Comic book explains why the Transpacific Partnership serves no one but the ultra-rich

boing
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You understand that fast-track simply means that the treaty has to be voted yes/no, not that it is immune to a vote (i.e. democratic scrutiny).

The idea that the negotiation has to be done in secret has nothing to do with fast-tracking. If there’s a democratic deficit, I’d say it resides there, rather than in the fast-tracking yes/no vote process.

And what country in the world is going to negotiate with a country that is going to change the terms of the treaty after negotiation? And would the USA accept a treaty that would be changed by the other country after the negotiations were concluded?

Negotiations should be a lot more open, but in the end, an up/down vote with no amendments is the only way to have a treaty. Can you imagine if the US congress got to amend Kyoto or the UN Declaration of Human Rights? Certainly it would mean no more arms control treaties.

Negotiate as long as you like, and let’s make them open. But after negotiations with the other parties are finished, you either sign or you don’t. And yes, “don’t” may well be the right answer for many of these treaties.

(I’m also beginning to realize that “fast-track” has morphed in popular imagination into meaning everything bad and secret about the negotiating process rather than the simple mechanism for voting on trade agreements under US law, so we may be arguing at cross-purposes. I am, of course, referring to its legal meaning.)

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And what country in the world is going to negotiate with a country that is going to change the terms of the treaty after negotiation?

That’s missing the point. The terms and limits of the negotiation need to be transparent and public in the first place. That benefits the public and cracks down on corrupt side deals that merely benefit the elite few. Fast track is an enabler for opaque corruption. If the elite few don’t like transparency, then tough shit.

I am, of course, referring to its legal meaning

I’m referring to its literal meaning as it applies to the TPP in reality.

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That’s a reasonable point. It may be possible that your government is no longer capable of acting in the service of the people, which might be why Libertarianism is so popular there. (If the government is the enemy of the people, then better less of it.)

On the other hand, if that’s the case, it’s probably safer for no treaties to be negotiated at all.

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(If the government is the enemy of the people, then better less of it.)

I take a more nuanced stance that when the government is an enemy of the people, “less or more” has little to do with it. What is needed is more public involvement and an optimized government which may make it bigger or smaller depending on the needs. Smaller government for the sake of smaller government means little to me.

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Author here. SIgned in to reply to this.

The idea that Iceland exports bananas is an urban myth, left over from some failed experiments in the mid-20th century. See page 6 here: http://www.grapevine.is/Media/PDF/grapevine_17_2013.pdf.

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He understands labor and income inequality. He’s also an advocate for free-trade. For example: http://robertreich.org/post/1254390108

Capital and goods easily cross borders. People not so much.

In the race for the bottom, eventually Haiti and Eritrea will eventually have an economic boom.

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I don’t understand. The way treaties and contracts traditionally work, is you send your guys over to my place and they work something out with me that I’ll sign. Usually, I then sign it, but in any case I agree to the proposed terms. Your flunkies take the agreement and some of my guys back home to you, and you say “no, I’m not signing that, these changes have to be made” and my guys then work out something that seems equitably reasonable. The first document (aka “the offer”) is discarded, the second document (“counteroffer”) is returned with your signature on it. If I still don’t like it, I make another counter, and so on ad infinitum until something gets signed by both of us or we agree to stop bothering each other. If at any point we both sign the same agreement, then we are both legally bound to the terms, and violations are potentially actionable (or in international terms, a “casus belli”). At any point, though, we can can mutually agree to void the agreement.

Obviously, if more than two parties are involved the complexity of negotiations and the likelihood of failing to reach an agreement increases (and not linearly, either!). But it’s still the same process; whoever objects to the treaty on the table makes a counterproposal which can then be countered in turn.

So: if there’s been no treaty or contract signed, then negotiations aren’t over. They just aren’t, no matter how many conferences have been held or press releases sent out. Which is why I really don’t understand what you are trying to say here.

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You are, of course, technically correct. It is conceivable that you could go back after the other party has spent the political capital to get iteration #1 through their parliament and tell them to rip it up and go for iteration #2, but if we’re dealing with even an iota of reality here, for any major treaty (which inevitably means stepping on toes, so you are using political capital), whether it’s trade, arms reduction, or environmental, there’s only a single kick at the can.

You can try and claim that you only sent it back for renegotiation, but let’s face it, if there’s a zero percent (to 2-3 decimal places) chance of the getting the other side to pass a a modified treaty, you’ve killed it. Better to call a spade a spade and stand up for what one believes in than pretend one is too stupid to understand the ramifications of one’s actions.

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Well, since I tend towards the socialist side of the spectrum, I find Libertarianism overly optimistic (I feel if there’s no government, then something will grow to fill the vacuum, and at least democratic government is controllable through elections).

But I have to say, American citizens reaction to their government is a bit disconcerting. I certainly understand not having a party with one’s preferred policies in power (Canada is ruled by a Conservative gov’t at the moment). That’s a natural outcome of democracy. But the paradigm that you cannot have a government that serves any swathe of the people’s interests is disheartening and fairly widespread south of the border.

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Indeed. Paleoconservatives like Buchanan and such LOVE to hear arguments about giving up american sovereignty to foreigners. They might be on your side.

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There’s no denying that too many Americans don’t vote. But, I also think more Americans should look at the plus sides of past voting and work from there. For example, we’ve already shown that grassroots efforts really can help to get someone elected and even reelected despite having a powerful, wealthy opposition. No doubt that Obama was massively funded by our enemies (financial sector, Goldman Sachs, etc.), but that alone didn’t get him elected.

If Obama had kept more of his promises, we’d be in a pretty good position right now. The fact that someone who ran on a somewhat progressive platform and still won the presidency by a healthy margin (and despite our horrible electoral college system) is a very good sign. It just goes to show that the majority of the American public are progressive and really do want a single payer system (once they understand it) or at the very least a public option, along with less war profiteering and less wealth disparity.

Obama flaked out after getting elected, but what he did show is that it’s possible to get the person (he promised to be) elected. Now what we need to do is find someone who will follow through and start a grassroots campaign to get this person elected to our highest office.

Not that the corporatist mass media wants to talk about it, but Occupy Wall Street already helped to do it in the largest city in the USA. Evidence:

"We Are Living in the World Occupy Made": New York City Voters Elect Mayor Who Vows to Tax the Rich

Here’s a great butthurt headline that I really enjoy:

Commie Mayor Bill De Blasio Appoints Occupy Wall Street Activist As City Council Speaker (Awesome)

Is Bill De Blasio and the new City Council speaker, perfect? Nope, but it’s a start. Of course, De Blasio got money from the Washington establishment and is certainly no outsider, but like I said, it is a start.

Considering the mountains of entrenched, corporatist walls that were in place to keep awareness of disparity and corruption out of many Americans’ collective consciousness, I’d like to see someone else come up with a better plan than what OWS accomplished. Especially a plan that would have worked in such a trivial amount of time as it did. Despite the what the corporate media says, Occupy Wall Street was a success and it isn’t dead, it’s diversified.

There’s been a tangible sea change of awareness among Americans that wasn’t there before.

Evidence:

Most Americans Think Income Inequality Is A Big Problem: Poll

Unfortunately, the pessimist naysayers aren’t going to look at the positive side and they’ll continue to be defeatists. But, like usual, we’ll have to work past them.

Some solid groundwork has been laid. What needs to happen next via entities like the folks at Boing Boing, etc. is to combine forces with other influential progressive entities to put a massive, concerted effort into finding a presidential candidate that we can trust. Find that person, vet that person out and put the same effort we saw with things like the fight against SOPA to get this person nominated and put into executive office.

There’s already work being done on the local level, but that needs to be ramped up with support as well.

It’s time to stop acting like weak outsiders who only want to influence and beg paid-off politicians to do our bidding. It’s time to take over this motherfucker. The groundwork has been laid and it’s time for action. Cowards, defeatists and naysayers be damned.

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Sir, I stand corrected and retract my previous unfounded accusation of poor research on your part.

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Well, I didn’t know anything about the whole thing until you posted, so your point still stands (your post scared the bejesus out of me, actually–“crap, why did I pick Iceland why why why”–until I tracked down the full story).

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