[CTC] A couple more trade and election pieces

[Arthur Stamoulis]

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/02/05/exclusive-donald-trump-smashes-obamatrade-after-team-obama-just-signed-in-new-zealand-its-a-terrible-deal/
Exclusive — ‘It’s A Terrible Deal,’ Donald Trump Says About Just-Signed Obamatrade


by MATTHEW BOYLE <http://www.breitbart.com/author/matthew-boyle/>5 Feb 2016Washington, DC1,924 <http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/02/05/exclusive-donald-trump-smashes-obamatrade-after-team-obama-just-signed-in-new-zealand-its-a-terrible-deal/#disqus_thread>
Donald Trump, currently leading in New Hampshire polling ahead of this coming Tuesday’s primaries, tells Breitbart News exclusively that the just-signed Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) Pacific rim trade agreement is a “terrible deal.”

“It’s like all deals that the United States makes under this president, it’s a terrible deal,” Trump said when asked to react to the news that President Barack Obama’s U.S. Trade Representative just inked the deal officially in Auckland, New Zealand.

It’s going to allow countries to continue to take advantage of us and take our jobs, take our trade. It’s bad for us. It’ll allow China to come in through the back door at a later date and continue to really do a number on us, and it doesn’t take into account money manipulation—manipulation or devaluation of currency, which is the single biggest tool that countries use against us. It’s a terrible deal.

Trump also hit former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton—who used to favor the TPP portion of Obamatrade, but now says she opposes the highly unpopular deal even though she helped negotiate it—for flip-flopping to oppose the deal. In Thursday evening’s Democratic debate, Clinton re-expressed her newfound opposition to Obamatrade’s TPP, but she used to be in favor of it heavily.

“So she’s against it in violation of the president, who’s for it?” Trump told Breitbart News.

Wow. If she’s against it, she’s right—one of the few things she differs on the president with. If she’s against it, she’s right. She was for it, against it, for it and now she’s against it. Look, it’s a very bad deal for the United States. It’s a deal which will cause us further erosion of our jobs, our good jobs, and further erosion of our manufacturing. It’s a terrible deal for the United States. And it doesn’t discuss—the biggest problem is devaluation, currency manipulation, which is their greatest asset.

Trump also explained exactly how he plans to to stop China from devaluing currency. He said the United States, because of weak leaders, has not used the “great power”—or leverage—it has over China to prevent the Asian powerhouse nation from wealth theft from America.

“What you have to do, China is the king of devaluation and monetary manipulation,” Trump said when asked about his plans to block currency manipulation on the world stage.

Nobody does it better, more deftly, more magnificently, than China. And China has taken advantage of the United States for years and we don’t even know what’s happening. We’re like a bunch of dummies that don’t have a clue. What’s happened and what happens is we have a great power over China because they get rich off the United States because they sell their product here. So if we had strong leadership, we’d use that power to stop their devaluation very simply. But they just did it again. They just did the biggest devaluation in 20 years. And now I understand they’re going to devalue again. It’s actually hard to believe.

More from Trump’s exclusive interview with Breitbart News ahead of the New Hampshire primaries is forthcoming.


http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/patrick-goodenough/clinton-waited-oppose-tpp-because-i-did-want-give-benefit-doubt

Clinton Waited to Oppose TPP ‘Because I Did Want to Give the Benefit of The Doubt to the Administration’

By Patrick Goodenough <http://www.cnsnews.com/author/patrick-goodenough> | February 5, 2016 | 4:25 AM EST
 
Hillary Clinton said in Thursday’s Democratic primary debate in New Hampshire that she waited to see the outcome of negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership before coming out in opposition – although as secretary of state she voiced enthusiasm for the trade deal on numerous occasions.
 
“I did hope that the TPP, negotiated by this administration, would put to rest a lot of the concerns that many people have expressed about trade agreements,” she said.
 
“And I said that I was holding out that hope that it would be the kind of trade agreement that I was looking for. I waited until it had actually been negotiated because I did want to give the benefit of the doubt to the administration. Once I saw what the outcome was, I opposed it.”
 
Clinton served as secretary of state for four years, beginning on 21, 2009. The first formal round of negotiations for the TPP began in March 2010, and during Clinton’s tenure a further 15 rounds – out of a total 19 – were held.
 
(The 19 formal rounds were followed by a series of meetings at chief negotiator and ministerial levels, culminating in final agreement last October. The TPP was signed in New Zealand on Thursday.)
 
As secretary of state, Clinton frequently spoke favorably about the TPP – which groups the U.S. with 11 other nations on either side of the Pacific – on one occasion saying on a visit to Australia in late 2012 that it set “the gold standard in trade agreements.”
 
Elsewhere during that same visit, Clinton said the TPP “will lower trade barriers, raise labor and environmental standards, and drive growth across the region.”
 
And days later in Singapore – another TPP partner – she said the trade deal “will cover 40 percent of the world’s total trade and establish strong protections for workers and the environment. Better jobs with higher wages and safer working conditions, including for women, migrant workers and others too often in the past excluded from the formal economy will help build Asia’s middle class and rebalance the global economy.”
 
Clinton formally declared her campaign for the presidency on April 12, 2015.
 
Three months later she declared her opposition to the TPP.
 
Last June CNN published an article listing 45 times Clinton voiced support for the TPP between January 2010 and the end of her tenure at the State Department.
 
On Thursday night, MSNBC’s Chuck Todd recalled that Clinton had supported the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in the 1990s but then opposed it when running for president in 2008.
 
Noting that she now opposes the TPP, he asked whether Democrats could expect that once she is in the White House she would support it again.
 
Although she did not answer the question directly, she did say that “there are changes that I believe would make a real difference if they could be achieved, but I do not currently support it as it is written.”
 
U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman said last October that the TPP would not be open for renegotiation.

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