donnie hands china a major unearned victory

[unblock]

while we're obsessing about donnie's overly friendly relationship with america's rival russia, donnie just withdraw from the tpp. handing a major victory to our other major rival, china.

whatever its flaws, the tpp was a geopolitical coup, forging a trade alliance with pacific countries except china, largely on our terms rather than on china's terms.

in our absence, china will be free to fill the void and form a trade alliance with the same countries except us, this time on their terms.


awesome job, donnie!

[DanTex]

1. Yup. Now China will set standards for environmental and labor rights throughout Asia. Wheeeeeee!

[unblock]

2. more pollution, more cheap labor, more long hours, and more cheap products

forcing us to keep our own labor prices even lower.

race to the bottom!

[malaise]

34. You need to have a look at what China is doing re climate change

China cannot force the United States to keep your labor prices low.
It was done for corporate profit - most of it American - and as a way to destroy Trade Unions and workers rights. Blame your own leaders who sold out for money.

[yallerdawg]

3. THESE standards.

[Eliot Rosewater]

4. When he is shown why TPP can make him rich, he will change his position.

I have predicted for a long time if given the chance he would sign it. I hope I am wrong, but the right argument has not been made to him yet.

Just like when he is shown how buying stock in war machine companies then starting a war is profitable, he will do that soon

[unblock]

5. *he* can make plenty of money off a china-led trade deal

because *he* can build hotels anywhere in the world.

he's happy to have asian billionaires stay at trump-branded hotels throughout the pacific.

what does he want with any worker protections or pollution standards or any other tpp terms that might favor workers or america?

[Jacob Boehme]

6. When your modus operandi is to...

.... fuck up everything you touch, there can only be ONE outcome to everything you touch.

Thus we now have: Donald J. Trump: Failure extraordinaire

[Hoyt]

7. Nixing the TPP is what a lot of Democrats have been pushing for. It's a mistake, but surprised they

aren't thanking Trump.

[Cha]

18. President Obama was looking out for us.

[Hoyt]

33. Exactly, Cha. He got nothing but grief for it too which is totally unfair.

[Cha]

35. Major Grief.. I trusted him.

[Jim Lane]

8. This was a victory for the American people

Trump does not possess reverse infallibility. Both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders agreed that the TPP as finalized was a bad idea. Even if Trump had his own (probably xenophobic) reasons for taking the action they recommended, it was still the right thing to do.

TPP did not set trade "largely on our terms" except in the sense that "our" government agreed to the terms. It was largely on the terms favorable to big business and unfavorable for consumers, unions, sick people, the environment, and freedom of information.

[unblock]

10. so why not renegotiate it like he says he'll do with nafta?

why abdicate any influence in this area?

i'm not saying it was perfect, i'm not even saying it was good. all i'm saying is that handing the negotiations over to china will be worse.

[Jim Lane]

22. It's hard to renegotiate a deal among twelve countries.

The TPP negotiations ran from 2008 to 2015, with twelve nations participating. The agreement they reached is more than 5,000 pages long.

Suppose the U.S. asks for a change in one particular. That change might benefit the U.S. but work to Japan's disadvantage. Japan agrees to go along with it anyway, provided that Japan is compensated by a change elsewhere. Fine, except that the the change elsewhere is objected to by both Malaysia and Vietnam. And so on.

I never bought this scaremongering about China. Without the TPP, the United States can continue to set its own laws, subject of course to the international agreements that are already in effect.

[unblock]

27. i agree that it's all way too complicated for donnie to handle.

i'm sure that's why he prefers one-on-one negotiations.


but now there will be a china-led pacific trade deal without us, and it will lead to cheaper labor and lax pollution laws to compete with america labor. this will hamper our ability to negotiate one-on-one *and* it will provide downward pressure on american labor prices.


abdicating it to china is roughly equivalent to repealing obamacare without giving any thought to a replacement.

fix it, don't just walk away from it.

[jmg257]

9. I'm confused - are we for it or against it?

Clinton didn't like it.
Sanders is against it.

[unblock]

11. i think either of them would have renegotiated it.

backing out and abdicating to china is what i have a problem with.

[jmg257]

12. Ah gotcha - thanks! nt

[fun n serious]

19. Clinton was only against it due to

currency manipulations. She wanted to renegotiate

[Jim Lane]

32. That wasn't the only reason and in fact wasn't a credible one.

She also mentioned her belief that the agreement was "putting the interests of drug companies ahead of patients and consumers."

As to currency manipulation, "renegotiate" is something of a misnomer, because the U.S. never even proposed the inclusion of currency manipulation in the TPP. It was and is a concern of U.S. policymakers, but they knew from the start that there was zero chance of reaching agreement on that score. That's one reason that "in the four years Clinton was secretary of state she never once brought up currency manipulation as something that should be tackled under the auspices of the TPP." https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/10/08/is-hillary-clinton-right-about-the-trans-pacific-partnership

[WinkyDink]

13. The TPP allowed for corporate super-sovereignty.

[unblock]

14. you figure china's going to make things better?

renegotiation would have made sense, not that i would trust donnie to do it competently.

but abdicating and handing it all over to china will not help matters.

[WinkyDink]

43. "renegotiation would have made sense": Did Pres. Obama know this?

[unblock]

45. Hang on, I'll ask

[unblock]

46. he says given the pushback, if he had another 4 years, yeah, he would have renegotiated it.

[Hoyt]

37. Just like every trade deal since 1959 does. I think there are like 3000 agreements with the "Super

Sovereignty" dispute clause in it. And almost every country is begging to sign more just like it. But, Trump will take care of that -- renege on a major deal and impose tariffs that won't protect any jobs, but will raise prices here.

[Xolodno]

15. Mixed bag.

No doubt some industries were going to be hurt profusely...and some perhaps wiped out by the TPP so much that our government kept it under wraps so no groups could organize against it.

But with that said, this probably puts China in the driver seat in regards to all trade in Asia. And yes, this probably does benefit Trump. For all his bluster with Taiwan and pissing off Beijing...it was all smoke and mirrors, Trump has investments in China and the TPP may have harmed them.

So damned if you do, damned if you don't.

[TrekLuver]

16. I really don't think people know what this TPP is really all about. We are giving away our power.

[fun n serious]

21. Yep. We are losing our GLOBAL place in the world.

Globalization can NOT be stopped, it can only be delayed. We're fucked.

[TrekLuver]

28. We need to get a message out to the world...toe the line for 4 years and we'll be back...this

is just a blip in the road...we'll be back...we're just taking a little vacation in hell. OMG if we don't lead someone else will. And look what happened last time someone else led! You would think people would realize that...it's not in depth concepts here.

[fun n serious]

17. In my opinion...

Bernie did not and still does not have the policy chops to understand many complex issues like TPP. In my opinion, he misled a lot of people.

[Cha]

20. I agree

[fun n serious]

24. It's a sad day when Populism and anger

trumps intelligence and experience. No pun intended.

[Cha]

26. hate, ignorance, anger trumped everything

this time around.

We have to hang in there until it's time for intelligence, experience, courage and compassion again.

fun n serious

[Yavin4]

23. Exactly. Middle class paying factory jobs for people with a HS education or less are a

thing of the past. We're not going back to 1950s America.

[fun n serious]

25. Nor do we want to.

SAD. To borrow a word....

[Cha]

30. To borrow an overused word, eh?

I feel funny using that word now #sad

Have you seen this? It's funny

[fun n serious]

39. OMG. LOL

Thank you for the laugh. Perfect. Can I share on my facebook?

[Cha]

40. Of course I borrowed it from Sherman!

[TrekLuver]

29. This

[Jim Lane]

31. Hillary agreed with Bernie. Did she also mislead a lot of people?

From "Hillary Clinton comes out against Obama’s Pacific trade deal":

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton announced Wednesday that she opposes an expansive 12-nation Pacific Rim free-trade accord finalized by the Obama administration this week, breaking sharply with the president over a deal she had championed while serving as secretary of state.

Clinton said in an interview with PBS that she would not support the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) based on what she knows of the deal. The 30-chapter text of the agreement, which negotiators concluded Monday, has not been made public.

"As of today, I am not in favor of what I have learned about it," Clinton said in the interview. "I have said from the very beginning that we had to have a trade agreement that would create good American jobs, raise wages and advance our national security. I still believe that's the high bar we have to meet. I've been trying to learn as much as I can about the agreement, but I'm worried."

"I appreciate the hard work that President Obama and his team put into this process and recognize the strides they made," Clinton said in a statement released to reporters traveling with her in Iowa. "But the bar here is very high and, based on what I have seen, I don't believe this agreement has met it."

I personally agree with both Bernie and Hillary on this issue.

[fun n serious]

42. I agree.

What is super disturbing is that so called progressives would buy into that and not have the USA be front and center in a global economy.

[etherealtruth]

36. I am with you ... we ceded all the power in the region to china

[Achilleaze]

41. Frikken Republicans are such losers

and whiners and cheaters.

[SidDithers]

44. Delightful!...nt

Sid