Here's WTD's Friday afternoon podcast for April 27, 2012. Enjoy!
http://washingtontradedaily.com/2012wtdpodcast0427.mp3
Friday, April 27, 2012
Friday, April 20, 2012
Here's WTD's Friday afternoon podcast for April 20, 2012. Enjoy!
http://washingtontradedaily.com/2012wtdpodcast0420.mp3
http://washingtontradedaily.com/2012wtdpodcast0420.mp3
Say What?
Say what?
Cabinet officials should pay attention to staff briefings before testifying to Congressional panels. Here’s why.
At an appearance Thursday before the House Energy and Commerce subcommittee to talk about the country’s manufacturing outlook, Commerce Secretary John Bryson seemed unprepared for some basic questions from members who were seeking some simple answers.
And Mr. Bryson committed a big "no-no" by saying China is manipulating its currency – a stand his boss took during the 2008 Presidential campaign – instead of repeating the normal Administration disclaimer that only the Treasury Department can talk about that issue.
Here are the key (amazing) excerpts from the hearing on renewal of the US Export-Import Bank (not likely to help the effort), on access to medicines in the TransPacific Partnership negotiations (huh?) and on China’s currency manipulation (oops).
Makes you wonder why he is Commerce Secretary.
Jim Berger
click here and enjoy
http://washingtontradedaily.com/brysonmpeg.mp3
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
Three Decades of Trade Policy -- And Then?
Last week, those of us who care about trade got a chance to hear from some of the brightest and most politically savvy minds around when six former US Trade Representatives – spanning from the Reagan Administration to George W. Bush – appeared at the Center for Strategic and International Studies annual roundtable with former USTRs.
Sitting at the table were Bill Brock (Reagan), Clayton Yeutter (Reagan), Carla Hills (George H. Bush), Mickey Kantor (Clinton), Charlene Barshefsky (Clinton) and Susan Schwab (George W. Bush).
They were assembled to talk about the US trade agenda. But the problem was that other than the TransPacific Partnership negotiations, the current Obama Administration doesn’t seem to have a trade agenda. It was not until near the end of the program – after nearly two hours of politely tipping toeing around the current Administration’s lack of a bold trade agenda that the former USTRs finally said what they were really thinking.
Here’s a transcript, courtesy of CSIS, of WTD’s question to the panel and the response:
MS. BROADBENT: Jim Berger, right there.
Q: Hi, thank you. Jim Berger from Washington Trade Daily. I just want to thank
everyone here for their great presentations. Makes me feel 10 years younger, actually.
(Laughter.) But one thing that wasn’t addressed – and there’s a lot of momentum here about
trade going right down the line, actually right through the decades – (chuckles) – if I might say –
but it seems to have dropped off at Ambassador Schwab’s end. What happened the day you left
office, and why did it happen?
AUDIENCE MEMBERS: (Chorus of ohhs.)
Q: No, I mean after you left office. (Laughter.) But why do we have this policy now in
this administration of – essentially no trade policy, which I think you – all of you have implied?
Someone once told me, who is a neighbor on K Street here that’s been around, that the president
just doesn’t get it.
(Off-side conversations, laughter.)
MS. BARSHEFSKY: Well, all right, I’ll take a shot. I think for most presidents – and
Mickey, you may have a different view of this – for most presidents, the first couple of years of
the first term are typically spent on domestic policy. For Bill Clinton it was a little bit different,
because sitting there was the NAFTA. Sitting there was the end of the Uruguay Round
negotiations. And so there was a kind of momentum and an imperative to make administration
decisions: Do we go forward with the NAFTA and the labor environment side – (inaudible)?
Do we go forward with the Uruguay Round?
But that’s atypical. And so I think for this administration, with the president coming into
the situation he did – which is to say, massive deficits, so on and so forth, and then of course the
war, et cetera – I think that – wars – I think that his attention was probably occupied elsewhere,
frankly – and one could argue appropriately so. It seems to me, under those circumstances, it
would have been wise for the administration to better empower its Cabinet, which I think was
something of a surprise to many of us who watched.
But I do think now – with this embrace of TPP especially, and with the passage of the
Korea FTA in particular – I think the administration is beginning to see that actually this can be
an area of important advance for the president, especially in light of his export goal of doubling
exports in five years. So my hope would be – if it’s President Obama in the next four years or a
new president, my hope would be that the momentum that just is – has begun now just very
recently – and with the continuation of TPP, that a little more momentum is now put behind
these efforts. But I do think you’re right to say that – I think all of us agree in one form or
another that there’s – that there has been a bit of a slowness off the block in terms of trade.
MR. KANTOR: I didn’t imply anything. (Laughter.)
MS.: You said it outright.
MR. BROCK: Are you running for something? The rest of us will imply. You know, you can understand the first year or two because you’ve come out of a campaign; you’ve made commitments to your constituencies, in the – in the present case to labor more precisely. And you do have other
priorities you got to deal with. But at some point you do have to make a decision about what
your policy is. We have yet to see that decision. It’s not TPP; we don’t have a trade policy,
period.
And either the president or his opponent has to say, you know, we have an economic
problem in this country. It’s not just the fiscal deficit. We’ve got a trade problem. The
opportunity is out there for us to grab. We’re not seizing it because we’re not taking the
initiative. And we’re the only people who can. Other countries not going to take it for us.
We’re the only people who can.
And somehow this country has got to start talking about trade as an issue of political
consequence. We don’t do that; we treat it as a – as a – as an issue for the textile industry or the
ethanol industry – you know, that kind of thing. And it does bother me that we seem to sort of
sit back and let the negatives take control of the debate. And that I think is really dangerous for
all of us.
MR. YEUTTER: And you know, one other element here is that, you know, too many
people, including people often at the highest levels of government and often in both
administration – either administration, really don’t see trade as a big deal. They see domestic
policy as a big, big deal, and they kind of ignore trade as being not very important in the United
States. The fact is it’s incredibly important, and it’s way more important than it was 20 or 30 or
40 years ago. And somehow, you know, people have to get that through their thick noggins.
MS. HILLS: Jim, that’s why you should continue writing. And you should make it very
clear the strategic issues are not only on the economic bilateral benefit of a trade transaction, but
also how it affects foreign policy, development policy, security policy and our economic growth
and prosperity.
Jim Berger
Here's the link to CSIS's video of the event:
http://csis.org/event/conversation-six-former-ustrs
Sitting at the table were Bill Brock (Reagan), Clayton Yeutter (Reagan), Carla Hills (George H. Bush), Mickey Kantor (Clinton), Charlene Barshefsky (Clinton) and Susan Schwab (George W. Bush).They were assembled to talk about the US trade agenda. But the problem was that other than the TransPacific Partnership negotiations, the current Obama Administration doesn’t seem to have a trade agenda. It was not until near the end of the program – after nearly two hours of politely tipping toeing around the current Administration’s lack of a bold trade agenda that the former USTRs finally said what they were really thinking.
Here’s a transcript, courtesy of CSIS, of WTD’s question to the panel and the response:
MS. BROADBENT: Jim Berger, right there.
Q: Hi, thank you. Jim Berger from Washington Trade Daily. I just want to thank
everyone here for their great presentations. Makes me feel 10 years younger, actually.
(Laughter.) But one thing that wasn’t addressed – and there’s a lot of momentum here about
trade going right down the line, actually right through the decades – (chuckles) – if I might say –
but it seems to have dropped off at Ambassador Schwab’s end. What happened the day you left
office, and why did it happen?
AUDIENCE MEMBERS: (Chorus of ohhs.)
Q: No, I mean after you left office. (Laughter.) But why do we have this policy now in
this administration of – essentially no trade policy, which I think you – all of you have implied?
Someone once told me, who is a neighbor on K Street here that’s been around, that the president
just doesn’t get it.
(Off-side conversations, laughter.)
MS. BARSHEFSKY: Well, all right, I’ll take a shot. I think for most presidents – and
Mickey, you may have a different view of this – for most presidents, the first couple of years of
the first term are typically spent on domestic policy. For Bill Clinton it was a little bit different,
because sitting there was the NAFTA. Sitting there was the end of the Uruguay Round
negotiations. And so there was a kind of momentum and an imperative to make administration
decisions: Do we go forward with the NAFTA and the labor environment side – (inaudible)?
Do we go forward with the Uruguay Round?
But that’s atypical. And so I think for this administration, with the president coming into
the situation he did – which is to say, massive deficits, so on and so forth, and then of course the
war, et cetera – I think that – wars – I think that his attention was probably occupied elsewhere,
frankly – and one could argue appropriately so. It seems to me, under those circumstances, it
would have been wise for the administration to better empower its Cabinet, which I think was
something of a surprise to many of us who watched.
But I do think now – with this embrace of TPP especially, and with the passage of the
Korea FTA in particular – I think the administration is beginning to see that actually this can be
an area of important advance for the president, especially in light of his export goal of doubling
exports in five years. So my hope would be – if it’s President Obama in the next four years or a
new president, my hope would be that the momentum that just is – has begun now just very
recently – and with the continuation of TPP, that a little more momentum is now put behind
these efforts. But I do think you’re right to say that – I think all of us agree in one form or
another that there’s – that there has been a bit of a slowness off the block in terms of trade.
MR. KANTOR: I didn’t imply anything. (Laughter.)
MS.: You said it outright.
MR. BROCK: Are you running for something? The rest of us will imply. You know, you can understand the first year or two because you’ve come out of a campaign; you’ve made commitments to your constituencies, in the – in the present case to labor more precisely. And you do have other
priorities you got to deal with. But at some point you do have to make a decision about what
your policy is. We have yet to see that decision. It’s not TPP; we don’t have a trade policy,
period.
And either the president or his opponent has to say, you know, we have an economic
problem in this country. It’s not just the fiscal deficit. We’ve got a trade problem. The
opportunity is out there for us to grab. We’re not seizing it because we’re not taking the
initiative. And we’re the only people who can. Other countries not going to take it for us.
We’re the only people who can.
And somehow this country has got to start talking about trade as an issue of political
consequence. We don’t do that; we treat it as a – as a – as an issue for the textile industry or the
ethanol industry – you know, that kind of thing. And it does bother me that we seem to sort of
sit back and let the negatives take control of the debate. And that I think is really dangerous for
all of us.
MR. YEUTTER: And you know, one other element here is that, you know, too many
people, including people often at the highest levels of government and often in both
administration – either administration, really don’t see trade as a big deal. They see domestic
policy as a big, big deal, and they kind of ignore trade as being not very important in the United
States. The fact is it’s incredibly important, and it’s way more important than it was 20 or 30 or
40 years ago. And somehow, you know, people have to get that through their thick noggins.
MS. HILLS: Jim, that’s why you should continue writing. And you should make it very
clear the strategic issues are not only on the economic bilateral benefit of a trade transaction, but
also how it affects foreign policy, development policy, security policy and our economic growth
and prosperity.
Jim Berger
Here's the link to CSIS's video of the event:
http://csis.org/event/conversation-six-former-ustrs
Monday, April 9, 2012
WHY NO ONE IS LISTENING
No one is listening to the Obama Administration on US trade policy because no one is saying anything.
President Obama is entering his fourth year of his first term and has yet to develop any comprehensive, forward-moving US trade agenda – unless you call cherry-picking disputes with US trading partners a policy.
For the past half century US trade policymakers – in Washington, the private sector and Congress – have managed for the most part to keep trade out of partisan politics. That has led to some major advances – from the a North American Free Trade Agreement, to closer trade with Caribbean and Central American allies under the Caribbean Basin Initiative and its follow-on US-Central American Free Trade agreement along with an expanding string of bilateral free trade agreements. One also cannot discount the economic benefits of the Tokyo Round and the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations.
For sure, Americans have been split on the benefits of trade – but the matter has not been a hallmark of either national political party.
It is not so today.
The Obama Administration – and President Obama himself – are deep in the pockets of organized labor. Once a big supporter of trade agreements, labor in the mid-1960s became protectionist when then recovering economies like Japan and South Korea started producing for the US market.
Recently, a West coast partner of a major international law firm told me that he often calls the US Trade Representative’s office to get information on not-yet-fully-formulated policies that affect his clients. He said that he seldom gets an answer. So he turns to the trade experts at the AFL-CIO. Those short discussions usually result in comprehensive policy descriptions. Lo-and-behold, come a few weeks later and the AFL’s explanations emerge as full-fledged US trade policies, he said.
You can read the results in the national embarrassment of having no bilateral investment treaty program with major nations like China, India and Russia. To that you can add the killing of the 10-year-old effort to improve on global trade rules in the Doha Development Agenda of trade negotiations.
Even on old issues, such as the much-touted US free trade agreements with South Korea, Panama and Colombia, the news is not all good. The Administration has implemented the Korea accord but will not let the agreements with Panama and Colombia see the light of day.
There are still big question marks about the ongoing TransPacific Partnership trade negotiations with nine countries of the Asia-Pacific region. Labor, certainly, is not happy and will not let those negotiations come forward unless significant labor provisions to their liking – often considered purely national prerogatives by other nations – are written into the final pact.
So I guess Americans will just have to forego the benefits of freer trade and get used to sacrificing their own welfare to the whims of special interests like organized labor – to which the Administration is so beholding. Hence the silence.
Jim Berger
President Obama is entering his fourth year of his first term and has yet to develop any comprehensive, forward-moving US trade agenda – unless you call cherry-picking disputes with US trading partners a policy.
For sure, Americans have been split on the benefits of trade – but the matter has not been a hallmark of either national political party.
It is not so today.
The Obama Administration – and President Obama himself – are deep in the pockets of organized labor. Once a big supporter of trade agreements, labor in the mid-1960s became protectionist when then recovering economies like Japan and South Korea started producing for the US market.
Recently, a West coast partner of a major international law firm told me that he often calls the US Trade Representative’s office to get information on not-yet-fully-formulated policies that affect his clients. He said that he seldom gets an answer. So he turns to the trade experts at the AFL-CIO. Those short discussions usually result in comprehensive policy descriptions. Lo-and-behold, come a few weeks later and the AFL’s explanations emerge as full-fledged US trade policies, he said.
You can read the results in the national embarrassment of having no bilateral investment treaty program with major nations like China, India and Russia. To that you can add the killing of the 10-year-old effort to improve on global trade rules in the Doha Development Agenda of trade negotiations.
Even on old issues, such as the much-touted US free trade agreements with South Korea, Panama and Colombia, the news is not all good. The Administration has implemented the Korea accord but will not let the agreements with Panama and Colombia see the light of day.
There are still big question marks about the ongoing TransPacific Partnership trade negotiations with nine countries of the Asia-Pacific region. Labor, certainly, is not happy and will not let those negotiations come forward unless significant labor provisions to their liking – often considered purely national prerogatives by other nations – are written into the final pact.
So I guess Americans will just have to forego the benefits of freer trade and get used to sacrificing their own welfare to the whims of special interests like organized labor – to which the Administration is so beholding. Hence the silence.
Jim Berger
Saturday, April 7, 2012
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