<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><br class=""><div class=""><div class=""><a href="https://www.thestand.org/2020/10/its-unanimous-free-trade-needs-restrictions/" class="">https://www.thestand.org/2020/10/its-unanimous-free-trade-needs-restrictions/</a></div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><div class=""><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><b class=""><i class=""><span style="font-size:18.0pt;mso-bidi-font-family:
Arial;color:#313131;mso-fareast-language:JA" class="">Vote in Congress Reveals Deep Flaw in the Way We’ve Managed Globalization</span></i></b></p><p class="MsoNormal">On September 22, Congress
did something remarkable. Significant legislation passed in the House by a vote
of <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/6210%3Fq=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22hr+6210%22%5D%7D%26s=1%26r=1" class="">406 in favor and 3 opposed</a>. That means almost every Democrat and almost
every Republican found common ground, in the midst of a highly polarized
presidential campaign and years of bitter partisan battles. </p><p class="Default">The legislation restricts imports of goods made in <span style="color:#323232" class="">China's Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous region, where </span><a href="https://amp.theguardian.com/global-development/2020/jul/23/virtually-entire-fashion-industry-complicit-in-uighur-forced-labour-say-rights-groups-china" class="">hundreds
of thousands of Uighurs</a><span style="color:#323232" class=""> </span>are <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/meghara/china-new-internment-camps-xinjiang-uighurs-muslims" class="">subject
to forced labor</a>, repression, and violations of human rights<span style="color:#323232" class="">.</span></p><p class="Default"><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/11/16/world/asia/china-xinjiang-documents.html" class="">Uighurs
have been harassed in China for decades</a><span style="color:#323232" class="">. The
crackdown has </span><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/24/world/asia/china-muslims-xinjiang-detention.html" class="">intensified
in the last few years</a><span style="color:#323232" class="">. </span></p><p class="Default"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";
color:#323232" class="">The action in Congress is remarkable for several reasons.</span><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class=""> </span></p><p class="Default" style="margin-left:.5in;text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol;color:#323232" class="">·<span style="font-size: 7pt; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Times New Roman';" class="">
</span></span><!--[endif]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";
color:#323232" class="">Getting 406 members of Congress to agree on anything is noteworthy
in itself<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p class="Default" style="margin-left:.5in;text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol;color:#323232" class="">·<span style="font-size: 7pt; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Times New Roman';" class="">
</span></span><!--[endif]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";
color:#323232" class="">This bill affects trade – always contentious, and more so in an
election year.<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p class="Default" style="margin-left:.5in;text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol;color:#323232" class="">·<span style="font-size: 7pt; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Times New Roman';" class="">
</span></span><!--[endif]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";
color:#323232" class="">The bill challenges China and </span><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/23/fashion/uighur-forced-labor-cotton-fashion.html" class="">powerful US corporations</a><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#323232" class=""> who manufacture
in China<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p class="Default" style="margin-left:.5in;text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol;color:#323232" class="">·<span style="font-size: 7pt; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Times New Roman';" class="">
</span></span><!--[endif]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";
color:#323232" class="">The vote made almost no news anywhere.</span><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50); text-indent: 0px;" class=""> </span></p><p class="Default"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";
color:#323232" class="">More remarkable is that the intent of the bill is a complete
rejection of principles at the heart of the World Trade Organization (WTO) and
hundreds of free-trade agreements such as NAFTA. <o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p class="Default"><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class="">By design, WTO and all those free-trade agreements protect
corporations who make products anywhere and sell those products everywhere.
Free-trade rules also discourage Congress from making domestic public policies
that address loss of jobs and industrial capacity in our domestic economy.</span></p><p class="Default"><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class="">Under free trade rules, a cookie is a cookie no matter how it is
made.</span></p><p class="Default"><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class="">For instance, cookie made in a country with forced labor, risky
food safety rules, widespread pollution, and damage to shared natural resources
must be treated the same as a cookie made in the US with our labor standards,
our food safety rules, and our environmental standard.</span></p><p class="Default"><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class="">This has the effect of blurring national borders and national
identities.</span></p><p class="Default"><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class="">Of course, the price of a cookie made by responsible US producers
will include costs for our higher standards. The same cookie made in China or
Mexico or Russia will not bear those costs of meeting our standards. Foreign
producers of cheaper cookies, cars, solar panels, electronics, steel, clothing,
and consumer goods will steadily displace our own production of those goods.</span></p><p class="Default"><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class="">That’s why it is so hard to get labor and environmental
protections into trade agreements. Global corporations worked hard to write
trade rules that favor investor interests over public interests</span><a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/western-companies-get-tangled-in-chinas-muslim-clampdown-11558017472" class="">. Billions of dollars are at stake
if government policies shift power away from global corporations</a><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class=""> and in favor of
workers and communities.</span></p><p class="Default"><a href="https://waysandmeans.house.gov/sites/democrats.waysandmeans.house.gov/files/documents/CathyFeingoldWrittenTestimony.pdf" class="">Organized labor</a><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class=""> and </span><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/23/fashion/uighur-forced-labor-cotton-fashion.html" class="">civil society groups</a><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class=""> </span>lobbied effectively in support<span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class=""> of this bill. In
the end, 406 House members made the remarkable statement that it is the
legitimate role of government to put the interests of Uighurs in forced labor
camps above the interests of US companies and their manufacturing partners in
China.</span></p><p class="Default"><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class="">Up to now, in case after case, Congress and our trade
negotiators endorsed free-trade rules that challenged common sense regulations intended
to raise living standards and improve well-being generally.</span></p><p class="Default"><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class="">It seems obvious to say, but the treatment of Uighurs cannot be
improved by free markets or free trade. Damage to our domestic producers cannot
be repaired without government action.</span></p><p class="Default"><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class="">The old free-trade approach is exhausted socially, politically,
and economically. It can’t be fixed with small incremental changes. It’s time
to rethink the way we manage globalization – quite possibly without the WTO,
and certainly putting higher priority on the interests of workers and
communities.</span></p><p class="Default"><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class="">One message of the House vote is that government does, in fact,
play a legitimate role in solving serious problems we face. It is completely
appropriate for government to set rules and make policies that reflect our
values and promote our interests as a country. At a common sense level, that is
totally obvious. Or it is, if we say it is.</span></p><p class="Default"><span style="color: rgb(50, 50, 50);" class="">Congress seems just about ready to say, yes it is. It's about
time.</span></p><p class="Default"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";
color:#323232" class=""> </span></p><p class="Default"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";
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color:windowtext" class=""> </span></p>
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