Media Silent as Anti-Corporate Trade Deal Protests Take Europe by Storm
by Carey Wendler, via Antimedia, Oct 17, 2016
Over the weekend [October 15-16], thousands of protesters across multiple countries condemned impending trade deals promoted by governments and their corporate partners.
Though the protests received little coverage from mainstream media, they stretched from Paris to Warsaw.
The demonstrations came amid the Commission on International Trade of the European Parliament’s plans to finalize the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) this week. The policy has been likened to so-called “free trade” deals pushed by President Barack Obama and other Western governments.
CETA, which has been in the works for seven years, would eliminate tariffs between Canada and European nations, which proponents argue would foster increased trade and create jobs. Nevertheless, the deal has been criticized for granting too much power to multinational corporations, the Guardian reports.
Though the European Commission recently drafted a statement claiming “environmental and health standards will not be diluted,” not all policymakers are convinced.
Passage of CETA hit a roadblock after the parliament of the Wallonia region of Belgium rejected it. Wallonia’s minister-president, Paul Magnette, vowed to block the entire country from ratifying the deal. This has proponents of CETA concerned about the agreement’s future, as all 28 member states of the European Union must unanimously agree on it before it can be further negotiated and ratified.
As the Independent reported, opponents claim it will “set a dangerous precedent and be used as a template to push through the controversial EU-US trade deal, TTIP.”
TTIP is another loathed trade deal that has been in the works for years; it was also the target of protests over the weekend, as CETA has been heavily compared to it. TTIP is “a bi-lateral trade agreement [that is] about reducing the regulatory barriers to trade for big business, things like food safety law, environmental legislation, banking regulations and the sovereign powers of individual nations,” the Independent has explained.
TTIP is also expected to encroach on online privacy, increase unemployment rates, and undermine democracy by “allow[ing] companies to sue governments if those governments’ policies cause a loss of profits.”
France 24 reports police claimed 1,200 protesters assembled in Paris on Saturday to oppose to deal, though organizers of the event claim the figure was closer to 5,000. Protests also took place in Lyon and Toulouse.
“‘The European governments must today hear the refusal of their people,’ said Attac, an international movement seeking alternatives in the globalisation process, and one of the main organisers of the protest in Paris on Saturday,” France 24 reported.
Thousands also protested in Spain and Belgium, according to France 24. Telesur reported that protests also took place in Germany and other countries affected by the deals.
Further, hundreds of protesters in Warsaw, Poland, expressed concerns that passage of CETA would “allow an influx of food from North America that will destroy local farming, and also hurt consumers by allowing in foods that are genetically modified,” the Chicago Tribune reported. France 24 reported a higher number of demonstrators, noting 1,000 gathered in Warsaw while hundreds more demonstrated in Krakow.
Also on Saturday, activist lawyer group ClientEarth filed a lawsuit against the European Commission regarding the Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) and the Investment Court System — the specific TTIP components that would allow corporations to sue governments for lost profits.
The protests follow massive demonstrations in September that saw thousands march on E.U. headquarters in Brussels. The sentiment has not waned.
“We don’t want TTIP, CETA,” Warsaw protesters chanted over the weekend.” Human souls first and profits later.”
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Here’s a perfect example of strategic law-breaking that the powerful do to gain and keep power. I blogged about this approach when I watched a Real News Network interview of Nick Deardon by Sharmini Peries. They were discussing the Wallonia anti-CETA decision. Nick told Sharmini that “Wallonia is being offered various things in order to sign up to this. It’s also being threatened. Extraordinary article came out just a few hours ago saying actually you know if they won’t play ball, we just need to ignore the veto in this. We need to go back to the commission, say actually member states should have no role at all in being allowed to authorize this deal and that will get this over the Wallonian objection. So in other words, suspend democracy to get it through. I mean just an extraordinary idea.” I commented that while it was extraordinary from the standpoint of ordinary people, it wasn’t unexpected. Then I explained what I meant be that.
I went searching for a couple of pics for my blog post and in the course of so doing discovered a website called EuroActiv. It’s clearly a fake friend of the people of Europe, and by extension, the people everywhere. The article attached to the photo of Paul Magnette I stole (with attribution) was a seemingly straightforward report. Except that there were small things that could influence people’s thinking in big ways. It’s possible they were innocent, but not likely. You’ll get an idea what was bugging me from my comment that I attached to the now buried article: ““The deal is opposed by anti-globalisation groups.” Let’s be clear, author or authors. That’s anti corporate globalization activists! Also, Nice try selecting one street protest with a count of 8,000 protesters. Millions of Europeans support democracy and the blocking of another ‘free trade’ deal that has nothing to do with democracy and everything to do with powerful special interests taking measures to ensure that democracy doesn’t get in the way of their mafia capitalist projects.” The article is titled “Wallonia Rejects EU Ultimatum Over CETA” and I don’t know who the sorry author is.
The above EuroActiv article (originally in German) was published October 24. An earlier, October 21 EuroActive article, titled “CETA: A Way Out Of European Self-Dwarfism,” by MEP Daniel Caspary, spouts pure, undemocratic bullcrap intended to encourage readers of this news and information organization that people (like Paul Magnette and those who support his position here) who ‘might’ stand in the way of CETA and other trade agreements are undemocratic. (Wallonia said ‘non’ on October 23.) Democracy is fascism and fascism is democracy, if you follow this turd’s reasoning. He talks as though most Europeans (who I assume are his main audience) think that free trade deals are about free trade. I hope he’s wrong about what most regular people think in this area. But the level of enlightenment out there is, I’m afraid, quite low.
Here’s a few things that member of European Parliament said that were interesting:
“The legal basis is unambiguous. The member states have transferred exclusive competence over trade negotiations and trade agreements to the European Union. In response to public pressure, the European Commission decided to involve national parliaments in the decision-making process.” He could have added, ‘And our position will unambiguously be, if the people choose wrongly, that it isn’t democratic until we say it is. And with this weak, so-called democratic concession to regions with individual states, democracy is undermined’.
Here’s what Tony Clarke, author of “Silent Coup – Confronting The Big Business Takeover Of Canada,” had to say (pgs 44 & 45 about the 1%’s view of pushback by the people who don’t enjoy the bullying of mafia capitalists and their partners in politics:
“Throughout the 1970s, the Trilateralists developed a common agenda for restructuring the global economy and nation states….
“On both fronts, the common obstacle that had to be dismantled was the Keynesian nation state and the international economy…
“In short, the pendulum had swung too far in the direction of democracy. The central political problem was what the authors called “an excess of democracy” which, in turn, “means a deficit in governability.” The main culprit was identified as the Keynesian welfare state.
“…The solution to the crisis, they said, was a stronger government in a weaker democratic framework. In order to effectively coordinate and plan changes in national economies required to facilitate transnational investment, governments needed to have more centralized authority and be less susceptible to diverse demands of citizens’ movements. The media should be disciplined through stronger libel laws and restrictions put on public access to government information…”
For people like Daniel Caspar and the owners and managers of EuroActiv, that pedulum which Tony Clarke talks about has still not swung back far enough. Do they want it all or what?!
Daniel, who asserts that “The advantages of the common market are universally accepted and appreciated,” laments that “If the ongoing debate around CETA ends with the principal inability of the EU to conclude trade agreements, future trade negotiations will have to be conducted separately. One strand of talks for those policy areas falling under the exclusive competence of the EU and a second set of negotiations for all those policy areas falling under national competence of the member states.
“Both strands of talks would lead to separate trade agreements. Thereby, the danger of a blockade, such as with CETA, would be averted since ratification by member states would not constitute a requirement for EU trade agreements to enter into force.” In other words, Daniel is saying that if the 1% and entrenched, powerful special interests don’t get their way, they’ll have to take measures, such as separating out the people and those foolish enough to represent them, letting them pretend to have a say and then proceeding with decision-making on their own.
See “The Complexities And Pathology Of The Neoliberal / Neoconservative Order.” – http://bit.ly/2exOHhm
That should be “Nick Dearden.”
Well people, bad news: it looks like Vallonia was either bribed or intimidated into ratifying CETA after all: Belgian politicians drop opposition to EU-Canada trade deal. How sad … I dared to hope!
“European Union leaders have expressed hope of signing a trade deal with Canada after Belgian politicians overcame differences that had been blocking the treaty …”
Sounds like Brussels put guns to the Vallonian representatives’ heads.
They did, no doubt. Just look at the tone of the powerful anti-democrats! If you lived in a nabe where the (conventional) mafia presence was strong and all the shop owners were paying for ‘protection’ and you could constantly hear mobsters bad mouthing you, Would you feel a little pressure? But, reportedly, deceit is playing a bigger role here than threats. Paul has bought their line that his concerns will be addressed.
Reblogged this on Declaration Of Opinion .
That’s an example of the price one pays for Government. It immediately becomes 100% corrupt, and becomes controlled by a wealthy few who fast use government as it’s main tool to concentrate all the wealth and power in their control, to the death and detriment of everyone else on the planet. Isn’t it past time to eradicate all governments by any and all means?
The subordination to powers that seem overwhelming reflect a shrinking self definition that then reaches for and gives power to someone or something ELSE to protect or check against the fearful. Just as it reaches for someone or something ELSE to hold responsible for not being what such sense of alliance bargained for.
Reblogged this on Worldtruth.
God bless Vallonia!
When government and corporations scheme together, ordinary people end up living with Fascism! That has been proven time and time again. the time for vigilance is now, before such malign ideology takes hold and changes our very lives!
Vigilence? It’s going to take a lot more than vigilance! It’s going to require nothing short of worldwide extremely violent reckoning revolution and an total purge!
But you are describing the nature of the globalist (extremely violent) purge.
I felt archie1954 is speaking out of a past that is long gone – if it ever was. The sideshow keeps the eyes off a fait accompli.
Perhaps you will get what you want. Perhaps you will find it is not what you thought and not what you really wanted. That’s your life to cherish as it unfolds its fulfilment.
I feel vigilant against allowing hate such as is currently being focused on ‘elites’ by the disenfranchised – from hacking and using my heart and mind as its botnet. Or to seed a new age of hate-founded power.
I doubt you will consider what I say but hate is itself a deceit by which to blind.
You don’t have to hate the elites to oppose their machinations! Ordinary people have the power to change circumstances. They are many and the elites are few.
Indeed that is one of my primary points. But vigilance against hate is no less against deception, because though hate’s reaction can ‘opposition’ be set off, subverted and controlled – and if you look at the methods of financial, corporate, social, medical, scientific, political – lets say broad spectrum dominance – the controlled opposition is part of the Establishment – as is perpetual war.
What do you oppose? An elitism of transnational corporate and financial cartels owning and redefining all key institutions to manage society within their terms, under their rules, without transparency, accountability or according worth or voice to a humanity fit therefore only for exploitation of serfdom, slavery or simply to be culled?
Anti-human and anti-life identities don’t operate in such overt terms – but seek to defend their positions and investments, whilst expanding a sense of power or control over threat, rival or loss.
That society has come to such a pass has been foretold or warned of or indeed engineered to by seers but the core pattern of its inevitability remains unchanged and perhaps un-addressed.
The engineering of consent or ‘mind-control’, the managing of perception or narrative control are all terms for deceit. Deceit is the primary weapon by which power is redefined and used against us, by our own thinking.
Anyone who becomes aware of the results of the power – beneath the narrative control of a managed mind – cannot but find them disturbing – and yet the mind seeks protection from such distress and discord by its operation and employment. But beneath the relational dynamic of the effects are the raw psycho-emotional charge of such dynamic, for this level – which is made unconscious by force of hate and fear – is where the definitions are set, by which a past made in confusion of self, imprinted a false sense of self – that recycles endlessly in place of and at expense of – and in fear and rage at true – but now unrecognized being.
Few can articulate the nature of the ‘problem’ as the mind’s defences is dissociation, displacement and denial at cause and operating a fragmented ‘virtual’ representation of attempt at resolution in EXTERNAL terms. The effects of which are then read and reacted to as cause. Consciousness in its true sense is lost to a management routine of attempt to treat the symptoms – as if they were the cause – because we are psycho-emotionally predicated to hide and deny the cause WITHIN our own set and pattern of Identity in image and thought.
Yes, act to hold in check and call for account – where loveless untruth masks a hateful or dishonest agenda. But one has to open the TERRAIN in which and of which everything speaks and is defined, perceived and reacted to.
Some form of self-interest is always at work. But self in fragmentation includes ‘shadow’ elements of subconscious habit or unconscious distortions. The surface mind THINKS it is controlling its life in defence of its self while it is actually running a program directed from the shadow self. The sense of self-DENIED, may be denied to conscious acceptance, but is no less active as a result. Rage and terror dance together in guilt and heartbreak. The little surface mind is not equipped or capable of managing reality. Nor need it struggle to do so.
Joy is also denied by the call to war, to hate and to fear, and the willingness to look upon and pass by or release the call to command and control (as the) mind, is a restoring of communication within true being. How does this relate to the ‘end of the world’? – By restoring and opening PERSPECTIVE by which the definitions that set the world and self are opened to fluidity of communication response rather than conditioned reaction, and an alignment of true being opens synchronicities that were blocked by the assertions of a false sense of self definition. This cannot be gotten across to anyone who is not open on some level to listening within themselves.
Communication in any true sense is within a shared language structure of value – or focus. An oppositional ‘self’ by definition translates communication into terms reinforcing of oppositional thinking. An integrative movement of self does not ‘see’ with the same ‘mind’.
A fragmented dissociation is the result of segregating – elitist – movement of self. It can be called divide and rule.
The reintegrative movement of being is not all the king’s men trying to put together again – in some Corporate ‘order’, but an opening to a deeper honesty of being in which one’s own part in a false sense of self is brought to light of a conscious acceptance – for the explicit purpose of healing or re-aligning in true.
My view is that this process of ‘denials coming home to roost’ is going on ANYWAY – as the world loses the capacity to hide its underbelly of deceit. So I invite a conscious participation in place of being dragged kicking and screaming into a new cycle or epoch – which from what I sense is not a one size fits all, so much as a vibrational prism of corrections somewhat like a market adjustment – but the key element is of who you accept yourself to be. Truth will out. Be mindful of what you wish for – because if it passes as your will – you choose to be as an unwilling victim to a wish that took your Life from you. Free will is sacrificed to assertive or tyrannous wish in time, over and over again – in the belief slavery is freedom, opposition is power, and hate is safety.
people seem to forget what happened Marie Antionette. Did the french hate when they pulled the lever? You bet!
I’m so sick of self appointed speakers of morality and social justice preaching about their new age, “love trumps hate” rhetoric. As if there is no justification for anger. Anger is not a sin. How bad do things have to get for you to wake up, binra? Or are you just part of the problem?
You are free to worship hate – sacrifice to hate, and ‘love’ to hate – go right ahead. Perhaps you are not so free. Perhaps you find hate acted out has a cost. Freedom is the cost and illusion of power the prize.
Hate FEELINGS are hateful – and so are projected away to mitigate pain. When you can accept that you feel hate – you can own it and transform it. Until then it runs you as a fake life because you assign the cause of your feelings to others – as a puppet on their string.
That the populace is being incited to hate is evident and pervasive. Every kind of fear and division is being targeted at your mind – so as to use the power you give away.
You can stand in the truth of your being – without self righteous judgemental crap – and be who you are. No one else has to listen – but they meet your presence in your voice and either resonate with you or they don’t.
Hate gives you power to join with like minds and become powerful. Power to the People! Bring on the Terror – lets have some blood sacrifice! Look at that. Is that your voice?
Deceit is pervasive. I don’t say I have the ‘answers’ or can live anyone else’s life. But I tune in when I write and trust that others tune in as they feel moved. If you read me as wishy-washy ‘love’ – you are in your own emotional triggers and not connecting.
Who SHOULD appoint ‘speakers’? I write because I am moved to write and that freedom is not at your or anyone else’s expense. Indeed it is an invitation to join in freedom – as you are by dialogue – so thanks for that.
I see the French Revolution as set up and carried off by a third party. I see the same going on in the USA. The manipulators appeal to your base (denied and distorted) nature and to your self-specialness. You then willingly do all their work for them.
when tbe future of my children is in jeapordy, when I see people who think they are above the law. They think they can murder and rape children, and you think I’m projecting? I’ll bet you deny pedophile island even exists. Human trafficking is real, and government officials are involved.
I suppose you think that turning the other cheek is how your ancestors survived? I’ve got news for you. The world is a lot more dangerous than you think.
Dear bookoball – you have some sort of version of me running that I don’t recognize or relate to. A case of mistaken identity. I see you have issues with who you take me for – but they are not my issues – so anything I say will not make sense within the way you are framing me.
You CAN project your ideas as to who you believe other people are – and populate their mind with your intentions – but that is not communication so much as an imagination believed true.
If you hear this – I am perfectly willing to dialogue with you about anything – but as I see it – you are judging who you have decided I am without having met me. perhaps I remind you of others in your past,
Then the ‘they’ becomes ‘us’. And the forces of darkness win. If we indeed have only imperfect humans to look to for salvation, then we are doomed. By all means, disbelieve in a higher power that is against this darkness, if you wish. But what are we left with?
Arrby, Yes – the forces that only have power within darkness of being kept hidden.
The true light is not born of fear in darkness as if to win the right to rule over darkness, but may be called on from our refusal to align in fear or darkness. Our fear then transmutes to reveal itself as the call FOR light in place of a wish for power within darkness.
A false light guilts us by getting us to hate ourselves and each other as ‘failure’. But in true light we recognize ourselves and each other in an extending of worth – not in judgement of failure. We do not create worth – it is given or innate to being. hatred of being results in meaninglessness and struggles to assert meanings over one another – where the conflict of meanings IS the meaninglessness that covers the true meaning that we both are and share and know through the sharing.
If the “Liars” running the World get their way the same way they get everything else, at least this time around the Entire Planet seems to be aware of what is Really Going On. Let them Pass their Agenda. Masses can undo it by staging a Complete, Organized, Shutdown of ALL Economy by a “strike”. The Media is going to “get er done”.
I like that … a massive strike in every country that’s affected by these trade deals….. a rolling strike that could virtually run 24 hours a day as it would be across most time zones. One day on strike …one day off,and repeat.
I call for clearer language. So called ‘Trade Deals’. So called ethnic ‘cleansing’. So called ‘honour’ killing. The hate agenda operates deceit by cloaking the wolf in sheep’s clothing. So educate ourselves to NOT trade in false currency.
Sometimes a term such as free will or freedom is used for coercion, exploitation and deceit – and though it is possible to invest identity in such ideas – the result is loss of freedom to a tyrannous will that is then operating through all one thinks and does.
But free will is the idea of our willingness for communication and acceptance arising from a genuine sense of worth that the ‘lie’ cannot accept and recognize itself in – and so they assert it does not exist and attack it.
Underneath all the complexities of the world are fundamental conflicts as to who we are and what our function or purpose is. The attempt to possess and control the narrative is seeking the power position by which to have the ‘last judgement’ in a sense of conflicting and competing self-beliefs and purposes. Some see this to mean that conflict or war is the TRUTH of us and therefore power is the only honesty and determiner of outcome.
But this operates to hide or deny their OWN personal conflicts in the presumption of power OVER others seen as the conflicting error to be ‘corrected’.
The mind that we employ to mask, protect, justify and assert – is not naturally serving such a function – but is a result of trauma.
Much of the corporate rape and financially controlled proxy wars are out of a sense of GETTING amidst the idea of scarcity. They are the SAME idea arising from the intent to control or limit abundance to become the controller with the template level. The fearful seek power to direct outcomes and lose the power of true relationships for hierarchy of obedience and sacrifice in the keeping or rising of protected position, and privilege.
But the hollow separate ones are like a bot-net to ideas that pass off as true because they drown out any other communication. But it remains our freedom to accept or reject ideas that are not true of us – and not pass them on or deal in them. The hollow Media is become a pipe of a tyrannous dictate. It may not seem so – for its art is to appeal to what people WANT to believe according to our respective identities. And of course this includes what we fear true.
Solidarity in shared purpose cannot be negatively defined and remain unified because hate and fear are inherently divisive. Hating the lie must become relinquishing and renouncing it in our self – which is a clearer foundation from which to address it in the public domain of what is becoming a maze of mind-control.
Without a grounded sense of worth all currencies are meaningless. Trade once meant an exchange of goods and services and honest trade meant a just exchange. Beneath just exchange is the meeting in needs being met. If our so called economy prohibits true needs being met – but rather – being captured, marketized and weaponized – then it should not be given the name ‘ The economy’ but rather something that identifies a corrupted system of energy exchange and communication. A stolen or hacked economy.