British Prime Minister David Cameron (shown) is accusing those who oppose an expansive trade deal with the United States of making up horror stories about the agreement in order to poison the pact.
That agreement is the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), and critics all along the political spectrum are exposing the dangers of the deal — all without having to invent a single scary story.
The prime minister thinks otherwise, however. In a story published July 14 in the Western Morning News, Cameron calls out those working to derail the deal:
David Cameron has accused critics of a huge trade deal with the US of inventing false scare stories that “we will all be force-fed chlorinated chickens” in a bid to scupper the “crucial” agreement.
Urging business chiefs to help make the case, he conceded that the agreement faced “a big fight” to overcome sustained attacks from left-wing opponents and warned Britain would “rue the day if we miss this opportunity” to open up transatlantic markets.
Cameron’s in for a fight for sure.
As we reported in June, the vote on a crucial package of TTIP amendments was delayed after successful efforts by opponents to stall the massive surrender of sovereignty wrapped in a trade deal.
{modulepos inner_text_ad}
A statement published that day by the U.K. Independent Party (UKIP) shed light on the real reason for the parliamentary push-back.
Today Nigel Farage, MEP and leader of UKIP, said: “In my 17 years as an MEP I’ve never received so much communication from the public on a proposed piece of legislation. The TTIP has concerned millions of people across the European Union. They have bombarded their MEPs with phone calls, letters and emails and in response to this the EU is now running scared.”
“They’ve got the wind up, particularly the left, who have been supporting TTIP from the start and finally have been exposed as backing large scale global corporatism.”
“The parliament suspended today not just the vote, but equally the debate on this issue which I think was cowardly in the extreme. It is interesting to note that for the first time ever actions in the European Parliament are now being heavily debated in Washington, too. Perhaps we need a redefinition of what a free trade deal is.”
Cameron cleverly ignored the UKIP’s leadership role in the fight against the TTIP, preferring to portray the political left-wing as the chief motivation. According to the Western Morning News report, Cameron said, “I am hugely positive about it but I think we have a big fight to win because the left across Europe is mobilising, often through NGOs, to try to find all sorts of reasons why this is a bad idea,” he told the Times CEO Summit.
Admittedly, there is a substantial bloc of TTIP foes on the left of the political spectrum.
Global Justice Now, a decidedly leftist network of social justice activists, pointed to the more than “two million signatures” collected in a recent petition against the TTIP as one reason for the reprieve. Furthermore, they reported political in-fighting among advocates as the source of the stall.
“However it wasn’t just the number of amendments that led to the decision to postpone the plenary vote, as some sources have suggested; there have also been deep divisions amongst the MEPs, especially in the Socialists and Democrats group, regarding TTIP and ISDS [Investor State Dispute Settlement]. It seemed like it was impossible to form a united block, or maybe there was enough discordance that those who were pro-TTIP, and specifically pro-ISDS, were concerned that the plenary vote would not turn out to their liking,” the group announced in a press statement.
Naturally, given the UKIP’s recent electoral successes in the U.K., Cameron would rather convince his countrymen that the TTIP is something “conservatives” should get behind.
It seems the message isn’t quite getting the purchase Cameron so desperately seeks. Again, from the Western Morning News:
Many protests have been held against the trade deal, including across the Westcountry, with critics saying the scheme could pose a threat to any future Government attempts to take privatised health services back into public ownership.
Members of the campaign group 38 Degrees in Devon staged a protest at the Guildhall on Barnstaple High Street in last October to voice their concerns over TTIP.
Cameron’s prediction that Brits will “rue the day” is right, though not if the TTIP is defeated, but if it ratified. There is so much wrong with this deal and The New American is the foremost source of information on the many crimes agains the U.S. Constitution lurking in this leviathan.
There is no doubt among constitutionalists in America and friends of liberty and economic freedom on both sides of the Atlantic that the TTIP is not to any right thinking person’s liking.
In an article on June 5, The New American laid out a detailed constitutional justification for rejecting TTIP, TPA, and their equally evil cousin, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP):
The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) proposes to begin “deep and comprehensive” integration between the 28 member states of the European Union and the United States. Over the course of the past several years, we have published many articles detailing the dangers posed by these (still officially secret) agreements. We are bringing together here, in abbreviated form, 10 of those reasons why every American — whether identifying as Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, Independent, Tea Party, liberal, conservative, or constitutionalist — should oppose both of these proposals.
Of course, were this deal a good deal for the United States, the U.K., or the rest of Europe, its advocates would be shouting its benefits from the rooftops. In fact, however, the agreement is being negotiated in secret and trade representatives of the various partners act assiduously to keep the details under deep cover.
That should be enough to give pause even to those predisposed to otherwise favor such globalist goings-on.
If readers are not yet wary enough to join the fight against the TTIP, the fact that the cornerstone of the globalist insider regime — the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) — is pushing the pact, should be just enough to get them involved in the battle for freedom. As The New American noted:
The CFR fully supports the trans-oceanic political and economic “integration” and “convergence” plans of the TPP and TTIP. It works closely with the Transatlantic Policy Network (TPN), which says its mission is “to promote and assist the convergence of EU/US Government policies.” The TPN’s 1995 “Partnership Project” called for combining NATO with a merged EU-U.S. “in a single political framework by early in the next century.” In its 2008 report Completing the Transatlantic Market, the TPN went further, revealing that “the process of creating a Transatlantic Market will be an integral step in the evolution toward an eventual Transatlantic Partnership Agreement embracing the economic, political, and strategic totality of the EU-US relationship.” “Totality” — did you catch that?
On July 8, the European Parliament voted to approve an amended TTIP. Some European legal experts suggest that terms of the EU Lisbon treaty mandate that the final text of the agreement will have to be approved by all member states and the EU before going into legal effect.
The 10th round of TTIP negotiations will begin next Monday in Brussels. In the United States, now that Congress has handed the president “fast-track” trade promotion authority, the fight against the TTIP must focus on the Senate.
