TPP on C-Span

[PADemD]

Anyone watching Rep. Ron Kind D-WI. He seems to be a big cheerleader for TPP.

[BlueCaliDem]

1. If you knew more about the TPP and what President Obama wants to achieve with it, you'd

be a "cheerleader" (I'd rather call it, supporter of) of it, too.

[cali]

2. no, I would not.

I know a lot about the TPP. I have read, over the past two years, everything I could find. I have read the leaked environmental, intellectual property rights and investment chapters, along with extensive analysis. I have read the leaked documents on process. I have seen the list of corporate advisers. I know the history of modern free trade agreements- at least to a significant degree. I have read the 114 long page tpa and analysis of that by such experts as Sean Flynn at American University. I have read what Nobel Prize winning economists Stiglitz and Krugman have to say. I have considered who supports it and who opposes it. I know the backgrounds of the negotiators. I understand that we already have trade with mostly low tariffs with the 11 other nations in the agreement. I know how difficult enforcement of lofty goal in past trade agreements is.

So no, I don't support it.

I am not impugning the President's motives. I'm not even interested in them.

[djean111]

3. I agree with you a thousand times.

And I am not interested in Obama's motives either. What the TPP does will harm people long after Obama is gone. In a way, he is irrelevant.

[PADemD]

4. I would never be a supporter

Specifically because TPP would allow corporations to sue any of our governments (local, state, or federal) if any safety or labor law would cause that corporation to lose projected profit.

[Hoyt]

9. Not true, at all.

[PADemD]

11. Yes, true.

Investor-State Attacks: Empowering Foreign Corporations to Bypass our Courts, Challenge Basic Protections

Among the most dangerous but least known parts of today's "trade" agreements are extraordinary new rights and privileges granted to foreign corporations and investors that formally prioritize corporate rights over the right of governments to regulate and the sovereign right of nations to govern their own affairs. These terms empower individual foreign corporations to skirt domestic courts and directly challenge any policy or action of a sovereign government before World Bank and UN tribunals.

Just under U.S. deals, more than $38 billion remains pending in corporate claims against medicine patent policies, pollution cleanup requirements, climate and energy laws, and other public interest policies.

http://www.citizen.org/investorcases

[Hoyt]

13. It is wrong from the first sentence. The dispute mechanism has been used since 1959, and is

currently in 2500 trade agreements.

The "could result" in your posts is like saying we should stop taking vaccines because they "could result" in health problems. Quite unlikely, but it "could" happen.

[PADemD]

14. Hillary Clinton is opposed to a critical piece of the TPP

"Hillary Clinton is opposed to a critical piece of the Obama administration's Trans-Pacific Partnership, which would give corporations the right to sue sovereign nations over laws or regulations that could potentially curb their profits.


http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026594784

[Hoyt]

17. Clinton wants safeguards to prevent what some fear MIGHT happen, but hasn't in over 2500 agreements

with these dispute mechanisms.

AND, OBAMA IS ADDING SUCH SAFEGUARDS.

[PADemD]

12. TABLE OF FOREIGN INVESTOR - STATE CASES AND CLAIMS UNDER NAFTA AND OTHER U.S. “ TRADE ” DEALS

43 pages

http://www.citizen.org/documents/investor-state-chart.pdf

[Hoyt]

16. I know you haven't and won't, but take a couple at random and read the Notice of Claim, then

read the results, assuming it's not still floating around in the dispute process getting nowhere.

You'll find that the cases are nothing like what you seem to think. Nor, have they resulted in some corporate take over or conspiracy to take a nation's wealth.

In fact, the USA has never lost one of these disputes against it.

I challenge you to read details on a few of the cases.


From the USTR web site:

The United States already has international agreements containing ISDS in force with six of the eleven other countries participating in TPP (Canada, Chile, Mexico, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam). The remaining five countries (Australia, Brunei, Japan, Malaysia and New Zealand) are party to a total of over 100 agreements containing ISDS. TPP will not newly introduce ISDS to any of the countries participating in the agreement. Rather, it presents an opportunity to establish agreement among the parties on a high-standard approach to resolving international investment disputes.

Much of the concern about ISDS is the risk of companies using the mechanism to challenge legitimate regulations. Philip Morris International, for example, has challenged Australia’s plain packaging regulation under a 1993 Hong Kong-Australia Bilateral Investment Treaty. Though that case has not yet been fully adjudicated and Australia has made no changes to their regulation, we nonetheless are working to ensure that TPP includes important safeguards that protect against ISDS being used to challenge legitimate regulation. That is why the United States has put in place several layers of defenses to minimize the risk that U.S. agreements could be exploited in the manner to which other agreements among other countries are susceptible.

In an effort to safeguard against potential abuses of ISDS, TPP will have state-of-the-art protections. It will recognize the inherent right to regulate and to preserve the flexibility of the TPP Parties to protect legitimate public welfare objectives, such as public health, safety, the environment, and the conservation of living or non-living exhaustible natural resources. The investment chapter will include carefully defined obligations and exceptions designed to ensure that nothing in the chapter impinges on legitimate regulation or provides foreign investors with greater substantive rights than those already available under U.S. law. It will also reaffirm the right of any TPP government to ensure that investment activity in its territory is undertaken in a manner sensitive to environmental, health, or other regulatory objectives. . . . . . .

The evidence is equally clear in the United States. Despite having 50 ISDS agreements in place, the United States has never lost a case and nothing in our agreements has inhibited our response to the 2008 financial crisis, diluted the financial reforms we put in place, or has challenged signature reforms like the Affordable Care Act or any of the other new regulations that have been put in place over the last 30 years. . . . . . .

https://ustr.gov/about-us/policy-offices/press-office/fact-sheets/2015/march/investor-state-dispute-settlement-isds

I think there is a relatively minor case that we may "lose" that has been going on for years involving Mexico's claim they are being discriminated against for what they believe is "dophin safe tuna," and the USA says isn't and can't put on labels. There won't be any big judgement, and Mexico has still had to make big changes in the way it captures tuna, no matter how the case is ultimately resolved.

[Dawgs]

5. Why should I trust him, when most Democrats hate it and most Republicans love it? n/t

[pampango]

7. You have other reasons no doubt than one that is not true.

Since most republicans hate the TPP and most Democrats think it is a good idea.

[Dawgs]

8. I'm not talking about a stupid poll of ignorant Americans.

I'm talking about the politicians that are paid to know about it.

[pampango]

15. "I'm talking about the politicians that are paid to know about it." Fair enough.

In your favor, the republican base disagrees with you. (When their base disagrees with you, you are very likely to be right.) They do not trust their politicians who largely support TPP (and are paid to know about it). Their base is very much against TPP and the fast track that would enable its passage. They does not really care what their politicians 'know' or say about either one.

The polls show their politicians run a far greater risk of voter retribution if they vote for fast track or the TPP than do Democratic politicians. Of course those are polls of 'ignorant Americans' so take them with a grain of salt. But in this case, it is the same ignorant Americans who claim they will take electoral revenge on republican politicians for a pro-TPP vote and who will actually be voting. Their ignorance may not protect those republicans in congress, at least in their primaries when their competition usually comes from the far-right.

[Hoyt]

10. Naw, Tbaggers are also against it.

[pampango]

6. In the past he has had a good pro-labor & environment record.

Rated 100% by UFCW, indicating an anti-management/pro-labor record.
Rated 8% by the US COC, indicating a anti-business voting record.
Rated 95% by the LCV, indicating pro-environment votes.
Rated 17% by CATO, indicating a anti-free trade voting record.
Voted YES on assisting workers who lose jobs due to globalization.
Voted NO on implementing CAFTA, Central America Free Trade.
Voted NO on withdrawing from the WTO.
Voted NO on 'Fast Track' authority for trade agreements.

http://www.ontheissues.org/house/Ron_Kind.htm