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Why we really need the TPP

Monday, June 27, 2016

Shouldn’t this have been front page news:

On June 24, foreign oil company TransCanada filed a lawsuit against the U.S. under NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement, arguing that the U.S. rejection of the Keystone XL pipeline violated NAFTA’s broad rights for foreign investors by thwarting the company’s “expectations.” As compensation, TransCanada is demanding more than $15 billion from U.S. taxpayers.

TransCanada’s case will be heard in a private tribunal of three lawyers who are not accountable to any domestic legal system, thanks to NAFTA’s “investor-state” system, which is also included in the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). The controversial TPP would empower thousands of additional corporations, including major polluters, to follow TransCanada’s example and use this private tribunal system to challenge U.S. climate and environmental policies.

From Ecowatch via Angry Bear

Yet another reason why it wasn’t insane to vote for Brexit, as the British are saddled with a similar “justice” system in the EU.

By the way, our future president, who was telling us a few months ago that she was against the TPP is making sure the Democratic Party Platform doesn’t hold her to that position. I’ve speculated several times on when she will announce that for one reason or another the problems she perceived with the TPP have been solved. This is just laying the groundwork:

Remember her appointees on the platform committee killed a Medicare-for-all plank, killed strengthening the $15 minimum wage plank, killed an anti-fracking proposal, killed Keith Ellison’s attempt to stop the TPP… all the stuff Republicans get woodies over.

via Down with Tyranny

Filed in Corporate Crime, Economics, Inequality | | Comments (0)

Brexit

Monday, June 27, 2016

The Brexit vote is all over the news, at least it was a day or so ago, and there are no end of explanations to why the British voted the way they did. It was a fairly unique situation. The right had reasons to support an exit, given the anti-immigrant posturing of some of the proponents, but so did the left, considering the inequality enhancing policies and actions of the unelected apparatchiks who actually run the EU, and the fact that in no way, shape or form do the people of Europe have any direct control over the EU.

One explanation favored by the elites is that the unwashed masses are frustrated by the fact that they are being swept along to impoverishment by historical forces over which they feel they have no control. The New York Times quotes David Axelrod:

“There’s a fundamental issue that all developed economies have to confront, which is that globalization and technological changes have meant millions of people have seen their jobs marginalized and wages decline,” said David Axelrod, a former strategist for President Obama and an adviser to Britain’s Labour Party in last year’s general election.

via the New York Times

Underlying this sort of statement is the assertion that “globalization and technological changes” are forces of nature beyond the control of mere mortals; that these changes are inevitable, and in opposing them the British electorate might just as well be spitting into the wind. Globalization as a historical force, we are supposed to believe, is no different than the force of climate change at the time of the Ice Age. This is a comfortable position for the elites to take, because it relieves them from any responsibility for those changes, and allows them to implicitly dismiss these frustrated voters as simpletons who refuse to accept their inexorable fate.

But the masses sense what the elites prefer to obfuscate: that their present situation is the result of deliberate choices made by those very elites, from the transfer of wealth embodied in tax cuts slanted toward the rich to the international trade agreements that are intentionally designed to exert downward pressure on wages and upward pressure on corporate profits. After all, if there really was an historical inevitability to these occurrences, the .01% wouldn’t have to spend so much money to bribe legislators to facilitate the transfer of wealth that’s been occurring.

If the people of Britain made the wrong choice, at least some of them made it for the right reasons. Democracy is becoming a charade. Our institutions are being co-opted by the super rich and their minions. The TPP is just the latest example. Not only will workers be screwed yet again, but the corporations will get their own rigged legal system, in which they will get to impose their will on so called “democracies” all over the world. It might not have been intended initially, but the EU has become something of a stalking horse for the oligarchs. It’s not surprising that there’s been a reaction.

Filed in Corporate Crime, Economics | | Comments (0)

One more reason I won’t give to the DNC, DCCC, or DSCC

Wednesday, June 22, 2016

As most politically aware Democrats know, there will be a primary in late August to decide the Democratic nominee for the United States Senate. Alan Grayson is one candidate. Lord knows he’s not perfect (well, actually there is no Lord), but at least he’s an actual Democrat, something that can only technically be said about his opponent, Patrick Murphy. What many politically aware Democrats might not know is that the DSCC has picked sides in this race, and is spending a million dollars to run ads on behalf of one of the candidates..

Do I have to tell you which candidate is on the beneficiary of this largesse?

As in Maryland, where the DSCC also went for the DINO, President Obama is helping out, assuring the people in Florida that Patrick Murphy has “had his back” while “serving” in Congress. Murphy has a strange way of having Obama’s back:

This nonsensical ad with Obama’s voice claims Murphy has had his back in the House. The only thing Murphy did with Obama’s back in the House was to stick knives in it. He was one of only a tiny handful of Democrats (all from the New Dem Republican wing of the party) to have not just voted for the Keystone XL Pipeline every time it came up but to vote for the disgraceful and unconstitutional GOP scheme to remove Obama from the decision-making process! Is that having his back? Grayson, coincidentally, was the congressman who began court proceedings to defend Obama’s authority in the matter!

But that was just one of scores of examples of Murphy stabbing Obama in the back. Can you imagine a Democrat voting with the Republicans to establish the Benghazi witch hunt against Hillary Clinton? That was Patrick Murphy. The only other Democrats still in the House who voted for the establishment of the Benghazi Committee are two ultra-reactionary Blue Dogs, Kyrsten Sinema (AZ) and Collin Peterson (MN)– just those two proto-Republicans and Murphy.

And then there’s Obama’s back in terms of Dodd-Frank. There is no House Democrat who’s worked more diligently– if not all that effectively, given his lack of talent– on behalf of the banksters than Patrick Murphy. He is the go-to chump among House Financial Services Committee memberswhen they need a patsy to make their pro-bankster legislation appear “bipartisan” by adding a Democratic schnook as a co-sponsor. Ironically, it wasn’t #DebtTrapDebbie Wasserman Schultz who co-sponsored the pay day lending scheme, it was Patrick Murphy, who has taken more money from the payday lenders than anyone else running for the Senate. In fact– at $1,413,950 and counting– Murphy has taken more money this cycle from the Finance Sector than any non-incumbent running for the Senate. The banksters have given him more loot than they’ve given to vulnerable Republican incumbents who have been serving their interests in the Senate already, like Ron Johnson (R-WI), Mark Kirk (R-IL), Richard Burr (R-NC), John McCain (R-AZ) and Roy Blunt (R-MO)– and nearly double what they’ve given any other non-incumbent from either party.

via Down with Tyranny

You would be hard pressed to find an issue on which Murphy has actually had “Obama’s back”. Which leads to a rather simple question. Why is Obama, not to mention the DSCC, doing this to a Democrat who has, consistently, and not just on rare occasions, had Obama’s back? Sadly, the answer is obvious. What Wall Street wants, Wall Street gets, at least to the maximum extent that the party establishment can possibly give.

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Burdensome government regulations

Sunday, June 19, 2016

Years ago my wife and I bought a second home in Vermont. It is somewhere between a shack and a house, if truth be told. We found shortly after we bought it that we could not pay the mortgage on the house and college tuition at the same time, so until recently it has been rented out, successfully bringing in enough to pay the mortgage and taxes.

Anyway, recently the tenant moved out, and my son and his wife have moved in for the summer, and are at working prepping it as a vacation rental. We’ve been to Vermont three times this year for various reasons relating to the house. It is at the end of a dirt road up in the hills surrounding the town of Chester, in an area known as Popple Dungeon right near Nudist Colony Road. It also has faster internet service than anything you’re likely to find here in Connecticut. Why? Because the socialistic state of Vermont has mandated that Internet providers blanket the state with fiber optic cable, which cable has reached the remote fastness of Popple Dungeon. They have apparently not imposed any similar obligation on cell phone service providers, so getting cell service is definitely hit or miss, but were I a resident, I think I’d rather have great internet than great cell coverage. Anyway, it’s further proof that government, in the right hands, can make a difference.

Filed in Politics | | Comments (0)

Hillary is stalking me!

Thursday, June 16, 2016

My wife and I have a landline. It’s primary use appears to be as a conduit to allow telemarketers and robocallers to reach us. However, I am of a generation for whom a ringing landline once actually meant there was a human being trying to reach someone, so like Pavlov’s dog I react to a ringing phone. I drop whatever I’m doing and answer it, even though I know deep down that after I say a cheery hello I will hear dead air space for quite a while, until the tape starts playing or an Indian fellow will start telling me that he is calling to help me with a problem with my Windows computer.

Lately, Hillary’s disembodied voice has been calling on an at least daily basis. I say at least daily, because who knows how often she calls while I’m at work. What’s weird is that it’s always the same recording, and it seems like it starts mid-message. When it’s not Hillary, it’s one of her computer generated minions. Whenever I get these calls I wonder about my fellow Americans. My reaction to robocalls, no matter the source, is to resent the fact that a machine has interrupted some vital activity, such as writing on this blog. But one must assume that, on balance, they work, and there are people out there who actually listen to what Hillary or the other robots have to say. That is to say, Hillary gains more money or votes by these calls than she loses. That is a truly depressing thing to believe about my fellow Americans. But then, what’s even more depressing is that there are probably even more people who eagerly listen to recorded messages from the Donald.

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The mind of a pundit

Tuesday, June 14, 2016

If you read Dean Baker’s blog, Beat the Press on a regular basis, you know that he regularly beats up on Washington Post columnist Robert Samuelson, especially when Samuelson offers up yet more reasons to eviscerate social security. Today Dean relates that Samuelson is upset that Obama has joined the ranks (if only rhetorically) of those arguing for an expansion of Social Security.

Dean relates the following:

Samuelson’s basic story is that the elderly are actually doing quite well; therefore, we should be looking to take money away from them rather than give them more. His main piece of evidence is a subjective question on well-being which shows the over age 65 age group consistently answers that they are most satisfied with their financial situation.

via Beat the Press

Dean goes on to give a number of quite plausible reasons for the fact that the elderly express satisfaction with their own financial situation, but I think he misses, or only glancingly refers to a rather glaring problem with Samuelson’s gripe.

Most people would be proud of the fact that our elderly feel satisfied with their financial situation. It is an historic achievement. A person from another planet, unfamiliar with our ways of thinking, would probably think that the next order of business should be to raise the satisfaction level of the younger generations. After all, isn’t the point to improve people’s lives? Samuelson’s solution to the disparity in satisfaction is not to improve the lot of the young, but to worsen the lot of the old. It is an odd sort of way to solve address the situation, the logic of which could only be apparently to a pundit safely ensconced in the Beltway..

Filed in Media, Pompous Pundits | | Comments (0)

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!

Sunday, June 12, 2016

I am constantly amazed at the extent to which so much of the press is uninformed about the forces that are shoveling our money to the .01%. Consider this article from our local rag, the New London Day, in which not a word is uttered about the outrageousness of what these “scientists” are proposing to do:

East Lyme — John Jasper and his collaborators may have hit on a discovery that will revolutionize the drug industry.

Jasper, founder and chief executive of Niantic-based Nature’s Fingerprint, will publish a paper next month in the leading scientific journal Pharmaceutical Technology that opens the possibility of essentially re-patenting existing drugs and extending their lives for up to 20 years through a new process known as molecular isotopic engineering.”

…

These new formulations, which would have the same effect on patients as previously approved drugs, could perhaps more easily pass muster with regulators, Jasper said, since they are only slightly different from treatments previously approved — meaning they are likely equally safe. Jasper noted that every lot of common medicinal products is slightly different when analyzed using isotopes, yet they all have the same basic effect on patients.

“It’s a novel way to protect products,” Jasper said. “I hope it will generate more business.”

via the New London Day

So, Mr. Jasper has found a way to extend patent protection, and therefore outrageously high drug prices, for an additional 20 years, without contributing any improvement on the drugs that would otherwise enter the public domain and be available as generics. The Day seems blissfully unaware of this; we are supposed to think that it’s just great that this man has found a way to transfer money from us to him without giving us anything of value in return. Apparently, we should all be delighted at this stroke of genius. 

In any rational world the Congress would take a look at this article and immediately pass legislation to prevent this robbery. But reason doesn’t have any lobbyists in Washington.

Filed in Corporate Crime | | Comments (0)

A legal question

Saturday, June 11, 2016

Two federal judges have declared recent changes in Ohio’s voting laws unconstitutional:

Judge Michael H. Watson, appointed by George W. Bush, made his 120-page ruling May 24. He stated that the GOP-run Ohio legislature in 2014 had violated the U.S. Constitution and Voting Rights Act by cutting the period of early voting from 35 to 28 days. Lawmakers also got rid of “Golden Week,” a period when citizens could register to vote and cast an absentee ballot simultaneously. These moves disproportionately affected blacks, according to Watson, who pointed out in his ruling that African Americans took advantage of Golden week three-and-a-half times as much as did white voters in 2008 and five times as much as in 2012.

via Daily Kos

The other ruling involved absentee ballots, so is not germane to the point I’m about to make.

Ohio was not a Confederate state, and was not subject, so far as I’m aware, to the pre-clearance requirements of the late lamented Voting Rights Act. So this ruling must have been strictly on constitutional grounds.

I’m not quarreling with the judge, but what I can’t figure out is how Connecticut gets away with zero days of early voting, if it’s unconstitutional for Ohio to have only 28 days. I realize that the legislature can’t do much to change things, because someone had the bright idea of casting our voting laws in stone by putting them in the state Constitution, but state constitutions take a back seat to the U.S. Constitution. Perhaps the distinction is that while our voting laws merely have the (presumably) unintended effect of making it difficult for people, especially working people, to vote, Ohio’s changes were intended to make it harder for certain people, disproportionally minorities, to vote. Nonetheless, it still has to be easier for anyone to vote in Ohio than it is here in the Land of Steady (but not always particularly good) Habits. It probably wouldn’t be hard to prove that our one day fits all voting (except for absentee ballots, which you have to qualify to get) disproportionately dampens minority turnout, so the effect is likely the same in both states.

In 2014 the poorly informed electorate turned back an attempt to change our antiquated voting laws. Maybe someone should sue the state. The state could confess judgment and then we could modernize our voting laws.

Filed in Lawyer stuff, Local issues | | Comments (0)

Come together

Wednesday, June 8, 2016

The time has come for us to admit what has been clear for a while. We can, at best, look forward to four more years of governance by corporate Democrats. Wall Street will remain firmly in control, and, even if some concessions are made to Sanders, control of the Democratic Party will remain firmly in the hands of the likes of Wasserman Shultz, Steve Israel, and Chuck Schumer. My only consolation is that my New Year’s prediction has come true in all respects:

As for the Dems, if you’re feeling the Bern
I’ve news that is sad, your affections must turn
For the Titans of Wall Street will allow no such frillery
The fix it is in, we must make do with Hillary

After that, as you know, it is still early innings
Clinton must work before collecting her winnings
From the press there’ll be questions on issues deemed critical
Like emails, Benghazi and motives political

But as they campaign neath the hot August sun
Some things we won’t hear, and I’ll tell you just one
Though the Earth it is warming in ways quite absurd
About climate change we’ll hear nary a word

Still in the end, when the votes are all cast
She’ll win when the race is over at last
If that’s not the case then I’ll sally forth
After packing my bags I’ll head straight to the North

Actually, the prediction has not yet come entirely true. It’s not August yet, but it’s a sure bet we won’t be hearing about climate change, unless you count Trump’s denials that it exists.

At the moment, it looks like Trump may be self-destructing, so I put the present chance of his winning as low, but you never know. Hillary could still blow it.

I’m toying with the idea of making a list of all the progressive positions that Hillary has appeared to have taken during the campaign, and keeping track of when she repudiates them, or it becomes sufficiently clear that she intends to do nothing about them. My prediction is that her opposition to the TPP will be the first reversal. Her people have already signaled that she wasn’t serious about that and it’s an issue her corporate sponsors feel strongly about. There’s money in it for them, and more powerlessness for us.

So, anyway, it’s time to come together. The march toward full scale oligarchy goes on, but under Clinton it will at least be at a slower pace.

Filed in Hillary Clinton | | Comments (0)

Truly loathsome

Monday, June 6, 2016

It’s a given that the Republican Party is chock full of loathsome politicians. In fact, it’s hard to find one that’s not loathsome. But we shouldn’t forget that we have our share of them too.

Filed in Creeping Totalitarianism, Democrats, Uncategorized | | Comments (0)