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Steel tarrifs.
BillieTheBot
Posts: 8,721 Bot
As you all may know the US introduced some illegal steel import duties a while ago, well they have been lifted.
Heres the story;
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3292191.stm
Heres the story;
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3292191.stm
Beep boop. I'm a bot.
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Our steel industry will benefit from the removal of the tariffs.
The economy on both sides of the Atlantic will also benefit in general by avoiding trade wars and boycotts.
And sweetest of all, the EU has for once shown some muscle and forced Dubya into a humiliating climbdown. It might even damage his chances of re-election, which would be a welcome and unexpected bonus for the human race.
I reckon the news will have been given a better treatment in the Continent.
It is certainly much bigger news in America, where the steel industry is said to be furious at the decision.
Don't forget that the WTO told him that he must, without that he could have just continued on his merry way, whether the EU showed balls or not...
The WTO is generally seen as the lapdog of the developed world and more specifically the US.
What will peoples perceptions of it be, now that is has forced the US to bow to its whim also?
The threat of reciprocal EU embargo on over two billion dollars worth of US goods, notably citrus fruit from Florida (ring any bells folks?) was what forced the issue. In the runup to election year, Bush cannot afford to maintain the steelworkers votes only to lose the more substantial votes of the broader interests at risk from an EU embargo, especially in Florida!
That's the long and short of it.
It was the EU real and imminent threat of sanctions that tipped the balance and made Bush see sense.
However I will concede that the WTO ruling that the tariffs were illegal was still very important to the whole issue. If the EU had imposed sanctions without a WTO backing the US government might have been more inclined to retaliate further.
Precisely.
The WTO backing and declaration a couple of weeks ago is what made the ultimate difference.
Those claims are indeed false anyways, but a full scale EU/Japan embargo would only serve to emphasise that reality as further export sectors were made to suffer.