Bob McCarty Writes

Three months ago, I reported that Mexican trucks were inching closer to U.S. highways.  Now, it appears the gate has been opened, allowing them unencumbered access to highways north of the Mexican border. Today, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood signed a cross-border trucking agreement with Mexico without providing the public or Congress with the final details [...]

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Independent American truckers are not happy about Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood’s announcement Friday that included details of a proposed, phased long-haul, cross-border trucking program between the United States and Mexico. “This is the wrong plan at the wrong time for numerous reasons,” said Todd Spencer, executive vice president of the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association. “It’s [...]

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Though I suspect most Americans paid little or no attention to news about President Barack Obama hosting Mexican President Felipe Calderón for two days last week, I think many will be interested in what results from the meeting between the two elected leaders, especially when they think about the question raised in the headline above. [...]

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Six weeks ago, Dan Little spearheaded a nationwide truckers shutdown which took place April 1 as a means of drawing attention to the poor economic plight of independent truckers and trucking companies. Today, the owner of a Carrollton, Mo., cattle-hauling operation finds himself in a new position representing the interests of truckers from across the [...]

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ProEnglish, an Arlington, Va.-based national organization that advocates for official English, released a letter to President Bush today, urging him to order U.S. Department of Transportation to stop allowing Mexican truck drivers involved in the NAFTA demonstration project to demonstrate their “proficiency in English” by answering questions in Spanish. ProEnglish and the Washington D.C.-based Eagle [...]

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Rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. The phrase above is often used to describe futile efforts to fix or save something already past the point at which it can be saved. While many of America’s independent truck drivers are fast approaching the point where their deck chairs are about to go overboard, some have already [...]

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Recently, I became aware of two groups of Americans who’ve given much thought to the question, “What would happen if, tomorrow, America’s trucking industry shut down?” In reality, all Americans should be interested in the answer. Approximately 160,000 independent owner-operators and professional truck drivers are extremely interested and they’ve been trying to get the nation’s [...]

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