Clinton's Indiana-China problem

McClatchy has a good summary of the events, as well as a link to a rebuttal by Clinton. Basically, Clinton ran an ad attacking Bush for allowing a factory making magnets for weapons to be "moved" to China. It turns out, however, that the initial sale of the factory to the Chinese company was approved by the Clinton administration. Clinton's rebuttal is that the factories were required to remain in the U.S. That doesn't take account of the fact that the requirement was only until 2005, but that's not even the biggest problem.

There were two factories, in Anderson and Valparaiso (note the misspelling in the Clinton press release). The Anderson factory was closed in 2001, and there was no fuss at all about it. I have a link to the original AP article text, with no mention of any legislators protesting. The protests came when the Valparaiso factory, which the Chinese company hadn't bought until 2000, after the original sale had gone through, was closed. So here's the question. If the factories were supposed to remain open until 2005, then why weren't there protests when the Anderson factory was closed? Because, according to a disreputable-looking source from 2003, the source of the guarantee was just an agreement the union had with GM, and tried to have with the Chinese company. It wasn't negotiated into the sale agreement.

Let me be clear: I don't really care that the Chinese make our magnets -- various experts have said that it's not really a risk. The issue is just about plant closings, and there, Clinton is being disingenuous. There was no government-enforced guarantee that the Anderson plant would remain open. Now, even on the subject of the plant closings, I'm not disagreeing with the Clinton Administration's actions, but Hillary Clinton is misrepresenting those actions. The Valparaiso protests by Bayh and others were on the grounds of national security, not job loss -- and this is not a national security issue, it is a job loss issue.