Forum Post: TPP Media Blackout
Posted 9 years ago on May 27, 2015, 6:53 a.m. EST by elf3
(4203)
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
The television news stations are actively burying any news or information on perhaps the most detrimental trade agreement of our lifetime and the history of our nation. Their hard hitting (or so called) investigations only apply to stories the elite power brokers of this country want you to know about...the real story is that the media is one of the elite power brokers. Concerned with stocks and shareholdings...while not news to most of us here...there comes a point when they are so agregious and traitorous as to collude in undercutting sovereignty and American worker rights...that we need to begin a serious investigation of our own...the who what when where and why and hows of exactly how they ( their boards and shareholders and advertisers) will be benefiting from this deal. If I were a business, and my clients activity included stepping on the people of my nation...I guess well they would no longer remain clients of mine but CNN, Fox, every local affiliate run by Murdock or Time Warner....are doing the opposite they are turning their clients into God and the people in our nation into enemy combatants...we are to be silenced: they have sold us out in favor of the almighty dollar. Its time we begin a heavy campaign against the wall street media.
Sounds like the almighty dollar is the bad guy behind the scenes who is telling everybody what to do.
I don't 'get' your comment.
"...they have sold us out in favor of the almighty dollar."
So it must be us against that dollar.
OK, I got it, and I agree, but as I mentioned to bw, from my observations from both within and out of Occupy... I see a gradual shift in people, especially young people who do not cash in, but rather follow their hearts.
Another young person, that I know came from a wealthy family in California, and after graduating Columbia University in NY, she chose a career path where she is making a lot less money, but following her conscience. I have no idea what her parents think of her choice, but I would be interested to find out.
Really cool. So there is hope for this world in the next generation.
Now if we can start getting the decision making elite to start thinking like that......
Thanks, it's all true too, as was the story I told bw about a young lady who is a friend of one of my kids, and whose parents were pissed at her for not choosing a more lucrative occupation after graduating Harvard.. Instead she followed her heart. And I feel lucky and privelidged to observe this neat trend. To be honest though, I do wish that I could see and cite similar examples in my suburban neighborhood.
Just a few hours ago, I met a young person who was an organizer/volunteer with the Left Forum. She was my 'boss' today when I assisted there a little. She had a good sense of humor despite attending Columbia Uni..! ;-) I'm not sure if she was laughing with me, or at me though....hmmm
As this trend slowly continues, the corrupt elite will become more and more ostracized, and the moral conflict that will rage may play out within families as well, as it did in the 60's, albeit for different reasons
We should never lose hope.
Sounds like we need to promote "the alternative to money." i.e. That we can live without it, or (realistically) not so much of it. Its great to hear a lot of smart young folks are figuring that out.
I remember when I was young I had a good high paying factory job with lots of overtime. After a few months I realized that was for the birds. I never worked more than fourty hours in a week since then.
Yes, it is heart warming to see all the bright young people working hard to make this a more 'just' society where the interests of people come first. I did make a mistake in my previous comment though; The person that I jokingly referred to as my 'boss' when I was volunteering at the LF actually is attending Queens College. The young lady that was attending a nearby table with a lot of Socialist books and reading material was in Columbia University, as was a person who graduated from the law school there, who I mentioned to bw, I think. We should all be buoyed by this. I am.
We're gonna end up with a world, not of nations, but of corporations, as corporations become more powerful than governments.These are scary times. No one in power can be trusted as greed rules the day and the general welfare of the people is forgotten.
They are underestimating both the massive impact of the mass unemployment that will result from the TPP,and the speedy arrival of it.This could be just the thing to wipe out the Ruling Class entirely.Makes sense now why they refused to fund the huge public works projects that are needed to upgrade the infrastructure in the US.They will be able to go forward with some of it now to mask the disastrous unemployment TPP will cause when the Mass Migration of Enterprises gets going.
Sure seems that way but Americans seem to be so passive about the quality if life and work...it seems that wallstreet and government don't need to worry about jobs cause aside from us...I don't see too many people up in arms over things. New normal boiling frog philosophy ..they figure if it happens slow enough we will get used to worse and worse. But you are right I think its going to happen so fast our heads will spin ...infrastructure will temporarily offset it but then again for who well connected union construction guys? They don't do too bad now...we need jobs for all the people sucking out . Or we need monopolies to step aside in favor of individual business ownership. We can create jobs for ourselves and others but they are cockblocking us at every turn. Banks need to start small business microlending for start up costs again. That is something if I could qualify for ...I couldn't move fast enough to do. Banks don't lend to average people for business loans. Too much risk . Perhaps our government should ask wallstreet to start paying taxes and pay forward by offering a business lending program ...no instead they give ws and banks our money. So who opens more eateries and stores ....chains. If I were emporess I would banish chains and landlords as a start. If wallstreet wants to do business overseas...let them go...we will gladly have our local economies back!
Twinkle for a thougtful post.The TPP does not include any kind of provision for people who become long term unemployed because of it.Who's going to continue employing people in their early&middle 50's if they can just get rid of them? Then they become unemployed or underemployed YEARS before they can get Social Security-and they'll be forced to opt for the LOWER amount at the earlier schedule.
Perhaps we need media financial disclosure ...I think use of our public airways ...means the public should have the right to know just what they are using them for. I want to know who is paying them to propagandize to our people. Is it the government, is it Dyn Corp...could be Mexican Drug Cartels for all we know...Disclosure Now! These may be private corporations...but they are on public airspace trading information like a currency ...making billions. Deciding what we get to access or know...knowledge is power...what happens when the media is using the airways to clog them up and hide information? Or is paid to hide it?
"If Dyncorp saw no evidence of human trafficking it is only because it was doing a world class imitation of the "See No Evil" monkey." The British legal system was able to see where DynCorp dared not gaze. On August 1, 2002, a British employment tribunal found that DynCorp had unfairly dismissed employee, Kathy Bolkovac, an employee who had blown the whistle on the trafficking and was fired for her efforts. DynCorp appealed and then eventually paid £110,221 to her.
A 2002 Human Rights Watch report [PDF] noted that, "In 1999, DynCorp repatriated five employees from SFOR installations after allegations emerged that they had purchased women. A DynCorp manager stated that the contractors were "buying girls out from... slavery with the intention of marriage."
But Ben Johnston, a former employee at DynCorp, reported a completely different interpretation of the facts. According to the testimony given by Johnston in his deposition, a fellow employee, Richard Ward, told him that Ward could purchase a woman for him. Johnston stated, "He says he'll get me one for -- you can have one for 100 marks [€51/U.S.$46] a night or buy them for two or three thousand marks [€1,026 to €1,538/U.S.$925 to U.S.$1,388]. They can be yours, and they can be your 'hoes'." Johnson stated under oath that DynCorp turned a blind eye to the involvement of DynCorp personnel in these activities.
In all, Johnston named eight DynCorp staff members who allegedly admitted to him that they had purchased women and girls in 1999 and 2000. And although five employees went home after the U.S. Army CID intervened in 1999, Johnston alleged that DynCorp employees continued to purchase women. Johnston stated that although some employees faced repatriation, "There was nothing said at work about 'you couldn't do it'... so it just continues. It continued and continued."
Dyncorp wrote:
Since these allegations were raised more than a decade ago, the Company has changed ownership and leadership; developed a strict Code of Ethics and Business Conduct, which includes a zero tolerance policy on human trafficking; created the position of Chief Compliance Officer; introduced global training programs; and has taken a number of steps to ensure a compliant, ethical, successful workplace. It is both good and commendable that DynCorp has taken steps since those days to ensure such things never happen again. But one can't help but wonder, just how strict is its code of ethics? While this is commendable, and perhaps someday even useful, it's hardly sufficient at the present time. Their mechanisms for enforcement are largely theoretical and not resourced, and there are no people or money put behind them. Right now such codes operate on the Joe Isuzu principle, which is to trust us. I'd prefer that companies heed the words of Ronald Reagan and trust but verify.
Are employees told, for example, that engaging in such behavior is grounds for immediate termination without pay? Or that they will be handed over to local authorities if they want to prosecute and not shipped back home? How many trips out into the field where DynCorp employees work does the Chief Compliance officer make? What kind of budget does he have and how much staff does he have?
If DynCorp subcontracts a contract it works on does it do regular audits to ensure the subcontractor is complying with the anti-trafficking regulations, such as the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000, which require that contractors insert an anti- human trafficking clause into all solicitations and contracts?
To conclude, the issue is not DynCorp; trafficking in and exploitation of people, whether for labor or sexual services, is the problem. There are plenty of companies to point fingers at. I believe DynCorp when it says has taken steps to improve the situation so what happened in Bosnia does not happen again.
But to say that this old news and to dispute that "not nearly enough has changed," as a DynCorp official emailed me, is public relations puffery, not dealing with reality. At a hearing last November 2 of the Technology, Information Policy, Intergovernmental Relations & Procurement Reform Subcommittee of the House Oversight Government Reform Committee it was estimated that the number of third-country national subjected to labor trafficking and abusive employment conditions ranged from tens to hundreds of thousands of people. To paraphrase Barrack Obama, that is not change we can believe in."
Follow David Isenberg on Twitter: www.twitter.com/vanidan
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-isenberg/the-dyncorp-see-no-evil-m_b_1267479.html
DynCorp didn't like that article one bit...well I guess when your employees torture kidnap and rape young girls on video tape ...don't look so good. So their first course of action is to attempt to silence the media. Bet they have expended far more energy on that than on actually reprimanding or correcting what occurred...id say a victims fund would have been the very least they could have done what with all their billions.
Are they rich enough yet...? I mutter to my fellow rider both of us gripping on to the back of the bus.
Note - "Rule By The Corporations TTIP - The Corporate Empowerment Act'' by Dr. Paul Craig Roberts http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article42017.htm Revolutions can start at the back of buses!