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.
That would be we Americans, btw.
Test question: Are we Americans better off with more...or less capital?
More.
Test question: does Chinese, South Korean, Japanese, Mexican, British and Canadian investment in the US give us more capital?
Good catch!
An interesting dodge of American security and American competitiveness. Submerging it, and ducking responsibility for it, within the morass of a collective... government(?).
Then you have effectively conceded.
Your next point is empirically deficient. The numbers are not even close, Todd.
And you need to breakdown the pattern of that investment. Some is good, some is not so good.
E.g., all governmental securities sold have to be paid back. With interest. Returning the capital...and then some... back to sender.
And to the extent that the "investment" is in our government's spending...it abets the dysfunctional deficit spending habit propping up an over-weening governmental albatross...which further undermines American competitiveness...and the conditions for individual liberty.
As our two last departed Presidents fondly observed:
"A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take from you everything you have."
I agree with you that Michael does sometimes resort to cheap shots against his opponents. However, he's a good guy. I've met him. And I'm glad he's speaking out against this North American Union paranoia. As to the neo-con label, it might have been invented by the left, but as you know, many on the right have adopted it.
Then you have effectively conceded.
I've conceded that capital investment is good? Okay.
Your next point is empirically deficient. The numbers are not even close, Todd.
What numbers aren't close to what numbers, Paul?
And you need to breakdown the pattern of that investment. Some is good, some is not so good.
Because capital is not fungible. Right.
E.g., all governmental securities sold have to be paid back. With interest.
So that makes investment bad for America? Because eventually, the investor gets his money back?
And to the extent that the "investment" is in our government's spending...it abets the dysfunctional deficit spending habit propping up an over-weening governmental albatross.
You suffer from the same economic confusion as dennisw. If the Chinese bought GM debt, instead of US Treasury debt, would you blame the Chinese for GM's indebtedness?
B'zzt. Wrong answer. Thanks for playing. In economics history there is a very clear understanding of the term and its origins. And it is not at all ambiguous, or "vacuous".
Henry Clay's In Defense of the American System was an epic reinforcement of the American Independence doctrines this country was founded on, and flourished with. Speech found here.
Your non-answer-with insult, confirms my earlier surmise of your unwillingness to learn . Hence, it is your seriousness, not mine, at issue.
Actually it appears to be keeping them airborne so far, and rather unfortunately I might add. Meanwhile, please note the contradiction in that observation. Many of your Phoney Trade colleagues here DEFEND Socialist Airbus as "competition".
Uh. No. By definition.
False. Only by a limited definition which is not relevant in this discussion. We are talking Public Policy AND Economics. By that definition, it is far more than your limited conception.
False. I don't believe that at all. I believe in mutually fair trade that promotes our middle class...and those of like-minded nations. Reciprocity, and trade with other high-wage societies is clearly mutually beneficial. Adam Smith-approved. Perhaps you missed that.
What is really funny is the notion that when it is empirically proved that the Chinese Communist party is prevailing in a supposed "market" situation. It has so egregiously rigged the terms of trade with their country that it reinforces their Party's dominance. Not just in their country...but abroad. And those controls on trading with them is at the expense of our industry and middle class, such that their penurious "We win, You Lose" mercantilist approach is being rewarded by the Comparative Advantage defenders who have hypocritically failed to deal with this "China" exception. A telling rebuke to their over-expansive claims to the universality of their rules.
I didn't bother to read your response past this BS. Name one FTA you favor.
You oppose all trade with poor countries? Or just with China?
Furthermore, I told you just yesterday that I am weary of pointing out to you that we do not have a FTA with China. Pointing to it as an example of a country that does not play by the rules simply generates a "well, duh" response.
If yes, why? If no, the reason is obvious, and it sure ain't because of "fairness."
Paul, I have asked Toddster a few times how deep in debt he is and whether he runs an annual trade deficit with the parties that he trades with. Amazingly enough I have never gotten an answer. I can only conclude he doesn't practice what he preaches for the United States. That trade deficits don't matter, actually he preaches that trade deficits are a plus and show confidence in the United States since these owners of US dollars will buy our US Government securities, our factories, land, real estate,
Of all types of ad hominems I find this one the most pernicious, because of the implications that, if one is well-off financially, then the status was achieved at the detriment of others or, if one is not well-off financially, then the person making the ad hominem knows better what to do about it than oneself (or the government must do something about it).For the record, I am up to my eyeballs in debt and hold no assets worth speaking of . . . and I resent your implication that you know what's best for me. Spend your money the way you see fit. Lobby government to spend less of ours. And keep your hands off my wallet.
I support it. Mexico is a lot different than Australia. Mexico is a hostile 3rd world nation that is invading us. While Australia is an ally and has roughly the same standard of living and is part of the Anglo Sphere we share with the UK and Canada
Yes, I run an annual trade deficit with the parties I trade with. I have a deficit with Dominick's and Jewel. I have a deficit with Binny's and I also have a deficit with Gibson's.
That trade deficits don't matter, actually he preaches that trade deficits are a plus
I've never said trade deficits are a plus, I've said that you can't prove they're a negative. If trade deficits were a negative and surpluses were good you might expect Germany and Japan would be outperforming our economy.
Do you think they are?
At least you practice what you preach. You are in hock to external parities so the United States being in hock to foreigners is not much of a leap of faith. If you are in debt to somehow enhance your wealth somewhere down the road, then this is a reasonable justifiable investment. I don't see much of our foreign debt being rung up to further productive investment
Buying Chinese craps at Wal-Mart is not investment, it's current consumption
I actually can't listren to Laura Ingraham anymore she is getting as shrill as Rosie O'Donnell.
JMO, the "true conservatives' are turning off a lot of people with their shrillness and constant negativity.
Do you think they are?
They plod along mostly because their economies aren't juiced up by going into hock to foreigners and aren't being invaded by 3rd world illegal aliens.
Their growth rates are reasonable and acceptable because of that
Toyota is doing very well and so are many other Jap corporations
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