Stop the Global Corporate Coup! - Stop the TPP !
Yesterday, I listened to Jeff Santos speaking with one of my favourite guests, Cassidy Regan, speaking out against the TPP. ("What's that?") I have heard her about 1/2 dozen times now, on Thom Hartmann, NPR, The Power Hour, etc. I love the way she speaks. She delivers, describes and elucidates well, with a hipster-nerdy, confident voice. She has been speaking out against the secretly negotiated TPP, (Trans-Pacific Partnership), since at least 2012. This global trade (and MORE) agreement has been negotiated in secret for at least six years, with Obbama fully, secretly involved, encouraged by current legislation pushing for, "Fast Track."
"Fast Track," sounds nice. It probably first came about because Rush Limbaugh shot off his mouth about how those darned liberals keep getting in the way of freebie Capitalism, always protesting and voting against, "obviously-good," trade agreements. NAFTA was once such agreement, and everyone except 1/3 of the voters, (neither Dems or GOPpers), thought it was, "obviously-good".
Ross Perot, whom we no longer hear from because the lives of his family members were threatened, had big ears and everyone laughed - and oh ha ha look at that running mate, "What am I doing here?!" a ha ha ha... But, really, the main point of Ross Perot was that he opposed NAFTA. While he said there would be a huge, "sucking sound," of jobs leaving the country after NAFTA, most everyone fell for the Disney-like propaganda against him, and snickered like little gossipping school brats. None of those detractors had made billions of dollars, but they knew enough to dismiss his graphs and stats, um, because he had big ears.
There is a myth that the longer a person's earlobes, the wiser that person will probably be. Turns out, Ross Perot was 100% right about NAFTA - and there really was a giant sucking sound. Or, it was a combination of 1 million people, all gasping, after becoming jobless. Today, now that old boomers and new generations have been hitting the bricks, looking for cheap service jobs, and joining the Army, they hear the name, "Ross Perot," and they laugh, "Wasn't he the guy with the big ears?!"
One day, Americans will learrn that the TV is not a comfy, safe, vulnerable member of the family. We give our eyes and minds over to the point of its camera, the angle of its marketeers, instead of thinking for ourselves.
"What comes to mind when I say, 'Howard Dean'?
"Wasn't he the guy that made that big YELL? At some convention?"
[That 2004, "Dean Scream," crippled his run for President. Rather... The mediacrats made that yell cripple his run. (See Wiki, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Dean ). (In 2008, Howard Dean employed the genius, "Fifty-state strategy", and got Obbama elected). Dr. Howard Dean has been a big proponant of fairness in health, wealth and trade, in the Democratic tradition of progressive, Paul Wellstone. There are been a few ripples between him and Rahm Emanuel, and Barack Obamma].
I just want to insert a little tangent here - about wealth inequality. This actually pertains entirely to the subject. It's what it is all about. That, "giant sucking sound," after NAFTA, was the sound of poverty flooding into a vacuum. We are fools if we do not learn from that mistake. We all know the damage that poverty can do. It leads to stress, crime, lowered IQs, health problems, political instability, even wars. Thom Hartmann has spoken on this many times, citing stats. He, economist Martin Armstrong, and others, have predicted that rising resentment against the status quo as a result of economic inequality is likely to cause a serious economic and political crash by 2016. How will it help, when people see the politicians trying to enact a supra-legal trade agreement which will be as destructive as NAFTA on steroids?
Listening again, today, to Jeff Santos: I heard a wildly conservative cowboy call in, looking to do nothing but blame liberals, e.g., for expecting people to pay for other people's welfare. He accused Santos of calling for a, "redistribution of wealth." I thought about how myopic this view was. How it misses the bigger picture, where Common wealth brings up the decency, worth and productivity of all individuals. The true redistribution of wealth lies in the mechanisms of capitalism itself, where the wealth of one precludes the advancement of others. And so, the whole game becomes HOW TO KEEP THE OTHER GUYS DOWN, POOR, POWERLESS.
For example, someone has the opportunity to build an apartment building on a large parcel of land. Yes, the building houses and protects some people, supposedly allowing them to enter into the capitalist system... But - at a disadvantage, especially if their rents are prohibitive - which rents will always inch towards being. Rising rents become a perpetual drag, or additional handicap, on the poor. AND - when the rich person takes a tract of land, he or she is depriving the use of that tract from other builders, or from homeowners, or from community gardeners, AND from the wide discretion of the full community!
This sort of preclusion of opportunity occurs within every transaction - being geometrically damaging in its effect, the larger it is.
So, when global, mega-corporations throw their nets across the globe, and make their mammoth transactions, and purchases of property, investments, etc., with the advantage of POLITICAL POWER, and of economic and physical SCALE, they throw out of FREE TRADE, and fair employment, a massive amount of people! Competition, per se, does not drive prices down and improve general conditions, especially when it reaches a monopolistic BOTTLENECK, and when secondary costs more and more get foisted off on others, accumulating as drag at an increasing rate! This is why so-called, "free trade," is made into a fallacy, especially through the auspices of human greed and corruption.
A little later, on the Santos show, another caller called in, and emphatically gave many more examples of just what exactly, "redistribution of wealth," means... It means unfairness in hiring. It means abusive working conditions. It means rendering people disabled and powerless. It means injustice and corruption and cheating and taking. It means lying in advertising.
It means SECRET TRADE DEALS AMONG GREEDY GLOBAL CORPORATIONS, INTENDING TO BYPASS LAWS, MEANT TO PROFIT THE RICH A BIT, AND DRAIN THE NON-RICH FAR MORE.
I read a little story about how, in real life, like in my own life, poor people are made to remain poor - and poorer - simply by the relentless demands of extractive mechanisms of wealth - such as companies impunding your car: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025927418
Richest 1% of people own nearly half of global wealth, says report - The Guardian, Oct 14, 2014
Third World Plunge: Nearly 40 percent of Americans now make less than $20,000 a year - Natural News, Nov 14, 2014
It is now illegal to share food with the homeless in Florida - Natural News, Nov 26, 2014
Hartmann: The Crash of 2016 - Dem Now, Nov 12, 2013
''The Crash of 2016 Gets Closer Every Day'' - TH blog Jul 3, 2014
Financial and Civil Collapse by 2016
While the TPP is pushed on by a conspiracy of Democrats and Republicans, enticed and controlled by the lobbyists and puppeteers of gobal elites and the bankster class, the dangers and the consequences of it's impending impoverishments speaks to both side of the poor, and then both sides of the middle class. This is not a right-left issue, it is an issue of wealth exploitation, and of the global elites - in mega-corporations, in banks, in "royal" families, and in, "big government" - and it is an issue of national sovereignty and of personal freedom and well-being. Therefore, both sides of the rising LEFT-RIGHT ALLIANCE have been taking on the issue of the TPP. That is the good news. And, so, I repost this:
"Unstoppable: The Emerging Left-Right Alliance to Dismantle the Corporate State." - by Ralph Nader 2014
Amy Goodman Interview!: Ralph Nader discusses this topic, the TPP, GM Recall, Nuclear Power...
"Former presidential candidate and longtime consumer advocate Ralph Nader joins us to discuss his latest book, 'Unstoppable: The Emerging Left-Right Alliance to Dismantle the Corporate State.' Nader highlights the common concerns shared by a wide swath of the American public, regardless of political orientation, including mass government surveillance, opposing nebulous free trade agreements, reforming the criminal justice system, and punishing criminal behavior on Wall Street. Nader also discusses the U.S. push for the sweeping Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact, General Motors’ new bid to escape liability for its deadly ignition defect, the revived nuclear era under President Obama, and challenging U.S. militarism through the defense budget." - Read Transcript! - http://www.democracynow.org/2014/4/28/ralph_nader_on_tpp_gm_recall
Also: Robert Reich outlines six points of agreement between “Occupy” leftists and the “Tea Party” right: #6. Oppose trade agreements crafted by big corporations. Two decades ago Democrats and Republicans enacted the North American Free Trade Agreement. Since then populists in both parties have mounted increasing opposition to such agreements. The Trans-Pacific Partnership, drafted in secret by a handful of major corporations, is facing so strong a backlash from both Democrats and tea party Republicans that it’s nearly dead.
Find more about the New Left-Right Populism via my recent post here: http://o-c-c-u-p-y.livejournal.com/49993.html
Like NAFTA, the TPP, (if it goes through), will be regarded as a treaty, whether that is legal or not. Like NAFTA, as a, "treaty", it will trump the laws of any state. That means that injurious environmental, or economic, or privacy moves, pushed by foreign corporations, will be allowed to happen, even though your state may have great environmental or economic or privacy protections. And these disruptions of the people and habitats within states will be rubber-stamped by the Federal Government, being seen as in accordance with Federal law, even where they contradict previous laws. Thus, we are moved way closer to being powerless peons in a third world, banana republic. THIS IS REALLY WHAT IS HAPPENING.
Why would we be reduced so? Who would gain? The corporations, the banks, the rich, the politicians, the lawyers, the security industry, the privatised prisons, the foreign globalists... These would all make a profit, though they be but a numerical handful, which will be a far cry from the wealth that had been previously shared amongst the U.S. people, amongst the Commons, within Nature, and in Spirit. Humanity defiled. This creeping crap is two steps away from the horror of water-boarding.
Let me emphasize: This TPP, which is wide-ranging, (far beyond trade), will trump state, (and Federal), laws, (and PEOPLE, and businesses). It will do so after being secretly created for at least 6 years, by both Dems and GOPers, by and for the good of global corporations - NOT for free enterprise. And, it will possibly pass after Obbama is granted, "Fast Track," which further extends the illegality behind this juggernaut, (see below).
As has been happening under NAFTA, people clearly wronged by actions brought about by the agreement will NOT BE ABLE TO TAKE LEGAL ACTION AGAINST FOREIGN CORPORATIONS, as they would be able to do against domestic corporations. Furthermore, if groups of businesses make a complaint or file a suit against an injurious corporation, they may be punished - for being right - by being sued, even by the state or Federal governments.
It is no secret that secrecy has been the name of the game in this country for the last several decades. I have just posted, yesterday, some of the other secret sins Obbama has perpetrated, usually at the behest of the Bankster class. After secret negtiations w/ Big Pharm and Big Med, over Obamacare, public voices were forceful evicted from Congress. Another Obbama secret was negotiations with terriblists in the, Bergdahl/ Hostage Exchange, earlier this year. http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-06-07/terrorist-negotiation-101 / http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025050252 After that, I posted a comment about secrecy to sing_marly:
(Also reposted in, "The Daily State of the Madman Address," date unk)...
In fact, "we" have continued to negotiate behind the scenes. In fact, El Quano is a terriblist organisation which was created by the USA See Eye Aye, and which continues to serve US purposes of invading countries, now in Africa. Negotiating privately is THE name of the game. That is how they - including Obama - are trying to pass the unconstitutional TPP and the TAP "trade" agreements. Even JFK privately negotiated w/ the USSR during the Cuban Misssile Crisis, and agreed to silently remove the (provocative) nuuk misssiles in Turkey. And Ronald Reagan negotiated with the USSR on how to structure the collapse of that country, saying we would never send NATO into Ukraine, {"we" lied}), afterwards.
The global banks, who are more powerful than any country, are constantly secretly negotiating with drrrg and gnnn runners, and arranging politicians from different countries into wars and crises, all to turn a maximum profit, via loans, investments, and their children corporations - i.e., the global, "military-industrial complex."
The pattern is so solid, that I think it is very likely that the war in Ukraine has been conspired, and that Obama was completely aware of what Snowden was up to, etc. I think Obama/ Administration is familiar with some folks in Anonymous. The insane war-mongering from Kerry and Obama and Hagel, on Iran, and Ukraine, and especially on SYRIA, was - almost completely OBVIOUSLY to me, an endless smokescreen for secret negotiations - such as the "accidental" proposal by Putin to oversee dismantling of (legal) chemical weappons in Syria.
Mainly, what is given to the public are basic moralities like, "We never negotiate!," and lots of BS war-mongering rhetoric, because that's what grabs people and gets them to vote for the politicians. Unfortunately, Americans vote along emotions, mainly fear, right now. This diversion is just what the big banks want, as they continue to conspire to exploit wealth, as they have for thousands of years.
So, it should come as no surprise that the TPP is something big, that has been negotiated SECRETLY. But why? The obvious answer is that it, like many other deals since the late 1940's, is IN CONTRADICTION TO THE INTERESTS OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE.
Yes, WDC is a central hub of politics, where there is nothing but intense pressure and $$$ on every front, making it so that a politician can hardly move, unless seeing a harmless bribe dangling before him or her, promising some elicit escape from this maddening echo chamber into a paradise of frolicking debauchery. Sometimes, secrecy may seem to be the only way to evade constant scrutiny and blame; (See today's Gruber testimony).
And yes, the country is a huge ship that takes years, and power, to turn around. But, it has become clear that the ship has been steering slowly TO THE WRONG DIRECTION! And, even if one move is made right, it only ends up being cover for all the moves made wrongly.
And now, what is the latest convenient issue? Finally, after years of back-and-forth, the report of secret See-Eye-Aye Torture Report is released. Yay - another good thing happens. But why? Because they can afford it, using it to divert attention away from "FAST-TRACK" LEGISLATION AND THE TPP.
Republicans dismiss Senate torture report
The whole issue of diversions, like racial pile-ons; like shutting the government down; like Ebola, and ping, ping, ping - these have become predictable to me, like habitual moves in a chess game. It is true. Most large news events today are deliberately manipulated as diversions from deeper, more dangerous issues. "Attribute it to the stupidity of the American people, or whatever." - Jonathan Gruber, (para). So - this whole topic is too extensive to discuss here.
However, all I ask is that you don't take your eye off the REAL issues. And look less at reports of what HAVE happened, and more at moves of what SHALL happen!
STOP FAST-TRACK: Congress: Don't betray democracy! No "Fast Track" for the TPP
Congress is pushing legislation right now that would "Fast Track" the Trans-Pacific Partnership -- a secretive agreement negotiated behind closed doors by government bureaucrats and more than 600 corporate lobbyists. It threatens everything you care about: democracy, jobs, the environment, and the Internet.
We oppose fast track because "free" trade = corporate rule. ... The TPP is the superhighway on the Road to Serfdom. It is the legislative structure that accelerates emerging Global Corporate Feudalism.
TPP will result in the same job losses, low wages and environmental degradation that we have seen from NAFTA.
Contrary to supreme court decisions, corporations are not persons and money is not speech. We must amend the U.S. constitution to that end. Read more. - STOP FAST TRACK - http://www.stopfasttrack.com/ !
See the many other reasons why WE oppose "Fast Track". More than 100 organizations oppose "Fast Track". Includes a list of links to some great progressive orgs, (many not listed over at HuffPo, etc.) - including:
http://www.MoveOn.org
http://350.org/the-largest-corporate-power-grab-youve-never-heard-of/
http://www.CodePink.org
Wisconsin Fair Trade Coalition
http://movetoamendcentralohio.org/blog - and -
http://Occupy.com/
Learn more about the TPP - and take action!.... "It's NAFTA plus several other nightmarish laws (like the failed SOPA/PIPA) all rolled into one." - Flush the TPP! - ABOUT THIS CAMPAIGN
Recent Day of Action - w/ a good summary on the issue! - Dec 5, 2014
Flush the TPP! - PETITION and SLIDE SHOW
The TPP: Interview on Occupy Radio with Alisa Simmons
Expose The TPP - (Links galour)!
The Ed Show Just Handed Obamas A$$ back to him on TPP - Dem Underground, Dec 9, 2014
Trans-Pacific Trade Talks Resume With Almost No Media Coverage - OurFuture, Dec 8, 2014
TPP Negotiations Go Further Underground with Secret Meetings in Canada - Activist Post, July 2014
Trading Away our Digital Rights: More Nations Join TPP... - Electronic Frontier Foundation, Nov 19, 2012
TPP: The Biggest Global Threat To The Internet Since ACTA ... - gizmodo, May 1, 2013
Trans-Pacific Partnership Talks Begin For Global Internet Censorship Plan - Old-Thinker News, April 24, 2014
WikiLeaks publishes secret draft chapter of Trans-Pacific Partnership - The Guardian, Nov 13, 2013
Corporations want a "Fast Track" to control our climate, food and safety - Examiner, Nov 17, 2013
US-backed TPP to be ineffective without Russia, China - Putin - Sept, 2014 (?)
US Government Study Predicts TPP Trade Agreement Will Produce Practically No Extra Growth For Anyone - Tech Dirt, Dec 5, 2014