McCain Amendment to Prohibit Buy America Crashes and Burns

Back in the general election, Obama bashed McCain for his comment that Buy America provisions were "disgraceful," as in this paid television ad below:

(See this ad and over a hundred others in our online database of paid election trade ads.)

If there was any doubt that McCain was fo' real, an amendment he introduced yesterday to the stimulus bill cleared that up. Senate Amendment 279 to the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (H.R. 1) listed as its purpose: "To prohibit the applicability of Buy American requirements in the Act to the utilization of funds provided by the Act."

This would have gone considerably farther than our current law and WTO commitments, since we have always been allowed to do most if not all of what is in the stimulus package. In essence, had it passed, it would have put the Senate on the record as opposing even the WTO-legal parts of Buy America. It would have also announced to America that, even when domestic policy proposals do NOT violate WTO obligations, we will not pass them if someone might THINK that they do. I'm not a total sovereignty hawk, but, wow...

Luckily, the amendment crashed and burned at around 8:30 pm last night, with only 31 senators (all GOP + Lieberman) supporting. All the Dems plus 9 GOP opposed. Find out how your senator voted! And then let them know what you think about it!