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When the Mexican government announced Monday that it will apply tariffs to U.S. exports it was clear that this was done in direct retaliation to the Obama administration decision to halt the Mexican trucking pilot program.
The cross-border trucking program, which came about with NAFTA, never worked. The Teamsters, along with other organizations, led the fight to keep the Mexican trucks off U.S. highways because of the safety issues associated with both the trucks and the drivers.
The U.S. Inspector General had found that the trucks were substandard and that the Mexican drivers were not held to the same standards as their American counterparts. While it was determined a few years ago for the program to halt, President Bush ignored that law. With the former Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters, the government blatantly broke the law and simultaneously put a lot of Americans in danger.
I think it is fairly bold for the Mexican government to make this tariff move because, as far as I know, they need us a little more than we need them, something a lot of newspapers reporting this story seem to be missing. In fact, a lot of the articles that I have read on the situation are forgetting why organizations, like the Teamsters, have fought this situation all along -- they are just reporting about the tariff announcement and hypothesizing that this is the beginning of what could be a larger trade war.
Would it not make more sense for the national and state publications to see the benefit of halting a failed Bush program, one that potentially put a lot of people in danger. Wouldn't it be cool if the publications and news agencies took a look at the exploited Mexican workers who are in these ill-equipped rigs with no enforceable hours of service rules? I don't see that happening with the five or six stories that I picked up on this situation. What I read has been slanted toward big business and the potential for trade wars because of the Teamsters --as though the union and its allied organizations are responsible for a trade war but not safe US highways.
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Typical of Corporate Idiotes and "Conservatives" in general
The typical "shift the blame and focus onto the Unions" so the corporate can find more ways of immoral/unethical dealing through legal loopholes. Signs of the times, brothers and sisters....Some corporate have neither the balls nor backbone to admit when they are wrong....and even if they do say they are wrong; they don't mean a damn word of it and keep lying, cheating and swindling the honest workers. Just look at how SORRY AIG pretended to be when they got caught in their stealing billions from the honest USA workers....hell, they even convinced "scholars"(sarcasm) like Limbaugh and many other corporate ass-kissing conservatives (Dem or Repub). I firmly believe Geithner has his nose up wall street's ass....people can change, but, Geithner and many idiots in our Govt. cannot trust these crooked bastards; our Govt., if they wise up, will finally see that they are going to have to heavily regulate and nationalize banks and wall street....until they can PROVE trustworthiness....they deserve years of regulation so things can be kept honest.
Forgive my rant, now back on topic. Reports will many times slant toward big business because the media that covers these reports are bought and paid for by big business to be their puppets. President Obama needs to put the squeeze on Mexico and expose the mistreatment of workers and also expose big businesses' dirty hands behind all of it. Trade wars; and to add to this the drug cartels that have set up shop in Mexico....many of the "worker bees" for these drug cartels are crossing the USA border and setting up shop in the USA by whatever means necessary....our Govt. better wake up and throw the hammer down hard on Mexico. At this time in our nation, we simply can't be putting up with Mexico's shit.