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Thanks to Leaked Documents We Now Know Some of the Sordid Details of the Secret Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Negotiations
utter and complete global fascism… brought to you in secret
Thanks to Leaked Documents We Now Know Some of the Sordid Details of the Secret Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Negotiations
The TPP = NAFTA with the Pacific Rim
Economy In Crisis – September 20, 2012
Last week, officials from the U.S. and 8 Pacific Rim nations – Vietnam, Malaysia, Peru, Australia, Brunei, Chile, New Zealand, Singapore – were in closed-door TPP talks in Leesburg, Virginia. TPP would be open for all Pacific Rim nations to join – China, Japan, Russia, Indonesia and more. Mexico and Canada also just entered these talks as well.
Drafts exist for TPP’s many chapters. Most don’t pertain to trade. Rather, TPP would impose a system of binding global governance over our federal and state laws and courts. We would be obliged to conform our domestic policies on land use, food safety, financial regulation, foreign ownership, patents and copyright, and more to TPP’s terms. Failure to do so would result in trade sanctions and/or obligations to compensate foreign firms with our tax dollars – penalties imposed by foreign tribunals.
The governments won’t release the draft text. But 600 U.S. corporate “trade advisors” have access, and a special role in setting the rules. Thanks to leaks, we know:
Offshoring Incentives: TPP has the investor protections also found in NAFTA that help corporations offshore jobs by removing many of the risks associated with relocating to low-wage nations. The U.S. has lost more than 5 million (1 out of 4) of its manufacturing jobs since NAFTA and the global WTO went into effect.
Ban on “Buy American”: Any firm operating in a TPP signatory nation would get privileged access to U.S. procurement contracts – our tax dollars! TPP would send our money offshore, rather than recycling it here to create American jobs.
U.S. Submitted to Jurisdiction of Foreign Tribunals: TPP would expand the notorious “investor-state” system, subjecting the U.S. to the jurisdiction of World Bank and U.N. tribunals. The tribunals would be empowered to order payment of our tax dollars to foreign corporations operating within the U.S. if they object to complying with the same laws that apply to U.S. firms.
More Financial Instability: TPP would forbid bans on risky financial products or services while making measures to reduce systemic risk, such as capital controls, illegal.
Higher Medicine Prices: Big PhRMA would get new privileges to jack up drug prices. Not only patent extensions, but new rights to challenge the cost-saving decisions of drug formularies, which are used here for Medicare and Medicaid.
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