Even NAFTA still has restrictions on personal exemptions, so the trade is only really "free" insofar as it supports existing supply chain jobs at home.

Use of the word Free also implies you don't have to give anything up for the deal, like your job.

Maybe "New and Improved" wasn't polling well with the focus groups.

To what extent is there "free trade" within countries like the US and does it "work"?

To the extent that there is free trade within the United States, a crucial compenent of it is free movement of workers within the country.

International trade agreements (falsely labelled "free trade" as Dean says) do not incorporate free movement of workers across borders - quite the contrary. In fact, so called "free trade" champions also support laws that severely punish workers for trying to move across international borders in pursuit of a better living.

In the UNited States, in addition to free movement across state lines, workers also have a federal government they can (to minimal extent unfortunately) pressure to look after their interests.

No such federal governmnet exists at the international level that workers can pressure.

Free or Unfree, trade agreements are not going to help the American worker until the U.S. manages to restructure its economy to make it possible for workers to find jobs in an emerging service economy. Manufacturing is not returning to this country with the strength it would take to put the millions of unemployed back to work, and right now the "leaders" of the country - neither political nor labor - have any idea how to prepare and transition the workforce into the future.

To die for one's country is the greatest sacrifice an individual can be called upon to make.

To shine a bright light upon the nobility of those unemployable working class people who opt for this way out of their situation while at the same time relieving society of the noxious burden of supporting them, the Tea Party is issuing a genuine gold-plated "Freedom Medal" bearing the likeness of the Beloved Leader, Ronald Reagan, that will forever commemorate their magnanimous offering up of their "last full measure of devotion". Special "Freedom" trains await to transport the useless to their rendezvous with destiny where they will imbibe a purple sugary liquid concoction called Jesus Juice, which, being the blood of the lamb, will numb their bodies and elevate their minds to a state of hyper ecstasy in preparation for the ritual that awaits them.

God Bless our exceptional country, where the rules that govern other nations don't apply. We are quite simply, above them.

There are no such things as "free" trade agreements.

There are simply different trade agreements with different winners and different losers.

And so forth.

Thank you for helping people to understand this.

Use of the word free is actually counter productive to the establishment. Free develops hostility to trade in a public that does not support it any more. I always sneer when I pronounce free in the phrase free trade.

It is like Fox News describing itself as fair and balanced.