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Health & Fitness

Free Trade assaults Constitution, Sovereignty, & Prosperity

According to the article "Fast Track Opens Door for US TPP Approval," published December 6 on the Financial Times website, "US lawmakers have moved closer to a deal to grant President Barack Obama the authority to pass trade agreements swiftly and without changes through Congress."  The American public should understand that this "fast track" process undermines Constitutional government, and the Free Trade deals thus promoted undermine our national sovereignty and democracy, as well as our economy.

Let's start with the Constitutional problem.  "Fast Track" (sometimes called "Trade Promotion Authority") is unconstitutional because it supposedly ratifies a treaty by simple majority of both houses of Congress, in violation of Article 2 Section 2 that authorizes the President to make treaties “PROVIDED TWO THIRDS OF THE SENATORS PRESENT CONCUR.”  Only a Constitutional Amendment can negate this requirement, but "Trade Promotion Authority” would only be an act of Congress --which cannot amend or violate the Constitution.

Because "fast track" is clearly unconstitutional, the President should be impeached for requesting it and any Congressman or Senator who votes for it should be immediately expelled by the Congress and/or recalled by the citizens.  Unfortunately, this "fast track" violation of the Constitution is how virtually all our Free Trade treaties have been ratified since 1974.  The American people must wake up and demand it stop or the Constitution will become an obsolete relic replaced by unconstitutional precedent and custom.

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Beyond these "fast track" Constitutional problems, the Free Trade treaties themselves would be harmful to America's sovereignty and economy.  The treaties being drafted right now are the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (US-EU deal).  These treaties are being being drafted in secrecy by over 600 corporate lobbyists appointed by Obama's administration.

Senators Blumenthal and Murphy both ignored my July letter requesting the draft text of the TPP.  When I reached an aide to Congressman Himes on the phone to ask why his office also ignored my request for a draft of the TPP, I was told without any hint of complaint that the Obama administration was not showing it to Congressman Himes.  Our Senators and Congressmen hide behind this Executive secrecy so they can duck responsibility for the content of the treaties.  But I was finally able to access some of the TPP draft through wikileaks, and now see why there is such secrecy.

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The TPP (and the US-EU deal) would create bodies of global governance to adjudicate matters of economic, labor and environmental regulations, taking these essential issues of governance out of the hands of our elected Congress and President.  That's exactly what the TPP draft text published by wikileaks shows.  And the same would be true in the US-EU trade deal also being negotiated by the Obama administration.  According to the article "The lies behind this transatlantic trade deal," published December 2 by The Guardian newspaper on their website, the US-EU trade deal would allow globalized corporations to "sue governments before secretive arbitration panels composed of corporate lawyers, which bypass domestic courts and override the will of parliaments."

Making such treaties would be an outrageous abdication of American sovereignty.  Creating these institutions of global governance to move essential regulation out of the Congress means the loss of democratic control and government responsiveness to the citizenry.

Finally, these Free Trade deals will only worsen the huge trade deficits that measure the huge loss of American manufacturing and other high value-added industries through off-shoring and outsourcing.  Every Free Trade deal so far has already deepened these problems, dismantling our country's productive economy and eroding our long-term prosperity.  On September 20, 2011, Manufacturing and Technology News reported that during the previous ten years, the US lost 54,621 factories, and manufacturing employment fell by 5 million employees.  This export of our tax base and manufacturing engines of wealth creation continues apace, and it is the fundamental reason for the fiscal crises at the federal, state and local levels.  It is also dismantling our industrial ecosystem, uprooting our skills and productive capacities in essential technologies.

We must reverse these policies before our economy is so damaged we suffer a historic collapse of living standards and of the ability to recover.

There is a solution.  Congress could pass a Balanced Trade law that uses a system of Import Certificates to license all imports.  By issuing these Import Certificates only in the same value as our exports, we would balance our trade.  This would divert the annual $600 Billion trade deficit into demand for US-made goods and services, directly creating millions of manufacturing jobs and indirectly creating many millions more jobs through the multiplier-effect manufacturing has.  This would add 4% annual GDP growth, grow the tax base, decrease the need for social safety net, and revive our country's long-term ability to create wealth.

A Balanced Trade law would even be legal according to our terms of membership in the WTO.  Article XII of the General Agreement on Tariff and Trade (GATT 1994), annexed to the Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization entered into on April 15, 1994, permits any member country to restrict the quantity or value of imports in order to safeguard the external financial position and the balance of payments of the member country.

In sum, replacing the disastrous Free Trade policies with a Balanced Trade policy would reverse the disintegration of American manufacturing and employment, restore our national sovereignty and democracy, and create the prosperity needed to resolve the fiscal crises pervading government at all levels.  American citizens should urge their US Senators and Congressional Representative to do everything possible to defeat so-called “fast track” legislation for “Trade Promotion Authority,” and oppose the Trans-Pacific Partnership and Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership treaties.  We should urge Congress to replace these disastrous Free Trade policies with a BALANCED TRADE POLICY.

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