221-205. Yet another episode in congress' war against the American worker.
I just tuned into C-Span to catch the tail end of the OFTA vote. We had a quite a number of Republican defectors to thwart this free trade agreement. Up until the last few seconds of the vote, it looked like we would have less Democrats voting yay than the fifteen who joined Tom Delay on CAFTA.
At they very, very end of the vote, however, a string of Democrats voted yay to put this bill through congress.
Jane Harman and Susan Davis, both of California, were two of the Democrats to vote yes on OFTA. The roll call is not up on the House Website yet but will be found
here soon.
I'm not the best source of analysis on this particular trade agreement but if its anything like the free trade agreements congress is addicted to passing, there is no excuse for a single yes vote from our side. A free trade agreement with a country like Australia, which we have, is something I can consider supporting. A country like Australia treats their workers with a sense of decency. In Oman, we see slave labor and allegedly, human traficking. To expose our labor force to a country that neglects the minimal international labor standards is an abomination.