Sen. Elizabeth Warren on why we need to stop the TPP
Can anyone tell me why Clinton supporters rejected adding explicit opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal to the Democratic Party’s 2016 platform?
This does not give me a warm & fuzzy feeling regarding the next Clinton administration….
Please share widely!
Doing so would have put the platform in direct conflict with the man who remains the leader of our party, which would be awkward to say the least. There are legitimate differences within the party on this one, but I have come down on the side of trusting the President when he says that this is among the most progressive, labor-friendly of such agreements we have negotiated. I also on balance favor such agreements as providing the greatest good for the greatest number, opening our own markets, and giving us a framework in which we can influence things from the inside. I hope and assume that the Clinton administration will continue to negotiate and produce a framework that will be beneficial to all concerned.
Did you miss the attached remarks from Senator Elizabeth Warren? This leader of our party is the same person who was in control when the 1% are recovered from 2008 recession while 99% are still waiting.
Good?
Good for who?
I’ve heard Sen. Warren’s arguments and watching her and the President disagree makes me about as comfortable as a kid witnessing his parents fight. We need to make it better rather than throw the baby out with the bathwater, just like what happened to NAFTA when the first President Clinton took over negotiations from the first President Bush (and yes, I do see NAFTA as a net benefit). The TPP is a framework in which countries work together, which philosophically is almost always better than the alternative IMO.
…for the middle class. How many times do I have to say this?
The TPP is a framework in which corporations from countries work together for their mutual benefit while national sovereignty and the rights of citizen workers suffer.
Wake up.
…but I’m pretty sure I read that the language ultimately adopted was what was suggested by labor. Also, I fail to see what your broken-record mantra about flat wages has to do with it. We need to adapt to the global economy and exploit our competitive advantages, not wrap ourselves in a protectionist caccoon and pretend we can do things like we did 40 years ago.
Sanders, Clinton, Warren and now the platform includes language protecting American workers.
I like the post and thought that it was good to discuss approaches, it reads like you favor a specific rejection. But you are going down the nutty nut nut path here in the comments.
No to the TPP. According to Oxfam, over 125,000 people in Vietnam alone — more than half of HIV/AIDS patients living in that country — could lose access to the medication they need to survive if the TPP is implemented. Moreover, Doctors Without Borders has stated that: “The TPP agreement is on track to become the most harmful trade pact ever for access to medicines in developing countries.”
It is no surprise to me that HRC, with her emphasis on the rich getting richer and her identification with the New Gilded Age elite would oppose blocking TPP. Still, it is sad because it [TPP} will impair fighting HIV and raise the cost of prescription medications worldwide, according to Doctors Without Borders.
You don’t have to take my word for it http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/news-stories/briefing-document/trading-away-health-trans-pacific-partnership-agreement-tpp
That is my understanding. And TPP will increase the flight of manufacturing jobs away from this country. I could not find any benefit to working people or the middle class from TPP – I could find provisions that would help the extraordinarily wealthy become wealthier, especially Big Pharma.
Only someone who wishes the fabulously wealthy to become even richer could like TPP – see Statement by Judit Rius Sanjuan, US Manager & Legal Policy Adviser, MSF Access Campaign:
“Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) expresses its dismay that TPP countries have agreed to United States government and multinational drug company demands that will raise the price of medicines for millions by unnecessarily extending monopolies and further delaying price-lowering generic competition. The big losers in the TPP are patients and treatment providers in developing countries. Although the text has improved over the initial demands, the TPP will still go down in history as the worst trade agreement for access to medicines in developing countries, which will be forced to change their laws to incorporate abusive intellectual property protections for pharmaceutical companies.
For example, the additional monopoly protection provided for biologic drugs will be a new regime for all TPP developing countries. These countries will pay a heavy price in the decades to come that will be measured in the impact it has on patients. As the trade agreement now goes back to the national level for countries’s final approval, we urge all governments to carefully consider before they sign on the dotted line whether this is the direction they want to take on access to affordable medicines and the promotion of biomedical innovation. The negative impact of the TPP on public health will be enormous, be felt for years to come, and will not be limited to the current 12 TPP countries, as it is a dangerous blueprint for future agreements.”
See: http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/article/more-50-groups-call-us-congress-stop-tpp-worst-trade-deal-ever-access-affordable-medicines
I’m afraid we still do not know precisely, in layman terms, what the TPP entails.
The TPP seems to extend legal protections to entities wishing to do business across borders. In theory, this applies to any business, big or small. In practice, it’s most likely to benefit big transnational corporations.
An alternative path to TPP would be bilateral harmonization of legal regimes; a much slower path than adopting the treaty. — Maybe would be a slower, but also a more democratic path.
It does a pretty good job laying out what it entails, the pros and cons, the advocacy and the critiques. (link)
Your choices are Clinton or Trump. Clinton supports the TPP because she’s trying to win a national electorate, just like Obama. As ridiculous as it sounds, Romney could have beaten Obama, just like Trump can beat Clinton if she moves too close to Sanders.
This is what we always do, and it’s not cutting it.
She has taken (at least) two positions on TPP. One was that it was the “gold standard” of trade agreements, another was that she opposed it.
So now she’s for it, I guess?
Whatever her real position is, it should be crystal clear to her supporters, and the platform should reflect that. When we aim at the imaginary center at the expense of our own principles (not sure that’s what’s happening here — but it feels like it), we lose twice.
My own take is that TPP is really about isolating China. In that sense it might not be that bad, if the stuff Amberpaw raised is addressed.
If what amberpaw says is true about pharma & TPP, you can be assured there are other similar things lurking in the TPP.
Simply put, the adoption process was behind too many closed doors. The American press did not get to cover at all what the TPP entails.
If we are not informed, the default answer should be NO, rather than yes, on legislation of such importance.
It’s also ironic to have Trump continually bash China and the TPP, since the TPP deliberately excludes China. They will either trade with us or trade with an oppressive and hegemonic government.
The Filipino government, desperate for more markets and investments, is supportive of this deal. One of the things we have to remember is that global trade has given rise to a global middle class that has increased democratization.
A Nigerian friend made a powerful point that pining for the 1950s trade environment is arguably pining for an era of greater white privilege than today. That said, I want fair wages and fairer trade. I do not fault Obama for trying to seek this agreement, but I would fault the party for endorsing it based on its flaws. A President Clinton can renegotiate it on stronger terms, particularly since the alternative is an unsteady hand who would abrogate many decades of treaties and collective agreements.
Replace white with “American” and the argument becomes nationalistic not racial. This is the argument that is resonating with Trump supporters today. Because those in the lower rungs of the middle class were historically non-white, they were among the first to feel the effects of globalization (loss of jobs). Now the higher rungs of the middle class (more white) are feeling the effects of global trade.
They are too big for us to “isolate.”
Every business wants a piece of that Chinese market.
So the trade is the carrot and reviving something like SEATO is a collective security stick. It’s a way to create leverage and prevent a similar bloc China is trying to create from becoming effective. That said, I still oppose this version of it since it was not negotiated from a position of strength. If the geopolitical and economic goals for the nation were the main priorities of the treaty, how come every corporate special interest got a sweetheart provision in the deal?
I strongly dislike the influence of private sector lobbyists on our foreign policy, especially when this entire deal was discussed behind closed doors away from the public. As a treaty vote, passing the bill was procedurally similar to the Iran Deal, it was very difficult for Congress or the public to offer amendments or voice concerns. Unlike the Iran Deal, the provisions were not even fully transparent to Congress on the reading. There was a robust debate on NAFTA and legislative give and take, there was not on TPP which was presented as a take it or leave it proposition. Clinton will have the electoral mandate and leverage as a new President to negotiate a better deal.
She was ORIGINALLY for it and hoped it would be the gold standard, but has SINCE developed doubts, just maybe not enough to call on the platform to say no way no how. There’s such a thing as nuance, but then I also understand exactly what John Kerry meant when he voted for the $87B for Iraq before voting against it.
But there is also pretzel logic.
Maybe TPP did change, but she never really explained why she flipped on it.
But, of course, that’s not true. She explained why she flipped when she did so (back many months ago when the TPP was finalized in October 2015). See e.g:
Sorry.
I retain my skepticism about her stance on this. But again, if she opposes it now — why does the party platform support it or at least not fully oppose it?
The sitting President, a Democrat, obviously supports it.
I found the initial comment from christopher a perfectly reasonable answer to your question.
No one expects her to be a carbon copy of President Obama, and no one expect the party platform to be unchanging. There’s nothing awkward about any of this.
What’s needed is clarity, not least with the TPP itself.
Why on earth would Dems want to run the 2016 election AGAINST the incumbent, who happens to be pretty darn popular among a pretty significant chunk of Democratic voters? The last time they did that, we got GWB, which is to say, it didn’t work out so well.
I DON”T CARE ABOUT THE STRATEGY.
Trying to game this is what gets us, her in particular, in trouble. All I’m asking is for her sincere position, and for the platform to reflect that (or, even better, the sincere position of the platform committee).
There is NO center to aim for. None. People judge candidates based on what they believe, not what they pretend to believe.
I get that.
I suppose I have a different view. In my view, if the Dem nominee were to go looking for a way to manufacture a rupture with Obama, 3 1/2 months before the election, it would be an absurdly foolish thing to do. I don’t want a candidate who wants to run against all of the things President Obama did wrong. There’s one of them already.
Given that TPP is strongly supported by the twice-elected Democratic incumbent, who remains quite popular among people who tend to vote for Democrats, it is probably safe to assume that this is not, at the moment, something upon which all Dems agree, and is therefore probably something best left off the platform, which is supposed to be party-unification vehicle, and not a single-candidate’s manifesto.
I get that you don’t know what her sincere position is, her various statements linked herein notwithstanding. That certainly speaks to a particular weakness of the nominee. But I don’t quite understand why something that is supposed to reflect something other than just her views would change that.
She opposes it and has stated so repeatedly. The platform says no trade agreements that violate trade, labor or environmental standards. Sec. Clinton, acting on President Obama’s direction, felt it met those goals. Candidate Clinton, free from the constraints of working in the executive branch can safely say it’s not meeting those standards.
So it leaves enough room for her to oppose TPP without implicitly breaking with the President. I don’t see what more has to be done, even if she flip flopped there are few Dems in Congress willing to support it and it’s likely the next Senate would kill it. Maybe Tom is right, and Sanders supporters want the letter of the law on every issues and not just the spirit of the law on trade. This platform is good enough for me and for Bernie.
At state she was a policy implementer in charge of turning the Executive’s foreign policy goals into achievable realities. Under that rubric, she could argue the deal was good since it achieved his strategic goals without too many domestic sacrifices. As a policy maker, she is now capable of saying the strategy itself needs to be changed and there are other goals to pursue or considerations to weigh.
Obviously domestic politics played a huge role, and there have been many noble flip flops in history caused by changing realities and outside pressures. FDR never did balance the budget, my relatives who got CCC jobs instead we’re grateful he didn’t. She could argue this here. Did any of us attacks Obama as a Johnny come lately on marriage or did we celebrate his “evolution” (back to his 2002 position…)?
She was pretty clear in her opposition to TPP during the primary, and got a lot of flak for changing her position on it.
I don’t see how opposition to TPP (especially if in the largely meaningless party platform) would hurt her in the general since Trump aggressively opposes the TPP. For going into a general election, being the one who can point to the other and say that they support something that will “ship jobs overseas” or whatever other talking point they want seems like a much stronger position than having to defend some but not all of the minute particulars of free trade agreements as generally good for the US economy. Giving Trump more ammo like this seems like a serious unforced error.
CNN
She got flak? Not much of it.
There is a compelling electoral argument that Trump’s success was due in part to moving to the center on economics and by moving towards Sanders on trade and other issues. It’s the piece about not moving so far to the left as to
move donors towards Trump that’s more compelling, but even then, he hasn’t has a ton of success. It is also inaccurate to say she supports the TPP, she is still on record as opposing it. The Democratic Party adopted neutral language at this meeting to avoid alienating the president and the nominee from one another.
That’s–odd. What voting block is she courting, do you think? Multinational CEOs? Hedge-fund managers? Which swing states will be won by supporting the TPP?
I think nearly 60-70% of Americans oppose the TPP, and as we see, this was a majority constituency in the primaries of both parties and is a position embraced by both major party nominees. And they oppose it because it isn’t a great deal, it’s not a bad deal, but it doesn’t resemble one negotiated from a position of strength.
I think that nearly 60-70% don’t know two things about the TPP. What it stands for, where it is in its journey toward ratification and enforcement, who must ratify it, what other nations are involved, what the expected time frame is, what it covers, what it doesn’t cover, etc.
People clearly care about the things it impacts (jobs, trade, environment, human rights, etc.), but as much as the protesting left wants to make it a dinner table conversation, I just don’t think it is or will be. Any time we spend on politics we’re too busy talking about emails, #BLM, guns, and Trump’s latest tweet.
Krugman makes the point that now, after many trade agreements have been reached, TPP will not be able to increase jobs that much for the USA.
Read the whole blog post at the link. Turns out there’s another major economist who is thumbs-down on TPP…
And if she’s as smart about this as a I think she is, she will tell Wall Street and labor alike that their choice is between a tougher bill that’s more pro-worker coming from her or a Trump unilaterally abrogating the negotiations. And she can use that threat of Trump to publicly exert leverage for a better deal. It’s also one of the few issues where she can put distance between herself and President Obama.