Posted on 06/19/2006 7:37:30 AM PDT by hedgetrimmer
The Bush Administration is pushing to create a North American Union out of the work on-going in the Department of Commerce under the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America in the NAFTA office headed by Geri Word. A key part of the plan is to expand the NAFTA tribunals into a North American Union court system that would have supremacy over all U.S. law, even over the U.S. Supreme Court, in any matter related to the trilateral political and economic integration of the United States, Canada and Mexico.
Right now, Chapter 11 of the NAFTA agreement allows a private NAFTA foreign investor to sue the U.S. government if the investor believes a state or federal law damages the investor’s NAFTA business.
Under Chapter 11, NAFTA establishes a tribunal that conducts a behind closed-doors “trial” to decide the case according to the legal principals established by either the World Bank’s International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes or the UN’s Commission for International Trade Law. If the decision is adverse to the U.S., the NAFTA tribunal can impose its decision as final, trumping U.S. law, even as decided by the U.S. Supreme Court. U.S. laws can be effectively overturned and the NAFTA Chapter 11 tribunal can impose millions or billions of dollars in fines on the U.S. government, to be paid ultimately by the U.S. taxpayer.
On Aug. 9, 2005, a three-member NAFTA tribunal dismissed a $970 million claim filed by Methanex Corp., a Canadian methanol producer challenging California laws that regulate against the gasoline additive MTBE. The additive MTBE was introduced into gasoline to reduce air pollution from motor vehicle emissions. California regulations restricted the use of MTBE after the additive was found to contaminate drinking water and produce a health hazard. Had the case been decided differently, California’s MTBE regulations would have been overturned and U.S. taxpayers forced to pay Methanex millions in damages.
While this case was decided favorably to U.S. laws, we can rest assured that sooner or later a U.S. law will be overruled by the NAFTA Chapter 11 adjudicative procedure, as long as the determinant law adjudicated by the NAFTA Chapter 11 tribunals continues to derive from World Court or UN law. Once a North American Union court structure is in place can almost certainly predict that a 2nd Amendment challenge to the right to bear arms is as inevitable under a North American Union court structure as is a challenge to our 1st Amendment free speech laws. Citizens of both Canada and Mexico cannot freely own firearms. Nor can Canadians or Mexicans speak out freely without worrying about “hate crimes” legislation or other political restrictions on what they may choose to say.
Like it or not, NAFTA Chapter 11 tribunals already empower foreign NAFTA investors and corporations to challenge the sovereignty of U.S. law in the United States. Sen. John Kerry (D.-Mass.) has been quoted as saying, “When we debated NAFTA, not a single word was uttered in discussing Chapter 11. Why? Because we didn’t know how this provision would play out. No one really knew just how high the stakes would get.” Again, we have abundant proof that Congress is unbelievably lax when it comes to something as fundamental as reading or understanding the complex laws our elected legislators typically pass.
Under the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) plan expressed in May 2005 for building NAFTA into a North American Union, the stakes are about to get even higher. A task force report titled “Building a North American Community” was written to provide a blueprint for the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America agreement signed by President Bush in his meeting with President Fox and Canada’s then-Prime Minister Paul Martin in Waco, Tex., on March 23, 2005.
The CFR plan clearly calls for the establishment of a “permanent tribunal for North American dispute resolution” as part of the new regional North American Union (NAU) governmental structure that is proposed to go into place in 2010. As the CFR report details on page 22:
The current NAFTA dispute-resolution process is founded on ad hoc panels that are not capable of building institutional memory or establishing precedent, may be subject to conflicts of interest, and are appointed by authorities who may have an incentive to delay a given proceeding. As demonstrated by the efficiency of the World Trade Organization (WTO) appeal process, a permanent tribunal would likely encourage faster, more consistent and more predictable resolution of disputes. In addition, there is a need to review the workings of NAFTA’s dispute-settlement mechanism to make it more efficient, transparent, and effective.
Robert Pastor of American University, the vice chairman of the CFR task force report, provided much of the intellectual justification for the formation of the North American Union. He has repeatedly argued for the creation of a North American Union “Permanent Tribunal on Trade and Investment.” Pastor understands that a “permanent court would permit the accumulation of precedent and lay the groundwork for North American business law.” Notice, Pastor says nothing about U.S. business law or the U.S. Supreme Court. In the view of the globalists pushing toward the formation of the North American Union, the U.S. is a partisan nation-state whose limitations of economic protectionism and provincial self-interest are outdated and as such must be transcended, even if the price involves sacrificing U.S. national sovereignty.
When it comes to the question of illegal immigrants, Pastor’s solution is to erase our borders with Mexico and Canada so we can issue North American Union passports to all citizens. In his testimony to the Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee on June 9, 2005, Pastor made this exact argument: “Instead of stopping North Americans on the borders, we ought to provide them with a secure, biometric Border Pass that would ease transit across the border like an E-Z pass permits our cars to speed though toll booths.”
Even Pastor worries about the potential for North American Unions to overturn U.S. laws that he likes. Regarding environmental laws, Pastor’s testimony to the Trilateral Commission in November 2002 was clear on this point: “Some narrowing or clarification of the scope of Chapter 11 panels on foreign investment is also needed to permit the erosion of environmental rules.” Evidently it did not occur to Pastor that the way to achieve the protection he sought was to leave the sovereignty of U.S. and the supremacy of the U.S. Supreme Court intact.
The executive branch under the Bush Administration is quietly putting in place a behind-the-scenes trilateral regulatory scheme, evidently without any direct congressional input, that should provide the rules by which any NAFTA or NAU court would examine when adjudicating NAU trade disputes. The June 2005 report by the SPP working groups organized in the U.S. Department of Commerce, clearly states the goal:
We will develop a trilateral Regulatory Cooperative Framework by 2007 to support and enhance existing, as well as encourage new cooperation among regulators, including at the outset of the regulatory process.
We wonder if the Bush Administration intends to present the Trilateral Regulatory Cooperative Framework now being constructed by SPP.gov to Congress for review in 2007, or will the administration simply continue along the path of knitting together the new NAU regional governmental structure behind closed doors by executive fiat? Ms. Word affirms that the membership of the various SPP working group committees has not been published. Nor have the many memorandums of understanding and other trilateral agreements created by these SPP working groups been published, not even on the Internet.
Later read.
It's really that simple, but difficult for most to absorb. We have to be a nation of laws and not men, else we'll fail. But those laws have to be, as you point out, in pursuance to the Bill of Rights/Constitution, for the Constitution constructs the legal mechanism and contract for our elected officials to adhere to, to prevent infringement of both enumerated and non-enumerated rights of the individual.
I replied
Our failure to hold those elected officials to their constitutional oaths is the real problem, as I see it.
It's a failure of our political 'two party' system. And FR is a perfect example of why that system is not working to restore our Constitution.
I notice you are defending our two party system, R-boy. Care to expand on your point? -- How are our liberties being defended by the present system?
Is our Constitution being honored by either party?
Or an entrepreneur who can't count?
Making fun of our current crop of third-party candidates is not "defending our two party system," so no thanks.
Interesting speech.
"No thanks" -- for what?
If you have to question what trade has to do with illegal immigration then you obviously are forgetting the line of BS we heard from the Clinton's et al about all the "benefits" we'd derive from NAFTA. They lied about our trade balances with Mexico( a healthy surplus has turned into a steadily rising deficit), how it would decrease illegal immigration by creating so many new jobs for Mexicans ( even want to touch that??), plus all the new jobs it would create in this country( an even bigger joke).
The point is this so-called trade agreement created a parasitical relationship between the US and Mexico that now has evolved into a sociological nightmare for healthcare givers, educators, prison officials, etc. Sorry, you just can't focus on one or two aspects of something like this to determine it's impact.......one has to look at the entire impact of NAFTA, CAFTA, etc. on our society to determine it's value.......and so far it's a disaster. If you don'tunderstand that you being disingenuous at best and delusional at worst.
Oh, it's still frowned-upon, it's just that FR is sticking with the technical requirement that the actual articles be different.
I hope so, but he hasn't shown much evidence of it. His stance on illegal immigration, for instance.
Carolyn
oh that thing buzzes my house in Springfield almost every night.
I download my NAU resume to it :)
Bush Sr. was the first to use the words "New World Order" because the Carnegie Institute had just published an influential policy document called "Self Determination in the New World Order". In 1992, this policy paper was published in book form http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0870030183/002-9341899-5438408?v=glance&n=283155 and was completely embraced by Clinton, who hired the authors for influential positions in his Administration.
A review & description of Self Determination in the New World Order is here: http://www.foreignaffairs.org/19921201fabook6395/morton-h-halperin-david-j-scheffer-patricia-small/self-determination-in-the-new-world-order.html
It's first real-world application was the break up of Yugoslavia -- with disasterous results.
The people in those states are there own victims, not suing for a republican form of government. When the U.S. Constitution is ratified by any state, the state at that time agreed that there can be no thing in their laws or state constitutions or judges rulings that are repugnant to the supreme law of the land, which of course is the Bill of Rights/U.S. Constitution, which specifically protects and recognizes the right of the people to keep and bear arms.
The U.S. Constitution recognizes the right of the people to keep and bear arms and it warns the federal government to not even think about infringing on that right. It is right there in front of their eyes, in black and white -- that the right to keep and bear arms is a right of the people -- not the federal government or state governments.
It defies logic why the people would agree that the federal government cannot prevent you from the act of defending your life, and then turn right around and allow the state to prevent you from defending your life? Does not compute.
Carolyn
1,000% agreement!!
Posted with the same certitude used to falsely claim that B4B had inside information about the President's recent trip to Iraq. B4B has ZERO credibility.
I agree. Not saying that Corsi is correct -- as a matter of fact, I think that he may be rather "out there". However, I never heard about "the case of Methenex vs. The State of CA" that he talks about. But if he is correct on this one small point -- that "had Methenex won, the State would have been liable" --this is an enormous issue well worth investigating.
NGO's (some of which are called "think-tanks")have a huge influence on public policy. The issues then get reframed (or repackaged) by politicians for our consumption. Just take a look at what the Carnegie Institute has to say about the US vs. Euro attitudes toward "Human Rights" in the International arena: http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20051101fabook84613/michael-ignatieff/american-exceptionalism-and-human-rights.html
Do you think that this represents the views of most Freepers?
You really think a few words in the Constitution really rule?
As I said before Wolfstar, believe what you'd like.
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