Lobby For Colombia Trade Pact Casts A Wide Net

New York Times:

There have been all-expense paid trips to Colombia for more than 50 members of Congress, featuring coffee tastings and dinner at a posh restaurant inside an old Spanish fort. The Colombian president has visited Washington to make personal appeals. Major corporations like WalMart and Citigroup are taking up the cause. And former Clinton administration officials have landed lucrative lobbying contracts.

This barrage of activity is over the trade pact that cost Mark Penn, a top adviser to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, his job over the weekend. Mr. Penn had been working for a presidential primary candidate opposed to the trade deal with Colombia, while also running a public relations firm hired by the Colombian government to promote it.

The debate has been quietly brewing ever since the Bush administration finished negotiating the pact to ease trade restrictions in late 2006. Human rights groups and labor leaders have urged Congress to put off considering the deal or to reject it outright, citing paramilitary violence against labor activists in Colombia.

The behind-the- scenes dispute has now escalated to a classic Washington boil in recent weeks after President Bush, growing impatient with Democrats on Capitol Hill, decided to send the agreement to Congress anyway, an action he announced formally on Monday.

"The need for this agreement is too urgent -- the stakes for our national security are too high -- to allow this year to end without a vote," Mr. Bush said.

He and others cited the need to support Colombia, which does $18 billion of trade with the United States annually and is battling leftist rebels that Colombian officials assert have received financing from the Venezuelan government.

To help make its case, Colombia had already hired at least three firms on Capitol Hill, in addition to the work by Mr. Penn's firm, Burson-Marsteller, paying out from $15,000 to $40,000 a month. Collectively the Colombian government has paid more than $1 million to firms that have negotiated or lobbied on behalf of the deal.

They include the Glover Park Group, the fast-growing firm set up by former Clinton White House aides including Joe Lockhart, who was chief spokesman for the president. (Howard Wolfson, Mrs. Clinton's campaign communications director, was a partner at the firm but has taken a leave of absence.)

The firm has approached more than a dozen members of Congress, focusing on moderate Democrats who the lobbyists believe might be persuaded to disregard their party leaders and vote in favor of the deal.

Read the whole story: New York Times

Comments

[FCBarca]

Money, money, money...Must be funny, in a rich man's world

[UCantPolishATurdblossum]

Somebody gave Hillary's campaign a "Colombian necktie".

[Caolas]

Keep digging and you'll find more. It's called the Revolving Door for a reason; these people move in and out, and, when needed, back in again.

[elbram]

What bothers me is the lack of news coverage on the VERBAL ATTACKS ON OBAMA from the president of Columbia TWO DAYS AFTER MARK PENN'S "visit". It makes you wonder why the attacks on Obama since BOTH CANDIDATES HAVE THE SAME POSITION ON TRADE...

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/4/5/01018/58668/686/490543

A foreign government official meddling in the affairs of American politics over a trade issues??? NEVER HAPPENS, unless you count Canada and NAFTA...

MARK PENN IS ALSO ATTACHED TO MCCAIN (SEE LINK)

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/2/24/14518/2213/544/463202

An excerpt...

Mark Penn's personal interests would clearly be best served by a Hillary Clinton victory. A McCain presidency wouldn't be a bad consolation prize, however. It would be far better to have the head of his lobbying be tight with the president than to have a president like Obama who sought to impose new restrictions on his lobbyist operation.

"It's tag-teaming Burson-Marsteller style."

VOTE OUT THE SPECIAL INTERESTS, VOTE OBAMA!

[deejsmom]

you got it - he thinks by being vocal against Obama that it will lend to Hillary's campaign - NOT!

If anything, it just proves that Penn's ties to the Colombian government gave the impression that they would have HRC in their pocket (perhaps ???) should she win -

[AndrewInToronto]

Worse still, the company for which Wolfson worked, Glover Park Group, seems to have been hired to represent the United States Government in negotiations, if I have correctly read a 9 November 2007 press release from the official website of the President Uribe of Colombia:

"Uno de los encuentros más importantes del Ministro de Comercio será el que sostenga con las empresas de lobby contratadas por el Gobierno de Estados Unidos. Plata espera conocer todos los detalles de la labor que adelantan firmas como Johnson Madigan and Peck, Glover Park y Burson Marsteller."
http://web.presidencia.gov.co/sp/2007/noviembre/09/13092007.html

This was confirmed in an article in the Colombian Ministry of Industry and Tourism's website:
http://www.mincomercio.gov.co/eContent/VerImp.asp?ID=6090&IDCompany=1

The press release also seems to imply an attempt to meet with Hillary Clinton during Minister Luís Guillermo Plata's visit to Washington from 12 to 15 November 2007.

[lovethesinner]

If you read the whole article at the NYTimes, you will ponder these paragraphs, and ask yourself, "Are Bill and Hillary, or perhaps the entire Democratic Leadership Council just Republicans in sheep's clothing?"

"While Mr. Wolfson has taken a leave from Glover Park, for example, he still has equity in the firm valued at $500,000 to $1 million, according to a disclosure form.

'A long list of former Clinton administration aides, including Mack McLarty, the former counsel to the president; Donna E. Shalala, the health and human services secretary; and Leon E. Panetta, the onetime chief of staff, also have come out in support of the deal. It puts them in alliance with Mr. Bush and Republican leaders."

If you are a REAL Democrat, a progressive Democrat, a liberal or a moderate Democrat, you will wonder how it is that BIG BUSINESS has taken such a hold on congress. You will ask yourself, "does anyone represent the actual people of the United States, or just the CORPORATIONS of the United States of America?"

The answer is, yes, someone does represent the people of America. He is not the enemy of business, but he's not willing to let them OWN our government. That man is Barack Obama.

May you find him now.

[Cedman]

Its pretty clear from this article the Clinton infrastucture is pretty plugged into making money off of this coming trade deal. Regardless of her public stance, if she is elected the fix is already in place. This trade agreeement would be good for former (and potentially future) Clinton Administration officials, members of Congress, Walmart, & Columbia. The unioins and average americans will take it in the rear end. Her phoney opposition to NAFTA not withstanding, I don't know how anyone in the Labor movement could support this woman....unless they just like being bent over.

[lynnn]

Of course he does...now what about Charlie Black (McCain's campaign manager). Since Black is employed by Penn's firm, it would be interesting to see who he's also working for (especially since Black is supposedly helping McCain for free).

[HumeSkeptic]

Some questions for those doing business with Colombian government:

http://www.revver.com/video/613521/rebel-music-americas-colombia/

[HumeSkeptic]

"The need for this agreement is too urgent -- the stakes for our national security are too high -- to allow this year to end without a vote," Mr. Bush said.
------------

National security? Colombia?


What is the bordering country north of Colombia? The answer is Venezuela.
What does Venezuela has a lot of? The answer is oil.

Get it?

There are also large natural gas reserves in the Andes Mountains region.

Look up Noam Chomsky's writings about this and the war on drugs.