Julian Assange is a riddle wrapped in an enigma a man truly the personification of a conundrum. A libertarian if one has ever existed he is global public enemy number one as a hacker most noted for owning WikiLeaks which he launched in 2006 to disseminate hacked top secret dossiers from foreign governments regarding sensitive issues. In 2010 he achieved notoriety when Chelsea Manning leaked information regarding U.S. intelligence and military dossiers. That same year the Swedish government opened an investigation into Mr. Assanges alleged sexual offenses. Two years later when faced with extradition to Stockholm to be formally charged he sought and was granted political asylum by the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. To date Mr. Assange still resides on sovereign Ecuadorian territory. Alongside Edward Snowden Mr. Assange is considered quite possibly the most controversial figure alive.
Over the past several days Mr. Assange has ascertained potentially incriminating top-secret documents on President Obamas dictation of what may become the Trans-Pacific Partnership free-trade agreement (TPP). Recent weeks have seen the media describe the rising tensions among Americas politicians and pundits on what merits such an agreement may possess. Yet no Congressman has openly acknowledged to have read these dossiers but there have been some who under extraordinary pressure by the Obama administration who not only read but were sworn to silence forbidden to even take down notes in order to discuss the issue with congressional colleagues. Understandably President Obama does not want this information to be leaked to the press and most definitely not Congress or the states given he would face utter political destruction so illegal is this agreement that would fully surrender the popular sovereignty of not only the American people but of all democratically-elected governments throughout the Asia-Pacific Rim.
In my article from May 26 The Dangers of International Free Trade Agreements I described why any free trade agreement is not only dangerous due to a systemic economic and financial collapse but to the sovereignty of the nation-state.
Conservatives and libertarians are renowned for desiring the greatest possible autonomy with respect to the free market. This phenomena in fact aided in igniting the shot heard round the world" April 19 1775 at Lexington and Concord. History teaches high school students the economic principle behind the French term laissez-faire or to let be". Free market economics were born from centuries of intercolonial trade within the British Empire and others known as mercantilism. Tariffs were placed on commodities in transit from markets outside these colonial domains as a protectionist approach to preserve imperial interests with little outside interference. And whether there was mercantilism or laissez-faire polity involving international trade one thing remains certain: there never has been a nation to subsist with a purely isolationist foreign policy. Global interactions preclude such a possibility. A Trans-Pacific free trade pact would flood the market with far more than merely unregulated immigration and undercutting the American peoples capacity to compete for jobs. It stands to lead to a Pangaea effect for supranational socialism through statism and its ugly red-headed stepsister corporatism. It will lead to an unprecedented dystopia born of globalization through the imposition of an inevitable single currency.
The deal portends of a supranational global socialist agenda where the U.S. government alongside its multinational corporate political lobbyists would nationalize all industry through draconian regulatory measures on the Internet global banking and the employment of global climate change as a major platform for said policies. This though is barely scratching the surface given a merger in the future with the nearly-bankrupt European Union is next which would form a geopolitical Pangaea superstate to compete with the BRIC alliance of Brazil Russia India and China. The report released by Truth and Action provides Mr. Assanges own summarization both in print and in an interview.
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WikiLeaks releases today the Investment Chapter" from the secret negotiations of the TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership) agreement. The document adds to the previous WikiLeaks publications of the chapters for Intellectual Property Rights (November 2013) and the Environment (January 2014).
The TPP Investment Chapter published today is dated 20 January 2015. The document is classified and supposed to be kept secret for four years after the entry into force of the TPP agreement or if no agreement is reached for four years from the close of the negotiations.
Julian Assange WikiLeaks editor said: The TPP has developed in secret an unaccountable supranational court for multinationals to sue states. This system is a challenge to parliamentary and judicial sovereignty. Similar tribunals have already been shown to chill the adoption of sane environmental protection public health and public transport policies."
Current TPP negotiation member states are the United States Japan Mexico Canada Australia Malaysia Chile Singapore Peru Vietnam New Zealand and Brunei. The TPP is the largest economic treaty in history including countries that represent more than 40 per cent of the world´s GDP.
The Investment Chapter highlights the intent of the TPP negotiating parties led by the United States to increase the power of global corporations by creating a supra-national court or tribunal where foreign firms can sue" states and obtain taxpayer compensation for expected future profits". These investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) tribunals are designed to overrule the national court systems. ISDS tribunals introduce a mechanism by which multinational corporations can force governments to pay compensation if the tribunal states that a countrys laws or policies affect the companys claimed future profits. In return states hope that multinationals will invest more. Similar mechanisms have already been used. For example U.S. tobacco company Phillip Morris used one such tribunal to sue Australia (June 2011 ongoing) for mandating plain packaging of tobacco products on public health grounds; and by the oil giant Chevron against Ecuador in an attempt to evade a multi-billion-dollar compensation ruling for polluting the environment. The threat of future lawsuits chilled environmental and other legislation in Canada after it was sued by pesticide companies in 2008/9. ISDS tribunals are often held in secret have no appeal mechanism do not subordinate themselves to human rights laws or the public interest and have few means by which other affected parties can make representations.
The TPP negotiations have been ongoing in secrecy for five years and are now in their final stages. In the United States the Obama administration plans to fast-track" the treaty through Congress without the ability of elected officials to discuss or vote on individual measures. This has met growing opposition as a result of increased public scrutiny following WikiLeaks earlier releases of documents from the negotiations.
The TPP is set to be the forerunner to an equally secret agreement between the U.S. and E.U. the TTIP (Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership).
Negotiations for the TTIP were initiated by the Obama administration in January 2013. Combined the TPP and TTIP will cover more than 60 per cent of global GDP. The third treaty of the same kind also negotiated in secrecy is TISA on trade in services including the financial and health sectors. It covers 50 countries including the US and all E.U. countries. WikiLeaks released the secret draft text of the TISAs financial annex in June 2014.
All these agreements on so-called free trade" are negotiated outside the World Trade Organizations (WTO) framework. Conspicuously absent from the countries involved in these agreements are the BRICs countries of Brazil Russia India and China.
While the general public only recently learned of the TPP negotiations few realize this has been a clandestine series of trade talks and negotiations for roughly five years. But those who do not reside in Europe or read international media particularly from the United Kingdom or the British government are likely in the dark on the potentially-catastrophic TTIP. Given the eurozone is on the brink of total economic collapse due to massive debts in Greece Spain and Portugal this is of grave concern as the E.U. operates under a common market with one central bank based in Brussels while each member state has its own economic infrastructure. For example during the fall of 2014 Prime Minister David Cameron provided the following data about the TTIP which is by far more publicly-transparent.
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Transatlantic Trade Partnership #1 (Courtesy of Her Majestys Government)/caption
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Transatlantic Trade Partnership #2 (Courtesy of Her Majestys Government)/caption
Given the debt crises in the European Union and in the Pacific with Japan such an geopolitical economic putsch would lead to a post-capital world. The European Commission in Brussels is not an elected body nor are the commissioners such as its present leader Jean-Claude Juncker. Greece recently reported it will not be able to meet its debt payment obligation the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and a third bailout to date has not been agreed upon. This is tied together by the failure of the euro the common markets single currency.
The issue with climate change treaties such as with the U.N. Agenda 21 are covered in the E.U. Emissions policy which would be adopted by the federal government upon any agreement to the TTIP.
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To better grasp the gravity of growing Euroskepticism due to the issues with the dying common market in Brussels in the years following the financial market crash of 2008 caused by Clinton-era provisions of subprime mortgages and loans Bloomberg TV and a very British documentary providing the history of the consolidation of the continents nations post-World War II are below.
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Finally in describing the debt crises in the U.S. and Japan it is all the clearer aside from a total loss in sovereignty the TPP and subsequently the TTIP not be permitted to become the American law of the land at the cost of the total abolition of the Constitution and the potential catastrophe of the $70 trillion shadow banking ring and the Chinese Trojan horse as a tool to topple the U.S. marketplace Alibaba.
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