Posted on 05/12/2015 1:28:02 PM PDT by sheikdetailfeather
Senate Republicans Tuesday accused Democrats of reneging on deal that would give President Obama "fast track" authority to approve trade pacts.
Senate Finance panel Chairman Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said Democrats broke an agreement struck in committee that Trade Promotion Authority legislation would move separately from two provisions dealing with trade enforcement and preferences.
"This demand materialized last week and came from the Senate Democratic leadership, virtually all of whom oppose TPA and their president outright," Hatch said, moments after Democrats voted to block the trade bill.
Democrats said Tuesday they opposed the bill because they wanted the legislation to include the two additional provisions. One would add language to curb trade violations, such as currency manipulation. A second provision, the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), would extend a law allowing duty-free imports from sub-Saharan nations in Africa.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonexaminer.com ...
The DNC infiltrators advising the GOP know weeks before any vote what the final tally will be.
You really wonder how stupid you need to be NOT to figure this out.
I enjoy the dems making a fool out of the idiot obama lol
-PJ
Specter suggests Reid reneged on word.
Newly-turned Democrat Arlen Specter today hinted that that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid reneged on his word to allow Specter to keep his seniority on committees on which he sits. "Sen. Reid assured me that I would keep my committee assignments, and that I would have the same seniority as if I had been elected as a Democrat in 1980," Specter said in a written statement today.Reid Bows to Far Left as Rs Rank Judges Issue #1.
And they undoubtedly have the Rasmussen survey results in the back of their minds as they consider their reaction to Majority Leader Reid’s broken promise to confirm three appeals court nominees before the Memorial Day recess, as well as Reid’s sure-to-be-broken earlier promises to meet the historical average (17) for appeals court confirmations in a president’s final two years. With just a couple of months left in the confirmation window, Reid is less than halfway to meeting that average.[snip]
“A good GOP Senate source reports today that Minority Leader Mitch McConnell addressed the entire Republican Conference … about the judge-fight issue. McConnell is said to have been very insistent that he would not let Majority Leader Reid's broken promise go unpunished … He would not tell the Conference exactly what action he was planning, but he did say it would be very firm, and that all concerned would know it when we see it.” – Quin Hillyer (5/21/08)
[snip]
While Sen. Lott overcame numerous obstacles to get Paez and Berzon confirmed, Sen. Reid has looked for excuses to renege on his pledge.
[snip]
GOP senators are understandably angry that Sen. Reid broke the golden rule of senatorial honor by reneging on his commitment.
[snip]
Democrats Target Coburn’s Holds
To ease passage of the public lands measure, Reid promised Coburn the chance to offer a limited number of amendments.Reid: No Vote On Lifting Drug Import Ban Before Health-Care BillBut after the majority leader objected to a Coburn proposal that would have eased restrictions on firearms in national parks, the package stalled for months, prompting Coburn to charge that Reid reneged on their agreement.
Coburn eventually got to offer four amendments — all of which were defeated — but not the guns measure.
Republicans accused U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., of reneging Tuesday on a pledge to allow a Senate vote on a measure lifting an import ban on pharmaceutical drugs before lawmakers take up health-care legislation.The development, supported by major drug makers, comes as the Senate is moving to craft the politically delicate compromises needed for the broader health care overhaul bill.
In a letter to a bipartisan group of senators that have been pushing for the import ban to be scrapped, Reid said there wouldn't be time in the busy legislative calendar for full consideration of legislation lifting the long-standing prohibition now.
"He did commit to us and obviously that commitment is not going to be kept," Senator John McCain, R-Ariz., said Tuesday evening.
People here seem bizarrely unaware that Republicans have supported free trade for decades and also that tariffs are taxes.
“Might have to take another look at Democrats. They seem more conservative than the GOP lately.”
It is pretty bad when you have to depend on Elizabeth Warren and Barbara Boxer to save the Republic from Obama, McConnell, and McCain.
Sen. Hatch is an idiot. With all due respect.
“People here seem bizarrely unaware that Republicans have supported free trade for decades and also that tariffs are taxes.”
Yes, tariffs are taxes on foreign factories. Consider it a price they pay for access to the US market. Likewise US factories pay taxes on profits to federal and state governments as well as property taxes, regulatory fees, license fees, unemployment insurance premiums to state governments, etc, etc, etc. All of those taxes and fees are also the price business pays to access the US market.
If the foreign factory is exempt from taxes in their own countries on goods exported (many are), receive export incentives directly from their home governments, receive other subsidies from their own countries (think China), and their home countries manipulate currency and put in place non tariff barriers to imports, those foreign factories have a distinct government created advantage competition with American companies and American workers. To give these foreign factories tariff free (i.e. tax free) access to the US market, while assessing all kinds of fees and taxes on American companies is committing economic suicide.
The Founding Fathers understood economics and the advantages of tariffs. They allowed US firms to trade freely (i.e. trade with any country) but they did not define free trade as tax free access to the US market by foreign firms. Instead they assessed high tariffs on foreign goods. Until the passage of the income tax amendment to the Constitution in the early 1900’s, the activities of the US federal government were almost completely funded by the tariff. In fact, during the period of the highest economic growth in US history (1865-1900) the US had the highest import tariffs in its history.
Perhaps this generation should learn from history and the wisdom of the founders. There is no evidence any of the free trade agreements of the past 25 years have benefited the US economy or the US worker. In fact, these agreements have destroyed the US manufacturing sector, funded the rise of China as a military and economic power, increased our national debt, reduced the standard of living of the average American household, and destroyed the middle class.
Twenty-five years of economic failure is more than enough. Not only should these new trade agreements be voted down, the US should exit the existing agreements, slap a 30% tariff on all imported goods, eliminate taxation on profits realized on the sale of goods manufactured 100% in the USA of USA sourced raw materials. Do this and watch the US manufacturing sector come back and the US economy soar. High tariff policies made us a great industrial power. It can happen again. Sign these new agreements and watch more jobs go offshore.
Perhaps this generation should learn from history and the wisdom of the founders. There is no evidence any of the free trade agreements of the past 25 years have benefited the US economy or the US worker. In fact, these agreements have destroyed the US manufacturing sector, funded the rise of China as a military and economic power, increased our national debt, reduced the standard of living of the average American household, and destroyed the middle class.””
Which is why they want this last deal so bad, to FINISH US OFF, thereby sealing their fate as Public Masters of their peasant Subjects.
Democrats - Doing the job republicans won’t do!
Democrats voted it down but for the wrong reasons.
Republicans should have been 100% against this.
Ditto. What a bizzaro world we live in!
Why the hell do Republicans TRUST Obama to fairly enforce this law?
Which are passed on to the consumer, which is what the people that support them want.
And considering he’s not due any I’d say he was given the appropriator amount ;)
Mark Levin is talking about this tonight. He said the Republicans are bought by the Chamber of Commerce and that is why they are selling the country down the river.
“Which are passed on to the consumer, which is what the people that support them want.”
Taxing US factories and not taxing imports from subsidized foreign factories puts US factories at a disadvantage in the home market. It essentially guarantees the US factories will lose to foreign competition. I say, if US factories are taxed, goods imported from foreign factories should also be taxed.
Also bizarrely unaware that our tax code encourages U.S. companies to offshore, and their solution will make things worse, by targeting companies that use those artificially-inflated products (foreign and domestic) in their own manufacturing processes.
bkmk
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