Sunday, March 8, 2009

Belated News: Gary Locke! Commerce Secretary


I'm really excited to share that G. Locke is Sec. of Commerce. He has great qualifications, very forward with the rights of citizens in the U.S. and has done well in serving his state of WA. Though, APA for Progress has a slightly different take on his appointment and shares some insight on hesitating to support Sec. Locke.

It comes down to this: Like President Obama, Governor Gary Locke supports free trade.

As a card carrying member of the DLC, Governor Locke’s trade policies fall firmly in line with the status quo. The Wall Street Journal (ugh) profiles Locke as a supporter of NAFTA and China’s entry into the WTO.

Why is this a problem? A 4-point answer.

* Progressives don’t support free trade because Progressives don’t support a 6 year old child earning 14 cents an hour, working 16 hours a day, enduring 110 degrees heat in a sweatshop in Burma.

* Progressives don’t support free trade because Progressives hate it when a laid-off American auto worker holds back tears to tell his daughter that she can’t go to college. He has no job, but thecorporation has a new manufacturing plant in Mexico.

* Progressives don’t support free trade because we know that “race to the bottom” trade policies result in wages that haven’t gone up since 1968.

* And Progressives just don’t believe in the WTO. Period.

The biggest problem is that the Office of the Secretary of Commerce is directly involved in executing the administration’s trade policies, which are no doubt those of the free trade kind.


Read more on his appointment here.

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