SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
The Center for American Progress reports
Democrats in the House dealt a stunning blow to the administration's trade agenda on [June 12], just hours after President Barack Obama personally lobbied lawmakers to grant him authority to negotiate several global trade deals that Congress could vote on without amending.
In the week leading up to Friday's vote, House leadership expressed optimism that it could muscle through the so-called Trade Promotion Authority (TPA), despite loud objections from most Democrats and conservative Republicans. Under the rules, the House had to pass: 1) a provision to aid workers displaced by foreign imports--Trade Assistance Authority or TAA and 2) the TPA. But Democrats, who have historically supported providing federal assistance to workers displaced by trade agreements, led a campaign to torpedo the TAA in order to kill the full bill. The TAA failed in a vote of 302 -126 and the TPA passed 219-211 (with 28 Democratic votes), meaning the overall measure will not advance to the president's desk.
House leaders promised on Friday to bring both back for a vote early next week. The Senate approved the full package earlier this month.
[...]Democrats and their allies in the labor movement have objected to the secrecy surrounding the TPP negotiations and various provisions said to be included in the deal. One section allows companies to take governments before an arbitration tribunal and argue that certain regulations interfere with their bottom line. Another would would delay the introduction of generic versions of life-saving pharmaceuticals. Progressives have also criticized the deal for failing to adequately enforce labor and environmental standards and prohibit the Pacific Area countries from manipulating their currencies.
Additional coverage at The New York Times , The Washington Post , pbs.org, and C-SPAN.
Original Submission
(Score: 5, Insightful) by K_benzoate on Sunday June 14 2015, @03:05AM
Thankfully, that's a claim we can test empirically. There are many "laboratory" civilizations running various experiments involving "leftism". I'm delighted to report that many have been successfully operating for decades, or centuries depending on your definition of "leftism". The perverse incentives of corporations are reigned in, crony capitalism is kept in check, and the prosperity of the most successful citizens contributes to the basic needs of everyone creating a virtuous cycle leading to more growth, more prosperity, and more wealth for everyone. You'll mostly find these nations in Europe, but they can also be found on every other continent except Antarctica.
People who claim otherwise usually have limited life experience, particularly a paucity of time spent outside of the USA or even their own state. Countries that adopt aspects of Social Democracy are not failed states with crumbling infrastructure and hopeless populations. They are in fact vibrant, flourishing, prospering places to live for the majority of their citizens. They're beating us on almost every metric that matters to human flourishing. It's the US model that has no future, and if the US itself is the last to realize this then things will be very bleak indeed for all of us here.
Climate change is real and primarily caused by human activity.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 14 2015, @03:17AM
The Soviet Union didn't even make it to 70 years old.
The former members of the Soviet Union, especially the most successful ones, have all moved far to the right.
Cambodia is a failed state. Vietnam is only marginally better.
China veered hard to the right after numerous failures of leftism, and in less than two decades the standard of living for hundreds of millions of people has risen dramatically.
Norway is only socialist thanks to having an absolutely huge amount of oil wealth, and a very small population.
Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands and Belgium are destroying their respective cultures through unbridled immigration from the third world, promoted by leftists.
Germany, France, the UK, Japan and Australia are much closer to the American model than they are to any socialist ideal.
Your examples are about as unconvincing as could possibly be provided.
(Score: 4, Informative) by K_benzoate on Sunday June 14 2015, @03:24AM
The Soviet Union didn't even make it to 70 years old.
It also wasn't leftist in the sense that anyone today means the word. The salient description of the Soviet Union was "totalitarian dictatorship." It was such an extreme and barbaric example of the type that it got its own term: Stalinism. A liberal government, a "leftist" one, requires real democracy. If there's only one party to vote for, if dissent is met with imprisonment or death, I don't know what kind of government or country you have but I know that it is NOT a liberal one.
Climate change is real and primarily caused by human activity.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 14 2015, @03:26AM
Well now, isn't that convenient! Blatant leftism somehow "isn't leftism" when it's an obvious failure.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by K_benzoate on Sunday June 14 2015, @03:38AM
None of the nations you listed are examples of liberal democracy, so they simply aren't meaningful to this discussion. I'd love to hear how you can explain otherwise. I'm not interested in talking about totalitarian/authoritarian dictatorships because I think we can all agree that those are all bad, no matter if they are left or right wing. We can just dispense with that. It's a given. We all agree that any government that brutalizes the population or denies fundamental rights is bad. Notice I'm not bringing up any right wing dictatorships [wikipedia.org] and claiming they count as failures of conservatism. That would be irrelevant to the discussion too.
Not all left-wing ideas or governments are associated with communism. Not all right-wing ideas or governments are fascist. Do you not have the capacity for this nuance, or are you being intentionally disingenuous?
Climate change is real and primarily caused by human activity.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 14 2015, @03:44AM
"Disingenuous"? You're at the wrong site, pal. The site you're looking for is Hacker News [ycombinator.com]. That's pretty much the only word they know how to use over there.
(Score: 2) by K_benzoate on Sunday June 14 2015, @03:48AM
I went there a few times but there were too many insufferable social justice warriors. I hate politically correct culture.
Climate change is real and primarily caused by human activity.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 14 2015, @03:54AM
If you hate social justice and political correctness, then why do you use their terminology? "Disingenuous" is one of the terms they use most frequently against their opponents.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by K_benzoate on Sunday June 14 2015, @03:59AM
Because typing, "pretending to misunderstand a situation or your interlocutor's arguments in order to build a straw man argument to fool bystanders" every time gets tedious.
Climate change is real and primarily caused by human activity.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 14 2015, @04:07AM
Instead of focusing on the topic at hand, you've started launching personal attacks against the others in the discussion.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 14 2015, @10:54PM
By their vocabulary shall ye know them? News flash, pal: disingenuous is common enough vocabulary that it means squat in determining the agenda of your debating opponent. Unless, of course, you are trying to disingenuously construct a straw man ad hominem attack on their character.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 14 2015, @01:38PM
There is a better correlation between percentage of blacks in a nation and that nation's well-being, than any left-wing/right-wing dichotomy.
The previously mentioned Cambodia for example, is light-years ahead of the most liberal democracies in sub-Saharan Africa. Haiti? Shares half the fucking island with the Dominican Republic. The poorest American states with the highest obesity rates, lowest literacy, and income are the states with the highest percentage of blacks (along the south). Adjust for race, and these numbers suddenly trend towards the mean.
Socialism (or socialist systems) in Europe and in Asia proper work because of the people. Now that the hordes from Africa and the middle-East have found a free gold-mine, these systems are starting to buckle.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday June 16 2015, @10:16PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 14 2015, @05:20PM
Well now, isn't that convenient! Blatant leftism somehow "isn't leftism" when it's an obvious failure.
Well, you've at least proved blatant ignorance is still blatant ignorance.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Sunday June 14 2015, @09:05AM
three days later the psychiatrist who diagnosed him died of poisoning.
One of the early sources of funding for the pre-revolution Communists was that Stalin knocked over a bank.
This was not what Marx was hoping for. The reason Marx devoted sixteen years of research in the Reading Room of the British Library was that he hoped to find a solution to the cruelty imposed on the common people by the Nobility.
My father, a cold war naval officer and staunch anti-communist even so held Soviet seamen in far higher esteem than his fellow Americans. When Soviet ships passed he'd smile and wave at them.
"all they really wanted" he told me "was something to eat".
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday June 14 2015, @07:35PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 16 2015, @12:59AM
The US is nowhere near leftist, so naturally it would be excluded from a list of leftist countries.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday June 16 2015, @10:18PM
The US is nowhere near leftist, so naturally it would be excluded from a list of leftist countries.
Depends where you draw the line.