THE LAST YEARS OF THE UNITED STATES?
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THE COVERT DRIVE FOR MORE SECURITY AND LESS HOMELAND
The Review has long pointed out that one of the prices of globalization
and free trade as currently designed has been the erosion of American
sovereignty and the rights it provides its citizens. In fact,
international business - which our politicians increasingly serve - has
little interest in such antiquated concepts as a nation or its
democratic constitution.
What is striking in the release below from Judicial Watch is the
evidence that the Department of Homeland Security has become a full
participant in this trend and considers its role not only security but
"prosperity," a term that actually describes corporate and not citizen
well being.
This story has been steadily ignored by the conventional American media
despite its potentially massive impact. Its implications are also
strongly denied by participants who call cricticisms things like
"Internet rumors." We have included some of these denials, which include
the disingenuous and even false. For example, the Security and
Prosperity Partnership claims, "There are private and state level
interests planning highway projects which they themselves describe as
'NAFTA Corridors,' but these are not federally-driven initiatives, and
they are not a part of the SPP." In fact, as one of these 'private'
interests admits that it is receiving funding from the federal
Department of Transportation.
How are citizens to react to all this? We would suggest, first of all,
bringing the issue out of cellar and into public debate, including the
presidential campaign. The clear effort to suppress public discussion of
the matter is an indication that someone is up to no good. It's also way
past time for the conventional media to stop ignoring the issue.
Five years ago, your editor wrote, "No assault on American sovereignty
has been more successful than that carried out in recent years by the
globalization movement, using such mechanisms as NAFTA and the WTO. That
which, over the course of our history, the British, Mexicans,
Confederates, Spanish, Germans and Japanese had been unable to do was
now being accomplished by a handful of lawyers armed only with cell
phones, fax machines and the support of politicians willing to trade
their country's nationhood for another campaign contribution."
JUDICIAL WATCH - Judicial Watch has released Department of Homeland
Security records obtained under the provisions of the Freedom of
Information Act containing Secretary Michael Chertoff's September 22,
2005 Implementation Memorandum for the Security and Prosperity
Partnership. The records describe the agencies within the Department of
Homeland Security responsible for executing the partnership's security
agenda.
According to the memorandum signed by Secretary Chertoff: "The [Security
and Prosperity Partnership] has, in addition to identifying a number of
new action items, comprehensively rolled up most of our existing
homeland security-related policy initiatives with Canada and Mexico, and
ongoing action and reporting in the various U.S.-Canada and U.S.-Mexico
working groups led by DHS should now be driven by a single agenda: the
SPP."
The records also contain an information paper describing ten "Prosperity
Pillar Working Groups," and the organization of the "US-Mexico Critical
Infrastructure Protection Work Group." Unlike previous records produced
by other federal agencies, the DHS records are heavily redacted to
withhold the names of the US, Mexican and Canadian government officials
carrying out the partnership's agenda across all three countries.
Another record reviewed and released by DHS is a 10-page chart listing
36 "SPP Security High-Level Working Groups" that include the "Mexico-US
Repatriation Technical WG," the "Mexico-US Intelligence and Information
Sharing WG," and the "Canada-US Cross Border Crime Forum," among others.
"These new records prove the Security and Prosperity Partnership is
being directed by officials at the very highest levels of the United
States government," said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.
"Americans should know that the SPP is a core policy initiative for many
agencies in our government, including the Department of Homeland
Security." On March 23, 2005, heads of government Vincente Fox, George
W. Bush, and Paul Martin launched the North American partnership at a
meeting in Waco, Texas, with the expressed goal of "a safer, more
prosperous North America." Critics, however, maintain the partnership is
advancing some dubious policies and could ultimately compromise U.S.
sovereignty.
http://www.judicialwatch.org/6216.shtml
JUDICIAL WATCH - On March 23, 2005, heads of government Vincente Fox,
George W. Bush, and Paul Martin launched the North American partnership
at a meeting in Waco, Texas, with the expressed goal of "a safer, more
prosperous North America." Proponents of the partnership claim its
purpose is to increase security and prosperity for all three nations
through enhanced cooperation. Critics maintain the partnership will
sacrifice U.S. sovereignty by establishing a "North American Union,"
with open borders and a common currency.
COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS REPORT - The security and well-being of its
citizens are at the pinnacle of any government's responsibilities. At
the beginning of the twenty-first century, the futures of Canada,
Mexico, and the United States are shared as never before. As a result,
all three countries face a historic challenge: Do they continue on the
path of cooperation in promoting more secure and more prosperous North
American societies, or do they pursue divergent and ultimately less
secure and less prosperous courses? To ask the question is to answer it;
and yet, if important decisions are not pursued and implemented, the
three countries may well find themselves on divergent paths. Such a
development would be a tragic mistake, one that can be readily avoided
if they stay the course and pursue a series of deliberate and
cooperative steps that will enhance both the security and prosperity of
their citizens. . .
terrorism has emerged as a serious regional and global danger. Deepening
ties among the three countries of North America promise continued
benefits for Canada, Mexico, and the United States. That said, the
trajectory toward a more integrated and prosperous North America is
neither inevitable nor irreversible.
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. . .
http://www.cfr.org/content/publications/attachments/NorthAmerica_TF_final.
pdf#search=%22%22Building%20a%20North%20American%20Community%22%22
CBC, CANADA, SEP 9 2006 - A North American security meeting was secretly
held in Banff last week, attracting high-profile officials from the
United States, Mexico and Canada. The North American Forum was hosted
with the help of the Canada West Foundation and the Canadian Council of
Chief Executives. . . The gathering may not have made headlines, but it
is still the talk of Banff.
Taxi Driver Chris Foote said he first learned of the meeting when he
stopped into a submarine shop for a late night snack last week and heard
rumors U.S. Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld was in town. "Here they
are talking in my backyard, no media to tell Canadians, Mexicans and
Americans about what's going on. [I am] completely outraged," he said.
"This is an assault on democracy."
John Larson, a spokesperson for the North American Forum, said reporters
were not told about the conference. He won't confirm who attended the
meeting nor will he give any concrete details about what was discussed.
"The participants joined the conference essentially knowing that it
would be a private function," said Larson.
Mel Hurtig, author and founder of the Council of Canadians, obtained
internal documents about the Sept. 12-14 forum revealing that the
gathering was called Continental Prosperity in the New Security
Environment. Rumsfeld was slated to be a keynote speaker and topics on
the agenda included North American energy strategy and security
co-operation. "We're talking about such an important thing, we're
talking about the integration of Canada into the United States. For them
to hold this meeting in secret and to make every effort to avoid anybody
learning about it, right away you've got to be hugely concerned," Hurtig
said.
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/edmonton/story/2006/09/21/secret-meeting.html
NASCO - North America's Super Corridor Coalition, Inc., is a non-profit
organization dedicated to developing the world's first international,
integrated and secure, multi-modal transportation system along the
International Mid-Continent Trade and Transportation Corridor to improve
both the trade competitiveness and quality of life in North America. . .
The NASCO Corridor encompasses Interstate Highways 35, 29 and 94, and
the significant east/west connectors to those highways in the United
States, Canada and Mexico. The Corridor directly impacts the
continental trade flow of North America. Membership includes public and
private sector entities along the Corridor in Canada, the United States
and Mexico.
From the largest border crossing in North America (The Ambassador Bridge
in Detroit, Michigan and Windsor, Canada), to the second largest border
crossing of Laredo, Texas and Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, extending to the
deep water Ports of Manzanillo and Lazaro Cardenas, Mexico and to
Manitoba, Canada, the impressive, tri-national NASCO membership truly
reflects the international scope of the Corridor and the regions it
impacts.
NASCO has received $2.25 million in Congressional funding to be
administered by the United States Department of Transportation for the
development of a technology integration and tracking project. The
project will have a team approach, using members of NASCO as the primary
participants in the project, to the extent possible. NASCO believes the
deployment of a modern information system will reduce the cost, improve
the efficiency, reduce trade-related congestion, and enhance security of
cross-border and corridor information, trade and traffic.
WAYNE STEWART, PALESTINE HERALD, TX, MAR 20,2007 - If the people of a
borderless North America are expected to be able to move around freely,
then they need the infrastructure to do so. One of the ideas behind that
free movement of people, and commerce, is the Trans Texas Corridor.
The TTC, when complete, would run from the border with Mexico all the
way to Oklahoma. There are other corridors planned, including one
running from Houston to Dallas parallel to Interstate 45, but the one
from Mexico is getting all of the attention right now.
If all the planned corridors were built in Texas they would comprise
about 4,000 miles of road, rail and broadband infrastructure. Most of
the land for that, about a half-million acres, would be confiscated
using eminent domain.
The link from the Mexican border to Oklahoma is the highest-priority
corridor right now. This superhighway will eventually lead to Canada
with an international port in Kansas City, which is currently being
called the Kansas City Smart Port. . .
So, what does all this mean for Texans, and all other U.S. residents? It
means an unrestricted and borderless trade and travel route from the
interior of Mexico to Hudson Bay in Canada.
As a sidebar to this, a Chinese company, Hutchinson Whampoa Limited
which also operates both ends of the Panama Canal that was given back to
Panama in the early 1990s, is investing millions of dollars to expand
deep water ports on Mexico's Pacific coast. Couple these facts with the
NAFTA corridor and China can have unfettered access to the continental
United States.
All of this is being done with the backing, and urging, of the North
American Super Corridor Coalition Inc, which believes that eventually
most of the products China docks in Mexico will make its way to U.S.
markets, severely undercutting the price of products made here in the
U.S.
The rationale behind all this is that U.S. ports are clogged (mainly
with Chinese goods), so these extra ports would enable foreign products
to enter the U.S. more efficiently. With these corridors being put in
place, the ability to be able to control the flow of traffic across
international borders will be non-existent. . .
Don't think this is something far off and into the future. It is
happening right now. U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters announced
just last week that beginning in April 100 Mexican trucking companies
can start making deliveries anywhere in the U.S.
Mexican laws regarding vehicle and driver safety tend to be more lax
than U.S. standards, thereby exposing drivers on U.S. highways to
greater risk. Most of this is being done well out of the public eye,
because the public would not stand for the dissolution of U.S.
sovereignty. Even with public sentiment against this, plans move forward
to make it happen, moving the North American continent closer to a
superstate.
http://www.palestineherald.com/opinion/local_story_
079100800.html?keyword=topstory
DON BUTLER, OTTAWA CITIZEN, FEB 24, 2007 - If you've never heard of the
NAFTA superhighway, it may be because no such plan actually exists. The
whole idea, one American official recently told a congressional
committee, is an "urban myth."
But some remain unconvinced, in part because the largely secretive SPP
process has created an information void that provides oxygen for
conspiracy theorists. Most SPP work is being done by 19 working groups
that meet behind closed doors. The project surfaces publicly only when
politicians from the three countries gather for periodic updates, like
yesterday's SPP ministerial meetings in Ottawa.
So far, anxiety about the purported NAFTA Superhighway has been confined
to the United States. Activists in Canada, by and large, don't quite
know what to make of it, although the Sierra Club has expressed concern
that NAFTA super-corridors could be used to pipe Canadian water to
American markets.
Even the Council of Canadians, never shy about expressing alarm about
anything that furthers "deep integration" with the U.S., declined
comment. "We're trying to figure out what's going on, like everyone
else," says spokesman Stewart Trew.
In the U.S, though, the furor over the NAFTA Superhighway is so intense
that the U.S. government's Security and Prosperity Partnership website
has posted a denial under the heading, "SPP Myths vs. Facts."
Those who swear that a NAFTA superhighway is in the works cite two main
pieces of evidence.
One is the Trans-Texas Corridor, a proposed statewide network of
transportation routes, each of which could include six automobile lanes,
four truck lanes, freight and commuter rail lines, and infrastructure
for utilities. It would take up to 50 years to complete.
The other is the existence of North America's SuperCorridor Coalition ,
a non-profit organization whose mission is to develop "the world's first
international, integrated and secure multi-modal transportation system."
NASCO, whose members include companies and governments in the United
States, Mexico and Canada -- including the city of Winnipeg and the
province of Manitoba -- promotes and lobbies for what's known as the
"international mid-continent trade and transportation corridor." It says
the corridor connects 71 million people and supports $1 trillion U.S. in
total commerce among the three nations.
The 4,000-kilometre corridor runs from the Pacific port cities of Lazaro
Cardenas and Manzanillo in Mexico to Manitoba, with a major offshoot to
the Ambassador Bridge border crossing between Detroit and Windsor. In
the U.S., the corridor tracks interstate highways 35, 29 and 94.
As it happens, the first leg of the proposed Trans-Texas Corridor would
run parallel to Interstate 35, leading critics to allege that the
massive Texas project is a prototype for the coming NAFTA superhighway.
Allegations like that exasperate Tiffany Melvin, NASCO's executive
director. The Texas plan, which NASCO supports, is a response to growing
highway congestion in that state, she says. "There's no plan - I cannot
emphasize this enough - to extend this to other states," Melvin insists.
. .
Nor is NASCO linked to the Security and Prosperity Partnership, says
Horosko, though one of the SPP's key transportation milestones is to
establish "an intermodal corridor work plan" and test it in a pilot
project. "We certainly are aware of what they're doing," says Horosko.
"Any time we see something that we think lines up well with SPP, we
certainly try to make sure that the federal government is aware of what
we're doing and can bring it to the SPP table.". . .
Stephen Blank, a business professor at Pace University in New York, says
the mid-continent corridor is well positioned to become North America's
main trade conduit, in part because its roads and rail lines already
exist. . .
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=
a8c759d7-b16f-48a4-9b81-0c93f24478b9
SECURITY & PROSPERITY PARTNERSHIP OF NORTH AMERICA - The Security and
Prosperity Partnership of North America was launched in March of 2005 as
a trilateral effort to increase security and enhance prosperity among
the United States, Canada and Mexico through greater cooperation and
information sharing. This trilateral initiative is premised on our
security and our economic prosperity being mutually reinforcing. The SPP
recognizes that our three great nations are bound by a shared belief in
freedom, economic opportunity, and strong democratic institutions. . .
Looking forward, President Bush, Prime Minister Harper and President Fox
have identified emergency management; influenza pandemics, including
avian influenza; energy security; and safe and secure gateways (border
security and facilitation) as key priorities for the SPP. The Leaders
also announced the creation of North American Competitiveness Council to
fully incorporate the private sector into the SPP process. . .
http://www.spp.gov/
SECURITY & PROSPERITY PARTNERSHIP OF NORTH AMERICA - Myth: The SPP is a
movement to merge the United States, Mexico, and Canada into a North
American Union and establish a common currency.
Fact: The cooperative efforts under the SPP. . . seek to make the United
States, Canada and Mexico open to legitimate trade and closed to
terrorism and crime. It does not change our courts or legislative
processes and respects the sovereignty of the United States, Mexico, and
Canada. The SPP in no way, shape or form considers the creation of a
European Union-like structure or a common currency. The SPP does not
attempt to modify our sovereignty or currency or change the American
system of government designed by our Founding Fathers. . .
Myth: The SPP infringes on the sovereignty of the United States.
Fact: The SPP respects and leaves the unique cultural and legal
framework of each of the three countries intact. Nothing in the SPP
undermines the U.S. Constitution. In no way does the SPP infringe upon
the sovereignty of the United States.
Myth: The SPP is illegal and violates the Constitution.
Fact: The SPP is legal and in no way violates the Constitution or
affects the legal authorities of the participating executive agencies.
Indeed, the SPP is an opportunity for the governments of the United
States, Canada, and Mexico to discuss common goals and identify ways to
enhance each nation's security and prosperity. . . .
Myth: The U.S section of the SPP is headed by the Department of
Commerce.
Fact: The SPP is a White House-driven initiative. In the United States,
the Department of Commerce coordinates the 'Prosperity' component, while
the Department of Homeland Security coordinates the ‘Security'
component. The Department of State ensures the two components are
coordinated and are consistent with U.S. foreign policy.
Myth: The U.S. Government, working though the SPP, has a secret plan to
build a "NAFTA Super Highway."
Fact: The U.S. government is not planning a NAFTA Super Highway. The
U.S. government does not have the authority to designate any highway as
a NAFTA Super Highway, nor has it sought such authority, nor is it
planning to seek such authority. There are private and state level
interests planning highway projects which they themselves describe as
"NAFTA Corridors," but these are not Federally-driven initiatives, and
they are not a part of the SPP.
Myth: The U.S. Government, through the Department of Transportation, is
funding secretive highway projects to become part of a "NAFTA Super
Highway". . .
Myth: The SPP seeks to lower U.S. standards through a regulatory
cooperation framework.
Fact: The framework will support and enhance cooperation and encourage
the compatibility of regulations among the three partners while
maintaining high standards of health and safety. Any regulatory changes
will require agencies to conform to all U.S. administrative procedures,
including an opportunity to comment. Enhanced cooperation in this area
will provide consumers with more affordable, safer, and more diversified
and innovative products.
http://www.spp.gov/myths_vs_facts.asp
JEROME CORSI, STOP SPP - One hundred Mexican trucking companies will
have unlimited access to U.S. roads to haul international cargo as part
of a year-long pilot program, the Department of Transportation announced
today. In return, 100 U.S. trucking companies will be allowed to operate
in Mexico but at a later date. Calling for congressional hearings,
Teamsters General President Jimmy Hoffa compared the announcement to the
"Dubai Ports debacle," charging President Bush is "playing a game of
Russian roulette on America's highways." . . . The Teamsters Union has
strongly protested the opening up of U.S. highways to Mexican trucks,
citing safety concerns.
http://stopspp.com/stopspp/
SAM SMITH, SHADOWS OF HOPE, 1994 - If one wishes to find a real Clinton
foreign policy, such places as Bosnia, Somalia and the UN are the wrong
places to look. The real Clinton foreign policy is simply this: there
are no foreign countries any more, there are only undeveloped markets.
The slogan has become "Make quarterly earnings growth, not war!" Trade
has replaced ideology as the engine of foreign affairs.
At one level this should be celebrated, since it is far less deadly. On
the other hand, this development also means that politics, nationhood
and the idea of place itself is being replaced by a huge, amorphous
international corporate culture that rules not by force but by market
share. This culture, in the words of French writer and advisor to
Francois Mitterand Jacques Attali, seeks an "ideologically homogenous
market where life will be organized around common consumer desires.". .
.
It is this unnamed country of international law, trade and finance, with
its anthem to "global competition in the first half of the 21st
century," that is increasingly providing the substance and the style to
our politics. It is their dual citizenship in America and in the Great
Global Glob that characterizes the most powerful among us, now more than
ever including even our own political leaders.
International man dreams of things like NAFTA and GATT and then gets
them passed. And he knows that he, as a corporate executive or licensed
professional, will pass quickly through Mexican customs because the
agreement he helped to draft and pass has declared him entitled to such
consideration. The union worker, the tourist from St. Louis, are, under
the new world order, from far countries and so it will take awhile
longer. This then is the Clinton foreign policy: it is the policy of
International Man, a policy that brings Mexico City ever nearer and
starts to make St. Louis a stranger in its own land.
SAM SMITH, 2002 - Bill Clinton told a 1995 Michigan State University
commencement shortly after the Oklahoma City bombing, "There's nothing
patriotic about hating your government or pretending you can hate your
government but love your country." And in a few years, George Bush's
attorney general would imply that even criticizing government policy was
unpatriotic.
How had loyalty to government come to replace loyalty to ideals, place,
and people in the pantheon of patriotism? In part because the American
elite had decided that nations no longer mattered all that much. It was
government we needed to honor lest our parochialism interfere with
corporate multi-nationalism. In 1992, Strobe Talbott had written in Time
Magazine, "Within the next hundred years . . . nationhood as we know it
will be obsolete; all states will recognize a single, global authority .
. . All countries are basically social arrangements, accommodations to
changing circumstances. No matter how permanent and even sacred they may
seem at any one time, in fact they are all artificial and temporary."
Talbott was expressing a centrist consensus later confirmed by that
Washington favorite, Francis Fukuyama: "Globalization will not be
reversed." And by Vaclav Havel, approvingly quoted in the New York
Review of Books referring to nations as "cultlike entities charged with
emotion."
It was not just a matter of words. No assault on American sovereignty
has been more successful than that carried out in recent years by the
globalization movement, using such mechanisms as NAFTA and the WTO. That
which, over the course of our history, the British, Mexicans,
Confederates, Spanish, Germans and Japanese had been unable to do was
now being accomplished by a handful of lawyers armed only with cell
phones, fax machines and the support of politicians willing to trade
their country's nationhood for another campaign contribution.
And it wasn't just happening to America. By the 1990s, about half the
top economies of the world were not nations, but corporations. Trade had
replaced ideology as the engine of foreign affairs. Politics, nationhood
and the idea of place itself was being supplanted by a huge, amorphous
international corporate culture that ruled not by force but by market
share.
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THE COVERT DRIVE FOR MORE SECURITY AND LESS HOMELAND
The Review has long pointed out that one of the prices of globalization
and free trade as currently designed has been the erosion of American
sovereignty and the rights it provides its citizens. In fact,
international business - which our politicians increasingly serve - has
little interest in such antiquated concepts as a nation or its
democratic constitution.
What is striking in the release below from Judicial Watch is the
evidence that the Department of Homeland Security has become a full
participant in this trend and considers its role not only security but
"prosperity," a term that actually describes corporate and not citizen
well being.
This story has been steadily ignored by the conventional American media
despite its potentially massive impact. Its implications are also
strongly denied by participants who call cricticisms things like
"Internet rumors." We have included some of these denials, which include
the disingenuous and even false. For example, the Security and
Prosperity Partnership claims, "There are private and state level
interests planning highway projects which they themselves describe as
'NAFTA Corridors,' but these are not federally-driven initiatives, and
they are not a part of the SPP." In fact, as one of these 'private'
interests admits that it is receiving funding from the federal
Department of Transportation.
How are citizens to react to all this? We would suggest, first of all,
bringing the issue out of cellar and into public debate, including the
presidential campaign. The clear effort to suppress public discussion of
the matter is an indication that someone is up to no good. It's also way
past time for the conventional media to stop ignoring the issue.
Five years ago, your editor wrote, "No assault on American sovereignty
has been more successful than that carried out in recent years by the
globalization movement, using such mechanisms as NAFTA and the WTO. That
which, over the course of our history, the British, Mexicans,
Confederates, Spanish, Germans and Japanese had been unable to do was
now being accomplished by a handful of lawyers armed only with cell
phones, fax machines and the support of politicians willing to trade
their country's nationhood for another campaign contribution."
JUDICIAL WATCH - Judicial Watch has released Department of Homeland
Security records obtained under the provisions of the Freedom of
Information Act containing Secretary Michael Chertoff's September 22,
2005 Implementation Memorandum for the Security and Prosperity
Partnership. The records describe the agencies within the Department of
Homeland Security responsible for executing the partnership's security
agenda.
According to the memorandum signed by Secretary Chertoff: "The [Security
and Prosperity Partnership] has, in addition to identifying a number of
new action items, comprehensively rolled up most of our existing
homeland security-related policy initiatives with Canada and Mexico, and
ongoing action and reporting in the various U.S.-Canada and U.S.-Mexico
working groups led by DHS should now be driven by a single agenda: the
SPP."
The records also contain an information paper describing ten "Prosperity
Pillar Working Groups," and the organization of the "US-Mexico Critical
Infrastructure Protection Work Group." Unlike previous records produced
by other federal agencies, the DHS records are heavily redacted to
withhold the names of the US, Mexican and Canadian government officials
carrying out the partnership's agenda across all three countries.
Another record reviewed and released by DHS is a 10-page chart listing
36 "SPP Security High-Level Working Groups" that include the "Mexico-US
Repatriation Technical WG," the "Mexico-US Intelligence and Information
Sharing WG," and the "Canada-US Cross Border Crime Forum," among others.
"These new records prove the Security and Prosperity Partnership is
being directed by officials at the very highest levels of the United
States government," said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.
"Americans should know that the SPP is a core policy initiative for many
agencies in our government, including the Department of Homeland
Security." On March 23, 2005, heads of government Vincente Fox, George
W. Bush, and Paul Martin launched the North American partnership at a
meeting in Waco, Texas, with the expressed goal of "a safer, more
prosperous North America." Critics, however, maintain the partnership is
advancing some dubious policies and could ultimately compromise U.S.
sovereignty.
http://www.judicialwatch.org/6216.shtml
JUDICIAL WATCH - On March 23, 2005, heads of government Vincente Fox,
George W. Bush, and Paul Martin launched the North American partnership
at a meeting in Waco, Texas, with the expressed goal of "a safer, more
prosperous North America." Proponents of the partnership claim its
purpose is to increase security and prosperity for all three nations
through enhanced cooperation. Critics maintain the partnership will
sacrifice U.S. sovereignty by establishing a "North American Union,"
with open borders and a common currency.
COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS REPORT - The security and well-being of its
citizens are at the pinnacle of any government's responsibilities. At
the beginning of the twenty-first century, the futures of Canada,
Mexico, and the United States are shared as never before. As a result,
all three countries face a historic challenge: Do they continue on the
path of cooperation in promoting more secure and more prosperous North
American societies, or do they pursue divergent and ultimately less
secure and less prosperous courses? To ask the question is to answer it;
and yet, if important decisions are not pursued and implemented, the
three countries may well find themselves on divergent paths. Such a
development would be a tragic mistake, one that can be readily avoided
if they stay the course and pursue a series of deliberate and
cooperative steps that will enhance both the security and prosperity of
their citizens. . .
terrorism has emerged as a serious regional and global danger. Deepening
ties among the three countries of North America promise continued
benefits for Canada, Mexico, and the United States. That said, the
trajectory toward a more integrated and prosperous North America is
neither inevitable nor irreversible.
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. . .
http://www.cfr.org/content/publications/attachments/NorthAmerica_TF_final.
pdf#search=%22%22Building%20a%20North%20American%20Community%22%22
CBC, CANADA, SEP 9 2006 - A North American security meeting was secretly
held in Banff last week, attracting high-profile officials from the
United States, Mexico and Canada. The North American Forum was hosted
with the help of the Canada West Foundation and the Canadian Council of
Chief Executives. . . The gathering may not have made headlines, but it
is still the talk of Banff.
Taxi Driver Chris Foote said he first learned of the meeting when he
stopped into a submarine shop for a late night snack last week and heard
rumors U.S. Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld was in town. "Here they
are talking in my backyard, no media to tell Canadians, Mexicans and
Americans about what's going on. [I am] completely outraged," he said.
"This is an assault on democracy."
John Larson, a spokesperson for the North American Forum, said reporters
were not told about the conference. He won't confirm who attended the
meeting nor will he give any concrete details about what was discussed.
"The participants joined the conference essentially knowing that it
would be a private function," said Larson.
Mel Hurtig, author and founder of the Council of Canadians, obtained
internal documents about the Sept. 12-14 forum revealing that the
gathering was called Continental Prosperity in the New Security
Environment. Rumsfeld was slated to be a keynote speaker and topics on
the agenda included North American energy strategy and security
co-operation. "We're talking about such an important thing, we're
talking about the integration of Canada into the United States. For them
to hold this meeting in secret and to make every effort to avoid anybody
learning about it, right away you've got to be hugely concerned," Hurtig
said.
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/edmonton/story/2006/09/21/secret-meeting.html
NASCO - North America's Super Corridor Coalition, Inc., is a non-profit
organization dedicated to developing the world's first international,
integrated and secure, multi-modal transportation system along the
International Mid-Continent Trade and Transportation Corridor to improve
both the trade competitiveness and quality of life in North America. . .
The NASCO Corridor encompasses Interstate Highways 35, 29 and 94, and
the significant east/west connectors to those highways in the United
States, Canada and Mexico. The Corridor directly impacts the
continental trade flow of North America. Membership includes public and
private sector entities along the Corridor in Canada, the United States
and Mexico.
From the largest border crossing in North America (The Ambassador Bridge
in Detroit, Michigan and Windsor, Canada), to the second largest border
crossing of Laredo, Texas and Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, extending to the
deep water Ports of Manzanillo and Lazaro Cardenas, Mexico and to
Manitoba, Canada, the impressive, tri-national NASCO membership truly
reflects the international scope of the Corridor and the regions it
impacts.
NASCO has received $2.25 million in Congressional funding to be
administered by the United States Department of Transportation for the
development of a technology integration and tracking project. The
project will have a team approach, using members of NASCO as the primary
participants in the project, to the extent possible. NASCO believes the
deployment of a modern information system will reduce the cost, improve
the efficiency, reduce trade-related congestion, and enhance security of
cross-border and corridor information, trade and traffic.
WAYNE STEWART, PALESTINE HERALD, TX, MAR 20,2007 - If the people of a
borderless North America are expected to be able to move around freely,
then they need the infrastructure to do so. One of the ideas behind that
free movement of people, and commerce, is the Trans Texas Corridor.
The TTC, when complete, would run from the border with Mexico all the
way to Oklahoma. There are other corridors planned, including one
running from Houston to Dallas parallel to Interstate 45, but the one
from Mexico is getting all of the attention right now.
If all the planned corridors were built in Texas they would comprise
about 4,000 miles of road, rail and broadband infrastructure. Most of
the land for that, about a half-million acres, would be confiscated
using eminent domain.
The link from the Mexican border to Oklahoma is the highest-priority
corridor right now. This superhighway will eventually lead to Canada
with an international port in Kansas City, which is currently being
called the Kansas City Smart Port. . .
So, what does all this mean for Texans, and all other U.S. residents? It
means an unrestricted and borderless trade and travel route from the
interior of Mexico to Hudson Bay in Canada.
As a sidebar to this, a Chinese company, Hutchinson Whampoa Limited
which also operates both ends of the Panama Canal that was given back to
Panama in the early 1990s, is investing millions of dollars to expand
deep water ports on Mexico's Pacific coast. Couple these facts with the
NAFTA corridor and China can have unfettered access to the continental
United States.
All of this is being done with the backing, and urging, of the North
American Super Corridor Coalition Inc, which believes that eventually
most of the products China docks in Mexico will make its way to U.S.
markets, severely undercutting the price of products made here in the
U.S.
The rationale behind all this is that U.S. ports are clogged (mainly
with Chinese goods), so these extra ports would enable foreign products
to enter the U.S. more efficiently. With these corridors being put in
place, the ability to be able to control the flow of traffic across
international borders will be non-existent. . .
Don't think this is something far off and into the future. It is
happening right now. U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters announced
just last week that beginning in April 100 Mexican trucking companies
can start making deliveries anywhere in the U.S.
Mexican laws regarding vehicle and driver safety tend to be more lax
than U.S. standards, thereby exposing drivers on U.S. highways to
greater risk. Most of this is being done well out of the public eye,
because the public would not stand for the dissolution of U.S.
sovereignty. Even with public sentiment against this, plans move forward
to make it happen, moving the North American continent closer to a
superstate.
http://www.palestineherald.com/opinion/local_story_
079100800.html?keyword=topstory
DON BUTLER, OTTAWA CITIZEN, FEB 24, 2007 - If you've never heard of the
NAFTA superhighway, it may be because no such plan actually exists. The
whole idea, one American official recently told a congressional
committee, is an "urban myth."
But some remain unconvinced, in part because the largely secretive SPP
process has created an information void that provides oxygen for
conspiracy theorists. Most SPP work is being done by 19 working groups
that meet behind closed doors. The project surfaces publicly only when
politicians from the three countries gather for periodic updates, like
yesterday's SPP ministerial meetings in Ottawa.
So far, anxiety about the purported NAFTA Superhighway has been confined
to the United States. Activists in Canada, by and large, don't quite
know what to make of it, although the Sierra Club has expressed concern
that NAFTA super-corridors could be used to pipe Canadian water to
American markets.
Even the Council of Canadians, never shy about expressing alarm about
anything that furthers "deep integration" with the U.S., declined
comment. "We're trying to figure out what's going on, like everyone
else," says spokesman Stewart Trew.
In the U.S, though, the furor over the NAFTA Superhighway is so intense
that the U.S. government's Security and Prosperity Partnership website
has posted a denial under the heading, "SPP Myths vs. Facts."
Those who swear that a NAFTA superhighway is in the works cite two main
pieces of evidence.
One is the Trans-Texas Corridor, a proposed statewide network of
transportation routes, each of which could include six automobile lanes,
four truck lanes, freight and commuter rail lines, and infrastructure
for utilities. It would take up to 50 years to complete.
The other is the existence of North America's SuperCorridor Coalition ,
a non-profit organization whose mission is to develop "the world's first
international, integrated and secure multi-modal transportation system."
NASCO, whose members include companies and governments in the United
States, Mexico and Canada -- including the city of Winnipeg and the
province of Manitoba -- promotes and lobbies for what's known as the
"international mid-continent trade and transportation corridor." It says
the corridor connects 71 million people and supports $1 trillion U.S. in
total commerce among the three nations.
The 4,000-kilometre corridor runs from the Pacific port cities of Lazaro
Cardenas and Manzanillo in Mexico to Manitoba, with a major offshoot to
the Ambassador Bridge border crossing between Detroit and Windsor. In
the U.S., the corridor tracks interstate highways 35, 29 and 94.
As it happens, the first leg of the proposed Trans-Texas Corridor would
run parallel to Interstate 35, leading critics to allege that the
massive Texas project is a prototype for the coming NAFTA superhighway.
Allegations like that exasperate Tiffany Melvin, NASCO's executive
director. The Texas plan, which NASCO supports, is a response to growing
highway congestion in that state, she says. "There's no plan - I cannot
emphasize this enough - to extend this to other states," Melvin insists.
. .
Nor is NASCO linked to the Security and Prosperity Partnership, says
Horosko, though one of the SPP's key transportation milestones is to
establish "an intermodal corridor work plan" and test it in a pilot
project. "We certainly are aware of what they're doing," says Horosko.
"Any time we see something that we think lines up well with SPP, we
certainly try to make sure that the federal government is aware of what
we're doing and can bring it to the SPP table.". . .
Stephen Blank, a business professor at Pace University in New York, says
the mid-continent corridor is well positioned to become North America's
main trade conduit, in part because its roads and rail lines already
exist. . .
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=
a8c759d7-b16f-48a4-9b81-0c93f24478b9
SECURITY & PROSPERITY PARTNERSHIP OF NORTH AMERICA - The Security and
Prosperity Partnership of North America was launched in March of 2005 as
a trilateral effort to increase security and enhance prosperity among
the United States, Canada and Mexico through greater cooperation and
information sharing. This trilateral initiative is premised on our
security and our economic prosperity being mutually reinforcing. The SPP
recognizes that our three great nations are bound by a shared belief in
freedom, economic opportunity, and strong democratic institutions. . .
Looking forward, President Bush, Prime Minister Harper and President Fox
have identified emergency management; influenza pandemics, including
avian influenza; energy security; and safe and secure gateways (border
security and facilitation) as key priorities for the SPP. The Leaders
also announced the creation of North American Competitiveness Council to
fully incorporate the private sector into the SPP process. . .
http://www.spp.gov/
SECURITY & PROSPERITY PARTNERSHIP OF NORTH AMERICA - Myth: The SPP is a
movement to merge the United States, Mexico, and Canada into a North
American Union and establish a common currency.
Fact: The cooperative efforts under the SPP. . . seek to make the United
States, Canada and Mexico open to legitimate trade and closed to
terrorism and crime. It does not change our courts or legislative
processes and respects the sovereignty of the United States, Mexico, and
Canada. The SPP in no way, shape or form considers the creation of a
European Union-like structure or a common currency. The SPP does not
attempt to modify our sovereignty or currency or change the American
system of government designed by our Founding Fathers. . .
Myth: The SPP infringes on the sovereignty of the United States.
Fact: The SPP respects and leaves the unique cultural and legal
framework of each of the three countries intact. Nothing in the SPP
undermines the U.S. Constitution. In no way does the SPP infringe upon
the sovereignty of the United States.
Myth: The SPP is illegal and violates the Constitution.
Fact: The SPP is legal and in no way violates the Constitution or
affects the legal authorities of the participating executive agencies.
Indeed, the SPP is an opportunity for the governments of the United
States, Canada, and Mexico to discuss common goals and identify ways to
enhance each nation's security and prosperity. . . .
Myth: The U.S section of the SPP is headed by the Department of
Commerce.
Fact: The SPP is a White House-driven initiative. In the United States,
the Department of Commerce coordinates the 'Prosperity' component, while
the Department of Homeland Security coordinates the ‘Security'
component. The Department of State ensures the two components are
coordinated and are consistent with U.S. foreign policy.
Myth: The U.S. Government, working though the SPP, has a secret plan to
build a "NAFTA Super Highway."
Fact: The U.S. government is not planning a NAFTA Super Highway. The
U.S. government does not have the authority to designate any highway as
a NAFTA Super Highway, nor has it sought such authority, nor is it
planning to seek such authority. There are private and state level
interests planning highway projects which they themselves describe as
"NAFTA Corridors," but these are not Federally-driven initiatives, and
they are not a part of the SPP.
Myth: The U.S. Government, through the Department of Transportation, is
funding secretive highway projects to become part of a "NAFTA Super
Highway". . .
Myth: The SPP seeks to lower U.S. standards through a regulatory
cooperation framework.
Fact: The framework will support and enhance cooperation and encourage
the compatibility of regulations among the three partners while
maintaining high standards of health and safety. Any regulatory changes
will require agencies to conform to all U.S. administrative procedures,
including an opportunity to comment. Enhanced cooperation in this area
will provide consumers with more affordable, safer, and more diversified
and innovative products.
http://www.spp.gov/myths_vs_facts.asp
JEROME CORSI, STOP SPP - One hundred Mexican trucking companies will
have unlimited access to U.S. roads to haul international cargo as part
of a year-long pilot program, the Department of Transportation announced
today. In return, 100 U.S. trucking companies will be allowed to operate
in Mexico but at a later date. Calling for congressional hearings,
Teamsters General President Jimmy Hoffa compared the announcement to the
"Dubai Ports debacle," charging President Bush is "playing a game of
Russian roulette on America's highways." . . . The Teamsters Union has
strongly protested the opening up of U.S. highways to Mexican trucks,
citing safety concerns.
http://stopspp.com/stopspp/
SAM SMITH, SHADOWS OF HOPE, 1994 - If one wishes to find a real Clinton
foreign policy, such places as Bosnia, Somalia and the UN are the wrong
places to look. The real Clinton foreign policy is simply this: there
are no foreign countries any more, there are only undeveloped markets.
The slogan has become "Make quarterly earnings growth, not war!" Trade
has replaced ideology as the engine of foreign affairs.
At one level this should be celebrated, since it is far less deadly. On
the other hand, this development also means that politics, nationhood
and the idea of place itself is being replaced by a huge, amorphous
international corporate culture that rules not by force but by market
share. This culture, in the words of French writer and advisor to
Francois Mitterand Jacques Attali, seeks an "ideologically homogenous
market where life will be organized around common consumer desires.". .
.
It is this unnamed country of international law, trade and finance, with
its anthem to "global competition in the first half of the 21st
century," that is increasingly providing the substance and the style to
our politics. It is their dual citizenship in America and in the Great
Global Glob that characterizes the most powerful among us, now more than
ever including even our own political leaders.
International man dreams of things like NAFTA and GATT and then gets
them passed. And he knows that he, as a corporate executive or licensed
professional, will pass quickly through Mexican customs because the
agreement he helped to draft and pass has declared him entitled to such
consideration. The union worker, the tourist from St. Louis, are, under
the new world order, from far countries and so it will take awhile
longer. This then is the Clinton foreign policy: it is the policy of
International Man, a policy that brings Mexico City ever nearer and
starts to make St. Louis a stranger in its own land.
SAM SMITH, 2002 - Bill Clinton told a 1995 Michigan State University
commencement shortly after the Oklahoma City bombing, "There's nothing
patriotic about hating your government or pretending you can hate your
government but love your country." And in a few years, George Bush's
attorney general would imply that even criticizing government policy was
unpatriotic.
How had loyalty to government come to replace loyalty to ideals, place,
and people in the pantheon of patriotism? In part because the American
elite had decided that nations no longer mattered all that much. It was
government we needed to honor lest our parochialism interfere with
corporate multi-nationalism. In 1992, Strobe Talbott had written in Time
Magazine, "Within the next hundred years . . . nationhood as we know it
will be obsolete; all states will recognize a single, global authority .
. . All countries are basically social arrangements, accommodations to
changing circumstances. No matter how permanent and even sacred they may
seem at any one time, in fact they are all artificial and temporary."
Talbott was expressing a centrist consensus later confirmed by that
Washington favorite, Francis Fukuyama: "Globalization will not be
reversed." And by Vaclav Havel, approvingly quoted in the New York
Review of Books referring to nations as "cultlike entities charged with
emotion."
It was not just a matter of words. No assault on American sovereignty
has been more successful than that carried out in recent years by the
globalization movement, using such mechanisms as NAFTA and the WTO. That
which, over the course of our history, the British, Mexicans,
Confederates, Spanish, Germans and Japanese had been unable to do was
now being accomplished by a handful of lawyers armed only with cell
phones, fax machines and the support of politicians willing to trade
their country's nationhood for another campaign contribution.
And it wasn't just happening to America. By the 1990s, about half the
top economies of the world were not nations, but corporations. Trade had
replaced ideology as the engine of foreign affairs. Politics, nationhood
and the idea of place itself was being supplanted by a huge, amorphous
international corporate culture that ruled not by force but by market
share.
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