Everyday, the drunken orange golfer who would be Speaker stumbles around the country braying "Where are the jobs, Mr. President?" The answer should be really clear: "you shipped them overseas, you NAFTA/CAFTA supporting idiot; now resign." But no one says that. And there's a reason. Our whole political class-- in a truly bipartisan way-- is completely corrupted. Corporate America finances our "democracy," underwriting the political careers of our politicians. That's the system. In return they get to write their own legislation. And when it has come to trade policy, it doesn't matter who's in power-- Democrats or Republicans-- trade policy is predicated on driving down the cost of labor at home and allowing U.S. companies to manufacture goods overseas and ship them back to home cheaply. That it has hollowed out the U.S. economy means nothing-- except to the American people... and that doesn't count since there hasn't been a politician's head on a pike in God knows how long.
A personal aside before I get into the names of potential pikees. I was driving home from a fundraiser tonight for a rare politician who would never sell out working families-- not if it cost him his life; very rare. He probably doesn't have much of a career in politics to look forward to. Anyway, I called my old friend to help while away the time-- let's call him Mr. Big. Mr. Big is a senior officer at a major American manufacturing company and Mr. Big sounded very, very depressed. "What's the matter, Mister Big? What's got you down." Short version: Mr. Big has $9,000,000 in stock options expiring next week and his company's stock is down-- way down. The $9,000,000 he was counting on is probably only going to yield $8,000,000. Mr. Big is thinking like someone is stealing $1,000,000. That's a lot of money; poor Mr. Big. He said the stock market is down because the country "is going away." Oh, no, I thought; I was at that fundraiser for hours; what happened?. "Where's it going," I asked. China, he shouted, accusitory-like. "But, Mr. Big, you guys manufacture all your junk fine products there." But, said Mr. B, no one has jobs here and no is buying anything. Poor Mr. Big; he didn't make that happen. Who did?
John Boehner!
And not just Boehner. Do you hear the silence of Democrats not blaming him when he shrieks, "Where are the jobs, Mr. President?" No one from our political elite says, "You sent the jobs to China, you drunken, orange piece of crap; resign, resign, resign." So I should tell you why. Late in December 1992-- after Clinton had been elected president, promising to look out for working families-- George H.W. Bush sat down with two corporate shills for other countries, Brian Mulroney of Canada and Carlos Salinas from Mexico. They signed the NAFTA treaty, although Bush had been unable to fast track it through Congress and it was so unpopular in Canada that it destroyed Mulroney's Conservative Party.
Clinton pushed it through the House a year later (dirty work by Rahm Emanuel), 234 to 200-- 132 Republicans and, pay attention, 102 Democrats. It passed the Senate 61-38. This is a list of people currently in the Senate who voted that day and how they voted:
populist Daniel Akaka (D-HI)- NO
corporatist Max Baucus (D-MT)- YES
corporatist Robert Bennett (R-UT)- YES
corporatist Jeff Bingaman (D-NM)- YES
corporatist Kit Bond (R-MO)- YES
populist Barbara Boxer (D-CA)- NO
corporatist Dan Coats (R-IN)- YES (He was in the Senate then and is running-- and will probably win-- this year)
populist Kent Conrad (D-ND)- NO
corporatist Thad Cochran (R-MS)- YES
corporatist Chris Dodd (D-CT)- YES
populist Russ Feingold (D-WI)- NO
corporatist Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)- NO
corporatist Chuck Grassley (R-IA)- YES
corporatist Judd Gregg (R-NH)- YES
populist Tom Harkin (D-IA)- YES
corporatist Orrin Hatch (R-UT)- YES
corporatist Daniel Inouye (D-HI)- NO
corporatist John Kerry (D-MA)- YES
corporatist Herb Kohl (D-WI)- NO
quasi-populist Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ)- NO
populist Patrick Leahy (D-VT)- YES
quasi-populist Carl Levin (D-MI)- NO
corporatist Joe Lieberman (I-CT)- YES
corporatist Dick Lugar (R-IN)- YES
corporatist John McCain (R-AZ)- YES
corporatist Mitch McConnell (R-KY)- YES
populist Barbara Mikulski (D-MD)- NO
quasi-populist Harry Reid (D-NV)- NO
corporatist John Rockefeller (D-WV)- NO
corporatist Shelby (D-- now R-- AL)- NO
corporatist Arlen Specter (R-- now D)- YES
I've bolded the ones who are up for reelection this year. Forget which party they're in. If they voted YES, they should be defeated, held responsible for what they did to America. If they voted NO, they earned a pat on the head for looking after their constituents' interests. There are too many members of the House to go through the same exercise. But let me just mention some standouts. In the YES column, the ones who voted to destroy the manufacturing base of the United States: current Tea Party leader Dick Armey (R-TX), oily Joe Barton (R-TX), John Boehner (R-OH), who we'll talk about a little more in depth below, Ken Calvert (R-CA), Mike Castle (R-DE), Jim Cooper (Blue Dog-TN), Nathan Deal (R-GA), David Dreier (R-CA), Steny Hoyer (D-MD), John Kasich (R-OH), Jon Kyl (R-AZ), Blanche Lambert Lincoln (Blue Dog-AR), Rick Lazio (R-NY), Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), and Rob Portman (R-OH). Those should all be familiar names.
And who went against President Clinton and stood up to Rahm Emanuel's threats of retributions? Here are a few names among the 156 Democrats and 43 Republicans (few of whom are still in Congress): Neil Abercrombie (D-HI), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Jim Clyburn (D-SC), Barney Frank (D-MA), John Lewis (D-GA), Jerry Nadler (D-NY), Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Ted Strickland (D-OH). Imagine the campaign ad Ted Strickland could run against Kacich, Portman and Boehner-- maybe throw in Pelosi-- in his current gubernatorial re-election bid. He won't.
Growing trade deficits and massive "job displacement" resulted, particularly after Bush came to office and ignored all the weak safeguards Clinton had put into the treaty to offer some semblance of protections for U.S. labor and environment. Close to a million net jobs have been lost to NAFTA, may more to similar "free trade" agreements since. Tragically, the vast majority of those jobs were relatively high-paying manufacturing jobs. In Mr. Boehner's Ohio, for example, 14,653 jobs were lost due to NAFTA-related reasons, primarily relocation of U.S. firms to Mexico.
So is Boehner an idiot? Or just playing politics with the economy? Both? Too many numbers to figure out? Economists can twist numbers, you think. Well, one thing can't be twisted and interpreted away-- John Boehner push for and voted for every piece of trade legislation that's come down the pike that undermined the American labor market, from NAFTA right to the ones he was shilling for last week (Columbia, South Korea and God knows where else). He's working to do what Mr. Big says is destroying America-- killing the ability of America consumers to afford to buy even the cheap products made overseas. It's enough of a reason to vote him out of office and to help elect Justin Coussoule in his place. Yesterday Ed Schultz had Justin on his MSNBC show again and Justin came up with a new phrase I hadn't heard before. He called Boehner, "the most coin-operated politician in Washington." I'll remember that! Anyway, lots of members of this community have chipped in for the Blue America efforts to raise money for the BeatBoehner billboards and to put the TV spots on cable in southwest Ohio. Here's the bonus for all the generous support. THANKS!