frankly, what I think we're doing here, is documenting the last gasps of democracy. Updated

[Jack Rabbit]

178. I'd like not to agree that we are documenting the last gasp of democracy, but . . .

. . . a couple of weeks ago, I posted the opinion that passage of the TPP would be the death of democracy and caused quite a stir mainly form HRC supporters.

Yes, the passage of the TPP will be the death of democracy. The reason I say that is because the TPP provides for a a platform to sue elected governments that is not available to actual citizens, who are made of flesh and blood and only of flesh and blood. The United States of America is formally a representative democracy. If the voters elect representatives who go to the capital to pass laws abating air and water pollution, who then pass such legislation only to be sued by ExxonMoble or the local coal company because such legislation will prevent them from realizing "expected profits," then democracy is indeed dead. The TPP creates corporations not as people, which is a silly enough idea, to creating corporations as a legal entity with more rights to citizens. It makes the realization of expected profits a right and with it the right to befoul the planet in pursuit of those profits.

We can elect whoever we please and pass whatever laws are appropriate, but ExxonMoble need not obey them and may even punish the citizens (who are also taxpayers, last time I checked, which is more than can be said for General Electric) by making us pay them for unrealized expected profits, awarded them by an unelected panel of corporate shysters in secret proceedings.

If that isn't the destruction of democracy, then what is?

I not only say that the TPP would be the end of American democracy, but that the only proper way for the public to respond to the passage of such a vile outrage is a mass campaign of civil disobedience aimed at making the TPP and similar "free" trade deal unenforceable. Our goal is victory. Our terms is unconditional surrender of the enemy. And when I say the enemy, Dave and Charlie Koch, I mean you, among other oligarchs.