Dean Baker: The Pacific free trade deal that's anything but free

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The Pacific free trade deal that's anything but free
The draft TPP deal may grant new patent privileges and restrict net freedom, but it's secret – unless you're a multinational CEO

Dean Baker
guardian.co.uk, Monday 27 August 2012


"Free trade" is a sacred mantra in Washington. If anything is labeled as being "free trade", then everyone in the Washington establishment is required to bow down and support it. Otherwise, they are excommunicated from the list of respectable people and exiled to the land of protectionist Neanderthals.

This is essential background to understanding what is going on with the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP), a pact that the United States is negotiating with Australia, Canada, Japan and eight other countries in the Pacific region. The agreement is packaged as a "free trade" agreement. This label will force all of the respectable types in Washington to support it.

In reality, the deal has almost nothing to do with trade: actual trade barriers between these countries are already very low. The TPP is an effort to use the holy grail of free trade to impose conditions and override domestic laws in a way that would be almost impossible if the proposed measures had to go through the normal legislative process. The expectation is that by lining up powerful corporate interests, the governments will be able to ram this new "free trade" pact through legislatures on a take-it-or-leave-it basis.

As with all these multilateral agreements, the intention is to spread its reach through time. That means that anything the original parties to the TPP accept is likely to be imposed later on other countries in the region, and quite likely, on the rest of the world. ...................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/aug/27/pacific-free-trade-deal

[Angry Dragon]

1. We need no more Free Trade Agreements

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2. Du rec. Nt

[marmar]

3. Sometimes you kick, sometimes you get kicked.....

[msongs]

4. Your president and congress selling you out to corporations in return for contributions nt