Has President Obama actually lied

[cali]

about and misrepresented the tpp?

You decide:

<snip>

1. 40 PERCENT: The President and his team have repeatedly described TPP as a deal involving nearly 40 percent of global GDP. This tells only part of the story. First of all, the U.S. by itself represents 22 percent of global GDP; a bill naming a post office would involve that much. Second, we already have free trade agreements with six TPP partners – Canada, Mexico, Australia, Singapore, Chile and Peru – and between them and us, that’s 80 percent of the total GDP in this deal. The vast majority of the rest is represented by Japan, where the average applied tariff is a skinny 1.2 percent, per the World Bank.

You can see this paragraph in graphic form here. The point is that saying TPP is about “40 percent of GDP” intimates that it would massively change the ability to export without tariffs. In reality it would have virtually no significance in opening new markets. To the extent that there’s a barrier in global trade today, it comes from currency manipulation by countries wanting to keep their exports cheap. The TPP has no currency provisions.

2. JOB CREATION: Saying, as the White House has, that the deal would support “an additional 650,000 jobs” is not true. This figure came from a hypothetical calculation of a report by the Peterson Institute for International Economics, which the Institute itself said was an incorrect way to use their data. “We don’t believe that trade agreements change the labor force in the long run,” said Peter Petri, author of the report, in a fact check of the claim.

The deal is actually more about building up barriers than taking them down. Much of TPP is devoted to increasing copyright and patent protections for prescription drugs and Hollywood media content. As economist Dean Baker notes, this is protectionist, and will raise prices for drugs, movies and music here and abroad.


<snip>

4. MOST PROGRESSIVE: Obama has called TPP “the most progressive trade deal in history.” First of all, so did Bill Clinton and Al Gore, when talking about NAFTA in 1993. Second, there’s reason to believe TPP doesn’t even clear a low bar for progressive trade deals. The Sierra Club, based on a leaked TPP environmental chapter, said that the deal is weaker than the landmark “May 10 agreement” for deals with Peru, Panama and Colombia, struck in 2007. Key Democrats who devised labor and environmental standards for those agreements, like Rep. Sander Levin, believe that TPP falls short. Even if the chapters were up to par, consistent lack of enforcement of the rules makes them ineffective. The U.S. Trade Representative has actually claimed the Colombia free trade agreement is positive because only one trade unionist in the country is being murdered every other week. Labor groups can only ask the White House to enforce labor rights violations, and for the past several years, the Administration simply hasn’t. So when Obama says violators of TPP will face “meaningful consequences,” based on the Administration’s prior enforcement, he’s lying.

<snip>

http://www.salon.com/2015/05/12/the_10_biggest_lies_youve_been_told_about_the_trans_pacific_partnership/

[onehandle]

1. Has Salon's writing gone really downhill these days? nt

[cali]

2. Care to state where the author is incorrect- or lying if you prefer?

And actually, this is quite a cohesive, well written piece. You? Diversion and dodging the issues.

[MaggieD]

5. It's an opinion piece calling Obama a liar

But the reality is the author just disagrees with Obama's stand on the issue. But I guess it just makes the author feel more important to pretend he is the mighty truth teller and Obama is a "liar."

My favorite part is where, at the end, he claims THE DETAILS are super secret. Right after spending many paragraphs ripping the details about the TPP.

[shawn703]

18. If it's not secret

Wouldn't there be a link somewhere on the USTR website?

[cali]

20. It's an opinion piece bolstered by facts.

but it's cute, maggie, that you think you are so brilliant and telepathic that you know the motivations of the author.

And sorry, but yes, it's a fact that there's has been unprecedented secrecy surrounding the TPP. Thankfully, we know quite a bit from the important (Environment, IP, Investment) LATE round draft chapter leaks. Nothing contradictory about the article.

<snip>

Why All the Secrecy?

The office of the United States Trade Representative has said that “negotiators need to communicate with each other with a high degree of candor, creativity and mutual trust. To create the conditions necessary to successfully reach agreements in complex trade and investment negotiations, governments routinely keep their proposals and communications with each other confidential.”

But previous trade agreements were shared more openly and despite the secrecy efforts, portions of the document have been leaking out, through WikiLeaks and other organizations.

<snip>

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/12/business/unpacking-the-trans-pacific-partnership-trade-deal.html?_r=0

TPP: The only trade agreement that has ever been classified as top secret for (supposed) National Security reasons.

[MaggieD]

23. I'm just following the author's lead

And his brilliant and telepathic knowledge of Obama's motivations.

But isn't it odd that the author is very explicit about details, then turns right around and claims it's secret? That part cracked me up.

[Android3.14]

10. Only if you read work that reinforces your own bias

The editing looks good, the article is reasonably concise, and the author illustrates real issues with the TPP. The incorrect observation you express appears to come from the cognitive dissonance that some readers experience.

[snappyturtle]

3. I've never been able to get beyond the "government transparency" promise. nt

[MissDeeds]

15. +1

Apparently he hasn't either. He made a lot of empty promises.

[Enthusiast]

4. Kicked and recommended to the Max!

A whole bunch!

[stonecutter357]

6. .

[cali]

7. Powerful refutation. When you can't muster an argument or contest the facts,

you can always fall back on smilies. That's convincing.

[Dawgs]

27. ...

[geek tragedy]

8. #1 isn't pointing out a lie, it's

questioning the relevance of the fact/statistic cited.

Odd decision to put the very weakest argument up front.

[Evar]

9. Salon article--wrong, like Warren

Salon is lying when it claims the president doesn't go after labor violations. Here are the facts:"Under this Administration, USTR (United States Trade Representative) has filed 18 WTO complaints, more than any other WTO Member. Nine filings target measures adopted by China; three target Indian measures; other complaints addressed an array of major economies including Argentina, the European Union, Indonesia, and the Philippines. At the same time, through our Free Trade Agreements, USTR has broken new ground by launching a dispute settlement case involving labor rights and environmental rights and conservation." https://ustr.gov/about-us/policy-offices/press-office/blog/2014/June/The-Obama-Administrations-Record-on-Trade-Enforcement-More-Resources-and-Real-Results

The TPP is NOT NAFTA, and the rush to judgment by progressives to assume it is reveals pure speculation, nothing more. The Asian market for trade is expected to grow by 2 billion customers and in another 15 years, it will be six times the size of the U.S. market. One in five American workers' jobs are dependent on exports. The opposition to this partnership is wrong-headed and stupid.

[RiverLover]

12. haha Oh my gosh I love it.

Your "proof" is a PR piece from the Trade Rep!!

Why didn't you post his statement that CAFTA is good because only one union leader gets killed in Central America every other week? It could be much worse!

I bet I know why, its in the OPlink.

[LondonReign2]

33. Another brand new poster supporting the TPP

Total coincidence, I'm sure

[cali]

13. lol. when an administration says that murder labor leaders on a mass scale

isn't a labor violation, it makes claims of enforcement a fucking joke.

I see your propaganda and raise you with a Nobel prize winning economist, The Sierra Club, Natural Resources Defense Council, World Wildlife Fund and Intellectual Property, trade and human rights expert:


It is not pure speculation, my dear. the objections are grounded in reality: Leaked late and important draft chapters, leaked process documents, leaks from some of the partner nations, analysis of not only those chapters by leading experts, but analysis of the current tpa legislation, which governs how the tpp and all the other trade agreements in the USTR pipeline are to be negotiated.

And using propaganda from the USTR is just pitiful. The USTR has been caught lying. They had to remove from their website material that intimated that the very environmental orgs that so strongly oppose the TPP, actually support it.

But forget the leaked chapters for a moment because I know that you'll make the bullshit claim that "they're only drafts"- despite the FACT that we know from comments by the USTR and the WH that some onerous provisions, like "evergreening' of drug patents, is in the IP chapter.

Let's focus on the TPA for a moment. That is not secret. Professor Sean Flynn, an expert in IP, human rights and trade at American University analyzed it vis a vis sovereignty:

Fact or Fiction: Does the Hatch-Wyden-Obama Trade Promotion Authority Bill Protect U.S. Sovereignty Over
Domestic Policy?

http://infojustice.org/archives/34298

Oh what the hell. Not that any of you "trust the President, forget the facts" folks will read it, but here is what the Sierra Club, NRDC and the WWF said about the leaked environment chapter:

Analysis of Leaked Environment Chapter Consolidated Text

http://action.sierraclub.org/site/DocServer/TPP_Enviro_Analysis.pdf?docID=14842

And let's hear what Nobel prize winning economist and expert on world trade, Joseph Stiglitz has to say yesterday, but YOU, of course are just sooo much better informed and educated than a Nobel prize winning economist and form chief economic adviser:

<snip>

Stiglitz, while unveiling a new report on inequality, criticized the TPP, calling it a move to increase corporate power at the expense of average Americans that could lead to increased inequality.

Stiglitz also addressed President Obama's recent attacks on progressives over trade, and particularly those against Warren, whom Obama recently called "absolutely wrong" for saying the proposed deal could to lead to the dismantling of Dodd-Frank.

"The president is making some fairly nasty remarks about people on the other side that they don't understand we're in the 21st century," Stiglitz said. "Actually, we do. I don't think he understands what's happened in the last third of a century."

Stiglitz, who served as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers in former President Bill Clinton's administration, has long been critical of TPP. Stiglitz's name did not appear on a letter signed by several former chairpersons of the Council of Economic Advisers from both parties asking Congress to grant Obama Trade Promotion Authority, which would subject trade agreements to an up-or-down vote without the ability to amend.

<snip>

http://www.nationaljournal.com/politics/nobel-winning-economist-comes-to-elizabeth-warren-s-defense-on-trade-20150512

[Liberalynn]

17. Well here's an idea

if it is such an amazing document that is going to produce such fabulous results not only in this country but others,why not let the public actually read the agreement as it stands so far? That would end all the "speculation" because we'd actually know what was in it!

It kills me that the proponents of this deal use the fact that people are judging it without having read it, when guess what?, the reason we haven't read it is because the President and his Republican allies have decided we aren't allowed to read it, until passage is all but guaranteed.

Our other elected representatives in the Senate , however,have read it although the President has forbidden them to talk about it to the people they are actually supposed to be working for, so they aren't just "speculating." Guess what they still have issues with it.

[Damansarajaya]

31. +1 well said! nt

[ucrdem]

28. Best analysis in days. nt

[shaayecanaan]

11. There's not many tariff barriers left...

and most of what remains has been preserved by dint of the usual cock-in-glove horse trading: eg Japan has agreed to accept the remaining American tariffs on auto vehicles in exchange for being allowed to keep its tariffs on rice.

Tpp is mainly about non tariff barriers and also very much about ip. I agree that the ip provisions are probably the most extraordinary parts of the agreement.

It may well turn out that the TPP leads to further manufacturing job losses in the US. At the moment a lot of trade secret-intensive manufacturing is done in the U.S. because companies don't trust ip enforcement in a lot of third world countries. If this leads to better protection for ip then a lot of those processes may well move offshore.

[cali]

14. the IP provisions are, ironically enough, protectionist.

[secondwind]

16. Without intending to, Obama has cleared the path for Bernie Sanders more than for Hillary.

I've had enough of empty promises, etc. and I am ready and willing to vote for the REAL DEAL this time around.

GO BERNIE!

[just my 2 cents]

[Demeter]

19. Like a Rumpled Rug in a Darkened Hallway

Obama lies and trips himself up, all the time, since before the Inauguration.

6.5 years later, this question is still in doubt?

[KG]

21. this president has lied before and will lie again. nature of the job.

sorry to burst the bubble of the true believers.

[cali]

22. sure, but lots of people adamently refuse to believe it.

And some of the lies about the tpp and related issues, are pretty blatant- the cherry picking and lies of omission, are even more notable.

[malthaussen]

24. He isn't lying, just occasionally careless with the truth.

-- Mal

[DanTex]

25. Both sides have lied.

Particularly the "job creation/destruction" stuff. Trade agreements, including NAFTA, don't generally create or destroy jobs on net. What they do is create some jobs and destroy others. So, in a way, both sides are right, but morally both sides are wrong.

What matter is whether the jobs that are created are better or worse jobs than the ones that are destroyed. For example, with NAFTA, manufacturing jobs were lost, and were often replaced with minimum wage jobs, as people employed in manufacturing ended up working at McDonalds.

[Javaman]

26. all politicians lie. nt

[hobbit709]

29. The best way to lie is to tell the truth in a way that no one believes it.

the second best way to tell a lie is to tell the truth but not all of it.

[Damansarajaya]

30. Since no one except Obama knows what's in the TPP,

it's pretty hard to support it.

[cali]

32. well, no one aside from

some congresscritters, some of their aides, USTR Froman and the negotiators and their aides, the advisory board(s) members, negotiators, staff and and government officials from tpp partner nations....