Sad, Sad, Sad, Incisive Story on Obama Administration’s Trying to Sell the TPP Fast Track Vote

By
Greg Diamond
– April 16, 2015Posted in: "The OC", Fresh Juice
Leaders of TPP member states

Leaders of the 10 TPP nations, circa 2010.  Is the confidence in them overwhelming you?

 

We’ve covered the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, or “TPP,” literally for years now — ahead of even most non-mainstream-media venues.  The arguments against it — that it would be a latter-day NAFTA, undermining labor and environmental regulations, plus also allowing foreign corporations the ability to strike down U.S. laws that they argue undermine competition — are pretty well-known here.  The main argument for it is, essentially, that trade is gonna happen — and the TPP excludes China and ensures U.S. economic influence over countries such as Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, and Vietnam that would perhaps otherwise fall under China’s economic domination.

The Obama Administration already has likely support from most Congressional Republicans for “Fast-Tracking” approval of the TPP, meaning that the houses of Congress could only offer a yes-or-no vote on the agreement rather than offering amendments.  (Even more troubling is that, at the time that the “fast-track” vote is taken, the secret classified terms of the agreement would not yet even have been made known to the public.)  His remaining problem is getting the approval of Democrats.

That makes your reading this story really important if you want to figure out what’s going on.

Unions, activists, and progressive lawmakers have united against the “fast track” authority Obama seeks to put back into place — a provision that would allow the president to negotiate trade deals and give Congress a simple up-or-down vote. They also oppose the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the Asian trade deal that the administration believes would become a cornerstone of Obama’s legacy. Another potential deal with the European Union has also rankled organized labor in the U.S.

Most expected some level of progressive opposition, but not for the issue to turn into a coalition-building rallying cry, drawing in national labor and the high-profile activism of Sen. Elizabeth Warren in a united front. Last month, the AFL-CIO suspended all political donations to focus all its financial resources on fighting the White House trade deals. This week, the group launched a “week of action” featuring a rally of union workers on Capitol Hill and events in every state publicly opposing trade deals. The message is clear: Democrats who cross labor on trade could be on the short end when it comes time for labor to fire up its massive political money machine again.

But progressives have used strong-arm tactics in plenty of fights. On the trade fight, they say the White House is taking its pushback to a new level they haven’t seen. Hour-long calls to lawmakers, secret classified briefings on Capitol Hill, bully-pulpit wrangling by Obama, and even a shadowy new progressive-focused group launched by Obama’s supporters solely to sell the trade deals have all been part of the effort. Obama’s trade opponents see an organized effort by the White House to find any opening in the left-wing anti-trade-deal firewall to exploit — or, failing that, to create one through pressure on activists and lawmakers.

“I don’t know of one crack,” said Larry Cohen, president of the Communications Workers of America and one of the most vociferous opponents of Obama’s trade plans. “They’re desperate to find a crack, but they won’t find one.”

Check it out; there’s much more.

For progressives — or, hey, just this once, let’s call us liberals — this continues a long-standing source of irritation towards the practices of our Democratic Presidents.  They are often blocked by Congress from getting things done, except when they are engaging in some practice that serves traditionally Republican ends.  (For example: Clinton’s NAFTA and GATT, immigration crackdown, anti-welfare legislation, and deregulating the banking industry; Carter’s draft registration and industrial deregulation efforts; and I’ll guess that you know about the criticisms of Obama.)

One really interesting here is that the Obama Administration, notoriously unwilling to “pull out all of the stops” to promote legislation, is going full-bore towards the goal here.  And another thing is really interesting: if this story is to be believed, they’re not doing it particularly well.

About Greg Diamond

Somewhat verbose attorney, semi-disabled and semi-retired, residing in northwest Brea. Occasionally ran for office against jerks who otherwise would have gonr unopposed. Got 45% of the vote against Bob Huff for State Senate in 2012; Josh Newman then won the seat in 2016. In 2014 became the first attorney to challenge OCDA Tony Rackauckas since 2002; Todd Spitzer then won that seat in 2018. Every time he's run against some rotten incumbent, the *next* person to challenge them wins! He's OK with that. Corrupt party hacks hate him. He's OK with that too. He does advise some local campaigns informally and (so far) without compensation. (If that last bit changes, he will declare the interest.) His daughter is a professional campaign treasurer. He doesn't usually know whom she and her firm represent. Whether they do so never influences his endorsements or coverage. (He does have his own strong opinions.) But when he does check campaign finance forms, he is often happily surprised to learn that good candidates he respects often DO hire her firm. (Maybe bad ones are scared off by his relationship with her, but they needn't be.)