All Discussions Tagged 'Partnership' - 12160 Social Network2024-03-28T22:16:24Zhttps://12160.info/forum/topic/listForTag?tag=Partnership&feed=yes&xn_auth=noI Am Jason The Son Of AKA Anonymoustag:12160.info,2017-05-04:2649739:Topic:16813262017-05-04T00:24:03.184ZAka Anonymoushttps://12160.info/profile/AkaAnonymous
<p> I Am Jason The Son Of AKA Anonymous, my dad has died, it was his wish for me to continue his work. I will do my best, and it will be up to the guy who runs this site, if I am allowed to stay.</p>
<p> Let me tell you about my dad, he was very intelligent, elite within his own rights. As he grew older, he lost his edge with age. Mom said he became to caring for the rights of others, and he let go of a fight he was winning, because of us. He feared for our lives.</p>
<p> England is a cold and…</p>
<p> I Am Jason The Son Of AKA Anonymous, my dad has died, it was his wish for me to continue his work. I will do my best, and it will be up to the guy who runs this site, if I am allowed to stay.</p>
<p> Let me tell you about my dad, he was very intelligent, elite within his own rights. As he grew older, he lost his edge with age. Mom said he became to caring for the rights of others, and he let go of a fight he was winning, because of us. He feared for our lives.</p>
<p> England is a cold and controlling country, which has reached in and all most taken all of the Sovereignty Right to Americans, through The United States Constitution. Soon you may lose all your rights to the UK's UN Agendas.</p>
<p> This was sent to my dad, I looked at it for over a hour, tell me how I should explain to Americans that England now controls 40% of the World ?</p>
<p> This was posted by a Mr. Hank Jordan,</p>
<h1>Its Not Over: Transpacific Economic Partnership Agreement (TPP) (TPA) Exposed</h1>
<p>The TPA Legislation, that Ted Cruz helped organize for and voted for, was approved, but a secret back door vote took place and <strong>Passed</strong>, a secret deal, behind doors of the <strong>Obama Administration</strong> took place. The following below is the 3 known so called Treaties also called Laws Of The Land, Like NAFTA and Obamacare, is a stepping stone against the Sovereignty and Rights of the American People according to God and the United States Constitution.</p>
<p> Now what I do not understand, what will Donald Trump do with the New Laws Of The Land, that was stated, TPP was not approved by Congress. Seeing how the UN UK now claims sovereignty over America and Americans. The vote took place, a digital world connected to the White House In Washington DC and the UN.</p>
<p> Ted Cruz, Obama, and many others betrayed America, the fight has only started.</p>
<p><a href="https://api.ning.com:/files/zuNdr-kLfKXbVSiEyaLM6xxUSqhRDLizfnmO8DyumQ-k4Dhp0yaIr1NGbT6A5vYZpwmA59Wz5Ql0b1tc6Ez2hNWjhHURELCI/GettyImages184060277.jpg" target="_self"><img src="https://api.ning.com:/files/zuNdr-kLfKXbVSiEyaLM6xxUSqhRDLizfnmO8DyumQ-k4Dhp0yaIr1NGbT6A5vYZpwmA59Wz5Ql0b1tc6Ez2hNWjhHURELCI/GettyImages184060277.jpg?width=750" class="align-center" width="750"/></a><a href="https://api.ning.com:/files/zuNdr-kLfKVLA*n5Ap0NGbaQziRSwvgpciCr*zerOMVVX5IECzM7OukoZmktZ8kZRSlMdBJDXcVKoEmyR2oxH0MvBJkC7ErJ/treaty400x224.png" target="_self"><img src="https://api.ning.com:/files/zuNdr-kLfKVLA*n5Ap0NGbaQziRSwvgpciCr*zerOMVVX5IECzM7OukoZmktZ8kZRSlMdBJDXcVKoEmyR2oxH0MvBJkC7ErJ/treaty400x224.png" class="align-left" width="400"/></a></p>
<p>TISA The Treaty Was Approved, still pending on TPP.</p>
<p>TTIP Approved- Pending.........</p>
<div class="_cwc"><div class="_sgd"><div class="_qgd"><b>Signed</b>: TBA</div>
<div class="_pgd"><b>Drafted</b>: TBA</div>
</div>
<div class="_WQd"><div class="_qgd"><b>Effective</b>: Not yet in force</div>
</div>
</div>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p>Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) <b>Signed</b>: 4 February 2016; 14 months ago</p>
<p><b>Drafted</b>: 5 October 2015; 18 months ago</p>
<div class="_qgd"><b>Effective</b>: Not yet in enforcement</div>
<p>English (prevailing in the case pending issues)</p>
<p>The <b>Trans-Pacific Partnership</b> (<b>TPP</b>), or the <b>Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement</b> (<b>TPPA</b>), is a <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trade_agreement" title="Trade agreement">trade agreement</a> between <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia" title="Australia">Australia</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brunei" title="Brunei">Brunei</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada" title="Canada">Canada</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chile" title="Chile">Chile</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japan" title="Japan">Japan</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia" title="Malaysia">Malaysia</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico" title="Mexico">Mexico</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand" title="New Zealand">New Zealand</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peru" title="Peru">Peru</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singapore" title="Singapore">Singapore</a>, the <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States" title="United States">United States</a> (until 23 January 2017) and <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam" title="Vietnam">Vietnam</a>.</p>
<p>The finalized proposal was signed on 4 February 2016 in Auckland, New Zealand, concluding seven years of negotiations. It currently cannot be ratified due to U.S. withdrawal from the agreement on 23 January 2017. The former Obama administration claimed that the agreement aimed to "promote economic growth; support the creation and retention of jobs; enhance innovation, productivity and competitiveness; raise living standards; reduce poverty in the signatories' countries; and promote transparency, good governance, and enhanced labor and environmental protections." The TPP contains measures to lower both <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-tariff_barriers_to_trade" title="Non-tariff barriers to trade">non-tariff</a> and tariff <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trade_barriers" class="mw-redirect" title="Trade barriers">barriers to trade</a>, and establish an <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Investor-state_dispute_settlement" title="Investor-state dispute settlement">investor-state dispute settlement</a> (ISDS) mechanism.</p>
<p>The TPP began as an expansion of the <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trans-Pacific_Strategic_Economic_Partnership_Agreement" title="Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement">Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement</a> (TPSEP or P4) signed by <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brunei" title="Brunei">Brunei</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chile" title="Chile">Chile</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand" title="New Zealand">New Zealand</a>, and <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singapore" title="Singapore">Singapore</a> in 2005. Beginning in 2008, additional countries joined the discussion for a broader agreement: <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia" title="Australia">Australia</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada" title="Canada">Canada</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japan" title="Japan">Japan</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia" title="Malaysia">Malaysia</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico" title="Mexico">Mexico</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peru" title="Peru">Peru</a>, the <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States" title="United States">United States</a>, and <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam" title="Vietnam">Vietnam</a>, bringing the total number of countries participating in the negotiations to twelve. Current trade agreements between participating countries, such as the <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Free_Trade_Agreement" title="North American Free Trade Agreement">North American Free Trade Agreement</a>, will be reduced to those provisions that do not conflict with the TPP or provide greater trade liberalization than the TPP.<sup id="cite_ref-9" class="reference"><a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trans-Pacific_Partnership#cite_note-9">[9]</a></sup> The Obama administration considered the TPP a companion agreement to the proposed <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transatlantic_Trade_and_Investment_Partnership" title="Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership">Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership</a> (TTIP), a broadly similar agreement between the U.S. and the <a rel="nofollow" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union" title="European Union">European Union</a>.</p>
<p>TISA, TTIP and TPP continue to be negotiated in secret, as <a rel="nofollow" href="https://wikileaks.org/tisa/#September%2015,%202016%20Publication" target="_blank">WikiLeaks</a> recently released a new leak from the updated <strong>TISA (Trade in Services Agreement) </strong>core text and annexes. If you want to know what TISA means in 7 words, it’s this: total privatization and commodification of public services.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, <strong>once something is privatized, it becomes very difficult to ever get it back into the public hands</strong>. Of the <strong>3 T-Treaties</strong>, TISA is the largest, encompassing 24 countries (including blocs such as the EU) which produce over 2/3 of global GDP, yet has received the least attention.</p>
<p>Protests against the <strong>TTIP</strong> (Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, negotiated primarily between the US and EU) have been strong, to the point where several European government officials have publicly stated that the treaty doesn’t look like it will pass. Protests have also been strong against the <strong>TPP</strong> (Trans Pacific Partnership, negotiated primarily among the US, Japan, Canada, Australia and other Pacific nations).</p>
<p>Since the worldwide economy is shifting from being product-based to being service-based, TISA has the potential to become one of the most important economics treaties on Earth. Already, according to 2015 figures from the World Bank, <a rel="nofollow" href="http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.SRV.TETC.ZS" target="_blank">service industries account for</a> 78% of US GDP and 74% of EU GDP. Together, the 3 T-Treaties promise to cement massive control in the hands of the international <strong>corporatocracy</strong>, disempowering sovereign states and preventing governments from setting laws, regulations and policy to protect their nations, markets and people.</p>
<h3>All About the Corporatocracy</h3>
<p>It’s laughable to hear politicians defend TISA and the other treaties by trying to claim they will be good for jobs or the economy. For most people in TISA, TTIP and TPP affected nations, the results will be disastrous, as discussed in <a rel="nofollow" href="http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/how-tpp-will-affect-you/" target="_blank">How the TPP is Going to Affect You.</a> The aim of these treaties is to open up markets for multinational corporations to exploit new labor and consumer markets – with less governmental regulation than before. These treaties give the corporatocracy the power to force down wages. This <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.ourworldisnotforsale.org/sites/default/files/Memo-Proposed%20TISA%20March%202014.pdf" target="_blank">article</a> talks about the proposed TISA agreement:</p>
<blockquote><p>“The “disciplines,” or treaty rules, would provide foreign services providers free access to domestic markets at “no less favorable” conditions than domestic suppliers and would restrict governments’ ability to regulate services. This would essentially change the regulation of many public and privatized or commercial services from serving the public interest to serving the profit interests of private, foreign corporations.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>You may not like tyrannical governments, but tyrannical corporations are even worse, because at least a government can be petitioned, replaced or overthrown; private corporations answer to no one except their shareholders. The point of government is protect the rights of its citizens, which includes regulating creatures like corporations who are created for the sole purpose of making as much money as possible above anything else. TISA, TTIP and TPP all gut the ability of national governments to enact laws to protect their land and citizens from marauding foreign multinationals. It’s corporate hegemony, pure and simple.</p>
<p><strong>TISA, TTIP and TPP would disallow GMO and country-of-origin labelin</strong>g, would essentially make Google, Facebook and any website owner a “copyright cop”, and would even require all signatory states to make their national laws conform (and be subordinate to) the ones in these treaties!</p>
<h3>ISDS<strong> (Investor State Dispute Settlement)</strong>: Parallel Legal System in All 3 T-Treaties</h3>
<p>Much has already been written about <strong>the ISDS (Investor State Dispute Settlement)</strong>, but for those who don’t know, the <strong>ISDS is a parallel legal system that only multinationals have access to.</strong> People, local companies and even national governments do not have access to it. The ISDS tribunal is staffed (of course) with corporate lawyers. ISDS even gives corporations the power to get legal damages in “expected profit”. The way it is written, a Vietnamese phone company, for example, could bring its company (with its workers paying its wages) into the US, could set up business there, and could sue if the local, state or national government tried to stop them.</p>
<h3>Opposition to TISA, TTIP and TPP Growing</h3>
<p>Despite the secrecy surrounding TISA, TTIP and TPP, the public and nations states alike have gained enough knowledge of them to mount widespread opposition. Recently (and surprisingly) <a rel="nofollow" href="http://commondreams.org/news/2016/09/16/tpp-ropes-its-corporate-power-vs-people-power-capitol-hill" target="_blank">Vietnam refused to ratify the TPP</a>, even though some considered it would benefit greatly from the clauses dealing with wage rates. Meanwhile, literally hundreds of thousands of people protested the TTIP in Germany. The French Government has opposed the deal (French Prime Minister Manuel Valls demanded a finish to the talks) and German Vice-Chancellor and Economy Minister <a rel="nofollow" href="http://bigstory.ap.org/article/611ff828b5ed44d5ad56ab46e0781e52/german-economy-minister-says-eu-us-trade-talks-have-failed" target="_blank">Sigmar Gabriel</a> revealed that TTIP negotiations had basically failed. He stated:</p>
<blockquote><p>“In my opinion, the negotiations with the United States have de facto failed, even though nobody is really admitting it … Europeans must not give in to (the Americans’) demands.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Those American demands he is referring to are things like Europeans accepting hormone-filled beef and chlorine-filled chicken. Europe’s food standards are much higher than those of the US, which has been more influenced and corrupted by <a rel="nofollow" href="http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/big-pharma-big-agra-mergers-synthetic-agenda/" target="_blank">Big Agra and Big Biotech</a> (and their toxic array of pesticides and GMOs) more than the EU. In the US, around 70% of supermarket food is GMO and around 90% of beef is made using growth hormones, whereas the GMO rate in the EU is way lower, and hormone-fed beef is banned.</p>
<div style="width: 461px;" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><a rel="nofollow" href="http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/TISA-economic-warfare-against-BRICS.jpg"><img src="http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/TISA-economic-warfare-against-BRICS-300x165.jpg" alt="" height="248" width="451"/></a><p class="wp-caption-text">TISA, TTIP and TTP: calculated economic warfare against the BRICS nations.</p>
</div>
<h3>3 T-Treaties: Economic Warfare Against BRICS</h3>
<p>As much as TISA, TTIP and TTP embolden multinational corporations, the 3 T-Treaties also serve another agenda: the geopolitical plan for the US and allies to isolate the BRICS nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa). To understand this, you need to realize that the so-called New World Order is very much an Anglo-American-Zionist dominated agenda. It’s all about the push towards global governance or world government, by centralizing power in every area of life: political, military, educational, financial and more. TISA, TTIP and TPP represent nothing less than <strong>economic warfare</strong> against BRICS.</p>
<p><strong>TTIP forges ties with the EU and surrounding nations, but deliberately excludes Russia. TPP forges ties with Japan, other Pacific nations and some South American nations, but deliberately excludes China, India and Brazil.</strong> TISA forges ties with countries all over the world (sort of a combination of TTIP and TPP) but none of them are the 5 BRICS countries. <strong>The plan is obvious: isolate, ostracize and weaken any nation which dares to challenge US supremacy</strong>. This goes hand-in-hand with US military agenda (the <a rel="nofollow" href="http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/pivot-to-asia-militarization-of-pacific/" target="_blank">Pivot to Asia</a>) which aims to inflict the same kind of weakening in a military sense.</p>
<h3><a rel="nofollow" href="http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/power-grab.jpg"><img class="alignleft" src="http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/power-grab-300x225.jpg" alt="power grab" height="225" width="300"/></a></h3>
<h3>Conclusion: TISA, TTIP and TTP are a Colossal Power Grab</h3>
<p>TISA, TTIP and TTP are an attempt to rewrite the playing rules for a massive amount of the world economy, bring financial pressure to bear down upon the perceived opponents and enemies of the US, consolidate more power for the corporatocracy, open up new markets for exploitation without regulation, and make the public even more powerless against Big Money. These 3 T-Treaties (and others like them such as CETA being negotiated between Canada and the EU) must be first brought out of secrecy and under scrutiny. They remove sovereignty and decision-making ability away from the local and regional level. It’s yet more <strong>centralization of power</strong> – the overriding theme of the New World Order agenda. That reason alone is hopefully sufficient for anyone unsure about these T-Treaties, and new to the sphere of conspiracy research, to regard them with a large dose of distrust.</p>
<p><em><strong>Makia Freeman</strong> is the editor of alternative news / independent media site <a rel="nofollow" href="http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/" target="_blank">The Freedom Articles</a> and senior researcher at <a rel="nofollow" href="http://toolsforfreedom.com/" target="_blank">ToolsForFreedom.com</a> (<a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.facebook.com/toolsforfreedom" target="_blank">FaceBook</a> here), writing on many aspects of truth and freedom, from exposing aspects of the worldwide conspiracy to suggesting solutions for how humanity can create a new system of peace and abundance.</em></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><strong><span style="font-size: small;">Sources:</span></strong></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;">*<a rel="nofollow" href="https://wikileaks.org/tisa/#September%2015,%202016%20Publication">https://wikileaks.org/tisa/#September%2015,%202016%20Publication</a></span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;">*<a rel="nofollow" href="http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.SRV.TETC.ZS">http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.SRV.TETC.ZS</a></span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;">*<a rel="nofollow" href="http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/how-tpp-will-affect-you/">http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/how-tpp-will-affect-you/</a></span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;">*<a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.ourworldisnotforsale.org/sites/default/files/Memo-Proposed%20TISA%20March%202014.pdf">http://www.ourworldisnotforsale.org/sites/default/files/Memo-Propos...</a></span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;">*<a rel="nofollow" href="http://commondreams.org/news/2016/09/16/tpp-ropes-its-corporate-power-vs-people-power-capitol-hill">http://commondreams.org/news/2016/09/16/tpp-ropes-its-corporate-pow...</a></span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;">*<a rel="nofollow" href="http://bigstory.ap.org/article/611ff828b5ed44d5ad56ab46e0781e52/german-economy-minister-says-eu-us-trade-talks-have-failed">http://bigstory.ap.org/article/611ff828b5ed44d5ad56ab46e0781e52/ger...</a></span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;">*<a rel="nofollow" href="http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/big-pharma-big-agra-mergers-synthetic-agenda/">http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/big-pharma-big-agra-mer...</a></span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;">*<a rel="nofollow" href="http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/pivot-to-asia-militarization-of-pacific/">http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/pivot-to-asia-militariz...</a></span></p>
<div class="copyright">The original source of this article is <a rel="nofollow" href="http://freedom-articles.toolsforfreedom.com/tisa-ttip-ttp-hegemony-corporatocracy/" target="_blank">The Freedom Articles</a></div>
<div class="copyright"></div> New Leak Confirms The Secretive Trans-Pacific Partnership Is A Horrorshowtag:12160.info,2015-07-30:2649739:Topic:15789512015-07-30T05:06:21.982ZCentral Scrutinizerhttps://12160.info/profile/H0llyw00d
<p></p>
<p><a href="http://govtslaves.info/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/tpp2.png"><img alt="tpp2" class="size-full wp-image-49592 alignleft" height="300" src="http://govtslaves.info/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/tpp2.png" width="300"></img></a> At a luxury hotel in Maui, representatives from the 12 countries participating in the highly controversial and secretive Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal <a href="https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/07/secret-tpp-talks-continue-hawaii-deal-grows-more-controversial">are negotiating</a> behind closed doors. Thanks to a secret letter from a 2013 meeting, released today by WikiLeaks, we now have a…</p>
<p></p>
<p><a href="http://govtslaves.info/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/tpp2.png"><img class="size-full wp-image-49592 alignleft" src="http://govtslaves.info/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/tpp2.png" alt="tpp2" width="300" height="300"/></a> At a luxury hotel in Maui, representatives from the 12 countries participating in the highly controversial and secretive Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal <a href="https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/07/secret-tpp-talks-continue-hawaii-deal-grows-more-controversial">are negotiating</a> behind closed doors. Thanks to a secret letter from a 2013 meeting, released today by WikiLeaks, we now have a clearer idea of what they’re discussing.</p>
<p>Unsurprisingly, based on <a href="http://motherboard.vice.com/tag/Trans-Pacific+Partnership">what we know</a> about the Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, so far, the letter is mostly about limiting the power of government in favour of private commercial development.</p>
<p>The TPP is a massive free trade deal that is set to impact everything from the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/feb/23/medicines-forecast-to-cost-taxpayers-millions-more-in-secret-tpp-trade-deal">cost of medicine</a> in Australia, to <a href="http://www.theglobeandmail.com/try-it-now/?articleId=25748009">milk production</a> in Canada, to <a href="http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the-trans-pacific-partnership-is-still-the-enemy-of-the-internet">internet governance</a> the world over. <a href="https://wikileaks.org/tpp-soe-minister/WikiLeaks-TPP-SOE-Ministerial-Guidance.pdf">The letter</a> was drafted for a ministerial meeting of the TPP countries in early December, 2013, and seeks guidance on key topics relating to the negotiations. Namely, how <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State-owned_enterprise">state-owned enterprises</a> (SOEs) should be treated under the trade deal.</p>
<p>According to the letter, “the majority of TPP countries” support obligations for these companies—which can include public utilities, telecommunication providers, mining companies, and <a href="http://www.temasek.com.sg/">state-run investment firms</a>—that “go beyond existing obligations” laid out in existing free trade agreements and by the World Trade Organization.</p>
<blockquote class="quote"><h3>State-owned enterprises would be obligated to ‘act on the basis of commercial considerations’</h3>
</blockquote>
<p>Such agreed-upon obligations would require SOEs to “act on the basis of commercial considerations,” the letter states, and governments should regulate both state-owned businesses and private enterprises with impartiality. State-owned businesses would also not be allowed to discriminate against private companies when purchasing or selling goods, the letter suggests.</p>
<p>“SOEs are almost always state-owned because they have functions other than those that are merely commercial,” Jane Kelsey, a law professor at the University of Auckland, wrote in <a href="https://wikileaks.org/tpp-soe-minister/analysis/WikiLeaks-TPP-Expert-Analysis-SOE-Ministerial-Guidance.pdf">an analysis</a> that accompanied the document, “such as guaranteed access to important services, or because social, cultural, development and commercial functions are inextricably intertwined.”</p>
<p>Relatively wealthy nations, like Canada, have <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crown_corporations_of_Canada">many</a> government-owned businesses, and the role of SOEs in developing nations has been <a href="http://esa.un.org/techcoop/documents/PN_SOEReformNote.pdf">noted by the UN</a> as being extremely important since they don’t follow market dynamics which may disadvantage poorer citizens. A <a href="http://www.voxeu.org/article/state-owned-enterprises-global-economy-reason-concern">2013 report</a> from the European Center for Economic Policy Research found that, globally, SOEs included in the <a href="http://www.forbes.com/global2000/">Forbes Global 2,000</a>list of companies had combined sales of $3.6 trillion, about the size of Germany’s GDP. That’s nothing to sniff at.</p>
<p>While concerning, none of the letter’s contents should come as a surprise. The US Trade Representative has <a href="https://ustr.gov/trade-agreements/free-trade-agreements/transatlantic-trade-and-investment-partnership-t-tip/t-tip-11#">a section on its website</a> where it lists the US’s priorities in TPP negotiations, and new rules for SOEs to ensure US businesses get a fair shake on the world stage are included. Previously revealed TPP stipulations also included things like giving companies the right to <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/26/business/trans-pacific-partnership-seen-as-door-for-foreign-suits-against-us.html?_r=0">sue governments</a> for hurting their bottom lines, which gives us a pretty clear idea of where this whole TPP thing is headed.</p>
<p>It’s not clear where the contents of the letter stand now, in terms of adoption in the actual text of the TPP, because it is from 2013 after all. But this is the weird time warp of TPP criticism: since the document’s text is secret, most of what the public knows about the agreement <a href="http://motherboard.vice.com/read/whoever-is-leaking-trans-pacific-partnership-drafts-please-leak-more">comes from leaks</a> that may be years old.</p>
<p>WikiLeaks has <a href="http://motherboard.vice.com/read/wikileaks-wants-to-offer-a-100k-bounty-for-a-trans-pacific-partnership-leak">set up a bounty fund</a> for the full text of the TPP, but the campaign has not yet reached its $100,000 funding goal. With negotiations once more underway—and the US armed with recently passed “<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/24/barack-obama-fast-track-trade-deal-tpp-senate">fast track</a>” legislation on the deal—time is running out.</p>
<p><a href="http://motherboard.vice.com/read/new-leak-confirms-the-secretive-trans-pacific-partnership-is-a-horrorshow" target="_blank">Jordan Pearson</a></p> 10 Reasons Why You Should Oppose TPP and TTIPtag:12160.info,2015-06-08:2649739:Topic:15645562015-06-08T14:49:42.115ZCentral Scrutinizerhttps://12160.info/profile/H0llyw00d
<div class="itemHeader"><h2 class="itemTitle">10 Reasons Why You Should Oppose TPP and TTIP</h2>
<span class="itemAuthor">Written by <a href="http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/constitution/itemlist/user/53-williamfjasper" rel="author">William F. Jasper…</a></span></div>
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<div class="itemHeader"><h2 class="itemTitle">10 Reasons Why You Should Oppose TPP and TTIP</h2>
<span class="itemAuthor">Written by <a rel="author" href="http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/constitution/itemlist/user/53-williamfjasper">William F. Jasper</a></span></div>
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<div class="itemFullText"><p>The U.S. Senate’s passage of Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) legislation on May 22 means that the TPA bill (also known as “Fast Track”) will soon be up for a vote in the House of Representatives. If the House follows suit and approves it, we can be certain that President Obama and his Republican supporters in Congress will move for expedited action on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), both of which, Obama has stated, are top priorities of his administration.</p>
<p>These twin, trans-oceanic agreements are massive schemes that propose a very radical transformation of the global politico-economic system, with revolutionary integration and convergence of the major Atlantic and Pacific nations. The TPP <em>currently</em> includes 12 Pacific Rim member states (Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the United States, and Vietnam), but is expected to expand to include more nations, including Communist China.</p>
<p>The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) proposes to begin “deep and comprehensive” integration between the 28 member states of the European Union and the United States. Over the course of the past several years, we have published many articles detailing the dangers posed by these (still officially secret) agreements. We are bringing together here, in abbreviated form, 10 of those reasons why every American — whether identifying as Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, Independent, Tea Party, liberal, conservative, or constitutionalist — should oppose both of these proposals.</p>
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<p><strong>1: Sovereignty will be lost.</strong></p>
<p>The Trans-Pacific Partnership and Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership constitute an all-out assault on, and an existential threat to, America’s sovereignty and independence.</p>
<p>Even if all of the glowing economic predictions and rosy job promises of the TPP/TTIP promoters were true — and as we show below, there are many good reasons to disbelieve this prosperity propaganda — would it really be worth sacrificing our national sovereignty and independence for these purported benefits? Would it be worth sacrificing our liberty and our Constitution? Would it be worth subjecting ourselves and our posterity to the rule of international bureaucrats and judges? Those are not idle, speculative questions; they go to the core of what the TPP and TTIP are all about.</p>
<p>Modern Preferential Trade Agreements (PTAs, such as NAFTA, TPP, and TTIP) have become so comprehensive and complex (see below) that they guarantee conflict — both among the nations that are party to the agreement, as well as between private parties and the various nation-state parties. Resolving the conflict means resorting to adjudication. As with NAFTA, the TPP and TTIP create conflict resolution tribunals (courts) that claim the authority to overrule national, state, and local laws, as well as national and state courts and national and state constitutions. Additionally, PTA members often opt to appeal their cases to the World Trade Organization tribunal, which claims global judicial authority. In practice, this amounts, virtually, to legislating globally from the bench, striking down laws and ordering revisions. This is not merely a theoretical threat, it is already happening. Most recently, the WTO appellate tribunal ruled against the United States in a NAFTA suit brought by Canada and Mexico that claimed the U.S. Country Of Origin Labeling (COOL) law, which requires foreign meat to be labeled as such, is an unfair and illegal trade practice. The WTO’s May 18 ruling was the fourth time in three years that the global court had ruled against COOL, even though U.S. courts had ruled that COOL is legal. Faced with WTO penalties and threats of retaliation, the U.S. Congress is now considering repeal of COOL, and American consumers may soon lose the ability to discover if the meat at the grocery store (or the fast food burger/taco joint) is U.S.-raised, or from Mexico, Brazil, or China.</p>
<p>The WTO COOL case is a harbinger of more to come. The TPP and TTIP would exempt foreign corporations from our laws and regulations, placing the resolution of any disputes regarding those matters in the hands of an Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) tribunal or the WTO. Besides unconstitutionally creating another international judicial authority higher than our own courts and legislature, the agreements will put American businesses (particularly small and medium-size businesses geared primarily for our domestic market) at a serious competitive disadvantage. Foreign firms could operate here unburdened by the costly and onerous regulatory shackles that are crippling and destroying American free enterprise.</p>
<p><strong>2: The TPP and TTIP are “living,” “evolving” agreements.</strong></p>
<p>On November 12, 2011, the leaders of the TPP nations endorsed the TPP “Trade Ministers’ Report to Leaders,” which states, <em>inter alia</em>: “We have agreed to develop the TPP as a living agreement.... Therefore, the TPP teams are establishing a structure, institutions, and processes that allow the agreement to evolve.... We envision a continuing joint work program, including new commitments.”</p>
<p>The Congressional Research Service, in a March 20, 2015 study entitled “The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Negotiations and Issues for Congress,” notes: “The TPP has been envisaged as a ‘living agreement,’ one that is both open to new members willing to sign up to its commitments and open to addressing new issues as they evolve.”</p>
<p>Likewise, the TTIP promoters push the “living” document theme. In February of this year, the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) issued a report entitled, “A Fresh Start for TTIP,” which declares, “The [TTIP] negotiators should agree on standard harmonisation where it can be easily achieved … and should set up an inclusive process of regulatory convergence to allow TTIP to become a living agreement which harmonises further standards later on.”</p>
<p>Dr. Alberto Alemanno, the Jean Monnet Professor of EU Law at HEC Paris, writes that “unlike any previous trade arrangement, TTIP is set to become a ‘living agreement’, whose obligations will continuously be added without the need to re-open the initial international treaty nor to modify each others’ institutional frameworks. Thus, should the regulators identify areas for convergence … their agreed commitments … will become legally binding through a sectoral annex.”</p>
<p>The TPP/TTIP architects are drawing from the “success” of the European Union. In the development of the European Union — from its origin as the European Coal and Steel Community to the Common Market to the European Community to, finally, the EU — this subversive mutational process has been referred to as “broadening and deepening.” Broadening (or “widening”) refers to the constant expansion through addition of new member-states; deepening refers to the constant creation of new supranational institutional structures and continuous expansion and usurpation by regional authorities of powers and jurisdiction that previously were exercised by national, state, and local governments. The “living,” “evolving” treaties and agreements of the EU have eviscerated the national sovereignty of the EU member-states and increasingly subjugated them to unaccountable rulers in Brussels under the rubric of “integration,” “harmonization,” “an ever closer union,” “convergence,” “pooled sovereignty,” “interdependence,” and “comprehensive cooperation.”</p>
<p><strong>3: It’s being planned in secret.</strong></p>
<p>The Obama administration has audaciously claimed that the TPP and TTIP processes are “completely transparent,” and President Obama has publicly claimed to be peeved by charges (false charges, he says) that there is any secrecy involved. But the president is talking utter nonsense, if facts mean anything. It is a fact that after more than three years of (secret) negotiations, the administration still has not made the draft texts of either of the agreements available to the public. It is a fact that the only texts the public has had access to are those that have been “illegally” leaked. It is a fact that elected members of the U.S. Congress are only allowed to see the text under severely restricted conditions: They must go to a special room, must leave their cellphones behind, may not make any copies, are monitored while in the room, and before leaving must surrender all notes they have taken. On the other hand, it is also a fact that private “cleared” representatives of, for example, pharmaceutical companies, Hollywood studios, Wall Street, and other corporate interests are given passwords to access the documents online at their leisure: no restrictions, inconvenience, or humiliation for these privileged elites.</p>
<p>This secrecy charge is not merely some invention of right-wing Republicans; it comes also from progressives of Obama’s party: Oregon Senator Ron Wyden, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, Florida Representative Alan Grayson, Connecticut Representative Rosa DeLauro, California Representative George Miller, and many others. If there is nothing to hide, why does the administration insist on shrouding the entire process in secrecy, and then ludicrously pretend they are being totally open and transparent?</p>
<p><strong>4: The TPP and TTIP are not about “free trade.”</strong></p>
<p>Historically, the “free trade” debate has centered on reducing or eliminating tariffs (taxes on imports). But U.S. tariffs are already at historic lows. If the TTIP and TPP were truly about free trade and tariffs, they could be written in a few pages. But they, purportedly, are hundreds of pages long. This is because they deal with what the globalization lobby calls “non-tariff barriers to trade,” which can be just about anything and everything. Here are some of the things the U.S. Trade Representative’s website lists as matters that are covered by the TTIP: “Agricultural Market Access, Competition, Cross-Border Services, Customs and Trade Facilitation, Electronic Commerce and Telecommunications, Energy and Raw Materials, Environment Financial Services, Government Procurement, Intellectual Property Rights, Investment, Labor, … Rules of Origin, Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) Measures, Sectoral Annexes/Regulatory Cooperation, Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises, State-Owned Enterprises, Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT), Textiles, Trade Remedies.”</p>
<p>And remember, as discussed above in number two, since these are “living,” “evolving” agreements, virtually anything may be added for consideration in the future. No less an authority than WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy has remarked on the revolutionary nature of TTIP. “Authorities in Europe and America have given the impression that the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership is just another trade agreement,” he said. “In fact, the proposed agreement is a different beast.” Lamy noted that “80 per cent of these negotiations deal with a realm of regulatory convergence.” Lamy, who previously worked as an official in the French government and the EU bureaucracy, knows about convergence, since he helped steer the process in the EU. “Convergence” in EU parlance has come to mean iron-fisted centralized authority running roughshod over national and local laws and customs.</p>
<p>Dr. Joseph Stiglitz, recipient of the Nobel Prize in economics, told the Italian Parliament last year during testimony regarding the TTIP, “This is not a free trade agreement and you should not sign it.” While this writer might disagree with Dr. Stiglitz on a number of other important economic matters, he is certainly correct on this point and his warning should be heeded. According to WikiLeaks, only five chapters of the purported 29 chapters in the TPP deal with matters that are considered traditional trade issues.</p>
<p><strong>5: It is an immigration Trojan Horse.</strong></p>
<p>The Obama administration, infamous for promising to use all executive means possible (whether constitutional or not) to grant amnesty to illegals and to expand legal immigration, is using the TPP/TTIP to replace our immigration system with EU-style mass “migration.” The still-secret agreements contain provisions for eviscerating our border controls, according to insiders who have studied them. “The Trans-Pacific Partnership includes an entire chapter on immigration,” Curtis Ellis, executive director of the American Jobs Alliance, remarked in an April 13, 2015 post for <em>The Hill</em>. “It is a Trojan horse for Obama’s immigration agenda. House members who were ready to defund the Department of Homeland Security to stop President Obama’s executive action on immigration must not give him TPA [Fast Track], which he will use to ensure his immigration actions are locked in when he leaves office.”</p>
<p>Critics point to the fact that President Obama has boasted of greatly expanding the L-1 “temporary guest worker” program to allow corporations to bring hundreds of thousands of workers into the United States while we are suffering extremely high unemployment. Moreover, Obama has already used a pseudo “free trade” agreement with South Korea to expand the L-1 program with that country.</p>
<p>We can take some guidance as to where this could lead from the EU, which the TPP/TTIP architects approvingly cite as their model. Restricted by EU court rulings, EU member states have found it virtually impossible to restrict “migration” and even extremely difficult to control the deluge of “welfare tourism” that is bankrupting many of their social services.</p>
<p><strong>6: It merges America with China/Russia.</strong></p>
<p>One of the overarching arguments repeatedly used by TPP promoters is that we <em>must</em> complete and adopt the TPP or Communist China will pre-empt us with its own trade pact. Likewise, they argue that we must approve the TTIP to keep Russia in check. The short answer to this is that the TPP/TTIP proponents are being totally disingenuous because most of the leading architects of the agreements have been on record for years in favor of admitting both China and Russia to the regional/global trade regimes. China is already a member of the U.S.-created Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) and has been integrally involved in the talks aimed at transforming APEC into a Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific (FTAAP). The TPP is a key “steppingstone” in that process, according to the APEC/FTAAP architects. An important source on this matter is the pro-TPP book <em>Understanding the Trans-Pacific Partnership</em> published in 2013 by the Peter G. Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE), one of the premier global think tanks that has played an especially important role in promoting the WTO, IMF, United Nations, and so-called free trade agreements, including NAFTA, CAFTA, TPP, and FTAAP. According to the PIIE book, “The TPP is regarded as an interim arrangement or stepping stone toward a broader, region-wide Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific (FTAAP).... TPP negotiators are … also planning and constructing the trade pact with a view toward future linkages with other APEC members, including and<em> especially China</em>.” (Emphasis added.)</p>
<p>Russia is also an APEC member and could be expected to be included in the FTAAP, which the Obama administration has been quietly developing alongside the TPP. As far back as 2010, the administration posted on the White House website an APEC press release of November 13, 2010 announcing: “Based on the results of this work, we have agreed that now is the time for APEC to translate FTAAP from an aspirational to a more concrete vision. To that end, we instruct APEC to take concrete steps toward realization of an FTAAP, which is a major instrument to further APEC’s Regional Economic Integration (REI) agenda.” Once that is achieved, both China and Russia will likely be full FTAAP members.</p>
<p><strong>7: Could the TPP/TTIP be used to foist gun control on Americans?</strong></p>
<p>This is not an “out there” question; it should be a genuine concern of all who treasure the Second Amendment. Constitutional champion Michael Hammond, the longtime executive director of the Senate Steering Committee, has warned that “there is ample time to insert firearms import bans (with the force of statutory law)” into the TPP and/or TTIP. “Barack Obama has been rabid in his zeal to destroy the Second Amendment community,” Hammond notes. “Over and over again, he has experimented with a wide variety of schemes to ban guns by regulatory fiat: eliminating credit, banning ammunition, compiling a gun registry, encouraging state bans, reclassifying common guns, banning the import of guns, and so forth. Hammond, who is now general counsel for the Gun Owners of America, notes that despite Obama’s notorious anti-gun record, the Republican “leadership” in Congress “didn’t see fit to even purport to prohibit the Obama administration from using a trade agreement to impose a statutory gun import ban.”</p>
<p><strong>8: The jobs and prosperity myth</strong></p>
<p>As with NAFTA and every other pseudo-free trade agreement, there are many politicians, lobbyists, and think tanks making pie-in-the-sky claims that TPP and TTIP will usher in new prosperity and a wave of good-paying jobs. We’ve been there before. In 1993, the Peterson Institute for International Economics released its influential study, “NAFTA: An Assessment,” which predicted that “with NAFTA, U.S. exports to Mexico will continue to outstrip Mexican exports to the United States, leading to a U.S. trade surplus with Mexico of about $7 (billion) to $9 billion annually by 1995.” It also predicted that the U.S. trade surplus with Mexico would increase to $12 billion annually between 2000 and 2010. The actual result was quite different.</p>
<p>In 1993, the year before NAFTA went into effect, the United States had a $1.66 billion trade surplus with Mexico; by 1995, the first year after NAFTA had entered into force, that changed to a <em>$15.8 billion deficit</em>. By 2000, that annual deficit had soared to $24.5 billion, and by 2007 it hit $74.7 billion. For 2014, our trade deficit with Mexico dipped to <em>only</em> $53.8 billion. In 1993, the year before NAFTA, we imported around 225,000 cars and trucks from Mexico. By 2005, our imports of Mexican-made vehicles had tripled to 700,000 vehicles annually, and in 2012, Mexico’s export of vehicles to the United States surpassed 1.4 million. Chrysler, Ford, and GM transferred major production facilities (and jobs) from the United States to Mexico. Our trade deficits with Canada have followed a similar path since adoption of NAFTA.</p>
<p>The PIIE authors and other pseudo-free trade propagandists had cherry-picked data and simply invented statistics to fraudulently sell their product: NAFTA. If they were car salesmen, they would have gone to jail for fraud and misrepresentation. Instead, they are back doing the same thing, concocting rosy statistics to sell the TPP and TTIP.</p>
<p><strong>9: The TPP and TTIP are corporatist schemes.</strong></p>
<p>Unfortunately, some of the loudest critics on this score are notorious leftists who regularly parade against capitalism. Republican leaders have been able to use that fact as a reason to disregard the compelling evidence that these criticisms of TPP/TTIP are solidly based. First of all, it is important to note that in most cases the big, international mega-corporations long ago ceased to consider themselves American companies and also long ago ceased to favor free enterprise capitalism: They are corporate welfare drones, the masters of government bailouts, government loans, government subsidies, government contracts. They are little different from the giant State Owned Enterprises (SOEs) or “private” corporations owned by communist princelings and commissars in China and Russia.</p>
<p>This is especially evident in the lineup of globalist corporations behind the TPP/TTIP: Goldman Sachs, Boeing, Dow Chemical, Unilever, Chevron, Caterpillar, UPS, Walmart, Chase, Citi — and a bevy of Big Business coalitions: Global Business Dialogue, Business Roundtable, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Transatlantic Policy Network, Atlantic Council, and more. These are “crony capitalists,” not free enterprise capitalists; they prefer to use the power of government rather than innovation, risk, and excellence to prosper. Many of these corporations and associations have their representatives working directly with the TPP/TTIP negotiators, and they are the “cleared” elites that get privileged access to the documents you and I don’t get to see, and our elected representatives only access under extreme controls.</p>
<p><strong>10: The TPP and TTIP are regional transitions in the push toward a world government.</strong></p>
<p>Unquestionably, one of the most important organizations pushing the TPP and TTIP is the New York-based Council on Foreign Relations, the uber-think tank that has been promoting schemes for world government for nearly a century. In a 2006 op-ed entitled “State sovereignty must be altered in globalized era,” CFR President Richard Haass declared that we must “rethink” and “redefine” sovereignty because “new mechanisms are needed for regional and global governance” and “states must be prepared to cede some sovereignty to world bodies.” Due to globalization, said Haass, “sovereignty is not only becoming weaker in reality, but … it needs to become weaker.” According to the CFR chief, we must choose between “an international system of either world government or anarchy.”</p>
<p>The CFR fully supports the trans-oceanic political and economic “integration” and “convergence” plans of the TPP and TTIP. It works closely with the Transatlantic Policy Network (TPN), which says its mission is “to promote and assist the convergence of EU/US Government policies.” The TPN’s 1995 “Partnership Project” called for combining NATO with a merged EU-U.S. “in a single political framework by early in the next century.” In its 2008 report <em>Completing the Transatlantic Market</em>, the TPN went further, revealing that “the process of creating a Transatlantic Market will be an integral step in the evolution toward an eventual Transatlantic Partnership Agreement embracing the economic, political, and strategic totality of the EU-US relationship.” “Totality” — did you catch that?</p>
<p>This is what former French Premier Edouard Balladur was aiming at with his 2007 book entitled <em>A Union of the West</em>, which received the expected send-off at the <em>New York Times</em> and other “enlightened” voices of the globalist media choir. According to Balladur the new partnership must be “a new alliance between Europe and America, and even more — a true union.” And that is what the TPP/TTIP schemers are truly attempting to put over.</p>
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<p><em>Related article:</em></p>
<p><a href="http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/constitution/item/21011-7-reasons-why-trade-promotion-authority-fast-track-must-be-defeated">7 Reasons Why Trade Promotion Authority/Fast Track Must Be Defeated</a></p>
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<p><a href="http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/constitution/item/21010-10-reasons-why-you-should-oppose-obamatrade" target="_blank">SOURCE</a></p>
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</div> The 10 biggest lies you’ve been told about the Trans-Pacific Partnershiptag:12160.info,2015-05-15:2649739:Topic:15578212015-05-15T22:26:50.197ZCentral Scrutinizerhttps://12160.info/profile/H0llyw00d
<h1>The 10 biggest lies you’ve been told about the Trans-Pacific Partnership</h1>
<p>Iron Sheik</p>
<p>Today, the Senate;<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/11/us/politics/obama-pushing-skeptical-legislators-hard-on-pacific-trade-deal.html" target="_blank">makes a critical test vote</a> on the Obama Administration’s trade agenda, kicking off a process that the White House hopes to end with the signing of an agreement between 12 nations called the Trans-Pacific Partnership. In preparation…</p>
<h1>The 10 biggest lies you’ve been told about the Trans-Pacific Partnership</h1>
<p>Iron Sheik</p>
<p>Today, the Senate;<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/11/us/politics/obama-pushing-skeptical-legislators-hard-on-pacific-trade-deal.html" target="_blank">makes a critical test vote</a> on the Obama Administration’s trade agenda, kicking off a process that the White House hopes to end with the signing of an agreement between 12 nations called the Trans-Pacific Partnership. In preparation for this vote, President Obama has been deliberately antagonizing his critics, mostly liberal Democrats. Senator Elizabeth Warren is “a politician, like everybody else,” <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/politics/why-obama-is-happy-to-fight-elizabeth-warren-on-118537612596.html?soc_src=mail&soc_trk=ma" target="_blank">Obama said Friday</a> to Yahoo News, who has “got a voice that she wants to get out there,” framing her concerns as insincere self-aggrandizement. Those concerns, Obama added, are “absolutely wrong.”</p>
<div class="entry-content"><p>This is not the first time that <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/politics/why-obama-is-happy-to-fight-elizabeth-warren-on-118537612596.html?soc_src=mail&soc_trk=ma" target="_blank">Obama</a> and <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2015/05/obama-aides-elizabeth-warren-trade-117703.html#ixzz3ZSRazWOo" target="_blank">his aides</a> have depicted opposition on trade as deliberate misinformation designed to stir up a left-leaning political base, or generate campaign contributions; my favorite is the claim that Warren is merely trying to energize a non-existent <a href="http://runwarrenrun.org/" target="_blank">Presidential campaign</a>.</p>
<p>It’s beneath the dignity of the Presidency to so aggressively paint opponents as not just wrong on the facts, but hiding the truth on purpose. Warren <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2015/05/11/elizabeth-warren-fires-back-at-obama-heres-what-theyre-really-fighting-about/" target="_blank">has responded</a> without using the same indecorous tactics. Unfortunately, I don’t have the same self-control. So by way of response, here are ten moments where the President or his subordinates have lied – call it “misled” or “offered half-truths” or whatever; but I’m in an ornery mood so let’s just say lied – about his trade agenda:</p>
<p>1. <strong>40 PERCENT</strong>: The President and his team have repeatedly described TPP as a deal involving <a href="https://ustr.gov/tpp/overview-of-the-TPP" target="_blank">nearly 40 percent of global GDP</a>. 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 <a href="http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/TM.TAX.MRCH.WM.AR.ZS" target="_blank">World Bank</a>.</p>
<p>You can see this paragraph in graphic form <a href="http://daviddayen.tumblr.com/post/118708311201?soc_src=mail&soc_trk=ma" target="_blank">here</a>. 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 <a href="http://ourfuture.org/20140622/what-is-currency-manipulation" target="_blank">currency manipulation</a> by countries wanting to keep their exports cheap. The TPP has <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/05/11/the-strong-dollar-is-hurting-u-s-manufacturing-theres-a-lesson-in-there-for-the-tpp/" target="_blank">no currency provisions</a>.</p>
<p>2. <strong>JOB CREATION</strong>: Saying, as the White House has, that the deal would support “<a href="http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/american-alliances-international-cooperation-by-john-f--kerry-2015-01#4bxmfbYemSPg1fzI.99" target="_blank">an additional 650,000 jobs</a>” is not true. This figure came from a hypothetical calculation of a <a href="http://bookstore.piie.com/book-store/6642.html" target="_blank">report</a> by the Peterson Institute for International Economics, which the Institute 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 <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/wp/2015/01/30/the-obama-administrations-illusionary-job-gains-from-the-trans-pacific-partnership/" target="_blank">fact check</a> of the claim.</p>
<p>The deal is actually more about building up barriers than taking them down. Much of TPP is devoted to <a href="http://www.cepr.net/blogs/beat-the-press/the-problem-of-protectionism-in-the-trans-pacific-partnership" target="_blank">increasing copyright and patent protections</a> for prescription drugs and Hollywood media content. As economist <a href="http://www.cepr.net/blogs/beat-the-press/the-problem-of-protectionism-in-the-trans-pacific-partnership" target="_blank">Dean Baker</a> notes, this is protectionist, and will raise prices for drugs, movies and music here and abroad.</p>
<p>3. <strong>EXPORTS ONLY</strong>: The Administration constantly discusses trade as solely a question of U.S. exports. A recent <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/docs/cea_trade_report_final_non-embargoed_v2.pdf" target="_blank">Council of Economic Advisors report</a> touts: Exporters pay higher wages, and export industry growth translates into higher average earnings. But the Economic Policy Institute points out that this <a href="http://www.epi.org/blog/cea-report-is-simply-not-that-relevant-to-current-trade-policy-debates/" target="_blank">ignores imports</a>, and therefore the <a href="http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2015/05/first-quarter-gdp-likely-negative-trade-deficit-soars.html" target="_blank">ballooning trade deficit</a>, 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 <a href="http://www.brown.senate.gov/newsroom/press/release/brown-statement-following-presidents-visit-to-nike-facility" target="_blank">increased the trade deficit</a>, 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.</p>
<p>4. <strong>MOST PROGRESSIVE</strong>: Obama has called TPP “<a href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/28/politics/obama-abe-trade-trans-pacific-partnership/" target="_blank">the most progressive trade deal in history</a>.” First of all, so did <a href="http://www.newrepublic.com/article/121670/obamas-tpp-arguments-mimic-gores-nafta-defense" target="_blank">Bill Clinton and Al Gore</a>, 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 <a href="http://action.sierraclub.org/site/DocServer/TPP_Enviro_Analysis.pdf?docID=14842" target="_blank">deal is weaker</a> than <a href="https://ustr.gov/sites/default/files/uploads/factsheets/2007/asset_upload_file127_11319.pdf">the landmark “May 10 agreement”</a> 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, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rep-sander-/an-open-letter-to-progres_b_7257776.html" target="_blank">believe</a> that TPP falls short. Even if the chapters were up to par, consistent <a href="http://www.ticotimes.net/2015/05/10/op-ed-lets-see-a-trans-pacific-partnership-that-respects-workers-rights" target="_blank">lack of enforcement</a> 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 <a href="http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2015/04/u-s-trade-rep-office-helpfully-explains-28-trade-unionists-murdered-colombia-last-year.html" target="_blank">murdered every other week</a>. Labor groups can only ask the White House to enforce labor rights violations, and for the past several years, the Administration <a href="http://www.ticotimes.net/2015/05/10/op-ed-lets-see-a-trans-pacific-partnership-that-respects-workers-rights" target="_blank">simply hasn’t</a>. So when Obama says violators of TPP will face “meaningful consequences,” based on the Administration’s prior enforcement, he’s lying.</p>
<p>5. <strong>CHANGING LAWS</strong>: 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 shell game. They <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2015/05/08/obama_democratic_critics_of_free_trade_policy_are_wrong.html" target="_blank">say</a>, “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 <a href="http://www.asiapathways-adbi.org/2015/03/investor-state-dispute-settlement-rule-of-law-or-law-of-the-jungle/" target="_blank">New Zealand did</a> with their cigarette packaging law, awaiting the outcome of a dispute between the tobacco industry and Australia (a <a href="http://doaneline.com/opinion/article_3d66aa66-b7da-11e4-9dce-8f3f114c5b69.html" target="_blank">suit that continues</a> despite an initial victory for Australia).</p>
<p>6. <strong>NEVER LOST</strong>: 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 <a href="http://www.railrode.net/wp-admin/v" target="_blank">never lost an ISDS case</a>. 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.</p>
<p>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 competitive 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.</p>
<p>7. <strong>WEAKENING DODD-FRANK</strong>: 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,” <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/politics/why-obama-is-happy-to-fight-elizabeth-warren-on-118537612596.html?soc_src=mail&soc_trk=ma" target="_blank">Obama told Yahoo News</a>, 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, <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2015/05/11/elizabeth-warren-fires-back-at-obama-heres-what-theyre-really-fighting-about/" target="_blank">as Warren says</a>, “punch holes in Dodd-Frank without directly repealing it,” by forcing regulators to roll back capital or leverage requirements.</p>
<p>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 <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2015/05/obama-aides-elizabeth-warren-trade-117703.html" target="_blank">told Congress</a> 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, <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-05-05/warren-says-dodd-frank-will-be-casualty-of-fast-track-trade-bill?cmpid=yhoo" target="_blank">for six years</a>, outlasting the current Administration. Scott Walker or Jeb Bush may decide it’s perfectly appropriate to undermine regulations in trade deals.</p>
<p><a href="http://govtslaves.info/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Leaders_of_TPP_member_states.jpg"><img class=" size-medium wp-image-39940 aligncenter" src="http://govtslaves.info/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Leaders_of_TPP_member_states-580x294.jpg" alt="Leaders_of_TPP_member_states" width="580" height="294"/></a></p>
<p>8. <strong>STOPPING CHINA</strong>: 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,” <a href="http://www.statesmanjournal.com/story/news/politics/2015/05/08/obama-says-trade-deal-lets-us-write-the-rules-not-china/26970847/" target="_blank">he said on Friday</a>. 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 <a href="http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/05/why-tpp-is-high-risk-low-reward-117658.html#.VVDpjFbTEpH" target="_blank">writes</a>, “China has been and will remain an inseparable part of China’s success story.” Plus, as <a href="http://www.salon.com/2015/04/21/obamas_deal_with_the_devil_the_dangerous_treaty_that_has_him_teaming_with_the_gop/" target="_blank">I’ve written in Salon</a>, 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.</p>
<p>9. <strong>SECRET DEAL</strong>: 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 <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2015/05/secrecy-eroding-support-for-trade-pact-critics-say-117581.html#ixzz3ZAKixRFj" target="_blank">only see the text in a secure room</a>, 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,” <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2015/05/11/elizabeth-warren-fires-back-at-obama-heres-what-theyre-really-fighting-about/" target="_blank">Warren told Greg Sargent</a>. The President wants to filibuster-proof the bill in secret, then employ pretend transparency on TPP after that.</p>
<p>10. <strong>JUST A POLITICIAN</strong>: This idea from Obama that everybody opposing fast-track is acting like a mere “politician,” aside from demonizing the concept of representing constituents, 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 <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/10/us/politics/obama-calls-elizabeth-warren-absolutely-wrong-on-trans-pacific-trade-deal.html?_r=0" target="_blank">publicly debate any opponent</a> on trade, he can float above it all, acting like a principled soul only wanting to better the country rather than a transactional <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ward_heeler" target="_blank">ward heeler</a>. This may be the biggest lie, that Obama’s somehow superior to everyone else in this debate.</p>
<p><a href="http://govtslaves.info/the-10-biggest-lies-youve-been-told-about-the-trans-pacific-partnership/" target="_blank">STORY</a></p>
</div> NEW WORLD ORDER---DEAD AHEADtag:12160.info,2013-12-09:2649739:Topic:13741042013-12-09T21:17:39.083Zolde rebhttps://12160.info/profile/oldereb
<p>The attached PDF file is the writers opinion of how Wall Street has used the IMF, WB, WTO, Federal Reserve, and the U.S. government to impoverish the third world, and they are now extending their tentacles over all of Europe, and have as their "end goal" the collection of the fraudulently induced $17 trillion United States debt. It is alleged the Federal Reserve system has hidden enormous profit that is properly due the United States by their exclusive handling of the auction accounts of…</p>
<p>The attached PDF file is the writers opinion of how Wall Street has used the IMF, WB, WTO, Federal Reserve, and the U.S. government to impoverish the third world, and they are now extending their tentacles over all of Europe, and have as their "end goal" the collection of the fraudulently induced $17 trillion United States debt. It is alleged the Federal Reserve system has hidden enormous profit that is properly due the United States by their exclusive handling of the auction accounts of Treasury securities by the FRBNY.</p> WikiLeaks Exposes North American Integration Plottag:12160.info,2011-05-04:2649739:Topic:3812172011-05-04T00:43:09.270ZM. Eatonhttps://12160.info/profile/MEaton
<p>As early as January of 2005, high-ranking officials were <a href="http://wikileaks.ch/cable/2005/01/05OTTAWA268.html" target="_blank">discussing</a> the best way to sell the idea of <a href="http://www.slideshare.net/miscott57/the-north-american-union-the-new-american-magazine-special-issuepdf" target="_blank">North American “integration”</a> to the public and policymakers while getting around national constitutions. The prospect of creating a monetary unit to replace national currencies was…</p>
<p>As early as January of 2005, high-ranking officials were <a target="_blank" href="http://wikileaks.ch/cable/2005/01/05OTTAWA268.html">discussing</a> the best way to sell the idea of <a target="_blank" href="http://www.slideshare.net/miscott57/the-north-american-union-the-new-american-magazine-special-issuepdf">North American “integration”</a> to the public and policymakers while getting around national constitutions. The prospect of creating a monetary unit to replace national currencies was a hot topic as well.</p>
<p><br/>Some details of the schemes were exposed in a <a target="_blank" href="http://wikileaks.ch/cable/2005/01/05OTTAWA268.html">secret 2005 U.S. embassy cable</a> from Ottawa signed by then-Ambassador Paul Cellucci. The document was released by WikiLeaks on April 28. But so far, it has barely attracted any attention in the United States, Canada, or Mexico beyond a few mentions in some <a target="_blank" href="http://www.dailypaul.com/163246/wikileaks-cable-confirms-north-american-initiative-union-single-market-currency-border-plans">liberty-minded</a> <a target="_blank" href="http://iheartfreedom.ca/personal-freedoms/38-personal-freedoms-news/191-wikileaks-cable-confirms-north-american-initiative-union-single-market-currenc">Internet</a> <a target="_blank" href="http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?289963-Do-you-remember-that-whole-North-American-Union-conspiracy-It-may-not-be">forums</a>.<br/><br/>Numerous topics are discussed in the leaked document — borders, currency, labor, regulation, and more. How to push the integration agenda features particularly prominently.<br/><br/>Under the subject line “Placing a new North American Initiative in its economic policy context,” American diplomatic personnel in Canada said they believed an “incremental” path toward North American integration would probably gain the most support from policymakers. Apparently Canadian economists agreed.<br/><br/>The cable also touts the supposed benefits of merging the three countries and even mentions what elements to “stress” in future “efforts to promote further integration.” It lists what it claims is a summary of the “consensus” among Canadian economists about the issues, too.<br/><br/><strong>Merging the United States, Canada, and Mexico</strong><br/><br/>Integration is a little-used term employed mainly by policy wonks. But while it may sound relatively harmless, it generally describes a very serious phenomenon when used in a geopolitical context — the gradual merging of separate countries under a regional authority.<br/><br/>Similar processes are already well underway in <a target="_blank" href="http://www.thenewamerican.com/index.php/world-mainmenu-26/europe-mainmenu-35/2509-lisbon-treaty-builds-eu-super-state">Europe</a>, <a target="_blank" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_Union">Africa</a>, and <a target="_blank" href="http://www.thenewamerican.com/index.php/world-mainmenu-26/south-america-mainmenu-37/6786-south-american-union-selects-socialist-leaders">South America</a>. And according to critics, the results — essentially abolishing national sovereignty in favor of supranational, unaccountable governance — have been an unmitigated disaster. But the U.S. government doesn’t think so.<br/><br/>In North America, integration has been proceeding rapidly for years. <em>The New American</em> magazine was among the first to <a target="_blank" href="http://www.slideshare.net/miscott57/the-north-american-union-the-new-american-magazine-special-issuepdf">report on the efforts</a> to erect what critics have called a “North American Union,” encompassing Canada, the United States, and Mexico. But more recently, the topic has received <a target="_blank" href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3E4s4JTzsY&feature=player_embedded">more attention</a>.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>After the creation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) — similar in many ways to the European Common Market that preceded the <a target="_blank" href="http://www.thenewamerican.com/index.php/world-mainmenu-26/europe-mainmenu-35/2509-lisbon-treaty-builds-eu-super-state">political union in Europe</a> — the integration scheme has only accelerated. And the bipartisan efforts have been going on for years.<br/><br/>Under President George W. Bush, integration occurred through the little-known “<a target="_blank" href="http://www.spp-psp.gc.ca/eic/site/spp-psp.nsf/eng/home">Security and Prosperity Partnership of North</a> <a target="_blank" href="http://www.spp-psp.gc.ca/eic/site/spp-psp.nsf/eng/home">America</a>.” And with the <a target="_blank" href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/02/04/declaration-president-obama-and-prime-minister-harper-canada-beyond-bord">Obama administration</a>, the process, now virtually out in the open, is only <a href="http://thenewamerican.com/index.php/world-mainmenu-26/north-america-mainmenu-36/6274-us-a-canada-agree-to-common-perimeter-biometric-tracking">accelerating</a>.<br/><br/>Back in 2005, the cable released recently by WikiLeaks explained how it would be done. And looking back, the document was right on the mark.</p>
<p>full article <a href="http://www.thenewamerican.com/world-mainmenu-26/north-america-mainmenu-36/7336-wikileaks-exposes-north-american-integration-plot">http://www.thenewamerican.com/world-mainmenu-26/north-america-mainmenu-36/7336-wikileaks-exposes-north-american-integration-plot</a></p>