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I see the TPP as part of the obsolescence of the nation state in favor of global corporate governance. The incompetence you mention fits in with this-- those boobs are just leftovers from the old system. The fact that Donald Trump is being seriously considered for president should tell you that the nation state is dead.

Not saying this is a good thing. Read any 80s cyberpunk novel to see what's coming. William Gibson was a prophet.

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Corporate lawsuits against governments at the World Bank (ISDS) can offer data on the balance of power between states and corporations. See this Aussie explainer video, in the style of the Daily Show: https://youtube.com/watch?v=M4-mlGRPmkU

More at http://www.isdscorporateattacks.org & https://icsid.worldbank.org

  Water: Azurix v. Argentina
  Investor win (awarded $165 million plus interest)

  Ban of toxic fuel additive: Ethyl v. Canada
  Case settled (investor received $13 million, ban reversed)

  Toxic waste: Metalclad v. Mexico
  Investor win (awarded $16.2 million)

  Too-big-to-fail: Saluka v. Czech Republic
  Investor win (awarded $236 million)

This is incredible. Reading the details of the cases listed on that site makes me feel sick. And there is absolutely nothing I can do about it.

Those pre-TPP cases are nothing compared to the future combined scope of TPP (Pacific), TTIP (Europe) and RCEP (China, Korea, India, and other Asian countries).

Never say there is nothing you can do. Tell other people about ISDS. Share the videos [1][2][3][4].

Jon Oliver's video [4] about the Philip Morris tobacco ISDS lawsuit against Australia (for brown paper packaging) caused such an outcry that TPP negotiators were forced to exclude the entire tobacco industry from ISDS. This is the first time such an industry-specific carve-out has appeared in a trade agreement.

[1] https://youtube.com/watch?v=M9ZFDpuiFUs

[2] https://youtube.com/watch?v=M4-mlGRPmkU

[3] https://youtube.com/watch?v=AABOIcXZZwg

[4] https://youtube.com/watch?v=6UsHHOCH4q8

Whenever I think about this for more than a passing moment I just become so scared and angry. How the fuck is a company able to take a country to court over a public health measure? Who the fuck voted for the evil bastards who made that possible? How do they fucking live with themselves?

The ones who listen to what they "will do", complain about what they do, then promptly forgets during the buildup to the next election.

The ones who follow "the line" and are afraid of getting ostracized by their peers.

The ones who value pocket change now over future prospects.

Easy. Sociopaths. They are insect minds wrapped in human skin. Wolves in sheep's clothing if there ever was such a thing.

Claire Patterson was able to run a successful one man campaign against lead in our products.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clair_Cameron_Patterson#Campai...

I don't know about the rest, but Mexico won the Metalclad case; there's still no toxic waste dump there. Mexico had to pay for the stuff they told Metalclad to build while knowing all along they were going to deny the dump.

I do not think that a corporation should not be allowed to challenge a government due to decisions impacting its business. Some of its actions can be very harmful to businesses. If an harm is done, the victim should be able to initiate a process of _public_ investigation (which ISDS seems not to be, I wonder why) and if the government is shown to have done wrong, the corporation should have the possibility to get compensated.

The above Saluka v. Czech Republic case got me interested, so I have read a little on this. At the time Japanese Nomura had invested in Czech IPB bank in 1998, there was an international treaty on protection of investments in effect between the Czech republic and the Netherlands. Nomura had transferred the 46% ownership of IPB to their Netherlands-based fund Saluka (I am not sure on legality of this operation). The lawsuit took place after Czech government's actions reacting to IPB bank falling down. Nomura was partially responsible for the downfall as it did not make promised actions to help the bank, but the government also had their feet wet when later they helped other banks in similarly bad shape, but did not help IPB. Nomura was smart and resourceful enough to point out this is in odds with the above treaty and benefit from the situation. The government has tried to sue Nomura as well for its actions/inactions and law breaking for 240 billion crowns, but then dropped it to make an agreement with Nomura.

An international arbitrage took place in 2006-8 which found 5 out of 8 claims made by Saluka to be invalid, but the remaining 3 were found to be valid. The most important finding was that the Czech republic did not give the same kind of financial assistance to the IPB bank it had given to other banks in similar shape and thus failed to honor the international treaty ion investment protection. Saluka demanded 30 billion crowns as a compensation, the arbiters decided only 3.5 billion crowns, equal to initial Nomura's investment, should be payed. In this case at least, it seems to me, legally things worked well - the government screwed up, it got sued, it lost and it paid up.

Sorry for the long write-up. What's the morale of the story? I am not outraged so much by the possibility of corporation suing the government as by government's utter ineptness. We need more efficient, less corrupt government that can follow and enforce meaningful rules and at the same time, keep nasty investors and their schemes in check.

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2144277

http://www.protext.cz/zprava.php?id=2487 http://www.kurzy.cz/zpravy/117569-respekt-nomura-na-investic... http://www.rozhlas.cz/radiozurnal/publicistika/_zprava/jan-m...

The fact that Donald Trump is being seriously considered for president should tell you that the nation state is dead.

It doesn't tell me that at all.

go on...

It means people are so tired of listening to self-interested politicians toe the party line that they're willing to elect a candidate solely based on how crazy his ideas are and how much he won't backpedal on them, even in the face of adversity.

In terms of fearless leaders, he definitely is one.

Of course, I also think his ideas are mostly inane and that within fifteen minutes of his inauguration he would have already started World War III. But I can understand why people want to elect him.

Excuse my ignorance as I'm not American and perhaps miss all the nuances.

- Wants to stop illegal immigration. Not immigration. Only illegal. i.e. people not paying taxes but living there undocumented

- Non-citizens giving birth in USA and then automatically the baby is USA's problem until it dies

- Tax reform that wants to stop corporate inversion and bring money back to USA (Google, Apple, etc.)

- Wants a more competitive health care system than Obamacare

- Wants USA to make better trade deals because there are crazy trade deficits.

Why are any of these ideas seen as being crazy by Americans?

Because of the how and why

The second is a result of the United States being based on the principle of jus soli, as opposed to the more common jus sanguinis.

It's not some incidental issue. Resolving it would mean completely overhauling what American identity is.

First off, I'm not American either.

It's crazy because you've just given the entire substance of his campaign. He hasn't actually given any more details than that, and the points are ostensibly chosen because they're easily latched onto by people who can't be bothered to pay very much attention. Also the wall thing.

But I don't see anyone on the internet writing articles rebutting any of the points. I.e. I'd expect someone to write an article where they negate each point on that list e.g. "Illegal immigration - I think Trump is crazy to bring this point up because there is nothing wrong with illegal immigration. The reason we should not be against illegal immigration is because ..." and so on and so on, for each point. The wall is an implementation detail. I see people focus on that but then it's almost like they're trying to avoid the topic.

Trump seems like a very pragmatic reasoner. Keeps things simple. His way of reasoning seems to go something like this: "Illegal immigration. Are you for it, or against it? Against it? Ok. Would a wall help? Yes or no. Yes? Ok but you seem apprehensive about it. Why are you apprehensive? It's going to be expensive? We have a trade deficit with Mexico. I bet I could force them to pay for it by using strong arm tactics and adding taxes onto things they like exporting here. I'm good at negotating shit like that. Are you still apprehensive?" And so on.

I just simply can't find any coherently written rebuttals other than articles that go "Trump is crazy. He's an narcissist. He's a racist" basically just ad hominems. No one is being critical about any of his points. So it's very weird when I see all the hostility against him but no actual counter arguments.

Not sure if you have ever paid attention to politics but what politicians say is not what they usually do. Especially the claim: "Tax reform that wants to stop corporate inversion and bring money back to USA (Google, Apple, etc.)" is very unlikely as he himself is part of that system and so are his friends and stakeholders.

I think his election would result in... nothing. No change at all. The office is almost a chair warmer position at this point.

See Jon Gnarr, who started an openly satirical joke political party in Iceland called the Best Party, but actually ended up winning the mayoral post of Reykjavik. At which point the Best Party became a serious effort.

Nation state fully intact. Donald Trump is far less dramatic and just another cookie cutter populist.

The nation state is dead unless Donald Trump manages to pull off a victory.

Yep, I don't know what Trump will lead US into (and I don't think it will necessary be worse than any other president in this day and age). But any mainstream candidate from GOP or Democrat will certainly lead to more TPP.

It doesn't much matter who is in the role, as it is exactly that: a role.

Even without conspiracy theories regarding secret cabals that rule the world from the shadows, there is overwhelming inertia baked into the system itself.

A fairly recent study that I very vaguely recall pointed to this fact: the conclusion being that it is extraordinarily difficult to effect change within systems that are essentially self-perpetuating.

Or Bernie Sanders.

They're both creative individuals that are willing to buck the trend and change things in the way they think is right rather than toeing the party line.

No they are not:

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/stop-comparing-donald-tr...

Notably #6 in the article.

So Sanders gets less attention and is campaigning based on the facts rather than his personality.

But although he tends to vote the same as many other Democrats, he is very dangerous to moneyed interests in politics. No one's bothered to fix that for a long time.

>he is very dangerous to moneyed interests in politics

Which is exactly why he can't win: those moneyed interests have...money.

Citizens United eviscerated of at least the appearance of a democracy.

Meanwhile, the DNC is ignoring Larry Lessing in any way it can, despite him meeting fund raising goals and being pretty much the third most serious contender since Biden has not even announced yet.

Well we can't have any choice over there, can we? It's Hillary's turn god damn it.

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