Yesterday, I wrote a post [1] saying there was a good, bad and potentially ugly side of Nancy Pelosi's move to delay a vote on the lobbyist-written Colombia Free Trade Agreement. The ugly side would be if this is a ploy to actually help the pact pass - and some new pieces of evidence suggest that's the goal.
First, we have Pelosi's own statement yesterday:
"I thought there was a risk, the President sending [the trade deal] to the Congress now. If brought to the floor immediately, it would lose. And what message would that send?"
So there it is, right from Pelosi's mouth. The trade deal isn't being delayed because it would pass now - it is being delayed because if it came to a vote now, it would probably lose because populist Democratic forces are better organized right now. In other words, Pelosi is maneuvering to thwart the will of the rank-and-file members of her caucus, all to keep a lobbyist-written trade deal alive.
This isn't a conspiracy theory - it's all out in the open being discussed by corrupt Democrats in the press. Rep. Greg Meeks (D-NY), one of the CAFTA 15 [2], had this to say in Roll Call [3]:
Meeks backed Pelosi’s move, saying it “is actually going to save it instead of kill it” because it would have been defeated on the floor otherwise.
As I said to start, this is the ugly side coming true.
Links:
[1] http://www.ourfuture.org/blog-entry/pelosis-trade-move-good-bad-and-potentially-ugly
[2] http://www.tompaine.com/articles/2005/07/29/spanking_the_cafta_15.php
[3] http://www.rollcall.com/issues/53_118/news/22933-1.html