General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Forget the DU created issues. How does Hillary not have an opinion on TPP? [View all]JDPriestly
(57,936 posts)But we have to honestly realize that the very idealistic aim for which Eleanor Roosevelt and FDR (and more recently the Rockefeller and other right-wing foundations and think-tanks) have advocated has failed the US.
It may be as you suggest and as I tend to agree that the US failed to institute the internal social and economic changes that would be necessary to make it work. But I am inclined to believe that the concept of the ISDS courts (and Elizabeth Warren, a professor of law at Harvard and Stiglitz, a great economist and brilliant thinker agree, I believe, with me) is flawed. The courts do not further democracy or democratic institutions. They weaken democracy and destroy the authority of democratic institutions including courts that emphasize due process and the rule of law (democratically passed laws). They also weaken the authority of legislative bodies. And the weakening of the authority of democratically elected legislative bodies is perhaps the worst result of international and multinational trade agreements including the WTO which impose super-national courts on the members of the agreement.
We made a mistake. FDR did not foresee the damage that the multinational trade agreements would cause.
And that damage is just starting to become evident. It is causing disputes between parties to the agreements and unrelated trade groups rather than bringing peoples of the world closer to peace.
And within the US because of our very "you are on your own, no matter how poor you are" mentality of our very strong, nearly Fascist right-wing and its success in our electoral system because of the influence of corporate money, the trade agreements are causing an undue amount of unemployment and underemployment, And so far there is utterly no moral or social consciousness to rectify the injury that the trade agreements are causing in our country. I suspect that Mexico also is having serious problems as are the countries in Central America due in great part to the displacement caused by the trade agreements.
There has to be a better way to trade that has a moral and ethical component that serves the PEOPLE of the world and not just the corporations.