A Democratic Trade Adjustment

By Joshua Holland, AlterNet. Posted August 8, 2005.

The story of last year’s fight for Ohio is by now all too familiar. Foremost on the minds of most Ohioans, according to exit polls, was not Jane and Mary getting married or whether John Kerry tossed his Vietnam medals over the White House fence. It was jobs, or the lack thereof. The bludgeoning by the "New Economy" left few states bloodier than the Buckeye State, and Ohioans felt much of the pain of this transformation during Bush’s first term.

According to the Center for Economic and Policy Research, between March 2001 and July 2004, nationwide non-farm employment dropped by a little more than 1 percent. In Ohio, employment dropped by almost 4 percent. Most dramatic was the rate of job "displacement," meaning long-held, full-time jobs lost to plant closures. Ohio’s rate -- at 2.1 percent -- was almost 2.5 times the national rate.

What’s more, as I pointed out in my last article, those displaced workers are largely on their own in Bush’s "Ownership Society." The Reagan and Bush I administrations slashed and burned trade adjustment assistance, long-term unemployment insurance and job training programs launched by Kennedy and strengthened by Nixon, just as the era of corporate-designed globalization began to pick up steam.

Yet in early 2004, as the presidential campaign gained steam, John Kerry said that he still supported NAFTA ("if I knew then what I know now ... "). His tepid try at a populist message on trade was that he’d "review" our trade deals within 120 days of taking office.

According to an Associated Press exit poll cited in USA Today, seven in 10 Ohio voters blamed foreign trade for taking away jobs, but Kerry won just half of their votes. If just 5 percent more in that group had gone for Kerry, he would have won almost 200,000 more votes and the presidency.

But some lessons are hard-learned. At the end of June, 10 Democratic Senators struck a blow for corporatism by voting in favor of the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA). Twelve Republicans voted against it -- without the aisle-crossers the deal would have died in the Senate. Then, last week, it happened again: 15 House Democrats voted for the agreement, 27 GOPers voted against and it squeaked by with a razor-thin margin.

That there’s still a debate within the Democratic establishment about whether to embrace or oppose the corporate "free-trade" agenda is an impressive illustration of the depth and breadth of the disconnect that exists between many Washington Democrats and the broader progressive community.

That disconnect has led too many Democrats to give up on a potent issue. Trade provides an entry point to a broader discussion of Americans’ growing economic insecurity, our changing workplaces, the influence of corporate money in politics and the fact that business interests have been gaming the system for their own narrow gain. Not opposing these deals makes sense only according to the rarified "logic" of the Washington Beltway.

Trade is an issue that reverberates with working Americans because people fear competition from abroad -- rightly or wrongly -- in a way that they don’t seem to fear being rolled over by the ideology and power of big business domestically.

Even Frank Luntz, the guru of right-wing rhetoric, is sensitive to Americans’ anxiety about the harsh winds of a free-wheeling global economy. He recently urged conservatives to never use the words "Global Economy/Globalization/Capitalism" as they represent "something big, something distant and something foreign." Republicans should avoid "talking about the principles of globalization," he warned. After all, "capitalism reminds people of harsh economic competition that yields losers as well as winners."

When you talk about trade policy, you’re really talking about the enormous influence of corporate power in our democracy. Leading up to last week’s fight over CAFTA, I spoke with Democratic Rep. Sherrod Brown, the gutsy Ohioan who led the opposition to the treaty in the House. He explains the close connection between corporate power and government policy today:

Joshua Holland is a fair-trade activist, a freelance writer and a regular contributor to The Gadflyer blog.

Liked this story? Get top stories in your inbox each week from AlterNet! Sign up now »