The Trans Pacific Partnership: Another disaster from a proven liar

One thing we can say about Barack Obama is that he is a proven liar. He lied when he told Americans we could keep our health insurance if we liked it.

Now he wants us to trust him on something else.

For the last several years, the Obama Administration has been negotiating something called the Trans Pacific Partnership. The Trans Pacific Partnership is a free trade agreement on steroids.

In 1992, then-Presidential candidate Ross Perot coined the expression, “Giant sucking sound” to describe the exodus of jobs from America into Mexico if the North American Free Trade Agreement was passed.

NAFTA was passed and America’s industrial base was decimated. Since NAFTA, several other free trade agreements have been passed. The results are always the same: The other nations get the benefit and America loses.

The most recent free trade agreement that was passed was the Korea Free Trade Agreement. After that took effect, America’s trade balance with South Korea went from a surplus to a deficit.

One of the most disturbing parts of this proposed Trans Pacific treaty is the secrecy in which it is being negotiated. The only real news Americans or for that matter Members of Congress can get, is from leaks.

Barack Obama is asking for fast track authority for the Trans Pacific Partnership. Consider that to be another version of “you have to pass this to see what is in it.”  With fast track authority, there will be no hearings on this treaty. It will be negotiated then sent to Congress for a simple up or down vote. The Congress will not be able to provide advice and consent because they cannot offer amendments under fast track.

Less than one fifth of the Trans Pacific Partnership deals with trade. The remainder of the treaty governs a myriad of things, including regulating the price of medicines. A few months ago, a mix of conservative and liberal groups stopped the “Stop Online Piracy Act” or SOPA. Most of the provisions of SOPA are included in the Trans Pacific Partnership.

Under the proposals of the TPP, American sovereignty would be eroded. American courts would be inferior to foreign trade courts and disputes between American citizens and foreign corporations would not be litigated in American courts but in these trade tribunals.

If you think unemployment is bad now, just wait. According to leaks from the Trans Pacific Partnership, the treaty will provide incentives for American companies to relocate overseas.

With ninety million Americans out of the work force and work force participation at it’s lowest since those statistics have been kept, incentives to send American employment overseas is shocking.

There are too many questions to be asked about this proposed treaty but perhaps the best question to ask is, if this treaty is so good for America, why is it being negotiated in secret?

According to Lori Wallach of Public Citizen in an op-ed in the New York Times, Ron Kirk, the former trade representative who was negotiating the treaty, said that if the treaty details were made public, the treaty would probably never pass.

If this is true, then this treaty should never be signed, much less ratified.

The biggest chance to kill this really bad idea is by denying Barack Obama fast track authority.

With Obama’s track record of lying to America, can we really trust him with this kind of trade agreement?


Judson Phillips is the founder of Tea Party Nation. This essay originally appeared on the Washngton Times.