The Alliance for American Manufacturing (AAM) is a non-partisan, non-profit organization that advocates for U.S. manufacturing.  As part of our work, we're often critical of both the Obama Administration and the president's GOP critics, like Mitt Romney and John Boehner.

Essentially, AAM calls it like it is.  We worry that much of current U.S. trade and tax policies needs fixing in order to make American manufacturing as competitive as possible for the 21st Century.

Unfortunately, Douglas McIntyre at 24/7 Wall Street takes a dim view of AAM's work.  In a blog post today, he criticized AAM's take on the Obama Administration's failure (yet again) to cite China as a currency manipulator.  No matter that the president made a campaign promise in 2008 to hold China accountable for its brazen violations of world trade law.  McIntyre considers AAM's views unhelpful, despite the fact that the U.S. trade deficit with China has cost 2.8 million jobs since 2001.

McIntyre is most displeased with AAM Executive Director Scott Paul, whom he refers to as a "lobbyist," even though Paul is actually the organization's director and spokesperson. 

McIntyre believes Paul's call to hold China accountable for its cheating would somehow start a "trade war."

In fact, the "trade war" scare has been debunked frequently.  China holds less than 10% of U.S. debt, and Paul makes clear that China only responds to the threat of consequences.

Perfect example: See this CNBC interview (video included below).  Paul is asked if action on China's deliberately undervalued currency would launch a trade war.  As he explains at 1:48 into the interview, such action would actually "end a trade war."  Beijing has long flouted the rules of world trade, never facing any action.  The truth is that Bejing desperately needs to sell to the U.S. market, and Paul points out that it's time to enforce the rules of trade to create a level playing field.

Essentially, what the U.S. needs to do is tell Beijing that there's a new sheriff in town, one who won't kow-tow to China's bullying.  So it's unfortunate to read McIntyre's criticism and see that he would rather coddle the Chinese than stand up to them.