Obama’s Doubletalk on NAFTA
Telegraph: Barack Obama’s credibility called into question By Alex Spillius and Toby Harnden
Last week in a debate [Obama] said: “We should use the hammer of a potential opt-out as leverage to ensure that we actually get labour and environmental standards that are enforced.”
But yesterday a memorandum written by Joseph DeMora, a Canadian consulate official in Chicago, about a meeting with Austan Goolsbee, Mr Obama’s economic adviser, suggested that he thought otherwise.
The memo said Mr Goolsbee “was frank in saying that the primary campaign has been necessarily domestically focused, particularly in the Midwest, and that much of the rhetoric that may be perceived to be protectionist is more reflective of political manoeuvring than policy”.
Mrs Clinton seized the opportunity to criticise a rival who has run a campaign based heavily on integrity and ending Washington double-speak.
She said that Mr Obama’s campaign gave the Canadians “the old wink-wink”.
“I don’t think [Mr Obama] should tell the people of Ohio one thing and then tell a foreign government something else behind closed doors,” she said.
