President Obama?s dedication to free trade is not as strong as it appeared to be during last year?s campaign, according to Business Week:
When he assumed office, Obama had to deal with two opposing factions on trade inside his own party. Centrist Democrats favored more pacts with other countries to lower tariffs further on imports and secure more opportunities abroad for U.S. exporters. Progressive Democrats condemned the rapid expansion of free trade as a pernicious way to cost U.S. workers their jobs and move more industries offshore.
Early in his term, Obama favored the centrists. The President made it clear that the financial crisis would only worsen if free trade were in any way curtailed and trade wars broke out among the major economies. He and his U.S. Trade Representative, Ronald Kirk, signaled that a new trade accord with Panama was possible within months, while a pact with Colombia by year’s end wasn’t excluded. Drafts of both accords had been drawn up by the Bush Administration to lower trade barriers between the two Latin American countries and the U.S. The prospect of a Colombia pact especially angered progressives and their union allies, who charged the Colombian regime with harassing local labor groups.
Now neither deal appears likely this year or next.
Wow, who could have predicted this change of heart ? back in February 2008?
