Apr 11 2015

Your NeoLib Nightmare

The good news is that this piece of garbage needs to be wrtten at all.

Why the Trans-Pacific Partnership Matters

By ROGER C. ALTMAN and RICHARD N. HAASS

APRIL 3, 2015

But the congressional outlook for this approach – called Trade Promotion Authority, or fast-track negotiating authority, because it does not allow amendments or filibustering – has dimmed. Without it, the agreement would collapse, the victim of endless amendments. The coming vote, therefore, is the equivalent to a vote on the TPP itself. Should it die, the adverse impact on American national security would be great.

The trade debate coincides with growing challenges to America’s allies. In the Western Hemisphere, the governments of Canada and Chile, which are parties to the trade negotiations, believe the accord (despite domestic critics) will stimulate growth. In Asia and the Pacific, parties to the deal – not only our allies Japan and Australia, but also Vietnam, Singapore and Malaysia – see the trade accord as a way of counterbalancing China’s economic might. This is why trade is central to our foreign policy; without this deal, the so-called pivot to Asia will be hollow.

…

Free trade leads to greater overall prosperity. The gains from free trade need to be widely shared, but defeating the TPP would not solve America’s problems with inequality. Instead, it would further rattle our allies. “Further” is the key word here, as there already are rising doubts about American reliability – the result of the debt-ceiling crises, government shutdowns, the failure to follow through on threats in Syria and, most recently, the letter addressed to Iran from 47 senators. If the TPP fails, countries that, rightly or wrongly, see Washington as ineffective will pay America less heed.

It’s reasonable to debate the merits of this major trade agreement. But the critics have exaggerated and distorted the economic costs of the accord, while all but ignoring its benefits – and the strategic costs of a rejection. The real choice is between supporting a trade accord that would help most Americans and serve the country’s strategic aims, and defeating it, which would leave the country poorer and the world less stable.

So, basically, ignore your lying eyes and follow us blindly because we’re very serious people and if you say that the Emperor has no clothes you’ll ruin our credibility and we will haz a sad.

(h/t Lambert at Naked Capitalism)

rustymancuso581

2 comments

  2. “Free trade leads to greater overall prosperity.”

    Proof that this agreement is about “free trade”? The actual name for fast-track is “Trade Promotion Authority”, so anything that it can be used for, like the “Trans-Pacific Partnership”, has to be about free trade.

    Of course, as reported in that raging left wing rag The International Business Times:

    Pharmacuetical industry leaders are meeting in Australia this week to finalize a massive trade agreement between the United States and 11 other countries, negotiations that critics say may result in strong intellectual property protections for drug companies at the expense of patients’ access to medicines.

    “Stronger monopoly rights” = “free trade”.

    Uhh … yeah, sure it does.

    Untangle the proof by naming, and calling things what they are, makes for a much less compelling argument … which is why the one thing you will not hear from TPP advocates is an honest argument:

    • “Increasing the strength of monopolies leads to greater overall prosperity”

    … uhh, no, in general, it really doesn’t.

    The case for granting monopoly rights to inventors is a special case that the total benefit exceeds the total harm … and so the case for extending monopoly rights for corporate “inventors” that are already raking in large profits is quite weak, since those healthy profits suggest that the motivation that they are getting from existing monopoly rights is already more than sufficient.

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