadership, the Chamber has also emerged as a major player in election politics, helping elect congressional pro-business candidates through financial support and voter activism and turnout generated through the Chamber’s grassroots organization, VoteForBusiness.com.

The National Chamber Litigation Center, the Chamber’s law firm, has become more aggressive in challenging anti-business measures in court and entered a record 125 new cases of significance to the business community and helped secure 54 victories in 2007.

The National Chamber Foundation, the Chamber’s public policy think tank, drives the policy debate on key issues and provides a forum where leaders advance cutting-edge issues facing the U.S. business community.


Donohue is president of the Center for International Private Enterprise, a program of the National Endowment for Democracy dedicated to the development of market-oriented institutions around the world.

[sam sarrha]

2. was the Petition written in Chinese.??

[BrklynLiberal]

3. Just WHOSE Commerce are they looking out for???

Surely not American Commerce...or jobs. Only the accumulation of money by those who are already rich.

The Chamber of Commerce is an organization that needs to be investigated and exposed, and shown for what they really are.

[DCKit]

4. The representatives of Mom and Pop businesses from sea to shining sea.

Definitely NOT a front group for nefarious corporate interests, fat, rich bastards or anything else that may appear unseemly. They're all about Mom and apple pie.

[BrklynLiberal]

6. Why would Mom and Pop businesses want to drop the "Buy American " clause?

The United States Chamber of Commerce is supposed to represent the best interests of American corporations and act as their legislative lobby.

[DCKit]

7. Sorry if I wasn't being sarcastic enough.

They put Mom and Pop out on an ice floe years ago.

[BrklynLiberal]

8. Sorry I did not pick up on it.

[Stevenmarc]

5. US Chamber reps

would appear at my office about twice a year looking for me to join, I always had my receptionist send them back so I could personally have the pleasure of telling them to fuck off.

[pampango]

9. We have trade surpluses with 9 of the 10 countries with FTA's since 2004? Is that possible?

That doesn't include NAFTA's (long before 2004) partners, Canada and Mexico. I know we have a trade deficit with Canada (due to oil imports mostly) and I suspect the same is true for Mexico (probably for the same reason).

You seem to dismiss our trade surpluses with those 9 countries as due to their being "marginal developing economies". And yet our biggest deficits (non-FTA countries) you cited were Thailand and China, which would seem to fit the same definition. I thought our biggest trade problems were precisely with "developing economies" and their low wages and weak unions. Some of those 9 countries - Chile, Jordan, Morocco, Oman, Peru and Singapore - would seem to be instances were we are successfully competing with those types of countries and economies.

Have FTA's with those countries "leveled the playing field" to an extent where we are able to successfully compete, while we have huge trade deficits with similar countries with whom we do not have FTA's? I don't trust this 9 out of 10 statistic coming from the Chamber of Commerce. There seems to be no way that can be true, since it seems to be an article of faith that we can't compete with countries like these without tariffs and some degree of protectionism.