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Friday, March 19, 2004
Volume 11, No. 6
A SPIRITED DEBATE OVER OUTSOURCING AND TRADE
Senate Republicans Dilute Proposal Aimed
At Keeping Government Service Jobs In U.S.
Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.) has been losing his voice
lately speaking emphatically about the loss of U.S.
manufacturing and service sector jobs to foreign countries.
Dodd was pressing the issue with sound and fury on the floor
of the Senate trying to galvanize support for his proposal to
require that all federal service contracts be fulfilled using
U.S. workers. But his efforts were attacked by Republicans.
After two days of debate, the final version of his legislation
excluded most federal agencies from the requirement.
Dodd’s amendment to the
“Jumpstart Our Business Strength
(JOBS) Act,” which is being
considered as a replacement for the
Foreign Sales Corp, generated a
spirited debate over how Democrats
and Republicans view the economy
and international trade. In the end,
the Republicans prevailed, arguing
that restricting government
procurement to U.S. companies and
workers would create retaliation
among trading partners. They
argued that such legislation was
“isolationist” and would likely cost
the U.S. economy more jobs than it
protects. Dodd’s proposal was
eviscerated.
As it was originally written, the
amendment restricted any
organization using federal tax
dollars from shipping jobs offshore.
BY RICHARD McCORMACK
All federal funding going to states
and local governments would be
impacted. “I realize it is a loud
shout at this moment and I know
others will argue that maybe it is
louder than it need be,” said Dodd
on the Senate floor early in the
debate. “But I do not know any
other way to express my deep
concern about what is happening in
my state and all across this country
if we do not begin to say that at least
with taxpayer money, you are going
to have to act differently. You may
decide to do it on your dime, but
you are not going to do it on the
dimes of my taxpayers. You do not
need to do that in order to survive.”
Dodd pointed out that the Senate
(Continued on page six)
Washington Cash: Don’t Get Trampled
In The Race For The Trough
The federal budget is setting records for deficits, but when it comes to
pork barrel projects, there has never been a better time to feed at the
trough. The appropriations bills passed for fiscal year 2004 are laden
with congressionally directed programs, stuffed into virtually every
agency, at record amounts. At some agencies, earmarks can make up half
the budget. The problem has worsened under the Republican controlled
Congress, most all observers agree. Organizations throughout the
country needing cash with no strings attached have learned that the best
place to go is directly to their local member of Congress.
Within the Omnibus Appropriations Bill that was signed by the
President in January, as many as 10,000 earmarks worth as much as $11
(Continued on page eight)
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Friday, March 19, 2004
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Bio Scientists Accuse Bush
Of Distorting Science
A growing number of environmental scientists are becoming more
vocal in their criticism of the Bush administration’s “misuse” and
“distortion” of scientific research into climate change, pollution, forest
management and oil exploration. “When the administration invokes
science, it relies on research at odds with the scientific consensus and
contradicts, undermines or suppresses the research of its own scientists,”
says a statement signed by 241 university professors, 625 graduate
students and 36 government scientists from around the country. Stanford
University graduate students and postdoctoral fellows are spearheading
the petition. The government scientists signing the statement work for
EPA, NOAA, USGS and NIH.
“Policymakers have the right to take scientific evidence and weigh it
with social, economic and other factors,” says Stephen Porder, with
Stanford’s Department of Biological Sciences and one of the organizers of
Stanford graduate students’ Web site, www.scienceinpolicy.org. “But
when they start mischaracterizing the science, we feel that goes beyond
the pale....We believe that the Bush administration is unprecedented in
its misuse of science, particularly when it comes to the environment.” A
similar charge organized by the Union of Concerned Scientists and
signed by 20 Nobel Laureates was delivered to the Bush administration
on Feb. 19.
Those signing the Stanford graduate student statement take issue with
the Bush administration’s decision to reject the findings of the United
Nations panel on climate change, which projects an increase of between
2.7 and 10.4 degrees F in the surface temperature of the Earth over the
next 100 years. “The White House dismissed the UN forecast out of
hand, even though it reflects the broad consensus of most climate
experts,” says Porder.
The environmental scientists also object to the Bush administration’s
practice of naming programs that “cloak environmentally damaging
policies,” citing the “Clear Skies” and “Healthy Forests” initiatives, says
Porder. “As a result, the public and the media often wrongly believe that
this administration uses sound science to help promote a healthy
environment,” he explains. “Scientists have an ethical responsibility to
stand up when we see science being mischaracterized. I hope this is the
beginning of a movement among scientists to inform the public about the
true state of science, something we haven’t done very well so far.”
U.S. Tourism Industry Makes
A Strong Comeback After 2001
The U.S. tourism industry is coming back to life. Total direct and
indirect tourism sales increased by 3.5 percent last year to an estimated
$722 billion, up from $698 billion in 2002 and $699 billion in 2001. It was
the first year of positive growth since 2000, when total tourism sales
reached $737 billion, according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis.
Air transportation related to tourism grew from $176 billion to $181
billion, which is still down considerably from the $225 billion in 2000.
Tourism sales at eating and drinking places increased from $127 billion in
2002 to $137 billion in 2003. Tourism sales at hotels and lodging places
dropped slightly to $189 billion. Tourism sales related to automobile
rentals increased from $46.6 billion in 2002 to $48.5 billion in 2003. The
report is located at:
http://www.bea.doc.gov/bea/newsrelarchive/2004/tour403.htm.
No Applications
For Smart Cards
In Retail Sector,
Says Analyst
Retailers should not invest any
money in developing smart card
technology or applications, says an
analyst with AMR Research in
Boston. Smart cards using embedded
computer chips are “irrelevant” and
should be “ignored” because
customers don’t need them and the
infrastructure for their support does
not exist, says AMR Research analyst
David Weisman.
“Target is just the latest example of
years of failed smart card programs
in the United States, from the 1996
Olympics to a New York City Pilot in
1997 to American Express’s Blue
Card,” says Weisman.
Payment options such as cash,
checks, debit, credit and gift cards
are well understood and effective.
“Loyalty programs work just fine
with magnetic stripe cards,” says
Weisman. “Retailers have already
spent a fortune outfitting checkout
lanes with card readers and PIN
pads to accept credit and debit cards.
These readers do not have smart card
readers and retailers aren’t going to
shell out the cash to add them with
little or no cards in consumer hands.”
Security does not require smart
card technology because electronic
transactions can be verified quickly
and cheaply. The business case for
smart cards in the retail environment
“remains a mystery,” Weisman notes.
“Sure, someday a new payment
technology will catch on, probably
based on radio frequency
identification, but there are years to
wait for that. Retailers should not
bother allocating any capital or R&D
budgets to smart cards. Instead, pour
resources into other store system
investments with immediate impact
on improving the customer
experience, including workforce
management, advanced consumer
selling technologies and eventually
RFID to improve back-office
operations.”
MANUFACTURING & TECHNOLOGY NEWS Friday, March 19, 2004
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It’s Time For The Government
To Get Serious About Trade
Enforcement, Says Rep. Wolf
A powerful member of the House of Representatives has introduced
legislation to transfer the federal government’s trade oversight
functions from the United States Trade Representative (USTR) to the
Department of Commerce. Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.), chairman of the
House appropriations subcommittee that determines the budget of the
USTR and Commerce Department, says the trade deficit is rising out
of control and the USTR is not adequately pursuing industry
complaints about unfair trade practices in China.
With a staff of only 202
United States Trade
employees, the USTR is negotiating
Representative Zoellick does not
a record number of new free trade
agree with Wolf ’s assessment. He
agreements, but does not have time
says there is a “steady stream” of
to enforce the ones it has already
U.S. companies coming into his
signed, says Wolf. The office “is
offices on a daily basis “working with
being stretched too thin,” he says.
us to figure out how best to press
“Enforcement is being shortchanged foreign governments” to open up
and U.S. companies are not being
their markets. The “vast majority” of
well served.”
these efforts are brought to a
The USTR has done nothing to
successful resolution “without the
rein in China’s outright stealing of
need to resort to formal litigation,”
intellectual property and its piracy
Zoellick said on March 9. “Most U.S.
of copyrighted materials, says Wolf.
companies urge us to do everything
It had not pursued a single case
that we can to resolve a problem
against China in the WTO until the
without bringing a WTO or NAFTA
semiconductor case filed on
case, given the amount of time such
Thursday, March 18. It has done
cases take.”
nothing to challenge China’s
Wolf isn’t so sure. Estimates are
requirement that U.S. companies
that 93 percent of the business
partner with Chinese companies in
software applications in China are
order to have access to Chinese
pirated. Chinese state-owned
markets.
companies have made an exact copy
ISO Creates Tamper-Proof
Standard For Freight Containers
The International Standards Organization (ISO) has developed new
guidelines to protect freight containers from tampering. ISO’s standard
for mechanical seals will allow customs officials, manufacturers and users
of freight containers to ensure the integrity of containers as they move
through the supply chain.
“Mechanical seals are used to secure the freight containers in such a
manner that provides an indication of tampering with the seal if an
attempt is made to open the container doors,” says ISO. “With the
concerns and need for increased security, the quality and integrity of the
seal is critical.”
ISO believes customs offices throughout the world will start requiring
the use of the standard (ISO/PAS 17712:2003) to save them time from
having to inspect every cargo container moving between ports.
Wolf: The USTR has too much
on its plate.
of a new General Motors “Spark”
vehicle. Chinese companies are
selling pirated pharmaceuticals,
health and safety goods and
automobile parts. “Not one of these
markets has been shut down, not a
single one,” says Wolf. “Yet the
USTR believes the People’s Republic
of China is keeping its promise to
enforce intellectual property rights.”
The U.S. business community
would be “better served” by having
the Commerce Department become
their trade enforcer, says Wolf. The
agency has the budget and
personnel to address unfair trade
issues impacting small- and
medium-sized manufacturers. The
Commerce Department
understands “how Chinese imports
and trade barriers are hurting
American companies,” he says.
The Bush administration has also
not requested enough funding for
the USTR to conduct oversight of
the trade agreements it has signed
or engage adequately with the
World Trade Organization. The
budget requests submitted by Bush
during the past two years have been
“woefully inadequate” and were
“insufficient to continue the
operations of the USTR,” Wolf
contends. “Astonishingly, the FY
2005 USTR budget released in early
(Continued on next page)
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Friday, March 19, 2004
MANUFACTURING & TECHNOLOGY NEWS
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the Chinese on “rampant piracy of
intellectual property rights,” unfair tax
(From page three)
policies and standards that are being
drafted to exclude foreign economic
February includes less money than was provided this
participation.
year. Less money. Yet the office says it will begin seven
“We recognize that enforcement of China’s
more free trade agreements. And they hope to
accomplish this extra work with less money than the year commitments requires sticks as well as carrots and we are
before? It is preposterous that such a level of work would certainly willing to utilize the tools Congress has made
available to us,” he says. The USTR is engaged in “the
require less money. And what happens to the mounting
careful use” of the China textile safeguard and it filed its
allegations of unfair trade practices under trade
case against China in the WTO for the unfair use of the
agreements already signed while the USTR negotiates
value added tax placed in imported semiconductors after
new deals — with fewer resources than the year before
it was unsuccessful in “pressing China to resolve these
when no unfair trade cases were brought before the
disputes promptly.”
WTO?”
“In 2003, senior administration officials met frequently
Wolf is also circumspect of the U.S. government’s
with Chinese counterparts to address shortcomings in
handling of human rights abuses in China. “Last year, I
China’s WTO compliance,” Zoellick said in prepared
requested that the U.S. support a resolution
comments before the Senate Committee on Finance on
condemning the human rights abuses in China in the
March 9, 2004. “We delivered a clear message: China
context of the UN Commission on Human Rights,” says
must increase the openness of its market and treat U.S.
Wolf. “The State Department explained to me that the
goods and services fairly if support in the United States
department was encouraged by promises made by the
for an open market with China is to be sustained.”
Chinese, therefore the U.S. refused to put forth
Zoellick says the pressure is paying off. China is
condemning resolutions.”
“correcting systemic problems” in its administration of
Yet the State Department’s recently released 2003
the tariff rate quota system for bulk agricultural
Human Rights Report on China found that China’s
commodities. It has reduced capitalization requirements
human rights record deteriorated last year. “Imagine a
for financial services including opening the motor
country where factory workers have no workplace safety,
vehicle financing sector.
labor or environmental protection and are required to
“While some of China’s compliance problems were
work 80-hour weeks for no more than $110 per month
to produce goods for export?” Wolf asks. “Many CEOs of initially viewed as growing pains as it brought laws and
regulations into line with new WTO obligations, China
U.S. companies supported Permanent Normal Trade
must do more to ensure that it is living up to obligations,”
Relations with China hoping for new markets for their
says Zoellick. “Without more progress on matters we have
products and services. We are now seeing some of these
been pressing with China, we will certainly need to avail
same business leaders questioning weather or not it was
ourselves of our rights under the WTO.”
the right decision for their businesses and their
communities in the long
term. Many of these
companies today who trade
with China do so with the
hope that the Chinese don’t
copy their products before
they can make a profit. That
The manufacturing community in Wisconsin is making waves in the state
is not the way free and fair
legislature. The Wisconsin Assembly on March 10 passed a bill by a vote of 97-1 to
trade should work. The
provide $1.5 million over two years to the Wisconsin Manufacturing Extension
Office of the USTR has had
Partnership (WMEP). The Wisconsin Senate followed with a vote of 31-2 in favor
many opportunities to bring
of the funding bill (number 859). The funding measure makes up for a year in
unfair trading cases against
which funding for the Wisconsin manufacturing center fell through the cracks.
China. Meanwhile, U.S.
WMEP received only $100,000 last year from the state due to a state budget deficit
factories continue to close,
of $3 billion and a change in governors.
American workers continue
The overwhelming vote of support comes at a critical time for the Wisconsin
to lose jobs to foreign
MEP. “Its importance was double given the impending federal cuts we’re facing,”
companies and the U.S. trade says center director Michael Klonsinski. “A lot of manufacturers and the media
deficit continues to soar.”
here came to the front and said this is a top priority for economic development.”
The bill (HR 3881), has
State Republicans were instrumental in restoring funding for the center.
been referred to the House
The Wisconsin center will begin to feel the impact of the federal budget cut of 67
Ways and Means Committee
percent in the national MEP program starting in August. It expects its federal
but has been criticized by
funding to decline from $2.5 million to $800,000. “We can scramble and piecemeal
Zoellick, who says he’s
it together” this year with substantially reduced funding, says Klonsinski. “It’s one
spending a “significant
thing to bridge your way through to next year, but it’s another thing to try to
amount” of his time
bridge your way back to a bad situation” that will occur if funding is not restored.
addressing issues related to
“If the fiscal year ’05 federal funding goes away, you have a tough time making this
unfair trade practices in
public mission work,” says Klonsinski.
China. He says he is pursuing
Trade Enforcement...
Wisconsin Legislature Provides
Funding For Manufacturing Center
MANUFACTURING & TECHNOLOGY NEWS Friday, March 19, 2004
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The Manufacturing Czar
Who Wasn’t: Tony Raimondo
The new “manufacturing czar”
came to Washington to be anointed
to a post at the Commerce
Department created with great
fanfare by President Bush on Labor
Day, 2003. The press conference was
scheduled. Everyone was ready to
celebrate. But politics intruded. The
press conference was cancelled and
the appointee, Tony Raimondo,
chairman and CEO of Behlen
Manufacturing Co. in Columbus,
Neb., sat around for a day waiting
for a phone call from the Commerce
Secretary and finally said forget it —
this isn’t for me.
The story that ran in every major
newspaper said that Democratic
Presidential hopeful John Kerry
helped derail the appointment by
insisting that Raimondo’s company
was laying off U.S. workers and
shifting production to China. The
Bush team, it was reported,
succumbed to the pressure from
Democrats.
Here’s an example of the rhetoric
used by Rep. John Dingell, (DMich.): “First, the White House says
outsourcing is good. Then, the
administration considers
reclassifying burger flipping and
milkshake mixing as manufacturing
jobs. Now, the President’s first choice
to lead America’s efforts to hold onto
manufacturing jobs turns out to
have already sent jobs to China. This
nomination is a Whopper! No
question that Mr. Raimondo would
get a frosty reception from
lawmakers in confirmation hearings.
After six months of searching, I
guess it is tough to find a Republican
who cares about protecting
American jobs.”
But that’s not what happened,
according to insiders.
The Bush administration did not
have a cold feet problem. Raimondo
was an excellent choice. He was from
the Midwest; worked for a small
manufacturing company and not a
big multinational; was politically
savvy, concerned and articulate. The
White House was not scared off by
his company’s venture into China.
Raimondo, who sits on the board
of the Nebraska Manufacturing
Extension Partnership and was
chairman of the National Association
of Manufacturers Small and
Medium Manufacturers group, had
a problem with home-state
Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel.
Hagel, who had just written a letter
of admiration to Raimondo after
visiting his plant, was livid with the
Bush administration for not
contacting him about the
appointment. It turns out that
Raimondo had donated to the
campaign of Nebraska’s other
senator, Democratic Ben Nelson,
who ran against Hagel in 1996.
Nelson is one of Raimondo’s great
admirers. Hagel, who has had other
issues with the Bush administration,
didn’t like it and let it be known.
Behlen’s foray into China has not
caused the loss of U.S. jobs,
Raimondo said late last year in a
small press availability at the
headquarters of the National
Association of Manufacturers. The
company entered into a joint
venture with three Chinese
companies, two of which are state
owned. “Our strategy is we protect
ourselves on the downside where the
Chinese put in all the capital and I
put in all the technology,” he
explained.
Raimondo was asked if he was
concerned about the Chinese
stealing his technology. He replied:
“I’d rather be on that locomotive
than be on the sidelines. The
Chinese will evolve through all of
these technologies over time and we
want to be part of it.”
Behlen’s facility in China has 200
employees making metal barricade
structural steel for the Chinese
market. The plans are to build
another plant within the next year
or two.
“Are there any formal restrictions
to the Chinese exporting [your
products] to the United States,”
Raimondo was asked. “No
restrictions,” he replied. “So if your
partners decide to export to the
United States, they could go into
competition with you?”
“Yes,” he said. “It’s possible.”
U.S. Needs To Get Back
Into Supercomputer Competition
The U.S. supercomputer industry needs to be “revived,” says Sen. Lamar
Alexander (R-Tenn.), co-chairman of the Senate Science and Technology
Caucus. Alexander has introduced legislation to authorize the Department
of Energy to spend at least $100 million a year for the next five years to
establish scientific supercomputing facilities and another $10 million each
year for a high-end software development center. The “Earth Simulator”
made by NEC is currently the world’s most powerful computer. Spain is
planning to install the world’s second most powerful computer. The United
States needs to remain competitive in high-end computing in order for it to
be a leader in science and technology, says Alexander, who introduced the
High-End Computing Revitalization Act of 2004 with sponsor Sen. Jeff
Bingaman (D-N.M).
Budget Committee: Thumbs Down On MEP
The House Budget Committee defeated an amendment offered by Rep.
Denise Majette (D-Ga.) on March 17 to restore funding for the
Manufacturing Extension Partnership program. The amendment, rejected
on a party-line vote by the committee, would have provided $71 million to
the MEP program for 2005, bringing it back to the level of funding the
program received in 2003. Majette, president of the freshman class of House
Democrats and chair of the Task Force on Jobs and the Economy, says she is
“very disappointed in my colleagues on the other side of the aisle.”
6
Friday, March 19, 2004
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Outsourcing Debate...
(Continued from page one)
had just spent the past five weeks debating medical
malpractice, immunization for gun manufacturers and
pension reform, “but we have not spent five minutes
debating the issue of what is happening to American
jobs,” he said. “This is a big issue. The American people
are outraged that we have nothing to say when it comes
to outsourcing of jobs to other nations and we are not
standing up and defending our own workforce.”
Senator Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) took to the floor and
delivered a blistering attack on President Bush and his
economic record, noting the number of jobs that have
been lost under his watch. Kennedy pointed out that
Vice President Dick Cheney said that the “ ‘economy is
in very good shape’ and that if ‘Democratic policies had
been pursued over the last two or three years we would
not have had the kind of job growth that we’ve had.’
Job growth?” Kennedy stormed. “Someone should tell
the Vice President that we have lost over two million
jobs in the Bush economy.”
Kennedy’s asperity in turn spurred Sen. Orrin Hatch
(R-Utah) and other Republicans to lambaste the
Democrats, whom they described as being partisan and
“afraid” of international competition. “We are all
concerned about preserving American jobs, but we
need to make sure the cure is not worse than the
disease,” Hatch said.
Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.) said Dodd’s amendment,
titled the United States Workers Protection Act,
“basically opens a trade war” and that more than six
million jobs created in the United States by foreign
companies could be at risk.
“This is precisely the point,” Sen. Mitch McConnell
(R-Ky.) responded. “I think retaliation would be the
order of the day. We do not want to do anything to
jeopardize the existence of Toyota or 50 or 60 supplier
plants that have come into my state.”
Gregg characterized the Dodd amendment as being a
“stalking dog — colored in fairness and reasonableness,
but as a practical matter, its effect will be to create
retaliation. I guess my question is this. Are we a nation
that believes we can compete in the world or aren’t we?
Are we a nation that believes our people are smarter,
brighter and more productive than anybody else in the
world or aren’t we? My question is, are we so fearful of
our capacity to compete as a nation that we must put
forward this new concept that we hear pattering from
the other side of the aisle toward us of protectionism or
are we a nation that competes and competes well?”
Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) took to the podium:
“We have been hearing from the defeatist wing of the
Democratic Party,” he lectured. “I am not prepared to
be a defeatist in international trade. I intend to wear
the badge ‘Made in America’ with honor, as it has been
for decades and decades. What does the political wing
of the Democratic Party want? Do they still want people
making buggy whips when we don’t have buggies
anymore? Times change, but the defeatist wing of the
Democratic Party has lost confidence in America. They
don’t think ‘Made in
America’ is a badge of
distinction anymore.”
Democrats
pounced back,
charging that
Republicans agree
with the views
expressed by the
chairman of the
White House Council
of Economic Advisors
(CEA), who said
outsourcing jobs was
beneficial to the
United States
economy.
Sen. Richard
Durbin (D-Ill.) said
Dodd: “This is not brain
surgery at all. This is a rather
his Republican
colleagues “are scared simple matter. We need to
stop the outflow of our
to death of this
amendment. They do industrial base that's
occurring. How are we going
not want to vote on it
because in their heart to provide for the national
security needs of our nation?”
of hearts, they
obviously agree with
[CEA chairman] Mr. Mankiw. They think the
outsourcing of jobs overseas is a healthy thing. I would
defy any of my colleagues to go home to Main Street
and defend it. Say to the people that the 4,000 jobs that
leave IBM and go to India is a good thing for America.”
The Republicans then proposed an amendment to
the Dodd amendment requiring that the Secretary of
Commerce certify whether the Dodd amendment
would cause the loss of more jobs than it would save. If
Commerce Sec. Don Evans found there would be more
harm than good, then the proposal would not go into
effect.
Democrats took offense. Sec. Evans “will certify
exactly what [the administration] told us,” Durbin
stormed. “They believe in outsourcing. They think it is
healthy to have outsourcing of jobs overseas. Do my
colleagues expect the President and the Secretary of
Commerce to defy his economic advisors? No way! The
amendment guts the Dodd proposal.”
The amendment to the amendment, requiring the
Commerce Secretary’s certification 90 days after the
bill’s passage, was included by Dodd in the final version.
After almost two days of discussions, Dodd pleaded
for a vote. “I have been on the floor with my
amendment for 24 hours and all I want is a vote,” he
said. “If you think outsourcing is a good thing and
many people do, then vote against my amendment. I
am not trying to be difficult. I have offered
amendments before and lost before. I am not shocked
when I bring up an amendment and I lose.”
(Continued on page 12)
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A Talk With Senator Dodd
Democratic Senator Christopher
Dodd of Connecticut has become
enmeshed in the issue of
manufacturing and white collar
offshore outsourcing, due in no
small part to an intense amount of
pressure he is receiving from smalland medium-sized companies in his
home state. He knew the legislation
he introduced to prevent U.S.
taxpayers’ dollars from being used
to outsource jobs was going to be
controversial. And that it was.
“We’re going to provide an
opportunity on the floor of the
United States Senate for people to
vote on these matters,” he said at
the recent unveiling of the Jobs and
Trade Network in Washington,
D.C. “We’re going to give people a
chance to express where they stand
on these issues.”
Dodd admitted that his bill wasn’t
perfect — “that it is, in a sense, a
scream coming from across the
country.” More than anything else,
Q: Realistically, how much effect can you have in
stopping the migration of jobs that are done
electronically over high-speed networks with such a
high profit motive for companies to do it?
Dodd: It is huge. You can’t stop it all, but if we can
provide incentives for those who want to stay here,
maybe that will equalize it. Lou Dobbs [of CNN] is
identifying companies every night that seem to do more
of this than others. I don’t think they want to show up
on that list all the time. I don’t think this is going to go
away any short time soon. We’re not going to stop it
altogether, and neither are we saying we should stop it
altogether. But the trend is so overwhelming in that
direction that if we don’t make some effort to try to put
the brakes on here to slow this down to consider what
we’re doing I think it would be a huge mistake
historically.
Q: How do you stop the outsourcing trend?
Dodd: If you let people decide public policy in this
country based on what their quarterly goals are, this
place would look massively different today than it does.
People have stood up from time to time and said there
are such things as antitrust laws, a minimum wage,
health conditions and a lot of other things that would
not have occurred miraculously.
Once the [small production plants] go, they’re gone.
I’m talking about high-value, sophisticated
manufacturing companies that I’m losing. We had a
company that went offshore — outsourced to a
European country. One of our allies went to that
company and [asked] would you help us produce one of
the components for hand grenades? They wouldn’t do
it because they disagreed with our policy in Iraq. When
you start having messages coming back like that, you’re
giving away this stuff. I worry about it. I think we’re
going to be indicted historically if we don’t begin to try
to do something. I’m not going to stop it all, but at least
provide some incentives for people to stay or you’re
going to turn around in very short order and say what
the hell happened?
Q: The large defense contractors and the Aerospace
Industry Association rallied last year and put a halt to
it served as a vehicle to let
Americans know that there is at
least some interest in the issue of
outsourcing within the world’s
greatest deliberative body. “We
need to provide a forum someplace
that says to the American public
that we care about this issue.”
Dodd recently spoke with
Manufacturing & Technology News
editor Richard McCormack. Here is
what he had to say:
your proposal to restrict the use of foreign “offsets.”
Are the big companies fighting you tooth and nail on
outsourcing and are they winning this debate?
Dodd: We put that proposal in the Defense
Production Act and the administration begged
[chairman] Dick Shelby [R-Ala., chairman of the Senate
Banking Committee] to drop it in conference. He
wouldn’t do it. I tailored it down and at this point it’s
only a study to make the case, but the administration
was opposed to even studying this thing knowing what
the results would be. They begged Shelby to drop it but
he wouldn’t do it because he talked to his own people in
Alabama and they said this is a problem. The fact that
we have to pay some countries 100 percent or 200
percent of the value of a contract is wrong.
Q: The small- and medium-sized manufacturers are
getting squeezed on this and don’t have much voice
against the big defense companies that are doing this
type of outsourcing.
Dodd: Not yet, but here’s the deal: there are a lot
more of these guys at home and talking. I represent GE,
too, but believe me I’ve got a lot more of these [small]
guys than I do employees of GE.
The language that encourages [offsets] and
outsourcing of jobs was written in the late 1940s to help
war-torn Europe. It think we might have accepted the
notion that in the late 40s and early 50s that Europe was
war torn, but don’t suggest to me in the year 2004 that
we're dealing with a war-torn continent when it comes
to allowing the exaggerated use of [defense offsets].
In the country of Holland alone, outsourcing [of U.S.
defense weapons parts and components] exceeds 300
percent of the actual contracts. That is the most
egregious example, but overall it's about 100 percent of
those contracts.
I accept the notion that in order to reap some of the
contracts in some of these countries you're going to
have to share some of the labor. I get that. I'm not a
fool. But the idea that you take 100 percent or 200
percent of the value of that contract in order to do
business in some country, that is not my country
standing up to protect jobs in the United States of
America.
8
Friday, March 19, 2004
MANUFACTURING & TECHNOLOGY NEWS
WWW.MANUFACTURINGNEWS.COM
Earmarks Become A New Business Model...
(From page one)
billion were approved by Congress, and there was not
much of an outcry, save for Sen. John McCain who said:
“It appears that the big spenders in Washington have all
but stolen the credit card numbers of every hardworking taxpayer in America and gone on a limitless
spending spree.”
This year’s poster child for pork abuse is the $50million indoor rainforest in Iowa, a pet project of Sen.
Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), say watchdog groups. There
were hundreds of congressionally directed projects
associated with industrial technology, economic
development and research programs that otherwise
would never receive funding through the peer-review
and grant application system run by federal agencies. In
the Housing and Urban Development appropriations,
there were 40 consecutive pages of earmarks — 902
earmarks totaling $278 million. “The only word that
comes to mind to describe this practice is shameful,” says
McCain.
In discussions with a half-dozen staff aides in
Congress, Washington lobbyists and taxpayer groups,
there is agreement that the spending system in
Congress is broken, accompanied by a sense of sobriety
over why there has been so little concern shown by
Americans.
“The pendulum swings, but I don’t know what will
cause it to swing in the other direction,” says one House
aide. “Nobody is getting tarnished.”
Earmarks have traditionally been used to build
coalitions to help move appropriations bills through
Congress. Earmarks are tucked into the “report”
language accompanying bills. Because they are not
included in the legislative language they cannot be
targeted by the president using the line-item veto.
Agencies are also not required to spend the money
because they are not part of law — and have not been
authorized. But if they don’t provide the funds for
Congress’s pet projects, “the appropriators will kick
their ass,” says one Hill assistant.
Billions of dollars of earmarks for projects that have
never been vetted to the public or debated in Congress
are now crowding out legitimate government programs
that have been left starving for resources, say observers.
“The system has switched and nobody wants to be left
behind,” says one congressional aide. Even Washington
trade associations are now getting in on the act.
There is recognition that this golden era of pork is
being propagated by Republicans who control Congress
and the White House. “The Republican majority, which
has been there for 10 years, unfortunately seems to be
taking on a lot of the characteristics of the 40-year
Democratic majority that they displaced,” says John
Berthoud, president of the National Taxpayers Union.
“Some of the Republican leadership tries to justify these
things with the preposterous claim that earmarks are
good policy because otherwise it would be a bunch of
bureaucrats deciding where the dollars are spent. Our
perspective is that while bureaucrats aren’t perfect, the
decisions of politicians directing dollars are being made
first and foremost on electoral considerations.”
Adds Tom Schatz, president of Citizens Against
Government Waste: “Once the pork starts it’s hard to
stop it. In a close election, they think that’s the way to
get themselves reelected.”
Sen McCain calls the recently signed Omnibus
Appropriations bill the “Incumbent Protection Act of
2004.”
Others note that pork has helped eliminate
competitive congressional races throughout the country.
The system is stacked in favor of incumbents. “We’re
trying to build a democracy in Iraq and I’m in my early
40s and I have never in my whole life voted in one
House election that has ever been competitive,” notes
Berthoud. With the system of earmarks, congressional
franking, Congress’s exemption of itself from the antispam legislation, and gerrymandering there are few
competitive House races. Not a single race in California
was contested in the last election.
The system sounds corrupt, but nobody interviewed
was willing to use that word.
The era of earmarks “is one of the rewards for being
the majority,” says one Republican congressional staff
aide. “It’s minimal what you can do because everyone is
participating.”
The spending spree on congressionally directed
projects is also being fueled by the vestiges of the
euphoria that accompanied the short period of time
when the federal budget was generating surpluses and
money was in abundance. That no longer exists, but
Congress still acts as if it does.
“I have conversations with people [on the Hill] and
ask them, ‘Doesn’t anybody feel guilty up there about
what they are doing to the next generation?’ And the
answer is ‘Not enough of them,’ ” says Schatz.
There is also a growing sense of unease among aides
that earmarks are eating heavily into major national
programs. The National Institute of Standards and
Technology, the National Science Foundation,
Department of Energy and NASA are all suffering from
either slow budgetary growth or budget declines. But
the pork is flowing freely to projects that require no
scrutiny, no oversight and no deliverable benefits. It is
estimated that 10 percent of the federal money being
spent on university R&D or as much as $2 billion, now
falls under the category of pork.
“My guess is we’re going to have to pass a numerical
threshold that shocks the sensibilities of people,” says
one House Science Committee aide. “I thought $2
billion might do it, but it’s probably going to be $4 or $5
billion. When we get to that in academic R&D there is
going to be some point that this is no longer just a tax
on the system. This is striking at the heart of our
capability to sustain our research agenda in a
meaningful fashion.”
With money spread throughout every congressional
district, it’s becoming harder to create major national
programs that need focused funding and coordination.
“It’s getting worse,” says another aide. “It’s out of
control.”
(Continued on next page)
MANUFACTURING & TECHNOLOGY NEWS Friday, March 19, 2004
9
WWW.MANUFACTURINGNEWS.COM
Earmarks...
Continued from previous page)
For recipients of earmarks, the
system works best through the
creation of an “iron triangle” of
members of Congress and their staff,
lobbyists that include former Hill
workers and members, and federal
agency managers. “The people
controlling the earmarks will look
for somebody in the agency to
endorse it and that controls it a little,
but there are all sorts of variations of
that right now,” says one
Washington lobbyist. The “iron
triangle” system works especially
well in the Defense Department’s
budget account.
Lobbyists for trade groups,
universities and economic
development agencies are directly
approaching their senators and
representatives to press them on the
importance of their program and its
ability to create jobs in their district.
“They basically find it impossible to
say no,” says the lobbyist. “You don’t
have to prove that it’s going to work.
You don’t have to prove that it’s
really good for the country. All you
have to do is make them believe
somehow or other that it’s good for
their district. What they’re thinking
in their mind is they can issue a
press release and say look what I did
to employment in our district and
isn’t that great for us.”
In conversations about earmarks,
the discussion comes back to their
escalation under Republican control
of Congress. “They’ve not been the
party of fiscal constraint for 20 years,
but they have a better PR machine
than we do,” says one House
Democratic aide. “We’re the party
that raises taxes and loses the House
and they’re the ones who promise to
get the government under control
and then inflate the deficit. They did
it under Reagan and Bush and
they’re doing it again under Bush —
and shamelessly and without
accountability, as far as I can tell.”
Republicans say that the budget
deficit would be far worse if
Democrats were in control. In a
debate on the Senate floor on March
4, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) said:
“If we had listened to our friends on
the other side, over the last year
alone we would have spent $1
trillion more. Our budget would
have been so out of whack we would
never get it back. Yet they are telling
the American people they are the
fiscally responsible party? We can’t
bring up a spending bill that they
don’t want to double. They think
that is good for the economy.”
The earmarking system has
gotten to the point where members
of Congress are submitting their
earmarks earlier and earlier to
members of the appropriations
subcommittees in charge of budgets
so they can be worked more easily
into the appropriations bills, others
point out. “Ted Stevens [Chairman
of the Senate Appropriations
Committee] or anybody on the
Appropriations Committee in the
House is in a very powerful position
and if you irk them or say something
bad about the process then in the
middle of the night right before the
bill goes in — it’s thousands of pages
long — your little earmark will slip
out while nobody is looking and
they say, ‘It must have been a
mistake, Senator. We’ll do it next
year.’ So the senator or congressman
is red faced and has to go back and
tell their people that they couldn’t
deliver for them.”
When is this going to end? The
Budget Committee on March 17
passed a resolution requiring budget
discipline, which is a good start. But
observers note that authorizing
committees like the Budget
Committee have no power in
Congress over spending and their
mandates are virtually ignored by
appropriators.
Taxpayers will have to get irate
and demand a change, which
doesn’t seem likely any time soon,
unless the deficit becomes an
overwhelming political issue. Others
say President Bush needs to put his
foot down. “It takes leadership from
the top,” says Tom Schatz from
Citizens Against Government Waste,
echoing statements made by others.
The Office of Management and
Budget can issue an edict to every
federal agency telling them that they
will not fund earmarks contained in
the report language. An executive
fiat would put the heat on the
President who would have to face
down the Republican Congress.
OMB “talks a good game on this but
they don’t want to spend the
political capital on it,” says one aide.
In the meantime, don’t get
trampled in the stampede.
Earmarks From The FY ‘04 Omnibus Appropriations Bill
Selected International Trade Administration Earmarks:
• $10,000,000 — National Textile Center
• $3,000,000 — Textile/Clothing Technology Corp.
Selected NIST Earmarks:
• $1,200,000 — For Inspiration and Recognition of Science
and Technology Program
• $800,000 — spreadsheet engineering initiative at the Tuck
School of Business;
• $1,600,000 — Hollings Marine Laboratory
• $1,900,000 — “a certain wind demonstration project in
Texas”
• $600,000 — school safety and preparedness project at the
National Infrastructure Institute
Department of Labor Selected Earmarks:
• $200,000 — Mississippi State University for Robotics and
Automated Systems for Nursery Industry
• $500,000 — National Center for Manufacturing Sciences,
Ann Arbor, Mich.
• $250,000 — Closing The Gap, Lansing, Mich.
• $105,000 — Collegiate Consortium for Workforce and
Economic Development, Philadelphia, Penn.
• $1,000,000 — National Technology Transfer Center for a
coal slurry impoundment pilot project in Southern West
Virginia
Selected Earmarks in the EPA Budget:
• $1,375,00 — National Center for Manufacturing Sciences
in Ann Arbor, Mich., for assisting EPA in meeting the
Strategic Goals Program in the metal finishing sector
• $700,000 — University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for
a Green Chemical Manufacturing and Processing research
program
• $8,775,000 — Environmental Systems Center of Excellence
at Syracuse University for research and technology transfer
in the fields of indoor environmental quality and urban
ecosystems sustainability
(Continued on next page)
10
Friday, March 19, 2004
MANUFACTURING & TECHNOLOGY NEWS
WWW.MANUFACTURINGNEWS.COM
Earmarks...
(From page nine)
• $1,000,000 — Syracuse Research Corporation’s Probability
Risk Assessment Center
• $750,000 — Consortium for Plant Biotechnology Research
• $900,000 — Integrated Petroleum Environmental
Consortium
• $2,000,000 — Mickey Leland National Urban Air Toxics
Research Center in Houston, Texas
• $250,000 — Carnegie Mellon University Green Chemistry
Initiative
• $500,000 — Center for the Study of Metals in the
Environment
• $1,200,000 — Center for Air Toxic Metals at the Energy and
Environmental Research Center
• $750,000 — Environment and Sports Inc., a nonprofit
organization, for an environmental awareness program
• $500,000 — Small Business Pollution Prevention Center at
the University of Northern Iowa
• $2,000,000 — National Alternative Fuels Training
Consortium
• $2,000,000 — nine Environmental Finance Centers
Selected Earmarks at NASA:
• $900,000 — Alabama A&M University, Advanced Space
Propulsion Material Research and Technology Center
• $1,300,000 — University of Toledo Turbine Institute
• $1,000,000 — Advanced Interactive Discovery Environment
engineering research program at Syracuse University
• $1,500,000 — Integrated Sensing Systems at the Rochester
Institute of Technology
• $2,000,000 — Cryogenic Power Electronics Development at
the State University of New York at Albany
• $4,500,000 — National Center of Excellence in Infotonics in
Rochester, New York
• $4,500,000 — National Center of Excellence in
Bioinformatics in Buffalo, New York
• $4,500,000 — New Science Center at St. Bonaventure
University in New York State
• $5,000,000 —Project SOCRATES
• $6,000,000 — continuation of the Space Alliance
Technology Outreach Program, including $2,500,000 for
business incubators in Florida and New York
• $900,000 — Florida Institute for Technology in Melbourne,
Florida for a Hydrogen Production, Fuel Cell and Sensor
Technology Initiative
• $8,000,000 — Florida State University System Hydrogen
Research Initiative
• $3,000,000 — Wichita State University for the National
Center for Composite Materials Performance
• $2,000,000 —Wheeling Jesuit University for the National
Technology Transfer Center
Selected Earmarks at the Small Business Administration:
• $1,000,000 —Accelerated Entrepreneur “ACE” Program
• $500,000 — National Mass Fatalities Institute
• $1,000,000 — Textile Tracers Program
• $500,000 — Maryland Technology-Based Rural Business
Incubation Initiative
• $1,000,000 — Northeast Indiana Innovation Center
• $1,000,000 — Greenville Automotive Research Park
• $1,000,000 — Indiana University Kokomo Business
Incubator
• $1,593,000 — Tuck School of Business
• $500,000 — South Carolina Export Consortium
• $1,590,000 — Alaska InvestNet/Technology Venture Center
and Tech Ranch in Montana
• $500,000 — Wisconsin Procurement Institute
• $1,000,000 — Next Generation Economy Initiative
• $1,000,000 — University of Missouri-St. Louis Information
Technology Incubator Project
• $1,000,000 — Northern Virginia Technology Council for a
technology entrepreneurship development and resource
center
• $500,000 — Wilberforce University for a technology
initiative
• $1,100,000 — Iowa State University to develop a research
park biologics facility
• $900,000 — Illinois Institute of Technology to examine and
assess advancements in biotechnologies
• $1,000,000 — Illinois Coalition for technology
development assistance activities
• $200,000 — Port of Benton for planning a science and
technology park in Richland, Wash.
• $1,500,000 — Rockford Area Ventures, Rockford, Ill., to
establish a small manufacturing business incubator and
technology research and development center
• $1,200,000 — MountainMade Foundation to continue the
initiative developed by the NTTC to help promote small
businesses, artisans and their products through market
development, advertisement and commercial sales
• $1,200,000 — Northwest Shoals Community College to
establish a Center for Business and Industry
• $1,000,000 — Wisconsin Procurement Institute to develop
an electronic based system to provide access and opportunity
to Federal funding
Department of Energy’s Science Division Earmarks
• $2,000,000 — Western Michigan University
Nanotechnology Research and Computation Center;
• $2,500,000 — Enterprise Center in Chattanooga, Tenn,, for
the Chattanooga Fuel Cell Demonstration Project;
• $1,000,000 — Oak Ridge National Laboratory chemical
tracers for apparel and textiles;
• $3,000,000 — Apparel and Supply Chain Research Facility
TC2, Raleigh- Durham, N.C.;
• $7,000,000 — National Textile Center.
MANUFACTURING & TECHNOLOGY NEWS (ISSN No. 1078-2397) is a publication of
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COPYRIGHT 2004, PUBLISHERS & PRODUCERS — “Newsletters Are The Purest Form Of Journalism.”
MANUFACTURING & TECHNOLOGY NEWS Friday, March 19, 2004
11
WWW.MANUFACTURINGNEWS.COM
House Science Committee Expresses
Concern About Funding For Science
The House Science Committee isn’t particularly
enamored with President Bush’s 2005 budget request
for research and development. In a 14-page document
entitled “Views and Estimates,” the committee urges
the full Congress to invest additional funds in longterm R&D as it debates the current budget in an
environment of record deficits. “Nothing benefits
federal revenues over the long-term as much as
accelerated economic growth and nothing fuels longterm growth more than science and technology,” says
the committee.
sciences,” the Committee
Proposed funding for
points out. The amount of
basic research “is
money being spent on life
insufficient,” the
sciences is “dwarfing” the
committee states. Federal
amount that is being spent
funding for defense R&D
on the physical sciences.
at $69 billion and health
The Science Committee
R&D at $29 billion
comprise 75 percent of the says it is imperative to
restore full funding to the
total R&D budget and the
National Institute of
two fields of research
Standards and
account for 93 percent of
Technology’s standards
the proposed increase in
funding for 2005. “Similar functions, which will suffer
attention [should] be given from a 10 percent cut in
its budget this year. It also
to other important R&D
recommends full funding
agencies such as NSF,
for the Manufacturing
DOE and NIST,” says the
document signed by every Extension Partnership
Republican member of the which is having to deal
with a “devastating” 67
Committee and six
percent cut in its funding
Democrats including
this year, despite receiving
ranking member Bart
a full “authorization” from
Gordon (Tenn.).
the Science Committee.
The budget proposes a
The committee is also
2 percent decline in the
“disappointed” that the
Department of Energy’s
Bush administration has
physical sciences R&D
eliminated funding for the
account to $3.4 billion, an
Advanced Technology
amount that “is
Program. The Committee
inadequate,” says the
supports continuing the
Committee. “This is
program at the 2004
significantly less than the
budget level of $169
$4.2 billion included in
million.
the House-passed
The Science Committee
conference report for
is also not pleased with the
H.R. 6, the Energy Policy
Bush request for the
Act of 2003. The proposal
National Science
also falls far short of the
Foundation, which sees a
goal of the President’s
budget increase of 3
Council of Advisors on
percent next year (by
Science and Technology,
$167 million), or $1.6
which recommended in a
billion below the funding
2002 report that the FY
level the President signed
’04 budget request should
in the NSF Authorization
begin bringing funding
Act of 2002 (PL 107-368).
for the physical sciences
“While recognizing that
into parity with the life
budget realities may not
allow Congress to fund
NSF at the guidance level
provided in the current
authorization, the
Committee still believes
that a significant increase
for NSF’s overall budget
are warranted. The
Committee is especially
troubled by the proposal
to eliminate the NSF’s
Math and Science
Partnership Program.
This program was
specifically authorized as
part of the NSF Act of
2002.”
The full report is
located at
http://www.house.gov/scie
nce/press/108/views05.pdf.
Meanwhile, House
Science Committee
Democrats say the budget
request is worse than the
majority describes. “The
President’s analysis uses
highly selective and
inaccurate numbers,” says
the Democratic “Views
and Estimates” on the
President’s 2005 budget
request. “Tricky
accounting is used to
inflate miniscule increases
in agency budgets,” it says.
For instance, within the
NIST account, the Bush
team “claims a 20 percent
increase of $86 million for
core laboratory
programs,” says the
Democratic analysis. “In
fact, however, this
supposed ‘increase’
includes $25 million for
equipment normally listed
in the working capital
fund, $13 million to make
up for ATP grants that will
no longer be transferred
to the laboratories, and
$35 million to cover ATP
close-out costs. Laying
aside for a moment the
devastation of NIST’s
MEP and ATP programs,
almost no funding is
actually left over for a real
increase in NIST’s inhouse research.”
The Democrats also
charge Bush Science
Advisor Jack Marburger
with making “false
statements” and using
“selective arrangements of
facts designed to put a
positive spin on a dismal
overall picture. The fact of
the matter is that the FY
2005 budget submission
for R&D (excluding
weapons development) is
the most anemic R&D
budget submitted to the
Congress by any President
in the past 20 years. It is
an R&D budget unsuited
to the challenges of the
time.”
The President’s R&D
budget request does not
deal with the challenge of
job creation. “Technology
transfer programs at
NASA and DOE are cut,
and there are no new
ideas or initiatives for
moving federal
technologies into the
private sector, especially
small businesses,” say the
Democrats.
The President takes
credit for congressional
actions from prior years.
The administration
“decries R&D earmarks
but does nothing (e.g.,
requiring competition) to
lessen their impact,” notes
the Democratic analysis.
“Furthermore, when it
suits the administration to
count earmarks (e.g.,
when crowing about
budget increases from
2001-2005), they do so.
When it doesn’t suit them
to count earmarks (e.g.,
when claiming that one of
their FY 2005 budget cuts
isn’t so bad when the FY
2004 earmarks are
discounted), they don’t.”
The analysis is located at
http://www.house.gov/scie
nce_democrats/archive/vie
ws05.htm.
12
Friday, March 19, 2004
MANUFACTURING & TECHNOLOGY NEWS
WWW.MANUFACTURINGNEWS.COM
Outsourcing...
(Continued from page six)
But it was not to be. Making their way into the
chamber for the first time in days, Sens. John McCain
(R-Ariz.) and John Warner (R-Va.) took to the
microphone. With great ardor, they ripped the
amendment apart on grounds that it would cripple the
nation’s defense. Noting that the amendment had been
“debated ad nauseam,” McCain said: “Straight talk — I
do not support the amendment offered by the Senator
from Connecticut. If we do not allow the purchase of
foreign-manufactured defense equipment, then sooner
or later they will retaliate by not purchasing ours. This
could have a significant effect.”
McCain pulled out a letter from Michael Wynne,
acting undersecretary of Defense, which said the
provision “would impact our ability to sustain our
troops stationed overseas.”
From a military perspective, the Dodd amendment
was an extension of the “Buy American” debate that
lasted six-months last year, added Warner. Those
provisions were soundly defeated and the Dodd
amendment should be defeated for the same reason:
“This will do incalculable damage to our national
security, undermine our relationship with our allies and
violate many of our trade agreements with respect to
defense procurement,” he said. “The Dodd
amendment will spark a trade war in aerospace and
defense trade, one of the few remaining areas that the
United States has a manufacturing trade surplus. It will
lead to the destruction of the U.S. aerospace industry
and the loss of thousands of jobs that will migrate
overseas.” Warner compared the bill to the SmootHawley and the Buy American Act of 1933 that
“extended the misery” of the Great Depression.
Dodd left the chamber and quickly rewrote his
amendment stating that it
“shall not apply to any
procurement for national
security purposes entered
into [by] the Department
of Defense or any agency
or entity thereof.” It
named the Army, Navy, Air
Force “or any agency or
entity of any of the military
departments” as being
exempt from the proposal.
It also excluded the
Department of Homeland
Security, the Department
of Energy “or any agency
or entity thereof with
respect to the national
security programs of that
department or any
elements of the intelligence
community.”
Dodd reiterated that his
was a modest proposal,
which, by the time the debate ended after two full days,
had become far more modest. A vote was called and the
much changed amendment passed by a margin of 70 to
26, with all those voting against being the following
Republicans: Alexander (Tenn.), Allard (Colo.), Bennett
(Utah), Brownback (Kansas), Burns (Mont.), Campbell
(Colo), Chambliss (Ga.), Cochran (Miss.), Cornyn
(Texas), Craig (Idaho), Crapo (Idaho), Enzi (Wyo.),
Fitzgerald (Ill.), Gregg (N.H.), Hagel (Neb.), Hatch
(Utah), Kyl (Ariz.), Lott (Miss.), Lugar (Ind.), McCain
(Ariz.), Nickles (Okla.), Roberts (Kansas), Stevens
(Alaska), Sununu (N.H.), Thomas (Wyo.), and Warner
(Va.).
“The Dodd
amendment will
spark a trade
war in
aerospace and
defense trade,
one of the few
remaining
areas that the
United States
has a
manufacturing
trade surplus.”
MANUFACTURING & TECHNOLOGY NEWS: TEN YEARS OF EXCELLENCE IN JOURNALISM
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