Jackson Vanik will pass – bipartisan support of congress and interest groups gives momentum
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- Obama’s capital key to holding firm on repeal deadline
- Obama is accommodating Republican demands
- Only our evidence is conclusive about the final vote
- Obama persuasion needed to convince Congress to repeal Jackson-Vanik
- Obama’s leadership is key to ensure passage
- Only uses PC when making final push
- Obamas capital is key-has to push and convince Congress to overcome opposition
- Even Obama admits he’ll have to consult with Congress to push through opposition
- Debates now – Obama expending capital others haven’t
- 1. Plan isn’t a win – It’s so unpopular that it would be viewed as a legislative failure
- 3. Empirically denied – Healthcare proves. He lost momentum because it was so unpopular – Republicans were screaming bloody murder and he was unable to get anything else passed
- 5. Obama’s Velcro – only blame will stick
***Link Debate***PC KeyPC key to repeal votes on Jackson VanikMoscow Times, 4/5 “Margelov Hopes Jackson-Vanik Will Be Repealed in 2012”, http://www.themoscowtimes.com/business/article/margelov-hopes-jackson-vanik-will-be-repealed-in-2012/456160.html, BJM The United States will raise the issue of discussing the Jackson-Vanik amendment before this summer, said Mikhail Margelov, head of the Federation Council's International Affairs Committee, Interfax reported. "The administration of President Barack Obama, which has been lobbying this issue in Congress, is synchronizing watches and taking stock of its forces," Margelov told reporters after a round table that focused on the reversal of the amendment in the context of Russia's accession to the World Trade Organization. The event was held behind closed doors. Margelov said Ambassador Michael McFaul has been participating in the round-table process. It is important for the Obama administration to understand how many votes it can secure in Congress for the decision to repeal the amendment, which was passed during the Cold War era and which limits trading opportunities between Russia and the United States, the senator said. The issue is "a matter of the U.S. internal calendar," he said. "For us, it is interesting only from the standpoint that the reversal of this amendment will become a political signal that the relics of the Cold War will be removed from our political realities and the reset will be filled with substance," Margelov said. For the first time, the U.S. presidential administration "has been lobbying the reversal of this amendment genuinely and deeply, and has been doing so very seriously and professionally," he said. Obama’s capital key to holding firm on repeal deadlineRussia & CIS Business & Financial Daily, 4/4, Lexis “Margelov hopes Jackson-Vanik amendment will be repealed in 2012”, BJM The United States will raise the issue of discussing the Jackson-Vanik amendment before this summer, said Mikhail Margelov, head of the Federation Council Committee on International Affairs. "A process of time check and forces' review is now underway for the administration of President Barack Obama, which has been lobbying this issue in Congress," Margelov told reporters after a roundtable that focused on the reversal of the amendment in the context of Russia's accession to the World Trade Organization. The event was held behind closed doors. It is important for the Obama administration to understand how many votes it can secure in Congress for the decision to repeal the amendment which was passed during the Cold War era and which limits trading opportunities between Russia and the U.S., the Russian senator said. The issue is "a matter of the U.S. internal calendar," he said. "For us, it is interesting only from the standpoint that the reversal of this amendment will become a political signal, that the relics of the Cold War will be removed from our political realities and the reset will be filled with substance," Margelov said. For the first time, the U.S. presidential administration "has been lobbying the reversal of this amendment genuinely and deeply and has been doing so very seriously and professionally," he said. Obama is accommodating Republican demandsNeedham 2/28 (Vicki Needham, “OVERNIGHT MONEY: Bernanke returns to Capitol Hill to talk monetary policy,” http://goo.gl/j2jAI) The Obama administration continued its delicate dance on Russian trade relations on Tuesday. Even as Russia defies the United States at the U.N. Security Council on Syria and struggles to crack down on political opposition at home, the White House is pushing to normalize trade relations. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Tuesday that the administration is willing to work with the Senate to “send a message” to Russia on human rights at the same time Congress lifts the trade-restricting Jackson-Vanik amendment. Clinton emphasized that since Russia is already joining the World Trade Organization — probably sometime this summer — keeping the restrictions in place will only put U.S. exporters at a disadvantage. Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), who wants to use the Jackson-Vanik vote this spring to send Russia a message, said he thought the amendment could be lifted at the same time a message is sent. U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk will testify at House Ways and Means on Wednesday, where the topic will likely come up again. Only our evidence is conclusive about the final voteHerszenhorn 2/24 (David Herszenhorn, “U.S.-Russian Trade Ties Face Some Political Snags,” NYT, http://goo.gl/CNlbI) In trying to overcome the political obstacles, the Obama administration could face opposition from those who say that any concessions to Russia are not worthwhile, given the major disagreements on foreign policy, human rights and concerns about corruption, and especially because the amount of trade with Russia is small. There were slightly more than $8 billion in American exports to Russia in 2011, compared, for instance, to more than $100 billion to China. To highlight the importance of the Russian market to individual companies, Mr. Baucus visited a John Deere factory in Russia, which he said helped support jobs in the United States, including at three suppliers in his home state, Montana. In an interview, Mr. Baucus said that despite the uphill battle of passing any legislation in a presidential election year, he believed that Congress would ultimately see the wisdom of normalizing trade relations with Russia, or at least recognize that failing to do so would only punish American business. “Even though this is an election year, the logic is unassailable,” he said. “This makes good sense for America. It will help create more American jobs.” Obama persuasion needed to convince Congress to repeal Jackson-VanikCarnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2-1-12, p. Lexis For the United States to take advantage of Russias WTO accession and for US businesses to trade with Russia under the new rules, Congress must repeal the Jackson-Vanik amendment on trade with Russia. But there is a strong anti-Russia Republican contingent in Congress which will oppose repealing the amendment. Proposing a free trade agreement with Georgia is a good tactic to persuade these people in Congress to drop their objections. So there was also a domestic political agenda in the meeting for Obama too. Whoever is the Republican presidential candidate will inevitably try to accuse him of being soft on Russia because of his re-set policy, especially after Vladimir Putin is re-elected president in Russia in March. And, prior to this meeting, there might have been accusations about betraying Georgia. That is no longer possible and this meeting was a kind of pre-emptive strike on that issue. It was good for Obama that the Georgian president left the meeting saying, I am leaving this office very happy. Obama’s leadership is key to ensure passageInside U.S. Trade, 1/13 (“WHITE HOUSE UNDER PRESSURE TO DO HEAVY LIFTING ON RUSSIA MFN VOTE,” 1/13/2012, Factiva ) Permanent MFN for Russia is coming to the forefront as Russia prepares to enter into the World Trade Organization. If the United States does not graduate Russia from the Jackson-Vanik amendment, U.S. exporters cannot gain the full benefits of Russia's trade concessions as a WTO member. Russia's WTO entry is part of the Obama administration's "reset" policy with Russia that seeks to strengthen the strategic relationship between the two countries. This policy is controversial with Republican congressional leaders, such as House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH). U.S. Chamber of Commerce President Tom Donohue yesterday (Jan. 12) publicly signaled that he wants the administration to be more visible in the fight for Russia MFN and that trade and economic arguments are unlikely to carry the day in Congress. "There are no pure economic arguments on the Hill," he said at a press conference after his state of American business address. Business will work to focus attention on economics, but "everyone's thinking about political implications," according to Donohue. "I think the administration will probably have to be motivated, particularly in an election year, to put its oar in the water here, but we're going to push them to do it because its not a very good idea to leave all that trade to somebody else," Donohue said. The commercial benefits of Russia's WTO entry are small. U.S. exports to Russia are lagging behind those to Panama, with $6.006 billion worth of goods exported to Russia in 2010, according to Commerce Department statistics. The top five goods the United States exported to Russia in 2010 were civilian aircraft, engines and related parts; poultry meat and offal; machinery parts; passenger cars and vehicles; and polymers of vinyl chloride also known as PVC plastics, according to the Commerce Department. But the business message that the White House needs to take the lead may also be influenced by informal signals from Republican aides in Congress that the commercial arguments will not generate the necessary votes for the Jackson-Vanik legislation and that it is more effective to let the administration to make the foreign policy case. In the Senate, both Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and Finance Committee Ranking Member Orrin Hatch (R-UT) are perceived as being cool to the idea of extending permanent MFN this year. Hatch, for instance, appears interested in first securing stronger protections for intellectual property rights. But a Senate Democratic aide charged that congressional Republicans want to see the administration work for this vote and incur the political costs for securing it. Other sources said some Republicans want to make any "victories" for President Obama in an election year as difficult as possible, and a Senate Republican aide said that Republicans "will do anything" to deprive Obama of a foreign policy victory this year. Sources said that until business groups pressure Republican leaders to support Russia MFN, nothing will happen. A Senate Republican aide said that if executives from large multinational companies such as Boeing visit key Republican offices asking for this vote, it would be more difficult to ignore. So far, senior executives of major companies have been absent from the Russia lobbying push, which has been left largely to association lobbyists who do not carry the same clout, this aide said. Only uses PC when making final pushBeckmann and Kumar 11 [Matthew N. Beckmann PhD and Associate Professor, Political Science School of Social Sciences at UC Irvine; and Vimal Kumar, “How presidents push, when presidents win: A model of positive presidential power in US lawmaking,” Journal of Theoretical Politics, 23: 3, Ebsco] Fortunately for those inside the West Wing, some researchers paint a more optimistic picture regarding presidents’ potential for passing important planks of their legislative agenda. Covington et al. (1995), Barrett and Eshbaugh-Soha (2007), Edwards III and Barrett (2000), Kellerman (1984), Light (1982), Peterson (1990), and Rudalevige (2002) all observe that presidents secure greater support for their ‘priority’ items, and when they exert ‘effort’ pushing them. In addition, Covington (1987) concludes that White House officials can occasionally win greater support among legislators by working behind the scenes, while Canes-Wrone (2001, 2005) shows that presidents can induce support from a recalcitrant Congress by strategically ‘going public’ when advocating popular proposals (see also Kernell (1993)). Sullivan (1987, 1988) finds that presidents can amass winning congressional coalitions by changing members’ positions as a bill moves through the legislative process. However, even among these relative optimists, the prescription for presidents appears to be an ephemeral combination of luck and effort, not a systematic strategy. In discussing the challenge for a president looking to push legislation on Capitol Hill, Samuel Kernell offers a comparable assessment. He writes, The number and variety of choices place great demands upon [presidents’] strategic calculation, so much so that pluralist leadership must be understood as an art…an ability to sense ‘right choices’. (Kernell, 1993: 36) Furthermore, the seemingly paradoxical findings noted above, that is, a general (if modest) pattern of president-supported legislative success on passage and policy content, but not on ‘key’ roll-call votes, remain unexplained. This paper aims to demystify the White House’s legislative strategies, both their logic and their effects. Developing a non-cooperative game in which the president allocates scarce ‘political capital’ to induce changes in legislators’ behavior, we deduce two lobbying strategies White House officials may execute and, in turn, investigate their impact on the laws that result. Interestingly, we theorize that presidents’ foremost influence comes from bargaining with congressional leaders over policy alternatives before bills reach the floor, not bargaining with pivotal voters for their support once they do. Precisely because so much of the presidents’ influence comes in the legislative earlygame (rather than the endgame), we theorize that typical roll-call-based tests of presidents’ legislative influence have missed most of it. Obamas capital is key-has to push and convince Congress to overcome oppositionDouglas Busvine 10/30 (National interest, not votes to get Russia into WTO, http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/30/us-russia-wto-analysis-idUSTRE79T1VI20111030) Convincing a skeptical Congress of the benefits of Russia's WTO accession poses a challenge to the Obama administration as the opposition Republicans seek a contender for next fall's presidential election.John Boehner, the Republican majority leader of the House, has criticized the 'reset' in relations with Russia sought by Obama and, in light of Putin's return to the Kremlin, called for Washington to oppose Russia's WTO entry.While Congress cannot directly block Russia's WTO entry, it can vote against repealing the so-called Jackson-Vanik amendment -- a 1974 provision that linked awarding most-favored trading status to emigration rights for Soviet Jews.Failure to repeal Jackson-Vanik would, however, allow Russia as a WTO member to deny the United States most-favored status, in what would amount to an own goal for U.S. business interests."If we don't lift Jackson-Vanik when Russia's accession becomes effective, we are at the risk of discriminatory treatment -- and we don't want that to occur," said the USRBC's Verona. Even Obama admits he’ll have to consult with Congress to push through oppositionAFP 11/12 (Obama says time to end Russia Trade curbs, http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iVRzEjKUPEMw27VQqBLxZTFnCHeg?docId=CNG.a7dd32f66b6231dfd54596020fa71a03.161) US President Barack Obama said Russia's pending entry into the WTO meant it was time for him to consult with Congress on ending trade restrictions on Moscow dating from the Cold War.In a meeting with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in Hawaii, Obama committed to lifting the Jackson-Vanik amendment which restricts trade privileges to nations that limited freedom of human rights and emigration.Moscow cleared its most significant hurdle for accession just Wednesday when it finally clinched a customs deal with Georgia, which was able to veto any accession bid by virtue of its membership to the trade body. Yes CapitalDebates now – Obama expending capital others haven’tFrolov, 3/23 Vladamir, Russia Profile, “Russia Profile Weekly Experts Panel: Will Russia Graduate From the Jackson-Vanik Amendment?”, Factiva, BJM The United States Senate Finance Committee began hearings last week on abolishing controversial trade restrictions against Russia under the Soviet-era Jackson-Vanik Amendment. American lawmakers will debate granting Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) status to Moscow. Will Russia finally be graduated from the Jackson-Vanik Amendment imposed in 1974 on the now non-existent country? Will the congressional opposition succeed in imposing new trade restrictions on Russia linked to the human rights situation? What will this mean for the U.S.-Russian “reset?” The Jackson-Vanik amendment was adopted in 1974, linking restrictions on trade with the right of Jews to emigrate from the Soviet Union. That issue has been dead since the collapse of the Soviet Union, and Russia has been deemed in compliance with the Jackson-Vanik legislation by annual presidential waivers since 1990. During the post-Soviet period, all U.S. administrations, from Bill Clinton to George Bush, promised to graduate Russia from Jackson-Vanik, only to see little congressional support for the measure. None ventured to spend much political capital on pushing it through a reluctant Congress. In the meantime, several post-Soviet states – Ukraine, Georgia, and Kyrgyzstan – were graduated from Jackson-Vanik and granted PNTR when they joined the World Trade Organization. Now, Russia is joining the WTO and the Barack Obama administration has jumped on this opportunity to do away with this last legacy of the Cold War in U.S.-Russian relations. This time around, it is the United States that would benefit more from Russia's graduation. A2: Winners Win1. Plan isn’t a win – It’s so unpopular that it would be viewed as a legislative failure2. Fighting for passage of the plan FORCES a trades off with other agenda prioritiesBernstein, political scientist who writes about American politics, 8/20 (Jonathan, 8/20/2011, “The power that a president does -- and doesn't -- have A president has less power than Obama's liberal critics think -- but they also have more power than they realize,” http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2011/08/20/bernstein_presidential_power/index.html) Moreover, the positions of the president and most everyone else are, to look at it one way, sort of opposites. The president has potential influence over an astonishing number of things -- not only every single policy of the U.S. government, but policy by state and local governments, foreign governments, and actions of private citizens and groups. Most other political actors have influence over a very narrow range of stuff. What that means is that while the president's overall influence is certainly far greater than that of a House subcommittee chair or a midlevel civil servant in some agency, his influence over any specific policy may well not be greater than that of such a no-name nobody. A lot of good presidential skills have to do with figuring out how to leverage that overall influence into victories in specific battles, and if we look at presidential history, there are lots of records of successes and failures. In other words, it's hard. It involves difficult choices -- not (primarily) policy choices, but choices in which policies to fight for and which not to, and when and where and how to use the various bargaining chips that are available. 3. Empirically denied – Healthcare proves. He lost momentum because it was so unpopular – Republicans were screaming bloody murder and he was unable to get anything else passed4. Legislative success depletes capital – doesn’t increase itPurdum, 10 – Award winning journalist who spent 23 years with the NY Times (12/20/10, Todd S., Vanity Affair, “Obama Is Suffering Because of His Achievements, Not Despite Them,” http://www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2010/12/obama-is-suffering-because-of-his-achievements-not-despite-them.html) With this weekend’s decisive Senate repeal of the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy for gay service members, can anyone seriously doubt Barack Obama’s patient willingness to play the long game? Or his remarkable success in doing so? In less than two years in office—often against the odds and the smart money’s predictions at any given moment—Obama has managed to achieve a landmark overhaul of the nation’s health insurance system; the most sweeping change in the financial regulatory system since the Great Depression; the stabilization of the domestic auto industry; and the repeal of a once well-intended policy that even the military itself had come to see as unnecessary and unfair. So why isn’t his political standing higher? Precisely because of the raft of legislative victories he’s achieved. Obama has pushed through large and complicated new government initiatives at a time of record-low public trust in government (and in institutions of any sort, for that matter), and he has suffered not because he hasn’t “done” anything but because he’s done so much—way, way too much in the eyes of his most conservative critics. With each victory, Obama’s opponents grow more frustrated, filling the airwaves and what passes for political discourse with fulminations about some supposed sin or another. Is it any wonder the guy is bleeding a bit? For his part, Obama resists the pugilistic impulse. To him, the merit of all these programs has been self-evident, and he has been the first to acknowledge that he has not always done all he could to explain them, sensibly and simply, to the American public. But Obama is nowhere near so politically maladroit as his frustrated liberal supporters—or implacable right-wing opponents—like to claim. He proved as much, if nothing else, with his embrace of the one policy choice he surely loathed: his agreement to extend the Bush-era income tax cuts for wealthy people who don’t need and don’t deserve them. That broke one of the president’s signature campaign promises and enraged the Democratic base and many members of his own party in Congress. But it was a cool-eyed reflection of political reality: The midterm election results guaranteed that negotiations would only get tougher next month, and a delay in resolving the issue would have forced tax increases for virtually everyone on January 1—creating nothing but uncertainty for taxpayers and accountants alike. Obama saw no point in trying to score political debating points in an argument he knew he had no chance of winning. Moreover, as The Washington Post’s conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer bitterly noted, Obama’s agreement to the tax deal amounted to a second economic stimulus measure—one that he could never otherwise have persuaded Congressional Republicans to support. Krauthammer denounced it as the “swindle of the year,” and suggested that only Democrats could possibly be self-defeating enough to reject it. In the end, of course, they did not. Obama knows better than most people that politics is the art of the possible (it’s no accident that he became the first black president after less than a single term in the Senate), and an endless cycle of two steps forward, one step back. So he just keeps putting one foot in front of the other, confident that he can get where he wants to go, eventually. The short-term results are often messy and confusing. Just months ago, gay rights advocates were distraught because Obama wasn’t pressing harder to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” Now he is apparently paying a price for his victory because some Republican Senators who’d promised to support ratification of the START arms-reduction treaty—identified by Obama as a signal priority for this lame-duck session of Congress—are balking because Obama pressed ahead with repealing DADT against their wishes. There is a price for everything in politics, and Obama knows that, too. Finally, Obama is hardly in anything close to disastrous political shape. Yes, the voters administered a shellacking to his party in December, but there are advantages to working with a hostile Republican Congress as a foil, instead of a balky Democratic one as a quarrelsome ally. His own personal likeability rating remains high—much higher than that of most politicians—and his job approval rating hovers at just a bit below 50 percent, where it has held for more than a year, nowhere near the level of a “failed presidency.” Sarah Palin’s presence for the moment assures an uncertain and divided Republican field heading into the 2012 election cycle, and the one man who could cause Obama a world of trouble if he mounted an independent campaign—Mayor Mike Bloomberg of New York—has recently made statements of non-candidacy that sound Shermanesque (even as he has remained outspokenly critical of business as usual by both parties in Washington). 5. Obama’s Velcro – only blame will stickNicholas and Hook, 10 (Peter Nicholas and Janet Hook, 7/30/10, LA Times, “Obama the Velcro president,” http://articles.latimes.com/print/2010/jul/30/nation/la-na-velcro-presidency-20100730) If Ronald Reagan was the classic Teflon president, Barack Obama is made of Velcro. Through two terms, Reagan eluded much of the responsibility for recession and foreign policy scandal. In less than two years, Obama has become ensnared in blame. Hoping to better insulate Obama, White House aides have sought to give other Cabinet officials a higher profile and additional public exposure. They are also crafting new ways to explain the president's policies to a skeptical public. But Obama remains the colossus of his administration — to a point where trouble anywhere in the world is often his to solve. The president is on the hook to repair the Gulf Coast oil spill disaster, stabilize Afghanistan, help fix Greece's ailing economy and do right by Shirley Sherrod, the Agriculture Department official fired as a result of a misleading fragment of videotape. What's not sticking to Obama is a legislative track record that his recent predecessors might envy. Political dividends from passage of a healthcare overhaul or a financial regulatory bill have been fleeting. Instead, voters are measuring his presidency by a more immediate yardstick: Is he creating enough jobs? So far the verdict is no, and that has taken a toll on Obama's approval ratings. Only 46% approve of Obama's job performance, compared with 47% who disapprove, according to Gallup's daily tracking poll. "I think the accomplishments are very significant, but I think most people would look at this and say, 'What was the plan for jobs?' " said Sen. Byron L. Dorgan (D-N.D.). "The agenda he's pushed here has been a very important agenda, but it hasn't translated into dinner table conversations." Directory: file -> view view -> Western Europe after wwii view -> Author study: paul fleischman view -> Qpa1 7ela study Guide view -> Arctic Oil/Gas Neg view -> November 1970 Approximately 150,000-500,000 deaths Bhola Cyclone Bangladesh view -> Grade Level: 6 Unit of Study: Caribbean glce view -> Citation: Duffield, Katy view -> Table of Contents Lesson # view -> Chinese Wind Energy Disad Download 0.68 Mb. Share with your friends:
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