WHERE SOVEREIGNTY WENT

A few posts back I asked a question regarding the implementation by a President of an unratified treaty. I was seeking legal counsel on the subject, but so far have not received legal advice. Still waiting...I decided to research some more....

In case you think a President has restricted powers and that our election of a President is a rather inconsequential exercise of our voting process, you might want to rethink that. Yes, our Constitution gives each branch of government restrictions, "checks and balances" if you will. Not to let a little thing like that get in the way...our recent Presidents have completely ignored the premise of Constitutional restraint.

Evidently, the United States of America has hopped onto a process where we do things based on the United Nations' ideas of how America should be operating. The reason this has come to my attention is the implementation of a United Nations Treaty...under the name of the Rio Treaty or the Kyoto Treaty or Agenda 21...not three different treaties, but the same treaty under different names. (again, the global Marxists keep changing the names of things to deflect criticism and continue on their happy march to global Marxism.)

From Bill Clinton's creation of the President's Council on Sustainable Development, to Obama's creation of the White House Rural Council, we have two Presidents implementing Agenda 21, a United Nations treaty, WITHOUT Congressional approval.

Why would they do this?? They do it because #1. they know the treaty is not compatible with the United States Constitution, and #2. they know the people of the United States would not vote for one iota of it, and 3. they can put the revenue stream in place without our consent over use of our own money. So they do it anyway...by executive orders.

Well, the last time I checked, the President of the United States does not have dictatorial powers. These executive orders are illegal representations of a United Nations treaty that the American people don't want. Legal counsel, please advise.

Wikipedia on the word "Treaty" - Sole Executive Agreement

"A party's consent to a treaty is invalid if it had been given by an agent or body without power to do so under that state's domestic law. States are reluctant to inquire into the internal affairs and processes of other states, and so a “manifest” violation is required such that it would be “objectively evident to any State dealing with the matter". A strong presumption exists internationally that a head of state has acted within his proper authority. It seems that no treaty has ever actually been invalidated on this provision."

"A strong presumption exists internationally that a head of state has acted within his proper authority????" Well, I suggest we'd better not "presume" such a thing in the case of United States' Presidents, because they have done just the opposite. Electing a President who refuses to adhere to the will of the people or respect the U.S. Constitution is obviously a bigger problem than most people realize. Hence, the Presidential election is not so inconsequential after all...is it? We used to think that Congress and the Constitution held the reins on Presidents. Evidently not so much.

Wikipedia on the word "Treaty"

"In the United States, the term "treaty" has a different, more restricted legal sense than exists in international law. U.S. law distinguishes what it calls treaties from executive agreements, congressional-executive agreements, and sole executive agreements. All four classes are equally treaties under international law; they are distinct only from the perspective of internal American law. The distinctions are primarily concerning their method of ratification. Whereas treaties require advice and consent by two-thirds of the Senate, sole executive agreements may be executed by the President acting alone. Some treaties grant the President the authority to fill in the gaps with executive agreements, rather than additional treaties or protocols. And finally, congressional-executive agreements require majority approval by both the House and the Senate, either before or after the treaty is signed by the President."


Under the United States Constitution, no treaty is valid unless it is ratified by Congress. Yet, we now have Presidents implementing United Nations treaties and edicts without the consent of our representative Congress and thereby, without the consent of the American people. Evidently, from that last paragraph, a sole executive agreement is a treaty by executive order, the President acting alone. Yet, our Constitution requires Congressional ratification of a formal treaty. I'm confused. Are you??

I searched further to find that there is such a thing as a "sole executive agreement." This is also considered a treaty. I found more on that:
"Additionally, an international accord that is inconsistent with the U.S. Constitution is void under domestic U.S. law, the same as any other federal law in conflict with the Constitution. This principle was most clearly established in the case of Reid v. Covert.^[8] The Supreme Court could rule an Article II treaty provision to be unconstitutional and void under domestic law, although it has not yet done so."Cite Wikipedia on Treaty-Clause

"Although it has not yet done so????" Drat the luck! So, even if a President agrees to a United Nations treaty by his signature and / or implements the tenets of a treaty, it is still subject to adherence to the U.S. Constitution. But no one has nullified such actions?? No process or matter of regulation coming through our government by way of the United Nations' treaty compliance regarding sovereign land use, water use, energy use, etal, is consistent with our Constitutional rights. The rub is that we have local and state elected officials complying with the processes and regulations, thereby implementing a UN treaty, and bypassing referendum or voter consent in doing this. The process has become corrupt. The funding and dictates are coming from the executive branch of our government in order to implement the wishes of the United Nations for control over the U.S. Am I the only one who sees something wrong with this??

Our only hope is to UNELECT those who participate in this corrupt scheme of anti-Constitutional dictates, from Presidents all the way down to city councils and county commissioners.

Back to the Agenda 21 (Sustainable Development and Smart Growth) question of treaty implementation without the American voters' consent, I am still looking for legal counsel on the subject. There is nothing in our Constitution which gives the United Nations authority over our land use, energy use, water use, building codes, or anything else within the purview of our sovereign lands. Somehow American Presidents are swearing to uphold our Constitution, but at the same time, putting United Nations' orders and regulations into place using our Federal government as force and our taxes as funding. All of this without Congressional consent.

This is where our sovereignty went. How and when do we get it back??

ONCE AGAIN MULTICULTURALISM IS DEAD - DIVERSITY DOESN"T WORK

Think Asian Carp and Kudzu. Previous post on the subject Some things just aren't good to incorporate into a homogenized society. If you look at Europe as the test case for importing cheap labor from groups of people who have no interest in immersing themselves into the culture of the host country, you'd have to admit the test failed to ameliorate the goals. What has happened has been a chaotic clash of cultures. History could have taught this anyway, but evidently there are people who get into powerful positions in governments who have never studied history and have some unfounded and abstract idea of how to run the planet. This has been a costly mistake over the ages and especially recently for France, Germany, and now the Netherlands.

Netherlands Abandoning Multiculturalism At American Thinker today, Thomas Lifson reports:
"A new integration bill (covering letter and 15-page action plan), which Dutch Interior Minister Piet Hein Donner presented to parliament on June 16, reads: "The government shares the social dissatisfaction over the multicultural society model and plans to shift priority to the values of the Dutch people. In the new integration system, the values of the Dutch society play a central role. With this change, the government steps away from the model of a multicultural society."

Let this be a harbinger of smart thinking to the coming leadership of America. The Progressive mantras of "Diversity," "Multicuralism,"and even "Social Justice" are ideas wrought in the halls of anti-culturalism studies in universities. Anti-culturalism and multiculturalism are two sides of the same coin. (two names for the same thing.) By placing the ideology of "multiculturalism" into a cohesive society with traditional morés and laws, you are, in total effect, eliminating cohesiveness and diluting a culture into incompatible factions, i.e. creating an anti-culture. When our forefathers gave us the freedom to associate, they meant for people of common interests to associate with each other, unfettered by unreasonable interference by government. What progressives have done is to force incompatible cultures into what was a cohesive culture and call it "Multiculturalism," or "Diversity."

Common interests could include many things, but France, Germany, and now the Dutch have learned that they have allowed immigrating populations into their countries who have little or no common interests with the host cultures. (We could have told them this from the lessons of the fall of the Roman Empire, but would they have listened?"

Now if we can only educate our leadership to take that lesson and apply it to our own country, we'd be light years ahead of the curve once again. Instead, we have historically illiterate imbeciles requiring "Diversity" and "Multicultural" programs in order to qualify for government grants and subsidies, using our own tax dollars to implement a deliberate destruction of the American culture. Yes, there was, and hopefully still is, an American culture based on a cohesive determination of our laws and morés....and no, this does not mean we can't enjoy some different cuisine in American restaurants or a dance review by some talented Russians or Irish. The line of demarcation inevitably comes when mass chaos of too many competing values, laws, languages, and morés ensues when concentrated in one place. Hopefully, some adult with wisdom arrives to draw both a figurative and literal line in the sand. That is what has happened in Europe. The mistakes of "Multicuralism" and "Diversity" are what they are trying to put the brakes on in Europe. If only our country would get the message.

Well, today I congratulate the Dutch for recognizing the error of their ways and doing something to try to reverse the tide. I guess the question remains on what to do with all of those people who refuse to assimilate. We'll be watching.

OBAMA'S HOLOMODOR - WHITE HOUSE RURAL COUNCIL

I'm not sure how much evidence Americans need to realize the guy in the White House is a serious Communist, but the creation of Obama's Rural Council on June 9th is about the most any hopey-changey person would need.

The executive order states, “To enhance the Federal Government’s efforts to address the needs of rural America, this order establishes a council to better coordinate Federal programs and maximize the impact of Federal investment to promote economic prosperity and quality of life in our rural communities.”

Gee, doesn't that sound nice? In case no one is noticing, the Federal government has no Constitutional authority to do anything with rural communities. Rural communities are within the purview of the states, not the Federal government.

The order covers 16% of the American population who lives in rural counties because they “supply our food, fiber, and energy, safeguard our natural resources, and are essential in the development of science and innovation.” Cite

Well, isn't that news to us all...?? That our rural areas are agrarian and supply natural resources to the rest of us? I guess Obama thought we didn't notice that, so he ought to take charge of those areas. You know he can do what no one else can, such as; make the oceans recede and lower the temperatures of the planet, and increase jobs, too!! What a guy!

"On June 9, 2011, an Executive Order established the White House Rural Council with 25 executive branch departments including Defense, Justice, Homeland Security, National Drug Control, Environmental Quality, Labor, Commerce, Interior, EPA, Housing, Health, Education to name just a few. " Cite

Executive orders are becoming more and more intrusive, brash, and prevalent. I wonder when these executive orders get rescinded...?? Do we ever see that happen? I've seen those cute photo ops with all of the former Presidents standing side by side and smiling, being buddies as if in an exclusive club. Maybe there is some unwritten rule that Presidents just don't undo what the previous Presidents did out of some sort of hat tip to the guy who went before them. Whatever the reason, the "ticking time bombs" these guys put into place never seem to go away. So whoever gets the White House the next time is the lucky inheritor of the White House Rural Council? And Bush and Obama have inherited the President's Council on Sustainable Development. And so on...without end? So the executive branch of Czars and unelected bureaucratic monsters just keep multiplying over time. Trust me we are already covered up with them. Swamped. Suffocated. Saturated.

When it comes to Bill Clinton's President's Council on Sustainable Development and this new one, the White House Rural Council, the limits have been broken. Both of these are anti-property rights programs. Land use, natural resources, water, even "views" are now under siege by the White House.

We know Obama knows this is an un-Constitutional over-reach, a slap in the face of all Americans. But he doesn't care. Why would a Communist care about such things. His goal is to turn all of America into an outdated soviet style system put together by collectivist ideology. That's his idea of "progress?"

This has happened before in the last century. And it didn't turn out too well actually. Lenin set the collectivization of rural Ukraine in motion before Stalin took it and ran with it. Between the two of them, the Ukraine suffered beyond description. It is the other holocaust you don't hear about. And now we have a parade of American Presidents putting the same collectivism in place here in the U.S., one building on the last one's authoritarian creep against our freedom.

I wrote about the Ukrainian Holomodor in February 2010. So here is the History Lesson of the Day

Joseph Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union, set in motion events designed to cause a famine in the Ukraine to destroy the people there seeking independence from his rule. As a result, an estimated 7,000,000 persons perished in this farming area, known as the breadbasket of Europe, with the people deprived of the food they had grown with their own hands.

Stalin also imposed the Soviet system of land management known as collectivization. This resulted in the seizure of all privately owned farmlands and livestock, in a country where 80 percent of the people were traditional village farmers.

My previous post on the Holomodor in Ukraine

Evidently Obama has learned his lessons well from his Communist parents. The liberation of Libya from Ghadaffi is his current fascination, while here at home he intends to enslave our entire population. He is working successfully on the price rationing of energy and energy starvation here and now. How long before he, and the inheriting Presidents coming after him, implement rationing of food, fibers, natural resources, and all else in America? Smart Meters anyone?

What a bad joke this and these past Presidents are. I'm not laughing. The Ukrainian dead are not laughing. The Ukrainian dead are telling us their story for good reason.

We have to find a Presidential candidate for 2012 and candidates forever beyond who are bound to the U.S. Constitution and the sovereignty of our nation...AND who believe in states rights through the 10th amendment. The Federal government was never meant to be this powerful and the United Nations does not have jurisdiction over our nation.


Bunkerville Exposé on Obama's Rural Council
Judicial Watch on Obama's Rural Council

THE GREAT DIVIDE OF CURRENT EVENTS

Everywhere I look, on every issue, I am seeing America split into two camps. You are either a "Progressive" big government, gay promoting, pro-amnesty, green zealot, or you are a "Constitutionalist" small government, freedom lover. Our country divided is unfriendly, uncivil, unhappy, and suffering from a lack of cohesive citizenship, pitting false ideas of victimhood against the formula for individual success. There is no joy in Mudville lately.

Our country is broken in a way I believe is comparable to the days leading up to the Civil War. And like the Civil War era, this has come upon us gradually and insidiously. Families and friends were lined up on two different sides of the issues of the day; slavery, states rights , tariffs, and a wide divide in economic prosperity between the states. You could say that slavery was the underlying most critical issue of all and that is what drove the divide to the ultimate culmination of war. And I believe you would be mostly correct on that point. But I would also add that states rights - federalism was the Constitutional structure most challenged over the issue of slavery. In that way, slavery became a Constitutional crisis.

Since the days of the Civil War and the construction of the Communist Manifesto, the divide has only grown. Each current issue (as slavery was) is now an attack on the Constitution. Every issue arising in the public square becomes a divisive sticky wicket that people don't seem to know how to address and/or dismiss as either part of our way of life or not. This is what happens when chaos begins.

Does the Federal government have the right to force you to buy healthcare? Does the Federal government have the right to dictate what lightbulbs are sold? Does the Federal government have the right to use our taxes, i.e. grant money, to implement United Nations' projects? Does the Federal government have the right to force states to educate illegal aliens? Legally, under the Constitution, the answer is no to all of the above. Yet we are surrounded by people who have no idea that the government does not have those rights.

What was a racial slavery issue in the early days of our Republic is now an all encompassing class issue, teetering on the brink of enslavement of the entire mass population of America....all because the Constitution is being ignored and because government bureaucrats are, quite simply stated, completely out of control. Power over others is an aphrodisiac. Give a man or woman a job as a bureaucrat, where he or she can wield power over fellow citizens, and the man or woman will go home every night feeling drunk with power. Convince young students that their role in life is to go forth and tell everyone else how to live and what to do...and you have a generation of people who don't know how to do anything else. Conversely, do not teach young students to create anything or learn a skill of real worth...and you have a generation of people who will flounder and depend on government to pay their way. (by real worth I mean..farming, manufacturing, engineering, communicating, managing wealth, fishing, retail management, etc. etc.) The culmination of this is a huge segment of the population who knows nothing but regurgitating the government rules they have been taught to force onto others.

The goal of Progressives is collective Federal force against the individual. The goal of Constitutionalists is celebrating individual gifts and successes, forcing no one into paying for someone else, i.e. allowing individual liberty. The dichotomy is that the slavery issue from the Civil War has been translated into whether or not you can buy an incandescent light bulb or purchase your own healthcare insurance. In this way, the Constitutional crisis of slavery has become a Constitutional crisis of personal choices, a catalyst for enslavement of the entire population of America. Federalism has been turned on its head.

I am struck by the vehement adherence to these un-Constitutional dictates that I see in some people around me. It is as if our cultural conversations are on two completely different planets. It's nice to think we have common ground, but it is obvious we don't. "Never the twain shall meet" is the motto of the day. Opposites, in this case, do not attract, but repel each other. I am repelled by the Progressive, Marxist, big government people I hear and see in our society. Seriously repelled. I don't see common ground with them. There is none.

I read recently (sorry I didn't grab the link) that the Progressives' admonition of "old white dead men" being responsible for the Constitution somehow never becomes "old white dead men" are responsible for the Progressive movement, i.e. Marx, Engels, Popper, Wilson, Lenin, Mao, George Bernard Shaw, and more. I'm not ashamed to say, I like our "old dead white men" better than theirs.

The Constitution can and should prevail in its brilliant assurances of individual freedom from slavery, from slavery by the Federal government, from slavery by tyranny at all levels of government. Those who wish to enslave others to their own power agenda have no place in America...just as those who wished to continue the practice of African slavery had no place in America. The slavery of Progressivism is the same, only this time it is slavery of all people. Our current events are just that...current incarnations of the same old divide. We need to let them know this, in no uncertain terms. The beginning of the end of the Progressive Era has come. We've fought this fight before and we won. They don't win....we do.

This post is also seen at PunditHouse.com
This post is also seen at Conservatives On Fire!
Another great post on this subject at Crockett Lives

IMPLEMENTING AN UNRATIFIED TREATY - AGENDA 21

Is there a legal scholar out there who can help me with the issue of: Can the states, counties and cities implement an international treaty without the authorization of Congressional ratification? If you are out there, I'd love to hear from you.

As I have been trying to figure out the key to stopping the insanity of Agenda 21 - Sustainable Development - Smart Growth, a reader sent me an interesting proposition regarding the illegality of implementing these Agenda 21 / Rio Climate Treaty tenets without the ratification by our Congress. The reader asserts that because the Treaty was never ratified, the states, counties and cities are illegally adopting the Treaty anyway. I agree. However, I'm not sure what legal standing the people have to stop this insanity.

There is a modern, recent, term called "Soft Law." Basically, "soft law" refers to regulations that are not founded in Constitutional law, but are put in place arbitrarily without formalization by the voters. An example of "soft law" is the adoption of a "Vision Plan" to regulate citizen activity without referendum and without the knowledge of the voters. "Soft law" is giving legislators the power to go around the voters by using "stakeholder councils," corporations, NGO's, and activist groups as evidence of some sort of consensus. Consensus is not a referendum on a ballot. The consensus achieved this way is invalid. Consensus, in this scenario, is merely achieved by putting some like-minded people in a room with a facilitator to create a false idea of what "people" want. But it is just a few people and the outcome is always what those few people want...not a representation of the voters at large. What happens then is the outcome is presented to local councils and commissioners, and even state legislators, to convince the elected officials to enact a rule or regulation that the actual mass of the voting public doesn't want or never even heard of. This is an abuse of power and an attack on the rule of law in America. It is crony politics at its worst. And the voters are left with losing liberties by the boat load while the "stakeholders" get the cream off the top of everything.

"Soft law" is exactly how Sustainable Development is being forced on the public without consent or knowledge. "Soft law" is Smart Growth zoning and regulations which completely impede the free flow of commerce and property rights. Hard law is what our nation bases our rules upon. Hard law is being ignored and, for all intents and purposes, being removed from our governmental structure.

Article from Canada Free Press On Constitutional Powers
"So! Does The Constitution grant to Congress the power to make laws respecting the reduction of carbon dioxide, methane, water vapor, etc. “emissions”? Is transferring wealth from Americans to “poor” nations to compensate them for our “past emissions” one of the enumerated powers of Congress? Does The Constitution grant to the Executive Branch jurisdiction over carbon dioxide, methane, and water vapor?"

My questions for our legal scholar are: Are the cities, counties and states enacting an international treaty without ratification by Congress? And if so, isn't that illegal? And, if illegal, how can the voters stop and annul the offending regulations? As above, does the Congress have the power to regulate redistribution of our money on the basis of natural animal emissions or water vapor? (the majority of CO2 is water vapor)

Write to me if you have some answers for this! I'm hoping we can stop the madness through the rule of law, assuming anyone here in America still holds the Constitution as the basis for our laws.

Linked on Conservative Hideout

TEA PARTY IS ONTO AGENDA 21

Below is a copy of the speech I am presenting at our local Tea Party meeting tomorrow night. The topic of Agenda 21 is finally beginning to gain exposure in mid to small cities across the country due to the over-reach of unelected governmental organizations which are over-riding the will of the voters. I am hoping this is not a day late and a dollar short....but at least I could say it is better late than never. You may read the speech here and have a preview of what I hope is the beginning of the end of Agenda 21 in America.

Here it is:

Thank you for coming and showing your concern for our city, county and most of all our government. I’m here because I am a concerned citizen and I have important information to share with you regarding regulations being put into place without voter approval.

Every time I opened the newspaper over the last few years I began to see a recurring pattern of legislations emerge from our mayor, council and commissioners that I have never seen on a ballot. I kept asking myself, “Where is this coming from?” “Where are they getting these crazy ideas?” “Who gave them the authority to do this or that?” So I decided I needed to do some research and find out who, what, why…. and how this was happening to our area. I’m also here because I believe we need to act decisively and fast to stop an anti-American juggernaut, born in the United Nations, called Agenda 21. We need to vet our political candidates to expose their positions on the subjects of Sustainable Development. Smart Growth, and ultimately, Agenda 21. What I found is very complicated, so I am going to try to give you a brief synopsis and I hope you will research this subject yourselves.

While I am speaking to you, I want you to think about 2 things….POWER and MONEY.

So…

What is Agenda 21? First, I want you to know it is NOT a conspiracy theory. Agenda 21 is a United Nations plan…a 40 chapter document….a “Vision Statement for Our Planet for the 21^sst Century” that was promoted at the United Nations Earth Summit at the Rio Conference in 1992. George Bush Sr. signed onto Agenda 21 at the Rio Conference. But, when the “Vision” of Agenda 21 was exposed to our Congress as a UN treaty, our Congress did not ratify it. For good reason. Agenda 21 usurps sovereignty, property rights, economic liberty, and basically hands over power, resources and land to unelected elitists… to control the populations of every country in the world. Agenda 21 purports to address environmental issues, but calls for wealth redistribution, resource redistribution, food redistribution, energy restrictions, supposed social justice, and more. It is NOT about the environment, though it pretends to be. The phrase Sustainable Development became the popular term in America to define Agenda 21. It is a political ideology being infused into every level of government in America. In short, it’s a Marxist plan for global control of everything.. with the United Nations at the head of central planning.

Agenda 21 is comprised of 8 program topics. These are:

Agriculture

Biodiversity and Ecosystem Management

Education

Energy and Housing

Population

Public Health

Resources and Recycling

Transportation and Sustainable Economic Development

When our Congress refused to ratify the treaty, Bill Clinton established the President’s Council on Sustainable Development (PCSD) in order to implement Agenda 21 through federal government agencies such as HUD, DOT, DOE, and the EPA. Environmentalists saw this as an open door to Federal government financing. As Sustainable Development grants and subsidies penetrated the revenue stream, corporations, non-profits, the American Planning Association, thousands of environmental groups, local city and county governments all jumped on the bandwagon to grab the money.

As time has marched on over the past twenty years, you have seen indoctrination at all levels of our society to support the global agenda of Sustainable Development. When you started hearing about man-made Global Warming it was because of the United Nations pushing for Agenda 21 / Sustainable Development in America. In my research I found substantial evidence that there is no such thing as man-made Global Warming and …by the way, CO2 is not a pollutant. When man-made Global Warming was proven to be false, they changed the name to man-made Climate Change. Now we are hearing about man-made Climate “Disruption.” They keep changing the names to try to draw you in. Smart Growth, a nice sounding name for central planning, is the tool to implement Agenda 21 in cities and counties across the country. CO2 restrictions and man-made “Climate Change” are not about environmental issues. They are, however, about controlling wealth and resources. (I can give you more information on how that is taking place without your vote… if you wish to contact me later.)

http://washingtonexaminer.com/node/524827

This week I read an article by Mark Tapscott – who is a Former Heritage Foundation director for media and public policy and has long list of other credentials. He explains:

Quote: “Today’s environmental movement includes hundreds of environmental nonprofits in Washington, D.C., that employ thousands of political activists, community organizers, media strategists, policy analysts, legislative tacticians, fundraisers, think tank managers, computer programmers, and experts with every other important skill imaginable."

"The movement receives billions of dollars in annual funding from government grants and contracts, activist liberal foundations, individual billionaires like George Soros, and legions of smaller donors around the country responding to direct mail and Internet appeals for money.”

"They marshal thousands of volunteers during political campaigns and direct millions of dollars to favored candidates and incumbents at all levels of government."

"They help train journalists in covering environmental issues, teach millions of elementary, secondary, and post-secondary public and private school students, and occupy posts throughout government wherever decisions are made on where people can live, what they drive, how they earn a living, and virtually every other aspect of daily American life.” End quote.

Another supporting article here:

http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/special-reports/examiner-special-report-big-green-environmentalists-aren-t-really-about-clea

So here we are in 2011 and every day we see our council and commissioners working with unelected boards and regional government organizations who are not accountable to the voters. We’ve seen greenway maps laid over our county and city regardless of who owns what property. We’ve seen our mayor and council use eminent domain to support a local greenway. We’ve seen wealthy individuals buying up land in order to donate it in perpetuity to lands conservancy projects, enriching themselves with tax breaks and impoverishing the taxpayers with maintenance of property that is now held collectively. We’ve seen projects for infill, high-density living centers, mixed use developments which increase traffic congestion, expensive light rail projects, and downtown development which is subsidized by an extra tax burden on everyone….all of this instead of allowing private enterprise and the free market to work. They used to talk about watersheds….now they include something called “view”sheds. That means if you own property with a nice view, it should become part of the collective and restricted or owned by government. The appetite for control of wealth, land and resources is huge.

Sustainable Development - Smart Growth is being implemented locally through the Centralina Council of Governments, the Catawba Regional Council of Governments, the UDO, the American Planning Association, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the SEQL Sustainable Development for Quality of Life). DENR (Dept. of Environment and Natural Resources) and countless Non-governmental organizations. …too many to list here. None of these groups are accountable to the voters, yet our council and commissioners are taking grants and subsidies from these groups and the federal government to implement tax funded projects about which the voters have no say and most likely don’t want. The grants and subsidies come with strings….you play their game or your don’t get the money. The strings have become complete strangulation of our liberties.

So….what can you and I do about this?

We have local elections this fall and we have national and state elections in 2012. We must find candidates who will reject Sustainable Development and Smart Growth who will bring sovereignty back to the United States and to our local area. The country is broke and 14 trillion dollars in debt. The state is broke and in debt. Gastonia and Gaston County are not flush with expendable capital. Recently we are told we have no money to buy a necessary fire truck for city safety. But we have money to subsidize taking private property for a greenway? We have money for subsidizing infill projects, but no money for services to neighborhoods, such as trash pick-up? That doesn’t make sense to me. Does that make sense to you?

Using tax money and borrowing… putting us further into debt in order to implement a system that takes away our Constitutional rights is suicidal. There are ways to protect the environment, our food supplies, our water supplies, and our property rights without wrecking the American way of life in the process. Our country is only successful as long as our Constitution survives. The juggernaut of Agenda 21 is in place and it is up to us to dismantle it. Agenda 21 is wrecking our country faster than a catfish can swim across the Catawba River. We need to act now to get rid of Agenda 21.

Again…I have lots of information on this that I will share with you if you wish to contact me.

Thanks for coming….and thanks for being concerned about this vital issue!

WHERE DID WE GO?

I'm going to be visited by my son and his family soon, an occurrence that is all too rare. He is career Air Force, so coming home is a big deal to us. The world seems to be his oyster. When he was growing up I don't know if I ever imagined his life would involve so much travel to such far away places.

There is a Dr. Seuss book called, "Oh, The Places You'll Go." It's a child's book, but someone gave it to us when my son graduated from high school. When I read it I cried and cried. I must have had a gut feeling that this was it...the end of childhood and the beginning of his big, grown-up life out there in the big, grown-up world. It took me a month to even walk back into his room when he left for the Air Force Academy. Maybe this says something about how much fun we had as he grew up. He and his sister and I had a wonderful time supporting each other and learning so much about coping with and enjoying the world. Sometimes, still, even though he is doing just great, when we hang up the phone I will just burst into tears. It's so silly...but I can't seem to help it.

Anyway, I was reading an article by Mona Charen this morning about preparing to send her son off to college. It brought all those emotions back to me. She writes about the leftist take-over of "higher education" in America. All the hopes of America being dashed in American Universities. When I sent my son to USAFA 16 years ago, I believed an American military academy would be one of the best places for instilling an appreciation for American history. In recent years the Air Force Academy has installed a place of worship for Wiccans and Gaia worshipers. Who'da thunk it? And when my daughter went through a popular state university to study finance and business, she was not exposed to Western Civilization classes, as Mona Charen points out. In my daughter's case, she is avidly now interested in American history and is catching up on what she missed by studying on her own.

Mona Charen writes for Townhall below:

"In "The Vanishing West," the NAS examined the curricula at 50 leading colleges over time. In 1964, all of them required some sort of Western civilization survey course or interdisciplinary course treating the same themes. They began with Greek civilization and encompassed Rome, the rise of Christianity, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, literature, art, music, the history of science, political philosophy, the modern era, and so forth. By 2010, none of the 50 colleges required any course in Western Civ. Even for history majors, survey courses on Western civilization are rarely required. The same is true for American history."

"Students can still find courses on these subjects, but only as choices in a vast cafeteria of offerings that also includes courses like "Lesbian Queer Media Cultures" (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign), "The Living and the UnDead: An Inquiry into Zombies in Cinema and Literature" (University of Mississippi), "the Militarization of American Daily Life" (Oberlin), and "The American Sexual Past" (Temple University). The term "higher education" is fast becoming a misnomer. American students are graduating with scads of courses on zombies and queer theory -- which is why we're importing an ever-larger number of our Ph.D.s."

If we don't know how we got here, we are going to lose site of our destination, which is to be the "shining city on the hill," as Reagan put it. Freedom exists in the blood of our fathers who gave it to us. That same blood courses through our veins. Denying the foundations of freedom in America is suicidal...and I'm not feeling particularly suicidal, thank you very much. Nor am I feeling like throwing away my children's futures for some Marxist tyranny based on the destruction of our history.

So, when my son, wife, and four little cuties come to visit this month, I will be celebrating the blessings of having a family in what was the best country on earth. I will also be reminded of why we are fighting so hard to put America back on the path to our true destination; liberty for all. There is a lot at stake and a lot of work still to do.