APEC 2007: Advancing U.S. Exports to the Asia-Pacific Region

Interview

APEC 2007: Advancing U.S. Exports to the Asia-Pacific Region

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REP. SIRES: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Madame Ambassador, members of the panel that are here today, thank you very much for being here. I represent a district in New Jersey where it has the two ports, the main ports, Newark and Elizabeth. And I represent the district which at one time was called the embroidery capital of America.

The imbalance for trade -- this is where I'm going. We have a situation now that the imbalance is so great that the containers that come in, we can't send them back. So we don't know what to do with these containers. So we stack them up along the New Jersey Turnpike. And as everybody sees, it's a symbol of the imbalance that we have, although we do like a billion dollars' worth of exports to Japan and about $875 (billion) to Korea.

What I'm getting at is I noticed that you said in your opening statement that you worked quietly to open the doors for American goods. Wherever I attend a meeting, Madame Ambassador, I'll tell you, it's not quiet. It is -- wherever I go, I get beat up on the fact that we import all these goods and yet, when we try to go to China, we can't even get into their financial services. We can't get there with insurance.

So I don't know if "quietly," I would use that word, because I think people are pretty fed up. The district that I come from is where people step off Ellis Island to work in the embroidery; you know -- (inaudible) -- for years those jobs.

What do I go back and tell my district, that we're working quietly? I don't mean to --

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