Originally posted at www.REBELLION.life.
The TPP is billed as a “free-trade” agreement between the United States government (representing the interest of the large corporations who have bought it) and 11 countries – Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam.
Here is the only question you need to ask yourself – if trade were allowed to be free amongst individuals, companies, and other individuals and companies – why would you need an agreement?
Free trade, in its simplest form, means that people are free to trade with other people. You don’t need an agreement, or a pact, because people are free to do what they want, and individuals and the market will respond accordingly. That is what “free” means. If there is nothing stopping someone – they are free.
However, the TPP could very well end the freedom of individuals to both trade freely with other individuals, as well as have their individual rights eroded.
The agreement would allow food products from other countries into our nation’s food supply as long as the exporting country says they are ‘safe’. This is a grave danger to the health and well-being of America’s citizens who enjoy the ability to consume foods that are extremely regulated in comparison to other countries, especially when it comes to the use of toxic pesticides and monitoring of heavy metals. Food labels could actually be considered a “trade barrier“, and the TPP would rather allow products to flow “freely” without allowing people to know where exactly their food is coming from. And of course, I believe, that consumers deserve to make an informed decision of whether or not they want to eat a product – and the country of origin is certainly part of that decision.
Small companies and producers never benefit from such large, over-reaching agreements. Only gigantic multi-national corporations, who purchase our representatives in Washington, need this type of blanket agreement with other governments – to preserve their trade.
The smoking gun here is that our government, that promised un-compromised transparency, will not allow us to see the actual text of the TPP agreement. However, Wikileaks has a portion of this document available here.
Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton won’t speak to this issue, as another smoking gun, that the TPP is latent with corruption and does not deserve the support of our representatives. We hope you will make an informed decision about who should represent you in 2016, and consider “cleaning your house” as a precaution.
– Tisha Casida
Filed under: Policy, Property Rights, TPP Tagged: free trade, GMO labeling, Hillary Clinton, NAFTA, rebellion, rebellion.life, tisha casida, TPA, TPP, trade barriers, trade promotion authority, Trans-Pacific Partnership
