I need you to make a phone call
Elizabeth Warren info@elizabethwarren.com via proofsender1.gc.cuny.edu
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David,
We have one last chance to stop Fast Track on trade – right now! The House has scheduled a vote for Friday, and dozens of members of Congress are still undecided (or undeclared) about which way they will vote.
Will you take a minute right now to call your representative’s office and tell him or her to vote NO on Fast Track?
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You need me to make a phone call? Honestly, if I'm doing it, I'm not doing it for you. I hope this great American progressive is not slowly turning into Alan Grayson.
As the House vote on giving the president fast-track authority to negotiate the Trans-Pacific and Transatlantic trade agreements (I just noticed if you spell them out TPP has a hyphen and TTIP doesn't, something calculated to give a copy editor an ulcer) approaches, and the crazy gets ever crazier, I noticed a weird little detail in the
Times story on the resistance, noting how rightwingers too are resisting it:
Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, the Ways and Means Committee chairman, and other leaders were offering favors to win over conservatives one by one. A trade enforcement bill that is also part of Friday’s package has been loaded with conservative wishes, including a measure prohibiting trade agreements from compelling United States action on climate change or expanding visas for foreign workers.
Yes, some of those crazy conservatives are afraid the TPP would enable a cabal of furrin countries to
force AMERICA to act to limit carbon emissions, and how could that be, since we know the entire agreement was dictated by the clandestine agents of ExxonMobil?
Or was it?
No, I'm pretty sure the TPP was indeed going to make it possible to compel the parties to act on climate change. Just not to weaken their anti-pollution regulations.
As I have been saying. If the Republicans have their way on this and fuck up the agreement's environmental provisions, I'll join you on the other side. For now, I'll just hope Leader Pelosi has her way and manages to stop them somehow.
Sometimes I'm right, though. For example, I've been saying
since at least November 2013 that there's no evidence the National Security Agency ever bugged Bundeskänzlerin Merkel's phone, and guess what? After a yearlong inquiry, the German government has decided
it agrees with me:
"The documents published in the media so far that come from Edward Snowden also contain no evidence of surveillance of the cell phone used by the chancellor solid enough for a court," the statement said....
"The vague comments by US officials about possible surveillance of the chancellor's mobile telecommunication by a US intelligence service - 'not any more' - are not enough to describe what happened."
It seems to me there's been an awful lot of fighting the last war going on among self-denominated progressives, whether out of nostalgia for the delightful rage George W. Bush made us all feel, or genuine libertarian paranoia. It's not as romantic to have the president hopefully and awkwardly on your side; it's a lot more fun being in the maquis with the anti-fascist heroes than in the corridors of power with the nerds. But ultimately both sides don't do it. Barack Obama is not George W. Bush, and there's progress to be made, here and now. Those trade agreements could be a really valuable instrument if we could only push our input into them instead of running around screaming "Unclean! Unclean!"
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