Liberty
Matters News Service
May 25, 2007
Law of the Sea Treaty; It's Back
Apparently, President Bush is not satisfied with merely destroying the United States' sovereignty with his secret North American Union plan and bestowing citizenship on every illegal alien that sneaks across our border. Now, he is pursuing ratification of the United Nation's Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST). LOST first surfaced twenty-five years ago and was promptly vetoed by President Ronald Reagan. In 2004, Sen. Richard Lugar (R-IN) brought it up again, but it fell to defeat at the hands of then Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN). Now, President Bush is trying to cajole Republican grassroots' leaders to take the bait again, using the chief counsel for the State Department and judge advocate general of the U. S. Navy to twist congressional arms. LOST created the International Seabed Authority (ISA) that takes unto itself total jurisdiction of all the oceans and everything in them. Through LOST, ISA can levy international taxes, regulate all ocean research and exploration, and deny access to ocean minerals to countries it chooses to punish, meaning the U.S.A. A Canadian socialist, Elizabeth Mann Borgese, was one of the chief promoters of the idea. In a January 1999 speech, Borgese said; "The world ocean has been, and is…our great laboratory for the making of a new world order." Phyllis Schlafley blasts Bush's treachery saying; "Now a lame duck, Bush is ignoring his supporters and instead is pushing the agenda of globalists who are determined to erase sovereign borders…"
Deep-six the Law of the Sea
Bush to pressure Senate to revive U.N. sea
treaty
Clean Water Act Must Cover Every Puddle
Seventeen-term Congressman James Oberstar (D-MN) has introduced legislation to expand the scope of the Clean Water Act to cover every puddle and pothole in the nation. Oberstar thinks two Supreme Court rulings drastically diminished the government's role in dictating how the nation's water sources can be used. In the 2001 case of Solid Waste Agency of Northern Cook County v. the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers, the court "decided that the Army Corps of Engineers lacks authority to regulate certain isolated intrastate wetlands." In Rapanos v. the United States, Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for himself and Justices Thomas, Alito, and Chief Justice Roberts, said the law only authorizes the federal government to regulate permanent, standing, and continuously flowing bodies of water. Justice Anthony Kennedy, the deciding vote, took a harder line on the issue, but did agree the case must return to the lower court for a final decision. HR 2421, the Clean Water Restoration Act of 2007, will "restore the authority of the Clean Water Act so it has the same effect it had prior to the Supreme Court's rulings," said Oberstar. HR 2421 will "reaffirm the original intent of Congress in enacting the Federal Water Pollution Control Act Amendment of 1972 (86 Stat. 816). Introduced May 22, 2007, Oberstar's bill already has 150 co-sponsors. The worst aspect of the bill is it changes the term "navigable waters of the U. S." to "waters of the U.S.," making the definition as inclusive and wide open as possible.
Federal Fertilizer
Website for Congressman Jim
Oberstar
Extraordinary Powers
President Bush recently signed a directive granting extraordinary powers to the office of the president in case of a declared national emergency, neatly sidestepping Congress. The "National Security and Homeland Security Presidential Directive," signed May 9, establishes a new national continuity coordinator whose job is to make plans for "National Essential Functions" of all federal, state, local, territorial and tribal governments as well as private sector organizations to continue functioning under the president's directives in the event of a national emergency. "Catastrophic emergency" apparently means anything the ruling class says it means, including "any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U. S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions." Let's see, did they leave anything out? The directive ignores the National Emergency Act that gives Congress oversight to "modify, rescind, or render dormant" such emergency powers if Congress thinks the president acted improperly. In his book "Towards a North American Community," Robert Pastor states it will take a national disaster to force the American people into the North American Union. President Bush's directive appears to be placing all of Pastor's pieces of the puzzle together fulfilling his prediction should a national disaster come to pass. Now, if it does, the president, not the U.S. Constitution, will be in charge.
Bush Grants Presidency
Extraordinary Powers
Former Interior Official In Hot Water Over Fish
Former deputy assistant Julie MacDonald, secretary for Fish, Wildlife and Parks may have exerted her influence to remove the Sacramento splittail from endangered status for personal gain. Ms. MacDonald resigned her job in the Interior Department last month after she was criticized for ignoring Endangered Species Act rules in several instances. Rep. George Miller (D-CA) and Nick Rahall (D-WV) wrote to Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne on Monday asking him to investigate whether Ms. MacDonald is guilty. "It is unacceptable that such an unprecedented policy decision may have been made because a deputy assistant secretary had a direct and substantial personal financial interest," they wrote. MacDonald's 80-acre farm lies in the Yolo Bypass that could have been flooded to protect the fish. MacDonald's financial statement shows she earns as much as $1 million a year from the farm in Dixon, California. "If it turns out that former Deputy Assistant Secretary MacDonald acted inappropriately regarding the Sacramento splittail, we will conduct an appropriate review of the regulatory process that led to the final decision," read a statement from Interior officials.