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And We’re Supposed to Trust This Guy?

Barack Obama has ratcheted up his attacks on NAFTA, but a senior member of his campaign team told a Canadian official not to take his criticisms seriously, CTV News has learned.

So says CTV this morning.  [1]

Yeah, well, no shock for that. When Obama takes up a cause, it’s not because he particularly thinks it’s a good cause to take up, past the idea that it gives him leverage against his political enemy.

Rather like on his stand on Iraq, hmmm?

Addendum: (David L)

You gotta give the old guy credit.   He doesn’t give different stump speechs in different states and he doesn’t pander in any state.   What Barack Obama, and Mrs. Clinton, are doing in Ohio is attributing every job loss in a Rust Belt state to NAFTA.   The LA Times [2] is not buying it:

The 14-year-old North American Free Trade Agreement [3]has become a hot issue in this year’s Democratic presidential campaign — in Ohio, at least. When Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama hit the hustings in the Buckeye State, they compete to be NAFTA’s biggest critic. [4]But when they jet to Texas, which is also holding its primary Tuesday, the candidates have little or nothing to say about the pact.

The disparity illustrates two truths about major trade deals: They’re a magnet for pandering, and they produce both winners and losers. Ohio, like other states in the Rust Belt, is stinging from the loss of manufacturing jobs in the years since NAFTA took effect. In Texas, however, communities near the border have blossomed with an influx of investment, jobs and workers

There lots of reasons Rust Belt states are losing jobs.   Blaming all lost jobs on NAFTA is merely scape goating.   Further, Obama and Mrs. Clinton are not running to be President Ohio, but rather President of the United States.   Overall NAFTA is a plus.