May 4, 2015 | Constitution, Globalism
By Harold Pease, Ph. D
Many are still ignorant of the coming to fruition after a decade of numerous secret meetings, a huge trade agreement known as the Trans Pacific Partnership or TPP, first initiated under George W. Bush in 2005 and now pushed by Barack Obama, “which when finished, will govern 40 percent of U.S. imports and exports” and “26 percent of the world’s trade” (“Everything you need to know about the Trans Pacific Partnership,” Washington Post, Dec. 11, 2013). It will be the law of the land for the United States and 11 other countries in the Asia-Pacific region without the input of a single U.S. member of Congress. This in violation of Article I, Section I of the U.S. Constitution that mandates that all legislative powers reside in the House and Senate and in no other body. It also violates Article II, Section II that gives only the Senate power of advice and consent on treaties. But reportedly Senators requesting the proposed treaty have been refused access to the secret agreement whereas privileged corporations have no problem obtaining copies.
Critics, mostly Democrats and Tea Party proponents, resent the secretive nature of the agreement’s origin. Those feeling especially threatened include: global health advocates, environmentalists, Internet activists and trade unions. “The treaty has 29 chapters, dealing with everything from financial services to telecommunications to sanitary standards for food,” demonstrating the wide variety of areas believed to be affected by it, but again, it is the secretive nature of it that is most offensive. Apparently TPP participants signed “a confidentiality agreement requiring them to share proposals only with ‘government officials and individuals who are part of the government’s domestic trade advisory process’.” That excludes you, me, the media, and Congress.
Tea Party supporters oppose the treaty primarily because it violates two of its core values: constitutional limited government and the free market. They are also bothered by its likelihood of increasing illegal immigration and view it as a giant leap in the direction of world government because it replaces national sovereignty with international sovereignty. Neocon Republicans, like the Bush’s past and present, favor such agreements. Democrats oppose it primarily because it is likely to send jobs overseas, cost consumers more, and undermine environmental protections. The Democratic Party is split on the deal with Obama decidedly for it and Senator Elizabeth Warren and Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton expressing concerns over potential loss of American jobs. Republican presidential candidate Scott Walker shares the same concern over loss of American jobs. Again, both political parties abhor the secrecy and deception surrounding it.
Amplifying the concern over secrecy and deception is the president’s push for fast track status, meaning an up or down vote of both houses of congress with no debate or amendments. This is blatantly unconstitutional as it, in essence, voids them as the sole architects of law. They have a function far more worthy than merely approving or disapproving law made by benefiting corporations.
The Washington Post acknowledges that the agreement “encompass a broad range of regulatory and legal issues, making them a much more central part of foreign policy and even domestic lawmaking.” Such is curious. The Constitution requires the approval of your two U. S. Senators and your House member for every regulation upon you. There exists no language that any other individual or body—especially an international body—can perform this function. And, international law should not trump “domestic lawmaking.” You have the right to know that these three have read every rule emanating from the federal government upon you. Moreover, the admission that the TPP will influence foreign policy is interesting as only the U.S. Senate may influence foreign policy as per Article II, Section II. Giving a “more central part of foreign policy” to an international agency virtually voids the Constitution in this area and would have been thought treasonous by our Founders.
Were it not for Wikileaks who published the chapter on intellectual property in early November 2013, this and so much more would still be off limits to the media and everyone else. This chapter alone raised many questions about copyright protections and obviously this treaty, while billed as just a trade agreement, included music, film, books, the Internet and appeared to be potentially, as one critic called it, the treaty to “restrict access to knowledge.” And this is but one of 29 chapters.
International law imposed by an army of unelected bureaucrats is not freedom. The Trans Pacific Partnership siphons decision-making power from the elected to the non-elected in a foreign land and will affect every American. Any Congressman, or president, who supports such violates his oath of office “to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
Dr. Harold Pease is a syndicated columnist and an expert on the United States Constitution.
Jan 19, 2015 | Globalism, Liberty Articles
By Harold Pease, Ph. D
First Jeb Bush, then Mike Huckabee, and most recently Mitt Romney have each announced an interest in becoming the Republican Party nomination for president in 2016. The problem is, as is the problem with every election for many presidential elections, they, as with the media appointed Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, are all members of, endorsed by, or notably friendly to the international banking special interest group, the Council on Foreign Relations. Indeed for decades the CFR has not let anyone close to the nomination of either party for president that is not subject to their influence.
No special interest group has had more impact than the CFR over foreign policy in the 20th Century, leading many to question if we have but one political party in the United States with two arms. Indeed, many see no significant difference in foreign policy between George W. Bush and Barack Obama. Nor was there any between George Bush and Bill Clinton. CFR candidate Barack Obama, probably the most anti-war candidate in a couple of decades, and so condemnatory of his predecessor in this area, as president not only continued the Bush wars but added Libya, central Africa and now Iraq and Syria to the list while sponsoring drone killings in Pakistan, Syria, and Somali. History will view him as having been as pro-war as George W. Bush.
Obama’s previous Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, probably admitted more than she was supposed to in her address at the dedication of a branch CFR facility in Washington D. C., when she said that her source of direction was the CFR sub-center down the street. “I am delighted to be at these new headquarters. I have been often to the mother ship in New York City but it is good to have an outpost of the Council right here down the street from the State Department. We get a lot of advice from the Council so this will mean that I won’t have as far to go to be told what we should be doing and how we should think about the future.” Hillary Clinton Describes the Importance of the CFR 32511
Of those thus far indicating a 2016 intent to run for president only Mike Huckabee is remotely conservative but the CFR dominated media, because of his evangelical credentials, have undermined him as a serious candidate as they did Ron Paul, the only candidate for president in 2012 not CFR approved. Non-approved candidates are marginalized; as was Paul, “Nice guy but not likely to win,” type comments that with constant repetition become believed. “Why would anyone intentionally throw away his or her vote,” is the hidden message. Huckabee was once listed as a member of the CFR and presumably would follow instructions, at least on things that mattered to the establishment.
The next UN Ambassador, Secretary of State, Ambassadors to both Russia and China will be from this organization, as will a third of his/her cabinet. Not might be!! Will be!! No one gets to be president without its approval. No exception!! We get to choose which one of their approved party finalists we want, but the first election is theirs. I make the same prediction today for whoever follows Barack Obama to the presidency. Such has been the case since the Council on Foreign Relations was founded by its international banker creators J.P. Morgan and et in 1921. It is the special interest group of Wall Street, supported by grants from the Rockefeller, Carnegie, and Ford foundations. Its journal, Foreign Affairs, is “considered throughout the world to be the unofficial mouthpiece of U.S. foreign policy. Few important initiatives in U.S. policy have not been first outlined in articles in this publication.” The CFR promotes sovereignty transfers from all nations to the United Nations; indeed its end goal is world government.
The Bush family has been CFR attached long term. George Herbert Walker Bush was at one time a director and later loaded his administration with advisers from that group, as did his son George W. Bush (although not a listed member but his Vice President, Dick Cheney, was). One can expect the same for his brother Jeb who was co-chair of “CFR Task Force Report on U.S. Immigration Policy,” (July 2009). The current CFR membership roster does not list Mitt Romney as a member, and in 2007, he denied such. That said, the CFR website did have a very comprehensive and favorable outline of his policies on 22 foreign policy areas seemingly to invite support for him. They cite him as having published in their July/August 2007 magazine Foreign Affairs. They publish no one unless seen favorably by them. His selection of their organization as the source for a majority of his foreign policy and national security advisers suggests that a Romney Presidency will be managed by the CFR as with his predecessors.
This is why there is so little difference in foreign policy between democrats and republican presidents. They get their advisers from the same Wall Street special interest group pool. They all support extensive foreign aid, policing the world with over 900 military bases in other lands, and continual wars without declaration or pre-established end. They all support economic sovereignty transfers from all nations to the United Nations and outsourcing American jobs through regional partnership agreements. Likewise, they all support bank bailouts and their management of the money supply through the bankers own private Federal Reserve Bank. The one percent richest Americans heavily finance both parties. Neither represent, as first consideration, the poor or the middle class.
Dr. Harold Pease is a syndicated columnist and an expert on the United States Constitution.
Oct 20, 2014 | Constitution, Globalism, Liberty Articles
By Harold Pease, Ph. D
Three weeks ago President Barack Obama made it clear to the United Nations General Assembly that he no longer intended to be guided, at least in foreign policy, by the U.S. Constitution, “We cannot rely on a rule-book written for a different century,” he told them, then he advocated global government through the UN. “If we lift our eyes beyond our borders – if we think globally and act cooperatively,” he said, “We can shape the course of this century as our predecessors shaped the post-World War II age” (Obama UN Address Sept.24, 2014).
So with this clear directive to follow UN law, as established by those who “shaped the post-World War II age,” he spoke of the bombing of Syria to get rid of ISIS. This without either the permission of Congress, as required by Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution or that of the United Nations though the UN Charter. Nor did he seek permission from the sovereign country of Syria to invade, with warplanes their soil.
Is an attack warranted under international law and, if not, could we be viewed by the world as an aggressor nation? Consider the following United Nations Charter violations we incurred when we crossed the Syrian border without Syrian permission to illuminate ISIS: Article 2, Sec. 4, “All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state….” Even our threat of the use of force is a violation. The only exception to the use of force is self-defense as stipulated in Art. 51. “Nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective self-defence if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations, until the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain international peace and security.”
Obama has yet to make a case to the United Nations for attacking the sovereign country of Syria. He has not, and will not, because he would have to justify such action on the basis that Syria had first shown actual aggression toward us necessitating our responding in self-defense. This he cannot do. Yes, ISIS has a history of aggressive behavior, even beheading two U.S. citizens on Iraqi soil, but Assad had nothing to do with this and has not even been consulted in resolving the problem either approving or denying our war planes entering his country. Were U. S. citizens attacked by Syria we could respond in self-defense but we were not. According to the UN Charter such acts of aggression justifying self defense must immediately be provided to the UN Security Council who then decide “such action as it deems necessary in order to maintain or restore international peace and security.”
Do not get me wrong, I oppose world government and think it incompatible with a country’s sovereignty and liberty and want us to operate totally independent of it, but Obama made a strong case for global government declining to follow the Constitution that he swore to “uphold, defend, and preserve” in favor of it, yet he refused to follow its charter also. He must follow one or the other or he risks being accused of following no legal path.
Other United Nation Charter rules also need satisfied. Article 39 stipulates that “the Security Council shall determine the existence of any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression and shall make recommendations, or decide what measures shall be taken in accordance with Articles 41 and 42, to maintain or restore international peace and security.” Even before this takes place Article 40 must be satisfied which reads: “In order to prevent an aggravation of the situation, the Security Council may, before making the recommendations or deciding upon the measures provided for in Article 39, call upon the parties concerned to comply with such provisional measures as it deems necessary or desirable. Such provisional measures shall be without prejudice to the rights, claims, or position of the parties concerned. The Security Council shall duly take account of failure to comply with such provisional measures.” Obama went to the UN, not to comply with any of these instructions, but to tell them what he is already doing.
Theoretically Russia, China and Syria could ask the United Nations to define the United States as the aggressor nation and Obama as a war criminal and call for economic sanctions on us as has been used on other nations. That would be unlikely as they too are showing their own aggressive natures, Russia invading the Ukraine and China coming down oppressively on Hong Kong. Ironically Obama refuses to be guided by constitutional law or established international law—the very authority that he patronizes in his speech. And since we are the most powerful military power on earth the UN is not likely to press the matter, even more so as other countries, without UN or Syrian permission, are also bombing in Syria. Still, our signature on the Charter document obligates our submission to international law now mocked by Obama’s not following it. Did we think when we signed the Charter, creating the “world government,” that the rules did not apply to us, that we could just bomb whomever, whenever, and wherever we wished? Obama must think so.
Jul 29, 2014 | Constitution, Economy, Globalism, Immigration, Liberty Articles
Harold Pease, Ph. D
Clearly our borders are not protected when children can cross, reportedly unaided: if children, then anyone. If anyone then we cease to be a country. Historically borders define a country, when they cease to exist, or to have meaning or respect, the country soon also ceases to exist.
The first sentence of the Constitution, the Preamble, charges the federal government with the responsibility of providing for the common defense. All common defense powers (except the Commander and Chief component) are then listed as powers of Congress in Article I, Section 8. Protecting the border is clearly the responsibility of the Congress—who makes all the law. The executive branch enforces the law as written and understood by the Congress.
Clearly there exist laws forbidding illegal entry and clearly the executive branch has not, and is not, protecting the border. But such can be said of all presidents since before Ronald Reagan, although failure is more blatant now. I have told my students for 25 years that there would never be an effective southern border because neither political party really wanted one. I repeat this prediction today. The argument that our borders are too long to protect is easily dismissed when we reflect that the Chinese successfully kept barbarians out of China for hundreds of years by building the Great Wall without the aid of cranes, giant earth-moving trucks or any other technological marvels. Today, if we really wished to restrict entry, motion detectors, electric fences and drones could stop most, if not all the traffic.
I have consistently argued that The Council on Foreign Relations—-the most powerful special interest group in the United States– with vast influence in both parties and also in the establishment media, would not endorse any candidate for president pushing for a real border. A border where both countries had real security aimed at preventing passage. They have another plan called the North American Union patterned after the European Union.
This plan calls for the amalgamation of Mexico, the United States and Canada into first an economic union through NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement, ushered in during the Clinton Administration, followed eventually by a political union. Canada and the United States are already near economic equals but Mexico, and Central America, added later under the Central American Free Trade Agreement, or CAFTA, is not.
The North American Union plan, which has never been denied by the CFR, the powerful wall-street special interest group, is to give Mexico and south to Panama, thirty to forty years of near open border status to gain what they call “economic commonality” with their northern neighbors before political assimilation. (For those who may not understand, political assimilation is the end of the United States, the Constitution, and Bill of Rights, as we know them). Southern foreigners would invade the United States taking the jobs Americans did not want and send some of their new wealth back home to elevate their families and the economies of their homelands. Many would retire to their place of origin with pensions and other amenities acquired from the United States—perhaps even Social Security and Medicare. Their children would seek the middle and higher-level jobs and being bilingual would have advantage over their American peers.
Although most of us are not ready to talk of the late, great America and believe that just getting back to the Constitution will always keep America great, the present foreign child invasion of the United States does demonstrate a non-existent border and such is a serious threat to independence and sovereignty. Apparently, the signal has been sent to prepare us for an open dialogue on actually combining the three large countries into a single, North American Union. Two notables proponents of assimilating the countries, who “have woven” this theme into their recent public speeches, are House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, and former U.S. military commander and former head of the CIA, David Petraeus.
In The Margaret Thatcher Conference on Liberty, June 18, of this year in a panel discussion entitled “After America, What?” General Petraeus answered, “There is North America.” He went on to proclaim “the coming of the ‘North American decade,’ a vision he explained was founded on the idea of putting together the economies of the United States, Canada and Mexico, some 20 years after the creation of North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA” (Jerome Corsi, “What Comes ‘After America’?,” July 7, 2014).
If the children of foreign lands can cross our borders unaided, as contended, it is difficult to argue that we have a border. Look for the internationalist, who do not understand or value our sovereignty, to come out of the closet arguing that it is now time to open the borders to all who wish to come. Such are enemies of the republic and will destroy the United States, as we know it.
Jul 2, 2014 | Constitution, Globalism, Liberty Articles
Harold Pease, Ph. D
I awoke on a Sunday morning where I was visiting, a ray of light coming through the window. The window view showed side-by-side symbols; one of liberty, as represented by a small community of multi-colored and multi-shaped living structures with residents going about their business oblivious to the second symbol, represented by large, grey, ugly, windowless government buildings spying on and recording everyone’s communication. The contrast of liberty and totalitarian intent was startling and breathtaking.
To the far left of the window view was a new housing development intruding into largely undeveloped land, like an extending finger, with brown hills above it and a large hay farm in front and below stretching far forward and to the right of my view. Here residents made choices that enhanced the quality and comfort of their lives largely free from total government spying and restriction—or so they thought.
The number of churches to the population seemed unusually high, five church steeples reaching skyward, as if begging for the influence of God in their community, in what looked to be no more than 300 structures, mostly apartments, as seen from my window—all within a mile of where I was. I attended one of the churches and was greeted with the opening song “America the Beautiful,” the classic patriotic tune words written by Katherine Lee Bates and music by Samuel A. Ward. It housed the favorite words “America! America!” followed by four phrases in four verses “God shed his grace on thee,” and, “God mend thine every flaw,” and, “May God thy gold refine,” and again, “God shed his grace on thee.” Obviously, these Christians loved their liberty. A similar tune representing a relationship between God, country and liberty could have been found throughout most of the country the Sunday before the 4th of July.
In stark contrast off in the distance about two miles, but still clearly visible from the left side of the same window, was the most profound symbol of big government ever—the new NSA spy center, the largest in the world, capable of holding a yottabyte of information collected from every person on earth, some say, for generations to come. These enormous, ugly, grey, windowless, buildings perched on a hill with intimidating guard-houses restricting entrance, represented potential total control of the actions and thoughts of every human. What is different about the Bluffdale, Utah spy center from other such centers in the United States is that the government does not deny that it specifically targets its own citizens.
Much has been published on NSA government spying of its own people and LibertyUnderFire.org has published on this topic two previous articles, so nothing new is found in this one. A project began under George W. Bush and accelerated under Barack Obama, Bluffdale “is the final piece in a complex puzzle assembled over the past decade. Its purpose: to intercept, decipher, analyze, and store vast swaths of the world’s communications as they zap down from satellites and zip through the underground and undersea cables of international, foreign, and domestic networks… Flowing through its servers and routers and stored in near-bottomless databases will be all forms of communication, including the complete contents of private emails, cell phone calls, and Google searches, as well as all sorts of personal data trails—parking receipts, travel itineraries, bookstore purchases, and other digital “pocket litter” (“The NSA Is Building the Country’s Biggest Spy Center. Watch What You Say.”) The project was code named “Stellar Wind.”
Fortunately the secret is out and the public has known about their government spying on them for well over a year, some much longer. Even the ill informed make government surveillance jokes, but still the collection continues. It is as though everyone is in denial. It is as though the revelations of the last two years could not really be real. No one is really being arrested or punished for their thoughts. Yet. The noose is not tight. And what is a yottabyte of information anyway? The size description is incomprehensible adding to brain overload. A yottabyte is 1,000 zettabytes (the number 1 followed by 24 zeros — 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000). That “318 scientists, computer engineers, and other staff work in secret on the cryptanalytic applications of high-speed computing and other classified projects” (Cryptome, March 16, 2012, “NSA Decryption Multipurpose Research Facility”), making what is now happening possible, merely adds to the incomprehensiveness of the subject.
Monday morning the same light flooded the room. The same symbols of liberty and oppression lay in stark contrast below. The same five church steeples reach for the sky as though to appeal to God for His influence. The same residents drive by, perhaps the greatest symbol of totalitarianism of all time, on their way to work, as though it does not exist. Some may even work at this place to help give the government details on their neighbor. Everything about this ugly, windowless, grey structure violates the Constitution. Chances are those of the community next door that sing of freedom will return to office the same Democrats and Republicans that authorized and funded their surveillance. I closed the window. If I too ignore what it shows, it will go away. Right?
May 13, 2014 | Globalism, Liberty Articles, Taxes
By Harold W. Pease Ph. D
G-20 meetings come and go with much fanfare but never with any kind of detail with respect to what these meetings accomplish—at least by the establishment media. The most recent G-20 meetings will affect every person on earth and should be a topic of discussion in every newspaper or network that covers international news. Are we ready for a world tax? Such is being implemented now. Those Americans living overseas are already feeling part of the plan and at least forty governments are committed to implementing it by the end of 2015.
The globalist world tax plan is pushed under the guise of catching the “tax cheats” that invest over seas—mostly the rich it is argued—so the rest of us naively assume that it will not impact us. We are told that tax evasion is a global problem so we need an IRS-type world organization to catch the “cheats” but to do this we first need the sharing of the financial records of all people with participating governments. The plan, called the Global Account Tax Compliance Act, or GATCA, requires all governments to collect and pool all personal banking or financial institutions’ information on all their people. G-20 leaders infer that the global tax authority will be the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the financial arm of the United Nations.
In the most recent G-20 meeting held last February in Australia, proponents were falling all over themselves with excitement over the plan. In a joint communiqué they wrote: “We endorse the Common Reporting Standard for automatic exchange of tax information on a reciprocal basis and will work with all relevant parties, including our financial institutions, to detail our implementation plan at our September meeting” (“A New World Tax Regime,” New American, April 21, 2014, p. 20). They continued with an appeal to all nations “that have not yet complied with the existing standard for exchange of information on request to do so and sign the Multilateral Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters without further delay.”
The plan is most highly promoted by a group referred to as the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa)—all highly socialist countries. Their enthusiasm is understandable. They oppose, and demand an end to, the free market principle of maximizing “value for customers and shareholders by keeping profits and economic activity in lower-tax jurisdictions as much as possible.”
Congress and the Obama administration have already implemented the sharing part of the program for Americans living abroad and it has been functioning since 2010. Buried deep within the “HIRE Act,” endorsed by the President and the then democratically controlled Congress, was the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) which “imposed huge penalties—30-percent ‘withholding tax’ on all U.S. transactions, including sales of securities—on firms that do not hand over all information they have on ‘U.S. persons’ to the IRS” (“Dark Road: The Worst Tax Law You’ve Never Heard About,” New American, p. 11). For the 7.5 million Americans living in other countries it has been disastrous sometimes resulting in their having to renounce their citizenship rather than to be double taxed and have their hosting country know their personal and private information. To accomplish the above requires an uncomfortable closeness between the NSA, IRS and their new government. Foreign governments that do not comply are threatened.
The second part of the plan, after the universal sharing of all our financial records, is to establish a base for a world tax authority. Catching “tax cheats” was never the “real” reason for all the effort but instead the rational for the implementation of a planetary tax with the IMF becoming the world IRS. So far Congress has not implemented this part and is not likely to do so unless hidden in another bill, as was the sharing of private financial records. Consequently, we have some time to get public awareness of the deception and of the intended objective.
The mission of the globalists, and seemingly a majority of the G-20 participants, is an independent financial stream for the United Nations, free from its present dependence on the United States wherein it resides and from which it receives a third of its funding. The globalists’ ploy to make the U N a world government could be ended should Americans decide such was not in their best interests and cut their funding. This could not be allowed to happen, thus the need for alternative funding. The GATCA plan is the most dangerous world government-funding plan presently proposed because the sharing of confidential records is already partially in place, at least for Americans living abroad.
