[S]ince Hillary Rodham Clinton was elected to the Senate in 2000, Corning and its mainly Republican executives have become one of her largest sources of campaign contributions. And in that time, Mrs. Clinton has become one of the company's leading champions, delivering for it like no other Democratic lawmaker.
In April 2003, a month after Corning's political action committee gave $10,000 to her re-election campaign, Mrs. Clinton announced legislation that would provide hundreds of millions in federal aid to reduce diesel pollution, using, among other things, technology pioneered by Corning. It was one of several Congressional initiatives Mrs. Clinton has pushed that benefit the company.
And in April 2004, Mrs. Clinton began a push to persuade the Chinese government to relax tariffs on Corning fiber optics products, inviting the Chinese ambassador to her office and personally asking President Bush for help in the matter. One month after the beginning of that ultimately successful effort, Corning's chairman, James Houghton, held a fund-raiser at his home that collected tens of thousands of dollars for her re-election campaign....
Corning ... and its employees contributed $137,000 from the time she was elected in 2000 through the end of 2005... the most from any single source other than MetLife.... [Thersites' note: MetLife's a big Lieberman contributor, too...]It's not just Corning and MetLife. Clinton even used to sit on the Board of Directors of WalMart -- unsurprising for an influential Arkansan, but still unseemly for a supposedly pro-American-worker Democrat, not just because of WalMart's poor labor practices and abuse of government social programs to provide health and other benefits to its workers but because WalMart is the single biggest importer of consumer goods from China.
Worst of all, conservatives and many independents see Clinton as representative of all Democrats, so we get tarred with the same brush as her when in reality we and conservatives share a distaste for Clinton's politics. Can you imagine how crass, calculating and unAmerican we'll look if she becomes the 2008 Democratic Presidential nominee?
Update: Or I could be all wet for once; a commenter pointed out that by reducing tariffs, Hillary was protecting American jobs. I still dislike the quid-pro-quo aspect of her relationship with Corning, and her general "Wall Street over Main Street" economic policies -- but I can't dispute the point on tariffs. I wasn't paying enough attention. Dang.
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14 comments:
what you say abuot hillary is wrong.
she will be great president.
see my blog at
hillary-for-president.blogspot.com
for details.
This is outrageous.
Hillary the Hawk pledged to bring 200,000 new jobs to Upstate when she ran for the US Senate.
During her tenure, Rochester, NY has lost 35,000 jobs.
We can and we must do better than this pathetic DINO.
Christopher: But how to derail her machine, when so many donors want her and so few Dem voters really understand her? If all I'm doing is talking to the blogosphere, it won't work. I'm scratching my head.
I love your blog, but your economic analysis here is dead wrong. Hillary campaigned for the Chinese government to lower its tariffs. This makes American goods cheaper to Chinese consumers. They will therefore demand more of the American good.
This move does nothing to affect the price of Chinese goods faced by American consumers.
This move by Hillary actually helps to keep jobs in America. If Corning wants to sell its prodcuts to the Chinese market in the face of high tariffs, it would have had two options:
1) open a plant in China and therefore avoid prohibitive tariffs; or
2) abandon the plan to access the Chinese market.
By getting China to lower its tariffs, Corning is able to keep jobs in the US and expand its operations.
Nordy:
Damn. You're right. I still don't like the quid pro quo aspect, and I wonder how many employees in the U.S. vs. elsewhere benefitted, but the article makes clear that Corning has a significant economic presence in upstate, which is all to the good, and you're absolutely right about the tariffs.
Thank you for correcting me.
None of it changes one thing: I really hope that Hillary ain't the Dem's nominee.
Feingold in 08!
Dude! Thanks for the update.
Hill pisses me off alot too but Free Trade man.. We've got A LOT of work to constantly update trade agreements so they amount to Fair Trade as well, but protectionism never protected anyone as a long-term policy.
It's like holdin' your breath, you simply can't do it for long and you better hope you're not under water when you've got to breathe.
I hear ya on the QPQ effect, though. It's always been freakin' hard to discern rational backscratchin' from mere opportunism. That's why we gotta follow Pols who, as Harkin just did, own their mistakes and do their best to correct them.
It can be politically expedient if future-adjustments are prepared to effect a more rational long-term goal. In other words, if you're ready and willing to take responsibility for corrections.
I just draw the line at it costing unwitting human lives.
By the way; I bet Bill's a big Corning guy as well. For their silicon division, of course.
{-'
Free Trade man.. We've got A LOT of work to constantly update trade agreements so they amount to Fair Trade as well, but protectionism never protected anyone as a long-term policy.
Fair Trade definitely is the key. I'm even a fan of protectionism when it's for a targeted cause -- if the U.S. is the key market for a new technology, for example, then I see no reason not to keep the loop closed to U.S. manufacturers and U.S. consumers until the industry has established itself, then opening up. But that's a rare situation. The main thing is to have a level playing field: comparable environmental and labor protections. If the field is level, American labor should be able to compete effectively.
All this is giving me a weird idea, to be posted later...
You folks interested in the free trade discussion may appreciate the next post up.
Thers,
I don't have the answer.
If you look at her base (those who haven't abanndoned her over supporting the Iraq war), you find a crazy quilt of aging feminists, divorced women who identify with her saga, men and women who adored and still adore her husband, and DNC stalwarts. Then, there's the matter of her huge financial purse and her stardom.
The powerful NYC gay community bows before her like she's Madonna, much to my consternation as a gay male who has enjoyed 2 very heated face-to-face conservations with her.
If the early polling is accurate, she loses to McCain in 2008. The thought of a McCain administration makes me want to hurl.
It's little wonder large majorities of voters simply don't bother to go to the polls when the choice is shit like Hillary the DINO or John "I 'heart' Bush" McCain.
I'm no fan of Hillary, but...
I bought some Corning Ware a few weeks ago. I was shocked when I saw "Made by Union Labor in the USA" on the bottom of the box.
Wal-Mart, Tyson, Corning, it's all the same deal, Hillary is the perfect Democrat for the Corporate State.
Hillary will sell out the middle class, just like Bill and dubya did...
She is too beholden to the big money corporate interests to even fake caring about anyone making less than $100k/yr.
You want to know why millions of poorly educated Mexicans flood our country? NAFTA! They actually have no choice, when you consider that since NAFTA, the percentage of Mexicans in poverty has tripled. You will get more of this type of "Free Trade" from Hillary.
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