Tuesday, November 30, 2010

The Fallout from WikiLeaks' Latest Exposure

Julian Assange - Wikileaks


Tunku Varadarajan writing for the Daily Beast condemns Julian Assange of WikiLeaks for divulging sensitive diplomatic material exposing the inner working of America’s foreign affairs. Assange’s WikiLeaks has exposed American military personal in War Zones to harm in past releases. This recent release probably does not place American sons and daughters in harm’s way this time; however the WikiLeaks dump will compromise the State Department’s ability to collect data from willing information conduits by drying up those sources for fear of being exposed. Also the latest WikiLeaks dump may hamper State Department career diplomats from writing stark details because of the fear of the sensitive material being easily stolen and released to the public. When career diplomats begin using neutral notes that is the time that State Department and the Presidential Office is forced into neutral analysis or uninformed conclusions because career diplomats failed to give a nuanced report.

JRH 11/30/10
*******************************
The Fallout from WikiLeaks' Latest Exposure

November 29, 2010 12:48 AM

Julian Assange may not have endangered lives directly by leaking thousands of pages of purloined diplomatic correspondence, but he's certainly made conducting American diplomacy more difficult. Tunku Varadarajan on the consequences.

Another WikiLeaks whirlwind has hit us. The trick, truly, is to stay grounded and ask a question that newspapers (yes, even The New York Times) don’t easily ask: This is all mighty interesting, and truly, madly juicy, but…should we really be colluding with nihilists who traffic in stolen information?

There are a few observations that one should make in the face of the latest act by Julian Assange, the prime mover of WikiLeaks, who has just dumped in the laps of four publications—The Times, The Guardian of London, El Pais of Madrid, and Germany’s Der Spiegel—thousands of purloined pages of diplomatic correspondence between United States Embassies across the world and the State Department in Washington. This correspondence was never intended to enter the public domain, and its entry into the public domain may have thrown American diplomacy into a crisis of confidence.

1. Mr. Assange is a dangerous vandal masquerading as a moral crusader. What is his purpose in publishing this stolen material? There is no clear philosophy behind his actions, no higher aim, other than the gleeful humbling—the public embarrassment—of the United States, a country against which he and his neo-anarchist cohorts have waged their own private little war for well over a year. Mr. Assange detests the United States, detests the philosophy of Western free market democracies, and rejects the notion that the U.S. could ever conceivably wage war abroad that is not criminal. He is, in short, an avowed foe of our society and our way of life.

2. Mr. Assange has not engaged in a single act of “exposure” that disrupts our enemies. When he starts disrupting the enemy, I will begin to concede that he can be treated—remotely—as evenhanded or worthy of praise. Instead, he has by his leaks, and by the pseudo-moral rhetoric that has accompanied them, offered propagandistic succor to those who would harm us, in addition to the priceless intelligence that he has handed to them on a platter.

3. Mr. Assange may not have endangered lives directly in this latest round of leaks, compared with the reprehensible mischief in July, when he imperiled hundreds of people in Afghanistan. But Mr. Assange has certainly made immeasurably more difficult the conduct of American diplomacy abroad. The content of cables leaked contained much that was hypersensitive, spoken to our representatives abroad by foreign politicians, leaders, bureaucrats, military officials, dissidents, and businessmen, in the belief that their thoughts were being received in strict confidence. Will people talk as freely to our diplomats again? What price will we pay for the inevitable evaporation of candor?

This is "something of a disaster for U.S. diplomacy," Charles Hill, a professor at Yale and a former U.S. diplomat, told me in an email. "Not because of what's revealed--everyone knows all diplomatic services do and say such things--but because it has been revealed in a way that indicates the U.S. has lost its ability or willingness to keep such material closely held. So foreigners will tell us less and we will write less down and less substance will be conveyed to Washington. An earlier phase of this came in the late 1980s when it became clear --I was involved--that notes of internal Washington meetings could not be protected from release. So people stopped keeping notes. The result has been that the official record has withered, as has history's knowledge of what happened. Now that loss is extended to foreign meetings."

4. Of course, the fault for the exposure lies, in large measure, with the State Department, and its astonishingly profligate approach to confidentiality. Thousands of people, it turns out, have access to this material. Why are we so lax, so trusting? One answer resides in the belief, still ingrained in our civitas, that Americans have a shared sense of purpose and destiny. Alas, we no longer do. Many in our midst see their own country as “imperialist” and “evil”—and effectively beyond redemption. The rootless, self-aggrandizing Assange has no civic obligations to the U.S., so he’s not being traitorous. But one has to say that the U.S. has been exposed as having a pathetic system of secret documents and communications. A private with minimal security clearance was able to download and distribute all this stuff to a transnational nihilist conspiracy. Can you imagine the Chinese being as flaccid? Or the Israelis?

5. On the bright side: The leaks show, happily, that Foggy Bottom isn’t as clueless in private as it appears to be in public. That is, indeed, gratifying, though it does suggest that its functionaries should perhaps be more candid in their public assessments—diplomacy be damned.

6. Equally, there is nothing that suggests that any great American global conspiracies are afoot. All this is the embarrassing release of diplomatic pillow talk: None of it is particularly surprising or alarming; and certainly, none of it is damning. The United States government, the leaks make clear, is often stupid, but never malevolent. There may be some unexpected propaganda value here.

7. The key to understanding the WikiLeaks phenomenon lies in the erosion of the distinction, once clear and accepted, between the public and the non-public. Diplomacy, to work at all effectively, must draw a line between the “consultative process” and the “work product.” This is but part of the human condition: Human beings need to consult, speculate, brainstorm, argue with each other—yes, even to gossip and say dopey things—in order to find their way through the difficult task of coming to an official, or publicly stated position which would then be open (legitimately) to criticism. The refusal to see this distinction is, effectively, Marxist: It all comes down to property, which in Marxist terms is the root of evil. So one is no longer allowed to have property even in musings and speculations. (This, of course, is what underlies political correctness: You must no longer be allowed to think, let alone say, certain things.)

8. Ultimately, the U.S. will be insulated from pillory because every single diplomatic mission of every single state sends back confidential cables to the foreign ministry in the country’s capital. Can you imagine what goodies lie embedded in cables from the Saudi Embassy in Washington, the Chinese Embassy in Pyongyang, the Pakistani High Commission in New Delhi, the Israeli Embassy in Ankara, the British Embassy in Buenos Aires, the French Embassy in Kigali, the Indian Embassy in Kabul?

9. Given the above, is Assange a weird and perverse benefactor? The State Department (1) produces tons of useless verbiage at great cost; and (2) distributes this verbiage to missions worldwide, in hundreds of copies. 1 + 2 = impossible-to-protect secrets, as we’ve just learned. Lesson? Find another way; and write scarcely anything down.

10. There are those who make comparisons between the Pentagon Papers and WikiLeaks, not least Mr. Assange himself. If that is so, will he turn himself in to face the consequences of his acts, as Daniel Ellsberg did in the case of the Pentagon Papers? “I did this clearly at my own jeopardy,” Ellsberg said, “and I am prepared to answer to all he consequences of this decision.”

It should be noted, of course, that Ellsberg wasn’t wanted for rape at the time…
_____________________________
Tunku Varadarajan is a national affairs correspondent and writer at large for The Daily Beast. He is also the Virginia Hobbs Carpenter Fellow in Journalism at Stanford's Hoover Institution and a professor at NYU's Stern Business School. He is a former assistant managing editor at The Wall Street Journal.

COPYRIGHT © 2008-10 RTST, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Monday, November 29, 2010

WikiLeaks: Red Crescent smuggled weapons for Iran

I came across a series of News stories and blog posts about the latest Wikileaks deposits that are usually focused on American embarrassing news about sensitive material somehow retrieved by the Wikileaks king Julian Assange. Normally I am a good Conservative and would condemn the constant publishing to the public of American documents. This is so especially because Wikileaks has gone to notorious lengths to place Americans and American military personal in harm’s way with the data being made public.

However, this time the American embarrassment leaves one asking legitimate questions from a Conservative perspective. The primary concern on my mind runs something like this: With both Israel and Middle Eastern Arab  Muslim nations calling for America to stop Iran’s nuclear program even if it means meant military action, why did not President G.W. Bush step up to the plate and work some allies in which could have forged better relations between Israel and Israel’s hostile Muslim-Arab neighbors?

There are other questions as well. Check the next series of posts to see if you agree.

JRH 11/29/10

Is Obama Community Organizing Leftist Bloggers?

Leftist Blogging Trolls
John R. Houk
© November 29, 2010

Is it possible that President Barack Hussein Obama’s recent meeting with Leftist Bloggers was a think tank moment on ways to smear Sarah Palin between now and 2012? Kristinn Taylor and Andrea Shea King writing in Big Journalism takes on Leftist media watchdog known as Media Matters. Taylor/King write that Media Matters’ Oliver Willis skewed a faux pas by Sarah Palin mistakenly saying North Korea was America’s as a knock at her intelligence. The reality is Palin did say such a thing then corrected herself.

When Leftists decided to jump on the vilify Palin machine one should be reminded that Palin was ready for Left Wing hypocrisy. Palin wrote on her Facebook Page:

In a Thanksgiving Day message posted Nov. 25th on her Facebook page, Palin opened her post with a tongue in cheek send-up of President Barack Obama in which no fewer than ten of his verbal gaffes and misstatements were included and sourced.

My fellow Americans in all 57 states, the time has changed for come. With our country founded more than 20 centuries ago, we have much to celebrate – from the FBI’s 100 days to the reforms that bring greater inefficiencies to our health care system. We know that countries like Europe are willing to stand with us in our fight to halt the rise of privacy, and Israel is a strong friend of Israel’s. And let’s face it, everybody knows that it makes no sense that you send a kid to the emergency room for a treatable illness like asthma and they end up taking up a hospital bed. It costs, when, if you, they just gave, you gave them treatment early, and they got some treatment, and ah, a breathalyzer, or an inhalator. I mean, not a breathalyzer, ah, I don’t know what the term is in Austrian for that …

The point Palin was making was that though everyone occasionally goofs up — including the President, you might not remember hearing about his, “because for the most part the media didn’t consider them newsworthy,” Palin wrote. (From Big Journal)

The subtle Taylor/King point being made is that Media Matters fails as a watchdog and succeeds as a fringe Left Democratic Party tool.

My point is based on this observation:

Such is not the case when it comes to Palin who in the course of a radio interview with Glenn Beck, mistakenly referred to South Korea as North Korea, but then quickly corrected herself. Media Matters blogger Oliver Willis, writing at his personal blog, posted the audio clip of Palin’s slip. Willis is one of several liberal bloggers who met recently with President Obama at the White House. (From Big Journalism- Emphasis is mine)

What would be the reason President BHO would meet with a bunch of Left Wing bloggers? Can you say Saul Alinsky? Alinsky was President Barack Hussein Obama’s Marxist community organizing hero for transforming society from the Constitutional status quo.

JRH 11/29/10
****************************
Media Matters Lies About Media Coverage of Sarah Palin North Korea Slip

Nov 28th 2010 at 4:58 am

Democratic Party front group Media Matters for America has published yet another attack on Republican Sarah Palin. This one a dishonest portrayal of media coverage of her recent slip of the tongue regarding the crisis on the Korean peninsula.

In a Thanksgiving Day message posted Nov. 25th on her Facebook page, Palin opened her post with a tongue in cheek send-up of President Barack Obama in which no fewer than ten of his verbal gaffes and misstatements were included and sourced.

My fellow Americans in all 57 states, the time has changed for come. With our country founded more than 20 centuries ago, we have much to celebrate – from the FBI’s 100 days to the reforms that bring greater inefficiencies to our health care system. We know that countries like Europe are willing to stand with us in our fight to halt the rise of privacy, and Israel is a strong friend of Israel’s. And let’s face it, everybody knows that it makes no sense that you send a kid to the emergency room for a treatable illness like asthma and they end up taking up a hospital bed. It costs, when, if you, they just gave, you gave them treatment early, and they got some treatment, and ah, a breathalyzer, or an inhalator. I mean, not a breathalyzer, ah, I don’t know what the term is in Austrian for that …

The point Palin was making was that though everyone occasionally goofs up — including the President, you might not remember hearing about his, “because for the most part the media didn’t consider them newsworthy,” Palin wrote.

Such is not the case when it comes to Palin who in the course of a radio interview with Glenn Beck, mistakenly referred to South Korea as North Korea, but then quickly corrected herself. Media Matters blogger Oliver Willis, writing at his personal blog, posted the audio clip of Palin’s slip. Willis is one of several liberal bloggers who met recently with President Obama at the White House.

Responding to Palin’s “57 states” comment, Media Matters’ Eric Boehlert wrote “Palin Concocts More Media Sins.” Boehlert uses a search of Nexis to make Media Matters’ disingenuous case that Palin has overblown media coverage of her “We have to stand by our North Korean allies” flub made during the interview with Beck on his radio show last Wednesday.

Boehlert smears Palin, describing her as being nuts in some manner or form, “self-obsessed” and imagining things.

“Fox News’ Sarah Palin is now so consumed with every real or imagined media wrong against her that she’s to the point where she’s attacking the press for stuff they don’t even do.”

Even though Palin’s slip was reported in headlined stories by American and international wire services, as well as major news sites across America and around the globe, Boehlert claims “major American newspaper(s) did not turn the Palin/North Korea gaffe into a “major political headline,” did not treat it as news, and did not even mention it as news when it occurred.” Boehlert changes Palin’s assertion of major political headlines to major newspaper headlines, a sleight of hand that allows Boehlert to use Nexis to list major American news outlets that supposedly did not report on Palin’s slip:

“New York Times; Wall Street Journal; Los Angeles Times; Washington Post; New York Post; Houston Chronicle; Philadelphia Inquirer; Newsday; Denver Post; Arizona Republic; Minneapolis Star Tribune; Dallas Morning News; Cleveland Plain Dealer; Seattle Times; Chicago Sun-Times …”

Boehlert also claims broadcast media did not cover Palin’s slip:

“What other news outlets ignored Palin’s verbal gaffe when it occurred? All three major networks – ABC, CBS, and NBC–as well as CNN, Fox News, PBS and NPR.”

However, Boehlert fails to note the story exploded on major news sites on the Web within hours of Palin’s slip.

Boehlert also conveniently fails to note that the faux scandal was initiated by his fellow Media Matters writer Oliver Willis.

A Google News search reveals the following global reporting trying to paint Palin as ignorant for what a transcript of the interview with Beck reveals to be a simple slip of the tongue.

The Associated Press article Palin Draws Fire With North Korea Gaffe was published at 162 news sites according to Google News, including The Washington Post; Newsday; CBS News; The Miami Herald; The Kansas City Star; and The Huffington Post.

Another wire service, AFP, headlined their article, In Gaffe, Palin Supports Our North Korea Allies’. UPI titled their article Palin Silent on North Korea ‘Ally’ Gaffe.

Newsbusters reported that ABC News mentioned Palin’s slip on Good Morning America.

Also contrary to Boehlert’s shoddy propaganda is this Wall Street Journal report titled, Sarah Palin Says US Must ‘Stand With North Korea Allies’ and a Los Angeles Times piece titled, Why Make a Big Deal Out of Sarah Palin’s ‘our North Korean allies’ Gaffe which concluded the media should make a big deal of it.

In addition to carrying the AP article, CBS News did a stand alone article titled, Sarah Palin Mistakenly Calls N. Korea an “Ally” which drew 1075 comments.

Political news sites played up Palin’s slip, including MSNBC; The Hill; Politico; and The Atlantic Wire, which gleefully headlined their article, Quote of the Day: Palin Sticks With ‘North Korean’ Allies.

The story quickly went around the globe. British news outlets reporting Palin’s slip included: The Guardian; the BBC; Sky News; and The Daily Mail.

The Daily Express headlined their article Let’s Back North Korea Says Blundering Sarah Palin.

Palin’s slip was also reported in Korea; China; Hong Kong; Malaysia; India; New Zealand and Australia.

Clearly, the Nexis version of news does not reflect online versions of the media’s dead tree editions. Moreover, the vast majority of people are reading their news online. Boehlert’s sleight of hand claim that Nexis has no record of the story being published in the majors is disingenuous.

If there’s a lesson to be learned from Media Matters ginning up a political hit only to follow it up later with commentary that Sarah Palin is delusional, it’s this: reporters relying on Media Matters for accuracy are setting themselves up to be played for fools.
__________________________
Is Obama Community Organizing Leftist Bloggers?
John R. Houk
© November 29, 2010
_________________________
Media Matters Lies About Media Coverage of Sarah Palin North Korea Slip

Sunday, November 28, 2010

AFTER AMERICA Info on Agenda 21

Agenda 21 is Evil
John R. Houk
© November 28, 2010

Have you heard of the Agenda 21 Conspiracy Theory? I first became aware of Agenda 21 from a person that went by the pseudonym Savant Noir.

The international mantra that is the drive behind re-shaping the world is ‘man-made climate change’. The ‘green revolution’ has pervaded every level of our Society and there is not a day that goes by that we are not bombarded with advertisements touting how environmentally friendly some product is, or how ecologically responsible some corporation is. Its nauseating. I am neither a Geologist nor a Climatologist, so as I pour through all the scientific arguments I must admit that I cannot confer credibility with absolutism upon either side of the debate.


However, I can ask if this ‘climate-change’ is being used as an excuse to foist a political agenda? There have been numerous publications and statements made that certainly reveal the intent to create a crisis so that the Elitists can step in and tender their solution.


The Elite Class has had a plan in the hopper for some time now, and it is rapidly coming to fruition. The universal acceptance of Agenda 21 has ushered in this new era, and just by giving a cursory glance over the 40 chapter titles that comprise Agenda 21 would reveal the depth of this Master Plan. Never heard of Agenda 21? Perhaps you have heard the words ‘sustainable’, ‘smart growth’, ‘social justice’, ‘biological equity’, and a plethora of similar words that have pervaded our societal lexicon. Whenever you hear such words realize they are derivatives of Agenda 21. (From SlantRight link above quote)

I then had a series of emails from Tony Newbill that edited into two sets of three-part posts. I say two sets because much of the Newbill info on Agenda 21 was similar so I added new data into a rewrite of the first set of three parts. You can read the beginning of the two sets of three HERE and HERE.

Newbill has pointed out a very lucid essay about Agenda 21 written by pseudonym AfterAmerica by the blog of the same name – After America’s Blog.

JRH 11/28/10
****************************
[SlantRight Editor: SlantRight.com archive site might be shut down by censors thus this title was at to SlantRight 2.0. 3/7/12]

 
AGENDA 21 Exposted

By afteramerica
November 20, 2010
After America


Agenda 21: The United Nations Programme of Action from Rio, also known as the “Rio Declaration on Environment and Development” was published in 1992, a product of the Earth Summit as a manifesto to create a “new global partnership for sustainable development (pg 15)” based on the December 1989 United Nations General Assembly resolution 44/228. The International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI) was founded in 1990 by 200 local governments at the World Congress of Local Governments for a Sustainable Future at the United Nations headquarters and later renamed “ICLEI-Local Governments for Sustainability” in 2003. ICLEI is the major global coordinator of the UN Agenda 21 “sustainable development” program and it is ICLEI’s job to promote the goals embodied in this program at the local level. The city of Spokane is a member of ICLEI. In fact, ICLEI has worked closely with the Mayor’s Sustainability Task Force as can be seen on the cover of the March 9, 2009 Greenhouse Gas Inventory report. As explained by Climate Physicist Edwin X. Berry in an open letter to the city of Spokane, the city has been duped by ICLEI into reshaping the city against the best interests of its citizens.

It is time to expose this fraud and to end it in the city of Spokane. Two city charter amendments have been introduced towards this end. In this article we will give you the overview of where Agenda 21 fits into the big picture with regards to what various special interests are trying to accomplish at your expense.

Many have never heard of UN Agenda 21 or ICLEI; we are here to correct that. You probably have heard the code words for Agenda 21 everywhere though, embodied in “sustainability,” “climate change,” or even “democracy.” Incidentally, if you think democracy is not a code word for something more sinister, I invite you to check out the following website PermanentDefense where a ballot initiative, or vote of the people, was characterized as an “undemocratic assault on majority rule.” Confused? We shall explain the connection later in this article. The words “democracy” and “sustainability” were riddled throughout Envision Spokane’s Proposition 4 (seeking “to build a healthy, sustainable, and democratic Spokane”) which best illustrated principles behind UN Agenda 21 and ICLEI’s global sustainability program. It was too much change, too fast for politicians in control as few of them would even endorse it because the population of Spokane was not ready for it yet – such measures are best implemented gradually so that the public does not notice the changes in their daily lives. However, if you compare the goals of Proposition 4 to the principles as set forth in page 6 of the ICLEI Charter, you will find similar language and concepts represented.

Now many of the goals and concepts behind “sustainability” do not sound bad at all. Tyranny and government oppression is never marketed as such in the open – one always must have publicly admirable goals in order to justify any agenda that a regime is trying to promote. For example, most would agree that affordable health care and housing is a good thing; that is, until their taxes shoot through the roof in order to pay for such. People generally approve of respecting the ecosystem; that is, until the government comes in and tells you exactly how you can use the property you paid good money for. The citizens of Spokane recognized that this is exactly what Proposition 4 was trying to accomplish and overwhelmingly voted it down.

However, UN Agenda 21 and ICLEI’s sustainability plan are no different. Goals are there for a reason. It is to justify a coordinated action. What type of action? Government action. More specifically government action which lightens your pocket book, limits the free market, and gradually erodes what is left of private property rights. “Sustainability” is the rallying cry to ratchet up the government control grid until our grandchildren no longer can conceive of what a truly free society looks like. In fact, I imagine the government control we live under today would be intolerable to someone alive 100 years ago in this country and in as little as 10-20 years we might be living in Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World.

The whole idea behind “sustainable development” is that human beings, when left on their own, free from government meddling in their daily personal affairs, cannot live in a “sustainable” manner. Such unfettered development will purportedly wreak great havoc upon the environment and global “equity.” The use of the term “equity” repeatedly throughout UN Agenda 21 (“new and equitable global partnership” pg. 9) is particularly disturbing. The term embodies the ideas not of equal justice under the natural law, but the idea of equity put forth by Karl Marx, “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.” In fact, the idea of wealth transfer from nations which are prosperous (due to adherence to free market principles long ago) to nations which are not prosperous (usually third world dictatorships which do not respect private property) can be found throughout the UN Agenda 21 document. Principle 5 in the declaration has as a key goal of decreasing “the disparities in standards of living,” not recognizing that this can only be achieved by allowing free market commerce in these banana republics, not through a global handout program or by imposing government controls on free market societies. The result of this tactic will be to “equalize” them into poverty.

The United States was founded on the principles of natural law codified in our Constitution, which formed and guaranteed a republican form of government. I am not talking about the political party, I am talking about the form of government where the rule of law governs above the whims of mankind. Great philosophers such as John Locke saw that the sole purpose of civil government was the protection of private property from theft by larger groups of people. In theory, the government, or supergang as some call it, would prevent these gangs from harming others or taking property that does not belong to them. However, the creation of this supergang known as government created great dangers as well, and could be more harmful than any gang if it exercised arbitrary powers. That is why the founders established very limited powers. to the central government and established a system of checks and balances, codified in the United States Constitution. This is why public officials all swear an oath to the U.S. Constitution, not to Congress, the president, or the Supreme Court. We are ruled by law, not the whims of men.

Democracy, on the other hand, is the rule of the majority, not the rule of law. The United States was not set up as a democracy as our founders despised democracy because it undermined the very reason for the foundation of civil government: the protection of private property. Benjamin Franklin said, “Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote.” In a democracy, if 51% of the people vote to steal from 49% of the people, they can do so (and regularly do). If people over 5 foot 6 inches vote to take everything from those who are shorter, they can do so in a democracy. In a republic, such laws would be null and void. While our elected officials are elected in a democratic fashion, they are constrained by the rule of law – the United States Constitution, which gives them limited powers to violate the private property rights of others.

Unfortunately, our republic is being destroyed. Individual rights, as guaranteed by the United States Constitution, are being mocked and dismissed by our public school system. Instead of teaching the true history and intent of our country’s Founders, public education has become the most useful tool to justify corrupt Supreme Court decisions which ignore the framer’s intent, and treat the document as a living, breathing entity which can be changed at will by the same government it is supposed to be constraining. A prime example was Wickard v. Filburn where Supreme Court officials, appointed by a corrupt and power hungry president, ruled that a farmer, using the crops he grew himself to feed his family, was engaging in interstate commerce. The very protections of a republic are gone when such interpretations can be justified or allowed to stand. If jurors of the public were originally informed of their obligation to follow the Constitution first, such cases would have never even made it to the supreme court. However, foundations long advocating a global socialist economy, like the Carnegie Foundation, have infiltrated our schools. They indoctrinate our children by convincing them that we are a “democracy,” where public theft is legitimized for the sake of “equity”, instead of a “republic,” where private property is respected, hard work is rewarded, and our rights are commensurate to our responsibilities. When one can infiltrate the public education system, one can shape the opinions of entire generations of people to lead your new “democracy” in any direction that those in control want. This creates a system which is visibly a “democracy,” but which, in reality, is an oligarchy, or rule by an elite few. That is why educational indoctrination is a key tool of those promoting sustainability to create not a population of individual thinkers, but “sheep people” or “sheeple” who will accept what they are told without critical thinking.

A prime example of this is the current hysteria over global warming, or manmade climate change. When one confronts young people with hard facts contradicting the hypothesis, such as the fact that carbon dioxide concentrations were much, much higher at the time of the dinosaurs and life was never more abundant, they often can only respond, “But this is what we are taught in our school books so it must be true.” I was told by one Global Warming believer that the exposed fraud behind the IPCC data was irrelevant, because everyone had “forgotten about it.” The message was that propaganda is more important than facts! When one is focused on the answers to standardized tests, such as those required by the No Child Left Behind bureaucracy foisted upon us by the Bush administration, instead of teaching logic and critical reasoning skills from a classic education, these are the types of brainwashed people you get. That is what it takes to create a new “up-to-date mythological or religious structure” (see quote at top of page) of global climate change, where people blindly accept what they are told because it is coming from the modern priests, or scientists. Just as priests could be corrupted in the Middle Ages, so can the scientists who are paid to justify one particular hypothesis. What do you think happens to scientists at a think tank, funded by the United Nations to specifically advance a climate change agenda, when they come up with conflicting conclusions? I imagine it is the same thing that happens to researchers employed by cigarette companies who find a link between cancer and smoking. In this perspective, the ClimateGate data manipulations to justify a pre-formed conclusion make total sense.

That brings us back to this religion of false environmentalism. In order to get people to give up their natural rights, you have to redirect their focus on something greater than themselves. In time of war, it is patriotism – the need to defeat the other side. The Report from Iron Mountain (purportedly a hoax, but someone came up with these ideas over 50 years ago; hoax or not, the ideas which made it to the New York Times bestseller list appear to have been co-opted towards action based on the extent of climate fraud) discussed the challenge of controlling the masses in times of peace. The answer involved creating a series of new wars against ideas, instead of actual nation-states, i.e. War on Drugs, War on Terror, War on Environmental Pollution. The most intriguing idea generated in the report was the ability to mobilize people to confront an environmental crisis by convincing them that if they did not act in submission to their government in support of these goals they risked their own lives and the lives of future generations. Such language pervades UN Agenda 21. In the Report from Iron Mountain they even suggest deliberately polluting the environment or making up a fake crisis in order for people to submit to a more powerful government. In the guise of the manmade climate change myth, those lusting for more power have gotten their wish. It does not matter that (1) warming is historically beneficial to the environment, (2) solar radiation is the prime motivator of climate change, (3) carbon dioxide represents one of many greenhouse gases such as water vapor, (4) there is a dramatically diminishing effect to the trapping of solar radiation with increasing concentrations, and (5) climate change models represent what statisticians call “curve-fitting” with poor prediction records, as one should not let the idea of facts get in the way of a good public hoax or religion amongst its zealots. It is most interesting that most meteorologists who must use and develop good, predictive climate models are some of the harshest critics of the myth of manmade global warming.

Now do not get me wrong. I am not saying that being conscious of preserving the environment or helping underdeveloped countries is a bad thing. In fact, if the American people actually knew the way the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and various non-governmental entities were “helping” these nations, they would be appalled (read Confessions of an Economic Hitman, or The Creature from Jekyll Island for shocking details). The reality is that individual private property owners, when left to their own devices, are much better stewards of the environment than most governments and multinational corporations. When there is personal ownership, there is also responsibility; people tend to take care of their own property. If you do not believe me, go and check the state of public forest land versus privately owned forest areas.

The problem with pollution generally comes not from individuals, but the very multinational corporations behind this drive towards “sustainable development.” Ask yourself why the effort to regulate carbon dioxide, a gas necessary for plant life to thrive, seems to be the main focus of this global environmental push, yet the same public authorities actively promote the addition of flouride, a potent carcinogen as determined by EPA scientists, into your drinking water. The answer is global control. If you can control the very gas expired by all animal life, you control life itself. Do you realize the sort of money large investment banks such as Goldman Sachs stand to make from the entire cap and trade scheme (conceived by Enron, of all companies)? The reality is the “carbon tax” you hear being proposed will not be paid to your governments, but to the large corporations themselves! Meanwhile, prior to dumping toxins like sodium hexaflouride into your drinking water, large corporations such as aluminum producers had to pay a lot of money to dispose of this toxic waste. Now they GET PAID to pollute our drinking water with it.

Limited liability corporations are at the core of the real problems of environmental pollution. There is a reason for this. Under the law, the elected board of directors and management team is under a fiduciary responsibility to make the greatest profits possible for their shareholders, but are not necessarily under a moral responsibility that individual small business owners feel. By giving the investors limited liability, they can vote in those who care most about corporate profits (over collateral obligations like a code of ethics) who will benefit their individual pocket books the most without having to individually face the consequences. These directors can then “press the envelope” and if worse comes to worst, the investors lose no more than what they put in, even thought the environmental or other damage could be much greater than the value of corporate assets. As one accumulates large sums of money, one can also pay more money in court costs and make generous contributions to lawmakers to better one’s odds of the public policy of a nation aligning with the interests of the corporation. It seems ironic that one would be crazy to not form a limited liability corporation, because of the dramatic expense of the modern legal system; however, remember who benefits from that expensive legal system: those with practically unlimited money to spend on court cases, quashing justice for the average individual or small business owner. It is reasonable to believe that large corporations’ influence on Congress over the past 150 years had everything to do with this.

Why would multinational corporations be promoting sustainable development? Believe it or not, they are the biggest beneficiaries of enhanced government powers, because they most directly control the government through the big money campaign contributions to elect these officials. Did you ever wonder why members of both political parties were rushing to bail out Goldman Sachs, when 90%-plus of the population were against it? Follow the money. Large corporations own the major media outlets which promote certain candidates over others (wonder why Fox News banned Ron Paul from the New Hampshire debate?). In a society where running for political office requires a lot of money, guess where it comes from? They will often contribute funds to politicians of both parties (if you do not believe the Republicans participate in the whole sustainability agenda look up the International Democratic Union). That way, whoever you vote for, the large corporations end up on top. People forget that citizens had the right to vote in the old Soviet Union. However, that vote was between, for example, Boris the Communist and Vladimir the Communist. It was the illusion of democratic choice in a system that was really an oligarchy. Our country is no different. That is why the differences between the two parties are minor. Did the Republicans actually drill for oil in Alaska, lower spending, or reduce the educational bureaucracy as per their party platform? No. Have the Democrats repealed the Patriot Act, gotten rid of warrantless wiretaps, or brought our soldiers home? Absolutely not. Each side creates the illusion of choice, advancing one aspect of tyranny (Republicans – social control on individual rights, Democrats – social control on economic rights) while never repealing anything done by the other side. Both sides are firm adherents to the doctrine of sustainability in one manner or another (mayors Hessian (R) and Verner (D) in Spokane).

What most progressives or liberals do not understand is socialism is not about making things better for the poor at the expense of large corporations. It is precisely about enriching large corporations by killing competition from small businesses. John D. Rockefeller said, “Competition is a sin,” and he meant it. What is the best way to eliminate competition? By using the apparatus of government to force them out of business. Increased regulations put a large regulatory compliance burden on small mom and pop units, which do not have the revenue base for the economies of scale to cover this overhead. Burdensome regulations will force them out of business. Our legal system has become a tool by which only those companies with armies of attorneys and very deep pockets get a fair shake. We have eliminated international trade barriers, so large corporations can make goods in sweat shops overseas and import them back to the United States to compete with domestic businesses. Incidentally, elimination of trade barriers is a hallmark of the UN Agenda 21 plan!

It is no wonder that large financial interests financed Lenin’s Bolshevik takeover of the Soviet Union, the rise of Hitler’s national socialism in Germany, and Chairman Mao’s Communist revolution in China. In none of these centrally controlled tyrannies was the lot of the poor made better; however, those in power exercised tremendous control over those below them. Those in control lived lavishly, not like the Communist dream of “equity” in the idealist literature. Socialism is the lie spoon fed to the masses, like the ideals of democracy, sustainability, and manmade climate change, to get people to go along with the corporatist takeover of their property rights. This is what we are fighting. It is “We the People”, as individuals and small business owners, against global multinational corporations who promote the sustainability agenda to increase control and corporate profits, making the average person dependent on these same corporations and the state itself.

________________________
AFTER AMERICA Info on Agenda 21
John R. Houk
© November 28, 2010
____________________
AGENDA 21 Exposted
After America’s Blog


SlantRight Editor: this post had what appeared to be links to corroborating sources; however on my browser the apparent links did not work.

Fear Factor: Sarah Palin and 2012

Gina Loudon

Yep, it is true. I am a Sarah Palin supporter. Check out this Big Government post by Dr. Gina Loudon.

JRH 11/28/10

Saturday, November 27, 2010

Stick With the Founding Fathers Original Design

Founding Fathers sm
John R. Houk
© November 27, 2010

Here is an interesting American Thinker article with ideas to balance the economic ship USS Economy. In politics I am on board with the principles of balanced budgets, Free Market economics, Less Government, Less Taxes and so on. I am on board with these principles on faith more than knowledge. Frankly I am a Conservative more because of Social Conservatism, Pro-Family Values, Pro-Biblical Christian faith, a Conservative slant on First Amendment Rights, I am very Second Amendment (i.e. that of individuals to bear arms), the reinstitution of State Sovereignty according to the Tenth Amendment and so on.

When it comes to Conservative Economics or Tea Party Economics I am in a position of choosing who to trust in what is good for America. As a student of history I can read what the effect Liberal or Leftist Economics has accomplished to benefit people. That benefit is nonexistent.

Leftist Economics have the modern world’s greatest genocides into existence. The worst thing Right Wing Economics have done is exploitation of working class people by Big Business. By Big Business I mean organized markets that benefit companies and corporations more than or perhaps rather than the well-to-do that might employ them. This means in the early days of Big Business when the ruling elite of nations were most often European Noblemen or close offspring thereof, the common man was way more exploited economically and in Human Rights than what should have been morally unacceptable as members of Christian nations.

I suspect a few national revolutions changed this unequal existence between the upper class and the common man. Here are a few of those revolutions which are not exhaustive, but are from skimming the top of my humble mind:

The Magna Carter of 1215 and later revisions

Magna Carta (Latin for "Great Charter", literally "Great Paper") was drawn up in 1215 to limit the power of English Monarchs, especially King John, from absolute rule.

Magna Carta was the result of disagreements between the Pope and King John and his barons over the rights of the king: Magna Carta required the king to renounce certain rights and respect certain legal procedures, and to accept that the will of the king could be bound by law.

Magna Carta is widely considered to be the first step in a long historical process leading to the rule of constitutional law, much of English Common Law can be traced back to Magna Carta.

The gist of the gripe the Barons had with King John was that he had too much power and they too little.

The Barons had the populace behind them, in as much as anyone took any notice of the populace.


The deal struck between Parliament and the royal couple in 1688-89 was that Parliament would support the war against France, while William and Mary would accept new constraints on their authority. The new constitution reflected the relative weakness of William's bargaining position more than any strength in Parliament's position. Parliament feared the return of James, but William very much needed England's willing support in the war against France because the costs would be extraordinary and William would be focused on military command instead of political wrangling.

The initial constitutional settlement was worked out in 1689 in the English Bill of Rights, the Toleration Act, and the Mutiny Act that collectively committed the monarchs to respect Parliament and Parliament's laws. Fiscal power was settled over the 1690s as Parliament stopped granting the monarchs the authority to collect taxes for life. Instead, Parliament began regular re-authorization of all taxes, Parliament began to specify how new revenue authorizations could be spent, Parliament began to audit how revenue was spent, and Parliament diverted some funds entirely from the king's control (Dickson 1967: 48-73). By the end of the war in 1697, the new fiscal powers of Parliament were largely in place.

American Revolutionary War (1775 – 83) and Formation of the USA

·       Many, many things caused the revolution. From the economic problems, to the discontent with autocratic rule.

·       Also, the colonies were not allowed their own economy to flourish, not letting the colonials print legal tender money which also in turn, since any monies printed was not considered by the King, it made it much harder to pay royal taxes. After the Boston Tea Party, came the Coercive Acts, or the Intolerable Acts on Boston, which really upset them and made them want to take even more action, rather than just using effigies (dolls made to look like the redcoats and used to scare the redcoat's and boycotting.

·       Reasons for American Revolution: Taxation without representation in parliament. Colonials thought the English could not control colonies from so far away. (across the pond) Money, people like John Hancock did not want to pay taxes on his goods being brought into the docks or sent to England, import and export. (Some Wiki answers listed on Answers.com)

The objective of the constitution was to create a strong elected government that would be responsive to people’s will. Although many founding fathers believed that the new government had to be insulated from the will of the people. The constitutional features were included like the Electoral College and the election of the senate by state legislatures. (From: U.S. Constitution: A Short History)

… As adopted, the Constitution included only a few specific rights guarantees: protection against states impairing the obligation of contracts (Art. I, Section 10), provisions that prohibit both the federal and state governments from enforcing ex post facto laws (laws that allow punishment for an action that was not criminal at the time it was undertaken) and provisions barring bills of attainder (legislative determinations of guilt and punishment) (Art. I, Sections 9 and 10).  The framers, and notably James Madison, its principal architect, believed that the Constitution protected liberty primarily through its division of powers that made it difficult for an oppressive majorities to form and capture power to be used against minorities.

… In the ratification debate, Anti-Federalists opposed to the Constitution, complained that the new system threatened liberties, and suggested that if the delegates had truly cared about protecting individual rights, they would have included provisions that accomplished that.  With ratification in serious doubt, Federalists announced a willingness to take up the matter of  a series of amendments, to be called the Bill of Rights, soon after ratification and the First Congress  comes into session.  The concession was  undoubtedly  necessary to secure the Constitution's hard-fought ratification.

James Madison was skeptical of the value of a listing of rights, calling it a "parchment barrier."  … Despite his skepticism, by the fall of 1788, Madison believed that a declaration of rights should be added to the Constitution. Its value, in Madison's view, was in part educational, in part as a vehicle that might be used to rally people against a future oppressive government, and finally--in an argument borrowed from Thomas Jefferson--Madison argued that a declaration of rights would help install the judiciary as "guardians" of  individual rights against the other branches. …

Some members of Congress argued that a listing of rights of the people was a silly exercise, in that all the listed rights inherently belonged to citizens, and nothing in the Constitution gave the Congress the power to take them away.  It was even suggested that the Bill of Rights might reduce  liberty by giving force to the argument that all rights not specifically listed could be infringed upon.  In part to counter this concern, the Ninth Amendment was included providing that "The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage other rights retained by the people." …


In the end, we owe opponents of the Constitution a debt of gratitude, for without their complaints, there would be no Bill of Rights.  Thomas Jefferson wrote, "There has just been opposition enough" to force adoption of a Bill of Rights, but not to drain the federal government of its essential "energy."  George Washington agreed: "They have given the rights of man a full and fair discussion, and explained them in so clear and forcible manner as cannot fail to make a lasting impression." (Excerpted from: The Bill of Rights: Its History and Significance)

The French Revolution took a different path of bringing balance between the common man and the upper class. That path was bloody and little to do with offering Liberty and more to do eliminating the French Nobility Class including the French Monarchy with death sentences to transform French society from a nation of an entitled ruling class to an egalitarian Republic. The difference between the Republic of the United States of America and the French Republic are that the rights of man applied to all classes (at least in theoretical law) in America while the rights of man in France were based on fear of the French Republic government rooting out French Nobles (i.e. outright despotism).

The American Thinker article mentioned at the beginning of this post has to do with utilizing the tools the Founding Fathers left as a heritage and legacy of regrouping in potential perilous times. There are three authors to this essay: Raymond Richman, Howard Richman, and Jesse Richman. They postulate utilizing tariffs as a means of America equalizing trade with nations that undercut American production with cheap labor producing less expensive products. Then they postulate eliminating corporate income taxes in favor of sales taxes or Valued Added Taxes to encourage Corporations to keep their financial homes in America as well as foreign Corporations establishing American divisions in America. I’ll leave the details of these three author’s thoughts for you to read. The goal is to bring up employment in America which means an infusion of money into the economy which means economic growth.  

JRH 11/27/10