Secretive TPP distrusted by both Left and Right – says Ralph Nader
Ralph Nader on TPP, GM Recall, Nuclear Power & the “Unstoppable” Left-Right Anti-Corporate Movement, Democracy Now, 28 April 14 Former presidential candidate and longtime consumer advocate Ralph Nader joins us to discuss his latest book, “Unstoppable: The Emerging Left-Right Alliance to Dismantle the Corporate State.” Nader highlights the common concerns shared by a wide swath of the American public, regardless of political orientation, including mass government surveillance, opposing nebulous free trade agreements, reforming the criminal justice system, and punishing criminal behavior on Wall Street. Nader also discusses the U.S. push for the sweeping Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact, General Motors’ new bid to escape liability for its deadly ignition defect, the revived nuclear era under President Obama, and challenging U.S. militarism through the defense budget.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form
AMY GOODMAN “……….Now, he’s out with a new book; it is called Unstoppable: The Emerging Left-Right Alliance to Dismantle the Corporate State. It highlights the common concerns shared by a wide swath of the American public, regardless of political orientation. These concerns include resisting mass surveillance, opposing nebulous free trade agreements, and punishing criminal behavior on Wall Street. Throughout, Ralph Nader argues in favor of transcending divisive partisan labels and instead working in concert to pursue shared interests, all the while offering practical solutions rooted in collective organizing………
AMY GOODMAN: Ralph Nader, I want to go to this global issue of the TPP, because over the weekend President Obama spoke to young leaders during this town hall-style meeting at the University of Malaya in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. His talk was briefly disrupted by peaceful protesters holding up signs denouncing a sweeping new trade deal, the Trans-Pacific Partnership—the TPPoften referred to by critics as NAFTA on steroids, as you were talking about, establishing a free-trade zone that would stretch from Vietnam to Chile, encompass 800 million people, about a third of world trade, nearly 40 percent of the global economy. Obama defended the TPP………
AMY GOODMAN: That’s President Obama in Malaysia. Who is advising President Obama on TPP? The unions? Environmental organizations? Ralph Nader.
RALPH NADER: Well, they can’t get back through the secrecy of these negotiations in these drafts. As Lori Wallach of Global Trade Watch has pointed out repeatedly, even members of Congress couldn’t get the draft negotiations from the TPP, although the corporate lobbyists have access to these drafts. But it’s quite clear that the TPP is nothing more than an extension of NAFTA and the World Trade Organization on steroids.
And here’s where we have a left-right alliance, each one with their reason. On the left, they’re opposed to these agreements because they’re bad for workers; they’re bad for the price of medicines being affordable, under the intellectual property rules that are being negotiated; they’re bad for open government; and they’re bad for the environment. On the right, they don’t like these trade agreements because they shred our sovereignty. I happen to agree with that, too. All international treaties reduce sovereignties, by definition. But this one, these trade agreements are the greatest usurpers of local, state and national sovereignty in American history. And so, we have this growing alliance. And, by the way, it goes back to documents like the 2002 Texas Republican state platform, that was dead set against these trade agreements on sovereignty issues……..http://www.democracynow.org/2014/4/28/ralph_nader_on_tpp_gm_recall
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