Republicans no longer like Free Trade

Ardentfrost · 10-04-2007, 08:54 AM

Republicans Grow Skeptical On Free Trade - WSJ.com

Republicans Grow Skeptical On Free Trade

WASHINGTON -- By a nearly two-to-one margin, Republican voters believe free trade is bad for the U.S. economy, a shift in opinion that mirrors Democratic views and suggests trade deals could face high hurdles under a new president.

The sign of broadening resistance to globalization came in a new Wall Street Journal-NBC News Poll that showed a fraying of Republican Party orthodoxy on the economy. While 60% of respondents said they want the next president and Congress to continue cutting taxes, 32% said it's time for some tax increases on the wealthiest Americans to reduce the budget deficit and pay for health care.

Six in 10 Republicans in the poll agreed with a statement that free trade has been bad for the U.S. and said they would agree with a Republican candidate who favored tougher regulations to limit foreign imports. That represents a challenge for Republican candidates who generally echo Mr. Bush's calls for continued trade expansion, and reflects a substantial shift in sentiment from eight years ago.

"It's a lot harder to sell the free-trade message to Republicans," said Republican pollster Neil Newhouse, who conducts the Journal/NBC poll with Democratic counterpart Peter Hart. The poll comes ahead of the Oct. 9 Republican presidential debate in Michigan sponsored by the Journal and the CNBC and MSNBC television networks.

The leading Republican candidates are still trying to promote free trade. "Our philosophy has to be not how many protectionist measures can we put in place, but how do we invent new things to sell" abroad, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani said in a recent interview. "That's the view of the future. What [protectionists] are trying to do is lock in the inadequacies of the past."

Such a stance is sure to face a challenge in the 2008 general election. Though President Bill Clinton famously steered the Democratic Party toward a less-protectionist bent and promoted the North American Free Trade Agreement, his wife and the current Democratic front-runner, Hillary Rodham Clinton, has adopted more skeptical rhetoric. Mrs. Clinton has come out against a U.S. trade deal with South Korea.

Other leading Democrats have been harshly critical of trade expansion, pleasing their party's labor-union backers. In a March 2007 WSJ/NBC poll, before recent scandals involving tainted imports, 54% of Democratic voters said free-trade agreements have hurt the U.S., compared with 21% who said they have helped.

While rank-and-file Democrats have long blasted the impact of trade on American jobs, slipping support among Republicans represents a fresh warning sign for free-market conservatives and American companies such as manufacturers and financial firms that benefit from markets opening abroad.

With voters provoked for years by such figures as Pat Buchanan and Ross Perot, "there's been a steady erosion in Republican support for free trade," says former Rep. Vin Weber, now an adviser to Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

One fresh indication of the party's ideological crosswinds: Presidential candidate Ron Paul of Texas, who opposes the Iraq war and calls free-trade deals "a threat to our independence as a nation," announced yesterday that he raised $5 million in third-quarter donations. That nearly matches what one-time front-runner John McCain is expected to report.

In a December 1999 Wall Street Journal-NBC poll, 37% of Republicans said trade deals had helped the U.S. and 31% said they had hurt, while 26% said they made no difference.

The new poll asked a broader but similar question. It posed two statements to voters. The first was, "Foreign trade has been good for the U.S. economy, because demand for U.S. products abroad has resulted in economic growth and jobs for Americans here at home and provided more choices for consumers."

The second was, "Foreign trade has been bad for the U.S. economy, because imports from abroad have reduced demand for American-made goods, cost jobs here at home, and produced potentially unsafe products."

Asked which statement came closer to their own view, 59% of Republicans named the second statement, while 32% pointed to the first.

Rocky Outlook

Such sentiment suggests a rocky outlook for trade expansion. Early in his term, Mr. Bush successfully promoted a number of new free-trade pacts, but the efforts have stalled, particularly after Democrats took control of Congress last November.

Even relatively small deals are facing resistance. While trade pacts with Peru and Panama have a strong chance of passing in the current congressional term, deals with South Korea and Colombia are in serious jeopardy. Some legislators believe South Korea isn't opening its market wide enough to American beef and autos.

This is on the front page of the WSJ... I almost fell over when I read it. What the hell has happened to the Republican party? They're supposed to be the defenders of our economy, and now nearly 2/3rds of them think free trade is bad?

I can't believe this bullshit.

WickedLou9 · 10-04-2007, 09:59 AM

That's funny because 2 days ago there was a story on the cover that said the GOP is losing it's core buisniess vote.. Hmm I wonder why.

6SpeedTA95 · 10-04-2007, 10:24 AM

good job republicans

David Octavius · 10-04-2007, 10:40 AM

That is because the new Republican voters are "Bush Republicans", tax cut and spenders, xenophobic, believe in strong national government to protect American interests and moralists

WickedLou9 · 10-04-2007, 10:43 AM

Originally Posted by David Octavius

That is because the new Republican voters are "Bush Republicans", tax cut and spenders, xenophobic, believe in strong national government to protect American interests and moralists

There is actually a large group of what used to be considerd Bush's base that say if Guiliani or Romney get chosen as the GOP's candidate, that they will jump ship and support a 3rd party candidate.

It looks like that will happen, and if it does, the GOP will be too divided to win the election. I can't say that I would be too upset if that did happen.

Rouger2 · 10-04-2007, 12:59 PM

It's about time those lame brain republicans realized that goods from third world countries that have cheap labor with no benefits and little safety and enviormental costs make for unfair trade and for our companies to compete they must pay the same low wages with no benefits. Their standard of living goes up while ours goes down until they meet, and then there is a level playing field, but our benefits are gone and wages are down. I have never understood why our businesses who have lost out to the unfair trade have not yelled louder about the unfair trade, and we workers also, who are losing our benefits and higher wages. GM workers are losing benefits now.

AVengeance · 10-04-2007, 01:50 PM

Rouger: but with unions, political-correctness, and other liberal inventions, the US can never compete. We'll just keep losing jobs to overseas until our economy tanks completely, and people HAVE to barter and buy locally, because they won't have a dollar to spend (or the dollar will be worthless on the International scale).

Scrum · 10-04-2007, 02:32 PM

Originally Posted by AVengeance

Rouger: but with unions, political-correctness, and other liberal inventions, the US can never compete. We'll just keep losing jobs to overseas until our economy tanks completely, and people HAVE to barter and buy locally, because they won't have a dollar to spend (or the dollar will be worthless on the International scale).

Collective bargaining isn't a liberal invention.

motivez · 10-04-2007, 02:37 PM

Maybe it's just that the bar that measures what mainstream conservatism is continues to change as time does and different things become more widely accepted, whether it's social or economic ideas?

David Octavius · 10-04-2007, 04:14 PM

I think we are witnessing history here..the Republicans are moving away from their more traditional values and getting split by the anti-war faction center and the extreme right wing faction...the democrats are also moving away being split by there extreme left side and the new democrat right (at least many of the ones who won office in 06)

Something has to give and I cant wait to see it!

My hope is that the extreme left or right breaks and forms their own group that includes some of those already elected, and as a result the Demos move more to the center and the republicans move more to the left leaving a vacuum for another party

Pure conjecture, but it would be interesting - I am sure we all have our theories of what could happen to the 2 majors.

WickedLou9 · 10-04-2007, 04:35 PM

Yeah I have always taken it for granted that the parties were sort of permanent.. but I guess we used to have the Whigs and the Federalists but they are gone. Who knows what will happen.

David Octavius · 10-04-2007, 04:50 PM

Originally Posted by WickedLou9

Yeah I have always taken it for granted that the parties were sort of permanent.. but I guess we used to have the Whigs and the Federalists but they are gone. Who knows what will happen.

And remember the Demos weren't always liberal, they were the party of the deep south, remember the Dixiecrats? The republicans were alot more liberal minded than the Demos, they swicted sometime ago but I can see them shifting again.

Kytro · 10-05-2007, 02:43 AM

False scarcity FTL. Free trade > Protectionism

thomez · 10-05-2007, 07:07 AM

Foreign Policy: The Free-Trade Paradox

Sometimes the "free trade agreements" are the worst component of free trade.

DosEquis · 10-05-2007, 11:27 AM

Personally I prefer fair trade. That is more of a problem then our wages, unions, or otherwise. We give them free trade, they dont do the same in return, and the competition becomes slanted giving our business a disadvantage. I have beat the example to death but how is GM supposed to compete in Japan if they only allow like 3 or 4 vehicles of their line up there?

Rouger2 · 10-05-2007, 02:50 PM

Originally Posted by AVengeance

Rouger: but with unions, political-correctness, and other liberal inventions, the US can never compete. We'll just keep losing jobs to overseas until our economy tanks completely, and people HAVE to barter and buy locally, because they won't have a dollar to spend (or the dollar will be worthless on the International scale).

If we get rid of free trade deals and demand fair trade we can compete, and if not we must use the dirty word to many tariffs. American consumers are only doing their job in a capitalistic society by buying the cheapest and best product but if the product is made from cheap, non benefit labor from over seas companies that have little safety and enviormental costs it is doing american labor a disservice and taking our jobs and benefits.

Ardentfrost · 10-05-2007, 06:37 PM

why should we demand fair trade? So what if they want to apply tariffs to our stuff? So what if they use gov't subsidies to promote whatever it is they can make? By buying it, we're making them poorer (because of the increased money they have to subsidize) all while making ourselves richer because the less money we have to spend on whatever it is they're making, the more money we can spend on the things that we do well.

Globalization means focusing on what you do well, and not worrying about what you don't. Trade doesn't have to be fair for us to benefit.

Rouger2 · 10-06-2007, 08:14 PM

Originally Posted by Ardentfrost

why should we demand fair trade? So what if they want to apply tariffs to our stuff? So what if they use gov't subsidies to promote whatever it is they can make? By buying it, we're making them poorer (because of the increased money they have to subsidize) all while making ourselves richer because the less money we have to spend on whatever it is they're making, the more money we can spend on the things that we do well.

Globalization means focusing on what you do well, and not worrying about what you don't. Trade doesn't have to be fair for us to benefit.

Lets just keep losing our jobs and closing our busnesses especially production business to over seas competiton. We can all be barbers or telephone operators and all those high paying service and part time jobs. Yea that is what we do best cut each others hair.

Diesel66 · 10-06-2007, 08:38 PM

Originally Posted by Rouger2

Lets just keep losing our jobs and closing our busnesses especially production business to over seas competiton. We can all be barbers or telephone operators and all those high paying service and part time jobs. Yea that is what we do best cut each others hair.

Manufacturing in the US is thriving. Some industries have changed, but others have grown. Look at all the new jobs in the South from japan and europe.

Rouger2 · 10-08-2007, 07:11 PM

Originally Posted by Diesel66

Manufacturing in the US is thriving. Some industries have changed, but others have grown. Look at all the new jobs in the South from japan and europe.

Those jobs are just a drop in the bucket compared to what we have lost.