House Members Urge the Renegotiation of NAFTA Trucking Provision
OPS_admin | Apr 17, 2010 | Comments 0
A bipartisan coalition of 77 House members sent a letter Wednesday to U.S. Trade Rep. Ron Kirk and Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood imploring them to renegotiate a section of the North American Free Trade Agreement that provides Mexican trucks with full access to U.S. roadways.
That provision of the trade agreement has sparked a bitter trade dispute between the U.S. and Mexico. NAFTA was supposed to allow Mexican trucks full access to U.S. roadways by 1995, however, opposition led by safety advocates and organized labor managed to keep the borders closed to Mexican trucks, more-or-less. After a Mexican trucking company successfully sued the U.S. for its failure to meet its obligations under the agreement, the Bush administration instituted a pilot program that was later scuttled by Congress. In response, the Mexican government levied tariffs on some 89 U.S. products totaling $2.4 billion.
The pilot program gave access to up to 500 Mexican trucks to drive deeper into the United States than previously allowed under law, which posed a whole host of safety risks, according to the letter.
Full Story: House Members Urge the Renegotiation of NAFTA Trucking Provision | Economy In Crisis.
Filed Under: Foreign Policy
Comments (0)
-
If we don't change our ways soon...
A new report by the Royal Society, chaired by Nobel prize-winning biologist Sir John Sulston warns that world population must be stabilized and consumption in wealthy nations must be reduced or the entire planet is in big trouble. As the report reads: "The number of people living on the planet has never been higher, their levels of consumption are unprecedented and vast changes are taking place in the environment. We can choose to rebalance the use of resources to a more egalitarian pattern of consumption... or we can choose to do nothing and to drift into a downward spiral of economic and environmental ills leading to a more unequal and inhospitable future."This is the same warning that President Jimmy Carter gave Americans back in the 1970's - but it was ignored when Ronald Reagan came to power with a "more positive" message basically telling Americans we can do whatever we want. And then after 9/11 - Bush told us all we should go shopping and consume ever more.And now with corporations calling the shots in Washington - long-term sustainability of the planet takes a back seat to short-term profits. If we don't change our ways soon - and embrace clean, alternative energy and educate women around the plant - then we all could be headed for a rough century.-Thom(Is there any chance we will learn in time? Tell us here.) -
LEGALIZE Democracy
" We the corporations" On January 21, 2010, with its ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Supreme Court ruled that corporations are persons, entitled by the U.S. Constitution to buy elections and run our government. __________
MOVE to AMEND
a project of the CAMPAIGN TO LEGALIZE Democracy
Help end Corporate personhood
-
The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. 
moveon.org
