Fight Corporate Offshoring of U.S. Jobs - Free Trade = Job Loss

Corporate offshoring of American jobs to low-wage countries has become one of the defining issues of the 2010 elections.

Even The Wall Street Journal—not exactly a cornerstone of the supposed “liberal media”—just published a survey with some revealing results about who and what is to blame for our nation’s poor economy:

86% of Americans believe that offshoring of jobs by U.S. companies contributed to our sluggish economy.
Nearly 7 out of 10 people—an all time high—say that “free trade” agreements with other countries cost us jobs here at home.
Over three-quarters of Americans consider corporate profit-seeking a factor in the downturn.
This is not news to you, or to Public Citizen. Time and time again, we have proven that flawed trade policies and blind corporate greed are eroding the U.S. economy.

Now, our Global Trade Watch team has launched an innovative, interactive website to give you the knowledge to be a more informed voter by seeing the full impact the corporate pursuit of profits has on jobs, the environment and our communities.

Check out Public Citizen’s Trade Data Center.

This powerful new tool is just the latest example of the tremendous amount of research, education and advocacy that Public Citizen does to expose and counteract policies that benefit mega-corporations at the expense of We, the People.

This powerful new tool is just the latest example of the tremendous amount of research, education and advocacy that Public Citizen does to expose and counteract policies that benefit mega-corporations at the expense of We, the People.

Lost jobs. Corporate greed. Of course these are the issues you care about. And Nobody is more committed to reforming the failed trade regime and challenging runaway corporate power than Public Citizen.

With your support, Public Citizen can continue developing resources like the Trade Data Center and fighting for policies that benefit all of us, not just the multinationals.

Onward!
Robert Weissman, President

To get regular e-alerts about opportunities for activism and other ways to help with Public Citizen's work, sign up for the Public Citizen Action Network.

A Really Bad Day for Maliki, the Prime Minister of Iraq

No matter how bad a day you’re having, it’s probably not as bad as the day Nouri al-Maliki is having.

Maliki is the prime minister of Iraq. He wants very much to remain prime minister of Iraq, but he’s having trouble forming a coalition that can make up a majority of parliament. He’s been trying ever since indecisive elections last March -- seven months ago -- a world record, the BBC reckons.

You knew the job was dangerous when you took it…

On a visit to Tehran today, Maliki was told he must “get rid of America” and the 50,000 remaining U.S. troops in his country. So said Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

He’s the real power in Iran, in contrast to the blowhard president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who grabs all the headlines but doesn’t even command the military.

Maliki will take this seriously. For one thing, he lived in exile in Iran during Saddam Hussein’s rule. On the other hand, he’s well aware he wouldn’t be prime minister now if the United States had never invaded Iraq. It’s hard to serve two masters.

Now he has to make a choice. Two weeks ago, Iran convinced another faction in Iraq to back Maliki’s bid to remain prime minister. It happens that Washington insists this faction be kept out of the coalition because it insists on the departure of U.S. troops.

Maliki’s 4½-year balancing act between the United States and Iran is coming to a head. This is the choice he now faces…

Side with Iran and form a viable governing coalition
Side with the United States and allow a seven-month crisis to drag into perpetuity, undermining his legitimacy among ordinary Iraqis
No. 1 seems like a slam-dunk. It’s an outcome Washington won’t like but nonetheless can live with. The Bush administration already negotiated an agreement under which all the U.S. troops are gone by the end of next year. That gives the current administration political cover.

Still, come the end of next year, we can just imagine the cries: “Who lost Iraq?” That is, how did the U.S. invasion manage to strengthen Iran’s hand in the Middle East?

We won’t wade into that political thicket. We’ll just note that Iran sees itself as a sort of godfather to all Shia Muslims. And now they’re allied with an oil-rich country next door where 60% of the population is Shia.

“Iran's Shia influence,” says Byron King, “has spilled across the border into southern Iraq. Southern Iraq is where you'll find six of Iraq's eight ‘supergiant’ oil fields. It's also where you'll find a key border with Shia Islam's mortal enemy -- Saudi Arabia.”

If that sounds like a recipe for conflict, you’re right. It could easily push oil to $125 a barrel… and, if it really spirals out of control, $200 or more. Byron paints an all-too-believable scenario in a fully revised and updated version of his presentation on the subject. He also shows you how to safeguard your investments when the day comes.

Regards,

Addison Wiggin
The 5 Min. Forecast

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Save the U.S. Senate from Corporate Domination Sponsored by Republicans

There's no point in sugarcoating this: If the election were held today, Republicans and their corporate benefactors would gain control of the House—and quite possibly the Senate.

That's the nightmare scenario. It would spell an end to any hope of progress in the next two years—and quite possibly to Obama's presidency.

But there are three key races that Republicans would have to win to take the Senate, and all are tied. Meaning, they're close enough for us to tip the balance. We need to help these Democratic candidates raise enough money to get their message out—despite all the corporate ads targeting them—and run serious get-out-the-vote efforts.

This is a true emergency: We must stop the Republicans from taking over the Senate. There's a critical fundraising deadline at midnight tonight.

Please, make the most generous contribution you can afford, immediately

Here are the three progressive candidates in tight races who need our help right now:

We're adding Alexi Giannoulias in Illinois to our Progressive Heroes list today because he's locked in a tight race for President Obama's old Senate seat, and because he's running a populist campaign focused on taking on the corporate special interests and cleaning up Washington, D.C. This is the closest race in the country: Every poll in this race for the past two months has been tied.

Sen. Patty Murray is the highest-ranking Democratic woman in the Senate. She supported the public option and the fight for clean energy jobs, and has worked with other pro-choice Democratic women senators to eliminate egregious gender disparities in insurance coverage. Her Republican challenger significantly out-raised her in the last three months, and Murray needs our help to win.

And Sen. Harry Reid in Nevada is facing Sharron Angle, the tea party fanatic who wants to "phase out" Social Security and Medicare, withdraw from the United Nations, and abolish the Department of Education.1 The latest polls show her tied—or even slightly ahead, and just yesterday her campaign announced that they've raised a record-breaking $14 million in the past three months.2

Can you chip in to these candidates' campaigns and help stop the takeover?
Thanks for all you do.

–Michael, Joan, Anna, Adam, and the rest of the team


1. "Sharron Angle says eliminate Social Security," Progress Now Nevada, June 8, 2010

"Reid, in Fistfight, Could Take More Punches From Climate Bill," Climate Wire, May 26, 2010


"Sharron Angle wants to eliminate federal Department of Education," MyNews4, September 8, 2010


2. "Angle raises $14.3 million," The Washington Post, October 12, 2010


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