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« on: August 28, 2018, 05:16:06 PM » |
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The Patriot Post Digest 8-28-2018
From The Federalist Patriot
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The Patriot Post® · Mid-Day Digest
Aug. 28, 2018 · https://patriotpost.us/digests/57906-mid-day-digest
THE FOUNDATION
“States, like individuals, who observe their engagements, are respected and trusted: while the reverse is the fate of those who pursue an opposite conduct.” —Alexander Hamilton (1790)
https://patriotpost.us/fqd/57900-founders-quote-daily
IN TODAY’S EDITION
Is Trump’s bilateral trade deal with Mexico better than NAFTA?
Democrats are struggling with their own alternate reality.
The ACLU just came to the defense of the right side.
Another case of garbage in, garbage out at CNN.
An Obama judge thwarts Trump’s effort to clean up public unions.
Daily Features: Top Headlines, Memes, Cartoons, Columnists, and Short Cuts.
FEATURED ANALYSIS
A New NAFTA and the Art of the Deal1
Lewis Morris
President Donald Trump announced a tentative trade agreement with Mexico Monday, calling it “one of the largest trade deals ever made” and “much better” than the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Speaking from the Oval Office, Trump was joined by Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto via conference call. Nieto also chimed in that it was an “incredible deal for both parties.” Is it?
As always with trade, the answer is “yes and no2.” There are good aspects and bad ones.
Points reached in the agreement include changes to automobile manufacturing. Each car produced would have to be 75% sourced in North America, up from 62.5%, to avoid tariffs when being transported across national borders. Also, 40-45% of each car produced must be manufactured by workers making $16 per hour or more to avoid tariffs. That helps American manufacturers, but it will raise prices for consumers. Additional updates to rules on intellectual property and labor are also part of the agreement.
The deal still must be approved by Congress and the Mexican government. Trump is eager to make this happen before the midterms, and Peña Nieto is likewise hoping to have his government approve the measure before he leaves office on Dec. 1. At this point, there don’t appear to be any insurmountable political hurdles to prevent the trade agreement from becoming a reality, but never underestimate the machinations of American Democrats or Mexican Socialists like incoming President-elect Andrés Manuel López Obrador3. And in any case, time constraints likely mean it isn’t going to happen this year.
It’s important to note that this is a strictly bilateral trade agreement between the U.S. and Mexico. What will become of Canada, the third member of NAFTA, is yet to be determined, though clearly Trump means to use this as leverage with our northern neighbors. Trump told reporters that negotiations with Canada would start back up immediately, and Peña Nieto voiced his hope that the U.S. and Canada would be able to come to an agreement. Chrystia Freeland, Canada’s minister of foreign affairs, said separately Monday that her country was encouraged by the optimism shown by the U.S.-Mexico agreement. “Progress between Mexico and the United States is a necessary requirement for any renewed NAFTA agreement.”
Trump, of course, says he’s prepared to scrap NAFTA4 altogether, insisting that the very name has bad connotations. He has repeatedly referred to NAFTA as a historically bad trade deal for the U.S. — a “disaster” — and thus he would rather this deal be referred to simply as the United States-Mexico Trade Agreement. Moreover, Trump has signaled his comfort with cementing two separate bilateral deals with Mexico and Canada, though those two nations still hold out hope that NAFTA can be renegotiated and salvaged.
Trump’s strategy is simple: The U.S.-Mexico deal puts pressure on Canada, which was sidelined while Trump pursued a divide-and-conquer approach to negotiating better deals with America’s biggest trading partners.
Markets reacted favorably5 to the news, with major U.S.-based auto manufacturers seeing bumps in their stock price and equity markets across North America also getting a boost.
A few months ago, Democrats, business leaders, and international trade groups cried6 that Trump was going to wreck the world economy and crash America’s economic rebound with his tariffs and his America-first approach to new trade deals. None of this has come to pass. In fact, little by little, the very nations that claimed they were prepared to engage in a trade war with the United States have started changing their tune.
Earlier this summer, the EU came to an agreement with the U.S.7 that will allow us to export more produce and liquid natural gas to Europe. The door was also left open to work toward a zero-tariff trade deal between the U.S. and EU.
The new deal with Mexico and the positive signs for an agreement between the U.S. and Canada suggest that Trump will continue scoring points on trade. The more victories he lines up, the stronger will be his bargaining position with tougher nations like China.
As we have said frequently, never underestimate the art of the deal.
https://patriotpost.us/articles/57903-a-new-nafta-and-the-art-of-the-deal
IN BRIEF
Democrats vs. Reality8
Nate Jackson
The Democrat Party is struggling to navigate the alternate reality its members have created. The progressive worldview says each person can have his/her/its own reality, untethered to truth and objective morality. That tension, along with collective Trump Derangement Syndrome9, being so spooked by the Russian-collusion bogeyman that the DNC mistook a cybersecurity test for a hack10, and bad fundraising, means it’s not easy being a donkey these days.
Over the weekend, the Democratic National Committee voted to modify its charter to account for “all” of the genders. There are, of course, only two, but hey, this is the modern Democrat Party. As National Review reports11, the charter will now “define gender as being determined by self-identification and [will] include a classification for gender non-binary members.” Furthermore, “The previous charter required that all committees be divided evenly between men and women but, under the newly adopted system, committees ‘shall be as equally divided as practicable between men and women (determined by gender self-identification) meaning that the variance between men and women in the group cannot exceed one (1).’”
Sounds like fuzzy math to us.
“At the root of our diverse party is a commitment to inclusion and opportunity,” DNC Chair Tom Perez crowed in a statement. “By adopting this amendment, the Democratic National Committee is ensuring every Democrat feels welcome and embraced for who they are. This action reaffirms our solidarity with the LGBTQ community.”
This “choose your own identity” fantasy has its limits, however. Ask Rachel Dolezal12, the white women who insists she’s black.
Meanwhile, the DNC reduced the power of superdelegates13 in its presidential primaries after the Hillary Clinton/Bernie Sanders debacle revealed that the “Democratic” Party wasn’t all that democratic.
Perhaps one answer to why these changes are happening now is to follow the money. DNC fundraising is down from previous cycles, and it’s raised about half the total for the Republican National Committee. Loyal donors are telling DNC politicos to buzz off “until they get their act together14.” Some rank-and-file Democrats are just walking away15. Amidst the trend of more Democrats becoming Trump-deranged, gender-fluid, full-on socialists16, it’s no wonder.
https://patriotpost.us/articles/57899-democrats-vs-reality
The ACLU Stirs Against Cuomo17
Good news has emerged in the ongoing legal battle of New York Democrat Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s abuse of financial regulations18 to target the National Rifle Association19. The American Civil Liberties Union has joined the fight — and it is siding with free speech20.
We have noted the ACLU’s silence21 on select issues of free speech in the past, and Cuomo was prominently cited. We’re glad to update the record, but this is something that should have been done when Cuomo made the threats. The good news is that the ACLU doesn’t want the case dismissed, which means a favorable ruling could come. The bad news: The ACLU has taken a limited step, only supporting discovery, not the actual objective itself. |
