Free Republic

The Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST), a United Nations initiative, has been bouncing around since before President Reagan's time in the White House. He refused to sign. Obama is yearning for it (amassing power for his future time as UN Secretary-General). As all United Nations treaties, those foolish countries ratifying it lose sovereignty. We will lose taxpayer monies, and monies that we generate from within our 200 nautical mile from our shorelines - among other egregious problems with LOST. Portman is believed to be on Romney's shortlist for Veep. Ayotte may be considered as well. Pullout Quote: President Reagan...

Europe's leaders convening in Brussels on Thursday for an European Union summit are under intense pressure to come up with a new plan to save the euro, but they seem as divided as ever. Chancellor Angela Merkel used uncommonly stark language on Tuesday when she rejected the idea for common euro bonds by saying Europe would not share total debt liability "as long as I live." But German media commentators have drawn some comfort from a blueprint for a radical revamp of the eurozone's architecture presented this week by the "gang of four" European presidents: European Council President Herman Van...

On Thursday evening, the Women in Green for Israel's tomorrow undertook an operation to put up signs on Highway 60 from the southern Hevron Hills to Elon Moreh, urging the application of Israeli sovereignty over all of Judea and Samaria. A statement released by the group on Sunday said "Women in Green" has long understood that we must pass to initiative rather than trudge through an endless defensive." Women in Green has scheduled its second annual conference on starting Israeli sovereignty in the region for July 12th in Hevron. ...

Property Rights: Few have heard of Agenda 21, the U.N. plan for sustainable development that tosses property rights aside. But Alabama has, and it recently secured a victory as important as that over union power in Wisconsin. After Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker's stunning triumph over the excesses and abuses of public-sector unions, the London Telegraph's James Delingpole, an indefatigable opponent of global warming fraud, opined in a piece titled, "How Wisconsin And Alabama Helped Save The World," that we should take note of "an equally important but perhaps less well-publicized victory won in the Alabama House and Senate over the...

What's green and blue and grabby all over? President Obama's new pressure campaign for Congress to ratify the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST). The fight over LOST goes back three decades, when it was first rejected by President Ronald Reagan. He warned that "no national interest of the United States could justify handing sovereign control of two-thirds of the Earth's surface over to the Third World." According to top Reagan officials William Clark and Ed Meese, their boss believed the "central, and abiding, defect" was "its effort to promote global government at the expense of sovereign nation states --...

Senate Committee Foreign Relations THE LAW OF THE SEA CONVENTION (TREATY DOC. 103-39): THE U.S. NATIONAL SECURITY AND STRATEGIC IMPERATIVES FOR RATIFICATION Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Martin Dempsey. Date: Wednesday, May 23, 2012 Time: 10:00 AM

The broader Asia-Pacific region—encompassing countries in Asia, North, Central and South America, and Oceania—accounts for more than half of both global GDP and the world’s food supply, includes key food exporters and importers, and encompasses populations with rising incomes and transforming diets, alongside subsistence agriculture and urban poor. It is not surprising that food and agricultural policy issues have moved front and center on the agendas of the region’s policymakers, farm groups, food industry and civil society. Given its prominent role in both global food production and consumption, efforts to promote food security and forge new trade ties in the...

A proposed Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST), which has been signed by President Obama but not yet ratified by Congress, will subordinate U.S. naval and drilling operations beyond 200 miles of our coast to a newly established U.N. bureaucracy. If approved, it will grant a Kingston, Jamaica-based International Seabed Authority (ISA) the power to regulate deep-sea oil exploration, seabed mining, and fishing rights. As part of the deal, as much as 7% of U.S. government revenue that is collected from oil and gas companies operating off our coast will be forked over to ISA for redistribution to poorer, landlocked...

The stunning repudiation of Sen. Richard Lugar's, R-Ind., bid for a seventh term has sent shock waves through Washington's internationalist lobby. A former Rhodes Scholar, Lugar has spent his career promoting a globalist agenda, since he succeeded the late Jesse Helms as the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. One day after Indiana Republicans handed Lugar his walking papers, an outfit called the Atlantic Council held a forum to promote the discredited Law of the Sea Treaty. As former Republican U.S. Sens. Chuck Hagel and John Warner beamed their approval, Obama's Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta declared that...

A Chinese group known as “Sino-Michigan Properties LLC” has bought up 200 acres of land near the town of Milan, Michigan. Their plan is to construct a “China City” with artificial lakes, a Chinese cultural center and hundreds of housing units for Chinese citizens. Essentially, it would be a little slice of communist China dropped right into the heartland of America. This “China City” would be located about 40 minutes from both Detroit and Toledo, and it would be marketed to Chinese business people that want to start businesses in the United States. Unfortunately, this is not just an isolated...

This is an incredible story showing how far the federal government is from rational thought. Here’s what happened in Tombstone: Between May and July 2011, the Monument Fire engulfed a large part of the eastern portion of the Huachuca Mountains. Record-breaking monsoon rains followed. With no vegetation to absorb the runoff, huge mudslides forced boulders to tumble down the mountain sides, crushing Tombstone’s mountain spring waterlines, destroying reservoirs and shutting off Tombstone’s main source of water. In some areas, Tombstone’s pipeline is under 12 feet of mud, rocks and other debris; while in other places, it is hanging in mid-air...

Sovereignty: Even if he's not re-elected, the president hopes to leave behind a treaty giving a U.N. body veto power over the use of our territorial waters and to which we'd be required to give half of our offshore oil revenue. The Law Of The Sea Treaty (LOST) has been lurking in the shadows for decades. Like the Kyoto Protocol that pretended to be an effort to save the earth from the poisoned fruit of the Industrial Revolution, LOST pretends to be an effort to protect the world's oceans from environmental damage and remove it as a cause of potential...

Per Fox... United Nations "diplomats" have concluded a tour of the U.S., speaking to Indian tribes in six states. According to Fox, many of the tribes involved told the UN they need the UN's help in reclaiming "ancestral sacred land," included in which would be the Mt. Rushmore monument and surrounding national park. One is left to wonder just what changes to Mt. Rushmore would then be made. The Obama Administration was reportedly responsible for arranging the UN tour. Just in time for the 2012 elections. Your $3B/year UN dues at work.

The City of Tombstone, Arizona is no longer the only one fighting the federal government for water rights. The latest move by the Federal Bureau of Land Management appears to herald a bigger and much more comprehensive effort to seize water and access rights on federal lands throughout the western states. Just last week, the Bureau of Land Management declared to the Arizona Department of Water Resources that the federal government holds senior water rights across much of Arizona’s San Pedro River riparian watershed. The BLM’s objection to the “Designation of Adequate Water Supply” issued by ADWR to Sierra Vista’s...

Dear Friend, In this video commentary, I discuss how Obama is about to join the International Criminal Court prohibiting any war without UN approval (giving Russia and China a veto). Tune in!

The issue arose early in the oral argument, even before the solicitor general could make his claim of exclusivity. Justice Scalia kicked off, asking Mr. Clement whether he would concede "that the State has to accept within its borders all people who have no right to be there, that the Federal Government has no interest in removing ... and the State has no power to close its borders to people who have no right to be there." This time Mr. Clement answered: "I think my answer to that is no." But he did not back up his answer with either...

Salam Fayyad ReutersPalestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad has inaugurated a new PA construction project, despite the fact that it is located in an area under full Israeli control, the PA-based WAFA news agency reported on Monday. According to a statement issued by Fayyad’s office, he inaugurated on Monday stage one of a water dam to be built in “Palestine” at a cost of over $1 million. The statement quoted by WAFA said that during a visit to the village of Ouja and the Jordan Valley, Fayyad inaugurated the Ouja Dam, which he said is one of the projects to...

Britain can extradite a radical Muslim cleric and four other suspects to the United States to face terrorism charges, Europe's human rights court ruled Tuesday. The case centering on Mustafa Kamal Mustafa, also known as Abu Hamza al-Masri, considered Britain's most recognizable extremist, has been closely watched as a sign of Europe's view on tough U.S. prisons. The court said Britain would not violate EU human rights rules by extraditing the suspects, who could face life sentences in a maximum-security prison. Al-Masri and the other suspects had argued that in the U.S. they could face prison conditions and jail terms...

May 1881 US explorers approached Jeannette Island and Henrietta Island and claimed them for the United States. According to some US individuals, including the group State Department Watch, eight Arctic islands currently controlled by Russia, including Wrangel Island, are claimed by the United States. However, according to the United States Department of State no such claim exists. The USSR/USA Maritime Boundary Treaty, which has yet to be approved by the Russian Duma, does not address the status of these islands nor the maritime boundaries associated with them. The Obama Administration is reportedly giving away Wrangell, Bennett, Jeannette and Henrietta islands...

Palestinian Authority prime minister Salam Fayyad said Wednesday his administration is actively defying Israel and operating in eastern Jerusalem. "The PA is continuously trying to allocate resources inside the city, which Israel occupied in 1967," Fayyad said in his weekly radio address from Ramallah. "The Israeli government is trying to impose its policies to control Jerusalem and its institutions, which is contrary to international law and signed agreements," Fayyad said. “This all won’t change the truth that East Jerusalem is the main part of the occupied Palestinian territories," Fayyad said in his weekly radio address, which focused on Israeli policy...