That's... a different person. And issue.

99% chance that any rules or standards will, in most ways, be optional for the cheap labor countries. Equally likely that those same countries will act like China when it comes to defending their own markets from western products/services/patent lawsuits.

The part we see is the marketing, everything secret are loopholes and exceptions to that marketing.

@ Bort, Multinational corporation don't need any more power.

Nafta didn't us any favors & I dread the sequel...

Pillager, this is why I want to find analysis that isn't an exercise in confirmation bias. Obama has said that TPP won't have the job-destroying weaknesses of NAFTA; he may or may not be telling the truth about that, but he is at least acknowledging the harm done by NAFTA. And the bulk of the harm with NAFTA came about because of the power to export jobs to nations that allowed child labor, lacked unions, had no minimum wage, etc. which does seem to be something that the TPP might mitigate. Might.

It's pretty common on the left to demonize Obama as the most pro-business, anti-common-man president ever, so they're jumping directly to the conclusion that this is a mad scheme to put us all in shackles. But Obama has proven to be a far better president than they will acknowledge, so if Obama supports the TPP, I'm guessing there's a more real reason than The Final Destruction Of The American Worker.

I think Obama is getting a big fat juicy bribe to fuck us all over.

You're making positive assumptions about something being kept hidden from you until it is put into law.

You wouldn't do that for anything else in your life, like a mortgage, contract, legal settlement, etc. Why the exception ?

I'm not making any positive assumptions; I'm speculating that perhaps this isn't about trying to enslave the masses like a lot of people are assuming. I would like to see the detail before I actually come to any conclusions, though.

Or at least I'd like to see some analysis that isn't rife with confirmation bias.

I'll tell you right now that it's 100% not about enslaving the masses.

It's about extracting maximum profits without caring about human suffering or environmental damage.

I found this:

http://www.vox.com/cards/trans-pacific-partnership

"You're making positive assumptions about something being kept hidden from you until it is put into law."

Update: negotiations are complete and the text is fully available to any interested parties. It will probably be months before it is voted on, because of course there was never any chance that it would be put into law without the text being made public. That's not how laws are made; bills are matters of public record.

So, plenty of time for anyone who actually cares to pick apart the TPP. Or you can just jump to your preferred conclusions, like 99% of the media coverage has done.

He's been playing a lot of the Witcher3 lately.