Is this true? Obama Trade Document Leaked, Revealing New Corporate Powers And Broken Campaign Promi

[still_one]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/13/obama-trade-document-leak_n_1592593.html

"WASHINGTON -- A critical document from President Barack Obama's free trade negotiations with eight Pacific nations was leaked online early Wednesday morning, revealing that the administration intends to bestow radical new political powers upon multinational corporations, contradicting prior promises.

The leaked document has been posted on the website of Public Citizen, a long-time critic of the administration's trade objectives. The new leak follows substantial controversy surrounding the secrecy of the talks, in which some members of Congress have complained they are not being given the same access to trade documents that corporate officials receive."



I would love to know who leaked this?

[Drale]

1. I don't know but I won't believe it

until I get more information. This feels like a repuke trick, look how its already blowing up here with people believing it 100%. Divide and conquer.

[emulatorloo]

17. Stinks of Rove or a Rove-wannabe. Divide and Conquer indeed.

[woodsprite]

2. It's the moles that Bush buried deep before he left office.

They see something that may have a tad of truth, then find out how to twist and exploit it so it sounds believable, then leak it to the public. Probably working with Rove.

[Marr]

6. Are you kidding me?

That's the sort of logic pretzel we all used to laugh at from Bushbots.

Let's be honest for a moment. This sounds believable because it's in step with the Obama Administration's general stance on big business; ie, "How Can We Serve You?".

[emulatorloo]

18. Republicans have a long history of "ratfucking"

[limpyhobbler]

29. Why does matter who leaked it? What matters is the secret corporate influence.

[kenny blankenship]

65. Aren't you used to it by now?

This place has been Pretzel Logic Central since the savage rape and murder of health care reform - summer/fall 2009.

[JustAnotherGen]

3. When it comes to smears

Against President Obama - I don't believeas an automatic knee jerk reaction . . . is this like how they can't decide if our President is a Muslim or a follower of Black Liberation Theology?

[Freddie Stubbs]

4. Rather than speculate or listen to rumors, wouldn't it be better to look at the President's

actual actions on trade issues?

What he has done is likely to be more instructive that what he says he will do or what others say he will do.

[limpyhobbler]

7. In that case it is probably true.

[Dawgs]

10. Ha!

[Romulox]

5. The President is too busy renegotiating NAFTA to sign such a deal!

[PufPuf23]

8. Here is article at Public Citizen and link to document PDF

June 13, 2012


Controversial Trade Pact Text Leaked, Shows U.S. Trade Officials Have Agreed to Terms That Undermine Obama Domestic Agenda



http://citizen.typepad.com/eyesontrade/2012/06/controversial-trade-pact-text-leaked-shows-us-trade-officials-have-agreed-to-terms-that-undermine-ob.html

PUBLIC CITIZEN PRESS RELEASE

After Two Years of Closed-Door Negotiations, Trans-Pacific Partnership Text Replicates Alarming Bush Trade Pact Terms That Obama Opposed as Candidate, and Worse

WASHINGTON, D.C.– A leak today of one of the most controversial chapters of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) reveals that extreme provisions have been agreed to by U.S. officials, providing a stark warning about the dangers of “trade” negotiations occurring under conditions of extreme secrecy without press, public or policymaker oversight, Public Citizen said.

“The outrageous stuff in this leaked text may well be why U.S. trade officials have been so extremely secretive about these past two years of TPP negotiations,” said Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch. “Via closed-door negotiations, U.S. officials are rewriting swaths of U.S. law that have nothing to do with trade and in a move that will infuriate left and right alike have agreed to submit the U.S. government to the jurisdiction of foreign tribunals that can order unlimited payments of our tax dollars to foreign corporations that don’t want to comply with the same laws our domestic firms do.”

Although the TPP has been branded a “trade” agreement, the leaked text of the pact’s Investment Chapter shows that the TPP would:
•limit how U.S. federal and state officials could regulate foreign firms operating within U.S. boundaries, with requirements to provide them greater rights than domestic firms;
•extend the incentives for U.S. firms to offshore investment and jobs to lower-wage countries;
•establish a two-track legal system that gives foreign firms new rights to skirt U.S. courts and laws, directly sue the U.S. government before foreign tribunals and demand compensation for financial, health, environmental, land use and other laws they claim undermine their TPP privileges; and
•allow foreign firms to demand compensation for the costs of complying with U.S. financial or environmental regulations that apply equally to domestic and foreign firms.


The document in PDF:


http://www.citizenstrade.org/ctc/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/tppinvestment.pdf

[deutsey]

19. There are no nations. There are no peoples.

There are no Russians. There are no Arabs. There are no third worlds. There is no West. There is only one holistic system of systems, one vast and immane, interwoven, interacting, multivariate, multinational dominion of dollars. Petro-dollars, electro-dollars, multi-dollars, reichmarks, rins, rubles, pounds, and shekels. It is the international system of currency which determines the totality of life on this planet. That is the natural order of things today. That is the atomic and subatomic and galactic structure of things today!

Network, 1976

[WillyT]

38. Yep...

[deutsey]

43. I'd like to see Network remade

And I'm not a fan of remakes, in general.

It's still very relevant...just update it to include cable and replace the Mao Tse Tung Hour with the Ayn Rand Hour.

[WillyT]

45. I Like...

Not a big fan of remakes either, but...

I'd love to see 'Three Days Of The Condor' remade as well.

Just because the technical side of it is so out of date, that I fear young people would see it as a comedy.

Same with 'War Games'...

[deutsey]

49. Agreed...so long as it's not like the remake of "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three"

I love the original...the remake really sucks, despite some of the talent in it. Gutted the heart and soul of it, imo.

[rusty fender]

27. These provisions are way too outrageous to be true

This has got to be a fraudulent document. No one, anywhere, would agree to these.

[bajamary]

31. but it's not too outrageous AND it is TRUE

Below is the link to the 9 page analysis by the progressive non-profit organization: Public Citizen.

http://www.citizen.org/documents/Leaked-TPP-Investment-Analysis.pdf

"The outrageous stuff in this leaked text may well be why U.S. trade officials have been so extremely secretive about these past two years of negotiations," said Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch in a written statement.

[sabrina 1]

70. That borders on treason. Does Congress have any say in this? Do we have a functioning

government anymore, or do Corporations now write all of our laws?

•limit how U.S. federal and state officials could regulate foreign firms operating within U.S. boundaries, with requirements to provide them greater rights than domestic firms;

•extend the incentives for U.S. firms to offshore investment and jobs to lower-wage countries;

•establish a two-track legal system that gives foreign firms new rights to skirt U.S. courts and laws, directly sue the U.S. government before foreign tribunals and demand compensation for financial, health, environmental, land use and other laws they claim undermine their TPP privileges; and

•allow foreign firms to demand compensation for the costs of complying with U.S. financial or environmental regulations that apply equally to domestic and foreign firms.

Who are these people? And who knew about this?

[Remember]

9. Hope it's not true

If this is true then this will cause a problem that no amount of convincing the voting mass to vote Democratic will happen. Cannot be true. I HOPE this is not true".................

[Zalatix]

11. They'll get worse than this if they vote Republican.

[emilyg]

12. Sorry excuse.

[Zalatix]

13. I know, "The Republicans are worse" is a piss poor consolation

but for now it's all we have.

Still, I'd like to see this new Asian-NAFTA get ABORTED.

[Luminous Animal]

14. Unbelievable, isn't it.

Whatever happened to counting on things getting better? Apparently, the best we can count on is it'll be bad but not worse.

[emilyg]

30. Makes my blood boil that

this is the best we can count on.

[HarveyDarkey]

42. really?

[msongs]

15. we are being sold to China one deal at a time, goodbye independence and sovereignty. BTW if you

conduct your business in the USA in violation of these fake trade pacts you can be sued by...foreign corporations whose laws and rules cancel out your constitutional rights.

Obama is not the first president to sell us out for corporate profit.

[thecrow]

16. This is the third thread on this topic today

TPP hasn't even been fully negotiated yet. Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership - Wikipedia, the free ... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trans-Pacific_Strategic_Economic_Partnership

SNIP

The original agreement among the countries of Brunei, Chile, New Zealand and Singapore was signed on June 3, 2005, and entered into force on May 28, 2006.

SNIP

In February 2008 the United States agreed to enter into talks with the P4 members regarding liberalization of trade in financial services.[9] Then, on September 22, 2008, U.S. Trade Representative Susan C. Schwab announced that the United States would begin negotiations with the P4 countries to join the TPP, with the first round of talks scheduled for early 2009.[10] Commenting on the announcement, New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark stated, "I think the value to New Zealand of the United States coming into a transpacific agreement as a partner would be of the same value as we would hope to get from a bilateral FTA. . . It's very, very big news."[11]

**************************************

Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) - United States Trade Representative www.ustr.gov/tpp

You can go and read all about it.

[woo me with science]

22. Maybe because it's important. nt

[limpyhobbler]

23. That's what happens when you attack labor unions and democracy and the American people.

We tend to make a lot of posts about that stuff.

Here go read about it:
http://www.aflcio.org/Blog/Economy/Take-a-Real-Look-at-the-Trans-Pacific-Partnership-FTA

On March 1, President Obama released his 2012 Trade Policy Agenda and reiterated his commitment to move "full-speed ahead" in finalizing the Trans-Pacific Partnership Free Trade Agreement (TPP). You may never have heard of the TPP—millions of your fellow Americans certainly haven’t.

That is why the American Prospect’s special report on the TPP, Pacific Illusions, is so important. Pacific Illusions shows how, so far, it doesn’t look like the TPP fixes the problems with U.S. trade policy that have been hurting workers for the past 20 years, which means the TPP could be a big mistake.

Just what is the TPP anyway? It’s a trade agreement between the United States and Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Chile, Malaysia, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam. The United States Trade Representative (USTR) has called it “an ambitious, 21st-century” agreement.

If passed, it would be the biggest free trade agreement since NAFTA, and that’s before including Japan, Mexico and Canada, which are waiting in the wings to join. With an unemployment rate of more than 8 percent, and 2.8 million jobs lost to trade with China over the past decade, America’s workers have every right to be wary—is the TPP the right answer to create good jobs in America?

...snip...

Unfortunately, there isn’t much publically available information about the TPP, given the secrecy not only of the text, but also of the negotiating goals and the way the press is largely ignoring the negotiating process. However, what little information is available should be cause for concern. At the very least it indicates that the USTR’s definition of a “high-standard, 21st century agreement” is very different than working Americans’ definition.

http://www.aflcio.org/Blog/Economy/Take-a-Real-Look-at-the-Trans-Pacific-Partnership-FTA

http://www.aflcio.org/Issues/Trade/Trans-Pacific-Free-Trade-Agreement/Labor-Rights

And now we find out that corporate goons have special access to info that is secret from the American people???
Nobody is really surprised to tell the truth.

The more posts about it the better.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

28. Obviously the AFL-CIO

is one of Karl Rove's deepest moles, buried to hurt the President.

[bajamary]

32. what...are we supposed to just wait until is is a DONE DEAL?

I suggest that the people at DU have the right to post about this grave matter more than three times.

Are you the posting police?

Are we to simply wait until this is a DONE DEAL before we voice an objection to this very serious matter.

We can not sit back and just watch our democracy being sold down another NAFTA drain.

Below is the link to the 9 page analysis by the progressive non-profit organization: Public Citizen.

http://www.citizen.org/documents/Leaked-TPP-Investment-Analysis.pdf

"The outrageous stuff in this leaked text may well be why U.S. trade officials have been so extremely secretive about these past two years of negotiations," said Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch in a written statement.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

20. If the Chamber of Commerce is for this, if Rmoney is for this, and if Obama is for this, isn't this

latest pending "free trade" agreement good for us?

From the article:

Trans-Pacific negotiations have been taking place throughout the Obama presidency. The deal is strongly supported by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the top lobbying group for American corporations. Obama's Republican opponent in the 2012 presidential elections, Mitt Romney, has urged the U.S. to finalize the deal as soon as possible.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/13/obama-trade-document-leak_n_1592593.html

[secondwind]

21. CHENEY LEFT MOLES BEHIND IN SEVERAL FEDERAL AGENCIES. COMMON KNOWLEDGE

[limpyhobbler]

24. The courageous whistle-blower who leaked this info is an American hero.

[uponit7771]

26. lol, good one

[Teamster Jeff]

25. If a Repug administration was negotiating this

the entire left would be outraged. Now that a Dem administration is doing it we "can't believe it" or we make excuses. This sums up the entire Obama presidency. He moves the the country further to the right while neutering the left. He has virtually destroyed the democratic party

[Tarheel_Dem]

39. "He has virtually destroyed the democratic party"

Hyperbole much?

[JDPriestly]

33. Horrible news! Probably true!

But consider the alternative!

No wonder. With Hillary Clinton in the SOS position (and she is good at her job), the corporate takeover is being expedited.

The Clintons are a classic rags to riches story. That do you expect?

[Autumn]

51. What makes you think Hillary, who is good at her job, is behind this?

Obama is the President, and I seriously doubt she drags him around by the balls. I think Obama is just every bit as much for the corporations as the Clinton's. Obama fits the rags to riches as well as they do.

Obama won the election in 2008, he's the one in charge. This is just another shitty fuck over for us.

[WillyT]

34. Question: How Many Pawns Are There... In 3-Dimensional Chess ???

[Luminous Animal]

35. 310,598,599

[WillyT]

36. Sounds About Right... Sigh...

[morningfog]

46. Ouch.

[siligut]

37. IF THIS IS TRUE, I AM VOTING FOR RMONEY!

Just sick of rethugs, please know I am kidding.

[Tarheel_Dem]

40. This is the kind of crap the KKKarl Rove moles at DU thrive on. Try Harder!

[Luminous Animal]

41. So, you are saying that this document is a fake? Or that it doesn't say

what Public Citizen and the article says what it says? If it is the latter, perhaps you can read it (a link to the pdf is upthread) and tell us what it really says.

[Occulus]

44. *crickets*

[Luminous Animal]

55. *crickets* is Tarheel_Dem's middle name.

[WillyT]

50. *Crickets*

[morningfog]

68. Is the document fake?

[bhikkhu]

47. It looks like a set of regulatory controls and standards upon existing trade

which is one of the jobs of the president to get done. One of the goals is to double US exports by 2015, and things are well along toward that, but trade is better when it is better regulated; when their are governing bodies to mediate disputes and established pathways to iron out grievances, things go better.

Speaking here from a state on the Pacific rim, where the economy has been very much dependent on trade with other Pacific rim countries for a long time. I don't see a problem with more regulation and control, and the establishment of a body to mediate disputes. There is much more of a problem when these things aren't done. Pretending we are sovereign countries who have no need or use for one another is another variety of pretending we are sovereign citizens who have no need or use for one another - asshattery either way.

[Luminous Animal]

48. When that mediating body can rule against the laws and regulations of a sovereign state

then I've a huge problem with it.

The issues exposed by this leak are issues that should be openly debated by the people and their representatives. That congress was pretty much shut out of negotiations is undemocratic. That the people have been kept in ignorance and thus unable to weigh in and make their views known to their elected representatives is undemocratic.

[WillyT]

52. It Has Happened Before... (NAFTA)

BILL MOYERS REPORTS: TRADING DEMOCRACY

BILL MOYERS: Everyone's heard about NAFTA – the North American Free Trade Agreement – and all the talk about jobs.

But almost no one heard about one obscure section of NAFTA - Chapter 11 - except for multinational corporations who are using it to challenge democracy.

CHARLES "CHIP" ROH: If you regulate and make me less profitable, pay me off.

SEN. SHEILA KUEHL: There's no democracy in any of this stuff.

BILL MOYERS: Today, foreign companies are exploiting Chapter 11 to attack public laws that protect our health – and our environment – even to attack the American judicial system.

MARTIN WAGNER: It's sort of a like a sophisticated extortion racket.

WILLIAM GREIDER: We're gonna hit you for half a billion dollars if you do this.

BILL MOYERS: Secret NAFTA Tribunals can force taxpayers to pay billions of dollars in lawsuits filed by corporations against the United States.

BILL MOYERS: The public doesn't have a clue?

WILLIAM GREIDER: This was not in the debate at all.

MIKE ALLRED: If the American people ever find out, they are going to be in open rebellion against this.

BILL MOYERS: NAFTA's Chapter 11 threatens radical changes in public policy. But it's all happening out of sight. Citizens have no seat at the table.

BILL MOYERS: This is the story of how a trade agreement – supported by two Presidents and ratified by the Congress – became an end-run around the Constitution. The terms were influenced by Washington lawyers and lobbyists – and the companies who employ them. It is now played out in rooms like this.

Chapter 11 is only one provision in the five hundred and fifty-five page North American Free Trade Agreement – negotiated to promote business among the US, Canada and Mexico. It was supposedly written to protect investors if foreign governments tried to seize their property.

But corporations have stretched NAFTA's Chapter 11 to undermine environmental decisions – the decisions of local communities – even the verdict of an American jury. The cases brought – so far – total almost four billion dollars.

The claims are being decided not in open court, but in what has become a system of private justice, in secret tribunals. That's exactly the way the authors of Chapter 11 designed it.

Much More: http://www.pbs.org/now/transcript/transcript_tdfull.html

And...

Link: http://www.citizen.org/trade/article_redirect.cfm?ID=6687

[Luminous Animal]

54. Each and every day we are screwed in every way.

I worked my butt off protesting NAFTA. That and "welfare reform" was exhausting.

[bhikkhu]

56. The WTO members, us included, agree to arbitration in trade disputes

which is nothing more or less than this bill allows for. Without arbitration its very difficult to resolve disputes. Having effective trade relations is a big part of having a healthy economy.

[Luminous Animal]

57. When trade agreements include provisions to override a nation's environmental,

food safety, & labor regulations, it is undemocratic. You do know, don't you, that there is robust people's protest against the corporate undemocratic model of the WTO?

[bhikkhu]

59. Yes, and there certainly needs to be a balance

Its difficult to say without looking at the text of the regulations and comparing these to existing ones how it will work out. I am inclined to say that regulated trade is better than unregulated trade, and multilateral trade agreements are an improvement over free-market free-for-all.

But I do know of the problems with the WTO. The thing is, until you have a governmental body and legal structures (like the WTO) set up, there is no entity to protest against and little hope of changing how things are done.

[Luminous Animal]

60. Umm, you can protest and have input into the process and the proposed legal structure.

IF, the process is transparent. Why should we wait for our "betters" to make the decisions before we are permitted to have input?

[bhikkhu]

63. Trade relations are and have always been the responsibility of the president

that's the job. I haven't seen much in the way of suggestions, more pot-stirring that without much understanding of how or why trade works. Or just the usual fear and loathing of anything with his name on it. Obama has a very good record so far on managing trade relations toward an increase in exports, which is the primary goal ( http://news.yahoo.com/u-exports-march-hit-record-high-186-8-191608747.html )

[Romulox]

64. We could have arrived at your position on this merely by your post history. It's reflexive. nt

[Octafish]

53. I don't care about the leaker as much as the lack of transparency.

The bill as designed will do the same as NAFTA and all the rest: more faster better Reverse Robin Hood.

[KoKo]

62. +1

[TheKentuckian]

58. Who leaked it is backburner to what the contents were.

Who is a distraction.

[woo me with science]

61. Every day. Every damned day there is a new one. nt

[Romulox]

66. What's hilarious is it's like the multiple stages of grief. First, flat denial. Then, Bush moles.

Third, "rat-fucking" (whatever that means) and so on...

[brentspeak]

67. kick

[woo me with science]

69. Kick