-Caveat Lector-
Free Trade Is Not Free
Address to the Chicago Council of Foreign Relations
by Patrick J. Buchanan
This is a prestigious forum and I appreciate the opportunity to address it.
As my subject, I have chosen what I believe is the coming and irrepressible
conflict between the claims of a new American nationalism and the commands of
the Global Economy...
TAC NEWSWIRE
04/14/99 - RALEIGH NEWS OBSERVER
Two Sides to NAFTA on Display at Hearing - Sen. Jesse Helms turned thumbs
down Tuesday on five years of the North American Free Trade Agreement,
telling a top U.S. trade official that the pact has cost North Carolina and
other states tens of thousands of manufacturing jobs. . . Richard Fisher,
deputy U.S. trade representative, testified on the effects of NAFTA before
the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which Helms chairs. Fisher was joined
by Republican presidential candidate Patrick Buchanan and Vontella Dabbs, a
textile mill worker from Maiden, N.C. Helms said his initial warnings about
NAFTA, which eased tariffs and other trade barriers among the United States,
Canada and Mexico, have been proved true since the accord took effect Jan. 1,
1994, after Congress approved it at the urging of President Clinton. . .
"Now that the U.S. is five years into NAFTA, more than 200,000 jobs have been
lost nationwide," Helms said. "In North Carolina, more than 20,000 jobs have
been lost in the textile industry alone, and the picture is getting bleaker
by the day with plants closing and moving to Mexico" . . . "Five years ago,
we predicted that this agreement would mean growth, better and more jobs,
rising standards of living and a higher quality of life," Fisher said.
"Today, we can say that the agreement is keeping its promises" . . .
Buchanan, the TV commentator who has made opposition to international trade
agreements a centerpiece of his presidential campaigns, criticized Fisher for
focusing only on U.S. exports to Mexico and Canada, without looking also at
those countries' shipments to the United States. "It's a little bit like
saying, 'The Washington Redskins scored three touchdowns Sunday,' without
saying, 'The Dallas Cowboys scored six touchdowns,' " Buchanan said. . .
The United States enjoyed a trade surplus with Mexico before NAFTA was
implemented, Buchanan said, but now has a trade deficit of $17 billion. . .
He said the devaluation of the Mexican peso has prompted a flood of Mexican
goods across the border. . . . "If we continue these open-border trade
policies with nations that have hard-working people who will work for 10
percent of American wages, every large industrial and manufacturing plant in
this country is ultimately at risk," Buchanan said. . . . Dabbs traveled
to the hearing from Catawba County, where she works for Delta Mills Marketing
Co. at a plant that makes cotton yarns and woven cloth for apparel
manufacturers. "I come to you today not as an expert in any field, not as a
politically motivated person, but simply as an American who is deeply
concerned for both my future and the future of my family and friends," Dabbs
said. Dabbs blamed NAFTA for the recent decision by Burlington Industries to
close nine plants in the Carolinas. One of them, a large denim weaving
factory in the Iredell County town of Mooresville, is being replaced by a
similar facility in Mexico, she said. . . "These treaties, laws and trade
agreements have not really opened up the world to the American textile
industry as was intended," Dabbs said. "Instead, they have opened our borders
for foreign manufacturers to flood our country with goods produced with near
slave labor and in deplorable conditions for workers." Helms said the
Burlington closings would cost North Carolina 2,400 jobs. . .
04/14/99 - THE WASHINGTON POST
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