Trans-Pacific Partnership

Discussion in 'Politics' started by sculptor, Mar 10, 2015.

  1. sculptor Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    8,466
    OK?
    There seems to be a lot of position taking on this "agreement".
    Anyone have an insight or opinion?
     
  2. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  3. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    23,198
    Not sure what you spoke of but this probably has impact* on it:
    * As does China's wildly successful AIIB - 50 nations have now applied to join! Even Canada, the UK and most of the EU, much to Uncle Sam's dismay.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

    Daddy WarBucks doesn't call the shots anymore.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Apr 18, 2015
  4. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  5. Kittamaru Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Adieu, Sciforums. Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,938
    So... basically, China is just gobbling everyone up financially, instead of doing it the way Russia is attempting...?
     
  6. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  7. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    23,198
    Yes. US is fighting with obsolute WWII concepts and a basically dis functional government. Here is good discussion of this from: http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/us/2015-04/27/content_20546871.htm (today's issue: 4/27/15)

    Entering the 21st Century, how global leadership is being shaped by these two countries is vastly different given their contrasting political systems -- a somewhat dysfunctional democracy versus highly efficient authoritarianism.

    For America, the turning point was President George W. Bush's attack on Iraq that not only put the U. S. in the center of the Islamic conflicts and chaos throughout the Middle East, but tarnished America's indisputable standing as a world leader. It will not end, as evidence by the Republican's leading candidate to be the next president, Jeb Bush, who recently declared that as president he will order the U.S. military to root out all the "barbarians" and "evildoers" around the globe. He is less hawkish than the other Republicans running for president.

    America's presumed role as global policeman is not the only problem. President Barack Obama's efforts to assert leadership internationally is being undermined within his own country. The Obama Administration led the effort in negotiations that would preclude Iran from developing nuclear weapons and ending international sanctions. Before the agreement was finalized, a newly elected U.S. Senator obtained 47 signatures on a letter that clearly undercut America's leadership role among the G7 counties heavily committed to this historic action. Did these Senators have concerns about the terms of the agreement, not known at the time, or was it more about Israel President Netanyahu's defiant trip to Washington and the AIPAC's generous contributions to the Senators campaigns.

    President Obama's other initiative, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) involving twelve countries, is also being undermined, this time by his own Party. Organized labor support is the lifeblood of many Democrats who must seek election every two years. The union leaders' message to any Democratic Congressman who votes for either the Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) or the trade agreement itself, is made crystal clear: "we will cut the spigot off on future donations to your campaign."

    Both the Jewish lobby and union leaders are scoring big time but they are also weakening their own president's leadership and America's standing in today's world. So many special interest groups now own parts of the U.S. Congress that the American public has little say on the outcome of these issues.

    By contrast, China's President Xu's rising stature and influence is being felt in capitols all around the world. His proposed Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) has gained rapid traction, signing up 57 countries as founding members despite America's plea to its allies not join the Chinese initiative. This is obviously a rival to the American-backed World Bank, but yet another illustration of China taking the lead and America struggling to maintain its super-power status.
     
  8. iceaura Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    30,994
    One of the advantages of a centrally planned economy is that one can easily use economic favoritism and punishment for political coercion and leverage toward political ends.

    American corporations don't take orders from their government - hell, they barely have to pay taxes - so the US has only the military option.

    Or the non-imperial option - but that was buried in WWI.
     
  9. Trippy ALEA IACTA EST Staff Member

    Messages:
    10,890
    Over here (a non US jurisdiction which is party to it) the opposition to it has a couple of main aspects.

    1. The secrecy - in short, our own government is telling us next to nothing about what it's signing us up for and the leaks we have seen we don't like.
    2. What amounts to a loss of sovereignty - there are clauses in it that effectively allow american run corporations to take foreign governments to court over things like plain ciggarete packaging (which is already happening in Australia anyway) and effectively dictate domestic policy, we look at how agreements like NAFTA have been abused by US corporations and we neither like it nor want a part of it.
    3. Over here there is a general opposition to the American theocratic-pahllocratic hegemony, especially after some of the poor treatment that our state has received at the hands of the US administration in retaliation for exercising our independence.

    Those that are opposed to it do not want to see corporate control of the government escallated the levels observed in the US.
     
  10. iceaura Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    30,994
     
  11. sculptor Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    8,466
    The United States is in the final stages of negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a massive free-trade agreement with Mexico, Canada, Japan, Singapore and seven other countries. Who will benefit from the TPP? American workers? Consumers? Small businesses? Taxpayers? Or the biggest multinational corporations in the world?

    One strong hint is buried in the fine print of the closely guarded draft. The provision, an increasingly common feature of trade agreements, is called “Investor-State Dispute Settlement,” or ISDS. The name may sound mild, but don’t be fooled. Agreeing to ISDS in this enormous new treaty would tilt the playing field in the United States further in favor of big multinational corporations. Worse, it would undermine U.S. sovereignty.

    ISDS would allow foreign companies to challenge U.S. laws — and potentially to pick up huge payouts from taxpayers — without ever stepping foot in a U.S. court. Here’s how it would work. Imagine that the United States bans a toxic chemical that is often added to gasoline because of its health and environmental consequences. If a foreign company that makes the toxic chemical opposes the law, it would normally have to challenge it in a U.S. court. But with ISDS, the company could skip the U.S. courts and go before an international panel of arbitrators. If the company won, the ruling couldn’t be challenged in U.S. courts, and the arbitration panel could require American taxpayers to cough up millions — and even billions — of dollars in damages.


    If that seems shocking, buckle your seat belt. ISDS could lead to gigantic fines, but it wouldn’t employ independent judges. Instead, highly paid corporate lawyers would go back and forth between representing corporations one day and sitting in judgment the next. Maybe that makes sense in an arbitration between two corporations, but not in cases between corporations and governments. If you’re a lawyer looking to maintain or attract high-paying corporate clients, how likely are you to rule against those corporations when it’s your turn in the judge’s seat?


    If the tilt toward giant corporations wasn’t clear enough, consider who would get to use this special court: only international investors, which are, by and large, big corporations. So if a Vietnamese company with U.S. operations wanted to challenge an increase in the U.S. minimum wage, it could use ISDS. But if an American labor union believed Vietnam was allowing Vietnamese companies to pay slave wages in violation of trade commitments, the union would have to make its case in the Vietnamese courts.

    Why create these rigged, pseudo-courts at all? What’s so wrong with the U.S. judicial system? Nothing, actually. But after World War II, some investors worried about plunking down their money in developing countries, where the legal systems were not as dependable. They were concerned that a corporation might build a plant one day only to watch a dictator confiscate it the next. To encourage foreign investment in countries with weak legal systems, the United States and other nations began to include ISDS in trade agreements.

    Those justifications don’t make sense anymore, if they ever did. Countries in the TPP are hardly emerging economies with weak legal systems. Australia and Japan have well-developed, well-respected legal systems, and multinational corporations navigate those systems every day, but ISDS would preempt their courts too. And to the extent there are countries that are riskier politically, market competition can solve the problem. Countries that respect property rights and the rule of law — such as the United States — should be more competitive, and if a company wants to invest in a country with a weak legal system, then it should buy political-risk insurance.

    The use of ISDS is on the rise around the globe. From 1959 to 2002, there were fewer than 100 ISDS claims worldwide. But in 2012 alone, there were58 cases. Recent cases include a French company that sued Egypt because Egypt raised its minimum wage, a Swedish company that sued Germanybecause Germany decided to phase out nuclear power after Japan’s Fukushima disaster, and a Dutch company that sued the Czech Republic because the Czechs didn’t bail out a bank that the company partially owned. U.S. corporations have also gotten in on the action: Philip Morris is trying to use ISDS to stop Uruguay from implementing new tobacco regulations intended to cut smoking rates.

    ISDS advocates point out that, so far, this process hasn’t harmed the United States. And our negotiators, who refuse to share the text of the TPP publicly, assure us that it will include a bigger, better version of ISDS that will protect our ability to regulate in the public interest. But with the number of ISDS cases exploding and more and more multinational corporations headquartered abroad, it is only a matter of time before such a challenge does serious damage here. Replacing the U.S. legal system with a complex and unnecessary alternative — on the assumption that nothing could possibly go wrong — seems like a really bad idea

    This isn’t a partisan issue. Conservatives who believe in U.S. sovereignty should be outraged that ISDS would shift power from American courts, whose authority is derived from our Constitution, to unaccountable international tribunals. Libertarians should be offended that ISDS effectively would offer a free taxpayer subsidy to countries with weak legal systems. And progressives should oppose ISDS because it would allow big multinationals to weaken labor and environmental rules.

    Giving foreign corporations special rights to challenge our laws outside of our legal system would be a bad deal. If a final TPP agreement includes Investor-State Dispute Settlement, the only winners will be multinational corporations.

    By Elizabeth Warren
     
  12. sculptor Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    8,466
    The senate voted to block "fast track".
     
  13. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    23,198
    Yes and Obama is not likely to get to sign it or the trade agreement with Europe. Both are sort of OTE (Over Taken by Events).

    I.e. China is rapidly expanding its trade agreements and about 45 nations have applied become "charter members" of China's AIIB, the de facto rival of the US controlled world bank. Quite a few other seem to be planning to apply before the dead line for charter membership expires (Perhaps even Japan as China is softening its "islands dispute" with Japan, at least for now!)
     
    Last edited by a moderator: May 13, 2015
  14. sculptor Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    8,466
    My country really needs to stop wasting money on military adventurism and corporate wellfare, and focus on building the infrastructure and on education and the welfare of my fellow citizens.
    Every day that we waste we see more disenchantment, alienation, poverty and disunion.
    If our idiot leaders could actually get their collective heads out of their collective assholes:
    I'll not have to concede this century to China.
     
    Trippy and joepistole like this.
  15. joepistole Deacon Blues Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    22,910
    And where is here? You may find it odd, but those are pretty much the same reasons folks in the US oppose the trade agreement. Just replace the US with foreign and you could be making the argument for the US opposition to this trade agreement.

    American employers have exported jobs to countries with cheap labor and little if any environmental regulation. In effect, NAFTA allowed US corporations to evade pollution laws and avail themselves of cheap labor. The name free trade agreement is a bit of a misnomer. You don't need thousands of pages of regulation to effect free trade. Some Americans, including myself, were none too happy about the lack of reciprocity afforded Americans in NAFTA.

    But when all is said and done, we need a Pacific trade agreement because we need trade. All the Pacific countries need trade. And if it is a fair agreement, I expect everyone will not be happy with it, because everyone will have to give something up.
     
    Last edited: May 13, 2015
  16. sculptor Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    8,466
    here is Iowa, U.S.A.
     
  17. Seattle Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    8,849
    Regardless of certain provisions that people are mentioning the bottom line for most opponents of this agreement is that they aren't for free trade and it wouldn't matter what the agreement was.

    Many of the same people want tariffs to ensure that manufacturing jobs stay in the U.S.

    This just isn't going to happen.
     
  18. Trippy ALEA IACTA EST Staff Member

    Messages:
    10,890
    New Zilund

    A lot of us are getting sick of the government bending itself backwards over the table to 'accomodate' 'Murica.

    Probably less off than you might think.

    I actually agree with you here. I accept that globalism is a neccessary step in the transition to a Type II civilization, however, I do not think that the TPPA represents the best path towards that ends.
     
  19. sculptor Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    8,466
    The thing is that secrecy involved on the TPP flies in the face of earlier promises from our President:

    "My Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government. We will work together to ensure the public trust and establish a system of transparency, public participation, and collaboration. Openness will strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness in Government."

    Words really should have some meaning!
    Trust is a difficult thing to earn and an easy thing to lose.
     
  20. joepistole Deacon Blues Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    22,910
    I don't think it does. Did anyone really expect Obama to divulge state secrets? What Obama actually promised was and unprecedented level of openness and transparency during his presidency. In recent decades these trade agreements have never been transparent to the general public, Obama hasn't broken his promise. Obama certainly isn't being less transparent.

    https://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/TransparencyandOpenGovernment/
     
    Last edited: May 13, 2015
  21. sculptor Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    8,466
    What about a trade agreement would be considered a significant state secret that could endanger the citizens of the U.S.A.?

    I once had a ts+++ clearance, and from my perspective, the "secrecy" bullshit was almost all smoke and mirrors. 'Twas a game for spies, national, political, and industrial with little real substance.
    Much more like a good old boy's network wherein those on the inside had "secret" knowledge denied to the rest of the populace.

    I could readily acknowledge that keeping things like the launch codes, and associated encryption and frequencies secret has a value for "the greater good".
    But a trade agreement? Seriously? What in hell did/do they want to hide? And, (perhaps more importantly) WHY?
     
  22. joepistole Deacon Blues Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    22,910
    How has New Zealand bent over backward to accommodate "Murica"? Your economy is mostly based on agricultural, minerals and tourism.
    Why? What is so special about the TPPA? The fact is any trade agreement worth its salt will not please everyone. Without secrecy, negotiations would become sidetracked, demagogued and nothing would get done.
     
  23. joepistole Deacon Blues Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    22,910
    Well, there are a lot of state secrets. If you had a security clearance you should know there are a range of security levels and clearances and for a variety of reasons ranging from employee personal information, criminal investigations, to spying and military secrets. I would imagine trade treaties would fall into the confidential classification. As I said before, trade treaties in recent decades have been conducted in relative secrecy, because as clearly demonstrated in this thread, would become sidetracked with demagoguery. In order to get agreement, some level of confidentiality is needed. Have you ever tried to get hundreds of people to come to an agreement on something? It can be very difficult, especially when you have thousands of competing interests each with a stake in the outcome.
     

Share This Page