From: crosen@world.std.com (Carl Rosen)
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.politics
Subject: Partisan Politics kills GATT
Summary: U.S. and EC Presidents sacrifice GATT for political gains at home
Keywords: GATT Bush Clinton Delors France America trade tariffs politics
Date: 7 Nov 92 10:03:11 GMT
Distribution: bit
Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA

Partisan Politics takes priority over world trade in the final days
of the Bush Administration.  

Just one day after losing the presidential election, The White
House announced Wednesday that the Global Agreement on Trade and
Tariffs (GATT) talks had reached an impasse, and that $300 million
in protective tariffs would be raised as retribution for French
intransigence on the issue of agricultural subsidies.  The move
sparked nervousness in every major market around the world,
instilling fears of a Euro-American trade war similar to that which
drove the Great Depression of the 1930's.  Partisan politics played
a role on both shores of the Atlantic.  

European Community President Jacques Delors, a French politician,
protected his political viability at home by refusing to eliminate
subsidies to EC oilseed farmers.  The agricultural lobby is a
powerful, vocal and sometimes violent force in French politics. 
Mr. Delors faces French voters in March.

In Washington, President George Bush met with his supporters and
said "Let's finish the job with style."  He has apparently taken
steps to keep his word.  Since he took office in 1988, he has
driven the American economy to it's deathbed.  The coming tariffs
threaten to "finish the job."  Both the timing and the content of
the announcement to raise tariffs are interesting.  Since Bush
could not fix the economy he wrecked, he has apparently decided to
scuttle it.  In a shrewd political move aimed at destroying the
momentum of the incoming Clinton Administration and recapturing the
White House for the Republicans in 1996, the Bush Administration
elected to delay the effective date of the tariffs for 30 days.  By
postponing the start of the tariffs, the Bush Administration has
set a time bomb that cannot be defused.  The effect on the economy
will not be felt until after President-Elect Bill Clinton has taken
office, creating the illusion that "things got worse as soon as
that Democrat got into the White House."

President-Elect Clinton will certainly have his work cut out for
him when he takes office on January 20.  In addition to fixing an
ailing economy made worse by the calculated political sabotage of
the previous Republican administration, he will also have to
placate an angry Europe, whose economies will also suffer for the
partisanship shown in both the United States and France.  He will
have to calm Chinese leadership, upset and defiant over the
possibility of linking Most Favored Nation trading status to human
rights performance.  Reassuring an Arab world that is uneasy about
the prospect of a new administration in Washington that they
believe would favor Israel is a top priority.  In a single act of
spite, the lame-duck President Bush will leave foreign affairs in
the same disarray he left domestic affairs in.
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Carl Rosen           |  My views are my own.
crosen@world.std.com |  I represent only myself.
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