North American Union to Replace USA? ("is this the plan?" alert!)

HumanEventsOnline.com ^ | 5/19/2006 | Jerome R. Corsi

[Dark Skies]

President Bush is pursuing a globalist agenda to create a North American Union, effectively erasing our borders with both Mexico and Canada. This was the hidden agenda behind the Bush administration's true open borders policy.

Secretly, the Bush administration is pursuing a policy to expand NAFTA to include Canada, setting the stage for North American Union designed to encompass the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. What the Bush administration truly wants is the free, unimpeded movement of people across open borders with Mexico and Canada.

President Bush intends to abrogate U.S. sovereignty to the North American Union, a new economic and political entity which the President is quietly forming, much as the European Union has formed.

The blueprint President Bush is following was laid out in a 2005 report entitled "Building a North American Community" published by the left-of-center Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). The CFR report connects the dots between the Bush administration's actual policy on illegal immigration and the drive to create the North American Union:

At their meeting in Waco, Texas, at the end of March 2005, U.S. President George W. Bush, Mexican President Vicente Fox, and Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin committed their governments to a path of cooperation and joint action. We welcome this important development and offer this report to add urgency and specific recommendations to strengthen their efforts.

What is the plan? Simple, erase the borders. The plan is contained in a "Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America" little noticed when President Bush and President Fox created it in March 2005:

In March 2005, the leaders of Canada, Mexico, and the United States adopted a Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPP), establishing ministerial-level working groups to address key security and economic issues facing North America and setting a short deadline for reporting progress back to their governments. President Bush described the significance of the SPP as putting forward a common commitment "to markets and democracy, freedom and trade, and mutual prosperity and security." The policy framework articulated by the three leaders is a significant commitment that will benefit from broad discussion and advice. The Task Force is pleased to provide specific advice on how the partnership can be pursued and realized.

To that end, the Task Force proposes the creation by 2010 of a North American community to enhance security, prosperity, and opportunity. We propose a community based on the principle affirmed in the March 2005 Joint Statement of the three leaders that "our security and prosperity are mutually dependent and complementary." Its boundaries will be defined by a common external tariff and an outer security perimeter within which the movement of people, products, and capital will be legal, orderly and safe. Its goal will be to guarantee a free, secure, just, and prosperous North America.

The perspective of the CFR report allows us to see President Bush's speech to the nation as nothing more than public relations posturing and window dressing. No wonder President Vincente Fox called President Bush in a panic after the speech. How could the President go back on his word to Mexico by actually securing our border? Not to worry, President Bush reassured President Fox. The National Guard on the border were only temporary, meant to last only as long until the public forgets about the issue, as has always been the case in the past.

The North American Union plan, which Vincente Fox has every reason to presume President Bush is still following, calls for the only border to be around the North American Union -- not between any of these countries. Or, as the CFR report stated:

The three governments should commit themselves to the long-term goal of dramatically diminishing the need for the current intensity of the governments’ physical control of cross-border traffic, travel, and trade within North America. A long-term goal for a North American border action plan should be joint screening of travelers from third countries at their first point of entry into North America and the elimination of most controls over the temporary movement of these travelers within North America.

Discovering connections like this between the CFR recommendations and Bush administration policy gives credence to the argument that President Bush favors amnesty and open borders, as he originally said. Moreover, President Bush most likely continues to consider groups such as the Minuteman Project to be "vigilantes," as he has also said in response to a reporter's question during the March 2005 meeting with President Fox.

Why doesn’t President Bush just tell the truth? His secret agenda is to dissolve the United States of America into the North American Union. The administration has no intent to secure the border, or to enforce rigorously existing immigration laws. Securing our border with Mexico is evidently one of the jobs President Bush just won't do. If a fence is going to be built on our border with Mexico, evidently the Minuteman Project is going to have to build the fence themselves. Will President Bush protect America's sovereignty, or is this too a job the Minuteman Project will have to do for him?

[nicmarlo]

The reason was stated at the posting: for comparison. There are substantial similarities of intent, goals, and ideals as stated within the Joint Statement, the SPP, and the CFR. These goals, associations, and common themes cannot be dismissed as merely coincidental.

I've already posted earlier that several CFR recommendations have already been implemented.

But transparency is lacking as to specifics, as far as I'm concerned. I am always suspicious when transparency is lacking.

[hedgetrimmer]

I posted "The CFR is a globalist secret organization that makes policy recommendations and is comprised of many members of the US Government"

See? I crossed out the word secret.

Maybe there is no interest in isolationism outside of Pat Buchanan.

Ah, now I am disappointed in you. To toss out the boring old pat Buchanan aspersion is beneath you. I was having fun, and now....

Here is a little game I play sometimes. I substitute the word Independence when I see people use "isolationist". It its technically more correct.

Maybe there is no interest in isolationism independence outside of Pat Buchanan

See ? This statement is more correct, given both Clinton and Bush's recent comments about interdependence. They clearly have no love for the Independence that was once bred into the American soul.

[calcowgirl]

Hong Kong existed as an independent national economy for decades. Now how can that be? Before it was a special administrative region for China, it was a British Dependent Territory, and before that it was a British colony.

The same way that Hong Kong is still an almost completely independent economy! Look, I understand that you're against free trade in principle that you may not want to answer my question. But the answer is obvious: that Hong Kong's free market policies at home and abroad constitute the main reasons why it's so prosperous. Remember, the thirteen colonies revolted because their own economic independence was threatened,; distance and development created that space.

But the report in question, clearly is not talking about an "independent" economy, but one that is completely intertwined and interdependent as the new "North American solution".

Building a North American Community, p.54:

Conclusion
The global challenges faced by North America cannot be met solely through unilateral or bilateral efforts or existing patterns of cooperation. They require deepened cooperation based on the principle, affirmed in the March 2005 joint statement by Canada, Mexico, and the United States, that "our security and prosperity are mutually dependent and complementary."

Establishment by 2010 of a security and economic community for North America is an ambitious but achievable goal that is consistent with this principle and, more important, buttresses the goals and values of the citizens of North America, who share a desire for safe and secure societies, economic opportunity and prosperity, and strong democratic institutions.

I also note that you want to equate "free market" principles with the "free trade" policies of some of these international agreements. The two are simply not the same. Furthermore, the report is not solely about "trade". It includes recommendations on education (how and what our children should be taught), changes to international water treaties, new regulatory and advisory bodies, etc.

p.53:

A North American Advisory Council. To ensure a regular injection of creative energy into the various efforts related to North American integration, the three governments should appoint an independent body of advisers. This body should be composed of eminent persons from outside government, appointed to staggered multiyear terms to ensure their independence. Their mandate would be to engage in creative exploration of new ideas from a North American perspective and to provide a public voice for North America. A complementary approach would be to establish private bodies that would meet regularly or annually to buttress North American relationships, along the lines of the Bilderberg or Wehrkunde conferences, organized to support transatlantic relations.

[Rokke]

"These goals, associations, and common themes cannot be dismissed as merely coincidental. "

Why not? Both efforts were seeking solutions to the same problem. If you went to several different doctors seeking opinions about a medical condition, would you be concerned if they all agreed with each other. It really doesn't take a Harvard PhD to come up with a list of viable solutions to the problems we are encountering with both trade and security in North America. And none of the initiatives listed in either source are very specific (as you've pointed out). Yet both sources represent the efforts of representatives from all three of the countries involved. It isn't that surprising that there is a broad degree of consensus between the two.

[hedgetrimmer]

Who is advocating integrating with corrupt socialist and communist governments?

Council on Foreign Relations member Robert Pastor for one. He first wrote Integration With Mexico: Options for U.S. Policy

When that didn't stick, he reprised the idea with Toward a North American Community: Lessons from the Old World for the New . It should be noted that he gets funded in part by the Inter-American Development Bank which is in part funded by the American taxpayer. Does the CFR also pay Pastor? Maybe you could ask your insider for the information, I'd sure like to know. Certainly they publish his books for him.

One wonders why a venerable institution such as the Council on Foreign Relations, would keep this man on as a member, and publish his books, when he is clearly advocating the overthrow of our Constitutional government through his writings.

[Rokke]

"See? I crossed out the word secret."

So?

"Here is a little game I play sometimes."

Drop me a note when you learn how to answer questions and discuss a single topic.

[nicmarlo]

The specifics are not laid out. But the goals glare.

The goals are to remove the sovereignty of the United States and of Canada, take their wealth and distribute it to Mexico, even moreso than has been the case. It is to encourage migration from Mexico to the United States.

Are the specifics mentioned? No, but the goals are there, in all three documents. If all surgeons are, in fact, wrong on which leg to remove, it matters not that they all agreed upon removing the wrong leg.

The amibitions set forth by the "trilateral", CFR, North American Union are antithetical to the United States, its sovereignty, its Constitution and our Bill of Rights.

[hedgetrimmer]

Lets look at another essay by Council on Foreign Relations member Robert Pastor. See what he says about who will have the greatest say in an integrated norther hemisphere.

Become a resident of North America

Robert Pastor is Goodrich C. White Professor of International Relations.

Four hundred million people live in Canada, Mexico and the United States, but few, if any, think of themselves as residents of North America.

The three governments have devoted so much effort to defining their differences that the people have not seen what they have in common, or that they share a continent, values and an agreement. The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) began officially on Jan. 1, 1994, and it is a foundation on which we should build a North American Community.

Despite its critics, NAFTA succeeded in what it was designed to do. Today, the United States exports nearly four times more to our two neighbors than to Japan and China and 40 percent more than to the 15-nation European Union. In the 1990s, Mexico had the highest rate of export growth in the world, and Canadian investment in the United States grew twice as fast as U.S. investment in Canada.

Two decades ago, less than one-third of the three countries’ international trade was with each other; today, it’s more than half. Our firms have become continental and more competitive, and North America has a combined gross product of $10 trillion, making it the largest free trade area in the world, 15 percent higher than the European Union.

NAFTA’s failure has come from what it omitted. The income gap between Mexico and its northern neighbors has not narrowed. Illegal migration has increased. If Europe built too many institutions, NAFTA made the opposite mistake. It lacks institutions to anticipate or respond to crises or take advantage of opportunities. It also lacks leaders who could define an inclusive identity that would inspire citizens of all three countries to think of themselves also as North Americans.

Alone, Mexican President Vicente Fox Quesada has offered a vision of a wider community and an eventual common market. President George W. Bush clearly wants good relations with Mexico, but despite many meetings with Bush and his administration, the American president has failed to offer a response to Fox’s proposal. Prime Minister Jean Chretien of Canada also wants to work closely with President Bush, but he can’t see Mexico over the colossus next door. And so, absent leadership by Bush, NAFTA is likely to remain two bilateral relationships rather than a single, continental relationship.

What should the presidents of the United States and Mexico and the prime minister of Canada do? The three met in Québec in April 2001 for a photo opportunity at the Third Summit of the Americas, but they didn’t have much of an exchange. The three governments’ officials have a “trained incapacity,” in Nobel Prize-winning economist Robert Merton’s phrase, to visualize the two bilateral relationships as actually two sides of the same problem. They treat each border problem as distinct without realizing that a trilateral approach is more likely to yield durable rules instead of a lopsided collision between a big and smaller country.

The only way to define a North American agenda is to establish a North American commission to prepare the leaders for summit meetings.

Unlike the sprawling, regulatory European Commission, the North American one should be lean and advisory—just 15 distinguished individuals, five from each of the countries. Their task would be to help the leaders think continentally. To deal with immigration and customs at the border, they could propose “North American passports” for frequent travelers, or that “North American customs and immigration officers” patrol the perimeter, and subsequently reduce documentation by half. Instead of grading each other’s behavior against drug traffickers, as Washington currently does, we could work more effectively as partners.

Illegal immigration will not be reduced until the income gap between Mexico and its northern neighbors is reduced. The European Union lifted its poorest countries—Spain, Portugal, Ireland and Greece—and we could learn from their experience. From 1986–99, per capita GDP of those countries rose from 65 percent to 78 percent of the EU average, and emigration slowed markedly. The astonishing progress was due in part to free trade and foreign investment, but mostly to the transfer of aid that amounted to 2–4 percent of the recipient’s GDP. The most effective resulting projects were in infrastructure and education.

NAFTA is deliberately laissez faire, but the result is that most foreign investment has concentrated in the congested, polluted border area between the United States and Mexico, where it has served as a magnet attracting workers from the heart of Mexico. From there, many immigrate illegally to the United States. In other words, the absence of a strategy has meant that NAFTA has been encouraging illegal migration, not reducing it.

Foreign companies would prefer to invest in the interior (where the workforce would be more stable), but the roads and infrastructure are inadequate. The World Bank estimates Mexico needs $20 billion a year for 10 years just for infrastructure.

The three leaders should establish a North American Development Fund, whose priority would be to connect the border to central and southern Mexico. If roads were built, investors would come, immigration would decline and income disparities would narrow. If Mexico’s growth rate leapt to twice that of its neighbors, the psychology of the people and their relationships would be transformed.

There is much more that a North American Commission could propose—a continental plan for infrastructure and transportation, a plan for harmonizing regulatory policies, a customs union, a common currency. But the boldest accomplishment would be a Development Fund. The three leaders should not create a new bureaucracy; the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank could administer it. But it will need an injection of funding comparable to the Alliance for Progress.

The three North American governments could contribute in proportion to their wealth, but the United States needs to lead. Fox has focused on migration because he knows that Mexicans want respect from United States, but the only solution to our relationship is narrowing the income disparities between our two countries. That should be the building block of a new community. Then, we all would begin to think of ourselves proudly as “North Americans.”

[William Terrell]

List some.

I'd rather not spend my time looking up documents, but off the top of my head is the amnesty of illegal aliens while not securing the borders, guaranteeing a greater continued flood, talks with Canada and Mexico to combine the three countries with a common perimeter border and no borders in between, replacing the currency of the three countries with the "Amero", complete lack of border control when all it would take is executive order and some additional money from Congress, complete refusal to enforce laws against hiring illegals. You're welcome to look up others yourself.

Bush's daddy let some hints drop during his administration, and president Bush deliberately refused to enforce the law in certain areas.

I'd like to point out something I think that might be misunderstood.

Planning of this sort, global governments, socialism being able to work if the world's resources are available, other nutty ideals, most probably are, for the most part of the planners, what is sincerely thought to be the best for the greatest number of people.

Once a family is insulated from the harsh realities of material life for a couple generations or so, it becomes very easy to think in terms of good sounding ideas that will not work when applied to realty.

It's easy to transmute ultra-complex human reactions and behavior into simplistic theories because its scions have not lived in the arena where they want to play.

But this makes them no less dangerous. Disaster through ignorant good intentions is still disaster, and Mother Nature will not hear your case for unfairness.

[Czar]

"Pick a topic related to something in this thread."

After reading the rest of this thread (at least through #733), I have concluded that I ought to do some further research and reading on the extent to which our government has bought into the grand experiment called an "Integrated North America" or the "North American Union", and to what extent that plan would erode the traditional loyal American conservative values you and I share. I have also decided that I do not know nearly enough about the details of the NAU. Despite having to do some additional homework, I remain very suspicious of the CFR, its membership and it's influence within and among our highest elected representatives. If this sounds like I no longer trust the federal government, that's because I don't.

One last point. In catching up on this thread, I noticed someone asked you if you are related to a certain Gneral Rokke who is a member of the CFR. You responded:

" Yes. And just one more reason why I know what I'm talking about when I describe the motives and loyalties of many of the members of the CFR. I've worked for or have known several of them. Every single one of them men who have dedicated (and in many cases risked) their lives to preserving American sovereignty. 715 posted on 05/22/2006 3:47:29 PM PDT by Rokke"

This would appear to render you somewhat, if not entirely, conflicted on the CFR issues under discussion. That need not have been the case had you openly disclosed this important fact. But you did not, instead waiting until you were asked a direct question by hedgetrimmer. We're not talking about a third cousin here, Rokke, but a parent whom you would of course protect and defend no matter what. Others on this thread with an anti-CFR/NAU position deserved to know about this well before post #715.

Being obviously conflicted in this manner, why did you not disclose it early on so as to avoid even the appearance of familial bias? You have a horse in this race and you should have disclosed it from the beginning.

[Rokke]

I ask you who is advocating integrating with corrupt socialist and communist governments and you say Robert Pastor writing about Mexico?!?!? You do realize Mexico is not a socialist or communist state? And do you base ALL your opinions on book titles? You link me to an Amazon page that says exactly ZERO about what the book is about and use that as evidence to support your point? Are you serious? I've already asked you what your problems are with what he said. That wasn't a rhetorical question.

"When that didn't stick, he reprised the idea with Toward a North American Community: Lessons from the Old World for the New . "

Oh great. Another link to Amazon. Does this constitute research for you? No wonder you are so lost.

Look, the only reason I opened this discussion with you in the first place was because in post #143 of this thread you asked GondramB if he would like to "go through the document point by point?" I've been trying and trying to do just that with you and instead you are linking me to two books on Amazon that weren't even published by CFR.

You are just one more lazy conspiracy sponge who is incapable of following through on his own questions, nevermind answering anyone elses. I was a fool to think otherwise.

[Czar]

"Oaths of office mean nothing to those who hold nothing sacred including our Constitution. As for being a Conservative party the GOP died in 1996."

Someone might have a convincing counter-argument to this. I don't.

[hedgetrimmer]

From #748

The only way to define a North American agenda is to establish a North American commission to prepare the leaders for summit meetings.

Done. There is a North American Commission for Environmental cooperation, and a North American commission for labor.

To deal with immigration and customs at the border, they could propose “North American passports” for frequent travelers, or that “North American customs and immigration officers” patrol the perimeter

This is being done.

The three leaders should establish a North American Development Fund

This is done. Its called NADBank. Search on it and see how they are using this fund to build transnational trade corridors to further integrate North america.

a continental plan for infrastructure and transportation

Western hemispheric travel initiative anyone?

plan for harmonizing regulatory policies

SPS for codex alimentarius is one.

a common currency

We saw this idea floated in an article just posted today by the same Jerome Corsi who wrote the story about the North American Union.

This Council on Foreign Relations which has no affiliation with the US government and no institutional position on merging the US with Canada and Mexico, certainly managed get its agenda enacted. How did that happen? Are all those members of the CFR in our government uninvolved? Certainly the American people have not been involved nor pushed this agenda. How did it come to pass?

[Rokke]

"The goals are to remove the sovereignty of the United States and of Canada, take their wealth and distribute it to Mexico, even moreso than has been the case. It is to encourage migration from Mexico to the United States."

Really? I didn't read that in either document. Could you point out where they said that.

"The amibitions set forth by the "trilateral", CFR, North American Union are antithetical to the United States, its sovereignty, its Constitution and our Bill of Rights."

Your statement is based on your assessment of what those ambitions are. That is a brilliant opening statement to a debate in which you'd provide support for that statement. I am no longer under the delusion that that is going to happen on this thread.

[hedgetrimmer]

You do realize Mexico is not a socialist or communist state?

You do realize that a communist is running in the upcoming presidential election, and it is a distinct possibility he could win. You also realize that the FTAA plans to merge the US with the rest of the western hemipshere, and when I last looked, Venezuela and Bolivia were tilting communist, and Peru, which is also bound to elect a communist this summer, will follow.

[mjolnir]

So do you think tariffs and duties, to the extent they are high, help America to the extent that they are high?

Do you believe if Europe or Mexico subsidizes their industries, we should subsidize our own?

What I'm trying to understand is whether it is the details of NAFTA you don't like, or if you're against freedom of trade in principle-- if, no matter how simple NAFTA was, you would still be against it.

Free trade helps all countries, including the United States. The United States is by far the world's biggest exporter of services, just as the United States is by far the leading exporter of goods, becuase the United States is a hoss. In a country this size, with the kinds of fundamentals we have, in this kind of economy, with the virtually full employment we have, the United States is the last country that should be afraid "exporting good jobs".

You quoted C.S. Lewis. Like Hayek, C.S. Lewis believed as Kant did that human beings were ends in themeselves, not mere means to an end. C.S. Lewis decried the Malthusian view that human economic life in its totality must be zero-sum. He noted that this true only when we don't live by God's rules with respect to one another. In other words, theft does result in zero-sum games, while games which involve freely giving do not. That's why, at the end of the Voyage of the Dawn Treader, there is a table which continually reproduces food-- Lewis saw this non-zero-sum nature as a miracle that could not be explained in crude metaphysical materialist terms. In this way he echoed Jonathan Swift and foresaw the insights of Julian Simon.

[hedgetrimmer]

Oh great. Another link to Amazon. Does this constitute research for you? No wonder you are so lost.

Did you read the titles of the books? Or are you just mad I didn't give the CFR their due by linking to their online store for the books.

[nicmarlo]

You have a horse in this race and you should have disclosed it from the beginning.

As I previously stated, I have an innate mistrust with what is not transparent. Disclosure and openness are moves in the direction of transparency. Coincidentally, it is that same transparency which is also missing from the proponents of the trilateral, the NAU, and statements from the CFR.

[hedgetrimmer]

I'll go through point by point. But somehow you got hung up on a disclaimer that is clearly incorrect in practice, by the CFR.

[Czar]

More reason to be suspicious.