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On May 02 2016 23:01 AngryMag wrote:If this TTIP thing goes through I think the people should choose/ seriously think about violent methods to get rid of their leaders. The secrecy, the leaked information just look like the thing is a power transfer from people to economy and is threatening to cut into our rights guaranteed by our respective constitutions.
... you want to usurp the parliament because of chlorined chicken?
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On May 03 2016 01:34 Nyxisto wrote:Show nested quote +On May 02 2016 23:01 AngryMag wrote:If this TTIP thing goes through I think the people should choose/ seriously think about violent methods to get rid of their leaders. The secrecy, the leaked information just look like the thing is a power transfer from people to economy and is threatening to cut into our rights guaranteed by our respective constitutions. ... you want to usurp the parliament because of chlorined chicken?
I don't care much about consumer right's. They are a decision for parliament. If the citizens are not fine with the decisions made, they can vote someone else in. I care very much about the independence of the judiciary. Private arbitrating bodies filled with corporate lawyers are the exact opposite of independent and neutral. Giving private companies the possibility of sueing governments not infront of the independent judicary system of the respective countries but infront of private arbitrating bodies is a direct attack on checks and balances and judicary independence which are guaranteed within every constitution of the western world.
And I would be highly surprised if denying members of parliament access to the documents about which they are supposed to vote about at a later point in time is not a breach of parliamentary rules of procedure.
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Negotiations have to happen in secret. You could not negotiate anything if you'd have any interest group interfering at every step. Imagine the Iran nuclear deal being negotiated in public. Also when the thing is finalized there'll be a one year period with everybody being able to look at it anyway before it's being voted on.
The arbitration courts are pretty shitty yes, but the opposition to TTIP is very disproportionate. There are better things to rebel against.
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On May 03 2016 02:04 Nyxisto wrote:
Negotiations have to happen in secret. You could not negotiate anything if you'd have any interest group interfering at every step. Imagine the Iran nuclear deal being negotiated in public. Also when the thing is finalized there'll be a one year period with everybody being able to look at it anyway before it's being voted on.
The arbitration courts are pretty shitty yes, but the opposition to TTIP is very disproportionate. There are better things to rebel against.
The parliament and it's members are not the public... And no, 5 dudes negotiating something behind closed doors is not the normal procedure. The normal procedure is dudes negotiating, fulfilling their obligation to inform about progress, goals, problems of the negotiations infront of the members of parliament who then have the chance to give their own input, ideas and critizism of said negotiations which may or may not result in a correction of the negotiation goals.
Oh and the goal is to get this thing rolling this year before Obama's term is finished as witch Merkel today said. So no their will be no long period for members of parliament to get into this stuff. They'll likely get several thousand pages of material on Tuesday and have to vote on it on Thursday or something like that. But to who am I talking here.
And no arbitration courts are not pretty shitty, they are a direct attack on our judicary system, handing the interpretation of national law over from independent judges to private companies and their law departments. WTF?
They already tried to pull that off 20 years ago and failed (thanks France for that), now they relabelled this bullshit and it must be stopped at all costs.
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No, the whole thing will literally be public for you and everybody else when the negotiations have ended
http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/press/index.cfm?id=1230
"We will make the whole text of the agreement public once negotiations have been concluded – well in advance of its signature and ratification." The UK government expects ratification to last one to two years so there'll be plenty of time. The thing has to go through almost 30 parliaments after all.
CETA for example was finalized in 2014 and still has to be ratified.
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On May 03 2016 02:16 Nyxisto wrote:No, the whole thing will literally be public for you and everybody else when the negotiations have ended http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/press/index.cfm?id=1230"We will make the whole text of the agreement public once negotiations have been concluded – well in advance of its signature and ratification." The UK government expects ratification to last one to two years so there'll be plenty of time. The thing has to go through almost 30 parliaments after all. CETA for example was finalized in 2014 and still has to be ratified.
This is this way because of critics. Still very strange that lobby have such a place in the negociation between two giant such as the europe and the US. You're, as always, downplaying what's seriously disturbing about all that - which is the disregard of democracy. Elected officials still have no control over what they will vote, while lobbies have.
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I'm not trying to downplay anything, but the relation between secrecy and lobbyism is wrong. In this case the secrecy exists so that the negotiators are not acting under external pressure. If TTIP were to be openly negotiated every single lobby could interfere in the negotiations. This would make them impossible in the first place and probably produce a worse result as well. There is no absolute transparency in high tier diplomatic relations, never has been. This transparency fetish is completely unrealistic and counterproductive.
Do you seriously think you need to do things in secret to pass policies that are bad for the average citizen? Many European countries have passed huge welfare cuts over the last two decades right under the eyes of the public that are a hundred times more harmful than TTIP. You don't need scheming politicians in secret rooms to do bad stuff
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On May 03 2016 02:46 Nyxisto wrote:
I'm not trying to downplay anything, but the relation between secrecy and lobbyism is wrong. In this case the secrecy exists so that the negotiators are not acting under external pressure. If TTIP were to be openly negotiated every single lobby could interfere in the negotiations. This would make them impossible in the first place and probably produce a worse result as well. There is no absolute transparency in high tier diplomatic relations, never has been. This transparency fetish is completely unrealistic and counterproductive.
Do you seriously think you need to do things in secret to pass policies that are bad for the average citizen?
Who is going to impose pressure on negotiators if not for lobbies ? They're the only one who are actually aware of what is being negotiated about ...
It's not about transparency, it's about who is doing what. Most elected officials have no clue on what the TTIP is about, aren't you at least surprised that the people that decide for sch a huge treaty are technocrats with no democratic authority ?
Do you seriously think you need to do things in secret to pass policies that are bad for the average citizen? Many European countries have passed huge welfare cuts over the last two decades right under the eyes of the public that are a hundred times more harmful than TTIP. You don't need scheming politicians in secret rooms to do bad stuff
Fallacious argument.
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Most elected officials have no clue about 90% of what they're voting on and just follow the party line.
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On May 03 2016 04:18 RvB wrote:
Most elected officials have no clue about 90% of what they're voting on and just follow the party line.
Yeah well, what percentage of having a clue is reasonably possible? I mean in some fields of politcs, science, economics, etc. experts are doing research for years and still come to conflicting conclusions.
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On May 03 2016 02:46 Nyxisto wrote:
I'm not trying to downplay anything, but the relation between secrecy and lobbyism is wrong. In this case the secrecy exists so that the negotiators are not acting under external pressure. If TTIP were to be openly negotiated every single lobby could interfere in the negotiations. This would make them impossible in the first place and probably produce a worse result as well. There is no absolute transparency in high tier diplomatic relations, never has been. This transparency fetish is completely unrealistic and counterproductive.
You realize that TTIP is only secret to one side, right?
Lobbies have full access and directly contribute to the wording of the negotiations, while most members of parliament have never seen a single page...
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On May 03 2016 02:46 Nyxisto wrote:
I'm not trying to downplay anything, but the relation between secrecy and lobbyism is wrong. In this case the secrecy exists so that the negotiators are not acting under external pressure. If TTIP were to be openly negotiated every single lobby could interfere in the negotiations. This would make them impossible in the first place and probably produce a worse result as well. There is no absolute transparency in high tier diplomatic relations, never has been. This transparency fetish is completely unrealistic and counterproductive.
Do you seriously think you need to do things in secret to pass policies that are bad for the average citizen? Many European countries have passed huge welfare cuts over the last two decades right under the eyes of the public that are a hundred times more harmful than TTIP. You don't need scheming politicians in secret rooms to do bad stuff
No, you do. As usual, as well.
Fact of the matter is that even the government as a whole doesn't actually know what is negotiated/demanded by the US. As was clearly shown by CSU chief Horst Seehofer, who actually said that he'll veto it. Purely based on the fact, and i quote now, "as long as there's no transparency, and as long as a responsible politician doesn't even know what exactly is negotiated, and what "balance of interests" is achieved, i won't give the green light for TTIP".
Even the people in charge and question disagree with you.
And it has nothing to do with "transparency fetish", which is a ridiculously idiotic statement btw, but the simple fact that i'd like to know if or how the party i elected actually (or not) is working in my interest. Sadly, most of those people don't even know what is negotiated in the first place, so there's that.
TTIP won't make it, and it's a good thing on top. There's literally purely demands on side of the US, and these demands are, on top of it, 100% against the grain of the EU. One of the good things in europe is the quality control of meat and crops. I'd say to me, that's one of the very few things the EU does right. What america is trying there, with pretty much 75% of the demands, is to either get a loophole to circumvent, or flatout reject the prevention-principle of the EU.
I certainly do understand why people are pissed off about it. What i don't understand is morons trying to justify the way everything is handled.
Sidenote: you're wrong on top. It was only the american position that was unknown. The european stance was known all along, you can actually download the transcripts to their meetings. Now why do you think that the US was trying to hide (to ridiculous lengths, including body searches and collecting electronic devices btw) their demands? You get a single guess.
edit
Btw, in case of lobbying..
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/ttip-deal-business-lobbyists-dominate-talks-at-expense-of-trade-unions-and-ngos-10475073.html
So much for "interference".
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
eh seems like a lot of normal haggling over agricultural protection. european agri protectionism isn't based on science obviously but on simple interests of the producers etc.
i look forward with glee to the day that haughty euros get their daily serving of good ole genetically engineered green goo.
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On May 03 2016 10:51 oneofthem wrote:
eh seems like a lot of normal haggling over agricultural protection. european agri protectionism isn't based on science obviously but on simple interests of the producers etc. That isn't even true.
Euro agricultural industry are not at all on the Euro side of negotiations. They want just as little regulation as their US counterparts.
In their eyes, it is these annoying EU consumer protection laws that need to be drilled holes in. And an international trade agreement is just a great angle of attack for them.
Science does not come to play. And even if, science can always be brought, because the responsible agency will always be under-budgeted for truly independent research.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
i'm sorry but that is not an informed view about eu's trade position. you are talking about domestic regulation which is a different game.
industry wants protection vs foreign competition, and less domestic regulation.
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On May 03 2016 10:51 oneofthem wrote:
eh seems like a lot of normal haggling over agricultural protection. european agri protectionism isn't based on science obviously but on simple interests of the producers etc.
i look forward with glee to the day that haughty euros get their daily serving of good ole genetically engineered green goo.
And what does science tells us in regards to agriculture ? Obesity can be achieved ? Pesticide are pretty potent to produce cancers ? OGM are inefficient to reduce pesticide use ?
Crack me up. oneofsanto strikes again.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
eh i don't think europe would become america fat just because you guys become more efficient at raising corn. you are reducing a lot of complexity with respect to food culture, school lunch, advertising driven consumption with the processed food market etc into gmo. this is no good.
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We already use GMOs developed over millennia. Ancient corn had nowhere near current levels of yields. We have been selecting the best in each generation over and over and over. GMOs simply skip 1000 years of doing that, which can end up any direction yet the ones we want to buy is the ones going in the direction normal selective breeding would have done. Yes GMOs need to be treated just as any other consumable, the current medicine path with trials etc with an environmental analysis on top sounds good to me.
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Always funny how GMO-opponents get labeled 'uninformed worrywarts', anti-science and caught up in propaganda and what not.
And then I read stuff like 'It's just like breeding man.' that could be straight out of a GMO lobby brochure.
Who is the ignorant sheeple here actually?
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On May 03 2016 16:33 lord_nibbler wrote:
Always funny how GMO-opponents get labeled 'uninformed worrywarts', anti-science and caught up in propaganda and what not.
And then I read stuff like 'It's just like breeding man.' that could be straight out of a GMO lobby brochure.
Who is the ignorant sheeple here actually?
well, gmo is the subject with the biggest discrepancy between scientists and non-scientists, independent from what field people are from. ~90% of scientists think that gmo are completely fine while only ~1/3 of the general population think the same. the other two subjects with large discrepancies are man made climate change (90%/50%) and animal tests (90%/50%).
so anti-science and uninformed worrywarts are somewhat accurate descriptions.
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EPT
