Just a quick, but what seems important, post about TPP - Canada, you know, the country with that province that is like Texas (ie, oil & gas nirvana) that just elected its equivalent of Bernie Sanders, is siding with Elizabeth Warren in the TPP spat:
President Barack Obama and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) have been locked in a public feud over whether free trade agreements can be used to undermine the 2010 Wall Street reform law. On Wednesday, the Canadian government sided with Warren.
Canadian Finance Minister Joe Oliver gave a speech in New York arguing that the Volcker Rule -- a key tenet of the 2010 banking law -- violates the North American Free Trade Agreement. The move underscores Warren's warning that such deals, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership that Obama is currently negotiating, jeopardize financial reform.
So, I guess the question to Obama becomes - is Canada's finance minister also "just wrong" about TPP?
Ball's in your court President Obama .... and your's, too, Hillary Clinton.
Here's the Administration's reply:
"The Volcker Rule is clearly not a violation of NAFTA or any other trade agreement, all of which explicitly safeguard the ability of the United States to protect the integrity and stability of our financial system," a Treasury spokesperson said. "The Volcker Rule is a key prudential financial regulation that prohibits risky proprietary trading while protecting taxpayers and the depth, liquidity, and stability of U.S. capital markets. NAFTA does not weaken our ability to implement Wall Street Reform now or in the future, and neither would any trade agreement we're negotiating."
Seems like more of the same from them - no, that's not true, trust us.
1:38 PM PT: Here's a question I'd like to hear asked of Obama and Hillary Clinton - knowing what we know now about NAFTA, should the United States have passed that legislation?
3:57 PM PT: From the comments, Yves Smith has a take on this development:
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/...