Jesus, what a bunch of fucking weaklings.
You know all those cries of “don’t normalize!”? You can thank gutless governments and frightened functionaries to make that a pointless statement.
Environmental standards vary from country to country to. Also don’t forget, infrastructure such as sewers, fire, police, etc. vary from country to country. These differences matter when trying to compete.
“He said trade deals need to offer a “we win-fuck yours” situation.”
FIFY
The G19, on the other hand, will be all in favor.
Its decisions don’t have the same force as an international treaty but simply depend on individual countries’ promises to follow through on them.
That’s the big thing in all this, I believe.
The WTO and IMF truly do have their problems however, and are not really honest brokers in many respects. They claim to care about emerging countries, but their actions seem often to show that they really don’t. Not to mention, many countries routinely don’t follow any of the rules set forth by these world trade and financial organizations. Countries often turn a blind eye to copyright infringement for instance, and other trade agreements between nations that have been approved by these world bodies.
It may seem gutless now, but I think they’re trying to think ahead in order to protect themselves from us to be honest, particularly if this asshole continues to spout off and disrupt markets around the world. He’s liable to throw a monkey wrench into the whole thing anyway, rules or no rules. That pompous asshole we call a President doesn’t feel a need to follow any rules, here or abroad…and the unprincipled people he’s put in charge of negotiating these agreements also could care less. They’re there to make bank for shareholders they once held sway with imo.
“We believe in free trade: we are one of the largest markets in the
world, we are one of the largest trading partners in the world,” Mnuchin
said. “Having said that, we want to re-examine certain agreements…
And to the extent that agreements are old agreements and need to be
renegotiated we’ll consider that as well.”
This was the warning sent. I think the warning is that the US might be ready to renegotiate all agreements. Possibly a Bannon Trump starting point towards weakening the premise/purpose of the EU?
I know that someone in Russia might rather approve of such a shake up, bet he is pleased. Maybe another wikileaks dump to distract the media from Trump’s embarrassing performance with Merkel will be the reward for starting a little jiggling (in terms of the purpose of the G20)? Just introducing a little more wobbliness and questioning of established institutions?
I have a feeling the EU will stick together and eventually leave us out of the equation if push comes to shove. But you’re right. Russia would be pleased if the EU was weakened in all this and that is exactly what President Bannon is all about.
ETA: The difference between the EU and the US is that Europeans know what kind of shit fascism and authoritarianism can unleash. We’re new to this in this country, particularly with it being conducted out of our own White House and on our own shores.
I agree about the EU.
I just wonder if the Brexit call that all agreements will have to be negotiated with members of the EU and be renegotiated with countries outside the EU (from the agreements those countries had with the EU) isn’t the point that this threat - made at this meeting is trying to tap into in terms if all of these treaties are to going to have to be renegotiated - what is the point/benefit of the EU?
It is a weak argument, because as a unit the members and markets of the EU are in stronger negotiating positions as a common market than as individual countries. But Bannon and Trump aren’t particularly deep or strategic thinkers.
I know that Bannon and Trump want to make unilateral decisions regarding trade one on one with individual countries, and to hell with those common markets of unified countries. They’re trying to break up all the old alliances that were put in place since the end of WW2, that have kept the world safe from authoritarianism, fascism and communist takeovers. I don’t think in the end they’ll succeed. It might be short-lived if they get anywhere with their numbskull ideas, but it won’t last. Too many countries have too much invested and too much to lose with that arrangement, and won’t bow to the pressure if it puts them in economic turmoil. Plus, Republicans in general aren’t going to back this approach as free traders. That’s kinda their thing, since forever.
A lot of this seems like the difference between the political and the economic issues at hand, in a “deconstructed” ideological premise based on power. Bannon wants to remake the world in political terms based on crazy animus towards “the others” interfering in his plan for white world domination. Trump seems to want to remake the world in economic terms, so that the billionaires can continue to prosper without any real regulations, and probably so that he can profit in some way for himself. A match made in hell for the time being the way I see it.
At this point, they might as well make it the G19 and the G6.
@srfromgr Bannon is the most self-pitying of the snowflakes, and redirects that into hatred of all those smarter, happier, healthier, and more successful than him. Blow up the world - it wasn’t fair to me!
He is one sick cookie…and what a fucking slob. He needs to be gone much like Commandant Gorka. There should be no place in our government, especially at the highest levels, for subversives and traitorous idiots like that.
”Trump and other critics of free trade argue that it can cause jobs, such as in the labor intensive manufacturing sector, to move to lower-cost countries.”
Unless Trump plans to outlaw robots, it won’t make any difference.
Self-driving vehicles, drone deliveries, self-checkouts, restaurant-table terminals, AI financial advisors…
And that’s just the service sector, let alone automated manufacturing.
Wall Street will eliminate every single job (manufacturing or service) that it can, as soon as it can.
20 years from now, half the jobs in America will be gone. Forever. Even if we never offshore another one.
Trade is a temporary, tactical distraction.
The real conversation we need to have – and won’t – is about redefining equity for all Americans.
Before torches, pitchforks, and guillotines do the talking for us…
But what does the billionaire boys’ club care about all that anyway? They never step into a restaurant unless its 5 star, awaiting their reserved private table; never go into a grocery store to purchase their own gallon of milk; never drive their own cars anyway. The limo service or the driver picks them up from their front door and takes them to their private jet. They already employ a personal shopper, and when they do go out to buy some up-scale shit, its by invitation-only, or is done by phone like at an art auction that is simulcast to its high-end buyers.
These people, the new captains of industry…never have to step out onto the public sidewalks if they don’t want to, when they have acres of land they can build anything on to suit their fancy, including their own sidewalks and roads to travel on, going from here to there. See irasdad, you’re not looking at it through their eyes. They don’t think like the rest of humanity. They’re selfish pricks. They really just don’t fucking care about the rest of us. They don’t believe in anything that is communitarian or shared. That’s socialism to them. If they had their way, they’d have us all go back in time to supporting the monarchy and refight the war of 1812…just so they could continue to be the chosen landowners, lords of the plantations, and have titles kept in posterity, all the while being perfectly content to keep all the little people at bay as long as they live.
Bad day for me. I’ll quit now…though I promised myself I’d do that earlier.
Thank you.
Agreed. Long term we need to work towards a universal basic income guaranteeing all American citizens an acceptable, bare bones living standard. Many will continue to strive to improve these economic situation but others will devote their time to the pursuit of happiness not solely defined as consumption.
Shorter Trumpsters: “We can’t compete! It’s not fair!”
“some European states tend to intervene more often in private sector business than the U.S. government.” Fixed version: “most European states tend to intervene more often in private sector business than the U.S. government, the latter intervenes for the benefit of private sector business, against labor”.
EU is, I believe, still the world’s largest market. U.S. is second largest.
That’s right. That’s why President Bannon and his sidekick would like to do away with it I believe, and also because it will enable Putin to reclaim its old Soviet satellite states or exert its influence again on those countries. The EU countries would be foolish to allow themselves to be broken apart by these nationalists. They would lose that economic advantage. As an individual country we outrank other individual countries, including China as it stands right now, but not the EU as a whole.