NAFTA negotiations enter day #4 today.  The final Round 1 summary day is tomorrow, Sunday.   Information as to specifics is hard to find.  Much of the ongoing negotiation is clouded in secrecy.
However, that said, one of CTH mouses (with wolverine teeth) shares a negotiation aspect that drew a great deal of conseternation from the Mexico and Canada side.
The issue revolves around government contracts, specifically U.S. federal contracts for goods and services.  President Trump has initiated a “Buy American, Hire American” policy for government contracts; meaning if the U.S. government has to spend money for a product or service, it should be spent on acquisition of American products made by American workers.
Mexico and Canada want access to these lucrative contracts.  President Trump’s “America First” procurement process is against their interest.  Canada is especially upset about this dynamic.  Canada wants to be able to bid on U.S. Federal Government contracts; and Canada’s Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland referred to the buy-local rules as “poor public policy.”
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“It can’t be done”, they said. “There’s no way Trump can achieve 4.0% economic growth” they said.  The Congressional Budget Office said economic projections were “improbable”, they said….  “Impossible”, they said.
Yeah, well, Donald Trump said: “Impossible is just the starting point“.  And now:

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The U.S. economy is on track to expand at a 4.0 percent annualized pace in the third quarter with inventory investment contributing 1.12 percentage points to growth, the Atlanta Federal Reserve’s GDP Now forecast model showed on Thursday. (read more)

How is this possible?  Well, if you’ve never had to wash your hands with Lava – it might seem impossible.  For those who have washed with Lava, it’s simple common sense.
The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth, is the growth in value of all goods and services produced within the economy over a specified period of time.  A key part of that equation is the sum total of exported goods minus imported goods is part of the measure.  Only the stuff created in the U.S. increases the growth dynamic.  If you import more, the GDP shrinks.  It’s simple arithmetic.
If you grow exports, and maintain a constant on imported products, the net lowering of the trade deficit adds to GDP growth. It’s not a hard equation.  If our economy is making more stuff, our economy is growing.
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If you are only listening to corporate media presentations you would be left thinking the political strategy of Democrats against President Trump is working.
Except you would be wrong.
VERY wrong.

While the overwhelming majority of corporate media punditry and opinion broadcasts paint a picture of President Trump and the larger republican/deplorable party in retreat, the actual data, outside the influence of media, shows a completely divergent truth.
The Democrats are in serious trouble; and it’s only getting worse.
The latest self-admissions by the larger American electorate on Party Affiliation show the number of people identifying as Democrat has slipped to 28%.  That matches the lowest number of registered democrats recorded in the past decade.
For comparison, in November 2016, just before the presidential election, the number of registered voters identifying as Democrat was 31%.  Conversely the number of registered voters identifying as Republican is also 28%.  However, that’s actually an increase of one point from November when the number was 27%.
However, party affiliation only represents one small part of the data dynamic.
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Day two of Round One NAFTA negotiations continued today.
Round one is scheduled to run through Sunday August 20th.   Generally speaking the key negotiators are not presenting too much public information as the larger objectives of the first round are structured around the bigger issues of the agreement itself, and not the individual economic sectors which follow.
The potential for an agreement still appears around a level “3” on a ten point scale.
On the positive side for those who follow the U.S. Trade Team, you might enjoy hearing that the crony-capitalistic lobbying group, The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, has been significantly reduced.  U.S. CoC President Tom Donohue attempts to put his best face forward amid his diminished ability to influence actual policy:
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Based entirely on what can be pulled from Government Accounts and media interviews of the participants involved in NAFTA negotiations, I’m going to try and summarize each day as it can be determined through those sources.
Additionally, for those who might be interested in a perspective I’m going to give a rating of my confidence that a tri-national agreement is possible.
On a scale of zero to 10 – where zero is NAFTA will dissolve and parties will be at irreconcilable differences, and 10 is confidence an agreement will be reached, at the end of Day #1, today, I’d asses the likelihood of an agreement at “3”.
Outlook not too good.
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Political Strategist Steve Bannon gives an exclusive interview to a far-left progressive media outlet where he asserts the big picture issue that matters above all other current policy issues, is the economic war between China and the U.S.

(Via Prospect) […] To me,” Bannon said, “the economic war with China is everything. And we have to be maniacally focused on that. If we continue to lose it, we’re five years away, I think, ten years at the most, of hitting an inflection point from which we’ll never be able to recover.”
Bannon’s plan of attack includes: a complaint under Section 301 of the 1974 Trade Act against Chinese coercion of technology transfers from American corporations doing business there, and follow-up complaints against steel and aluminum dumping. “We’re going to run the tables on these guys. We’ve come to the conclusion that they’re in an economic war and they’re crushing us.”

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I find it interesting that Chinese TV is more interested in NAFTA renegotiation than most U.S., Canada or Mexico media.  Against the backdrop of China exploiting NAFTA as a backdoor into the U.S. market we accept this disparate level of interest is not accidental. China is specifically the “third party dumper” mentioned by Robert Lighthizer.
The negotiations can have as many as six rounds; each round lasting 5 days; two rounds in each nation, over the course of three months, with each round tackling a different economic sector.
It is also entirely possible they could also end sooner, much sooner.
The introductory remarks by Trade representatives from Canada, Mexico and the U.S. can be considerably enlightening for those who review the transparent political agendas behind the trade discussions.  I have a spidey sense these first round negotiations might not even make it to Sunday.
In the video below it is interesting to watch Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland, outline her priorities (also here in more detail).  Ms. Freeland gives her remarks in English, Spanish and French.  If you can watch Freeland without A.) Laughing hysterically, or B.) punching your TV/Computer screen, well, you’re Job.
Through Ms. Freedlan’s leadership – Canada is focused on ensuring a “progressive trade agenda”.  She is demanding a focus on LGBTQ, and specifically transgender rights in the trade deal, in addition to cultural sensitivity aspects, and climate change. Go figure.
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President Donald Trump has cancelled the Manufacturers Council and the Strategic Economic Advisory Board.  There are trillions of dollars at stake.  The members of the boards, and their representative companies, were being targeted by left-wing groups like Move-On.Org with boycotts and opposition.

There are massive international corporate and financial interests who are inherently at risk from President Trump’s “America-First” economic and trade platform.  Believe it or not, President Trump is up against an entire world economic establishment.
I will outline how it works below; and when you understand how it works in the modern era you will understand why the agents within the system are so adamantly opposed to U.S. President Trump.
The biggest lie in modern economics, willingly spread and maintained by corporate media, is that a system of global markets still exists.
It doesn’t.
Every element of global economic trade is controlled and exploited by massive institutions, multinational banks and multinational corporations.  Institutions like the World Trade Organization (WTO) and World Bank control trillions of dollars in economic activity.  Underneath that economic activity there are people who hold the reigns of power over the outcomes.  These individuals and groups are the stakeholders in direct opposition to principles of national economics.
The modern financial constructs of these entities have been established over the course of the past three decades.  When you understand how they manipulate the economic system of individual nations you begin to understand understand why they are so fundamentally opposed to President Trump.
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The first round of new NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) negotiations begins today in Washington DC.  The U.S., Canada and Mexico begin the task of renegotiating a trade deal originally established in 1995. There are trillions of dollars in trade being discussed, and more substantively the basic principles behind a tri-lateral trade deal that has compromised U.S. economic growth are being reformatted and reestablished.
Most of the media presentations on the substantive issues are framed in falsehoods, deception and many outright lies.  The advancement of multinational corporations, and multinational financial constructs has eliminated the historic reference points still being used by the media to mislead the average consumer – EXPLAINED HERE –
NAFTA was/is a highly political trade deal that has severely compromised U.S. workers and U.S. manufacturers.  There may be as many as six rounds of negotiations as each economic sector is addressed.  However, the first round is essentially to establish the principles of priority for each trade nation.  Against the backdrop of America as the worlds largest economy and market, the entire globe is watching to see the outcome.
U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer delivers his opening remarks (video and transcript below).

This morning, @USTradeRep Ambassador Robert Lighthizer delivered an opening statement at the first round of #NAFTA renegotiations. pic.twitter.com/8h21Ednskf

— Department of State (@StateDept) August 16, 2017

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AMBASSADOR ROBERT LIGHTHIZER – This is an historic day for the United States. Today, for the first time, we will start negotiating to revise a major free trade agreement. American politicians have been promising to renegotiate NAFTA for years, but today President Trump is going to fulfill those promises.
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The transparency is obvious for anyone who has followed the history of motives behind U.S. business entities, and affiliates, who each have vested financial interests in global manufacturing exploitation to the detriment of America’s economic interests and U.S middle-class workers.
It would be laughable if their oppositional interest was not so consequential.  However, TEAM USA will prevail. Bigly. Believe it.  For many years CTH has been warning about the “trillion dollar stakeholders” in the multinational corporatism that infects the U.S. body politic. –Outlined HERE–

Toward that end manufacturing CEO’s, who have vested interests in retaining international manufacture of their products for U.S. market, took up positions aboard President Trump’s manufacturing council in an effort to steer the “America First” shift in economic policy.
Those CEO council voices initially convinced President Trump not to “scrap” the NAFTA trade deal and instead requested a “re-negotiation” therein.  However, on the eve of the actual re-negotiation taking place, and against the backdrop of looming and consequential trade sanctions against China, those same entities are facing a reality where the system enabling their continued indulgences is likely to be collapsed.  Because Trump.
The communist Chinese government is no longer trying to hide their prior insurance payments into the corrupt and exploitative economic policy of the U.S.
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