More Insults About the 'North American Conspiracy'

Human Events ^ | 1-5-2007 | Jerome Corsi

[jmc813]

Conservative blogger John Hawkins of Right Wing News has now decided to join Michael Medved in a new ad hominem attack by using a disparaging adjective to call me a name (“kooky”) and placing me No. 3 in the list of the 20 “people on the right” he finds most annoying.

Hawkins places me between No. 2 Mark Foley, whom Hawkins characterizes as a “page-molesting pervert,” and No. 4 Duke Cunningham, the congressman Hawkins notes is “going to jail for 8 years after taking a bribe.” I am honored to be included on any list John Hawkins wishes to create. But, as far as I can determine, my offense to Hawkins involves writing with the scope of the 1st Amendment, an offense that Hawkins considers somewhat worse than taking bribes, but not quite as bad as making salacious approaches to underage male employees.

I first want to thank Hawkins for his continuing campaign to draw attention to my arguments.

Second, I wonder how much additional writing I will have to produce before Hawkins reduces himself to the “liar, liar” ranting stage Michael Medved exhibited in his recent emotional tirade published on Townhall.com. I guess I will have to read more of Hawkins’s writing to determine if I find his views annoying, but upon introspection I find I have no emotional reaction whatsoever, even to his characterization that I am somehow “annoying” to him. Perhaps President Bush drew solace that he was listed seven positions below me on Hawkins’s “most annoying” list. I apologize to President Bush that Hawkins could not find a better pejorative for him than “incompetent.” Clearly in Hawkins’s hierarchy to be “kooky” in writing a political commentary is much more annoying to him than to be merely “incompetent” in conducting the affairs of the nation’s highest elected post.

Arguing that my writings advance a “completely moronic North American conspiracy theory,” Hawkins linked to an old post he had written on his blog last summer. In an exchange published in July on HUMAN EVENTS’ Right Angle blog, I answered these and other objections raised by Hawkins. The exchange ended when Hawkins chose not to respond. Hawkins has never answered my last specific rebuttals published on the blog. Merely repeating his initial arguments would be considered “non responsive” in traditional debate theory.

Besides, I have never argued a “North American conspiracy.” The European Union and the Euro are realities today, not a conspiracy theory. So too, North American integration is proceeding rapidly right now, fully documented, as the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America attests if you reference the Department of Commerce website SPP.gov. Equally, the Trans-Texas Corridor is proceeding rapidly, as documented by the Texas Department of Commerce website. If either the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America or the Trans-Texas Corridor is a conspiracy, the conspiracy is being perpetrated by government officials on their public websites.

We will grant that the now public writings of those who advanced the European Union, such as the memoirs of EU intellectual architect Jean Monnet, confess after the fact that a stealth method was pursued to create the European Union. As Christopher Booker and Richard North, co-authors of the 2003 book, “The Great Deception: A Secret History of the European Union,” write that Jean Monnet “knew that only by operating in the shadows, behind a cloak of obscurity could he one day realize his dream.” Architects of North American integration, such as Robert Pastor of American University, breathe new life into stealth politics when suggesting openly that a new 9/11 crisis may be just the event needed to advance his agenda for creating the “North American Community” he openly professes.

At any rate, I invite Hawkins to resume his debate with me. To make the process easy, we will link to the exchange. Seeing that I wrote the last rejoinder there, the next move appears to be up to Hawkins. Is Hawkins up to calm, rational debate, or does he want to leave his comments at the level of calumny, an ad hominem attack which always belies an inability to win the argument any other way?

My writing has been aimed at making sure that North American integration does not advance to the point where a North American Union emerges after what may be a decades-long incremental process. I want to be sure that the United States does not follow the template set in place by how the European Union and the euro emerged over some fifty years, driven by an intellectual elite and evolving step-by-step from an initial, seemingly innocuous continental steel and coal agreement.

What is it exactly that Hawkins finds annoying—that a NAU and the Amero could be the end result of the North American integration currently happening, or that I might suggest the Bush Administration could be following the Jean Monnet path intentionally?

[Alia]

Welcome back, Holiday Travelor! :)

We did have a very pleasant and fun Christmas, thank you. Not a single grinch in sight.

And then, to enter these threads... ;>

[nopardons]

Many thanks! :-)

I'm SO glad that you and yours had such a good Christmas!

These silly conspiracy/black helicopter threads are bizarre, aren't they? Reading them is akin to when people used to go to insane asylums, for the ENTERTAINMET, on a Sunday afternoon....they allow us to laugh and jeer at the "inmates". LOL

[texastoo]

That is somewhat interesting. I wonder why Mexico was not represented?

Vigilant Shield 2007 exercises troops on the Homeland Defense Mission

By Sgt. 1st Class Peter Rimar USARNORTH Public Affairs

US Army North recently participated in Vigilant Shield ‘07, an exercise designed to test the Department of Defense’s ability to response to an attack on the homeland.

The exercise emphasized the synchronized response of various DOD agencies to a variety of homeland defense scenarios, including cyber attacks, border security breaches, missile defense operations and a nuclear accident.

“This was the first true exercise where we could test the integration between US NORTHERN COMMAND, Joint Forces Command, Headquarters-NCR and USARNORTH in response to an attack on our homeland,” said LTC Andrew Lucke, Chief, Homeland Defense and Special Plans for U.S. Army North.

Troops from the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines and Coast Guard, along with Canadian Forces in the U.S. and at the three North American Air Defense regions took part in this exercise.

Interagency participants included the Department of Homeland Security, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Department of Energy, state of Arizona, and the city of Tucson, Ariz.

The various types of real-world scenarios developed for this exercise provided a realistic training opportunity for members of the command.

“The scenarios used during this exercise highlighted the importance of interagency coordination and cooperation needed in the initial response phase of a catastrophic event,” said Lt. Col. John Baniwicz, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers liaison to USARNORTH.

“The goals of this exercise were to improve the DOD’s Colonel Jeffrey S. Buchanan answers questions from the local San Antonio news media during exercise Vigilant Shield 07. Photo by Sgt 1st Class Peter Rimar capacity to manage a series of extreme events; improve seamless interaction of DOD with interagency response, validate authorities, strategies, plans, policies, procedures, andprotocols,” said MSG David Morrison, Senior Plans NCO. “It emphasized a sustainable, systematic, integrated DOD exercise program to support the national strategy for homeland defense----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- They were somewhat close to our southern border but I'll bet they didn't look that way. What a fr!gg!n joke HS is. I wonder what this cost? They could have gone a little further south and experienced the real thing of witnessing the invasion. But no, they just had meetings to talk about it. Yadayadayada..... Are they telling the truth now that Americans will be joining the Army North America, Marines North America and Navy North America? No doubt they are worried about recruiting.

[WilliamofCarmichael]

I believe that Mr. Corsi, et al. know the facts about both the Sun and SPP.

Mr. Corsi says My writing has been aimed at making sure that North American integration does not advance to the point where a North American Union emerges after what may be a decades-long incremental process.

I tried to restate that in terms of us "shareholders"; it is our right as citizens to oppose the proposals of the corporation's managers and their "rich and powerful" advisors. No question.

The argument seems to be how Mr. Corsi, et al. state their opposition and the reactions to the opposition.

RE: "This entire thread is about avoiding the issue. . . ."

I disagree. The bulk of the posted article is about Mr. Corsi's critics' contumely and many of us have been questioning why his critics react with such insolence.

[_Jim]

Medved shouldn't forget the federal government bankrolled the massive effort to rewrite software that had potential Y2K problems.

It was due to a massive influx of money, that Y2K was rendered harmless. If the government hadn't spent that money, the global corporations would have had to do it.

I'm going to label that 'a load'.

99.9999999% of the 'concern' with a so-called 'date' in any of the EMBEDDED applications DID NOT EXIST. Timing in those applications exists solely to click off seconds (or milliseconds or microseconds) to implement proportional/deriviative feedback loops or control the sequencing of a process; EVEN those higher-level apps that you might cite already had addressed the date issue on account of the need to make forecasting (you know, time and date into the future) functions in those apps work correctly ...

[WilliamofCarmichael]

RE: "Reading them is akin to when people used to go to insane asylums, for the ENTERTAINMET, on a Sunday afternoon....they allow us to laugh and jeer at the "inmates". LOL"

Cute.

Care to disuss any of the replies?

[nopardons]

I have, many times over. And frankly, this KOOKERY is just something to laugh at now. Corsi is pushing this tripe and a lot of people here, who associate him with the Swiftees ( when all he did was to EDIT the book; NOT write it! ) have swallowed this idiotic conspiracy theory hook, line and sinker. They shouldn't, but they have.

[_Jim]

In the "old days" of punch cards we did not have very much core and a mainframe disk pack the size of a basketball stored 29meg bytes.

Most of those 'old apps' have been replaced by newer counterparts with MUCH more capability (MRP systems e.g. Oracle comes to mind) or upgraded on-the-fly with new 'releases'.

I did some program updating with the initial 'card' based source 'text' for some early TI-960 cross compilers and linkers; we did the source editing on 990's and vie RJE sent in the jobs for compilation with the final executable 'load module' residing on 370 accessable DASD for execution when needed ...

[_Jim]

Y2k, that is. Mr. Medved has no knowledge of the millions of lines of legacy "big iron" code world wide. Had that code not been corrected in the years leading up to 2000 -- actually years before 2000 -- a lot of people would have thought the world ended as routine commerce crashed hourly.

And NONE of that legacy 'code' ever prepared 'forecasts' or 'payment tables' into the future?

Right ...

[WilliamofCarmichael]

RE: I'm going to label that 'a load'.

The discussion that prompted the funding comment was due to me relating my 30+ years experience on variuos mainframe applications and what happen worldwide during the late 1990s.

A large amount of mainframe code, especially in COBOL, in both private and government evolved over the decades, some from the early 1970s. Punch cards were still in common use; core and mass storage were limited. Every byte counted.

We were all aware (from time to time) that one day our DDDYY and MMDDYY dates in all government and corporate mainframe applications were going to "byte" us.

But there was never the will or money to fix the problem before its time. I don't recall but I bet 500 million dollars worldwide was spent -- the largest portion actually needed to fix the problem.

In fact, the inexpensive and good job done by Indian programmers help build their appeal that's paid off handsomely for them. Of course, scanning code and actually developing systems are dissimilar, kinda.

[Alia]

:)

Yes, they can be fun to read through.

But I, having lived in the SF Bay Area, also have this to say about "conspiracies": Been there. When one is surrounded by a marxist-dominated culture, and hasn't succumbed, one really does get to see moonbats riding bikes to work at Discovery Toys and Willie Wonka's mega-marxist factories. And one knows these people would bump you rightout of your constitutional rights, home, and life -- if given sufficient impetus to do so.

That being said, when additionally offered to believe the sky is falling, it is easy to agree with that postulation. Very easy: One's eyes see it in real-time all around. The natural supposition of a person in this type of terrain is to believe that it is the same everywhere. That all "good" people are surrounded by marxists, there are no good guys, and that hell is being alive, the country is "doomed".

The truth is, that simply is not so. There are pockets of the country where "doom and gloom" are prevalent therefore "predictions" that this is the same everywhere are handily accepted.

But, it doesn't mean it is true.

And then there are those on the cusp who live in purple zones and they just think things can't get better fast enough; that some magic remote exists which will fastforward them through the purple zone Marxist laden areas they live in to bloom into red.

And so they call their Repubs "spineless" and "gutless" because the Repubs don't seem to be pushing that "fast-forward" button on the remote fast enough for those who just wanna be in a "red zone".

A conspiracy that all elected are evil is the "lazy man's path" to absolving himself of actually moving, and/or doing something constructive about resurrecting the terrain he lives in, IME. It's just so much easier to add another reason for feeling so lousy about where one lives and the problems one has to contend with by living there.

[hedgetrimmer]

EVEN those higher-level apps that you might cite already had addressed the date issue

Well this just isn't so. I know for a fact that online brokerage firms all had y2k teams examining and rewriting all their software.

Brokerages benefitted from the Clinton R&D funds to pay for the Y2K rewrites.

I also know for a fact that municple water systems, power grids et al, all had reason to rewrite for y2k.

[_Jim]

A large amount of mainframe code, especially in COBOL, in both private and government evolved over the decades, some from the early 1970s. Punch cards were still in common use; core and mass storage were limited. Every byte counted.

You're relating 70's history and then segwaying into the Y2K era as if there had been no advancement in technology; let me assure you, IBM dis not sit on their laurels and still field hand-made magnetic 'core' memory with X, Y, and 'Z' (or sense) lines going into the year 2000 ...

Please peddle those stories to someone a little less technological who might be a little more in awe ...

I still label the previous as 'a load'.

The fear and hype that was Y2K was MORE than just fears that old COBOL programs in back-water data processign centers (I'm not even going bless those centers with the term "IT") might 'think' it was suddenly 1900; how preposterous. Y2K fears were also based on elevators not working, cars not running, verily, ANYTHING with a uP (a "microprocessor" for you laymen) would cease functioning (although the Y2K hucksters would never say HOW, they would slink back to citing 'decades old COBOL code' -never mind FORTRAN and PL/1 or anything else- that would cease running on account of 'incorrect date interpretation'.)

You also make it sound as if NONE of the software of that time dealt with ANY dates after the year 2000 prior to the year 2000; more fallacy. No one generated 'payment schedules' or other tables years in advance extraploted and detailed out beyond the year 2000 prior to the year 2000? Balderdash ...

[WilliamofCarmichael]

Forecasts you say!

Some of the mainframe systems I worked on forecasted from seven to ten years based upon planned future peacetime programs for military weapon systems. The bases of the forecast were several past years of actual usage and anticipated technical improvements. Mainly, we wanted to know the budget for acquisition, repair, and maintenance requirements. We of course had to handle y2k though at the time the systems were developed Y2k was still way off in the future.

So yes, systems developed long ago did handle Y2k. I sure worked on a lot of them outside the military application cited above that did not handle a condition where 00 was greater than 99 as in YY.

Regardless. You could not take a chance. Even if everyone said, "Don't worry it handles Y2k," you still had to run it through scans and checks and executions using system date modification testing tools as it did its thing using all the necessary third party and vendor utility programs.

Every modification had to go through the whole schedule of testing, QA, and acceptance.

[_Jim]

Well this just isn't so. I know for a fact that online brokerage firms all had y2k teams examining and rewriting all their software.

Assertion without cite; anecdotal; based on hearsay and tainted by fading memories of the actual facts.

Activities to rewriting all their software would be nearly suicidal for an operating business; ever read some of the classical case studies where large softeare projects run ober budget, over schedule and some are/were never implemented?

[WilliamofCarmichael]

Good answer, thanks.

I've heard Mr. Corsi in interviews several times. I don't see it the same way as you. I don't find his views at the conspiracy theory level -- just asking what is really going on. Let's find out and let Washington, et al. know what we think.

[_Jim]

Some of the mainframe systems I worked on forecasted from seven to ten years based upon planned future peacetime programs for military weapon systems.

You prove my case and I thank you for that.

My contention all along has been that the Y2K thing for most apps (we're talking LARGE main-frame based apps now, not single-user PC stuff) that used dates in any fashion was more evolutionary rather than revolutionary.

[hedgetrimmer]

Getting back to the topic of the thread:

Why is the SPP named as a resourThe links, documents, and other materials on this site have been selected, organized, and in some cases designed to advance teaching and research on North American regional integration. In particular, we hope to expand teaching materials available to university professors, both those who teach courses with “NAFTA content” and those in a variety of disciplines such as political science (international relations, international political economy), economics (international economics), and business (international business, international finance, international marketing) for whom a module on some dimension of North American integration would illuminate an important theory or operational issue. At the same time, the site also aims to benefit the broader community of North Americanists, within the academy and beyond, by putting at our collective fingertips – or mouse-reach – the kinds of current and historical material that will benefit research into, and understanding of, North American integration – past, present, and future.

	Government Agencies > Documents and Data
	CanadExport – Trade and Investment Publication of International Trade Canada http://w01.international.gc.ca/canadexport/default.asp?language=E Citizenship and Immigration Canada, Research and Statistics http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/research/index.html Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, Canada (DFAIT), Key Border Documents, Border Cooperation, Canada-U.S. Relations http://www.dfait.gc.ca/can-am/main/border/key_border-en.asp Energy Information Administration-U.S. Government Energy Statistics http://www.eia.doe.gov/ Industry Canada, Economic Analysis and Statistics (including Archived Papers) http://strategis.ic.gc.ca/epic/internet/ineas-aes.nsf/en/h_ra01971e.html Instituto Nacional de Migración, (National Migration Institute), Secretaría de Gobernación (Mexican Interior Ministry), Migration Statistics http://www.inm.gob.mx/paginas/710000.htm North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, NAAEC (Side Agreement) http://www.cec.org/pubs_info_resources/law_treat_agree/naaec/index.cfm?varlan=english North American Agreement on Labor Cooperation, NAALC (Side Agreement) http://www.naalc.org/english/naalc.shtml North American Competitiveness Council: Prime Minister’s Announcement and Biographies of Canadian Members, 13 June 2006 http://www.pm.gc.ca/eng/media.asp?id=1200 North American Transportation Statistics (Trilateral) http://nats.sct.gob.mx/Nats/ Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores, (SRE; Mexican Foreign Ministry) Migration Documents http://www.sre.gob.mx/english/events/doconmigration.htm Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPP): Leaders’ Joint Renewal Declaration, Cancún, Mexico, 31 March 2006 http://www.pm.gc.ca/eng/media.asp?id=1085 White House, SPP: Next Steps, March 31, 2006 http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/03/20060331-1.html Statistics Canada: Trade Data http://www.statcan.ca/english/tradedata U.S. Department of Commerce, TradeStats Express http://tse.export.gov/ U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Secure Borders Initiative (May 2006) http://www.dhs.gov/dhspublic/interapp/editorial/editorial_0868.xml U.S. Trade Representative’s Office (USTR) Document Library (Search or Browse) http://www.ustr.gov/Document_Library/Section_Index.html

[hedgetrimmer]

Medved claims the SPP is an 'innocuous' organization, widely publicized initiative to promote inter-governmental cooperation . . . .
The White House says the SPP is calling the shots for the leaders of the three nations!

The Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America: Next Steps

The three leaders of North America agreed to advance the agenda of the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPP) by focusing on five high priority initiatives

This is the White House press release.

[Petronski]

I don't know of a party by that name, and I have not seen Corsi indicate membership in it.

If he accepted their nomination for president in 2008, he would presumably join the party.