Matthew K. Beaver praised President Barack Obama’s State of the Union speech, but there was one crucial part missing for the local union official.
The leader of the Free World never mentioned restructuring the North American Free Trade Agreement.
The then Illinois Democrat campaigned in 2008 that he would modify NAFTA, which many blame for costing thousands of Michigan jobs and hundreds of thousands of U.S. jobs. But Obama, a free trade advocate, made no mention of it in his prime-time address Wednesday to the nation and Congress.
“He promised that, and it needs to change,” said Beaver, vice president of United Auto Workers Local 699, which represents about 2,000 hourly workers at Nexteer in Buena Vista Township.
“We’re not going to have an economy if we don’t have good paying jobs,” he said. “You can talk the talk, but you need to walk the walk.”
Beaver said he has the same concern about “unfair trade” with China, which he said sends over huge ocean cargo freighters that dump Chinese-made products on U.S. shores and leave empty.
“Without manufacturing,” he said, “you’re not going to have an economy. We’re going to be a Third World nation.”
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http://www.mlive.com/news/saginaw/index.ssf/2010/01/he_promised_that_local_union_o.html