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In short, it was a list of products bearing absolutely no relation to bananas.
While government officials were assuring reporters that the tariffs would never be levied, the U.S.-based companies that would be affected were taking no chances. In all, 42 types of products were targeted for tariff increases and, as it had to do by law, the USTR asked interested parties to respond.
Respond they did, setting off a furious lobbying campaign to try to get off the banana hit list. Companies and politicians showered the agency with letters warning of potential job losses in their districts if the increased tariffs were imposed.
At a USTR hearing on Dec. 9 attended by trade associations and Washington lobbyists, various interest groups spoke out against the tariffs, saying they would cripple or possibly destroy their businesses.
"The imposition of a prohibitive duty on ballpoint pens would have a devastating effect on Gillette's writing-instruments business in the U.S.," a representative for the Gillette Co. warned.
"Subjecting these dolls to a 100% duty could well result in the collapse of the entire line of American Girl products," a representative for Mattel cautioned.
"The imposition of a 100% duty rate on articles of fur clothing and garments will seriously impact our members, making their garments outrageously expensive, even for a luxury product," declared a representative of the Fur Information Council of America.
Two weeks later, on Dec. 21, products imported by Gillette, Mattel and fur retailers, as well as those of some two dozen other trade groups and industries that testified at the hearing or lobbied the USTR, were dropped from the list.
More lobbying ensued. On April 19, when the final list was published, most of the goods once proposed for high tariffs had been stricken from the list. Only nine types of products were covered.
In announcing the final list, Barshefsky, who had replaced Kantor as U.S. Trade Representative, reiterated that the higher annual tariffs on European goods were in retaliation for Europe's refusal to change its import rules on bananas.
"It is proof that the system works," she said. "When members [of the WTO] refuse to live by the rules, they will pay a price." There was one major oversight in Barshefsky's reasoning: the wrong people were going to pay the price.
The Clinton Administration salvo aimed at giant European corporations hit Rick Reinert, Arthur Kaplan, Timothy Dove and other small entrepreneurs, whose only connection to bananas is to eat one every now and then.
"I THOUGHT IT WAS A JOKE"