Thread: Mexico worries about Obama agenda

Originally Posted by wmarincic

Let's see, They want our business's to move to Mexico and they want us to let their Mexicans come to the U.S. freely to work. Yeh, thats sure to help us.....

Yeah, that's a sure win-win for them isn't it? I've been to the non-tourist areas of Mexico, and they are doing just fine economically, and in some cases, even better than Americans. I'm really getting tired of the "poor Mexico" mentality when they are doing just fine. I have 2 friends in Mexico and they confirm what I have said. Mexicans have jobs, cars. homes, etc. just like Americans. They just have the scum that would rather take advantage of us. According to my Mexican friends, Mexico is happy that these scum come here rather than stay there.

Like Fox, Calderon has argued that NAFTA should be "deepened" by providing for the flow of labor across the U.S. border

NO WAY! NAFTA has already opened up the floodgates to illegal immigration and crime. FINISH THE FENCE, DEPORT ILLEGAL ALIENS!

Sounds like a request for open borders. Let's make it equitable, all the uninsured Americans who go to Mexico for treatment will now receive such services for free. Their hospitals will also provide free ER care for all of us. Additionally, we'll move our families down there and overwhelm their education system, lowering their schools rankings, proving an ineptitude to master another language that shares the same Latin root.

Additionally, Mexico will provide an array of social services for us to wheedle. We'll complain loudly about getting busted for breaking their laws. We'll send our criminals there to reap havoc and stay in their prisons.

Our females will become grossly overweight and parade around in skinny teens fashions.

Mexico's Calderon Warns Obama Against Renegotiating Trade Deal

By Mark Drajem and Joshua Goodman

Nov. 22 (Bloomberg) -- Mexican President Felipe Calderon warned Barack Obama against trying to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement, saying restricting commerce would only encourage illegal Mexican emigration to the U.S.

``The day access is closed, workers will jump over whatever river or wall you put there,'' Calderon told business leaders today at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Lima, Peru, where leaders of 21 nations are meeting.

Calderon's comments reflect unease among U.S. trading partners over the likely economic policies of President-elect Obama, who has expressed reservations about Nafta and pending agreements with Colombia and South Korea. Leaders from the Asia- Pacific region also said they are concerned protectionism would exacerbate the global economic crisis.

``Obama's signals have not been very positive as far as free trade is concerned,'' Luc Gerard, president of Bogota-based private equity fund Tribeca Partners, said in an interview. ``There's definitely a concern.''

The leaders are meeting amid signs that the global economic slump is growing deeper. The worst credit crisis in seven decades spurred countries from China to the U.K. to boost spending or cut taxes in an effort to support growth and avoid a prolonged recession.

``One of the enduring lessons of the Great Depression is that global protectionism is a path to global economic ruin,'' President George W. Bush told the summit.

Bush complained that Congress hasn't approved pending trade deals, and Colombian President Alvaro Uribe wondered whether a free-trade accord with Canada would boost chances for his deal with the U.S.

Bush's Trade Agenda

Bush has made the pursuit of trade agreements the centerpiece of his international economic agenda, securing eight deals since taking office in 2001. He's also been a consistent cheerleader for the World Trade Organization's Doha Round of negotiations, which broke down in July. The APEC leaders are likely to pledge to try to revive it before Bush leaves office.

Obama, who takes office Jan. 20, has raised questions about the pending trade pacts with Colombia and South Korea. During the election campaign, he said he would seek to renegotiate Nafta, which includes Canada and Mexico and dates from 1994, to include strict labor and environmental provisions.

Advisers who spoke on the condition of anonymity have said that Obama will order a study on Nafta, then seek longer-term negotiations with Mexico and Canada on how to change it after he becomes president. Mexico is the third-largest U.S. partner, with trade valued at $347 billion last year.

Period of Transition

``We're in transition here in Washington, and that's part of the complication,'' said Myron Brilliant, vice president for Asia at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Other nations are asking ``questions about the priorities of the new administration.''

At the annual meeting, APEC leaders made the case for keeping markets open.

``Nations must not make a regression to protectionism citing the current financial crisis,'' South Korean President Lee Myung Bak said. ``Newly emerging economies that are vulnerable to protectionism will get the most damage.''

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who signed a free- trade agreement with Colombia yesterday, has rejected Obama's plan to rework Nafta and echoed Lee and Bush today.

``Building walls and closing doors is always wrong,'' Harper said. Signing the trade agreement with Colombia should send a signal to the world against protectionism, he added.

Mexico's Calderon was most direct when he asked about Obama's plans to rework Nafta.

``I hope that the next U.S. government won't make this mistake,'' he said. Instead of scaling Nafta back, the agreement should be expanded to include the free movement of workers, he added.

www.bloomberg.com

`The day access is closed, workers will jump over whatever river or wall you put there,'' Calderon told business leaders

Then a shoot on sight order is required. (at the border I mean)

Mexican officials want to negotiate a comprehensive treaty for legalizing Mexican workers, at least temporarily, in the United States.

And the American taxpayers and voters have said "NO". And fortunately, Mexican officials have no say in the policies of the U.S.

"If you look at the day-to-day impact that any country has on the security, economic well-being and prosperity of the Americans, then there is no country more important than Mexico," Saruhkan said.

If you make that day-to-day NEGATIVE impact, then I would agree. The security, economic well-being and prosperity of American citizens are in danger to the invasion of Mexican citizens.

Originally Posted by jshhmr

Originally Posted by wmarincic

Let's see, They want our business's to move to Mexico and they want us to let their Mexicans come to the U.S. freely to work. Yeh, thats sure to help us.....

Yeah, that's a sure win-win for them isn't it? I've been to the non-tourist areas of Mexico, and they are doing just fine economically, and in some cases, even better than Americans. I'm really getting tired of the "poor Mexico" mentality when they are doing just fine. I have 2 friends in Mexico and they confirm what I have said. Mexicans have jobs, cars. homes, etc. just like Americans. They just have the scum that would rather take advantage of us. According to my Mexican friends, Mexico is happy that these scum come here rather than stay there.

I've been saying the same thing for a long, long time. These people are NOT suffering as much as they would like us to believe and so many seem to believe.

I know. I manage a development which used to be packed to the rafters with IAs and if I heard about, or saw one more picture of. the homes, cars. farms. stores, etc. that these people have acquired over there through the abuse of this country, I'd have screamed.

IS there poverty? Of course. There's not a place on earth which doesn't have some segment of it's population living that way.

But is the majority of Mexico's population impoverished, eating dirt, etc? NO! They aren't.

Even among the illegals who have left this neighborhood.....because of enforcement and/or the economy......and are planning on leaving, it is not any big deal to them. They have homes and savings, many have already, or are planning to, buy ranches or farms, markets, restaurants or shops. Heck, right now there is a father and two sons living here who will be going back to Mexico soon after only 3 1/2 years of working in heavy equipment operation. They lost their jobs and are going home with no plans of ever coming back. They don't have to because they've already gotten started on setting up their own excavation company over there.

It's all very easy to do hen you're ripping the US and it's taxpayers off for ever dime you can get your hands on and if they regret anything it's only that it didn't go on longer.

Mexico cheers Obama but fears his trade stance
Wed Nov 26, 2008 3:06pm EST
By Catherine Bremer - Analysis

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexico's government and business leaders are worried about U.S. President-elect Barack Obama's commitment to free trade and the war on drug cartels, even though Mexicans cheered his election win as a chance to restore a jaded friendship.

Mexico felt neglected as President George W. Bush, who made his first foreign trip as U.S. president to Mexico in 2001, became embroiled in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and failed to win a much-vaunted reform of U.S. immigration laws.

As "Obamamania" swept the world, polls showed three-quarters of Mexicans backed the Democrat for president, but Mexican exporters and President Felipe Calderon's government fretted about Obama's campaign promise to revise the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA.

Obama is likely to spend much of his time fighting the economic meltdown at home, and Calderon warned him last weekend against trying to save U.S. jobs by using trade protectionism.

"Renegotiating NAFTA is a very bad idea," Calderon said at a meeting of Asian and Pacific leaders in Peru.

The pact is seen by Mexican business as a boon for Mexico. It went into effect in 1994 and Mexican exports to the United States have soared, although the slump north of the border is now hitting Mexican economic growth.

Mexico's "maquiladora" export-for-assembly industry has surged under NAFTA, generating $150 billion a year in sales and $25 billion a year in taxes and salaries that stay in Mexico.

"NAFTA has been very good for both sides. It keeps more manufacturing in the U.S. and Mexico, and stops it all going to China," said Enrique Castro, who runs a factory making foam packaging in Reynosa, on the border with McAllen, Texas.

Obama is likely to be too busy rescuing the U.S. economy to pay much attention to ties with Mexico, described by Bush early in his first presidency as the most important relationship the United States has.

"The composition and timing of Obama's policy agenda toward Mexico will depend heavily on the depth of the U.S. economic slowdown," the Eurasia Group political risk consultancy said.

DRUG WAR

Bush has pledged $1.4 billion in equipment to help Mexico and Central America battle increasingly bolder drug cartels but U.S. officials, worried about human rights abuses in Mexico, are still wrangling over the details of delivering it.

Some 4,300 people have been murdered this year as cartels who supply cocaine and other drugs to U.S. streets fight turf wars and lash back at a Mexican army crackdown.

Obama has said he will support the drugs war, and Mexico wants Washington to crack down on U.S. sales of guns which end up being used by Mexican cartels.

Analysts say the real anti-drug fight is inside Mexico, where gangs have bribed high level security officials and police, especially on the U.S. border, to let drug shipments through.

"Mexico's northern border is as close to a failed state within a state as exists. But it's pretty much Mexico's problem," said Dan Lund, head of research firm MUND Americas.

"Nobody's so full of fantasy that they think Mexico or Latin America has come to the top of (Washington's) list."

Hispanics voted for Obama in record numbers and there may be pressure to put immigration reform back on the agenda after his inauguration in January but analysts say that is unlikely to happen until the economic climate improves.

"Delivery is what counts. We'll have to see what happens once he's got his cabinet together," said Andres Rozental, a Mexican diplomat and former deputy foreign minister.

www.reuters.com

Added to Homepage:
http://www.alipac.us/article-3770--0-0.html

for general information from someone who lives in Mexico and is just an average working stiff with a business...there is no NAFTA for us. NAFTA is only for the big businesses and the elite. We average people have to pay import duties and have to go through beurocratic hell to import items into Mexico. It is very expensive and time consuming and guess what? The fact that it is so expensive and time consuming encourages smuggling of said importations. I just like every other business import just enough inventory to look good. the rest of the shop inventory is kept offsite and moved only when needed. we keep the number of items that we imported in case we are inspected. NAFTA has also done its fine part in keeping down wages. Average Mexicans like me do not benefit in the least from NAFTA so we could care less if it becomes repealed or whatever. All these complaints from our government are only showing their desperation. It is unbelieveable that they can show pride when they only want to export their problems, the people who could become a force against them and hold them responsible for their own stupid actions. Mexico has become a failed state in many ways it will implode its only a matter of time.