In Ohio primary, campaign hinges on NAFTA

"In Ohio primary, campaign hinges on NAFTA"
Amanda Paulson

February 26th, 2008

The article is written in Dayton, Ohio and begins with a reference to the troubles in 1993 when NAFTA was passed. Ohio has been greatly affected economically and many blame NAFTA for the loss of jobs. Since 2001 Ohio has lost 225,000 manufacturing jobs and as the Monitor states, “…NAFTA is an easy target.” The article discusses the techniques the candidates use to attract supporters while also trying to tack blame on their opponent.

The article is interesting because it quotes an economist from Cleveland State University saying, “It's nice to blame the bogeyman, rather than the failed business strategies of Ford, GM, or Chrysler," which implies that its not wholly the governments fault that there has been a huge loss of jobs.

The article continues to quote citizens who are struggling with loss of their jobs and aren’t getting hired. It also quotes a forklift operator who is suspicious of the Clinton name, “I heard on the radio that she’ll fight hard for unions. But you didn't do it. You didn't say anything to Bill back then. Now it's too late. The only thing we're good at exporting anymore is jobs.” This goes against a quote from a similar New York Times article that quotes people from Ohio in favor of Hillary because of her association with Bill.

This article ends with an expert saying that Obama has an edge because his name isn’t Clinton, but that really people will choose based on personality. Despite this talking about NAFTA is very important because “These are major issues, and the people are blaming their government for not only the loss of their job but also their inability to pay their mortgage and the loss of their homes...NAFTA matters.”

Overall the article was relatively unbiased, though it did imply a slight advantage to Obama over Clinton. The one interesting thing about the article was that it quoted six different people three were citizens and three were 'experts', which was very equal. But all the people quoted were men, I though that was a very interesting phenomenon.

The only thing about this article that disappointed me was that it was very into the horse race aspect of the campaign, and talked more about what people thought of the respective candidates than what the candidates positions were on NAFTA. The article also assumed previous knowledge about what NAFTA is and means.