Free Republic

The TPP, like many treaties before it, embraces the Investor-State Dispute Settlement process (ISDS), which allows corporate actors to sue sovereign nations to seek compensation for rules or regulations that impede the corporation’s ability to maximize profits. Unlike national courts that commonly allow corporations to sue to recoup actual investments, ISDS insists that corporations be compensated for expected profits, sometimes profits they anticipate decades into the future. The ISDS process is one-sided and undemocratic. Corporate claims against sovereign states are heard in special courts overseen by a handful of judges, most of whom are corporate lawyers. Once the ISDS panel...

A new blog post written by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) may appear to be an attempt to align with Hillary Clinton, but it takes direct aim at multiple Clinton Foundation donors. Warren’s post, “I agree with Hillary Clinton,” details her concerns with a provision in the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement that she says “would let foreign companies challenge American laws outside of American courts.” “The Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) provision isn’t a one-time, hypothetical problem—we’ve seen it in past trade agreements,” Warren wrote. Three of the five companies Warren uses as examples of companies that have abused similar...

EU and US trade negotiators completed the fourth round of trade talks on Friday (14 March), but were tight-lipped after Germany joined France in calling for controversial rules on investor rights to be left out of an agreement. The mechanism, known as investor state dispute settlement (ISDS), allows companies to take legal action against governments if their decisions risk undermining their investments. “From the perspective of the (German) federal government, US investors in the EU have sufficient legal protection in the national courts,” economic affairs minister Brigitte Zypries told the Bundestag on Wednesday (12 March). …

Michigan AG charges former Oakland ISD superintendent with embezzlement By TAREK EL-TABLAWY The Associated Press 3/29/2004, 5:34 p.m. ET DETROIT (AP) — The state attorney general on Monday announced felony embezzlement and misconduct charges against the former superintendent of the Oakland County Intermediate School District. James Redmond, who was fired by the Oakland ISD board last year amid claims he paid more than $680,000 in secret buyouts and used staff development money for personal flying lessons, also was charged with a misdemeanor count of having a contractual conflict of interest, said Attorney General Mike Cox. "We intend to show ......