i just gotta hold of this gem of an insiders' view on a recent meeting of a bunch of elites about how to restore the WTO's momentum after seattle. very NWO-esque.
--

Subject: restoring the WTO's momentum
Progressive Review,ssmith@igc.org,inet writes:

AN ACTIVIST AMONGST THE ROBBER BARONS

    [Bruce Silverglade of the Center for Science in the Public Interest
managed to get himself invited to a day-long high-level seminar on "After
Seattle: Restoring Momentum to the WTO." Speakers included Clayton
Yeutter (former Secretary of Agriculture), Robert Litan (former Associate Director
of the White House Office of Management and Budget), Lawrence
Eagleburger (former Secretary of State), and Luiz Felipe Lamreia, the foreign Minster
of Brazil. His fly-on-the-wall report is worth quoting at some length]:

I was disappointed that only one representative like myself from a non-
profit  organization concerned about the impact of the WTO on food
safety regulation was invited.  But I was pleased that the door had been
opened and I looked forward to [it].

 . . . As it turned out, I got a lot more than I bargained for.

The seminar turned out to be a strategy session on how to defeat those
opposed to the current WTO system.  Apparently, no one knew who I was
(perhaps my graying temples and dark suit helped me blend in with the overwhelming
older male group of attendees) and I did not speak up until the end of the
meeting.

    The meeting was kicked off by a gentleman named Lord Patterson
who  was Margaret Thatcher's Secretary of State for Trade and Industry. He
began by stating that our number one job is to restore confidence in the
WTO before embarking on any new rounds of trade negotiations.  So far, so
good, I thought.

    But he then proclaimed that non-profit groups have no right to
criticize the WTO as undemocratic because the groups themselves do
not  represent the general public. (I wondered which groups he was talking about
because organizations that are gravely concerned about the impact of the WTO
on environmental and consumer protection, like the Sierra Club and
Public Citizen, have hundreds of thousands of members). He then stated
That we must never have another WTO meeting on US soil because it was
too easy for  advocacy groups to organize here and security could not be assured .

    . .  He added that President Clinton's speech during the WTO
meeting in Seattle, in which the president acknowledged the protesters' concerns,
Was "disgraceful" and stated that it was also disgraceful that delegates to the
WTO meeting in Seattle had to survive on sandwiches and couldn't get a
decent meal during three days of social protest. The Lord finished his speech by
recalling better times having tea with Maggie, and stating that the staff of
the WTO Secretariat ~ should not be balanced with people from
developing countries just because of the color of their skin.  After a few words with
the chairman of the meeting, Lord Patterson added "Oh, I hope I have not
offended anyone."

  . . . The largely American audience of trade officials and policy
wonks took the Lord's pronouncements seriously. The first comment by
an American, picked up on the criticisms and asked 'How can we de-legitimize the NGOs?'

    The questioner claimed that these groups are usually supported by
just a few charitable foundations and if the foundations could be
convinced to cut off funding, the groups would be forced to cease operations.  Mr.
Litan, the former White House budget official, had another approach.  He
[asked] can't we give the NGOs other sandboxes to play in and have them take
their concerns to groups like the International Labor Organization (a
toothless United Nations sponsored-group).  The representative from the
US Trade Representative's office said nothing.

  . . . Under the banner of rebuilding public confidence in the WTO,
[former Agriculture Secretary] Yeutter concurred with his British
colleague's suggestion that the next WTO meeting be held in some place other than
the US where security can be assured.  He further suggested that the
WTO give the public little advance notice of where the meeting would be held
to keep the protesters off balance.  He said that the protesters' demands
for greater transparency in WTO proceedings was a misnomer because the
protesters didn't really want to participate in WTO proceedings -- all they wanted
was to get TV coverage and raise money for their organizations.

  . . . The day ended with the usual Washington reception  . . .
During desert, the foreign minister of Brazil lamented that if the next
WTO meeting had to be held in an out of the way place, he preferred that it be
held on a cruise ship instead of in the middle of the desert. He then gave
an impassioned speech in which he opposed writing core labor standards
into the WTO agreement and defended child labor by describing how in
one region of Brazil, more than 5,000 children "help their families earn a little
extra money" by hauling bags of coal from a dump yard to a steel mill.
He stressed, however, that the children do not work directly in the
steel mill.
    He was greeted by a hearty round of applause.
 
 

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