The Columbian’s Aug. 10 economic op-ed in support of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) neglects to mention any counter arguments, of which there are many (“In Our View: Free Trade is American Way”). The most important of these is that adoption of the TPP would abrogate American sovereignty, our ability to make and enforce our own laws, a concept initially encapsulated in the Preamble to The Constitution.
Speaking plainly, the TPP was constructed mostly in secrecy by corporate entities without input from our elected representatives. Of its 30 chapters, only 6 actually deal with trade; the rest are designed to protect corporate interests. The TPP creates an ISDS (Investor-State Dispute System) that circumvents American courts and laws. In practice its procedures would be secret, the panel of judges composed of corporate lawyers, its judgments final and not subject to appeal.
Treaties trump laws and, in this case, our Constitution. If the TPP was in effect and Gov. Inslee disallowed Vancouver Energy’s permit, Vancouver Energy could sue the state of Washington for “lost” profits and we Washingtonians would be on the hook for those payments.
The TPP is the broad gateway to neo-Feudalism, in which we all are no longer autonomous citizens under the Constitution but simple serfs subject to the whims of our “profit-at-any-cost” multinational corporate lords.
