Canadians-- On M-COOL

[Oldtimer]

IF Canadian cattlemen go ahead and challenge the US M-COOL law which will be implemented next year- and especially IF by some means they should succeed in a NAFTA or WTO ruling and alter what the US consumer is requesting-- it will just fuel the fire of this anti NAFTA movement that not only includes the Democrats but also the true conservative base of the Republican party......


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Democratic presidential contenders trash NAFTA

In following a campaign rite, scorn is heaped on accord by some of those who praised its creation



Tim Harper

WASHINGTON BUREAU

The Toronto Star

Aug 24, 2007 04:30 AM



WASHINGTON–When U.S. President George W. Bush stood beside Prime Minister Stephen Harper this week extolling the benefits of NAFTA, he was pumping up a trade pact that is under increasing pressure here.



It has become a convenient target for those seeking the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination who are following a campaign rite of demonizing trade deals to appease the party's labour base before moving to the centre during the general election.



But in 2007, the North American Free Trade Agreement is under more concerted attack than perhaps any time since it was signed at the beginning of 1994, and Democrats have high hopes of regaining the White House they lost in 2000 to Bush and the Republicans.



Those who are now raining scorn on the deal were among those who heaped praise on it when it was being negotiated 14 years ago.



"I had said for many years that NAFTA and the way it's been implemented has hurt a lot of American workers," says Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton, who was the country's first lady when her husband, Bill Clinton, signed the deal.



Clinton had turned to a key Democrat ally of the day, Bill Richardson, now New Mexico governor and a 2008 contender for the presidential nomination, to get Democrats onside to back the deal.



"We should never have another trade agreement unless it enforces labour protection, environmental standards and job safety," Richardson says now.



Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton's main rival for the Democratic nod, says he would "immediately call the president of Mexico and the president of Canada" – betraying a lack of knowledge of the Canadian political system – to amend NAFTA to get more favourable labour language in the deal.


Former North Carolina senator John Edwards, who has sought to fashion himself as labour's Democratic presidential hopeful, devoted an entire speech to trade deals and their harm in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, earlier this month.



"NAFTA was written by insiders in all three countries and it served their interests, not the interests of regular workers,'' Edwards, the Democrats' 2004 vice presidential candidate, said.



He said the deal gave unprecedented rights to corporate investors, but no protection for labour or the environment.



"Over the past 15 years, we have seen growing income inequality in the U.S., Mexico and Canada.



"Well, enough is enough.''



While Edwards and Obama would seek revisions or amendments to the tripartite trade agreement, only long shot Democratic presidential hopeful Dennis Kucinich, an Ohio congressman, would pull the U.S. out of the deal.

What does the trade trash talk mean for Canada?



"They're playing to their base, or their base instincts,'' says Elliot Feldman, a Washington-based trade expert.



Feldman wishes to inject a bit of reality into this debate, suggesting the Bush administration's commerce department is the most protectionist he has encountered in years of trade law, turning the traditional wisdom that Republicans are free traders and Democrats are protectionists on its head.



Neither Canada nor the U.S. is respecting the terms of NAFTA right now, he says, pointing to the U.S.-launched arbitration of the softwood lumber deal before the London Court of International Arbitration. It is the first time two countries have argued a dispute before a court that handles private commercial disputes.



Feldman also maintains that NAFTA was working in the softwood lumber negotiations and Canada would have ultimately won every dispute under NAFTA rules.



"Harper gave it all away in his determination to make nice with the Bush administration,'' he said.



"He gave away $1 billion.''



He was referring to the $1 billion (U.S.) Harper allowed the United States to keep as its share of the $5 billion (U.S.) it extracted in tariffs from Canadian companies under terms of the 2006 deal.



Although most trade analysts believe there is little danger in talking to a new administration about improvements or reforms to the deal, they fear the entire pact would unravel if it was formally reopened.



Under NAFTA, Canada boasts a $96 billion (Canadian) trade surplus with the U.S., a gap that rankles opponents here.



Bush told reporters after this week's NAFTA leaders' summit in Montebello, Que., that the accord had boosted Canada-U.S. trade from $293 billion (U.S.) per year to $883 billion (U.S.) per year.



"Now, for some those are just numbers, but for many it's improved wages and a better lifestyle, and more hope,'' Bush said.



The key for the deal is increased prosperity for all three countries in the North American "neighbourhood,'' Bush argues.



His trade representative, Susan Schwab, told a meeting of ministers of the three countries earlier this month in Vancouver that trade between the U.S., Mexico and Canada tripled since NAFTA took effect.



The U.S. has free trade agreements with 14 countries, 11 since Bush took office in 2001, and 42 per cent of all its exports go to free trade partners. But many Democrats argue only big business benefited from the deals.



Two more free trade deals, with Peru and Panama, still require congressional approval this fall, but Democrats were successful in inserting labour and environmental standards, the language they say NAFTA lacks.



International Trade Minister David Emerson attempted to calm Canadian nerves following the Vancouver meeting.



"People are basically trying to appeal to their party roots,'' he said.



"Until you get into a general election ... you don't have the same kind of moderating impact that perhaps one once saw.''



thestar.com

 

[Oldtimer]

Canadians may have false fears of M-COOL.....

American shoppers are reassured by food imported from such countries as Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, said Christine Burhn, director of the Center for Consumer Research at the University of California at Davis. They are wary of imports from lesser-developed countries, including China, India, and Mexico.

U.S. consumers are now looking for the country label



By Diedtra Henderson The Boston Globe

Published: August 24, 2007

Via International Herald Tribune



WASHINGTON: After contending with tainted toothpaste, suspect seafood, and poisoned pet food traced to China, many U.S. consumers are now looking for labels that indicate a product's country of origin.



Some foods - like shrimp and other types of seafood - already must be labeled with a country name, thanks to legislation the U.S. Congress passed in 2002.



Other suppliers added labels voluntarily long before a series of recalls made consumers skittish about Chinese products.



After years of delays, labels for a wider variety of foods - including beef, lamb, pork, perishable agricultural products, and peanuts - are on course to become mandatory by September of next year.



A bill passed by the U.S. House of Representatives this month is expected to be taken up by the Senate and signed by President George W. Bush with few revisions. But despite the long-awaited regulations, plenty of food still will not carry country labels.


Consider poultry. Because opponents of the legislation were so strongly against requiring country labels and so little imported poultry is sold in the United States, legislators exempted it to avoid jeopardizing the bill, said a staffer at the U.S. House Agriculture Committee.



Then there are the labeling law's quirks. For example, jalapeño peppers sold fresh will have to be labeled. But if they are sold frozen as "poppers" - wrapped in a jacket of breading with cream-cheese filling - they will be exempt.



And a laundry list of countries are likely to grace various hamburger labels, owing to the multitude of countries that send beef here for processing. But if that same beef is used as an ingredient in a frozen dinner, for instance, the dinner's maker will not be required to note the country of origin.



Opponents have seized upon what they call the arbitrary nature of the legislation. Why pigs and not poultry? Why green peanuts but not peanut butter? The answers lie in politics, and the definition of processing.



Processed foods do not have to carry country labels. For peanuts, that exempts nuts that are pulverized and sold as peanut butter, roasted nuts coated in chocolate, and peanuts roasted in their shells.



"We've made our case to USDA and Capitol Hill that snack nuts go through a roasting process," said Jim McCarthy, president of the Snack Food Association, referring to the U.S. Department of Agriculture and Congress.



Bob Sutter, chief executive of the North Carolina Peanut Growers Association, suspects that snack makers want to purchase ingredients from all over the world, "without having to say they came from Argentina or Mexico or Honduras."



When it comes to gourmet peanuts, however, Sutter hears from buyers seeking as much information as possible. Callers say, "We want to tell our customers where these peanuts came from. Not just North Carolina. We want to tell them they came from a farm in Northampton, N.C.," he said.



Those against the labeling law also say it provides few benefits for consumers but plenty of additional costs for suppliers and retailers.



The three-year-old practice of adding "U.S." labels to seafood did not boost sales, according to the Food Marketing Institute, which represents food retailers and wholesalers with annual sales volume of $340 billion. First-year costs for adding the labels soared up to $16,000 per store, 10 times what the Department of Agriculture estimated.



And the new labeling will be complicated. For instance, new meat labels will mark beef, lamb, and pork born, raised, and slaughtered domestically as well as meat that came from animals raised in other countries before being sold here. Mixed labels will highlight animals born and raised in one place, but slaughtered elsewhere.



Scraps from hundreds of carcasses can wind up in massive hamburger grinders, meaning a hamburger package could potentially list scores of countries.



A long list will inform consumers that a tub of hamburger may contain animals from a range of countries whose meat is processed by U.S. slaughterhouses. The largest exporters of fresh and frozen beef to the United States last year were Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Uruguay, and Mexico, according to the Department of Agriculture.



In the dozen or so years it has taken for country-of-origin labels to move from concept to congressional action, consumers have come to see them as shorthand for which food is safer.



American shoppers are reassured by food imported from such countries as Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, said Christine Burhn, director of the Center for Consumer Research at the University of California at Davis. They are wary of imports from lesser-developed countries, including China, India, and Mexico.



"I want to know how far the food has traveled. I want to know which country it has come from," said Marion Nestle, a New York University nutrition professor and author of "What to Eat." "I want to know whether the standards that we have for food production in the United States are generally followed in that country."



With such shoppers in mind, Kellogg highlights the Virginia peanuts in its Nutri-Grain Fruit & Nut Bars. Newman's Own Organics notes that its olive oil is a product of Tunisia and that its mints were made in Mexico City.



Wal-Mart to push toy testing

Wal-Mart Stores, the largest U.S. toy seller, says it will increase testing of toys before the holidays in the wake of several recalls of Chinese-made products for excessive lead paint, magnets and other hazards, Bloomberg News reported.



Wal-Mart is asking all toy suppliers to resubmit testing documentation for products that may be carried by Wal-Mart. The company also said that it had hired independent laboratories to carry out as many as 200 additional tests a day.



Wal-Mart's program follows the recall of more than 20 million Chinese-made products this month by Mattel, the world's largest toy maker. Hasbro and RC2 also recalled products from China earlier this year. The world's most populous nation makes 80 percent of the toys sold in the United States.



iht.com

 

[PeaceCountryCowboy]

IF Canadian cattlemen go ahead and challenge the US M-COOL law which will be implemented next year- and especially IF by some means they should succeed in a NAFTA or WTO ruling and alter what the US consumer is requesting-- it will just fuel the fire of this anti NAFTA movement that not only includes the Democrats but also the true conservative base of the Republican party......

That's alright, we'll scrap NAFTA and start charging duty on all the oil we export to the U.S ;-) .

 

[Oldtimer]

IF Canadian cattlemen go ahead and challenge the US M-COOL law which will be implemented next year- and especially IF by some means they should succeed in a NAFTA or WTO ruling and alter what the US consumer is requesting-- it will just fuel the fire of this anti NAFTA movement that not only includes the Democrats but also the true conservative base of the Republican party......

That's alright, we'll scrap NAFTA and start charging duty on all the oil we export to the U.S ;-) .

Which would please some US land owners and oil companies whose oilfields are laying idle or selling for $20 barrel under market because Canada has all the oil pipeline space tied up thru NAFTA...

Peacecountry-- Do yor really believe that if NAFTA was reopened and parts renegotiated- that Canadian cattle producers would come out on top... :???:

If you really do-- I know about this bridge in Brooklyn you can buy cheap ;-) :lol:

 

[PeaceCountryCowboy]

No, but maybe we'll use those billions of dollars in duties that we could collect without NAFTA on oil and gas to start our own agriculture subsidization program.

 

[hillsdown]

No, but maybe we'll use those billions of dollars in duties that we could collect without NAFTA on oil and gas to start our own agriculture subsidization program.

Don't forget water ;-) .It will get mighty dry and cold in the good ole USA.