i am heartbroken. Even though i still admire and love Jimmy Carter, and appreciate his calls to close down GITMO, i am deeply saddened that today, he chose to endorse CAFTA, an as anti-human rights, anti-democratic, anti-poor agreement as you can get.
http://futures.fxstreet.com/Futures/news/afx/singleNew.asp?menu=latestnews&pv_noticia=1118350762
-e04f0f08-46915
BUsh attempted to woo some Democrats today on CAFTA, but Dems like Rangel and others are still saying no way, not without some adequate protections for workers.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/09/AR2005060901432.html
CAFTA Will hinder AIDS patients in Central America from accessing generic drugs. people will die because Pharma needs their profits.
http://www.alternet.org/story/22081/
a very little known or remarked upon fact is that the state legislatures are all revolting against CAFTA, free trade, and government procurement agreements as part of the CAFTA that infringe on state sovereignty. under the govt. procurement agreement, a state may be unable to require living wages, or using recycled goods or requiring alternative energy and other progressive policies, in its contract bidding process. those will be labelled as "trade barriers" under CAFTA. The Maryland legislature overrode Ehrlich's veto and voted to withdraw MD from the state govt procuremnt agreement in CAFTA. Utah, ND, and MT are other legislatures taht have passed similar resolutions. this is a WINNING issue across the political spectrum and particularly in red states, where free trade is hated even more than in blue states (where high tech and rich sectors like Wall Street luv their free trade).
More on the CAFTA govt procurement:
http://www.citizen.org/documents/ACFC070.pdf
in today's vote to withdraw from the WTO (a move that not even i advocate cause it's just not realistic), you had Bernie Sanders and Dennis Kucinich on the same side as crazy Sennsenbrenner and Tancredo. this unites the populist left and right together.
And the people of Central America are revolting as well. checkout this timeline, as the fight against neoliberalism and corporate globalization takes place in Central America and in Bolivia...
Timeline
http://www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/cafta/actions.html
SHame on Jimmy Carter. But we the people will continue to fight for a global economy that truly does embody human rights and puts people above profit.