The Most Nefarious Part Of The TPP Proposal: Making Copyright Reform Impossible
by Mike Masnick, Tech Dirt
Thu, Nov 14th 2013 12:02pm
Watch closely, and you’ll see supporters of TPP, and especially USTR (United States Trade Representative) employees, make the claim that nothing or almost nothing in the TPP will require legal changes in the US. They’ll say that this is just about “harmonizing” norms across borders to make it easier for businesses to do business internationally. This is a lie.
It’s a lie in two different ways. First, there are multiple provisions in here that will absolutely require changes to US law. We’ll discuss a few in other posts, but what’s much more nefarious and downright obnoxious, is that this would lock in a variety of really bad copyright policies, making it nearly impossible for Congress to go back and change them. And that’s a real issue, because, as we’ve been discussing, Congress is actually discussing copyright reform again. The head of the US Copyright Office, Maria Pallante, has proposed a bunch of changes to copyright law (some good, some bad), and astoundingly, just as Congress is at least trying to have the discussion about whether or not those and other ideas make sense, the USTR is looking to effectively tie everyone’s hands by saying “these things cannot be changed,” including many of the reforms that Pallante has directly proposed.
That’s really quite incredible if you think about it. On the one hand, you have the very head of the Copyright Office suggesting some reforms, and you have Congress beginning the process to explore that. On the other, you have the USTR totally ignoring the sole power of Congress to make copyright and patent law, and effectively saying “you cannot make any of the suggested reforms.” And then the USTR has the gall to ask Congress to give up its power to challenge specific provisions in the agreement? While we’re concerned about the Congressional copyright reform process, at least it’s being done in the open. The USTR has been hashing out the plan in TPP in total secrecy for years.
Who the hell does the USTR think they are that they can flat out override the Constitution and the Congressional process, and effectively block them in and stop any meaningful attempt at copyright reform? All done via a process driven entirely by a few special interests? It’s anti-democracy. It’s pure corporate cronyism by the worst cronies around.
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not just as bloggers but as a sovereign nation. The New World Order is no longer a conspiracy theory; it’s reality.
a trade agreement.
First, you know that anything this friggin’ secretative cannot be meant for the good of the PEOPLE! At the helm and engineering the TPP Agreement are Halliburton, Monsanto, Chevron, and other such mega-corporations.
From what I’ve been able to read of some of the actual text, reference to the trade agreement and trade is minimal, instead, there is a ton of legalese pertaining to the regulations, restrictions, etc. now existent in various countries and how the TPP Agreement will establish tribunals within each country enjoined in the TPP, in efforts to reduce or completely irradicate any laws/regulations, as to the environment, wages, injuries/illnesses of workers, air quality, foods, etc. In essence, this would reduce workers within the TPP Agreement country no recourse within their own country as to their working/living/environmental conditions . . . .! Take, for example, the fracking bans in our country, moratoriums and the like, the TPP could/would conceivable strip away those laws in order to have “relaxed” regulations over fracking, as for an example. This would also allow the likes of Monsanto a carte blanche right to do as it pleases with its GMO’s, etc.
This TPP Agreement, if fast tracked, will prove to be the “turbo speed” to send workers into 3rd world status and to pollute the environment without any regard whatsoever to global warming.
There is hardly an arena, including that of intellectual property, the Internet, etc. that WILL NOT be affected by this psychotic so-called trade agreement.
The Trans-Pacific Partnership Treaty Is the Complete Opposite of “Free Trade”
Tuesday, 19 November 2013 13:48 By Mark Weisbrot, The Guardian