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Because once the agreement is finalized in negotiations, it's expected to get a "yea" or "nay" vote from participant legislatures. To my knowledge, congress ca

by peeters 11y ago

Because once the agreement is finalized in negotiations, it's expected to get a "yea" or "nay" vote from participant legislatures. To my knowledge, congress cannot amend the agreement at that point. So having the negotiations done in secret puts lawmakers and the public in a difficult position. Instead of compromising and tweaking, if they don't like parts of the agreement, they have to decide whether to flat out reject it, or approve it and live with the crappy parts. And those that reject it will be framed as anti-trade, anti-economy, etc. (even if they only vote against the bill because of its draconian copyright rules, e.g.)

rlpb 11y ago
> even if they only vote against the bill because of its draconian copyright rules I think it's about time that politicians start voting against bills because of the underhanded way they were drafted, and that voters start to support this behaviour. It doesn't have to be binary, either. "No for now but you can present it again in a year's time so that it can receive proper debate" should be perfectly acceptable. If for a process reason that actually means "No forever" in practice, then it should be made clear that it was the underhanded process that led to "No forever" and not the politician who was forced to vote it that way just because there was no opportunity to fix the process.
twoodfin 11y ago
Why would our trading partners make any painful concessions at all if they believe any corresponding painful concessions we make will simply be amended out of the enabling legislation by Congress? The result would be a scuttled agreement, and all the political headache of having made those concessions without any of the corresponding gain. The U.S. hasn't entered into a major trade agreement without "Fast Track" in 40 years. It's fine to be against liberalizing trade agreements, but it's practically impossible to be for them but against some form of TPA.
- peeters 11y ago
  I don't know what you're arguing against, but I never once said that Congress should be able to amend the treaty as they see fit. That doesn't make sense; it's a treaty. All participants need to ratify the same document. I was arguing for transparency into the process, when the treaty is still being drafted.
dragonwriter 11y ago
Congress can amend implementing legislation. A treaty can't be amended, but a treaty is ratified by the Senate, not the House, and requires a supermajority in the Senate. Personally, if you want a fast track with no amendments to implementing legislation for an international agreement that requires such legislation (is, is not self-executing), then a prerequisite for that is that the underlying agreement itself should be signed and ratified by the Senate as a treaty first. You can't modify it because it's implementing a treaty only works as an argument if you accept that the treaty needs to be ratified before we talk about the implementing legislation.
- twoodfin 11y ago
  You can't modify it because it's implementing a treaty only works as an argument if you accept that the treaty needs to be ratified before we talk about the implementing legislation. Is anyone making this argument? Has the Constitutional treaty process ever been used for modern trade agreements? The actual argument is that no agreement can be reached unless Congress concedes their authority to amend enabling legislation. It makes perfect sense: Why would our trade partners want to do N rounds with Congress or other nations' legislative bodies after they've already completed difficult negotiations to get to an agreement with the Executive in the first place? This is why we have a President and a USTR confirmed by Congress.

by peeters 11y ago

rlpb 11y ago

> even if they only vote against the bill because of its draconian copyright rules I think it's about time that politicians start voting against bills because of the underhanded way they were drafted, and that voters start to support this behaviour. It doesn't have to be binary, either. "No for now but you can present it again in a year's time so that it can receive proper debate" should be perfectly acceptable. If for a process reason that actually means "No forever" in practice, then it should be made clear that it was the underhanded process that led to "No forever" and not the politician who was forced to vote it that way just because there was no opportunity to fix the process.

twoodfin 11y ago

Why would our trading partners make any painful concessions at all if they believe any corresponding painful concessions we make will simply be amended out of the enabling legislation by Congress? The result would be a scuttled agreement, and all the political headache of having made those concessions without any of the corresponding gain. The U.S. hasn't entered into a major trade agreement without "Fast Track" in 40 years. It's fine to be against liberalizing trade agreements, but it's practically impossible to be for them but against some form of TPA.

peeters 11y ago
I don't know what you're arguing against, but I never once said that Congress should be able to amend the treaty as they see fit. That doesn't make sense; it's a treaty. All participants need to ratify the same document. I was arguing for transparency into the process, when the treaty is still being drafted.

dragonwriter 11y ago

Congress can amend implementing legislation. A treaty can't be amended, but a treaty is ratified by the Senate, not the House, and requires a supermajority in the Senate. Personally, if you want a fast track with no amendments to implementing legislation for an international agreement that requires such legislation (is, is not self-executing), then a prerequisite for that is that the underlying agreement itself should be signed and ratified by the Senate as a treaty first. You can't modify it because it's implementing a treaty only works as an argument if you accept that the treaty needs to be ratified before we talk about the implementing legislation.

twoodfin 11y ago
You can't modify it because it's implementing a treaty only works as an argument if you accept that the treaty needs to be ratified before we talk about the implementing legislation. Is anyone making this argument? Has the Constitutional treaty process ever been used for modern trade agreements? The actual argument is that no agreement can be reached unless Congress concedes their authority to amend enabling legislation. It makes perfect sense: Why would our trade partners want to do N rounds with Congress or other nations' legislative bodies after they've already completed difficult negotiations to get to an agreement with the Executive in the first place? This is why we have a President and a USTR confirmed by Congress.