By JOE McDONALD
AP Business Writer
BEIJING (AP) -- Asian exporters looked closely Wednesday at Barack Obama's trade stance, worried about the possible impact of his victory on Cambodian textile producers, Indian outsourcing companies and Korean automakers.
"He appears to be a protectionist," said Chea Mony, president of the Free Trade Union of Workers in Cambodia, which has an export-driven textile industry. "I am quite concerned about that because most of our clothing products are exported to America."
Obama has said he is in favor of free trade agreements if they benefit the United States. He has criticized a deal with South Korea that has yet to be ratified, saying it does not adequately address an imbalance in auto trade. South Korean automakers sold 772,482 vehicles in the United States in 2007, while the U.S. sold 6,235 in South Korea, according to industry statistics.
In an Oct. 24 letter to the U.S. National Council of Textile Organizations, Obama pledged "strong enforcement" of trade remedy laws, which can include added tariffs on imports that are deemed to hurt American businesses. Obama said he would include labor and environmental standards in free trade agreements - a measure that many in Asia view as a possible pretext to shield U.S. companies from foreign competition.
Obama also has said he would pressure China to end what he calls the manipulation of its exchange-rate system. Washington and other trading partners say Beijing's currency, the yuan, is kept undervalued, giving its exporters an unfair price advantage and adding to China's multibillion-dollar trade surplus.
Indian outsourcing companies - accused by critics of stealing U.S. jobs - have also expressed some apprehensions about an Obama victory.
"There are some apprehensions about protectionism being on the Democrats' political agenda. We hope that's misplaced and global trade and flows of goods and services will continue," said Saumitra Chaudhury, a member of the Economic Advisory Council of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and chief economist at the credit rating agency ICRA Ltd., a Moody's affiliate in New Delhi.
Other analysts said that despite Obama's pre-election comments, he was likely to follow the example of previous U.S. presidents and take a moderate line in office to preserve important trade relations with Asia.
"He may have talked tough, but based on past experience, that's just a tool to win over voters," said Qiang Yongchang, a professor at the Economy Institute at Shanghai's Fudan University.
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AP Business Writers Tomoko Hosaka and Yuri Kageyama in Tokyo, Elaine Kurtenbach in Shanghai, Jeremiah Marquez in Hong Kong and Kelly Olsen in Seoul, Associated Press Writer Ker Munthit in Phnom Penh and AP researcher Bonnie Cao in Beijing contributed to this report.
"He appears to be a protectionist," said Chea Mony, president of the Free Trade Union of Workers in Cambodia, which has an export-driven textile industry. "I am quite concerned about that because most of our clothing products are exported to America."
Obama has said he is in favor of free trade agreements if they benefit the United States. He has criticized a deal with South Korea that has yet to be ratified, saying it does not adequately address an imbalance in auto trade. South Korean automakers sold 772,482 vehicles in the United States in 2007, while the U.S. sold 6,235 in South Korea, according to industry statistics.
In an Oct. 24 letter to the U.S. National Council of Textile Organizations, Obama pledged "strong enforcement" of trade remedy laws, which can include added tariffs on imports that are deemed to hurt American businesses. Obama said he would include labor and environmental standards in free trade agreements - a measure that many in Asia view as a possible pretext to shield U.S. companies from foreign competition.
Obama also has said he would pressure China to end what he calls the manipulation of its exchange-rate system. Washington and other trading partners say Beijing's currency, the yuan, is kept undervalued, giving its exporters an unfair price advantage and adding to China's multibillion-dollar trade surplus.
Indian outsourcing companies - accused by critics of stealing U.S. jobs - have also expressed some apprehensions about an Obama victory.
"There are some apprehensions about protectionism being on the Democrats' political agenda. We hope that's misplaced and global trade and flows of goods and services will continue," said Saumitra Chaudhury, a member of the Economic Advisory Council of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and chief economist at the credit rating agency ICRA Ltd., a Moody's affiliate in New Delhi.
Other analysts said that despite Obama's pre-election comments, he was likely to follow the example of previous U.S. presidents and take a moderate line in office to preserve important trade relations with Asia.
"He may have talked tough, but based on past experience, that's just a tool to win over voters," said Qiang Yongchang, a professor at the Economy Institute at Shanghai's Fudan University.
---
AP Business Writers Tomoko Hosaka and Yuri Kageyama in Tokyo, Elaine Kurtenbach in Shanghai, Jeremiah Marquez in Hong Kong and Kelly Olsen in Seoul, Associated Press Writer Ker Munthit in Phnom Penh and AP researcher Bonnie Cao in Beijing contributed to this report.
9 comments:
No worry, without Cambodia, no one can afford to buy clothing in the US on low salary.
yES CAMBODIA SHOULD RAISE THE SALARY FOR THE WORKERS 11:17pm!
So why ah Kwack Hun Xen so STUPID?
What will become of his children, Pig brain or lopster????
Cambodia ruled by the uneducated government (CPP) for more then 20 years, turned country to the lawless country and the poorest country in the world.
Corruptions every corners from the grand corruptions to the street level of corruptions on the lives of the poor.
The rich and the high rank government official abuse and lands grabbing from the poor.
This happen to the poor Cambodians everyday lives.
In the United States Barack Obama won the election because American wanted to change new leader.
Cambodia need change a new prime minister too. Prime minister with well educate,
honest and protect county integrity.
Out of this topic: I would like to alert all our Khmer soldiers at the front or back line please pay attention, the new Thai trick is starting, they the Thai army did adjusted or pulled out some slowly out from the front line, but to all Khmer army, we must 100% becareful, this is the tactic of the war, why? Because their jet-fighter can bomb us Khmer army at any time if somethings will happen in the next minute or soon. We Khmer must think, don't truth the Siam.
Now Siam will play more game just to make our Khmer army start shooting first then the blame will be us, and next they can use their air attack so easy, coz their army was far away from our army.
Our Khmer commanders got enough skill and experiences, nothing to worry, but just to remind all our men be ready for something will occure.
This time if the shooting start again we Khmer must move our troops far inside Thai or to hit the Bangkok, and do not forget to wake up our men who carrying the SAM-7, put them on your soulder at any time from now.
Buddha bless the Khmer army.
Khmer in Surin
What justification do you have for raising the workers' salary, 12:05? Moneys don't grow on trees, you know?
Out of this topic: I would like to alert all our Khmer soldiers at the front or back line please pay attention, the new Thai trick is starting, they the Thai army did adjusted or pulled out some slowly out from the front line, but to all Khmer army, we must 100% becareful, this is the tactic of the war, why? Because their jet-fighter can bomb us Khmer army at any time if somethings will happen in the next minute or soon. We Khmer must think, don't truth the Siam.
Now Siam will play more game just to make our Khmer army start shooting first then the blame will be us, and next they can use their air attack so easy, coz their army was far away from our army.
Our Khmer commanders got enough skill and experiences, nothing to worry, but just to remind all our men be ready for something will occure.
This time if the shooting start again we Khmer must move our troops far inside Thai or to hit the Bangkok, and do not forget to wake up our men who carrying the SAM-7, put them on your soulder at any time from now.
Buddha bless the Khmer army.
Khmer in Surin
Here is something for the stupid Cambodians to read and know:
Paul Joseph Watson & Alex Jones
Prison Planet.com
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
The messianic fervor which has preceded Barack Obama’s expected ascension to the White House has alarming implications for freedom and is a painful reminder that most Americans have once again been suckered into believing that the two-party monopoly offers any kind of solution to the crisis that we face.
For eight years during the term of Bill Clinton, Alex Jones was labeled a right-wing fascist for opposing him and for the past near-eight years Jones has been derided as a communist and even an Al-Qaeda member for railing against the Bush administration.
Now even regular readers of our own websites are calling Alex a right-wing racist once again merely for questioning the ascension of the new great leader - Barack Obama.
The messianic complex that has been attached to Obama is truly frightening. Bishops like Cornal Garnett Henning are calling Obama the new “Moses” while his supporters refer to him as “the black Jesus”.
In one You Tube clip, a woman hails Obama’s Godly powers by proclaiming that as soon as he is elected, all her problems will simply disappear, saying that Obama will help her personally almost like Jesus healed the sick and wounded.
The election of a new president should not be a mindless act of idolatry and fanfare, it should be a solemn commitment to find a leader who will follow the Constitution.
But Barack Obama will ride into office with a gigantic approval rating to rival that of Bush after 9/11, along with a complete power monopoly over the executive, the legislative, the judicial as well as widespread media support.
This makes Obama more dangerous than Bush and certainly a damn site more dangerous than a McCain administration, because his policies for at least a year or two will enjoy universal acclaim and voices of dissent will be drowned out by a wave of droning acquiescence.
Obama has all the political capital he needs to implement the terrifying policies that he has already announced and beef the architecture of the police state crafted by Bush.
- The creation of a “civilian national security force” that is “just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded” as the U.S. military to enforce Obama’s carbon tax scheme and the total regulation and control of the American middle class.
- Obama has talked openly about his intention to bomb Pakistan under the guise of pursuing terrorists, continuing a Bush administration policy of violating the sovereignty of foreign nations.
- The guarantee to “bankrupt” coal power plants, costing millions of American jobs and skyrocketing energy prices.
- Unbridled implementation and expansion of the banker bailout that is hated by the majority of American citizens yet was vigorously promoted by both Obama and McCain. Doling out taxpayer’s money to Wall Street, causing rampant inflation, a lowering in living standards and the destruction of the dollar.
- Obama has rhetorically supported the second amendment and an individual’s right to bear arms, but his actions tell a different story. Obama supports local gun ban laws, including his endorsement of a state ban on the sale and possession of handguns in Illinois.
- Obama grandstands on the notion that he supports environmentalism with his climate change rhetoric, but his intention to extend biofuel subsidies will only accelerate price food costs that have already risen 75 per cent since 2002, causing economic distress and rioting in such countries as Haiti, Egypt, and Somalia, as well as deforestation on a massive scale.
Mark our words - the causes that the liberal left has been fighting for over the last eight years will simply be forgotten just like conservatives were put to sleep when Bush came to power. Obama is the pacifier that the establishment needs to quiet the simmering anger amongst Americans that has been threatening to boil over.
It will no longer be “fashionable” to fight the police state amongst the political left.
Mark our words - there will be no repeal of the Patriot Act, there will be no repeal of the John Warner Defense Authorization Act, there will be no repeal of warrantless secret surveillance of American citizens.
Democratic control of Congress and the Senate since the 2006 elections has achieved nothing in the way of reversing the Bush administration’s assaults on the Constitution, so why should we expect Obama to do anything different?
Obama may eventually withdraw a portion of troops from Iraq but mark our words, they won’t be home long before they are sent off to bomb another broken-backed third world country, this time in the name of a United Nations-backed “humanitarian” war, just as Bill Clinton presided over in Somalia and Serbia with the full support of the establishment political left.
Indeed, Obama’s running mate Joe Biden has already “promised” and “guaranteed” that Obama will be faced with an international crisis that will mandate him to take “unpopular” and “tough” decisions in the context of foreign policy.
Don’t think for a second that our warnings about Obama are an endorsement for John McCain. We have tirelessly attempted to educate Americans about the two party monopoly and the fact that Democrats and Republicans serve the interests of the elite, not the people, and have for at least five decades since Kennedy was killed.
Obama is Coca-Cola and McCain is Pepsi - at the end of the day you’re still drinking the same beverage.
The two-party monopoly offers no solutions for the problems we face, in fact the two-party monopoly that you will be helping to maintain should you vote for either Obama or McCain - is the problem.
Stop falling for the same bait and switch trick again and again every eight years.
When George W. Bush was elected, conservatives were in adulation and awe, confident that after eight years of federal government expansion under Clinton, Bush - complete with slick conservative rhetoric and promises of change - would shrink the size of government and restore dignity to the office of President.
Nearly eight years later and what have we witnessed, a record expansion in the size of government and an almost universal contempt for America around the world.
When Tony Blair swept into power with a landslide in the British general election in 1997, the country breathed a collective sigh of relief that this new young dynamo would put right years of Tory malfeasance and provide the “change” that everyone was crying out for.
When Blair left office in 2007 he had created a Socialist surveillance police state and eliminated a huge popular approval lead the Labour Party had enjoyed over the Tories, leaving most of the public once again to demand Conservative rule.
When are we going to wake up to the fact that voting in the lesser of two evils is not a solution?
When are we going to realize that participating in a rigged system, where our vote means virtually nothing anyway because it is counted by a completely compromised and hackable voting machine, not only fails to address any of our problems, but actually compounds them because of our passive obedience in participating in the phony virtual reality presented to us as “democracy”?
When are we going to realize that by continually electing Democrats and Republicans, we are voting away our own freedom as the march towards a new world order and an American police state proceeds no matter who takes office?
2:14 AM
Can you not defaecate all over the place like this it stinks.
Paste this shit on your forehead so you can remember it yourself.
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