At 7:25 -0700 01/04/5, Ma Be wrote: >Second, the issue of lobbying the EU. I understand where Louis is >coming from, therefore, why don't we approach the EU in a >"consultative" mode, i.e. why don't we make an inquiry with Mr. >Pietrasanta, for instance, about if there is any mechanism that was >setup by the committee responsible to oversee this issue to update >this situation both with TABD and the US government. If there is we >should then write them and inquire as to what's going on (in the >meantime, evidently, we should let Mr. Pietrasanta know of what >members of the TABD are doing! EU parliamentarians must know about >this backstabbing by American organizations, to again reinforce to >them what TABD's true colors are!!!). > >Please let me know what you think and how we can best get this thing >off the ground. Let's please remember that pre-emptive strikes are >better than to deal with remedial ones!!! ;-) Thanks, Marcus, for your suggestions, but I repeat that we should NOT approach for the moment Mr Pietrasenta or any other MEP. I know how this people work : when an issue is on their agenda, they set up a committee to study the matter and generate a position. But for the moment the issue IS NOT on their agenda, and there is no standing committee dealing with the matter. The EU Institution in charge of monitoring existing legislation - that is what we speak about - is the Commission. The Commission is made of 20 Commissioners, the one in charge of Trade is Mr Pascal Lamy. He has a cabinet, whose head is Mr Pierre Defraigne. Commissioners of course are assisted by civil servants, in our case the DG (Directorate General) "Commerce". If we have a strong argumentation we could (I could) send them (Mr Defraigne for instance) a documented paper. Indeed I may have a chance to meet Mr Defraigne next month. If somebody from the list could prepare for me a paper, I would appreciate. But why don't we directly address the TABD ? After all, they claimed that they were in favor of amending the UPLA to permit metric only labeling. And Hewlett-Packard, etc. are member companies to the TABD. Louis
