Sanders and Paul WTO withdrawal bill
The bipartisan House Ways and Means Committee is sending a bill for U.S. withdrawal from the World Trade Organization to a general vote with a negative recommendation. By now anyone reading this is well familiar with the critiques of the undemocratic nature of the organization (that link is to a hilarious parody of the childish actual WTO defense pages) and how this manifests itself in overturning environmental and labor legislation, etc.
The bill was cosponsored by Ron Paul (R-TX) and Bernie Sanders (I-VT). Once again a renegade libertarian Republican and the lone independent are out front on the issue, with support from the ‘liberal’ Democrats nowhere to be seen. Last time a WTO withdrawal bill was introduced, in 2000, it lost 363-56 with broad bipartisan support… for the WTO and the transnational corporations. Republicans actually outnumbered Democrats in voting the right way on the issue (33-182 on the Republican side and 21-181 on the Dems’) with 3 Dems chickening out and voting "present." At the time there were 2 independents in the House, and they both voted with democratic process over capital. The 12 non-voters were evenly split between the parties, and included a fellow named DeLay.
One can only hope for better this time around; the next vote is expected in June. Contact your Congressrat and tell ‘em we want out. Any international trade agreement lacking the US would crumble, and the world would have to go back to the drawing board. Hopefully any new agreement would include sovereignty for the decision-making powers of citizen action to control their own labor and environmental practices, instead of secret deals arranged by corporate lobbyists.
