The Scorpions, the Frogs and the TPP: Prepare to Be Stung

[WilliamPitt]

House Speaker John Boehner talks to reporters about support in the House to give President Barack
Obama power to accelerate a broad trade accord with Asia, on Capitol Hill in Washington, May 13, 2015.
The House has just passed President Obama's bill giving him fast-track trade authority by a slim margin
of 218 to 208. (Photo: Stephen Crowley/The New York Times)

The Scorpions, the Frogs and the TPP: Prepare to Be Stung
By William Rivers Pitt
Truthout | Op-Ed

Thursday 18 June 2015

An Aesop fable, "The Scorpion and the Frog," has been much on my mind today. Short version: A scorpion asked a frog to carry him across a stream. "How do I know you won't sting me?" asked the frog. "Because if I do," replied the scorpion, "I will die, too." Halfway across the stream, however, the scorpion stung the frog. As they sank to their mutual doom, the frog gasped, "Why?" The scorpion replied, "Because it is my nature."

As I watched the House pass President Obama's bill giving him fast-track trade authority (TPA) by a slim margin of 218 to 208, I thought to myself, "Here are the scorpions, and we are the frogs."

Some 28 Democrats voted in favor of it, while nearly twice that number of Republicans, fifty, voted against it. The bill allows the president to submit trade agreements to Congress for a straight vote with no amendments attached. It is, in every respect, the first step toward the president's ultimate goal: passage of the dangerous, foolish, destructive Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement.

Refresher: The TPP is based on the NAFTA model, but with vastly broader powers and implications. NAFTA was an astonishing job-killer in the US, and the TPP will be worse. It is a massive corporate power grab by multi-national corporations whose control, upon passage, over every aspect of our lives will be multiplied a hundred-fold. Food, medicine, the internet, and especially jobs will be profoundly affected, and if the corporations are challenged, they can seek redress in a trade court whose power will supersede US laws.

The fast-track bill was shot to pieces last week through some fairly clever maneuvering by the Democrats. Packaged in that vote with the TPA was a program going by the nauseating euphemism "Trade Adjustment Assistance," or TAA (more on that in a moment). Even though most Democrats support the TAA, they voted it down with Republican help as a means of upending the whole rowboat, and it worked ... until today, when the TPA was brought to a vote again, but without the TAA attached, and it passed.

A word on this "Trade Adjustment Assistance" thing. Let's say you work for a software company doing customer assistance over the phone. You make a decent living and get health benefits. You go to work one day and find a note on your desk informing you that, thanks to the wonder of the TPP, your job is being air-mailed to the Pacific Rim. Please clean out your desk by the end of the day, here's a form for COBRA, and thank you for your service. You go looking for a new job, only to find that every position in your field has also crossed the ocean.

That's not outsourcing, or getting laid off, or getting royally screwed. It's "Trade Adjustment." There would be "assistance" for you, but the folks on the Hill don't seem interested in passing that portion of the deal. It was more important to get the big deal done, and leave the little deal - you, your livelihood, your future - for some nebulous "later." They promised they would ... and if we had ham, we could have ham and eggs, if we had eggs.

That's not some idle fantasy, mind you. Despite all the happy talk from the president and his suddenly enthusiastic Republican allies about the TPP creating jobs for US workers, the very existence of a "Trade Adjustment Assistance" bill gives vivid lie to their hyper-optimistic hogwash. That bill exists because they know, as sure as little fishes swim in the sea, that the TPP will be a job-killer, and they created an "Assistance" plan as some sort of half-assed Band-Aid for all the people who will be streeted if this thing comes to be ... but they haven't passed it. Go figure.

The rest: http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/31462-the-scorpions-the-frogs-and-the-tpp-prepare-to-be-stung

[djean111]

1. I will not be voting for any more Democrats unless I can ascertain, somehow, that they are not a

scorpion. If we keep on voting for any "D(INO)" served up to us, we will soon see a Congress and White House filled to the top with scorpions.

[Ed Suspicious]

19. So with you. I know that position will be met with much gnashing of teeth on DU, but I'm seriously

sick of it.

[erronis]

30. And I wonder, somewhat seriously, what would happen if we just put the clowns in charge.

Sayanora, dems. Go find something else to do with your millions.

Hello Great Old Party of fuckups. We're all in your big tent now. Tea partiers, old-line conservatives, pest control experts, quacks, closeted homosexuals and not-so closeted bigots.

Our GOP now controls all three branches of the gummint and the banks and what's left of industry in this fine USofA. First we'll strip all social programs (Medicare/aid), and we'll defund what's left of infrastructure projects. Obamacare is so yesterday.

We'll increase spending for the military but cut any expenditures on VA and post-service programs. You won't need education since you'll be in the Army at 17 and not expected to survive.

Roads/trains - who needs them. We have private airports and our own fleets of jets. Police - OK, we have private forces on our estates.

China, Russia will totally understand our move to oligarchy. Old Europe - who needs them (well except for the Cote d'Azur.)

[djean111]

31. I think we are doing some of that stuff now, with the help of the corporate Dems.

Training for the folks who will lose jobs because of the TPP? Money comes out of Medicare. And Obama WANTS that bill to pass.
I assume your post is supposed to strike fear into my heart or whatever. But it does not. My fear is that I will be expected to vote for, and cheer on, New Democrats who want to do the same damned things.

[erronis]

40. Actually I wasn't trying to raise the fear level any more than it is now -

I guess I was more thinking that the best cure for the ills that are the current mainstream parties is to let them totally hose this country. Then, maybe - just maybe, we can rebuild with a stronger and more representative government. But then the same thing may happen on the current course - mass rebellion.

[djean111]

41. Okay, I see that, I understand. And yeah.

It is just that a post just like that almost automatically pops up if not voting for DINOs is mentioned.
The shorter version is "Say hello to President Cruz!". Gotten ludicrous now, though.

[Rex]

2. We didn't rise up after 2001, 2003 or 2008 when thousands of families lost their houses and lives.

I've noticed a disturbing trend - nobody even talks about the homeless anymore, they have been replaced by the soon to be homeless - the unemployed. Oh sure, we protested vigorously in 2003 but were ignored by the already bought and soldout M$M. Congress is such a purposeful mess, that they offer no help decade after decade.

SO now they know we can be thrown aside like garbage and that can go on and on and on, until there is a tiny group left to pull the levers and push the buttons.

It is insidious, but since we let this country get flushed down the toilet by Wall Street (starting back in the 80s when "Greed is Good" became the Wall Street mantra) and we let the M$M lose all objectivity over reporting the news - we set ourselves as a country on a one way street toward Altas Shrugged. Because that is all that will happen, individual lives mean nothing to people like Jamie Dimon.

Less than nothing.

[daleanime]

9. +1

[Dustlawyer]

42. To corporations like BP a life is 10 million! That is total cost!

The biggest chunk goes to their defense attorneys, then the widow, parents and kids, plus an ad budget to air commercials about how good they are! This is the same outlook all of these multinationals have towards us regular people/Proles.

They now have tort reform to put in caps, immunity in other cases (generic drug manufacturors), and lots of conservative judges appointed by both Democrats and Republicans.

Many of those who voted against TPP would have voted for it if it had been necessary, it just wasn't their turn to take a "hard vote!" You see a pattern, they lose the first vote and win the second to make it seem hard fought. Our problem is that our Republican and Democratic politicians are the political version of the Harlem Globetrotters vs. the Washington Generals. The Plutocrats write their script. As real as professional wrestling, unfortunately, we can't tell the difference!

For those who don't believe me, think about this, you set up an election system where most (not all) get to vote. Then you allow people, including corporations who are "people" without an actual vote (yet), to give as much money as they want to support their candidates. You have one small group of people with most of the money who pay regular installments to their candidates and their Super Pacs, but only as long as they say and do what the small powerful group wants them to. The understanding is that the money to get and keep them in power will continue until they croak in office will stop the minute they oppose what the small group wants. That money will go to someone else who will take their place if they persist in opposing the desires of the small, powerful group. You have the rest (99%) who don't have the money or organization of the small group and they all have a vote, but they only get to pick from the politicians who decide to run, which is usually only after promises of large amounts of money to their campaigns should they run. So the 99% only get to choose from the politicians pre-screened by the small group to begin with, thus assuring that the small group always wins. Additionally, the small group controls/owns the major means of reaching all of the people and controls the messaging for everything, thus convincing most of the 99% that either Republicans or Democrats represent their interests, their "team."

Every once in a long while an altruistic politician makes it through all of these obstacles to gain national attention. Enough of the 99% send small donations to keep them in their office, but there is never enough of these to cause a problem and actually help give the appearance that this is for real. While they usually tilt at windmills, the small group has the laws changed to better suit them at the expense of the much larger group. They co-opt the regulatory agencies, judicial branches. until they are above the law.

Only once every second or third generation do the 99% ever have a viable candidate for the Presidency that actually gives a shite about the 99%. This is dangerous to the small group because if elected, they will have the bully pulpit to get the message through to the 99% that the game has been rigged against them. All the other candidates for President have taken large, large sums of money from the small group on both Republican and Democratic sides. If the 99% ever realizes the truth, they can tear it all down and start over, building back the protections that they let slowly slip away!

To me, Bernie Sanders represents the politician who can do this if we support and help him to get his message out. He will be too old to make a serious run next time, and Elizabeth Warren may never decide to take on that much of a trial by fire. Settle for Hillary if Bernie doesn't win the Primary, but damn! Give a shite! At some point we have to take a chance to have a government that is for all of us, not just the wealthy! We cannot play it safe and just vote for the lesser of two evils every time! Are we fed up enough to make it happen? Climate Change will not wait on us forever! It has to be now!!!!!!

[kentuck]

3. Best explanation yet!

Thanks WillPitt.

[neverforget]

4. It's in their nature

to do the corporations bidding while screwing the workers.

[truebrit71]

5. Sickening....just sickening...

[0rganism]

6. yep, it wasn't bad enough with the TAA

now that TAA is out, we can celebrate the passage of this even crueler version of fast-track.

[AzDar]

7. Can't these 'deals' be undone, somehow...someway? I seem to recall a certain lying candidate

promising to 're-do' NAFTA...

[daleanime]

12. Wouldn't be easy....

at the very least it would involve another round of negotiations with all signers.

[nationalize the fed]

15. Watch Democrats talk to Union members in 2007

Keith Olbermann Hosts The 2007 AFL-CIO Democratic Debate

"Free Trade" at 18:18

Candidate Obama at 26:50 "Look- People don't want a cheaper t shirt if they're losing a job in the process"

I seem to recall a certain lying candidate promising to 're-do' NAFTA...

Then Goolsby called Canada

[AzDar]

52. Oh, Lord...I'd completely forgotten about this. Why do we allow them to sell us out again and AGAIN?

Torches and pitchforks...

[fasttense]

18. Yup a huge march on Washington against the Obama PP

Millions marching on DC would make the politicians remember who votes them into office. It might even make Obama care about non corporate entities.

[AzDar]

53. I'd love to see Labor/Unions organize such a thing. An issue that could cross Party lines...

And scare the living hell out of these corrupt traitors.

[bullsnarfle]

8. "Because it is my nature."

I learned the end of the story a different way ---

"You knew what I was when you picked me up."

Ain't that the damn truth.

[WilliamPitt]

20. That's "The Lady and the Snake"

A corollary parable with the same message.

[Enthusiast]

10. K&R! This post should have hundreds of recommendations!

Great piece!

[Elwood P Dowd]

11. K&R. A grand slam homerun. (nm)

[NRaleighLiberal]

13. Our president, ally and friends of the Republicans, lost any remaining confidence from me.

I still respect him as a good person, but....my disappointment in him runs very deep.

[AikidoSoul]

14. If it does pass, what will it take to undo it?

Of course we don't have the language of the agreement, so there may be words like "in perpetuity" somewhere deep inside the document.

In the minds of the corporatists there may exist incredibly fucked up logic that tells them this is the "solution" to over-population, immigration, global warming, healthcare costs, and what else....?

Many of us will die because our resources and support systems will disappear. Part of the corporatists' fucked up logic may be that because many in our country and around the world are suffering deeply from economic despair, that there is a kind of twisted rationale that pretends to be pity or mercy, and attempts to put us out of our misery. The trade agreement would be the coup de grace.

Very good writing to describe our situation, Mr. Pitt.

[arcane1]

28. Those corporations would likely sue the hell out of us for undoing it

And probably use our remaining jobs as blackmail.

[Demeter]

33. Boycotts, pitchforks and torches

in short, revolution. We have become Venezuela.

[progressoid]

44. Yep. That's the only solution I can see at this point. n/t

[WillyT]

16. HUGE K & R !!! - THANK YOU !!! (Will... Did You Catch THIS???)

DULink: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026859406

[WilliamPitt]

22. i did.

[Angry Dragon]

17. the many faces of Obama

[rhett o rick]

45. What many? He has only two. nm

[passiveporcupine]

21. The TAA was going to be funded on cuts to Medicare

If not for that, it would have been a good addition to the TPP. It should not have been included in the trade deal "as is".

In the original TAA bill passed by the Senate, the retraining programs were paid for with sequester cuts to Medicare.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/06/11/1392410/-Medicare-cuts-in-trade-bill-could-torpedo-Friday-nbsp-votes

[Demeter]

34. Good for what?

There is not point training people for non-existent jobs. It was just a gift to non-profits.

[passiveporcupine]

35. Not saying TPP is good at all

Just that the TPA would have made it a little less destructive, by trying to help displaced workers to find new jobs.

I'm not for the TPP in any way. I'm especially not for cuts to Medicare.

And you are right that the jobs they'd be training them for would probably be flipping burgers, as part timers without bennies.

[mrdmk]

61. The Medicare cuts in that bill were the classic Wrecking (Poison Pill) amendment

This was done very much on purpose with the intent to kill any attempt, forward or backwards to aid the working class.

Anyone who thinks otherwise needs to be considered suspect...


The definition of the wrecking amendment

In legislative debate, a wrecking amendment (also called a poison pill amendment or killer amendment) is an amendment made by a legislator who disagrees with the principles of a bill and who seeks to make it useless (by moving amendments to either make the bill malformed and nonsensical, or to severely change its intent) rather than directly opposing the bill by simply voting against it.

link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrecking_amendment

[passiveporcupine]

63. I understand that...it still was no go because of that

Now it's up to the dems to try to stop TPP. Not holding my breath for that one.

[Ed Suspicious]

23. This is one of my favorite lines ever.

"They promised they would ... and if we had ham, we could have ham and eggs, if we had eggs."

[raindaddy]

24. My question is simple..

How many people are still confident that this government can ever again represent the financial interests of the poor and middle class?

[rhett o rick]

46. We've long passed the point of no return. You can never go home. Welcome to New-Hati. nm

[Elwood P Dowd]

25. Now Will, you know that the guys from Citigroup and Bank of America that wrote the TPP

are just looking out for our best interests. There are no ulterior motives involved just because the USTR TPP guys are on loan from Wall Street. And the republicans that love this deal just want to do their part to eliminate poverty and bring about world peace.

[Fast Walker 52]

26. wait-- wtf? They did that today???

MOTHERFUCKERS.

[calimary]

29. Welcome to DU, Fast Walker 52.

Glad you're here. A pretty miserable day.

I was actually, for about half-a-moment, tempted to think this kid who shot all those people in church was a climate change denier. What he did sure took the attention off the Pope's new encyclical that was gonna have the corporations and big polluters reaching for their Maalox bottles.

But I kinda doubt our young Dylann-nnnnnn is that sophisticated in his thinking.

[Fast Walker 52]

54. thanks-- yeah it was a miserable day and I'm pissed.

But you did bring a smile to my face with the idea that the kid was a climate change denier.

[calimary]

27. The only "assistance plan" there seems to be is assistance to the high-rollers to roll higher,

and on a rigged playing field so they always win.

[antigop]

32. what the hell are workers whose jobs have been outsourced supposed to train for?

Having witnessed outsourcing first hand, I'd really like to know what my laid off colleagues in engineering and IT are supposed to train for when their jobs get shipped to India, China, Brazil, Romania, etc...

Seriously, what are they supposed to train for, especially if they lose their jobs at age 40 or 50?

[WinkyDink]

36. Do you think being a slave to the 1% is EASY?! Saying "YasSUH, BOSS!" just the right way takes

TRAINING!

[Ed Suspicious]

38. Rooftop organic subsistence farming.

Or share cropping. Or part time Wal-Mart greeter. The world is their oyster.

[Autumn]

43. Would you like some fries with that?

Housekeeping. Paper or plastic? I think that's about all they plan on leaving us. And we damn well better not expect a living wage.

[leftstreet]

37. DURec

[madfloridian]

39. Excellent post. Now it's my nature to ask why a president would want this for his country?

It's obviously going to hurt the working class, so why is he pushing this so hard that he's threatening those in his own party?

I don't feel at all passive or bipartisan right now....not at all. Fed up.

[rhett o rick]

47. Hey where are the Obama and Clinton fans celebrating this big win for coporate America?

One more step closer to total corporatism.

[KoKo]

48. Its not something they see as a "Bad Deal?" And this:

Don't know why but newly deceased "DU" Long Time Member, "Jackpine Radical" (Jim Petersen) posted this on his Blog: "Jackpine's Needles" a bit way back (2010)seems to say something we might want to think about going forward?

-------------------


THE LITTLE BOY WHO CRIED WOLF (Updated) (Jackpine Needles Blog)

There once was a shepherd boy who had the job of tending to the sheep that belonged to a village. He was watching over the sheep as they grazed in a clearing in a forest when a great pack of wolves appeared out of the forest and began chasing the sheep and scattering them. The boy cried “Wolves, wolves!” and all the villagers ran away because they were frightened.

"Don't cry 'wolf', shepherd boy," said the villagers after they straggled back to their village, "You frighten people with talk like that!"

A few days later, the wolves returned and the boy cried out again, "Wolves! Wolves! The wolves are chasing the sheep!" The villagers again ran away, leaving him alone to protect the sheep as best he could.

“We told you not to frighten us with these stories of wolves,” said the villagers. “We don’t believe you. We don’t think you ever saw any wolves.” From then on, they simply ignored the boy when he sounded the warning about wolves; they did not run away, but neither did they come to help him protect the sheep.

The wolves grew ever bolder, seeing that they had to contend with only one small boy. One day they summoned all the wolf packs from the surrounding countryside to join them in a gigantic raid on the flock. They dragged all the sheep off into the woods to eat at their leisure. They killed the shepherd boy and took his body along with them as well.

After a while the people of the village began to grow hungry for mutton, so they set out to bring home a sheep from the flock. When they got to the clearing in the forest, they found no sheep and no shepherd boy. “Look at this,” they told each other. “That thieving little boy has gone away and taken all our sheep with him. Now we know why he was crying ‘Wolf’ all the time. He was setting up his alibi.”

The moral of the story: Truth is precious. Don’t tell it too often, or nobody will believe you.

http://jackpineneedles.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2010-05-22T09:27:00-07:00&max-results=7

[raouldukelives]

59. The celebration is reflected in decimal points on financial statements.

Publicly they bemoan the assaults on the least, privately they finance them.

[Art_from_Ark]

49. Get ready for the worldwide "Reagan Economic Zone"

"We call for the restoration of presidential Trade Promotion Authority. It will ensure up or down votes in Congress on any new trade agreements, without meddling by special interests. A Republican President will complete negotiations for a Trans-Pacific Partnership to open rapidly developing Asian markets to US products. Beyond that, we envision a worldwide multilateral agreement among nations committed to the principles of open markets, what has been called a "Reagan Economic Zone," in which free trade will truly be fair trade. "

http://www.ontheissues.org/Celeb/Republican_Party_Free_Trade.htm

[bvar22]

62. ...and I got slammed for wanting a pony.

Instead, I got this:

"we envision a worldwide multilateral agreement among nations committed to the principles of open markets, what has been called a "Reagan Economic Zone."

These are some cold MFers.

[Zorra]

50. Cats and chickens are two animals that will rid your house of scorpions.

Cats kill them inside, and chickens roaming free around your yard will kill them outside.

True story.

It's time to herd the cats and rid our house of scorpions.

[AuntPatsy]

51. Kicking

[marym625]

55. It's even worse than all this

This is the last step to a true, global, corporatocracy.

[Oilwellian]

56. Kissinger titled his new book "World Order"

According to Hillary's glowing review in the NYT, he helped Obama and her write the TPP. I think a more apt title for what they have in store for us peasants is "World Disorder."

Excellent piece, Will, as always.

K&R

[marym625]

57. Perfect title

I'm not sure if you meant to reply to me or the OP. Will might not see this since it was a reply to me.

I agree completely, great article

[WilliamPitt]

58. I saw both.

Thank you both.

[marym625]

60. Oh

Good.