Reaching back all the way to NAFTA (oh, so ancient history…1993), there has been a complete lie and sham underlying virtually every trade deal post-NAFTA–don’t worry, so-called "free trade" advocates tell us (including free trade zealots Bill Clinton and Robert Reich) about these deals…we will put in place "labor protections" to make sure workers aren’t abused. Hah! And Wal-Mart makes that point just beautifully.

   Shareholder activists are turning up the heat on the Beast of Bentonville:

  At its annual shareholder meeting on Friday, the New York City pension funds, which own a small percentage of shares in Wal-Mart, plan to ask the company to require vendors to publish annual reports detailing working conditions in their factories.

Michael Garland, who oversees shareholder activism efforts as executive director for corporate governance at the city comptroller’s office, said the proposal was meant to improve workplace safety and worker rights at companies making goods for Wal-Mart, the world’s largest retailer.

“No matter how much Wal-Mart and other companies are doing, or claim they are doing, to monitor their suppliers, they just don’t have the capacity to do it in a comprehensive way,” Mr. Garland said. “They put tremendous pressure on their suppliers to cut money out of the system,” which can lead to long hours, low pay or other problems.

Wal-Mart opposes the request, citing the difficulty of persuading suppliers to issue reports. The company contends that even if it could enforce such a plan, to do so might threaten the availability of certain products from those who did not comply. [emphasis added]

   The last paragraph is the key. If Wal-Mart cannot persuade suppliers–who depend on the Beast for business–to issue reports, why are we so foolish to believe that toothless "side agreements" in trade deals are going to be enforced.

    They won’t. And we should stop the sham about these "side agreements".

    The fact is enforcement is a farce–I’ve been writing about this for a number of years (here is one example). It was a farce created to buy a few votes to jam NAFTA through a Democratic Congress. It was a farce concocted by a Democratic president and his Labor secretary (Robert Reich), who were both full-throated champions of NAFTA and so-called "free trade".  

    And Wal-Mart whining that it can’t even get its own suppliers to file reports proves the point.