Money Merry-Go-Round: Emails Show How Wall Street Execs and Alums Crafted Trade Bill

[Uncle Joe]

Foreign corporations could sue to undermine US protections for consumers’ health, safety and financial security under a provision added to the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal (TPP) after executives of big banks pressed the nation’s chief trade negotiator, himself a former big-bank executive, to include it.

A series of emails, obtained under the Freedom of Information Act and released last week by Rootstrikers, an organization that opposes the trade deal now pending before Congress, confirm the push by financial service companies for the “Investor-State Dispute Settlement” provision. ISDS, as it is referred to by the cognoscenti writing the emails, would, in the words of one critic, Public Citizen’s Lori Wallach, “elevate individual investors to the status of a nation-state” in trade disputes.

The emails also are bound to reinforce the suspicion that US trade policy is being set by what might be called an “executariat” of corporate and government leaders who periodically swap positions for their mutual benefit. “They’re written as if they are being sent between colleagues,” says Dennis Kelleher of the watchdog group Better Markets. “That’s because the writers all have been, currently are or will be colleagues at major Wall Street firms.”

Most striking is an exchange between Faryar Shirzad, the co-head of Goldman Sachs’ government affairs office, and US Trade Representative Michael Froman.

The two men have mirror-image resumes: Shirzad worked on economic and international issues in the administration of then-President George W. Bush, serving as a top aide to the president (known as a “sherpa”) at several international economic summits.

Froman worked for some of the same agencies as Shirzad, but in the administration of former President Bill Clinton. He sat out the Bush years in the private sector as a managing director of Citigroup, then swirled back through the revolving door into Barack Obama’s administration. At several international economic summits, Froman also served as the president’s sherpa. He became US trade representative in 2013 — but not before his financial holdings raised some eyebrows on Capitol Hill.

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http://billmoyers.com/story/money-merry-go-round-emails-show-wall-street-execs-alums-crafted-trade-bill/

[djean111]

1. No votes for me for TPP/TTIP enablers. Voting, shilling, crafting, whatever.

And anyone who shilled for it or voted for Fast Track, who now says gee, I had no idea - fucking liar or just plain stupid, no vote or support.

[KansDem]

2. Does that include politicians who only in the last eight months "absorbed" new info?

Hillary Clinton on free trade--

I oppose CAFTA & TPP, but global economy needs trade. (Feb 2016)
I absorbed new info and changed my mind to oppose TPP. (Oct 2015)
Trans Pacific trade deal doesn't meet my standards. (Oct 2015)
TPP must produce jobs, raise wages, & protect security. (Apr 2015)
Chief advocate for Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). (Aug 2014)

On the Issues

[djean111]

3. Why yes, it does.

Hillary is pandering, that is all she is doing. Campaign blathering lying. And if it falls to her, she would sign it in a heartbeat.
Oh, and if she is just now "absorbing information", after traveling the world shilling for it - she is, IMO, not bright enough to be president.

[KansDem]

4. Agreed...