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 | yooperpete
Join Date: Jan 2004 Posts: 1413 Northern Michigan 
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2005-07-29 114073
What do you guys think of the approval of the new Central American treaty?
From my viewpoint, our politicians are just giving another part of the USA away. It is definitely bad for farmers and all of us in general. In Mid-Michigan the sugar beet growers are going to take another beeting! (ha-ha) Kane sugar is much cheaper to produce than beet sugar.
We definitely will be helping some poor impoverished people though. Pretty soon we will be back to their standard of living.
Likewise, you can get corn, grain, beans, fruit and just about anything cheaper from other countries. So what if it comes with critters, like flies and worms that decimates our own fields when it spreads. Or how about some contaminated Canadian beef so our ranchers won't get too much on the open market for theirs. So what if we get chronic wasting disease in our herds.
I'm one p/o dude today!
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 | Murf
Join Date: Dec 1999 Posts: 7249 Toronto Area, Ontario, Canada 
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2005-07-29 114076
The way I see it, from the point of view of a ninth generation grower of "contaminated Canadian beef"...
The people who are complaining the loudest about free trade, with ANYONE, are the same people who didn't want to allow immigration so that we could lower production costs here at home. You can't have it both ways.
Suck, OR, blow into the straw, you cant do BOTH at the same time.
As long as people want to buy the cheapest product, instead of the best quality product, there will always be a strong motivation to produce something cheaper than the next guy.
Don't blame the politicians, stand outside a Wally World or a Kill Mart and yell at the people coming out with carts overflowing with cheap merchandise from overseas.
Sincerly, another P/O'd dude, eh? ....
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| Murf
Join Date: Dec 1999 Posts: 7249 Toronto Area, Ontario, Canada
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2005-07-29 114078
BTW, just to set the record straight......
RETAIL beef prices, on average nationwide, are only about 6% lower than before the BSE comotion, so the US ranchers who can't "get too much on the open market for theirs" should blame the wholesalers and retialers who are pocketing the difference.
Historically, the US imported about 1.75 MILLION head of cattle a year from Canada, if we look at just the last 25 years, that comes to more than 40 MILLION animals.
One cow out of 40+ million somehow becomes "contaminated Canadian beef"... How does that work?
BTW, what about the two "contaminated" cows in the US? Including the latest one they won't even disclose the history on, rumours have it that cow was born and raised in the good ole' US of A ......
Maybe with all that money from the illegal tariffs on Canadian softwood lumber the US government can spread some around to the farmers who need it. ....
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| yooperpete
Join Date: Jan 2004 Posts: 1413 Northern Michigan
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2005-07-29 114081
Figured I'd push your button making a negative statement as I did about anything Canadian.
Sorry I couldn't respond sooner, but some s.o.b. out of the last 1800 spams today sent me another bug and my computer is slow.
CNN reported that the justification of opening the markets to Canadian beef cattle was done to lower the cost so these poor cattle wholesalers could make a living. CNN implied that US ranchers where getting rich from the closed doors. American ranchers weren't doing well since the Japanese markets are closed to American cattle imports.
I guess we will be a nation of middlemen, until somebody figures out a way to get around that too. These days if you are not a middleman, food processor (hamburger flipper) or a small time lawnmowing contractor you can't get a job. Pretty soon the illegals will be doing all the lawnmowing too!
The use of ground up animal matter in the food chain is the cause if it is not a direct link. If you can't sell it for human consumption, the cattle can eat it. It is purely greed driven.
They don't know for sure were the last cattle in the U.S.A. got it and it took several attempts at testing to say that it did have it. Was this a ploy by some organization? See now I'm so P/O that I'm paranoid as well.
Our doors and borders our open to legal and illegal immigrants. So much so, we need another language in this country since it is too hard to learn the language of the country. My ancestors came from a German heritage, worked for every penny they made, got screwed during the depression and learned English on the way. The land that was passed on from generation to generation only dates back to 1857, so we are not 9 generations worth of hard working people. Wonder how much taxes have been paid on that property. ....
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 | AC5ZO
Join Date: Jul 2003 Posts: 928 Rio Rancho, NM 87144 
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2005-07-29 114084
For me closing the border to Canadian beef never made any sense. I grew up on a farm in the midwest where our primary cash was generated by beef that we sold. I don't think that anyone knows for sure, but BSE seems to erupt spontaneously in grazing animals including deer, elk, buffalo, and cattle. You cannot blame it on bone meal and the like because elk don't get much bone meal in their diet. Bans are the reactions of a scared politicians that doesn't know what else to do.
Now as far as free trade is concerned, I agree with the comments that you can either have it or not. But, it makes no sense to protect some things and not protect others. (except where dumping is clearly involved) Politicians pretty much screw up every time they get involved with business and trade. The last time I checked, "government" was supposed to be a "non-profit" organization and the skills and motivations necessary to run a "for profit" organization are different. I know that a lot of the political heads of the departments are elected or appointed from business leaders, but the bureaucrats that work in the departments and make the trade regulations generally do not have a business background. Diplomacy is not a business.
I don't have a problem with NAFTA or CAFTA. I want US products to be open for sale everywhere and I want products from everywhere. The free market should be the selector for the best producers. I don't think that the WTO is bad in concept, but it is poor as implemented. Look at the politics/corruption involved in the UN and tell me that we cannot do better there also.
I for one am willing to pay for high quality products. I don't buy my beef from the grocery store, because the quality sucks. I don't spend money on poorly made Chinese copies of other products. I buy some things at Wally World, but generally comodity stuff like OTC medicines, oil, and so forth. As far as I know, all of the stuff I buy there is made in North America.
I have been laid-off three times in my career. Each time was due to legal disputes and lawyers destroying another business. I did not see any winners except for the lawyers who got paid from both sides. Each time, I picked myself up; dusted myself off; and moved on. In most cases, I did better with a new job than I did with the previous one. I am truly sorry for the trouble that one has to endure personally, but times and situations do change. It is a lot healthier to embrace the change and grow than it is to stand behind a regulation that only protects the way things have been.
....
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| Murf
Join Date: Dec 1999 Posts: 7249 Toronto Area, Ontario, Canada
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2005-07-29 114085
It wasn't a matter of 'pushing buttons', I would correct anyone who was making an incorrect statement about anything, period.
The bottom line is, more Americans make money off Canadian cattle than not. Not just wholesalers either, truckers, feedlot employees and owners, cutters, processors, manufacturers, etc., etc., etc.
Besides, "ground up animal matter", presumably you mean bone meal in the feed, is just one instance where animals eat 'animal matter' and have since time immemorial, cows, as just one animal example, instinctively eat the placenta and lots worse, after calving to try to hide the existance of calves from predators. Pigs must be kept seperate from piglets because canibalism is so prevalent.
As for the 'Canadian' issue, it wasn't really a factor, especially considering I also have a US passport and was an American serviceman. Where you? ....
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| yooperpete
Join Date: Jan 2004 Posts: 1413 Northern Michigan
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2005-07-29 114086
We now will have equal trade in Central American where they placed tarrifs of 35%-60% on American exports in the past. We don't have much to sell them now, since everything is made someplace else. Now with the new rules there are no tarrifs on American goods, except for sugar. I got that from an article in today's mlive.com news.
Yes, I have an American passport and yes as a coming home vet, I was spit on by some hippie girl in the San Francisco airport for no reason while I was trying to get home and be left alone. That has made more of an impression on me in the last 30 some years than I realize. I was polite then! ....
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| Murf
Join Date: Dec 1999 Posts: 7249 Toronto Area, Ontario, Canada
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2005-07-29 114089
Well now, two more things we have in common, I got shot at, in Grenada, by a Grenadian, AFTER we had just 'liberated' them from the Cubans.
Go figure!!!
You could certainly say I was less than polite to the gentleman who shot at me. ....
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 | DRankin
Join Date: Jan 2000 Posts: 5116 Northern Nevada
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2005-07-29 114093
"CNN reported that the justification of opening the markets to Canadian beef cattle was done to lower the cost so these poor cattle wholesalers could make a living. CNN implied that US ranchers......... "
That could be part of the problem here..... thinking what you hear on CNN is actually news or totally true. They have about as much credibility as Dan Rather. ....
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| AC5ZO
Join Date: Jul 2003 Posts: 928 Rio Rancho, NM 87144
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2005-08-01 114193
There are many opponents to free trade that pick the treaty of the week and present it as the Beginning of the End of the US. With respect to CAFTA, it is almost a non-issue. The US is already the biggest consumer of CA production and CA consumes much more from the US than China, Inc. and other foreign countries. Probably the only substantial change with this agreement is that sugar imports are easier for the CA producers.
I have personally been involved in cross border manufacturing as a result of NAFTA. Nobody in the US lost a single job with what my manufacturing lines did in Mexico. In fact, as a result of the "supporting activities" happening in Mexico, I was able to create 250 additional jobs in the US and create $100,000,000 in sales of new medical devices per year in a market that did not exist before 1993. I had 35 to 40 suppliers of parts in the US in addition to my own manufacturing. I would say that all together, my manufacturing activities employed over 500 people, mostly in the US. The Maquilo Doro operations in Mexico accounted for less than 1% of my manufacturing and parts. You won't hear this story on CNN, because it does not sell commercial time to report happy outcomes.
As far as CNN is concerned, I agree with Mark. But, I understand that they are now beaming FNC to the north for another viewpoint. ....
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 | metastable
Join Date: Apr 2004 Posts: 78 North Plains, OR 
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2005-08-01 114203
Murf, "gentleman who shot at me." I find it odd that a gentle man would should at you. I think he would be anything but gentle. ....
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| brokenarrow
Join Date: Jan 2004 Posts: 1288 Wisconsin
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2005-08-03 114307
Being the gentleman I am, I was staying out of this especially since I am just a low bottom feeding tool maker.
Many of the jobs I see being created are not able to pay the employee enough to allow them to pay for top of the line merchandise. Not ALL the jobs, but many of them. Many of us who make 60K and more a year may have forgot what it was like to sustain yourself on a lower paying job.
My wife and I do just fine (esp. since I went back to work LOL) but I still need to be frugal on what I buy and how much it costs. I watch the show "what not to wear" and my bride and I are just floored at what the east coast folks are willing AND ABLE to pay for clothing! Problem being that in this society we have created, unless there are two people working full time at decent occupations, to raise a family and ACTUALLY pay your bills is very hard, especially if you want to buy a quality product instead of one that is cheaply priced and cheaply made. I am guilty of buying cheap products, not all the time but on items that are short term or items that I would not expect to keep for a life time. Giving credit to some of the foriegn country's though, many clothing items have come a long way and are actually holding up way better than 10 years ago.
Its a double edged sword. If your not paid enough money to comfortably buy the product your company makes, how can a company cry about not having enough sales in this country? ....
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| Murf
Join Date: Dec 1999 Posts: 7249 Toronto Area, Ontario, Canada
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2005-08-03 114310
Meta, one of the first things those nice people in Quantico, Virginia taught me years ago, was to be nice to all the people we encountered and treat them with respect.
Right up to, and sometimes even after the BANG.
That's called Battlefield Diplomacy ......
Best of luck. ....
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