Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, October 21, 1993                   TAG: 9310210063
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

PRESIDENT CLINTON PUTS ON FREE-TRADE BAZAAR FOR NAFTA

He predicted a new flood of illegal immigrants from Mexico and more competition from Japan and Germany.

"I'm telling you, everything people worried about in the 1980s will get worse if this thing is voted down, and will get better if it's voted up," he said.

White House image specialists staged a free-trade bazaar of sorts to promote NAFTA. Two huge, white tents were set up on the South Lawn to house a wide range of products that companies believe would find new or expanded markets in Mexico.

Approaching a 125,000-piece Lego model of the White House, Clinton bragged, "I was a Lego father for a long time."

He steered clear of a table full of gooey pastries from Miami, but posed alongside a pile of shiny, red apples courtesy of the Washington Apple Commission.

The pitch for NAFTA was more business-like on Capitol Hill, where White House Budget Director Leon Panetta said the administration still wants to raise transportation fees by about $500 million a year to finance the pact despite opposition of some Republicans.

The additional money would replace tariffs on imports from Mexico that would be eliminated under the trade agreement.

Dropping trade barriers would create "uniform growth" in Mexico "and people will be able to work at home with their families. And over the period of the next few years, we will dramatically reduce pressures on illegal immigration from Mexico to the United States," Clinton said.

On Capitol Hill, the Senate Finance Committee endorsed an administration proposal considered essential to winning congressional approval of the pact: a program of job retraining, counseling and income supplements for workers whose jobs are lost because of economic dislocation caused by the pact.

But in Canada, many believe the existing U.S.-Canada Free Trade Agreement already has cost hundreds of thousands of Canadian jobs.

Also on Wednesday, Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari warned world business leaders that protectionism threatens international commerce.

At the opening of the world congress of the International Chamber of Commerce, Salinas said "strongly protectionist pressures" are threatening the development of a global economy.