I was at Kirk's speech on Thursday -- it was completely lame. Essentially the Obama Administration's trade agenda consists entirely of the TPP and addressing some technical trade barriers at this year's APEC conference. Re: the 3 outstanding bilaterals, Kirk said that he needs "thought leaders" such as the people in the audience to help build support for free trade in this country. No buddy that's a job for you and the freakin' President of the United States, who, by the way, helped undercut support for free trade through the comments he made about NAFTA while campaigning for the office he now holds.
Thankfully Jim Kolbe laid into Kirk's comments a bit in a subsequent panel discussion by stating, "Hey, you want to prove you're serious about trade -- pass the bilateral FTAs!"
Totally agree, Colin. I am stunned by Kirk's frank-yet-bizarre admission that he needs the business community's help to sell free trade. Maybe if his boss didn't demagogue the issue for 18 months during the 08 campaign, and maybe if his administration stopped with the mercantilist nonsense, he wouldn't be so desperate for others to do his job for him.
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I was at Kirk's speech on Thursday -- it was completely lame. Essentially the Obama Administration's trade agenda consists entirely of the TPP and addressing some technical trade barriers at this year's APEC conference. Re: the 3 outstanding bilaterals, Kirk said that he needs "thought leaders" such as the people in the audience to help build support for free trade in this country. No buddy that's a job for you and the freakin' President of the United States, who, by the way, helped undercut support for free trade through the comments he made about NAFTA while campaigning for the office he now holds.
Thankfully Jim Kolbe laid into Kirk's comments a bit in a subsequent panel discussion by stating, "Hey, you want to prove you're serious about trade -- pass the bilateral FTAs!"
Totally agree, Colin. I am stunned by Kirk's frank-yet-bizarre admission that he needs the business community's help to sell free trade. Maybe if his boss didn't demagogue the issue for 18 months during the 08 campaign, and maybe if his administration stopped with the mercantilist nonsense, he wouldn't be so desperate for others to do his job for him.
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