The TPP is a proposed regional regulatory and investment treaty that include twelve countries throughout the Asia-Pacific region. Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam are included in this “treaty”. This proposed treaty began in 2005 and is said to “enhance trade and investment among the TPP partner countries, to promote innovation, economic growth and development, and support the creation and retention of jobs”.
“Twentieth Century ‘Fast Track’ is simply not appropriate for 21st Century agreements and must be replaced,” said their letter, which was signed by 151 House Democrats. “The United States cannot afford another trade agreement that replicates the mistakes of the past. We can and must do better.”
The TPP, if passed, will take away American jobs, take away our internet privacy, increase prices on our prescriptions, and propose “free trade”. “America lost nearly 700,000 jobs because of NAFTA,” to choose a harmful pact negotiated under fast track, 20 years ago, Teamsters President James Hoffa added. “Jobs have been shipped across borders, gutting the middle class. We can’t make that same mistake again. Corporate America loves to tout the growth in trade due to NAFTA. But those dollars have largely gone into the pockets of top executives.”
Obama is trying his hardest to get this treaty passed quickly. He has gotten some of the country’s top executives from Wall Street and corporate America to sign on with him on this agreement as well. “make the sale. . . It’s going to be very important for business to be out there and champion this and show that this is ultimately good for you, for your suppliers, for your workers,” Obama said.
Unions gear up forces to stop fast track; a growing number of lawmakers have stepped forward against it. Marshaled by influential Reps. George Miller, D-Calif., and Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., three-fourths of the House Democratic Caucus – 151 lawmakers – already wrote to Obama opposing fast track. So have 28 Republicans, many of them Tea Party members who hate the president. And 10 Democrats on Camp’s committee, Ways and Means, sent an anti-fast-track letter, too.
