TTIP—American
Economic Imperialism
By Paul Craig
Roberts
May 04,
2016 "Information
Clearing House"
- Greenpeace has done that part of the world whose
representatives are so corrupt or so stupid as to
sign on to the Trans-Pacific and Trans-Atlantic
“partnerships” a great service. Greenpeace secured
and leaked the secret TTIP documents that Washington
and global corporations are pushing on Europe. The
official documents prove that my description of
these “partnerships” when they first appeared in the
news is totally correct.
These
so-called “free trade agreements” are not trade
agreements. The purpose of the “partnerships,” which
were drafted by global corporations, is to make
corporations immune to the laws of sovereign
countries in which they do business. Any country’s
sovereign law whether social, environmental, food
safety, labor protections—any law or regulation—that
impacts a corporation’s profits is labeled a
“restraint on trade.” The “partnerships” permit
corporations to file a suit that overturns the law
or regulation and also awards the corporation
damages paid by the taxpayers of the country that
tried to protect its environment or the safety of
its food and workers.
The law
suit is not heard in the courts of the country or in
any court. It is heard in a corporate tribunal in
which corporations serve as judge, jury, and
prosecutor.
In other
words, the “partnerships” give global corporations
the power to overturn democratic outcomes.
Allegedly, Europe consists of democracies.
Democracies pass laws protecting the environment and
the safety of food and labor, but these laws
democratically enacted reduce profits. Anything less
than a sweatshop, with starvation wages, no
environmental protection, no safety legislation for
food or worker, can be overturned at will by global
corporations under the terms of the “partnerships.”
Only a
traitor, a well paid one, could sign such a pact.
In my
opinion, corporate taxation can also be overturned
as it obviously reduces profits.
The
Trans-Atlantic and Trans-Pacific “partnerships” have
been conducted in secrecy. The reason is obvious.
Had people known how they were being sold out, there
would have been a firestorm of protest. The
corporate shills and their propagandists in the
financial media could deny my revelations, because I
had no official documents to release.
The
“partnership” agreements are treaties. Under the US
Constitution, treaties are the prerogative of
Congress, not the prerogative of an executive branch
appointed Trade Representative who represents not
the people but the corporations seeking the
advantage. To avoid the US Constitution, the
agreements are defined as non-treaties. You see how
the groundwork for corruption is established.
The way it
works is that the appointed US Trade Representative
“negotiates” with appointed trade representatives of
other countries. Any resistance to the deal is
overcome with bribes and intimidation. All of the
negotiation is conducted in secrecy. When the trade
representatives sign on to the deal, it is presented
to the legislatures of the countries. The
legislators are told that they must approve the pact
and not endanger all the hard work that has gone on
for so long and that is in everybody’s interest as
attested to by all of the bribed and coerced trade
representatives.
These
“trade pacts” originate in the US, because American
global corporations and the American mega-banks are
the largest players in the world economy, and the
agreements that the corporations walk through the
process give the American companies economic
hegemony over the countries that sign the
agreements. The Trans-Atlantic and Trans-Pacific
“partnerships” are tools of US financial
imperialism.
Today (May
3, 2016) I debated on Press TV Sean O’Grady, the
financial editor of the UK newspaper the
Independent. It is extraordinary that O’Grady
took a line totally opposite to that of his
newspaper. I suggested to him that perhaps he should
read his own newspaper.
Today an
article in the Independent reported that
the leaked “documents show that US corporations will
be granted unprecedented powers over any new public
health or safety regulations to be introduced in
future. If any European government does dare to
bring in laws to raise social or environmental
standards, TTIP will grant US investors the right to
sue for loss of profits in their own corporate court
system that is unavailable to domestic firms,
governments or anyone else. For all those who said
that we were scaremongering and that the EU would
never allow this to happen, we were right and you
were wrong.”
As I
understand it, the situation is worse than the
article describes. TTIP applies to laws already on
the books, such as France’s laws against GMO seeds
and food products.
The
Independent article continues:
“Today’s
shock leak of the text of the Transatlantic Trade
and Investment Partnership (TTIP) marks the
beginning of the end for the hated EU-US trade deal,
and a key moment in the Brexit debate. The unelected
negotiators have kept the talks going until now by
means of a fanatical level of secrecy, with threats
of criminal prosecution for anyone divulging the
treaty’s contents.
“Now, for
the first time, the people of Europe can see for
themselves what the European Commission has been
doing under cover of darkness – and it is not
pretty. The leaked TTIP documents, published by
Greenpeace this morning, run to 248 pages and cover
13 of the 17 chapters where the final agreement has
begun to take shape. The texts include highly
controversial subjects such as EU food safety
standards, already known to be at risk from TTIP, as
well as details of specific threats such as the US
plan to end Europe’s ban on genetically modified
foods.
“The leaked
texts also reveal how the European Commission is
preparing to open up the European economy to unfair
competition from giant US corporations, despite
acknowledging the disastrous consequences this will
bring to European producers, who have to meet far
higher standards than pertain in the USA.
“According
to official statistics, at least one million jobs
will be lost as a direct result of TTIP – and twice
that many if the full deal is allowed to go through.
Yet we can now see that EU negotiators are preparing
to trade away whole sectors of our economies in
TTIP, with no care for the human consequences.
“The
European Commission slapped a 30-year ban on public
access to the TTIP negotiating texts at the
beginning of the talks in 2013, in the full
knowledge that they would not be able to survive the
outcry if people were given sight of the deal. In
response, campaigners called for a ‘Dracula
strategy’ against the agreement: expose the vampire
to sunlight and it will die. Today the door has been
flung open and the first rays of sunlight shone on
TTIP. The EU negotiators will never be able to crawl
back into the shadows again.
“For those
of us in the thick of the EU referendum debate, the
contempt shown by the TTIP negotiators to the people
of Europe is the most potent reminder of the
democratic deficit at the heart of the EU
institutions.”
You
can read the Independent article here:
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/ttip-leaks-shocking-what-are-they-eu-us-deal-a7010121.html
The
revelations are disconcerting for the British and
European peoples. For example, the Independent
reports that TTIP could cause the privitazation of
the National Health Service and the UK Parliament
would be powerless to stop it.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/ttip-could-cause-an-nhs-sell-off-and-parliament-would-be-powerless-to-stop-it-says-leading-union-a7006471.html
See also:
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/what-is-ttip-and-six-reasons-why-the-answer-should-scare-you-9779688.html
In our
debate Sean O’Grady performed as a shill, a
propagandist for the corporate interests behind
TTIP. He said that it was a free trade agreement
that benefitted everyone just as NAFTA and other
such agreements have proved to be the case. Tell
that to all the displaced American workers.
He said
that it was unfortunate that the secrecy had
possibly hurt the agreement’s prospects and that it
would have been better if the pact’s provisions had
been known as they were negotiated. That way, he
said, the agreement would not be threatened by the
shock effect of the leaked documents.
O’Grady
also claimed that no one has thus far agreed to the
pact despite the fact that the representatives have
agreed to the pact. Perhaps what he means is that
legislatures have not given their approval.
The
headline on the Independent article
suggests that the leak will prevent approval: “After
the leaks showing what it stands for, this could
really be the end for TTIP.” If so, O’Grady regards
it as a great loss. For the global corporations, of
course, not for the peoples it would exploit.
The
Greenpeace revelations should deep-six the pact, but
I am uncertain. French president Hollande says,
provisionally, that France will not sign the pact as
it is. In other words, give us some fuzzy language
to make it look like we got it fixed.
The EU’s
chief negotiator, Ignacio Garcia Bercero, a likely
recipient of a large bribe, rushed to the defense of
TTIP by declaring Greenpeace to be “flatly wrong.”
Bercero’s statement makes no sense. Greenpeace
released the official documents. No one denies that
the leaked documents are legitimate. So apparently
Bercero’s position is that the official documents
are wrong. He sounds like a guy working hard for his
money.
Bercero,
went on to say, according to the BBC, that “it is
not correct to say the US is pushing for lowering of
the level of protection in the EU.” This is an
amazing lie ! Those who are trying to put a good
face on the leak themselves admit that this is
precisely what the US is trying to do. They claim
that the Europeans haven’t yet given in.
It is
disingeneous for Bercero or O’Grady or anyone to
pretend that TTIP has not been from the very
beginning about establishing global corporate
hegemony over the governments of democratic
countries. I pointed this out when the corporations
first made their move. There is no doubt whatsoever
that the Trans-Atlantic and Trans-Pacific
“partnerships” are about giving global capitalism
immunity from the laws of sovereign countries.
EU
Trade Commissioner Cecilla Malmstroem is, according
to the BBC, “steering the TTIP talks.” Malmstroem,
another likely recipient of a large bribe, says: “I
am simply not in the business of lowering
standards.”
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-36185746
Her
statement is misleading. She is not in the business
of lowering standards. She is in the business of
making it possible for global capitalism to
overthrow all standards, high and low.
From my
encounter today with Sean O’Grady, a person whose
integrity I no longer respect, I expect the
corporate bought-and-paid-for Western financial
press and governments to close ranks and discredit
the leaked documents as some kind of Greenpeace
“conspiracy theory.” Even in my presence, a former
Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury and Wall
Street Journal editor, O’Grady had no compunction
about misrepresenting to my face the agreement as a
good one harmed only by secrecy. If it hadn’t been
secret, said O’Grady, it would have been OK.
All of the
blather about free trade and tariff reduction is
mere cover for the only purpose of TTIP, which is to
establish American economic imperialism over the
peoples whose governments sold them out for money.
Dr.
Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary
of the Treasury for Economic Policy and associate
editor of the Wall Street Journal. He was columnist
for Business Week, Scripps Howard News Service, and
Creators Syndicate. He has had many university
appointments. His internet columns have attracted a
worldwide following. Roberts' latest books are
The Failure
of Laissez Faire Capitalism and Economic Dissolution
of the West,
How America
Was Lost,
and
The
Neoconservative Threat to World Order.
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