WTO is effectively neutered. Trump *already* won the trade war against China and WTO is helpless to intervene

[Tom Kirkman + 8,860]

Heh heh, long term planning pays off for Trump, who for 30 years now has been railing against unfair and lopsided trade deals.

Trump has corrected this lopsided and unfair trade imbalance, and the globalist World Trade Organization is now helpless to intervene.

 

Trump Shuts Down WTO Appeals Court, Sending EU, China Scrambling For 'Plan B'

Axios certainly has the best intro to today's bombshell development: "Internationalists have always dreamed of a court with jurisdiction over all the countries of the world. In 1995, the World Trade Organization was created — allowing the world's countries to press claims against one another for the first time." 

But it won't survive the Trump presidency as on Tuesday his administration has effectively brought it to an end, neutering its ability to intervene in trade wars, having blocked all new appointments to its dispute-resolution court.

Starting two years ago the US administration began blocking appointments, and now Trump has run out the clock as the now paralyzed WTO’s Appellate Body over that period declined from seven judges to three, and with two more terms expiring Tuesday, only one judge remains, thus without the ability to issue a binding ruling. 

Also per Axios:

Donald "Tariff Man" Trump (his words) can now impose whatever tariffs he likes, without fear that the WTO might find them to be illegal.

However, there's widespread perception that the WTO has been rendered obsolete until it undertakes major reforms — for example criticisms that it frequently fails to abide by its own rules, has an inconsistent appeals mechanism, and its rules fail to account for state-controlled enterprises.

Viewed as among the foremost hindrances to Trump's "America First" program, he's already long bulldozed past WTO rules amid the trade war with China, including punitive levies on Chinese goods (and another tariff increase set for this upcoming weekend), and imposing metal tariffs on allies like Europe, Canada and Japan.  ...

 

[Marcin + 519]

Vandalism of global organization, of rules based order ? How low US can get ? @Tom Kirkman I do not know what is the source of your joy or pride. Trump is definitely Chinese asset. World was preparing for the current situation at WTO for a long time, but actually nobody thought that US will abandon global leadership and turn into isolationism. The international law specialists representing other 206 countries, more mature and less delusional than US, already prepared some solutions. It is the pattern that US becomes too exceptional to co-operate with global community. And global community  gets used to this situation. 

Edited December 11, 2019 by Marcin
Typo

[Marcin + 519]

I think some additional explanation is needed why this move is harmful for United States.

General advancement of developing countries and relative decline in importance of the developed countries is a fact for 20 years. In consequence importance of United States for the global economy is also gradually diminishing. This move would have  been effective 20 and even 15 years ago. Today with balance of power changed, such a move by US will cause temporary hurdles for all countries and thus backlash. This boondogle of purely procedural nature will be finally overcome, I do not know maybe eafter another year or two but certainly. US would use as a leverage access to its still second largest (after China) market for goods, and taking under consideration Chinese protection of the domestic market, still the most important for global suppliers. But on the other hand every country undrestands that US cannot say "I will not trade with you if you do not accept my changes to WTO" as it naturally has to offshore labour intensive manufacturing to Mexico and some Asian countries (China and SE Asia). US cannot sanction 206 countries. WTO reform is on the agenda of many international organizations, under pressure of US it was included in some official communiques. But nobody knows how such a reform could be realized. Developing countries are happy with the current set up. And also for smaller developed countries current multilateral set up and dispute mechanism is beneficial, and the are afraid that US will again bent rules to suit its particular needs.

Why Trump decided to go on with this risky and harmful in long-term perspective step ?

Again short-term gains of being The Tribune of the People, and Trump China Conqueror, and thus increasing chances of re-election are more important than long-term US interests.

 

Edited December 11, 2019 by Marcin
typo

[Tom Kirkman + 8,860]

3 hours ago, Marcin said:

Vandalism of global organization, of rules based order ? How low US can get ? @Tom Kirkman I do not know what is the source of your joy or pride. Trump is definitely Chinese asset. World was preparing for the current situation at WTO for a long time, but actually nobody thought that US will abandon global leadership and turn into isolationism. The international law specialists representing other 206 countries, more mature and less delusional than US, already prepared some solutions. It is the pattern that US becomes too exceptional to co-operate with global community. And global community  gets used to this situation. 

I am not a fan of Globalist organizations such as the United Nations or the World Trade Organization.  For example, this nonsense of 'Climate Reparations' attempted to be foisted onto the U.S.

U.N. Warns U.S. It Cannot Escape Paying Punitive Climate ‘Reparations’

The United States was warned Wednesday by the United Nations it cannot avoid compensating poorer nations hit by climate change, despite Donald Trump honoring his election promise of leaving the 2015 Paris climate agreement.

Delegates and observers at the COP25 negotiations in Madrid told AFP that Washington seeks a change to the U.N. climate convention that could release it from punitive “loss and damage” funding for developing nations which is predicted to run into the billions of dollars. 

Under the bedrock U.N. climate treaty, adopted in 1992, rich nations agreed to help developing countries prepare for unavoidable future climate impacts — the twin pillars of “mitigation” and “adaptation”.

But there was no provision for helping countries and small island states now calling for compensation.

A new mechanism was established in 2013, but with damage estimates climbing, there is no agreement on where the money might come from or even if it should be paid, although the U.S. is constantly the target of calls for financial reparations because it is rich, successful and a dominant world economic force.

One of the tasks facing delegates in Madrid is reviewing the framework for how countries might pay and account for this money.  ...

 

... Green groups have claimed the increased pace and intensity of climate disasters, such as the twin cyclones that devastated parts of Mozambique this year, means that funding needs boosting to keep track.

They said the amount needed for loss and damage would top $300 billion annually by 2030, of which the majority of which is expected to be invoiced to the U.S.

 

[Marcin + 519]

Tom,

1. WTO is a serious thing, international organization, created to make world more efficient, developing countries gaining such strength and this fast was not in the card when it was designed, and thus this US backlash.

2. All these green initiatives are more or less PR stunts to make us all feel better about themselves, but nobody but extremists would stop driving  or live in cottage. This is sth totally different, perceived as "toys for rich boys" and bored rich boys, I have not noticed anybody but Maledives and other sinking countries to back all these Greta excesses. Every poor country would say when I would be insanely rich as Sweden or US I would care about Climate Change etc. These developing countries are simply telling the rich guys: Stop f*cking around with this empty slogans, decrease your ecological footprint by 50% and then we will take you seriously.(and this is 80% of global population)

3. Do not forget that WTO was culmination of decades of haggling, huge effort. I would dare to say that WTO is the most difficult and amazing monument of international co-operation. Setting up UN or World Bank Group or EU was much easier and involved small group of avangarde countries.

So tread with caution when you want to destroy something a lot of countries are proud of.

Edited December 11, 2019 by Marcin
typo

[frankfurter + 562]

On 12/12/2019 at 1:22 AM, Tom Kirkman said:

Heh heh, long term planning pays off for Trump, who for 30 years now has been railing against unfair and lopsided trade deals.

Trump has corrected this lopsided and unfair trade imbalance, and the globalist World Trade Organization is now helpless to intervene.

 

Trump Shuts Down WTO Appeals Court, Sending EU, China Scrambling For 'Plan B'

Axios certainly has the best intro to today's bombshell development: "Internationalists have always dreamed of a court with jurisdiction over all the countries of the world. In 1995, the World Trade Organization was created — allowing the world's countries to press claims against one another for the first time." 

But it won't survive the Trump presidency as on Tuesday his administration has effectively brought it to an end, neutering its ability to intervene in trade wars, having blocked all new appointments to its dispute-resolution court.

Starting two years ago the US administration began blocking appointments, and now Trump has run out the clock as the now paralyzed WTO’s Appellate Body over that period declined from seven judges to three, and with two more terms expiring Tuesday, only one judge remains, thus without the ability to issue a binding ruling. 

Also per Axios:

Donald "Tariff Man" Trump (his words) can now impose whatever tariffs he likes, without fear that the WTO might find them to be illegal.

However, there's widespread perception that the WTO has been rendered obsolete until it undertakes major reforms — for example criticisms that it frequently fails to abide by its own rules, has an inconsistent appeals mechanism, and its rules fail to account for state-controlled enterprises.

Viewed as among the foremost hindrances to Trump's "America First" program, he's already long bulldozed past WTO rules amid the trade war with China, including punitive levies on Chinese goods (and another tariff increase set for this upcoming weekend), and imposing metal tariffs on allies like Europe, Canada and Japan.  ...

 

So we all can be on the same page, would you kindly define what you mean by "trade deal' and give one verifiable case that is "lobsided"?  Thank you. 

[Hotone + 412]

On 12/12/2019 at 1:22 AM, Tom Kirkman said:

Heh heh, long term planning pays off for Trump, who for 30 years now has been railing against unfair and lopsided trade deals.

Trump has corrected this lopsided and unfair trade imbalance, and the globalist World Trade Organization is now helpless to intervene.

 

Trump Shuts Down WTO Appeals Court, Sending EU, China Scrambling For 'Plan B'

Axios certainly has the best intro to today's bombshell development: "Internationalists have always dreamed of a court with jurisdiction over all the countries of the world. In 1995, the World Trade Organization was created — allowing the world's countries to press claims against one another for the first time." 

But it won't survive the Trump presidency as on Tuesday his administration has effectively brought it to an end, neutering its ability to intervene in trade wars, having blocked all new appointments to its dispute-resolution court.

Starting two years ago the US administration began blocking appointments, and now Trump has run out the clock as the now paralyzed WTO’s Appellate Body over that period declined from seven judges to three, and with two more terms expiring Tuesday, only one judge remains, thus without the ability to issue a binding ruling. 

Also per Axios:

Donald "Tariff Man" Trump (his words) can now impose whatever tariffs he likes, without fear that the WTO might find them to be illegal.

However, there's widespread perception that the WTO has been rendered obsolete until it undertakes major reforms — for example criticisms that it frequently fails to abide by its own rules, has an inconsistent appeals mechanism, and its rules fail to account for state-controlled enterprises.

Viewed as among the foremost hindrances to Trump's "America First" program, he's already long bulldozed past WTO rules amid the trade war with China, including punitive levies on Chinese goods (and another tariff increase set for this upcoming weekend), and imposing metal tariffs on allies like Europe, Canada and Japan.  ...

 

So what  are saying is: America is led by a liar-in-chief who has been lying that China was breaking WTO trade rules, when America has been projecting its sins on others?

Edited December 13, 2019 by Hotone
Wording

[Rasmus Jorgensen + 1,169]

On 12/11/2019 at 6:22 PM, Tom Kirkman said:

Heh heh, long term planning pays off for Trump

hmmm... Trump doing longterm planning? 

[Tom Kirkman + 8,860]

30 minutes ago, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

hmmm... Trump doing longterm planning? 

From the exceedingly anti-Trump newspaper, The Washington Post

Over four decades, Trump’s one solid stance: A hard line on trade

March 7, 2018

Donald Trump has always looked askance at people whose decisions derive from ideology. He likes to take his stands in the moment, from the gut, even if that means changing his party affiliation seven times in 13 years.

But there’s one issue on which the president has been rock-solid consistent for four decades: his fiery demands that the United States punish countries that take advantage of American workers.

Despite pleas, lessons and arguments from corporate executives, politicians and economists who say trade wars are destructive to American interests, Trump has stood his ground. Starting in the 1980s, he saw the trade issue as a way to build a national reputation as more than a playboy millionaire developer — and a way to connect with struggling American workers despite his life in a gilded Fifth Avenue tower.

The issue spoke to him personally: Driven since childhood by his resentment that others didn’t respect him or take him seriously, he believed his country was similarly being taken advantage of. The idea that Japan, Germany, or in later years, China were boosting their own economies by selling goods in the United States, even as fewer products made the return trip, incensed Trump, according to people who worked closely with him. His country, he believed, was being laughed at and abused. Worst of all, America was losing.

“People think he just came to this issue last year, but he came to it on his own, decades ago, seeing what was going on in the ’70s and ’80s with job losses and manufacturing in decline,” said Dan DiMicco, the former chief executive of Nucor, an American steel company, who advised Trump on trade during the 2016 campaign. “He was a very proud American, and he saw, in his business and around the country, that this trade situation was hurting our workers.”

Through most of the first year of his presidency, Trump peppered his staff with reminders that he had promised voters he would push back hard against countries he contended were sucking jobs out of the United States. Last week, even as some of his top aides continued to warn him that tariffs on foreign goods could damage relations with U.S. allies, Trump made his move.  ...

 

[Tom Kirkman + 8,860]

41 minutes ago, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

hmmm... Trump doing longterm planning? 

Tracing Trump's Aggressive Tariff Strategy Back to the 1980s | "Trump's Trade War" | FRONTLINE

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

On 12/12/2019 at 2:37 AM, Marcin said:

Vandalism of global organization, of rules based order ? How low US can get ? @Tom Kirkman I do not know what is the source of your joy or pride. Trump is definitely Chinese asset. World was preparing for the current situation at WTO for a long time, but actually nobody thought that US will abandon global leadership and turn into isolationism. The international law specialists representing other 206 countries, more mature and less delusional than US, already prepared some solutions. It is the pattern that US becomes too exceptional to co-operate with global community. And global community  gets used to this situation. 

The problem Marcin, is that the world WANTS to isolate the US and ‘put them in a box’ until their assests are required to sort out some issue elsewhere, be that financially or militarily.

The problem is, when a country, any country, gets fed up with globalist intervention in each and every aspect of said country’s business, said country can, and will, tell the globalist entities such as the WTO and the UN to piss off.

Which is exactly what we see happening now with the US.

Some of you older folks will remember that old Toyota commercial...You Asked For It, You Got It😂

[ronwagn + 6,290]

On 12/13/2019 at 2:31 AM, Hotone said:

So what  are saying is: America is led by a liar-in-chief who has been lying that China was breaking WTO trade rules, when America has been projecting its sins on others?

It is a little like China signing the Paris Climate Accords and then doing everything it can to burn MORE COAL and build coal plants all around the world. The world is just now waking up to the blatant lying and hypocrisy they normally use. President Trump opposed the Accords outright. 

[remake it + 288]

On 12/13/2019 at 10:35 PM, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

hmmm... Trump doing longterm planning? 

An oxymoron although as @Enthalpic knows that without "air" he really is something else!

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

On 12/14/2019 at 2:52 PM, ronwagn said:

It is a little like China signing the Paris Climate Accords and then doing everything it can to burn MORE COAL and build coal plants all around the world. The world is just now waking up to the blatant lying and hypocrisy they normally use. President Trump opposed the Accords outright. 

Trump also says "beautiful clean coal."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmvW25iKd9M

Have you ever seen coal? #trumpLogic

 

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

On 12/14/2019 at 2:52 PM, ronwagn said:

It is a little like China signing the Paris Climate Accords and then doing everything it can to burn MORE COAL and build coal plants all around the world. The world is just now waking up to the blatant lying and hypocrisy they normally use. President Trump opposed the Accords outright. 

In fairness to trump he isn't a hypocrite on that front - he openly hates the environment.

[Marcin + 519]

On 12/13/2019 at 2:56 PM, Douglas Buckland said:

The problem Marcin, is that the world WANTS to isolate the US and ‘put them in a box’ until their assests are required to sort out some issue elsewhere, be that financially or militarily.

The problem is, when a country, any country, gets fed up with globalist intervention in each and every aspect of said country’s business, said country can, and will, tell the globalist entities such as the WTO and the UN to piss off.

Which is exactly what we see happening now with the US.

Some of you older folks will remember that old Toyota commercial...You Asked For It, You Got It😂

I understand your point, each country can and should conduct independent policies, US too.

But why filibuster WTO, just take your toys and get out, like with UNESCO and Paris Accord.

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

If the US would in fact leave the WTO, wouldn’t that effectively neuter the organization?

Assuming it isn’t a toothless, useless organization as we speak...

[Rasmus Jorgensen + 1,169]

On 12/13/2019 at 2:16 PM, Tom Kirkman said:

Tracing Trump's Aggressive Tariff Strategy Back to the 1980s | "Trump's Trade War" | FRONTLINE

I don't see how being consistent with an opinion has anything to do with longterm planning. 

Anyways, don't really care. I know that Trump is the 2nd coming to many here. So let's just agree to disagree. Most here know my views. 

[Rob Plant + 2,756]

Just now, Rasmus Jorgensen said:

I know that Trump is the 2nd coming to many here

Haha love it Rasmus 🤣

[Rasmus Jorgensen + 1,169]

10 minutes ago, Douglas Buckland said:

If the US would in fact leave the WTO, wouldn’t that effectively neuter the organization?

Assuming it isn’t a toothless, useless organization as we speak...

Why even care? Why take time to comment? 

As @Marcin said - just take you ball and go play with yourselfes. That will either expose WTO as hoaks or a viable entity. 

[Douglas Buckland + 6,308]

Why take (the) time to comment?

That is what people do on forums. Why do you bother to comment?

Now back to the topic. If the largest economy on the planet would exit the WTO, that would essentially negate the assumption that the organization somehow represents ‘world’ trade - wouldn’t it?

[footeab@yahoo.com + 2,190]

If WTO kicked out 100% every dictatorship/communist/authoritarian nation, WTO would work just fine. 

WTO is an organization for nice ppl who never do underhanded BS like cheat, steal, currency manipulation.... you know the things humans and nations do when no one is held accountable.....  Why does WTO exist?   To make some small nations feel good where they get to pretend they are bigger than they are while hiding behind larger nations who have to put up the $$$ to defend said small nations so they can feel bigger than they are.

You can only have a "free trade" status with nations who are ~like you who have rule of law, justice, etc.  GATT had problems, but it worked because the only nations allowed INTO the organization were like minded nations who had rule of law, justice etc and the only true giant problem was currency manipulation since the gold standard disappeared.  Thus the small nations felt good and joined in common purpose as everyone upheld common "law" and "justice".  This is not true under the WTO who let EVERY scum dictator and authoritarian regime in.

You cannot do business with thieves who know they never have to be accountable. 

 

[Dan Warnick + 6,100]

3 hours ago, Marcin said:

I understand your point, each country can and should conduct independent policies, US too.

But why filibuster WTO, just take your toys and get out, like with UNESCO and Paris Accord.

As I read the other day, there's only one judge left at the WTO.  Is that correct?  If so, it is finished.  Ball taken home.

[footeab@yahoo.com + 2,190]

9 minutes ago, Dan Warnick said:

As I read the other day, there's only one judge left at the WTO.  Is that correct?  If so, it is finished.  Ball taken home.

Little nations will once again learn that the world requires responsibility and morals to uphold rule of law.  Once the hammer hits them upside the head that humanity is not a Utopia, then they once again will clamor to actively PARTICIPATE in rule of law based order instead of expect the top dog to foot the bill(assuming the top dog is interested in rules based order.... HINT: China is NOT interested) while they little guys currency manipulate and BACKSTAB from behind. 

[Tom Kirkman + 8,860]

26 minutes ago, Dan Warnick said:

As I read the other day, there's only one judge left at the WTO.  Is that correct?  If so, it is finished.  Ball taken home.

Yep.