Posted on 02/12/2003 2:40:21 PM PST by yoe
"Twelve million acres in the U.S., an area the size of Switzerland, is controlled by the The Nature Conservancy"
The most shocking exposé in America today is in a new publication from RANGE magazine. In "Nature's Landlord," investigative reporter Tim Findley explores "the world's most powerful environmental group, The Nature Conservancy." Findley calls TNC "the monster we made from indifference" and shows how it has carefully and methodically achieved global power on a scale few could imagine. He traces the history of the TNC from its modest origins to its current status as a behemoth with nearly $3 billion (tax-exempt) and worldwide control of some 90 million acres. Twelve million acres in the U.S., an area the size of Switzerland, is controlled by the TNC.
"Nature's Landlord" is not just a compendium of facts and figures. It is a masterpiece of brilliant writing that will fascinate readers. You'll meet "the shyly informed college boy in his neatly pressed blue work shirt" who insinuated his way into the heart of a small community. His real goal was to "seek weaknesses"-people who could be pressured into selling off their land. The TNC admits that it "helps the government get around the problem of local opposition" to property acquisition. TNC, cloaked in environmental benevolence, buys "these properties when they need to be bought, so that at some point we can become willing seller" to the government. As one 75-year-old rancher and poet said, "I had no choice, really. They [the TNC] bought everything around me. I'm just tired of fighting with 'em." The "college boy" who watched her lose her home is now the head of TNC in California.
Ranches across the West have fallen into the hands of TNC "like overripe fruit dropping from a shaken tree." On Virginia's Eastern Shore there was once a sustainable system of food production and ecology, but TNC changed all that. Operating covertly under a variety of names, TNC "saved" the area, putting a largely minority labor force out of work, deepening the scourge of poverty in the area. The "saved" islands were "served with opulent showplaces built for rich clients, all unaffordable to the people of the Eastern Shore."
Findley exposes many more instances of TNC's "outrageous contradictions and sad lies." He points to the mineral, gas and oil rights acquired by TNC under the guise of "saving" lands. For instance, TNC "saved" an endangered bird only to pump at least $5.5 million worth of oil and gas royalties, so far, from beneath its habitat. A million acres of timberland in Maine and New Hampshire are logged by TNC. A swath of American land larger than the state of Delaware was traded to a foreign power without a word from the American press and public. Two million acres of TNC land in the United States was swapped to the government of Brazil in exchange for Amazon rainforest.
It's not just member contributions that sustain TNC. Its chairman says trolling for 25-buck members is wasted effort. Appealing to wealthy corporations is "just a greater return." Besides, between 1995 and 2000, TNC raked in more than $32 million from the U.S. government-your tax dollars at work.
A report by professional ecologist Jeff Goodson on "The Network," describes a system of data centers with nearly 300 centers worldwide that collect and dispense biodiversity data, and include support for land-use planning, environmental impact assessment and endangered species management. Tax dollars and wealthy foundations supported TNC's program that has become "an environmental espionage and land-targeting program" that "collaborates closely" with the federal government.
It is future generations we should be concerned about, Findley writes. We need to bring "some accountability to a small group of people with grossly exaggerated power and authority over fundamental elements of a free society."
Copies of the 24-page, 4-color report "Nature's Landlord" are available from the RANGE (1-800-726-4348) while supplies last. Copies of RANGE magazine including "Nature's Landlord" are also available.
Paragon America is a rural advocacy non-profit organization.
The worst part is that we taxpayers gave this gang $32 million between 1995-2000 :-(
As night follows day, they will all begin to act in their own best interest (esp. those of the exec. committees), rather than in the interest to the cause of their founding.
See Ron Arnold's site, www.undueinfluence.com for more info.
They were in the thick of the efforts to drive 1500 families off of their land in the Klamath Basin Crisis of 2001 which was averted only at great risk and much travail and hardship ... and still is far from a sure thing.
Many people are being scammed, including many within the ranks of the Conservancy itself, who are being taken advantage of as classical "useful idiots" by the Conservancy's store front face.
Look beyond that face to the agenda and what it lines up with. That will reveal the true nature.
To those of us who value individual liberty, soveriegnty, property rights and a true free market, all of which are based on faith and morality ... both sets of culprits lead to the same end ... that is a destruction of those very values and principles.
It is why we must fight them at every turn ... and be wise in that fight.
I'd say that it's time to plug the money pipe, and end tax exemptions for these Urth wershipers.
How will we ever get on top of this if we continue to fund the opposition?
Fortunately, in Klamath much of this was avoided (but not all) by the actions of local and regional private citizens who helped their neighbors get through.
The net result for the land that is bought up, either by TNC or other imilar efforts (some by our own government) is that productive, free-market land is taken out of the system ... and it just so happens that much of the land so decommissioned is right in line with the UN Agenda's I referenced above.
That's not an accident. I believe the TNC is an official NGO with the UN.
Either way, I have seen them in action, as has Grampa Dave and many other FRreepers out here in the west, and they are no friend to the free-market or our way of life.
What bothers me about TNC is that they make sure that they get favorable conditions via legislative fiat before they start engaging in "free market capitalist" solutions.
Long before TNC starts spending money buying land, they make some strategeric campaign donations, and the land they want suddenly gets zoned as open space--and hence unusable. No one is going to buy it, except for TNC. When you have only one customer, you pay what the customer offers, or you don't sell--and you pay property taxes based on the last sale price, many times what the land can actually be sold for.
After TNC buys the land, they sprinkle a few more donations, and all of a sudden, that virgin, untouchable land can be logged, mined, or used for "low-density habitation' (read: a luxurious lodge can be built for occupancy by TNC bigwigs and their cronies).
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