Canada Makes The Big Time…

… for something other than the photogenic quality of its PM.

Reported in both the Glob and Male and here, in SF Gate, alternately Canada, or Freeland, walked out of talks with the Walloons (Franco-Belgian Region) in an attempt to bring them to heel so that the EU can sign off on CETA, officially the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement, the latest in a series of treaties aimed at removing barriers to corporate profit at the expense of pretty much everything, including sovereignty, way of life, culture, localization, the environment, sane fiscal policy, taxation, judicial matters, oh, and yes, it does reduce tariffs. However the agreement is dominated by the same ISDS clauses that make the treaty so odious in the eyes of those not likely to cash in on the corporate bonanza and also likely, through taxes, likely to pay for the rich settlements awarded by special tribunals for anything that constitutes a barrier to profits, real or merely possible (and sometimes not ever possible, but, hey!, you never know).

This situation is reminiscent of The Mouse That Roared, a silly little bit of fiction from the mid-50s that was notoriously made into a film with Peter Sellers, prophetic is that the whole brouhaha centers on a trade dispute and has a ridiculously small and inconsequential jurisdiction holding sway over a much larger and more powerful entity. And it is likely to remain fluffy fiction, given the simple disparity in the weight of the parties in the international community and the rather narrow leverage at the disposal of the blocking party.

It is comforting to think that there is at least one government, even if only a small regional government, who, in the midst of the pressure from the rest of the EU governments and the establishment in Brussels (no small irony), has the fortitude to speak out in favour of its citizens. Many other EU nations have sizeable numbers of people opposed to much of what happens in the current anti-social iteration of the EU and to what compliant governments in component countries are willing to accept as part of what is supposed to be the economic cornucopia conferred by EU membership. The Greeks are likely the best, if not the only, constituency to poll on that score.

The other signatory to this document is, of course, Canada, and we don’t find much about opposition to this and other agreements in the press, likely because those who own and run the presses are happy to let the sleeping dogs lie and to abet the theft of sovereignty because said owners will be full beneficiaries of the shareholding class’s bonus. In addition, it should be noted that the Sunny Ways government currently installed on Parliament Hill has not been a model of communication or candour about the contents of the treaties they’re looking to sign into law, touting the reductions in trade barriers without mentioning the poison pills of dispute settlement, as well as constraints that will kill initiatives to build local economy or preserve some semblance of a livable environment. In this, as in other instances, Sunny Ways means pretty much the same sludge that we got from Harper and Company, regression rather than progression, profits rather than people, and a narrow circle of beneficiaries connected to Bay Street and the inner sanctums of the Liberal and Conservative parties.