Obama - Candidate for Chage LOL

[Charon]

Within the last month, a top staff member for Obama's campaign telephoned Michael Wilson, Canada's ambassador to the United States, and warned him that Obama would speak out against NAFTA, according to Canadian sources.

The staff member reassured Wilson that the criticisms would only be campaign rhetoric, and should not be taken at face value.

But Tuesday night in Ohio, where NAFTA is blamed for massive job losses, Obama said he would tell Canada and Mexico "that we will opt out unless we renegotiate the core labour and environmental standards."

Late Wednesday, a spokesperson for the Obama campaign said the staff member's warning to Wilson sounded implausible, but did not deny that contact had been made.

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20080227/dems_nafta_080227/20080227

What a surprise! To think that a mainstream Democratic candidate, mentored and brought up through the Cook County/Illinois Democratic Machine, endorsed by Ted Kennedy and any number of mainstream Democratic leaders would be -- a typical politician.

Charon

[Shuffler]

News of obama saying that hillary supported nafta in the past is so funny. Here in Texas his ads say he supports FREE TRADE (read nafta). Evidently someone told him Texans like NAFTA..... nothing could be farther from the truth.

[eagl]

Originally posted by Shuffler
News of obama saying that hillary supported nafta in the past is so funny. Here in Texas his ads say he supports FREE TRADE (read nafta). Evidently someone told him Texans like NAFTA..... nothing could be farther from the truth.

Many hispanics (both legal and illegal) love NAFTA, and he's clearly going for their vote.  Even if he doesn't carry TX in the general election, reports that he won the hispanic vote here would carry over to the hispanic vote in other states that might be critical.

[indy007]

Originally posted by Shuffler
News of obama saying that hillary supported nafta in the past is so funny. Here in Texas his ads say he supports FREE TRADE (read nafta). Evidently someone told him Texans like NAFTA..... nothing could be farther from the truth.

I love NAFTA, and those arguing against it tend to be horribly misinformed.

[indy007]

So what has NAFTA really done... ?  Warning... this won't sound as good as BLAME CHINA! or THEY TOOK OUR JOBS!!

So Tuesday's debate in Cleveland devoted a lot of time to the question: Are you now or have you ever been a supporter of NAFTA? Both candidates denied any complicity, past or present, and both vowed to scrap the treaty if the Mexican government doesn't agree to changes.

Obama makes a special theme of blaming this and other trade agreements for setting off a race to the bottom that destroys American jobs. "In Youngstown, Ohio," he said in a Texas debate, "I've talked to workers who have seen their plants shipped overseas as a consequence of bad trade deals like NAFTA, literally seeing equipment unbolted from the floors of factories and shipped to China."

Why NAFTA would induce a company to move production to China is a puzzle, but you get the idea.
His campaign claims a million jobs have vanished because of the deal. That sounds devastating, but over the last 14 years, the American economy has added a net total of 25 million jobs—some of them, incidentally, attributable to expanded trade with Mexico. When NAFTA took effect in 1994, the unemployment rate was 6.7 percent. Today it's 4.9 percent.

But maybe all the jobs we lost were good ones and all the new ones are minimum-wage positions sweeping out abandoned factories? Actually, no. According to data compiled by Harvard economist Robert Z. Lawrence, the average blue-collar worker's wages and benefits, adjusted for inflation, have risen by 11 percent under NAFTA. Instead of driving pay scales down, it appears to have pulled them up.

Manufacturing employment has declined, but not because we're producing less: Manufacturing output has not only expanded, but has expanded far faster than it did in the decade before NAFTA. The problem is that as productivity rises, we can make more stuff with fewer people. That's not a bad thing. In fact, it's essentially the definition of economic progress.

We're not the only country facing that phenomenon. China makes everything these days, right? But between 1995 and 2002, it lost 15 million manufacturing jobs.

Even if the candidates don't want to acknowledge the gains of the last 14 years, it's hard to see how they can blame NAFTA for economic troubles in Ohio or elsewhere. The whole idea was to eliminate import duties in both the United States and Mexico (as well as Canada). What everyone forgets is that we got the best of that bargain, since our tariffs were very low to begin with.

"Mexico had very good access to the U.S. market" already, says Charlene Barshefsky, who was U.S. Trade Representative in the Clinton administration. "What NAFTA did was level the playing field."
Critics complain that while exports to Mexico have risen, imports from Mexico have risen even faster.

But that's not because we embraced free trade. It's because our economy has been more robust than theirs. Prosperous consumers buy more goods, from both home and abroad, than struggling consumers. Absent NAFTA, the trade imbalance with Mexico would not be smaller. It would be bigger.

None of this is a revelation to economists. The candidates' broadsides require them to ignore not just a wealth of evidence but the overwhelming consensus of experts. Gary Clyde Hufbauer, an economist at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington, estimates that 90 percent of the people in his profession regard the accord as a good thing.

Jagdish Bhagwati, a Columbia University trade economist, supports Obama and thinks his positions on trade are generally better than Clinton's. "But on NAFTA," Bhagwati told me, "he is dead wrong."
Clinton is also in error, but on the question of which candidate has more consistently and vehemently denounced the accord, Obama has opened up a clear lead. Now there's a race to the bottom.

[Charon]

The candidate for change shows how he is not just another politician -- he's different, somehow, maybe -- no, really!

Obama and his campaign had initially denied a Canadian television report from late last month that Obama's top economic adviser, Austan Goolsbee, had met with Canadian government officials in Chicago and told them Obama's call for reopening labor and environmental rules in NAFTA was merely campaign rhetoric.

But on Monday, The Associated Press obtained a Canadian government memo that detailed a meeting Goolsbee held on a variety of issues, including NAFTA.

What the memo said

"Noting anxiety among many U.S. domestic audiences about the U.S. economic outlook, Goolsbee candidly acknowledged the protectionist sentiment that has emerged, particularly in the Midwest, during the primary campaign," a consulate staffer wrote, according to AP. "He cautioned that this messaging should not be taken out of context and should be viewed as more about political positioning than a clear articulation of policy plans."

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/chi-obama-questioned-mar04,1,1478995.story

LOL.  And now the hounds have been released, maybe, for the moment.

Saturday Night Live has pretty much sucked since 1980, and IMO SCTV kicked its bellybutton from the start. But, apparently their latest sketch series on the fawing press corp has actually stirred them up enough to do their jobs.

The day before primaries in Ohio and Texas that could effectively seal the Democratic presidential nomination for him, a smiling Obama strode out to a news conference at a veterans facility here. But the grin was quickly replaced by the surprised look of a man bitten by his own dog.

Reporters from the Associated Press and Reuters went after him for his false denial that a campaign aide had held a secret meeting with Canadian officials over Obama's trade policy. A trio of Chicago reporters pummeled him with questions about the corruption trial this week of a friend and supporter. The New York Post piled on with a question about him losing the Jewish vote.

Obama responded with the classic phrases of a politician in trouble. "That was the information that I had at the time. . . . Those charges are completely unrelated to me. . . . I have said that that was a mistake. . . . The fact pattern remains unchanged."

When those failed, Obama tried another approach. "We're running late," the candidate said, and then he disappeared behind a curtain.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/03/AR2008030302769_pf.html

Being a product of the corrupt Illinois / Cook County Democratic machine I would have expected more out of Obama. He really is a lightweight.

Charon

[john9001]

<"In Youngstown, Ohio," he said in a Texas debate, "I've talked to workers who have seen their plants shipped overseas as a consequence of bad trade deals like NAFTA, literally seeing equipment unbolted from the floors of factories and shipped to China." >

i don't think that speech would work in marysville oh.

[Eagler]

[DREDIOCK]

And you folks would obviously rather have Hillary as President?

Face it. no matter what happens with the primaries. Come November Barring a major miricle in the economy and Iraq.
A Democrat is going to be elected to be in the white house.

The only question is.
Will it be Hillary, Or Obama.
McCain is nothing more then a sacrificial lamb.

Yes he will get the republican party behind him. But you need to get more then just your party. You need independants and members of the other party as well. the vast majority of which are not liking the economy, The Iraq war. And George Bush in particular.
And thats exactly what Mccain represents in alot of peoples minds. More George Bush.

And with Bush set to endorce Mccain today. Mccain will have the proverbial 800 lb gorrilla in his corner.
If I were McCain I would reject the endorcement. the one thing he MUST do to even stand a small chance is distance himself from Bush.
He's got to find a way to convince the people why he isnt another George Bush.

Rotsa ruck.

I dont particularly like the idea of Obama or Clinton in the whitehouse either.
but those two are your lessor of two evils. Not Hillary/obama vrs McCain
Its Hillary or Obama

[Eagler]

depends on how much truth the media shows on the dem nom ...

it really boils down to has the best last smear commercial as the facts do not matter anymore

I think we are screwed whichever of the 3 get in - we are just screwed the least if old John wins and that is the way I'll vote

[Charon]

And you folks would obviously rather have Hillary as President?

No and Yes. No in that I don't want either and yes in that I believe Hillery would actually do less damage. However, in a lesser of three evils scenario McCain will likely do less damage than either Obama or Hillery. My candidate of choice, for real change, was a bit ahead of the American Idol crowd for this election.

Obama is not some new rising star if you live in Illinois. He is a firmly entrenched Chicago Democratic machine candidate. If he truly was for change I would love him as would most of us in Illinois. But the only force for change in Illinois has been the US Federal Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald. Obama has been a do nothing tool. Consider his endorsement disasters. This Trib article tells it:

Critics: Obama endorsements counter calls for clean government
By David Jackson and John McCormick
June 12, 2007
Article tools

There was little controversy earlier this year when Sen. Barack Obama endorsed Mayor Richard Daley over two black opponents for a sixth term, lending his star power to an inevitable rout.

But Obama's record of local endorsements -- one measure of how he has used his nascent political clout -- has drawn criticism from those who say it reflects his deference to Chicago's established political order and runs counter to his public calls for clean government.

In the 2006 Democratic primary, for example, Obama endorsed first-time candidate Alexi Giannoulias for state treasurer despite reports about loans Giannoulias' family-owned Broadway Bank made to crime figures. Records show Giannoulias and his family had given more than $10,000 to Obama's campaign, which banked at Broadway.

Obama endorsed former Ald. Dorothy Tillman (3rd), calling her "a very early supporter of my campaign." Tillman was then under fire for her stewardship of the scandal-plagued Harold Washington Cultural Center, where contracts benefited members of her family.

Obama rejected the notion that such endorsements conflict with his promotion of ethics reform in government.

"I have been very proud of my track record as a state legislator and as a U.S. senator in terms of maintaining highly ethical behavior throughout my public life," he said in a recent interview. "Dorothy Tillman and Alexi Giannoulias were strong supporters of mine. There were no allegations that they had done anything illegal. And it was not a conflict for me to show my support for them."

Obama supported the re-election of Gov. Rod Blagojevich, whose administration is embroiled in corruption probes.

And during the race for Cook County Board president, Obama predictably endorsed Todd Stroger over a Republican. But he was criticized for calling Stroger "a good progressive" despite allegations of job-rigging to favor members of Stroger's 8th Ward organization.

Such moves detract from Obama's political independence, according to observers such as James Shapiro, state chairman for the Independent Voters of Illinois-Independent Precinct Organization.

"I don't think these are principled endorsements, but rather are of political expedience," he said. "It may be understandable, but it's not justifiable."

Even so, many presidential voters may not care.

"Barack Obama is a political animal. That means supporting the people you went to the dance with," said Loyola University political science professor Alan Gitelson. "The bottom line is, I don't think it will have any impact one way or the other."

Of these disasters he has supported in the name of party politics, Todd Stroger is the most recently obvious train wreck. He is roundly condemned as being a disaster by virtually all of the media (most knew he would be before hand, since he was shoehorned in to replace his father who was elected while in a coma after a stroke), Toddly promised to cut spending and fix corruption in Cook County and did exactly the opposite. He has now pushed through a sales tax increase that makes Cook County one of the highest in the nation and Chicago the highest in the nation. We have townships looking to secede from the county now.

So, frankly, a lot of us in Illinois know Obama for exactly what he is. A Democratic machine politician for the status quo, if not Dick Devine's and Ted Kennedy's status quo, who talks a good, charismatic and eloquent game but is otherwise an empty suit. We have lived the Obama dream already.

Charon

[Eagler]

saw last night that Obama has the dem nom in the  bag as billary can't get enough delegates b4 the convention and the super delegates will not give it to her and disfranchise the black and young dme voters as that would seal a defeat n Nov.
Just hope there are even older folks that choose McCain to keep that "empty suit" out of the WH.

[mg1942]

the one thing he MUST do to even stand a small chance is distance himself from Bush.
He's got to find a way to convince the people why he isnt another George Bush.

Bush and McCain are interchangeable.  McCain = Bush 3.0

[Eagler]

Bush and McCain are interchangeable.  McCain = Bush 3.0

you do not know anything about McCain then do you?

[mg1942]

you do not know anything about McCain then do you?

Personal life not counted. 

McCain will continue some of Bush 2.0 policies and might spice things up by adding a bit of his own ingredient(s) to Bush 2.0 policies. 

oh wait, he might be the liberal version of Bush 2.0.