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Monday, April 20, 2015

Two threads.

The image is from EFF, this item, with more there on TPP, especially here.

Of course, there is a host of web content about cause to oppose TPP, especially fast tracking through and/or bypassing Congress.

E.g., do your own websearch = tpp fast-track

Go from there to content; but if and only if you first at least quickly scan-read the EFF's linked-to items, and consider signing into their decision-maker - email-petition-contact effort.

For Tea Party conservatives, constitutionalists, and others having knowledge of history sufficient to understand at least generally Federalist Papers content, and Federalism after the Civil War and in light of the Civil War Amendments; such persons should concede that questions of sovereignty arose as important, splintered the nation, and remain important. In such a spirit, such persons should

Do your own websearch = tpp fast-track sovereignty

SECOND THREAD

In discussing Clinton, Warren on record seems insightful:

Though Warren has repeatedly insisted she won't run, it's clear why liberals are eager to see her enter the fray. Clinton has been accused of being too cozy with megadonors and financiers while Warren has earned a reputation as a populist opponent of corporate America.

Warren seems to have adopted a set talking point for questions about the contrast between her and Clinton. Recently, Warren has responded to this idea by attempting to take the focus off her and Clinton and noting she wants all politicians to advocate aggressively to address income inequality and problems in the financial industry. This strategy shows Warren isn't currently interested in launching direct attacks on Clinton. [...] Warren said people "need to see" what Clinton plans to do. She also stressed she's not just pushing Clinton on issues like regulating banks and decreasing interest rates on student loans and wants "everybody" in politics to take up these causes. [...] "But I want to be clear, I think this is what everybody should be talking about. Democrat or Republican."

When asked if she would urge Clinton to distance herself from Wall Street and champion Warren's pet cause to lessen the student loan burden, Warren replied, "You bet." However, she quickly returned to stressing this is something she is pushing everyone in politics to focus on and not just Clinton.

"I'm going to push everybody," Warren said. "Do I not look like I’m gonna push?"

A day earlier, in an interview on the "Today" show, Warren used a similar strategy when asked if Clinton was the right messenger to represent the middle class.

She began by saying Clinton needs time and space to outline her platform.

So would it not be nice were candidate Clinton to articulate a clear and reasoned stand on TPP now while the question is a hot potato of sorts; because if you cannot stand the heat ...

Wait - wrong old saying. Sorry about that.

Though arbitrary, it was decided to put the TPP issue atop the sidebar for awhile, because it is an issue that sunshine might kill or at least civilize to something less than one-world new-order confrontational lopsidedness of power serving big business, not us folk of the US of A.

And in ending - Do some dark opposition allusions tie into why candidate Clinton might straddle the fence, metaphorically agreeing with her friends on both sides?

Might there be beholden compromises in the way of fairly aptly being "Candidate Clinton skeptical of  TPP and Fast-Tracking"?

She surely was not Senator Clinton skeptical of Operation Iraqi Liberation when that hummer was on the Senate calendar for a vote and she admits she should have been skeptical.

If there is no rattling skeleton dimension weighing the balance, it would seem Clinton seizing the TPP issue early and pressing it often might disarm much of opponents' claims of improper ties to and improper past handshakes with those having their hands on corporate power and corporate campaign and other cash in great amounts.

_______________UPDATE______________
Today, in DC, the AFL-CIO demonstrates against TPP; and HuffPo just says "No." (In suitable detail.)

These peopleConsciousness-raising meetings, rallies and demonstrations from them.

The billionaire bankers on the other side don't demonstrate. How could public consciousness-raising ever work in their behalf?

___________FURTHER UPDATE___________
Good for Bernie. But you had to expect him to be there. In an email subscription notice delivered four hours ago:

Protesting a trade deal that would throw Americans out of work, Sen. Bernie Sanders marched with leaders of the AFL-CIO and other labor organizations to a rally outside the U.S. trade representative’s office.

One of the key reasons why the middle class in America continues to decline and the gap between the very rich and everyone else is growing wider is because of disastrous trade agreements which have sent millions of decent-paying jobs to China and other low-wage countries,” Bernie said.

Bernie’s leading role in opposing the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership follows a long record of opposing the North American Free Trade Agreement, Permanent Normal Trade Relations with China and other job-killing trade deals. Partly because of those and other agreements, nearly 60,000 factories in this country have been shuttered since 2001 and more than 4.7 million manufacturing jobs have vanished.

Proponents claimed that NAFTA would create 200,000 American jobs. Instead, the 1994 deal led to the loss of some 1 million jobs in the United States. The trade agreement with China six years later was ballyhooed by corporate backers as way to create hundreds of thousands of American jobs. Instead, it led to the loss of 3.2 million U.S. jobs.

Americans should not be forced to compete against desperately poor workers throughout the world. In Vietnam, for example, workers are paid as little as 56 cents an hour. “Trade agreements should benefit working people, not just CEOs of large corporations,” Bernie added.

As the largest economy in the world, Americans should expect corporations to invest in the United States and make products in America. “Corporate America must begin investing in the United States and not just low-wage countries,” Bernie said.

The senator also expressed concern about other aspects of the proposed Pacific Rim trade deal. While disturbing details of the agreement have been leaked, Bernie criticized the secrecy surrounding the negotiations. “It is absurd that a trade agreement of such enormous consequence has had so little transparency.” He also warned that the agreement could undermine U.S. sovereignty by giving foreign corporations the right to challenge laws in international courts. “It is beyond belief that this agreement would let corporations sue over laws to protect public health and the environment.”

Bernie and others participated in the rally outside the office of U.S. Trade Representative Michael B. Froman only four days after proponents of the trade agreement introduced legislation that would make it easier to rush the measure through Congress.

And this.