No More NAFTA?? Good Riddance? Careful What You Wish For

I just learned that the United States Congress is backing President Obama in backing out of NAFTA in about six months time. This proposal came from Missisippi Representative, Gene Taylor-D. It is getting the support of more and more, from the left Dems to Blue Dogs to GOP to Libertarians like Ron Paul from 16 states. It is being said that NAFTA has been hurting the American economy and American jobs since 1994.

“At a time when 10 to 12 percent of the American people are unemployed, I think Congress has an obligation to put people back to work,” Taylor said.

“You’ll see the American people rally behind this, in my humble opinion,” said Rep. Walter Jones, a North Carolina Republican who is one of about 28 co-sponsors of the bill.

It would seem that even the Tea-bagger hit parade is behind this. The biggest and most obvious reason for Obama and Congress timing of this would more than likely be because it’s election time this year for many senators, unemployment is at an all time high in the U.S. and American voters would definitely favor more an American-first kind of deal.

Republicans and Democrats coming together? American voters more than likely to go along with a pull-out of NAFTA?? A fait-accompli then? Not quite. There is a large hurtle to cross. Remember them pesky lobbyists and their powers state side.

Business groups like the National Association of Manufacturers and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce strongly support NAFTA, which they say has spurred U.S. economic growth by tearing down trade barriers between the three countries.

That is, unfortunately, the sad reality. The U.S. is ruled by lobbying from Business groups. With all those elections coming up this year, many would no doubt rely upon such groups to get re elected. Perhaps this idea will get shelved at least until afterwards. I would hope so.

These free trade deals with the U.S. haven’t really been great for Canada neither: Hello Softwood Lumber and Ethyl Corp. v Gov’t of Canada. Currently, Melvin J Howard, Centurion and Howard Family Trust v Gov’t of Canada (If anyone can tell where that suit is at these days, please drop a comment or email; last I heard was over the summer, it was before NAFTA arbitrators).

Then there is St-Stevie, yes, he does have his hands full at the moment, running away from the truth and contorting himself like a pretzel to sell his B.S. to a lot of gullible Canadians only too eager to swallow his kool-aid, making threats to the opposition and such. However, make no mistake; how much time will it take him to race (on once again, private jet plane) to the White House to catch Obama during one of his smoke breaks to get on his knees and beg him to keep NAFTA in place while offering more of  Canada on a silver platter? Or scrap NAFTA entirely for a whole new agreement, that would make Canada a step short of being the 51st state of the union.

Any bets on how long it will take St-Stevie to stop everything he’s doing to rush off to suck up to President Obama?