Posted on 01/09/2007 8:27:45 AM PST by jmc813
I’m greatly encouraged by the lengthy, indignant responses by prominent scare-mongers Joe Farah and Jerome Corsi to my on-air and on-blog denunciation (“Shame on Demagogues for Exploiting ‘North American Union’!”, 12/28) of their self-promoting paranoia regarding an alleged conspiracy to merge the US, Canada and Mexico. The defensive tone of their commentary suggests that these two have been appropriately embarrassed: Farah, in particular, dramatically deescalated his rhetoric.
While previous commentary on WorldNetDaily prominently and regularly featured the noun “plot” in defining this non-issue, his answer to my purposefully harsh attack omits that key word entirely and uses language in a vastly more responsible and rational style. If I can push an influential (and often insightful) journalist like Farah back toward reasoned debate and the mainstream, then I’ve already succeeded in my chief goal: to prevent conservatives from following self-interested Pied Pipers off a cliff into conspiracist cuckoo land.
I’m particularly gratified at the way that Farah worded his “Daily Poll” on this issue. He posed the question: “What do you make of the talk about the North American Union?” and offered only two alternatives (out of nine) that agreed with the lunatic alarmists on the subject. Those two choices declared: “The evidence keeps mounting. When will people stop being in denial?” and “Plans for a union are an absolute reality, and anyone who can’t see concerted attacks on U.S. sovereignty is blind.” Please note that in declaring “the evidence keeps mounting,” this response never specifies what, exactly this “evidence” is supposed to prove. Similarly, the statement that “plans for a union are an absolute reality” never suggests who it is who is making those plans. If the plans (not “plots” this time) for a North American Union are coming from forces on the left as marginal as the fringies on the right who worry about such shcemes, then there is, indeed, no reason for fear.
Amazingly enough, Farah himself supports this reassuring perspective in his muddled attempt to defend his previous hysteria. He identifies one Robert Pastor “as the man at the very center of the plans for a North American Union.” Pastor is a loony leftist, slightly unhinged professor at American University who was an enthusiastic supporter (and informal advisor) to John Kerry’s Presidential juggernaut--- and who bears no connection whatever to the Bush administration, or the dreaded Security and Prosperity Partnership. If an addled academic with zero power in the government and no clout whatever with the current administration is “the man at the very center of the plans for a North American Union” do those plans really sound so menacing and dire and imminent?
Moreover, even Professor Pastor (in an interview with NAU demagogue-in-chief Jerome Corsi, as quoted by Farah) specifically denies any desire for a North American Union. “Each of the proposals I have laid out represent (sic) more than just small steps,” Pastor proclaimed. “But it doesn’t represent a leap to a North American Union or even to some confederation of any kind. I don’t think either is plausible, necessary or even helpful to contemplate at this stage.” (Italics added)
I know that paranoids and conspiracy connoisseurs will seize on the last three words “at this stage” and scream, “Aha! The dreaded Pastor—the evil academic who’s the architect of the whole diabolical scheme – is suggesting at some later stage it WILL be plausible, necessary, or even helpful to contemplate a North American Union!”
But please, friends, consider this: if even the lefty professor who is considered the most dangerous plotter and visionary on the prospect of US-Mexican-Canadian merger explicitly denies any interest whatever in even contemplating that scheme at this stage, does it really make any sense—any sense at all – to frighten the public into believing that there is a current, powerful mass movement on behalf of such plans?
That’s the essence of my impassioned concern with the demagoguery on this subject: by focusing concern on a non-existent threat, people like Farah and Corsi take attention away from the very real dangers posed by the liberal ideologues who have taken over both houses of Congress.
There are open, undeniable, widely supported plans from the Democratic leadership to cripple the country in our war against Islamo-Nazis, to undermine our security agencies in the name of “constitutional rights,” to raise taxes, to punish productivity, to grow government, to undermine the traditional family, to nationalize health care, to force us all out of our cars (and onto useless mass transit) and to push through precisely the sort of immigration policies that most conservatives will absolutely hate. These plans demand a united Republican Party and a re-energized conservative movement that isn’t distracted and paralyzed by non-existent threats concerning non-existent plans to terminate the independent survival of the United States. (“PREMEDIATED MERGER: How Leaders are Stealthily Transforming USA into North American Union” reads one typical and current Farah headline.)
This is a fateful moment for the conservative moment that Barry Goldwater launched and that Ronald Reagan and Newt Gingrich and, yes, George W. Bush led to some significant triumphs. For the first time since Clinton first came to power 14 years ago, we are definitely in opposition --- coming out of our “thumpin’” in the 2006 elections, all the momentum and energy in Washington has currently shifted to the Democratic side. The next few months will help to determine whether Republicans and conservatives will fight the good fight over issues that matter or dissipate all chance of a return to power through in-fighting, defeatism and self-marginalization. Given the stakes involved with some of the current battles in Washington and around the world, how can any grownup, responsible activist justify focusing on black-helicopter-style threats like the border-dissolving, sovereignty-ending North American Union –- which no elected leaders of administration officials have ever endorsed?
Where, in the past, have conservatives succeeded in building majorities by concentrating on “secret plans” and “high level plots” by their fellow Republicans?
And this brings me to the unfortunate Jerome Corsi, who felt the need in his response to my scorn to bring up some long-ago misunderstanding between us in which he believed I had charged him with anti-Semitism. As I communicated to Corsi in a telephone conversation, I did not recall making that charge on the air and I still don’t believe I ever attacked him in that manner. If I had even hinted at Jew-hatred on Corsi’s part I was willing to apologize, I said.
But now that he’s brought up the long-dead matter once again, I went to the trouble of looking up some of his controversial (and profoundly embarrassing) internet postings from FreeRepublic.com that were publicized in 2004. One of them (03/04/2004) attacked “John F**ing Commie Kerry” as follows: “After he married TerRAHsa, didn’t John Kerry begin practicing Judiasm? (sic). He also has paternal grandparents that were Jewish. What religion is John Kerry?”
Given the fact that neither Kerry nor his wife (either wife, for that matter) ever practiced any form of Judaism (or “Judi-asm”, which might be a form of Judi worship), and given the fact that Theresa Heinz Kerry has never had any connection whatever to the Jewish people or the Jewish religion, and given the fact that Kerry himself has been a well-advertised, professing Catholic all his life, doesn’t Corsi’s snide little comment about Kerry’s “reverting” to the faith from which his paternal grandparents converted, give off unmistakable, fetid whiffs of anti-Semitic obsession?
In the same series of comments he also wrote of the beloved and revered Pope John Paul II: “Boy buggering in both Islam and Catholicism is okay with the Pope as long as it isn’t reported by the liberal press” (03/03/2003) and “We may get one more Pope, when this senile one dies, but that’s probably about it.” (12/16/2002).
And now this same angry, venomous, irresponsible figure wants to be taken seriously when he warns of the looming, desperate danger of North American Union. He insists that he is utterly disinterested and selfless in promoting this grand conspiracy theory--- but then the final line of his posting gives the lie to this preposterous pose. That line announces about Mr. Corsi: “He will soon author a book on the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America and the prospect of the forthcoming North American Union.”
I have no desire whatever to help him promote his latest book which is why I won’t invite him as a guest to debate these issues on my radio show. If he wants to call in (with other members of the public) to make whatever points he chooses to make, he’s welcome to do so on the one national talk show that identifies itself as “Your Daily Dose of Debate” and we’ll move him to the front of the caller line. The phone number, Mr. Corsi (toll free, by the way) is 1-800-955-1776.
And concerning his challenge to me to debate him publicly and formally over his poisonous obsession over phantom dangers, I’ve never in my life turned away from a rhetorical challenge, and I’m not about to do so now. If Corsi wants a debate (over a non-issue that I don’t believe is even worthy of serious discussion) I’m willing to join him if he arranges an appropriate venue and I can participate without incurring debilitating travel or personal expense.
If this sort of confrontation can flush out fringe-figures like Jerome Corsi from the dank, turgid conspiracist fever-swamps he chooses to inhabit, it may perform an important hygienic purpose in returning the conservative movement to the robust health it needs for the serious battles that lie ahead.
Of course we do. We have three times as many consumers as they do. The deficit should be a lot higher, except that most of what we export to them is high-end goods and most of what we import is oil, agricultural products and textiles. Do we need to raise the price of oil in this country so we can protect our nation's garment industry?
Farah has been pandering to the paranoia crowd for years, playing up any and all angles that appeal to the people most likely to purchase his wares at the big WND flea market he runs. That's the niche he's carved out for himself, and his associates.
It plays well in Peoria.
Say, isn't that Alan Keyes hometown?!?
Is a mortgage application "fair?" I mean, those can get pretty long, right? It's just "Please give me x for y." Heck the banker even speaks the same language.
I had a feeling Medved was a phony all along.
He gave these con-men free airtime (from Wikipedia)...
The show has welcomed the dissenting voices of Noam Chomsky, Michael Moore, John Shelby Spong,Oliver Stone, Warren Beatty, Ralph Nader, Senator Barbara Boxer, Al Gore, Madeline Albright, George Galloway, and Al Franken, among many others.
I would think if St. Jerome could demonstrate that he can behave himself, then Medved would be happy to give him a segment or an hour.
You've read both Medved and Corsi's pieces. You can honestly tell me that Medved has "behaved himself" better over the last few weeks?
Say what you want about Medved, he doesn't shy from debate.
The guy's outed himself as a complete pu$$y over the last week and his reasoning behind not allowing Corsi on as a guest but allowing him to phone in are completely logically unsound.
And while I have your permission to "say what I want about him", I've done some research and it turns out this Medved is a total phony. Get a load of this gem...
Michael Medved was voted "most radical" in his Los Angeles high school class, then graduated from Yale and attended Yale Law School, where he knew Bill and Hillary Clinton. He was an anti-war protester and backer of Eugene McCarthy, after which he worked for Robert Kennedy's Presidential campaign. He was at the Ambassador Hotel when Kennedy was shot. Medved also took part in George McGovern's 1972 Presidential run, and while living in Berkeley, California worked briefly for the re-election of Congressman Ron Dellums, described as the "angriest black radical in Congress." Medved eventually became a film critic, and for 12 years co-hosted the popular PBS movie review show "Sneak Previews."
I have real issues when a draft dodger makes nasty remarks about someone who admirably served.
You are a nutburger with cheese.
I am not talking about Corsi but about statement made by Hugin:
"When you talk about the character of a source being important, it is only important when discussing facts provided by that source. The merits of an opinion stand or fall on their own."
I agree that "merits of an opinion stand or fall on their own." You can have the greatest genius and a saint who expresses an opinion which is wrong, same way you can have wicked and dishonest person who expresses an opinion which is correct.
Opinions should be judged on their merits. On the other hand, when we do not have direct access to a fact, we may have to look at the integrity of the source.
Contrasting posts 146 and 147 pretty much sums up this entire thing.
All of them are people whom Medved's large radio audience would find interesting and know about before they're interviewed. Corsi is an obscure nobody whose profile would be increased dramatically on Medved's show. His column is much lower-profile and he can deal with more general issues like this.
It's like the Silly Party (Libertarian) candidate demanding a debate with the President of the US. It benefits the latter not at all and the former, regardless of the outcome.
You've read both Medved and Corsi's pieces. You can honestly tell me that Medved has "behaved himself" better over the last few weeks?
Yes.
And you've found out Medved's secret. He used to be a hardcore lefty.
Where did you find it?
How did you discover such damning information?
Why, the only place I'd ever seen it before is...
...the book he authored, himself.
You people are great. I think I shall allow you to carry my sedan chair and amuse me with your rantings. Can you wear a hat with bells on?
Building the EU by stealth
by Hugh McDonald
HOW DECEIT is integral to the development of the EU was admitted frankly by Italian prime minister Guiliano Amato in an interview with Barbara Spinelli of La Stampa on 13 July 2000. Since then Amato became vice-president of the convention that drafted the EU constitution. Here are some things he said:
"The project of the European constitution is daring, but to overcome obstacles in politics it is necessary to conceal them. In Europe one needs to act 'as if' - as if what was wanted was little, in order to obtain much, as if states were to remain sovereign to convince them to concede sovereignty. The Commission in Brussels, for example, should act as if it were a technical instrument, in order to be able to treated as a government. And so on, by disguise and subterfuge...
"The sovereignty that is lost at national level does not pass to any new entity. It is entrusted to entities without a face: Nato, the UN and eventually the EU,which is in the vanguard of a world that is changing, pointing to a future of princes without sovereignty.
"The new entity is faceless and those who are in command can neither be pinned down nor elected... The federalists still think that stripping nation states of their sovereignty transfers it to a higher level. This is their mistake. The truth is that shifting sovereign power will make it evaporate, disappear. In it there will no longer be individual identifiable sovereigns. In their place there will be a multitude of authorities at different levels of aggregation, each of which will be at the head of different interests of human beings: levels that possess ambiguous fields of power which they share with other authorities.
"That is the way Europe was made too: by creating communitarian organisms without giving the organisms presided over by national governments the impression that they were being subjected to a higher power. That is how the Court of Justice was born as a supranational body: it was a sort of unseen atom-bomb, which Schuman and Monnet slipped into the negotiations on the Coal and Steel Community. So also for the Coal and Steel Community itself: a casual mixture of national interests that became communitarian.
"It does not seem opportune to substitute this slow and efficient way which tranquillizes national States at the moment when they are being stripped of their powers with the great institutional jumps so dear to Fischer and the federalists. Fischer says that Monnet is outdated, but he misunderstands Monnet - he was a convinced federalist, but considered it prudent to conceal his federalism under cover of a functional federalism, applied progressively by sectors...
"As to the Commission, for me, the political role of the executive is beyond discussion. I am convinced though that it can exercise it best using the technical powers that the Treaty confers on it as an executive organ. As Delors did in the years of the Commission's period of maximum development between 1986 and 1992. When Delors then wanted to act explicitly as the government of the Union, after 1992, the crisis in Europe was immediate.
"Therefore I prefer to go slowly, to crumble pieces of sovereignty up little by little, avoiding brusque transitions from national to federal power. The proposal to directly elect the president of the Commission seems senseless to me. Here is another Jacobin idea which instead of a plural identity aims at a total "demos". There is already a representative of the communitary "demos", which should be strengthened - the European parliament. European patriotism will be born from the Charter of Rights, which should be the preamble of the European constitution and of the future distribution of responsibilities between organs of the Union. But even the constitution should be built without changes that are too abrupt.
"That is the way I think we will have to behave to build Europe's common policies. Which policies? The locomotive, or heart, of Europe will have to see to he common governance of the economy, as well as to common rules on immigration. It will have to define common rights for legal immigrants: the right to send their children to school, the right to health services, the right of the second generation to be integrated. Then we must create common rules for labour and (police) forces to watch over the common outer boundaries. As you see, the bulding sites are immense."
An opinion, by definition, cannot be "wrong".
If you believe that the EU was formed by some sort of secret cabal, you are so ignorant an ill-informed, you should lock yourself away so that you do not pollute the rest of humanity with your stupidity.
There is, quite possibly, no stupider nor more inane statement that the EU was formed this way.
Now if you want an organization that was formed by an elite, away from the opinions of the general populace, I can give you one.
Or can you guess?
Didn't read it.
Better things to do.
Summarize.
Again, the oldest trick in the book, debate the needle by dumping a haystack on it. Make your point.
Oh, tell me, how did Michael Medved, syndicated radio talk show host, shy from debate at the Minnesota State Fair, where I suppose he was to spend every waking moment addressing his critics? I want to hear this.
Oh, and if it's personal, my response is: He doesn't have time for every Tom, Dick and Paul that crosses his path.
But no, really, I want to hear this.
Have you seen my Cocoa Puffs?? Last time I saw them, a moose was browsing near my window.
LOL
Incidently, Ronald Reagan used to be a hardcore lefty.
Not really. I understand your point, but Reagan used to be a more-or-less conventional Democrat in the FDR mold. Maybe "hardcore lefty" but Medved used to be a genuine radical.
He's never denied his early years -- however for me, it's just that men like David Horowitz who were dedicated to the overthrow of the U.S. government switched and denounced, exposed the true nature of red-diaper babies of the New Left, as well as, the true nature of the remnants of the CP/USA.
In no way am I saying Medved was among Communists, I am saying he was their dupe. He was just one of the many young, arrogant jerks who were praised by the MSM as the brightest young ever produced by America. To this day he believes it, I bet.
He and other liberals fled the traditional, patriotic Democrat Party without a fight leaving the Party to become the New Left's Rat Party.
Unlike Horowitz he has never atoned and exposed the idiocy of liberalism of those war/civil right days; instead he simply brought his feeeeeeeeeeeelings and contumely to our side, unleashing the latter upon paleo-conservatives. IMO.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.