Harper, Bush, Calderon all meeting in New Orleans

There is more going on other than sports:

The leaders of the NAFTA nations: United States, Canada, and Mexico are meeting in New Orleans this week. The three leaders have had annual meetings in recent times to discuss issues concerning all three countries.

NAFTA has been an issue both in the meetings and from the government represenatives. Officially, the word is that NAFTA is great and shouldn't change. But there were rumblings in the Democratic Party primary that NAFTA would be investigated.

The "everything is pleasant" cries aren't accurate, at least among the workers in the U.S. and Canada. And there are cries on both sides of the U.S.-Canada border to improve NAFTA based on certain trade disagreements.

These annual meetings haven't produced anything earth-shattering so far. Perhaps there are subtle talks, inklings for future things, but so far we haven't seen any proof. And you can't help but wonder if Canadian PM Stephen Harper and Mexico President Felipe Calderon are running out the clock waiting to see who takes over the U.S. Harper will likely have his own federal election to deal with, likely in 2009. Canada currently has a minority government with Harper as the prime minister. Calderon's term expires in 2012; re-election is not an option in Mexico.