Obama is lying when he says TPP and TTIP are not secret. They very obviously are being kept very secret. Even Congress was not allowed to the coup d'etat do ents for years, until the last few months, and then only the highly restrictive conditions above, and then even Congress must keep the do ent secret from the public.
The 10 Biggest Lies You’ve Been Told About the Trans-Pacific Partnership
1. 40 PERCENT:
The President and his team have repeatedly described TPP as a deal involving nearly 40 percent of global GDP [8]. This tells only part of the story. First of all, the U.S. by itself represents 22 percent of global GDP; a bill naming a post office would involve that much. Second, we already have free trade agreements with six TPP partners – Canada, Mexico, Australia, Singapore, Chile and Peru – and between them and us, that’s 80 percent of the total GDP in this deal. The vast majority of the rest is represented by Japan, where the average applied tariff is a skinny 1.2 percent, per the World Bank [9].
You can see this paragraph in graphic form here [10]. The point is that saying TPP is about “40 percent of GDP” intimates that it would massively change the ability to export without tariffs. In reality it would have virtually no significance in opening new markets. To the extent that there’s a barrier in global trade today, it comes from currency manipulation [11] by countries wanting to keep their exports cheap. The TPP has no currency provisions [12].
2. JOB CREATION:
Saying, as the White House has, that the deal would support “an additional 650,000 jobs [13]” is not true. This figure came from a hypothetical calculation of a report [14] by the Peterson Ins ute for International Economics, which the Ins ute itself said was an incorrect way to use their data. “We don’t believe that trade agreements change the labor force in the long run,” said Peter Petri, author of the report, in a fact check [15] of the claim.
The deal is actually more about building up barriers than taking them down. Much of TPP is devoted to increasing copyright and patent protections [16] for prescription drugs and Hollywood media content. As economist Dean Baker [16] notes, this is protectionist, and will raise prices for drugs, movies and music here and abroad.
3. EXPORTS ONLY:
The Administration constantly discusses trade as solely a question of U.S. exports. A recent Council of Economic Advisors report [17] touts: Exporters pay higher wages, and export industry growth translates into higher average earnings. But the Economic Policy Ins ute points out that this ignores imports [18], and therefore the ballooning trade deficit [19], which weighs down economic growth and wages. Talking about trade without discussing both imports and exports is like relaying the score of a ballgame by saying “Dodgers 4.” It is literally a half-truth. Recent trade deals have in fact increased the trade deficit [20], such as the agreement with South Korea. Senator Sherrod Brown notes that the deal has only increased exports by $1 billion since 2011, while increasing imports by $12 billion, costing America 75,000 jobs.
4. MOST PROGRESSIVE:
Obama has called TPP “the most progressive trade deal in history [21].” First of all, so did Bill Clinton and Al Gore [22], when talking about NAFTA in 1993. Second, there’s reason to believe TPP doesn’t even clear a low bar for progressive trade deals. The Sierra Club, based on a leaked TPP environmental chapter, said that the deal is weaker [23] than the landmark “May 10 agreement” [24] for deals with Peru, Panama and Colombia, struck in 2007. Key Democrats who devised labor and environmental standards for those agreements, like Rep. Sander Levin, believe [25] that TPP falls short. Even if the chapters were up to par, consistent lack of enforcement [26] of the rules makes them ineffective. The U.S. Trade Representative has actually claimed the Colombia free trade agreement is positive because only one trade unionist in the country is being murdered every other week [27]. Labor groups can only ask the White House to enforce labor rights violations, and for the past several years, the Administration simply hasn’t [26]. So when Obama says violators of TPP will face “meaningful consequences,” based on the Administration’s prior enforcement, he’s lying.
5. CHANGING LAWS:
On the controversial topic of Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS), where corporations can sue sovereign governments for monetary damages for violating trade agreements that hurt the company’s “expected future profits,” the White House has engaged in a s game. They say [28], “No trade agreement is going to force us to change our laws.” But the point of a corporation suing the United States or any trade partner is to put enough financial pressure on a government to force them to alter the law themselves. So ISDS doesn’t “cause” a change in law only in the narrowest sense. Even third-party countries have curtailed regulations in reaction to ISDS rulings, as New Zealand did [29] with their cigarette packaging law, awaiting the outcome of a dispute between the tobacco industry and Australia (a suit that continues [30] despite an initial victory for Australia).
6. NEVER LOST:
The White House assumes that the only thing America cares about with ISDS is the upsetting of our own laws. So they’ve stressed that the U.S. has never lost an ISDS case [31]. This is irrelevant. What ISDS does is offer bailout insurance policy to multinational corporations. If they run into discrimination or regulatory squeezing by a foreign government, they can use an extra-judicial process to recoup their investment. Workers screwed over by trade agreements have no ability to sue governments; only corporations get this privilege.
The United States attracts businesses through our relative rule of law. When that insurance is granted to countries like Vietnam and Malaysia, it weakens our compe ive advantage, and makes it simple for countries to outsource their operations. Their investment is protected, as is their ability to exploit cheap labor. This makes it impossible for America to compete.
7. WEAKENING DODD-FRANK:
Obama reacted strongly to Senator Warren’s charge that a future President could overturn financial regulations or other rules through trade deals. “I’d have to be pretty stupid,” Obama told Yahoo News [4], to “sign a provision that would unravel” signature achievements like Dodd-Frank. I suppose he is, then, because modern trade agreements often seek to “harmonize” regulations, effectively setting a regulatory ceiling. This harmonization could, as Warren says [7], “punch holes in Dodd-Frank without directly repealing it,” by forcing regulators to roll back capital or leverage requirements.
European negotiators want a trade agreement with the U.S. called the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) to include a chapter “harmonizing” financial regulations. So far the Obama Administration has rejected this, while admitting the potential for regulatory harm. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew told Congress [32] in December 2013, “Normally in a trade agreement, the pressure is to lower standards” on regulations, “and that’s something that we just think is not acceptable.” A future President might find it acceptable, and today’s vote on “fast-track” authority would give trade deals an expedited process, with no amendments or filibusters by Congress, for six years [33], outlasting the current Administration. Scott Walker or Jeb Bush may decide it’s perfectly appropriate to undermine regulations in trade deals.
8. STOPPING CHINA:
President Obama frequently casts TPP as a way to “contain” China. “If we don’t write the rules for trade around the world, guess what, China will,” he said on Friday [34]. This is so facile as to be totally meaningless. China is a major Pacific Rim economy, and will have a presence regardless of our actions. As former Clinton Defense Department official Chas Freeman writes [35], “China has been and will remain an inseparable part of China’s success story.” Plus, as I’ve written in Salon [36], weak “rule of origin” guidelines could allow China to import goods into TPP member countries without any tariffs, while freed from following any TPP regulations.
9. SECRET DEAL:
Obama has angrily dismissed the notion that TPP is a “secret” deal, saying that everyone will have public access to the TPP text for at least 60 days before a final vote. This is not the point opponents are making. The vote on fast track would severely limit Congressional input into the deal. And right now, members of Congress can only see the text in a secure room [37], without being able to bring staffers or take notes, or even talk about specifics in public. That makes the deal effectively secret during the fast track vote. “The president has only committed to letting the public see this deal after Congress votes to authorize fast track,” Warren told Greg Sargent [7]. The President wants to filibuster-proof the bill in secret, then employ pretend transparency on TPP after that.
10. JUST A POLITICIAN:
This idea from Obama that everybody opposing fast-track is acting like a mere “politician,” aside from demonizing the concept of representing cons uents, neglects the fact that he’s a politician too. His interest in building a legacy, when practically nothing else has the potential to pass Congress the next two years, is a political interest. His possible interest in rewarding campaign contributors who would benefit from TPP is also political, or his desire to earn the respect of the Very Serious People who always support trade deals. Since Obama has a large platform and will not publicly debate any opponent [38] on trade, he can float above it all, acting like a principled soul only wanting to better the country rather than a transactional ward heeler [39]. This may be the biggest lie, that Obama’s somehow superior to everyone else in this debate.
http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-pol...ic-partnership
tl;dr
can it come up again?
Big Liz Warren showing off some strength.
Pretty impressive butt kicking.
Good to see there is still a party that cares about saving American jobs...
Senate Democrats handed President Obama a stinging rebuke on Tuesday, blocking consideration of legislation granting their own president “fast track” power to complete a major trade accord with 11 nations in the Pacific Rim.
The Senate vote on a procedural motion to begin debating the bill to give the president “trade promotion authority,” was 52 to 45 in favor, eight short of the 60 needed for passage. Republicans and pro-trade Democrats said they will try to negotiate a trade package that can clear that threshold.
But the vote Tuesday presented Mr. Obama what might be a no-win situation. He may have to accept trade enforcement provisions he does not want to get the trade legislation through the Senate, but those same provisions might doom the Pacific trade negotiations that legislation is supposed to boost.
That is especially true for a measure demanding a crackdown on currency manipulation, which is strongly opposed by Japan and Malaysia, two of the 12 nations trying to complete the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the largest trade accord in a generation.
Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/13/bu...T.nav=top-news
99
Is Sen. Warren now the de facto leader of the Dem party?
no way
PP is a huge deal, negotiated in secret since c. 2005 during Bush by 600 corporate trade reps. Behind closed doors. The TPP's EU part, the T-TIP, has been actively protested by Europeans for some time.
This wide reaching corporate coup d'état will capture the neoliberal economic global Jewel in the Crown. Lobbying and pressure on TPP-opposed Dems., and increased news coverage now are to finalize Fast -Track passage of the Trade Agreement very soon.
Perennial WH financial figure, Larry Summers, Clinton's Treasury Secy. and Obama economic advisor cautioned Eliz. Warren in 2009 that there are only two kinds of people: insiders and outsiders. The one rule that insiders never break is talking against other insiders he said. Summers also recently told Warren to tone down criticism of proposed changes favoring banks in budget negotiations.
Marginalizing Warren serves several purposes for corporate centrists who view her as an annoyance or threat especially in obtaining the green light for the TPP. Obama said he was closer to a moderate Republican years back and so to some his fight for this trade deal is no surprise, for others it's puzzling and out of character.
agree completely that Obama is a moderate Republican overall, not just in the area of trade: he kept Gates at DOD.
If Obama is a moderate republican, then what does that make Hillary? That is what scares the out of Progressives and why Bernie Sanders is popular in those circles...also why progressives want to recruit Warren to run in 2016....remember this is the same group that co-opt Hillary in 2012
Sure ain't a progressive, probably not even a commie. Might even be to the right of GWB,If Obama is a moderate republican, then what does that make Hillary?
(Medicare Part D 4ever!)
The Trojan Horse President
Stiglitz:At the core of this Nobel Laureate's argument against the TPP deal is the simple fact that legal authority - basic, bedrock legal authority - would be transferred from the sovereign courts of the United States to multinational corporations if this "deal" comes to pass. Note well, also, this statement from Stiglitz: "Though corporations can bring suit, others cannot. If there is a violation of other commitments - on labor and environmental standards, for example - citizens, unions, and civil-society groups have no recourse."
Fundamental to America's system of government is an impartial public judiciary, with legal standards built up over the decades, based on principles of transparency, precedent, and the opportunity to appeal unfavorable decisions. All of this is being set aside, as the new agreements call for private, non-transparent, and very expensive arbitration. Moreover, this arrangement is often rife with conflicts of interest; for example, arbitrators may be a "judge" in one case and an advocate in a related case.
If there ever was a one-sided dispute-resolution mechanism that violates basic principles, this is it. That is why I joined leading U.S. legal experts, including from Harvard, Yale, and Berkeley, in writing a letter to President Barack Obama explaining how damaging to our system of justice these agreements are.
Rules and regulations determine the kind of economy and society in which people live. They affect relative bargaining power, with important implications for inequality, a growing problem around the world. The question is whether we should allow rich corporations to use provisions hidden in so-called trade agreements to dictate how we will live in the twenty-first century. I hope citizens in the U.S., Europe, and the Pacific answer with a resounding no.
Warren:
The president has committed only to letting the public see this deal after Congress votes to authorize fast track. At that point it will be impossible for us to amend the agreement or to block any part of it without tanking the whole TPP. The TPP is basically done. If the president is so confident it's a good deal, he should declassify the text and let people see it before asking Congress to tie its hands on fixing it.
I understand that we want to be a nation that trades, that trade creates many benefits for us. But only if done on terms that strengthen the American economy and American worker. I should say the American family, because that's what this is really about.
A Republican President could easily use a future trade deal to override our domestic financial rules. And this is hardly a hypothetical possibility: We are already deep into negotiations with the European Union on a trade agreement and big banks on both sides of the Atlantic are gearing up to use that agreement to water down financial regulations. A six-year Fast Track bill is the missing link they need to make that happen.
Senator and presidential candidate Bernie Sanders agrees:http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/ite...orse-president
Incredibly, while Wall Street, the pharmaceutical industry and major media companies have full knowledge as to what is in this treaty, the American people and members of Congress do not. They have been locked out of the process.
The TPP follows in the footsteps of other unfettered free trade agreements like NAFTA, CAFTA and the Permanent Normalized Trade Agreement with China (PNTR). These treaties have forced American workers to compete against desperate and low-wage labor around the world. The result has been massive job losses in the United States and the shutting down of tens of thousands of factories. These corporately backed trade agreements have significantly contributed to the race to the bottom, the collapse of the American middle class and increased wealth and income inequality. The TPP is more of the same, but even worse.
TPP will allow corporations to outsource even more jobs overseas; Service Sector Jobs will be lost; manufacturing jobs will be lost; US sovereignty will be undermined by giving corporations the right to challenge our laws before international tribunals; wages, benefits, and collective bargaining will be threatened; our ability to protect the environment will be undermined; food safety standards will be threatened; prescription drug prices will increase, access to life saving drugs will decrease, and the profits of drug companies will go up; and Wall Street would benefit at the expense of everyone else.
The hyper-secret TPP/TTIP are Barry's biggest, dumbfounding ups.
Repugs, tea baggers, etc are OUTRAGED at UN, Sharia, World Govt taking over American sovereignty, but Senate Repugs are lining up to hand American sovereignty to BigCorp, and not even, not only American BigCorp.
From a Democracy For America, DFA, newsletter:
There's a big -- brand new -- attack on Medicare that's just been added in the Senate to the Fast Track bill for the TPP. The bill would cut a whopping $700 million from Medicare, hurting seniors who need access to health care.
That's right, Republicans insisted on cutting Medicare spending to pay for a Trade Adjustment Assistance program that Democrats got added to the bill in order to support workers who lost their jobs due to trade deals like the TPP.
========================
Republicans Use TPP Trade Deal To Slash Medicare
http://www.politicususa.com/2015/05/18/republicans-tpp-agreement-slash-medicare.html
Elizabeth Warren Details Obama's Broken Trade Promises
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) issued a report Monday morning detailing decades of failed trade enforcement by American presidents including Barack Obama, the latest salvo in an ongoing public feud between Warren and Obama over the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
Obama has repeatedly insisted the TPP will include robust labor protections, and has dismissed Warren's criticisms as "dishonest," "bunk" and "misinformation." On Monday, Warren fired back, showing that Obama simply has not effectively enforced existing labor standards in prior trade pacts. According to the report, a host of abuses, from child labor to the outright murder of union organizers, have continued under Obama's watch with minimal pushback from the administration.
"The United States does not enforce the labor protections in its trade agreements," the report reads, citing analyses from the Government Accountability Office, the State Department and the Department of Labor.
Warren's report undercuts an Obama public relations offensive that has repeatedly characterized TPP as "the most progressive trade deal in history."
labor unions and other critics say these measures have been ineffective. The AFL-CIO has been pressing for action on Guatemalan violations for Obama’s entire term in office, and the dispute remains unresolved. Meanwhile, as Warren's report do ents, Guatemala remains one of the most dangerous places in the world for union workers. In 2013 and 2014, according to the AFL-CIO, 17 labor activists were murdered in Guatemala while the Obama administration pursued diplomatic action. Three of the slain union workers were reportedly killed during a dispute with a local government over unpaid back wages.
Much of Warren's trade critique has focused on the capacity for free trade pacts to undermine financial regulations. Last week, Canadian Finance Minister Joe Oliver gave a speech arguing that a key tenet of Obama's 2010 Wall Street reform lawviolates the North American Free Trade Agreement.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/0...ushpmg00000003
currency manipulation is not punished in TPP, as US (auto) mfrs struggle to export when US$ is strong
Car States Balk at Trade Pact
Opponents say president’s push could cost jobs and not result in a more open Japanese market
By WILLIAM MAULDIN
May 18, 2015 6:22 p.m. ETPresident Barack Obama’s Pacific trade agreement is raising alarms not only in Michigan and surrounding states dominated by Detroit’s Big Three, but also farther south where backers of Japanese car makers worry about the fate of current and future plants in the region.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/car-stat...act-1431987742
The Mis-selling of TPP
One of the great blog posts of all time was from Daniel Davies, who declared — apropos of Iraq — that
Good ideas do not need lots of lies told about them in order to gain public acceptance.
It’s a good dictum; and if you see a lot of lies, or at least misdirection, being used to sell a policy you should be very, very concerned about said policy.
And the selling of TPP just keeps getting worse.
William Daley’s pro-TPP op-ed in today’s Times is just awful, on multiple levels. No acknowledgment that the real arguments are not about trade but about intellectual property and dispute settlement; on top of that a crude mercantilist claim that trade liberalization is good because it means more exports; some Dean Baker bait with numbers — $31 billion in trade surplus! All of 0.2 percent of GDP!
But what really annoyed me, even if it’s not necessarily the worst bit, was this:
But today, of the 40 largest economies, the United States ranks 39th in the share of our gross domestic product that comes from exports. This is because our products face very high barriers to entry overseas in the form of tariffs, quotas and outright discrimination.
Actually, no. We have a low export share because we’re a big country. Here’s population versus exports as a percentage of GDP for OECD countries:
Population isn’t the only determinant — geography matters too, as the contrast between Luxembourg (in the middle of Europe) and Iceland shows. But claiming that the relatively low US export share says anything at all about trade barriers makes me want to bang my head against a wall.
If this is the best TPP advocates can come up with, this is not looking like a good idea.
http://mobile.nytimes.com/blogs/krug...elling-of-tpp/
Last edited by boutons_deux; 05-19-2015 at 10:46 AM.
Good ideas do not need lots of lies told about them in order to gain public acceptance.
.... as in: Repugs/PNAC in 2001-2003 telling LOTS OF LIES about Iraq
Krugman's thinking about TPP
May 17 3:46 pm May 17 3:46 pm 124
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/?_r=0I’m getting increasingly unhappy with the way the Obama administration is handling the dispute over TPP. I understand the case for the deal, and while I still lean negative I’m not one of those who believes that it would be an utter disaster.
But the administration — and the president himself — don’t help their position by being dismissive of the complaints and lecturing the critics (Elizabeth Warren in particular) about how they just have no idea what they’re talking about. That would not be a smart strategy even if the administration had its facts completely straight — and it doesn’t. Instead, assurances about what is and isn’t in the deal keep turning out to be untrue. We were assured that the dispute settlement procedure couldn’t be used to force changes in domestic laws; actually, it apparently could. We were told that TPP couldn’t be used to undermine financial reform; again, it appears that it could.
How important are these concerns? It’s hard to judge. But the administration is in effect saying trust us, then repeatedly bobbling questions about the deal in a way that undermines that very trust.
Warren says she isn't against trade, but she should be, since she knows damn well that since capital flow controls were lifted and globalization was implemented since 1980, the WORLD's inequality, rich get incredibly richer and everybody else get poorer, has increased.
Hundreds of tech companies line up to oppose TPP trade agreement
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/may/20/hundreds-tech-companies-oppose-tpp-trade-agreement
Senate Advances Fast-Track For Obama Trade Deals
Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee and lead sponsor of the measure. He nevertheless argued for passage, saying
the nation’s “economic health and prestige are on the line here."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/21/senate-trade-vote_n_7353138.html?ir=Politics&utm_campaign=05211 5&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Alert-politics&utm_content=FullStory&ncid=newsltushpmg00 000003
Obscure Government Do ent Shows Elizabeth Warren Is Right About TPP
It's worth pointing out that the United States already trades heavily with the other 11 nations included in the TPP talks. As Paul Krugman says, “this is not a trade agreement.
It's about intellectual property and dispute settlement; the big beneficiaries are likely to be pharma companies and firms that want to sue governments.”
Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) has been particularly critical of the so-called Investor State Dispute Settlement provisions, which would empower corporations to use international courts to sue the U.S. government and others who are enacting regulations and protections that harm their profits.
The Obama administration is arguing that the deal is instead about trade and increasing American exports abroad. They have set up a web page on the U.S. Trade Representative's (USTR) site listing the benefits of exports from each of the fifty states in order to argue for the Trans-Pacific agreement.
Yet an obscure government do ent put out by that very same office makes Warren's case for her.
The office puts out an annual report on “foreign trade barriers” around the world, going country by country to list complaints the U.S. government has about their laws with respect to commerce.
If you read the 2015 report, you'll quickly see that
many of the complaints are about laws designed to promote environment, labor, and anti-monopolistic practices – and relate only vaguely to the larger issue of trade and tariffs. The complaints seem more focused around opposing regulations that restrict the rights of multi-national corporations and their investors.
http://www.alternet.org/obscure-gove...ter1036748&t=1
Obama is ING LYING about TPP/TTIP.
WikiLeaks Releases Secret Do ents Related to Controversial US Trade Pact
Do ent dump regarding Trade in Services Agreement comes day after organization put $100,000 bounty on do ents from series of US trade treaties
Among the text leaked on Wednesday are Tisa’s annex on telecommunications services, an amendment that would standardize regulation of telecoms across member countries, according to WikiLeaks. Other do ents in the batch of files relate to e-commerce, transportation of living people and regulation of financial services corporations.
Unions, which fear heavy job losses once long-standing trade protections are dismantled, reacted with dismay following publication of the previously hidden do ents.
Public sector unions have sought protections for state funded services that could be threatened by increased compe ion. One proposal from Turkey that came to light following a previous leak of do ents would endorse health tourism across all the countries covered by the deal.
Under the Turkish plan, people with health problems in the US and Europe would be encouraged to visit neighbouring countries for cheaper treatment, with the cost being reimbursed by their own health service or insurance provider. The plan implied that Turkey hopes to become a major provider of health services to Europe’s ageing population, paid for by European taxpayers.
“The irony of the text containing repeated references to transparency, and an entire annex on transparency requiring governments to provide information useful to business, being negotiated in secret from the population exposes in whose interests these agreements are being made,”
http://www.alternet.org/wikileaks-releases-secret-do ents-related-controversial-us-trade-pact?akid=13179.187590.kD-Vys&rd=1&src=newsletter1037371&t=5
As 10Ks of US citizens have discovered, medical tourism is a great way to screw the American health care system rather than be screwed.
Last edited by boutons_deux; 06-04-2015 at 03:12 PM.
“Chocolate makers accused of leveraging ‘loophole’ on child slavery” [Confectionary News].
Right now, 19 U.S. Code § 1307 prohibits importation of goods made by slave labor, except when “goods, wares, articles, or merchandise so mined, produced, or manufactured” cannot be made in sufficient quan ies in the US to meet domestic demand.
However, this pro-slavery provision could not be abolished without setting up a trade barrier, so TPP would freeze it in place.
Another way of looking at the TPP, I suppose, is that if Lincoln’s United States had signed the TPP, it would have had to compensate British cotton manufacturers for “lost profits” from passing the Fourteenth Amendment.
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2015/06/200pm-water-cooler-6815.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&ut m_campaign=Feed%3A+NakedCapitalism+%28naked+capita lism%29
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