Failing TTIP trade talks?

The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) is the deplorable US/EU equivalent of TPP—corporate coup d’etats against the public welfare, ecosanity and fundamental freedoms if enacted into law.

Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch calls it the latest attack venue against consumers, environmental protections and democratic values.

Dominant US and EU corporate predators seek unregulated powers for greater profits, no matter the harm to most people affected by new rules they want instituted.

They want so-called “trade irritants” eliminated, including public safety. They want investor interests alone served at the expense of everyone and everything else.

They want a world unfit to live in, profit-making the sole objective, they alone writing rules forced on participating nations, their people having no say on what’s going on secretly.

Like TPP, TTIP is a scourge vital to defeat. US/EU discussions aren’t going smoothly, America wanting its way force-fed on European countries.

According to German Vice Chancellor/Economy Minister Sigmar Gabriel, “negotiations with the United States have de facto failed, even though nobody really admitted it . . . because we Europeans [do] not want to subject ourselves to American demands.”

Endless rounds of talks failed to find common ground on any single chapter of the deal being discussed.

Obama wants TPP and TTIP consummated before he leaves office—jobs, fundamental freedoms and environmental safety protection destroyers if achieved.

US and European consumers strongly oppose the deals, gravely harming their welfare if becoming law. They’re about unrestricted profit-making, not trade.

According to journalist and former Belgian DEPUTY PARLIAMENT SPEaker Lode Vanoost, TTIP isn’t “about free trade and it’s not even an agreement. It’s basically a deal between the economic elite of the US and the European Union to protect their interests against the will of the population.”

TPP and TTIP are also part of Washington’s attempt to isolate China and Russia—unsuccessful so far, unlikely to fare better ahead.

Defeating both deals is essential to public safety, welfare and what remains of eroding freedoms.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. His new book as editor and contributor is “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.” Visit his blog at sjlendman.blogspot.com . Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network. It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at 1PM Central time plus two prerecorded archived programs.

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