At least we know why Bill Clinton and Al Gore are desperate for a quick vote on granting permanent normal trade status to China. Last week, big labor came to town to protest the pending deal with China. The labor movement held an impressive rally of over 10,000 people on Capitol Hill, and then sent thousands of constituents into the offices of House and Senate members to make their case. Members of Congress are hearing even more of this back home in their districts over spring break, and they will get still more heat when they return to Washington. In short, the weeks leading up to the trade status vote, now scheduled for the week of May 22, will be hell.
Hell for Democrats, that is. The vote is a potential disaster for the Democratic party. The most vocal and powerful forces lining up against the China deal happen to be the Democrats’ most important special interest groups, the ones the party counts on to deliver money and volunteers in tight races across the country. Fear of big labor, and also fear of environmental and human rights groups, is what makes it difficult for the Clinton administration to muster even 80 Democratic votes for China’s normalized trade status. But then there’s the problem of big business, especially the high-tech industry. The Democrats want their money, too, and big business is also making the China trade vote a litmus test. So the party is torn between two constituencies that refuse to be mollified.
Meanwhile, Al Gore is running for president, and he’s feeling the heat. He’s at odds with labor over the China trade deal, but he still has the endorsement of the AFL-CIO and most other unions. This is an unstable situation. Both Gore and labor leaders have to worry whether some of their rank and file will spurn Gore and find someone willing to stand up for them on trade. Jimmy Hoffa and Pat Buchanan were nuzzling each other at the Teamsters rally on Capitol Hill last week. Labor may not be inclined to forgive and forget those who gave them the shaft. Even if the people giving them the shaft are Democrats.
So what’s a poor Democratic party to do? Get this vote over with as quickly as possible. Do you want to know Al Gore’s worst nightmare? Picture the scene: It’s a hot August night in Los Angeles. The Democratic national convention has begun. But Congress has not yet voted on normal trade relations with China. So outside the convention hall are tens of thousands of protesters — protesters wearing hard-hats, protesters wearing funny animal costumes, protesters with heavily pierced protuberances, protesters taunting the famously cool-headed L.A. police. Democratic and liberal protesters. It makes last year’s riot in Seattle look like a picnic. And throughout the entire convention, it’s the main thing the news media choose to cover. It’s a frightening image, unless you’re a Republican.
So it’s not hard to understand why Bill Clinton and Al Gore are desperate for a trade status vote as soon as possible. The harder question is this: Why are Republicans?
We’ve spent the last few months outlining the principled and strategic reasons that make passing permanent normal trade relations for China now a bad idea. There’s the Chinese government’s increasingly brutal repression of political and religious groups, all documented by the Clinton administration’s own State Department. There is the fact that China remains, according to the CIA, the world’s leading proliferator of nuclear weapons and missile technologies and hardware. And there are China’s threats to make war on democratic Taiwan if the new Taiwanese government refuses to accept Beijing’s terms for reunification. Finally, there is no need for a quick vote on permanent trade status for China, which cannot even become a full-fledged member of the World Trade Organization until the end of this year, at the earliest. The Chinese first have to reach a deal with the Europeans, and then with the WTO itself. American businesses will pay no penalty if a vote is delayed until later this year, or even next.
But let’s set all these matters of principle and strategic interest aside for one moment and talk politics (note to high-minded, non-partisan readers: Stop reading here).
Republicans certainly shouldn’t be ashamed to be thinking in political terms about this vote. After all, politics is the only thing on the minds of Al Gore and the Democrats. From a Republican perspective, there are no advantages to an early vote on permanent normal trade relations. No one is going to be protesting at the Republican convention at the end of July. (Try to picture high-tech CEOs marching in funny costumes outside the convention hall in Philadelphia.) Nor should Republican leaders who are lusting after high-tech industry contributions worry that they will be punished for holding a later vote. The longer this thing drags out, the more Republican big business pals will see what a big problem they have with a Democratic party so sharply divided between its pro-labor and pro-business constituencies. And, excuse us, but at the end of the day, wouldn’t it be good for the country to throw a monkey-wrench into the Democratic campaign and increase the chances for a Republican presidential victory in November?
Let Republicans be the smart party this time. Labor leaders are only asking their Democratic allies to vote against permanent normal trade relations, and allowing them to vote for the usual annual renewal of normal trade status. Republicans can do the same. But they would be smart to do it later rather than sooner. September sounds nice.
William Kristol and Robert Kagan, for the Editors
