Alan Tonelson is a Research Fellow at the U.S. Business & Industry Educational Foundation and the author of The Race to the Bottom: Why a Worldwide Worker Surplus and Uncontrolled Free Trade are Sinking American Living Standards (Westview Press).

Serious trade policy critics examining the role played by globalization-related issues in the 2008 presidential race have long felt like those dogged astronomers stationed at huge radio telescopes probing the heavens for signs that, “We are not alone.”  Lots of gazing – painfully paltry results.  Fragments of genuine intelligence appear once in a while, like those chemical building blocks of life detected occasionally among the stars.  But the real McCoy remains as agonizingly elusive as ever.

The run-up to the Pennsylvania primary showcased all of the dominant globalization trends in all three major campaigns   Criss-crossing a state full of workers, companies, and entire industries victimized for decades by failed trade policies, Democratic contenders Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama addressed the subject almost continuously for weeks.  Yet their remarks betrayed no significant grasp of the main trade policy challenges confronting the state or the nation -- or of the bold measures needed to overcome them.  

As for presumptive Republican nominee, John McCain, he simply reminded Americans how grateful they should be that those 3 a.m. crisis phone calls that sometimes do awaken presidents rarely concern globalization policy

This week’s endorsement by Clinton and Obama of the Senate version of the only worthwhile anti-currency manipulation bill currently before Congress (the Stabenow-Bunning Fair Currency Act) is an unexpectedly promising development.  But as will be argued in this first of three analyses on the candidates and globalization, Clinton – like her Illinois rival –  will need to mount a more vigorous, sweeping, and sustained challenge to current trade strategies to win over the skeptics and – much more important – genuinely excite the voters.

For the globalization-minded, the most unexpected development of the campaign’s post-Super Tuesday phase may be Clinton’s transformation into a working class hero, even before she announced her new China position – at least as many primary voters see it.  

Part of the explanation may be the inevitably humanizing effect of her intertwined personal and political struggles – along with the remarkable resiliency she has shown once her aura of inevitability was destroyed.

But Clinton’s strength among middle- and lower-income voters surely also stems from her positions on globalization-related issues, which are not only passionately voiced but in some cases impressively detailed.  Her performance at the April 14 trade forum held in Pittsburgh by the Alliance for American Manufacturing was a striking example.  

Granted, Clinton (and Obama) had every reason to pander to their steel-union and steel-company hosts.   But she could have passed that test by simply repeating the by-now standard – and largely off-base – talking points about inserting strong labor rights and environmental protections into trade agreements.  She didn’t need to discuss in any detail the threats to America created by growing offshoring in defense-related manufacturing, or urging the “protection” of Buy America provisions in defense procurement laws.  She didn’t need to point out the emergence of China as a national security as well as economic challenge.  That day she didn’t need to put out a highly specific blueprint for reforming and more vigorously enforcing U.S. trade laws – including a promise to “consider” imposing a 27.5 percent tariff on Chinese imports if Beijing’s currency manipulation doesn’t stop promptly, along with other measures with real teeth.

But Clinton did all of these things, strongly indicating at the very least some interest in going  beyond cliche and actually learning something useful about the nation’s wide-ranging trade policy challenges – and in the process perhaps moving beyond the policies of the free-trade architects of her husband’s two administrations.

At the same time, big doubts remain about Clinton’s trustworthiness on trade policy (among many other issues, if the polls are right).  And these doubts remain reasonable.  The main problem is not that Clinton supported NAFTA or China’s admission into the World Trade Organization or any of the other numerous outsourcing deals her husband spearheaded.  To err is human, and presidents in particular should boast a real ability to learn from mistakes.  

Nor is the main problem the presence of staunch outsourcers from Bill Clinton’s administration among her senior economic advisors – like former Treasury Secretary and longtime Big Finance kingpin Robert Rubin, and former chief White House economic advisor Gene Sperling – or all the Wall Street support that virtually all major New York state politicians covet and win.  However influential they are, Hillary is clearly no one’s puppet.  And if, as is likely, the economy continues to weaken, more one-way free trade deals will look unappealing no matter who’s pushing them.

Instead, the two biggest problems concern Clinton’s continuing claims of opposition to NAFTA during her husband’s presidency, and her failure or unwillingness to understand the real balance of economic power between the United States and China.

Had Clinton simply admitted changing her mind about NAFTA, her First Lady record could be  reasonably forgotten.  But substantial evidence of NAFTA enthusiasm during those years coupled with explanations that are insultingly unconvincing (see, for example, the Feb. 25  GLOBALIZATION FOLLIES, http://americaneconomicalert.org/view_art.asp?Prod_ID=2950) understandably raise questions about her sincerity and the possibility of post-election betrayal.

As liberal syndicated columnist David Sirota has relentlessly chronicled, Clinton was anything but “a critic of NAFTA from the start,” to use her words.  She touted it on the campaign trail and abroad, and her newly released White House schedules show that she spoke at a major White House NAFTA pep rally in November, 2003 – just one week before the decisive House ratification vote.

In fact, former Clinton White House political guru Dick Morris (who, it must be noted, has turned into a harsh critic of the Clintons) recently wrote that “Hillary was a strong supporter of NAFTA....Hillary and I spoke frequently through all of 1993 and 1994 and together we plotted to help NAFTA ratification.  She was deeply involved in the decision to enlist past presidents in supporting the bill and followed the vote count with heightening anxiety as it appeared closer and closer.”

Moreover, Sirota notes, Clinton was singing NAFTA’s praises as recently as 2004.  And although she opposed the Central America Free Trade Agreement in 2005, as a Senator, Clinton voted to approve recent deals with Jordan, Chile, Singapore, Morocco, and Oman, and endorsed last year’s free trade agreement with Peru.   In all, her reluctance to “come clean” on NAFTA and her broader trade record continues to suggest to many that she has something up her sleeve.

Just as important, as a Senator, this political powerhouse has exercised no significant leadership on trade policy issues.  According to an April 12 Los Angeles Times article, she has introduced at least two bills that would require government studies of how trade agreements affect the U.S. economy and labor market.  But the bills were never debated – even in committee.  They attracted no co-sponsors – indicating that Clinton never lifted a finger on their behalf.

Notwithstanding her welcome endorsement of the currency manipulation bill, Clinton’s assessment of U.S.-China economic relations is troubling as well.  At the Pittsburgh conclave, she talked up her efforts to “crack down on currency manipulation” (which until recently were limited to co-sponsoring a weak Senate currency bill) and promised to “finish the job” as president.  She justified her call for using more aggressive use of U.S. trade laws against China by citing the need “to send China and other market economies a simple message: ‘If you subsidize your exports and hurt our manufacturers, you’ll pay the price.’”

And yet one of Clinton’s other main themes in Pittsburgh completely undercut such tough talk:  Specifically, she repeatedly insisted that “we’re in a really weak position” to push China and other predatory traders because, “We are now deeply in debt, we borrow from Beijing, we are dependent upon them to keep lending us money to pay the interest on George Bush’s debt.  That weakens us....you know, it’s very tough to crack down on your banker.  And we have put ourselves in this position.”

What Clinton ignored, of course, is America’s status as the best customer by far for China’s export-led economy, as well as Beijing’s desperate need to keep U.S. importing and consumption strong in order to keep unemployment, and therefore civil unrest, under control.  Why does she think the Chinese keep bankrolling Americans?  Because holding dollars has produced such great returns this century?  Out of charity?  Despite years of impressively determined efforts to squander its wealth, the United States still holds all the economic cards in dealings with China.  American leaders have simply lacked the will to use them.  

Moreover, although it’s true, as Clinton notes, that by 2000 the United States produced a budget surplus that reduced foreign borrowing needs, much of the growth responsible for this financial improvement stemmed from a technology bubble that didn’t burst until Bill Clinton’s last year in office.

Clinton also ignored how and why the China problem started: Her husband’s decision (cheered on by most Republicans, it must be noted) to turn trade policy over to the outsourcers and ultimately grant China permanent normal trade status.  This landmark development paved the way for Beijing’s WTO entry and resulting legal immunity from U.S. unilateral sanctions – and thus represents a blunder that makes NAFTA look like a masterstroke.

But instead, Sen. Clinton still conveniently pretends that all of the nation’s China – and other economic –  troubles began on January 20, 2001.  And in fact, the very morning of her praiseworthy endorsement of the Senate currency bill, the media were filled with articles on how she has glossed over her husband’s failure to prevent the 1995 Magnaquench fiasco – when an Indiana company possessing critical defense technology was sold to Chinese interests.

In the end, though, the main policy and political challenge faced by Clinton – and her two rivals, who are much farther behind the curve – is understanding the real problem plaguing U.S. trade policy.  It’s not the lack of (essentially symbolic) labor and environmental provisions in trade agreements.  It’s not the failure to monitor and enforce the terms of trade deals adequately.  It’s not the exorbitant time and large sums of money generally needed by domestic American manufacturers to use the U.S. trade law system successfully.  It’s not George Bush’s failure to file enough WTO cases against predatory trading partners.  And it’s not the encouragement provided by the tax code to offshore production – although to varying degrees all of these are problems needing solutions.

The real problem, which began in earnest at least 20 years ago, is the transformation of U.S. trade policy into an outsourcing policy.  In other words, the export of factories and jobs to low-income countries capable of becoming powerhouse exporters but too poor to become big net importers –  so often decried by Democratic politicians – has not simply been the byproduct of poor implementation or unintended consequences.  It became the whole point or our trade policy.  And the resulting record global economic imbalances are endangering not simply America’s prosperity but the entire world’s.

Clinton’s proposal for a “timeout” on new trade agreements until a new U.S. strategy is formulated may create the opportunity for a much needed change. But ultimately, it’s simply a procedural recommendation.  As such, it lacks both genuine substance and the potential  genuinely to excite voters – which she desperately needs to produce thumping late-primary victories and derail Obama.

So a frontal attack against today’s outsourcing-focused trade deals represents a big opportunity for Clinton.  It would boost her political fortunes, as well as serve the national and global interest.  But the jury is still out on whether she’ll really seize it or merely pay it lip service while toying with voters’ emotions.

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