Friday, July 1, 2016

Maine House of Representatives passed unanimous symbolic resolution 142-O against Trans Pacific Trade Partnership, TPP-Bangor Daily News

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6/29/16, "Trump rips Clinton, courts working-class voters in Bangor," Bangor Daily News, Michael Shepherd
 
"Earlier this year, the Maine House of Representatives unanimously passed a symbolic resolution against the Trans-Pacific Partnership, [142 to O, 4/29/16] a trade deal with Pacific rim nations negotiated by President Barack Obama’s administration."...(parag. 8)

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Added: 11/9/2015, Presumptive Democrat presidential nominee Hillary Clinton said she would not try to influence congress about TPP, CNN tweet:








Added: TPP will likely be decided in 2016 lame duck session:

6/27/16, "Hillary Clinton risks losing Ohio and the working class unless she alters her stance on trade: John Russo (Opinion)," Cleveland.com
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 "It is widely speculated that the Obama administration will push for TPP acceptance in the lame-duck session following the 2016 general election. According to a tweet from CNN's Dan Merica, Clinton says she will not lobby Congress on the issue. But this will only undermine her credibility....

Clearly, trade policy poses a problem for Democrats and their presumptive candidate. Clinton has been tied to former President Bill Clinton's NAFTA legislation and its Wall Street proponents. While she has stated that she is against TPP at this time, many Ohioans hear that as weasel words that only contribute to their distrust of Clinton....

She should stop talking about retraining and promising high-tech jobs, which only reminds voters of how hollow such programs have been in the past.

Instead, Clinton should acknowledge that we have lost the trade war and pledge to use every legal means at her disposal to protect American workers and industries from the continued onslaught of imports. This would include initiating trade cases against countries that target American industries by subsidizing their exports, exploiting workers, manipulating their currencies, and polluting the environment.

She should threaten to impose tariffs on every imported product from countries that refuse to implement the same U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency regulations and federal, state and local tax requirements that are imposed on American businesses.... 

  
In the latest Quinnipiac poll, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are tied in battleground Ohio. This suggests a very close race in Ohio in the fall.

Economic issues, especially trade, led many former Democrats to cross party lines to support Trump in the Republican primaries. Many who hadn't voted in recent elections joined them. We're likely to see a repeat of this in November unless Democrats change their trade policies.

None of this should surprise Democrats, especially those in Ohio."...

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6/21/16, "New Ohio poll shows Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump tied in Ohio," Cleveland.com, Andrew J. Tobias

"Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump's race for Ohio remains a toss-up, with a new poll finding the two presumptive nominees are tied in the perennial battleground state."...


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"U.S. trade deficit with the TPP countries cost 2 million jobs in 2015, with job losses in every state"...

3/3/16, "Ohio lost 112,500 jobs due to trade with TPP countries (graphic): EPI," Cleveland Plain Dealer, Olivera Perkins, Cleveland, Ohio

"Ohio lost 112,500 jobs in 2015 resulting from the United States' trade deficit with countries that are part of the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement, according to an analysis by the Economic Policy Institute.

That places Ohio sixth, in terms of the percentage of jobs lost to trade with TPP countries, among the 50 states and the District of Columbia ranked in the report released Thursday by the liberal Washington, D.C.-based think tank. The lost jobs represent nearly 2.2 percent of employment in Ohio, according to the analysis....

The TPP is a free trade agreement between the United States and 11 partnership countries, including Canada, Mexico, Japan, Singapore and Malaysia. While the countries have reached final agreement on the trade accord, it probably will not go into effect for several months. The agreement must clear several hurdles, including final ratification by Congress....

"Currency manipulation is one of the key driving forces behind the high and rapidly rising U.S. trade deficit with the 11 other members of the TPP," states the report, co-authored by Elizabeth Glass, an EPI trade and manufacturing policy research assistant.

"In 2015, the U.S. deficit with TPP countries translated into 2 million U.S. jobs lost, more than half (1.1 million) of which were in manufacturing."

The report says that the TPP should include "a set of restrictions and/or enforceable penalties against member countries that engage in currency manipulation."

"Without such provisions against currency manipulation, the TPP could well follow other trade agreements and leave even greater U.S. trade deficits in its wake," the report states.


Such concerns about currency manipulation are unfounded, according the USTR website.

"We have worked with macroeconomic authorities of TPP countries to secure a joint declaration that recognize our mutual interest in addressing unfair currency practices," it states.


Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO, said that is not enough.

"EPI's new report quantifies what a mistake it was to leave currency rules out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership," he wrote in a news release. "The trade deficit with TPP countries-attributable in large part to misaligned currency-cost America's working families 2 million jobs in 2015, more than half in manufacturing."
 

"Omitting currency rules from the TPP benefits Wall Street, making the TPP a tool for off-shoring jobs, not for job creation," he wrote. "If Congress is waiting for more evidence that TPP is a bad deal, this is it.""...

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From Economic Policy Institute report:

3/3/16, "Trans-Pacific Partnership, currency manipulation, trade, and jobs"

 
"U.S. trade deficit with the TPP countries cost 2 million jobs in 2015, with job losses in every state," Economi
c Policy Institute, by Robert E. Scott and Elizabeth Glass


Currency manipulation occurs when a country artificially depresses the value of its currency. Currency manipulation acts like a subsidy to the exports of the manipulating country, and a tax on U.S. exports to every country where U.S. exports compete with the currency manipulator’s exports. In this way, currency manipulation increases U.S. imports, suppresses U.S. exports, and inflates U.S. trade deficits. As past EPI research has shown, currency-manipulation-fueled trade deficits have reduced U.S. gross domestic product (GDP), eliminated millions of U.S. jobs, driven down U.S. wages, and propelled the outsourcing of U.S. jobs to currency manipulators.
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Many members of the proposed TPP, including Malaysia, Singapore, and Japan, are known currency manipulators. Others, namely Vietnam, appear to be following the lead of currency manipulators by, for example, acquiring excess foreign exchange reserves to depress the value of their currency. Currency manipulation explains a substantial share of the large, persistent U.S. trade deficit with the 11 other TPP countries that has not only cost millions of U.S. jobs but also increased income inequality and put downward pressure on American wages. We can’t afford a trade agreement that not only allows but would intensify these harmful trends:"...


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Below, 11/9/2015, "Clinton Will Oppose TPP But Not Encourage Congressional Opposition," You Tube



 
 



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