With over 650 people turning out, Mark DeSaulnier (*State Senator-Concord-Dem) set a new record for mass support at a Crab Fest in Contra Costa County.  The list of attendees included the County’s top political people including both Congressmen: Miller and Garamendi, Tom Torlakason (Assembly-Dem only 48 hours from a heart stint operation), 3 of the Board of Supervisors, The County Election Clerk, more than a dozen City Council folks from 5 different cities and county, district and state Democratic Party officials as well as union and business leaders throughout the area.

  The crowd gave DeSaulnier a standing ovation when he declared that what happened in Massachusetts will not happen here and further that ‘we will never, never, never give up on America.’

The Press Conference at the Steamfitters Union Hall in Concord was billed as a declaration of support for the TRADE Act of 2009 (“http://www.citizen.org/documents/TRADEAct2009_Final_House.pdf) by Congressmen Garamendi and Miller but it also  included some fireworks as  Miller took aim at the Columbian Government and declared that his investigation indicated that in the last decade 2700 union organizers in Columbia were “..killed at the direction of the government…killed at the direction of the manufacturers” as well as the economic elite of the country.  He declared that Columbia was the most dangerous place in the world to try to organize workers.

The details of the Bill 3012 were not reviewed which include:

1. review of all trade treaties including in that review details of what it is worth in terms of jobs for America

2. eliminate any future reinstatement of Fast Track for Trade Treaties

3. require in future treaties that the other countries agree to

       a. labor standards including minimum wage (amount not specified)

       b. by direct reference the UN Declaration of Human Rights

       c. ‘fair treatment of workers’

       d. dispute resolution that is open to the public

       e. a reference to environmental protection  (unspecified)

       f. equal protection under the law for investments citing specifically the US 14th Amendment Clause 1

The Congressmen also used the opportunity to tout their joint support for Buy American with Rep. Garamendi calling for the establishment of a military style procurement process that forces Buy American with the hope to re-establish some industries that have bleed massive jobs overseas.  

The main thrust of this is the desire to redo NAFTA and WTO which Miller said ‘was a bad idea then and is bad idea now’.  

  The chances of this bill getting passed was alluded to as very slim and a massive uphill battle.  As such it provides an opportunity only for posturing before the union crowds.    What is needed is to separate out the issues rather than to put them all in a single package where collectively they act to attract negatives to make it a dead bill despite some good ideas being weighted down with totally impractical approaches to international business and foreign relations.  Simply put- just calling for a rework of NAFTA and WTO is hard enough.

   The chances of this bill getting passed was alluded to as very slim and a massive uphill battle.  As such it provides an opportunity only for posturing before the union crowds.    What is needed is to separate out the issues rather than to put them all in a single package where collectively they act to attract negatives to make it a dead bill despite some good ideas being weighted down with totally impractical approaches to international business and foreign relations.  Simply put- just calling for a rework of NAFTA and WTO is hard enough.