“Films, football, beer, and above all, gambling filled up the horizon of their minds. To keep them in control was not difficult….” ― George Orwell, 1984
As Americans train their attention to Super Bowl 50, their way of life — and for nearly half a million people, their livelihoods — just got one step closer to being signed away. This Thursday, in Auckland, New Zealand, representatives of the twelve nations participating in the Trans-Pacific Partnership gathered to sign the massive trade deal turned corporate coup, bringing an end to the obligatory 90-day period ostensibly set aside for debate, following the close of five years of negotiations in October.
Agreed to by the United States, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Singapore, Mexico, Japan, Malaysia, Vietnam, Chile, Peru, and Brunei, the TPP will regulate ‘trade’ among the twelve nations. The deal is estimated to account for 40 percent of the global GDP — yet even the congressmen and congresswomen who will cast the deciding votes for U.S. participation were not privy to negotiations as that occurred.
Infamous both for secrecy among the top U.S. officials and multinational corporate lawyers who designed its structure, the TPP has made headlines more often for the fact it hasn’t made headlines, than for the sovereignty-crushing rules tucked into its multi-thousand-paged text.
Among the contents, some of which had been revealed in pieces by WikiLeaks thanks to concerned whistleblowers, is the notorious Intellectual Property chapter. This chapter acts as a vice grip on copyright law as well as guidelines for so-called “corporate tribunals,” which will allow “injured” corporations to sue governments (even local governments) for predicted future losses. Internet service providers (ISPs) would be forced to cough up customers’ names over instances of copyright infringement for the purposes of prosecution.
Many experts who have analyzed the text predict an end to such personal freedoms as knowing which country grew your produce — and whether or not it’s been genetically modified or even doused with toxic chemicals. Labor rights, environmental guidelines, investment rules — virtually every facet of everyday life is covered by this (corporate) trade ‘deal.’
As an ominous example of the effect the TPP will likely have and the importance to corporations and the U.S. that it passes, Malaysia was arbitrarily bumped up from the list of Tier 3 violators of human rights – a spot originally earned by its lack action on forced labor and adult and child sex trafficking. It was reduced to a Tier 2 designation without any improvements to its record, just so the country would be a permitted signatory state.
Despite claims made by Pres. Obama and other politicians that the TPP would “create” up to 650,000 new jobs, in actuality, researchers with Tufts University found that the “TPP will lead to employment losses in all countries, with a total of 771,000 lost jobs. The United States would be hardest hit, with a loss of 448,000 jobs.”
And all of these gems have now been officially signed by the participating nations and await only a yes or no vote by Congress, which will likely happen after the next president is elected — since no politician wants to be known as the ultimate corporate sellout.
But go ahead and enjoy that Super Bowl. It is the 50th, after all.
Claire Bernish writes for TheFreeThoughtProject.com
THE End of the American dream, More nails in the USA Coffin. BOTH Criminal Parties are to blame, I fought against this, GATT, NAFTA, CAFTA, WTO, with others while the majority slept…. WE THE CITIZENS NEED to TAKE OUR NATION BACK. Excuse ourselves immediately from these abominations…. TIME to gird up our loins and fight against these evil members of the District of Criminals….
how do you fight against this? what can we do to stop it?
What an idiot. You will never succeed as a troll. You are just too f”king ignorant.
like any of the sheep would care anyway what happens with anything that effects them even if they werent being distracted by their stupid pointless sports games
Gematria seems to be at play – check out a guy named zackery on you tube.
It appears that a good case can be made for gaming of the nfl,nba,mlb and probably hockey.
It appears that the numbers don’t lie (and is a tool of the all seeing eye crowd).
Some one at the bar asked me who I thought will win? I said CBS!
Well the idea of a TPP will last only as long as the power grids are able to stay up. It’s ALL based upon sufficient amounts of electricity humming in the wires, and as they all fall silent one by one due to the vampire-like TPP feeding off of itself and other reasons, there will not be any TPP left to worry about! We can see that this is already coming to pass by the fact that the Baltic Dry Index is at historical LOWS!! Ships are sitting idle at sea and in ports all around the globe, this can be verified quite easily by going to the web sites of the organizations that monitor such things. Fewer and fewer ships are at sea because there just isn’t enough trade going on to justify them leaving ports. World trade is grinding down to a halt, so by the time they get around to voting on the TPP, there won’t be any point to voting on it or anything to vote on!
The TPP will just be another fast fading memory in the catalog of wet dreams of tyrants and despots. ONLY someone who is completely insane would think that they could survive by cutting off their limbs one at a time, and eating them. This, in essence, is what the TPP is all about, the delusion that one can choke off all trade and still remain in business and make a profit!! Who in their right mind would care to engage in a venture that they knew was going to fail before they even started out on it? That is what the TPP is, a guarantee that most businesses are going to be MADE to fail, and so they will.
Is there a real solution to all of this insanity? Yes, of course there is! It is by educating people that there is no right for ANYONE to commit a fraud of any kind upon you and there is no actual obligation for you to endure any fraud. If there is, then where is the proof of that claim?
Here is the main difference between republicans & democrats;
Republicans will sell you into slavery for a corporation.
Democrats will sell you into slavery for the government.