Fast track passed through Congress and democracy was pushed out of the way. So this is how business will be done in the 21st century until the people start winning.
On June 24, 2015, Dave Johnson of Campaign for America’s Future writes on Nation Of Change:
Fast track passes. Our Congress – the supposed representatives of We the People – voted to cut themselves and us out of the process of deciding what “the rules” for doing business “in the 21st Century” will be.
How do the plutocrats and oligarchs and their giant multinational corporations get what they want when a pesky democracy is in their way? They push that pesky democracy out of their way.
Because of fast track, when the secret Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and any other secretly negotiated “trade” agreements are completed Congress must vote in a hurry with only limited debate, cannot make any amendments no matter what is in the agreement, and they can’t be filibustered. Nothing else coming before our Congress gets that kind of skid-greasing, only corporate-written “trade” agreements – and it doesn’t matter how far the contents go beyond actual “trade.”
Fast track takes Congress out of the picture, just in case the checks arrive late and our Congress decides to act like it is supposed to. Fast track means that representatives of Wall Street and giant corporations and our plutocrats negotiate with the plutocrats and corporate interests of other countries to divide up the economic pie, and Congress agrees not to “meddle” with the result, only to rubber-stamp it.
Public Rising Up
In spite of a near-blackout of information in the major media, majorities of the public opposed fast track. Word got out anyway and “left” and “right” activists and grassroots and media were against it. Calls and letters to the offices of representatives and senators were running heavily, heavily against it. People were appealing to representatives and senators with petition after petition containing hundreds of thousands of names each. People were even showing up and protesting at the offices of representatives and senators all around the country.
Wall Street and giant, multinational corporations and the big business lobbying organizations were for it. Every single labor union and literallythousands of other organizations representing the interests of citizens were against it.
Companies that don’t make things in the U.S. were for it. Companies that still try to make things in the U.S. were against it.
It almost didn’t make it through and this was a sea change. Those opposed to this corporate takeover rallied and won battles. Each time The Money pushed back and forced it onward.
It passed.
Fast Track Vote Marks A Change
This vote marks another change in the relationship between We the People of the United States and our government and the giant corporations.
Previously our corrupt system had “our” Congress simply ignoring what the people want, and doing whatever The Money class wants. You might recallthe study by Princeton’s Martin Gilens and Northwestern’s Benjamin Page showing that “business interests have substantial independent impacts” while “average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence” on our government’s policies. In other words, the Congress did what the rich and powerful want and ignore what the public wants.
We knew that.
This fast-track push was different, more aggressive, less concerned with how it looked. Facing increasing awareness of the money-corrupted nature of the system and a rising populist movement The Money was much more in-your-face and blatant than the system had been. This wasn’t just the corporations slipping something past the public with no regard to what the public wants; this was about pushing it through with the public engaged in opposition. Old corrupt system: sneaking it through; new corrupt system: pushing it through.
This time it is The Money telling Congress to set aside our democratic deliberative process, to pass something that says they – the bodies that represent the people – can’t amend, can’t have extended debate. They are doing this for a secretly negotiated agreement, the result of a rigged corporate-dominated process. They are afraid of We the people so they are trying to find ways to get us out of their way.
Fast Track is The Money directing Congress to go utterly against what vast majorities of people actively say, going utterly against what movements of people are fighting for. This goes beyond the Iraq War vote because there were blocks of the public on both sides of that fight – even if the “pro” block was largely manufactured by propaganda. This goes beyond the public bailout of Wall Street (but not the rest of us) because there was no time for opposition to rally, and there was no crisis or panic to manipulate. This time they just went ahead and did it and didn’t care how it looked.
Is this how business will be done in the 21st century? Maybe, but maybe not. We the People came close to winning this time. We will come closer and closer, then we will start winning again.
If anything proves that our so-called democracy is a sham the passage of the so-called Fast Track presidential authority to ignore the people and deal in secrecy. This action is beyond shameful and is cause for a people’s movement that will, unfortunately, never come as ALL of our lives are controlled by the wealthy ownership class and their rigging of the system, as evident here, to ensure they will OWN THE FUTURE.
So get prepared for continued decline of the United States of America and the hope that regular people can get ahead. Ahead are serious job lay-offs in the interests of bolstering manufacturing in low-wage foreign countries! Our so-called representatives acknowledge this in that they are counting on the Republicans to approve the Trade Adjustment Assistance bill to help workers get retrained. Retrained to do what––lower paying jobs? …or how to press a button to activate a super-automated computerized production line that will have eliminated hundreds, if not thousands of workers, none of which will OWN their non-human replacement.
We need to start manufacturing our own products needed and wanted by our society, not outsource more manufacturing to low cost labor countries.
The promise of the Republicans to support the Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) bill is more welfare payouts to the expected millions of American works whose jobs will be directly or indirectly eliminated due to the implementation of the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement with Asian countries. The TPP is designed to enable the largest corporations to completely monopolize the OWNERSHIP of all future wealth-creating, income-producing capital assets on a global scale.
Why President Obama has become the out-front advocate for this is unbelievable!! And what about all the Congressmen and Congresswomen and Senators who have sold out the American people? The agreement will promote the interests of giant, multinational corporations over the interests of labor, environmental, consumer, human rights, or other stakeholders in democracy, AND FURTHER CONCENTRATE OWNERSHIP OF THE NON-HUMAN PRODUCTIVE CAPITAL MEANS OF PRODUCTION!
The REAL STORY is a story about the collusion among a globally wealthy ownership class to further concentrate private sector ownership in ALL FUTURE wealth-creating, income-generating productive capital asset creation on a global scale. A sorta FREE TRADE ON STEROIDS!
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who campaigned vigorously against Fast Track, said the vote represented a win for corporate America. “The vote today—pushed by multi-national corporations, pharmaceutical companies and Wall Street—will mean a continuation of disastrous trade policies which have cost our country millions of decent-paying jobs,” the presidential candidate said in a statement.
And Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), another of the most vocal opponents of Fast Track, railed against TPA moments before the vote, accusing Congress of turning on its “moral” obligation to assist the working class.
“How shameful,” Brown said. “We’re making this decision knowing that people will lose their jobs because of our action.””
