Green Shadow Cabinet Joins Critical Struggle
To Defeat The Trans-Pacific Partnership
By Green Shadow Cabinet
18 June, 2013
Countercurrents.org
The Green Shadow Cabinet stands united in opposition to the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), and is committed to defeating this Obama administration effort to enrich and empower global corporations at the expense of people and planet.
For three years, the Obama administration has engaged in 16 rounds of secret negotiations to develop the TPP. Those negotiations have included hundreds of representatives of global corporations. The TPP negotiations have excluded representatives of the vast majority of the American people. It is a fact that the TPP is global economic policy for the 1%, at the expense of the 99%.
Today, all five branches and 81 members of the Green Shadow Cabinet begin to act in concert to not only defeat the TPP, but to show America that another government with another global economic agenda is possible. There is an alternative to the corrupt political establishment that produces economic terrors like the TPP. Our Cabinet is proof of that alternative.
Daily this week, the Green Shadow Cabinet will release over a dozen statements in opposition to the TPP; these statements describe the threats posed by the TPP, and offer better alternatives. This month, our Cabinet members will begin participating in the broader movement against the TPP through actions and events across the United States and urge all Americans to join this effort. We are bringing our networks and communities into this critical struggle.
THE TPP THREATENS ALL OF US
If you oppose the industrial farming practices of Monsanto, Cargill and other giant food and agribusiness corporations, with their intense use of toxic herbicides and other harmful chemicals, production of untested genetically modified food, efforts to control the seed supply and patent life, their pollution of the water, air, soil and food supply, then you must oppose the TPP.
If you oppose the actions of the big banks and financial institutions that led to the world economic crash, exploding wealth inequality, risky investments that endanger the economic future, and their ability to dominate national economies, then you must oppose the TPP.
If you are committed to protecting the rights of working people to a living wage, the right to organize, and to safe working conditions, then you must oppose the TPP.
If you favor a free and open Internet where free speech is protected and creativity and communication flourish, then you must oppose the TPP.
If you understand that healthcare is a human right and that the inflated prices of pharmaceutical drugs should not be protected by law, then you must oppose the TPP.
If you want to see the air, waters and lands protected from toxic chemicals and pollution, and know that the ecological crisis of species extinction and environmental breakdown must be reversed, then you must oppose the TPP.
If you would live in a world where local, state, and national governments are allowed to take urgent action to deal with the global climate crisis, and to implement a Green New Deal, then you must oppose the TPP.
We look forward to working with you in the coming months to defeat the Trans-Pacific Partnership and to prevent its sister trade agreement, the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, from following the same path. The first step is to stop enactment of Trade Promotion Authority legislation, also known as “Fast Track,” that would prevent Congress from holding hearings on the TPP or amending the TPP. There must be no end-run around the Constitution, or the right of the American people to petition the government for redress.
DEFENDING THE NEW WORLD
We know that another world is possible. We are building that world every day through local governments, cooperatives, community organizations, and publicly owned financial institutions.
Those who defend corporate capitalism also understand that another world is possible, and the Trans-Pacific Partnership is their attempt to foreclose our new world. The TPP gives major corporations legal personhood to sue in transnational courts dominated by judges who themselves are lawyers for major corporations. Under the TPP, corporations would be able to claim that environmental, labor, financial, health and other laws cost them profits, and to extract damages from our governments - and from us as taxpayers - if they enforce those laws.
The current administration in Washington D.C. is committed to passing the TPP and to defeating America’s grassroots movement for economic democracy. The Green Shadow Cabinet is committed to defeating the TPP, and to strengthening the U.S. democracy movement. We and our allies are the many, they are the few. Let us defend our communities and our future and stop the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
Statement of the Green Shadow Cabinet of the United States of America:
Jill Stein, President
Cheri Honkala, Vice President
Patch Adams, Assistant Secretary of Health for Holistic Health
Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, Government Transparency and Accountability, Director
Kali Akuno, Secretary of Racial Justice
Kris Alman, Assistant Secretary of Health for Data Privacy
Gar Alperovitz, New Economy Advisor to the President
Marc Armstrong, Secretary of Commerce
Ajamu Baraka, Public Intervenor for Human Rights
Bill Barry, Workers Rights Administration, Administrator
Roshan Bliss, Assistant Secretary of Education for Higher Education
Leah Bolger, Secretary of Defense
Steve Breyman, Environmental Protection Agency, Administrator
Mary Bricker-Jenkins, Aid to Families and Youth, Director
Ellen Brown, Secretary of the Treasury
Richard Bruno, Assistant Secretary of Health for Medical Education and Training
Shahid Buttar, Civil Rights Enforcement, Director
Lee Camp, Commissioner for the Comedic Arts
Olveen Carrasquillo, Assistant Secretary of Health for Health Equity
Claudia Chaufan, Assistant Secretary of Health for System Design
Steven Chrismer, Secretary of Transportation
David Cobb, Commission on Corporations and Democracy, Chair
Khalilah Collins, Public Intervenor for Social Justice
Christopher Cox, Political Ecology Advisor to the President
Michael Crenshaw, People's Culture Bureau, Work Progress Administration
Maureen Cruise, Assistant Secretary of Health for Community Wellbeing
Ronnie Cummins, Administrator, Food and Drug Administration
Tim DeChristopher, Emergency Climate Action Coordinator
King Downing, President's Commission on Corrections Reform, Chair
Mark Dunlea, White House Office of Climate and Agriculture, Director
Steve Early, Workers Power Administration, Administrator
Robert Fitrakis, Federal Elections Commission, Chair
Margaret Flowers, Secretary of Health
George Friday, Commission on Community Power, Chair
Bruce Gagnon, Secretary of Space
Jack Gerson, Assistant Secretary of Education for K-12
Jim Goodman, Secretary of Agriculture
Philip Harvey, Full Employment Council, Chair
Howie Hawkins, Full Employment Council, Vice Chair
Kimberly King, Secretary of Education
Charles Komanoff, Assistant Secretary for Sustainable Urban Transportation
Bruce Levine, Assistant Secretary of Health for Clinical Mental Health
Vance "Head-Roc" Levy, Poet Laureate
Ethel Long-Scott, Commission on Women's Power, Co-Chair
Sarah Manski, Small Business Administration, Administrator
Ben Manski, White House Chief of Staff
George Paz Martin, Peace Ambassador
Gloria Mattera, Assistant Secretary of Health for Public Health Education
Richard McIntyre, U.S. Trade Representative
David McReynolds, Peace Advisor to the President
Gloria Meneses Sandoval, Secretary of Immigration
Richard Monje, Secretary of Labor
Suren Moodliar, Global Democracy Programs, Director
Jim Moran, Occupational Safety and Health Administration, Administrator
Carol Paris, Assistant Secretary of Health for Mental Health Systems
Sandy Perry, Secretary of Housing
Todd Price, Assistant Secretary of Education for Education Technology
Jesselyn Radack, National Security and Human Rights Advisor to the President
Jack Rasmus, Federal Reserve System, Chairman
Michael Ratner, Division of Civil, Social & Economic Rights, Director
Ray Rogers, International Labor Rights, Advisor
Anna Rondon, Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Indian Affairs
Lewis Rosenbaum, Public Media Administration, Administrator
Daniel Shea, Veteran's Affairs: Chemical Exposure
Diljeet Singh, Assistant Secretary of Health for Women's Health and Cancer
Kaitlin Sopoci-Belknap, Bureau of Water Preservation, Director
Robert Stone, Assistant Secretary of Health for Emergency and Palliative Care
David Swanson, Secretary of Peace
Sean Sweeney, Climate Change Advisor to the President
Clifford Thornton, Drug Policy Agency, Administrator
Brian Tokar, Director of the Office of Technology Assessment
Bruce Trigg, Assistant Secretary of Health for Drug Policy
Walter Tsou, Surgeon General
Kabzuag Vaj, Commission on Women's Power, Co-Chair
Harvey Wasserman, Secretary of Energy
Rich Whitney, Office of Management and Budget, Director
Richard D. Wolff, Council of Economic Advisors, Chair
Ann Wright, Secretary of State
Bruce Wright, Commission on Ending Homelessness, Chair
Stephen Zarlenga, Monetary Authority Board, Chair
Kevin Zeese, Attorney General
Comments are moderated
