Thread: Hilary's campaign and free trade Colombia.

So Hilary has had to fire a top campaign employee because his PR firm received $300,000 from the Colombian government to "educate" members of Congress on the details of the deal. Hilary and Bill oppose the agreement so they had to fire the guy.

Obama tells voters he does not like NAFTA then an aide to Obama tells Candian officials "not to worry."

McCain tries to shove scamnesty down out throats at 1:00 A.M.

Can you trust any of them?

"If they are not kissing babies they are stealing their lollipops!"

Originally Posted by alipacdude

"If they are not kissing babies they are stealing their lollipops!"

Unless they are here Illegally then they give them everything

What is it with this free trade c***ola?!?!?! What ever happenned to fair trade? A good book on the subject is now over 20 years old, and it forecasted everything almost to the letter. It's called America What Went Wrong.

It covers how it all started with deregulation back in the '70s, and has pomulgated into what we now have. Business' that have left, or are leaving the country in droves to find the cheapest labor abroad. But if they bring their wares back to America, who can afford them? You have to have a job to earn enough money to purchase these items, and if there's no work or very little work, who's going to buy them?

It all boils down to short sightedness, and short term profits. Just like the talk from housing contractors. If we get cheap labor, the price of housing stays low. What a bunch of bull. Since most of the construction workers here in Colo. are illegals and work for 6 bucks an hour with no bennies, as opposed to a union worker, I haven't seen the price of housing drop from that. It has steadily increased, until the bottom of the market fell out here the last couple years.

And the corporations have the politicians in their hip pockets, because big money lobbying paid for what we now have. They have by-passed the labor laws in this country by making it possible for them to leave America with government legislation allowing it to go on, with glorious approval. The reason products are so cheap from the PRC and other places like that, is because there are no envirornmental laws that have to be followed to keep corporate waste from poluting the air, and water, like America did to the Great Lakes as a for instance. There are no labor laws for the workers, so if they strike for better wages, and better bennies, the government brings in the big guns, since the government has a big hand in business in those countries.

Add to it, all the countries in the world that were destroyed during WWII from bombing or ground fighting are now recovered, and don't need American Manufacturing for the things they depended on when the US was the manufacturer for the world from the late '40s until about the mid '70s, when everything started to fall apart, for us here in America.

But to stay on track with cheaper foreign labor, you need to have proper tariffs so that the price of cheaper made stuff is equal in price to domestically made stuff. And we all know that cheaper doesn't necessarilly mean better, but folks will for cheaper anyways, then complain about it later. If you pay someone a decent wage, you will get a deacent job out of them. Pay them an excellent wage, and you will get a fantastic return for your investment. But that thinking no longer exists for the most part. Nor does quality either. Except in rare instances where quality is companies main goal.

Here's an example, I had a customer (I work on auto HVAC systems) who needed about 1100.00 to 1300.00 dollars in work to do the job correctly. I'm talking 6 to 8 hours of intensive hard work. Major component failure. That was the bid I gave him, and explained the situation, and showed him the evidence I found to prove the point, and had cutaway models to help explain it too. He went to another shop, and then called me to tell me I was blowin' smoke up his.............. So I said well, let this other place do the work then. He did.

Eight months later, he calls me up again wit hte same problem. This other shop won't help hom with the same problem. I said I would come out and look at it again, but not for free this time. He agreed. The shop chared him 300 dollars for what he said was a new compressor. It turned out to be new from the junkyard.

So now, not only do I have the original problem to deal with, I have to clean up some one elses mess. I told him, "look, this isn't a 6 to 8 hour job anymore. I now have even more work to do to the tune of 14 to 16 hours. Basically a complete factory reinstall of the components, as they were all tore up. I had about 3 parts that were reusable. The rest were hosed. And I told him, "sir, this is going to cost around 2200 to 2400 dollars to fix now. His wife went ballistic, on him, and not me. She told him he was a moron for getting it done cheaper before, in front of my other customers. And she told him to give me the keys, and let me do it right. She did ask if there was a guarentee on the job, which I said, yes ma'am, I use factory quality parts, you can have the old ones back, as proof of replacement, and i stand behind my work with a guarantee of labor to match the parts which the factory warrentee is 12 months or 12,000 miles. She said that was great! And I told her, with everything I'm having to replace, there were about 2 dozen seals and gaskets, to keep an eye on the system, as you can get a bad seal from time to time. Which she appreciated the headsup.

Luckily nothing went bad for them after the job was done. I was able to get it done quicker than I estimated, and I adjusted the price accordingly. The parts took 2 days to accumulate, and it the onlt took 12 hours to complete. So they were happy that I knocked the price down to 1800, but that's still a big ammount of money compared to my original bid to do it right the first time.

Oh, he and his wife are now loyal customers of mine, and anytime something goes wrong they will have me look at it first, even if it's outside of what I specialize in. But I usually recommend a good shop to them for other things, as I know who the good guys and who the crooks are for the most part.

Hylander, I think that trade with a country like Canada is good. Other so called first world countries too! Why The people live well in Canada and Europe.

The problem is places like Mexico, China and India. American companies have left for the CHEAP labor and they can pollute overseas. Yes, big quick profits. However, when the WEALTH of the country AMERICA goes OUT of the US we go deeper into debt so who controls the US? Chinese?

Mexico promised us no more immigrants back in 94 with NAFTA and here we are in 2008 with more than ever. Why if free trade NAFTA was so good for Mexico?

Free trade with Colombia will not matter because CHINA has the cheapest labor costs so don't look for too many factories opening in Colombia.

Free trade YES is good for a few but for ALL OF US Americans? I say no and I think it is all coming to a head right now with this recession. Throw in the illegals.....export jobs (wealth- foreign investment) import people (illegals) How is it good for ALL?