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Obama Adviser Denies Trade Remarks
By Nedra Pickler
The Associated Press
Monday 03 March 2008
San Antonio, Texas - Barack Obama's senior economic policy adviser said Sunday
that Canadian government officials wrote an inaccurate portrayal of his private
discussion on the campaign's trade policy in a memo obtained by The Associated
Press.
The memo is the first documentation to emerge publicly out of the meeting between
the adviser, Austan Goolsbee, and officials with the Canadian consulate in Chicago,
but Goolsbee said it misinterprets what he told them. The memo was written by
Joseph DeMora, who works for the consulate and attended the meeting.
Goolsbee disputed a section that read: "Noting anxiety among many U.S.
domestic audiences about the U.S. economic outlook, Goolsbee candidly acknowledged
the protectionist sentiment that has emerged, particularly in the Midwest, during
the primary campaign. He cautioned that this messaging should not be taken out
of context and should be viewed as more about political positioning than a clear
articulation of policy plans."
"This thing about `it's more about political positioning than a clear
articulation of policy plans,' that's this guy's language," Goolsbee said
of DeMora. "He's not quoting me.
"I certainly did not use that phrase in any way," Goolsbee said.
The meeting was first reported last week by Canadian television network CTV,
which cited unnamed sources as saying that Goolsbee assured the Canadians that
Obama's tough talk on the North American Free Trade Agreement is just campaign
rhetoric not to be taken seriously. The Obama campaign and the Canadian embassy
denied there was any inconsistency between what the candidate was saying publicly
and what advisers were saying privately.
NAFTA is widely opposed in economically depressed Ohio, which holds its presidential
primary Tuesday and is a key battleground between Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Both candidates said in a debate in Cleveland last week that they would renegotiate
the trade agreement between the United States, Canada and Mexico, which is the
largest trading partnership in the world, and threaten to pull out if it doesn't
include more protections for workers and the environment.
"I think we should use the hammer of a potential opt-out as leverage to
ensure that we actually get labor and environmental standards that are enforced,"
Obama said in the debate.
The memo obtained by the AP was widely distributed within the Canadian government.
It is more than 1,300 words and covers many topics that DeMora said were discussed
in the Feb. 8 "introductory meeting" between himself, Goolsbee and
the consul general in Chicago, Georges Rioux.
Goolsbee "was frank in saying that the primary campaign has been necessarily
domestically focused, particularly in the Midwest, and that much of the rhetoric
that may be perceived to be protectionist is more reflective of political maneuvering
than policy," the memo's introduction said. "On NAFTA, Goolsbee suggested
that Obama is less about fundamentally changing the agreement and more in favour
of strengthening/clarifying language on labour mobility and environment and
trying to establish these as more 'core' principles of the agreement."
Goolsbee said that sentence is true and consistent with Obama's position. But
he said other portions of the memo were inaccurate.
He said he has been surprised that such a banal and trivial meeting with a
low-level consulate official has created so much controversy and resulted in
such an inaccurate depiction. He said he was invited to the consulate to meet
the officials and get a tour.
He said the visit lasted about 40 minutes, and perhaps two to three minutes
were spent discussing NAFTA. He said the Canadians asked about Obama's position,
and he replied about his interest in improving labor and environmental standards,
and they raised some concerns that Obama sounds like a protectionist.
He said he responded that Obama is not a protectionist, but that the Illinois
senator tries to strike a balance between the economic struggles of working
Americans and recognizing that free trade is good for the economy.
"That's a pretty ham-handed description of what I answered," Goolsbee
said of memo's account. "A: In no possible way was that a reference to
NAFTA. And B: In no possible way was I inferring that he was going to introduce
any policies that you should ignore and he had no intention of enacting. Those
are both completely crazy."
Tristan Landry, a spokesman for the Canadian embassy in Washington, said DeMora
was not available for an interview Sunday. His only comment on the memo was
to say that although consulate officials reach out to U.S. campaign officials
to seek their views, "Canada does not in any way seek to interfere in U.S.
electoral politics."
Canada supports NAFTA and does not want to see it interrupted.
The Canadian memo said that when Rioux "asked whether we could expect
to hear more of this as the elections progressed, Goolsbee thought not. In fact,
he mentioned that going forward the Obama camp was going to be careful to send
the appropriate message without coming off too protectionist.
"As Obama continues to court the economic populist vote, particularly
in upcoming contests like Ohio, we are likely to see a continuation of some
of the messaging that hasn't played in Canada's favour, but this should continue
to be viewed in the context in which it is delivered," DeMora wrote in
the closing section.
Obama spokesman Bill Burton said Goolsbee's visit was not as an emissary from
the campaign, but as a professor from the University of Chicago. He was not
authorized to share any messages from the campaign, Burton said.
Burton, who was on the call while Goolsbee described his visit to the AP, said,
"It all boils down to a clumsy, inaccurate portrayal of the conversation."
Asked if he agreed with Burton, Goolsbee said he did.
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