"Building a North American Community" by the Council on Foreign Relations.
Posted on 09/24/2007 7:30:30 AM PDT by lonewacko_dot_com
...[The building of the Trans-Texas Corridor] is all too sinister for Jerome Corsi, the Vietnam War veteran who helped lead the Swift Boat charge against John Kerry. Corsi has knitted disparate strands of each of these separate road projects to help convince fellow xenophobes such as Pat Buchanan, Phyllis Schlafly, Lou Dobbs and the John Birch Society that the corridor is the first leg of a secret federal project called the NAFTA Superhighway, a four-football-field wide monstrosity that would run from Mexico's Yucatan to Canada's Yukon...
Yet even Texas Rep. Ron Paul, a libertarian Republican candidate for president, has fallen for the paranoia. You'd think that Paul would be chanting hosannas to anything that facilitates free trade, but he too fears that the "superhighway" is part of a scheme by foreign companies to erode U.S. borders and create a North American Union combining the United States, Mexico and Canada -- complete with a single government and a common currency called the "amero."
Superhighway opponents regard even routine dialogue between the three neighbors as a treasonous assault on U.S. sovereignty. They are apoplectic about the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPP), a forum created in 2005 for bureaucrats to discuss such radical topics as how to snag terrorists before they enter the continent and how to speed up cross-border traffic for just-in-time deliveries...
(Excerpt) Read more at reason.com ...
Please help them see the errors of their ways by going here and leaving a comment pointing out one or two of the ways they're wrong.
Suffice to say, both extremes are equally nuts.
invoke corsi and the turtle bay blue boys will come to tinkle. always good for a laugh.
Couldn’t have said it better myself, and I am libertarian. This is all much ado about nothing.
Shouldn’t writers for Reason Magazine use rational arguments, rather than ad hominem insults?
As Aristotle might say, “Some people have posited that the trans-Texas highway is a threat to our freedom. Some have argued that it’s merely another superhighway. What are the arguments, for and against? How is this highway like other highways, and how is it different? Ladies and gentlemen, make your cases.”
Aristotle was no fool.
Whose payroll are you on?
My understanding is: Texans aren’t doing the TTC, it is being done to them.
They speak up and it doesn’t matter.
Toll roads for Cintra to make money on US citizens’ backs.
“Never mind that I-69 originated in a 1991 federal transportation law — pre-dating NAFTA — and that the planning for the Trans-Texas Corridor has been fully documented on the Web.”
This is the sort of reasoning we get from ‘Reason’ magazine? Never mind indeed, since NAFTA was originally proposed and drawn up during GHWB’s administration and passed in 1993 under Clinton. I-69 might have pre-dated NAFTA passage, but it sure didn’t pre-date NAFTA drafting and original presentation, and it sure didn’t pre-date NAFTA planning. They sound like concurrent projects to me.
Yes. I had thought of saying a bit more. For instance, who is behind this highway? What is the political background? Who are the players involved?
Those families with farms / ranches along the projected path might take exception to that “nuts” comment.
No one voted for this superhighway.
In Texas, it has done damage to the real estate market along the projected path and will end up being the largest eminent domain land grab in history.
NO put it underground and let the government and state build it.
The truth...it is a network of four hundred yard wide superhighways.
One leg shoots from the Mexican border to Amarillo, the other is the I-35 leg which will run just west of Austin and the third leg is called the I-69, running west of Houston up through Grimes county.
http://www.texastollparty.com/ttp_trans_texas.php
http://www.corridorwatch.org/ttc/index.htm
These ( 3 ) legs of the TTC will decimate farms and ranches that have been in families for a hundred years.
This is Pres. Bush and Rick Perry’s lil globalist brain child that will ultimately circumvent the American trucking, longshore, port and all other associated industries for cheaper Mexican equivalents.
This is a bad thing for America.
"Building a North American Community" by the Council on Foreign Relations.
Strong rumblings that Texas Governor Rick Perry is somehow tied to Zachary Construction which appears to be a consortium of Texas people who have invested in this. Perry has said that he will not support closing the border between Mexico and Texas.
AMERICAN CARGO CULT ——
All this brainless hyper consumerism will grind to a halt when the USD takes a dive and China and others stop exporting so many trinkets to us. These will be unused highways and unused rail links
I agree. I’m writing the supercorridor in my new book as an unfinished relic 400 yards wide, stretching to the horizons, marked by rusting construction equipment.
How do you know you’re importing too much and running up ruinous trade deficits? When your ports are too small to accommodate all the ships so you have to enlist Mexican ports to bring in all this crap you cannot afford in the first place. I ran this by a poster here named “Business prof” - it didn’t register with him
You make a good reference to it in your book. Useless NAFTA superhighways (landing strips) built in frenzies to bring in STUFF and more STUFF
Sept. 29: Hank Gilbert Talks About The Trans Texas Corridor
The Fort Bend County Democratic Party is sponsoring a talk at 9:45 a.m. on Saturday, Sept. 29, at First Colony Library by Hank Gilbert, on the proposed Trans Texas Corridor.
A former Democratic candidate for state agriculture commissioner, Gilbert has spoken to Democratic and Republican groups concerning this TTC.
The Trans Texas Corridor is a proposed road from Mexico to Oklahoma and eventually all the way to Canada. Taking land from farmers and ranchers via eminent domain, the environment, the possibility of Texas changing existing roads into toll roads, etc. We all need to know.
Come find out why you should be opposed to this TTC and also about the possibility of current roads being turned into toll roads. This is a non-partisan issue and Democrats and Republicans alike are opposed to this. The library is on Austin Parkway at Grants Lake in Sugar Land. For further information – call 281-240-6361.
[Suspected tinfoil in bold --TSR]
Libertarian ping! To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here.
There is no need for scare quote around ‘libertarian’.
They are indeed libertarian.
Open borders is the libertarian position. Freedom and lack of govt control means no tariffs and no nationalism/protectionism regarding who and what crosses the borders. It’s consistent.
But don’t tell the anti-NAU/SPP Ron Paul supporters. their heads will explode.
The point Reason is making is that there is no secret conspiracy.
There are real plans (TTC), there are pre-existing infrastructure plans (I-69), there are new proposals not yet funded/determined, and there are non-plans (the Mexico to Canada plans, which dont exist in reality). The Corsi conspiracy-theory mixes all 4 types together and makes it sound like its all one big NAFTA/SPP plot ... but its not.
Comments have been made that TTC was done without Texas’ voters approval. Well, fact is that most roads are done that way. TxDOT make plans with local planning organizations and legislative bills influence that. The Legislature approves the funding and directs it. A 2003 authorized the next step in TTC.
There is both good and bad aspects to TTC. However: The Trans-Texas Corridor should rise or fall on the merits of what it is, and not judged based on a dubious conspiracy.
“My understanding is: Texans aren’t doing the TTC, it is being done to them. They speak up and it doesn’t matter.”
Not so. TTC is just one of several moves towards toll roads in Texas, as TxDOT made a decision to rely on toll roads heavily for new construction. People dont like it. The pushback against toll roads is real, is genuine and it is having an impact. Roads that were planned to be converted to tolls were rolled back and TxDOT was put on notice by the lege wrt TTC.
IMHO, I think the TTC will eventually collapse or get drastically changed/curtailed.
Already the grand scheme TTC has been put on ice and they are now just focusing on I-35 corridor.
The legislature is demanding more oversight, they passed a moratorium on construction in May ...
“The juggernaut behind construction of the Trans Texas Corridor (TTC) suffered a major blow on May 2, as the Texas House joined the Senate in overwhelmingly voting to impose a moratorium on construction. God Bless Texas!”
http://www.citizenreviewonline.org/May2007/11/trans_texas_corridor.html
Texans dont want the TTC and their voices *DO* matter.
BTTT
It was written by one of the children who live on this large family ranch. It’s basically a plea to the state to not take away their land which, has been in the family for hundreds of yrs. The sign has been there for several yrs.
From the people I know and have talked to, this expresses the general consensus of the people potentially effected by this project. NO!
As far as the Trans-Texas Corridor 35 goes, there is currently no movement, as far as I know, to extend the highway in Oklahoma and points north. The I-69 corridor is making some progress in Indiana, Tennessee, and Mississippi, but is being designed as a standard Interstate, rather than as a super-corridor.
I really hope Texas wins this! While all eyes are focused on Texas, corridors continue being built in other states. Somehow they just looks like new or improved roads, but they part of the system eventually connecting Canada, and Mexico.
They are not the huge “SuperCorridors”, so they seem to be being built in our state under the radar.
It’s going all the way to the border.
In the case of the TTC-35 project, the state will bargain with the land owners and if they can’t come to an agreement, eminent domain will be the next course of action. The state will then lease the land to, in this case, a foreign company (Cintra) to build and manage the toll road.
http://www.keeptexasmoving.com/index.php#
Check this site out and tell me TTC-35 isn’t going past Texas. Just for kicks, try *Eminent Domain* on their search engine.......it will show NO results.
That’s the PORTS-TO-PLAINS corridor, not the NAFTA Superhighway. Ports-to-Plains goes from Laredo to Denver, while the NAFTA superhighway, should it ever go from tinfoil to reality, will run all the way from Mexico (probably at Laredo) to Canada, as well as possibly in Mexico and Canada.
The site also describes TTC-69 which, will run from the valley of Texas to Canada. (in the other states, it's already under consruction) Why wouldn't TTC-35 do the same. It’s time to remove the tin-foil banner and quit listening to the globalists. This thing is a GO.
I know you’ll hate to hear this, but the I-69 route along the coast , through Corpus and Houston up to Shreveport ... seems like a pretty good route for a highway. There’s no real interstate from Houston to south texas except via san antone.
They should build it as a standard interstate and stay away from the toll road cr*pola and TTC 1/4 mile-wide land-removal.
The more they overthink the plumbing, the easier it is to stop up the drain.
*An interstate from Austin to Corpus Christi*
Not tolled.
I know it’s selfish but, oh so convenient for my purposes.
I don’t have a problem with the upgrading of current highways for the benefit of Texans. I do have a problem making Texas some kind of limited access gateway for foreign interests who, in fact, will control said roadways.
I’m not against the idea of building a highway from Mexico to Texas, but whoever wants to build it better obtain the land themselves, not using eminent domain. I have just a *small* hunch that won’t be the case.
“*An interstate from Austin to Corpus Christi*
Not tolled.”
mmmmm, nice...
Isnt that I-35 to I-37? so are you allergic to San Antonio? ;-)
More seriously, the other thing we need to do is upgrade I-35. It is congested. the should make it 6 lanes from San Antonio to Dallas. One reason for TTC-35 is the claim that it would cost more to do that I-35 expansion than to build a new highway with a lot more capacity. This in turn has to do with how the frontage on these roads becomes valuable and so eminent domain on them is so much.
So, while some farmer may lament losing a farm to a road, consider that you can get 200 acres or more for $1 million, but $1 million of ED dollars on a frontage road might buy you less than 600 feet of frontage. Here in Austin, 1 acre of I-35 frontage could be $200,000 about 1,000 times the cost of some Texas acreage. ... That’s why they build these roads way out in the middle of nowhere - its cheaper.
“I do have a problem making Texas some kind of limited access gateway for foreign interests who, in fact, will control said roadways.”
Sure, but if that is inapplicable to I-69, what’s the problem with it? In other words, if I-69 is (1) not tolled, (2) built by american construction companies, (3) operated by govt not privately, (4) follows applicable US laws as current roads do, then it doesnt fit the template at all.
That is why I say we should separate fact from fiction on this issue. Tell me which factor does I-69 fall down on?
I know that the TTC/Cintra deal stinks to high heaven, but take that off the table and consider new highway question objectively - do we need more roads and rails in Texas to handle more traffic? Probably so.
“I’m not against the idea of building a highway from Mexico to Texas, but whoever wants to build it better obtain the land themselves, not using eminent domain.”
That’s simply not done with roads and for good reason. Getting 100% agreement on a 300 mile strip of land 500 feet across from the hundreds of landowners is impossible.
ED should be used only when necessary and for public purposes. But roads is exactly the case. (and few other cases are as strong, maybe electrical and utilities but that’s it.)
Personally, I don’t care about I69, I’ll never use it and unlike TTC35, don’t know anyone who will be effected. (might even be a viable alternative to TTC35) (the Feds have decided I10 and I69 are top priority for now)
I just came back from traveling through 8 southern states, all interstate highways. I came to the conclusion Texas has been screwing us. Setting us up for all these toll roads and such. There are sections between Waco and Dallas that have been under construction for over 30 yrs. This state has turned into Louisiana, corruption deluxe. I wouldn't trust Rick Perry and his cohorts to wipe my butt.
“Personally, I don’t care about I69, I’ll never use it and unlike TTC35, don’t know anyone who will be effected. (might even be a viable alternative to TTC35)”
YES, IT MIGHT BE. I think your comment makes my point, which is: Let us judge the road proposals as they are and not fold them up into a Vast RoadRing Conspiracy. TTC/Cintra is bad, but I69 may be fine.
“I came to the conclusion Texas has been screwing us. Setting us up for all these toll roads and such.”
I agree. We dont need these roads to be toll roads. If we really need them for the sake of international trade, for goodness sakes get the Federal govt to chip in and make it a proper interstate highway.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.