Earl Pomeroy: “I commend my colleagues who have just completed their hour discussing on the House floor tonight why we should enact…”

“I commend my colleagues who have just completed their hour discussing on the House floor tonight why we should enact CAFTA. Clearly, they were sincere, yet the arguments discussed essentially have been the same arguments advanced for why these negotiations even began now 2 years, 18 months ago, certainly being concluded well over a year ago. It is an enormous privilege to serve on the Ways and Means Committee, the committee of jurisdiction on trade matters. And during the period of time, the extended period of time this has been before the Congress, it has given us a chance to look at this agreement pretty closely. I could spend my time tonight going into the whats, and the whereases and the what-fors, but I think it might be more fruitful to discuss this in the broader perspective, perspective first of all involving the track we are on relative to our trade agreements and our Nation's economy. Then, secondly, a particular for instance in terms of where this is just more of the same, in terms of our loss of jobs, loss of economic opportunity here at home, and then finally to discuss the process, a process that I think raises serious questions about this trade agreement. Well, let us start with the broad pattern. We have been on a track of these trade deals, part of our participation in the global economy, for some years now. A recent commentator contrasted the approach taken by the United States with that of most other nations.…”