Being involved with political groups of a Libertarian persuasion, I get on the mailing lists of all sorts of well-meaning, but somewhat loony people on both the right and left of the political spectrum - and sometimes those two extremes are hard to tell apart. One of the things which is high on their list of concerns is the impending surrender of the sovereignty of the United States under the authority of a new continental government sometimes referred to as the 'North American Union'. I get a different email warning about it every few days.
For those not familiar with this looming threat, the North American Union is going to be a government similar to the European Union which will supersede the current governments of the United States, Canada and Mexico and bring all three countries together under a single unified legal, taxing and administrative structure. Unlike the European Union which originated as a clearly identifiable treaty voted on and adopted by the existing governments of the member states, the NAU is being secretly implemented through a series of treaties and trade agreements which add up to de facto political unification of the continent.
At least this is what paranoid anti-globalists at Human Events, WorldNetDaily, InfoWars and EagleForum plus of course news network lunatic Lou Dobbs all believe. Some of these sources have a certain amount of legitimacy in the political circles they appeal to - they aren't all professional scaremongers like Alex Jones - and there are a dismayingly large number of people who take Dobbs seriously.
The basic scenario is that a combination of treaties, agreements and government initiatives adds up to a new de facto government for all of North America. The conspiracy theory has deep antecedents. It originates in the fear of the Council on Foreign Relations which the John Birch Society and related groups have targeted for almost 50 years on the theory that the CFR is a sort of shadow government which secretly sets US policy on behalf of secretive international interest groups. In 2005 the CFR issued the task force report Building a North American Community, which seems to draw together the threads of a wide range of government activities into a single grand web of conspiracy to create a North American Union. This report is cited as the 'blueprint' for the new continental government.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Les Slater
Dave,
The logic of progress and technology is that boarders become a brake on such progress. Some aspects of the EU make much sense.
The Tran-Texas Corridor sounds like a good idea. Before I looked it up I thought that it might include a straight segment from Brownsville to El Paso, passing through part of Mexico.
That reminds me, I'm moving to Detroit in the next week or so and the most economical, and common, route from that U.S. city and the U.S. city of Boston, is through Canada. At least my car has the capability of going to metric displays like km/hr with push of a couple buttons.
Too bad the backward politicians couldn't be as enlightened as my Chevy Malibu.
Les
2 - Jet in Columbus
Dave I knew where this was going the moment I read you pronouncing Lou Dobbs a lunatic.
Computer still teetering towards falling off the right side of your desk I see!
:)
3 - Les Slater
Lou Dobbs is a lunatic.
4 - Clavos
Les, Dave:
So who is his audience?
This is interesting; you guys, who are somewhat apart politically :>), both think he's a lunatic (as do I, BTW).
Dave, what about Dobbs makes you say he's a lunatic?
Les, ditto?
5 - Les Slater
Jet,
Watching Lou a few times, he seems to think his audience is not too sophisticated; he preaches to the gullible from a right-wing perspective.
Les
6 - Les Slater
Sory Clavos, I did not notice it was you.
7 - Clavos
No prob, Les. Thanks for the response.
He does talk down to his audience, which is annoying as can be.
8 - Big_Ron
If the NAU does not exist could you please comment on why the State of Idaho just passed legislation against it?
Idaho became the first state to have legislation pass both the House and the Senate after 14 other states had measures come to the floor.
You can read the Bill Here
Can you write off a State Legislature as a bunch of Loonies?
9 - Clavos
Can you write off a State Legislature as a bunch of Loonies?
In a heartbeat.
And I'll give you both houses of Congress as a bonus.
10 - Doug Hunter
The trans texas corridor is easy to include in any conspiracy because it's such an obvious abuse or government power. The fact that the voters in Texas reelected the buffoon Perry demonstrates that perhaps the state was onto something. Perhaps the populace is so ignorant they deserve to have their property taken and put into the hands of the government/transnational corporations/Perry campaign donors.
BTW, I have nothing against the construction of new highways or even superhighways. I have a problem with land around the highway being taken and turned over to politically connected developers as a source of funding. The government is being run too much like a business, one with no limits on what it can do or take.
11 - Les Slater
Taking of private property can be abused and certainly has been, but private property cannot stand in the way of progress.
I haven't studied the trans-Texas proposal but I like the idea of it including rail. I presume this rail would be modern and economical.
In any case, what does this have to do with the North American Union? Maybe the NAU is progress so we have to oppose all progress lest we find ourselves in the NAU?
12 - Dave Nalle
Dave I knew where this was going the moment I read you pronouncing Lou Dobbs a lunatic.
Computer still teetering towards falling off the right side of your desk I see!
Jet, as you'll notice from the other comments, half the people think Dobbs is a right wing lunatic and half think he's a left wing lunatic. He's both and neither at the same time. He's a conspiracy mongering populist. He's a protectionist which pleases the left and a nativist which pleases the right. But the one thing that's always true about him is that if he believes something it's wrong.
I'm working on a separate article just on Dobbs and his constant misrepresentation of fact and self-serving fearmongering.
Dave
13 - Dave Nalle
Oh, and as for the Idaho State Leg., that news broke right after I wrote the article. I think they are the answer to the question of who actually listens to the drivel that Dobbs spews. They're a bunch of pinhead potato farmers who are so isolated from the rest of the country that they don't know any better than to believe what they see on CNN.
On the more positive side, I guess you can pass laws against the NAU whether it exists or not, just in case. If such a conspiracy DID exist it would certainly be a bad thing. But there sure isn't any real evidence to support its existence.
Dave
14 - Arch Conservative
"Lou Dobbs is a lunatic."
No more so than Al Gore and his human induced global warming propaganda.
15 - Mark Schannon
Nah, there couldn't be a conspiracy. I'd have heard about it long before now. That's how you can make a few bucks, and I ain't heard nothing but the woodpecker trying hole my house to death.
In Jameson Veritas
16 - Clavos
private property cannot stand in the way of progress.
Progress toward totalitarianism, one hallmark of which is the taking of property by force, cannot be allowed in a society which proclaims the freedom of its citizens as a prime principle.
17 - Dave Nalle
"Lou Dobbs is a lunatic."
No more so than Al Gore and his human induced global warming propaganda.
Don't look to me for an argument there. The fact that one person holds irrational beliefs doesn't make the irrational beliefs of another person any more rational.
Dave
18 - Dave Nalle
Taking of private property can be abused and certainly has been, but private property cannot stand in the way of progress.
It's not real progress if it results in the loss of basic rights like private property rights. Progress should enhance the lives of the people, not diminish them.
I haven't studied the trans-Texas proposal but I like the idea of it including rail. I presume this rail would be modern and economical.
Don't bet on it. Modern maybe, but the cost will be prohibitive and every existing study suggests no one will use it.
In any case, what does this have to do with the North American Union? Maybe the NAU is progress so we have to oppose all progress lest we find ourselves in the NAU?
That's pretty much the rationale of a lot of the conspiracy theorists. Any change or any new way of doing things MUST be part of an evil conspiracy.
Dave
19 - Iddybud
Re: SPP -
The U.S. Department of Commerce is, for all intents and purposes, rewriting U.S. administrative law with absolutely no Constitutional justification. This isn't conspiracy - it's happening in the open. We have every logical reason to question what's happening and every right to know exactly how our individual rights will be afected. With our common sovereignty at stake, I think that we need to get active to stop the unconstitutional replacement of American authority for a supranational replacement created by elites. We need to be watchdogs over our own individual rights, freedoms, and our democracy. I don't see the fear (or theory) of conspiracy couched in these concerns. It's more like worrying about how we stop naive government officials from trading away our rights, our democracy, and our sovereignty in their rush to keep Wall Street well afloat. Would the Founding Fathers accept this kind of trade-off? I happen to think not.
20 - Dave Nalle
Iddy, have you BEEN to the SPP website? Have you read their documents? You're right that it's all being done above board. It's also all very well documented.
And what's obvious to anyone who actually reads those documents and is not clinically diagnosed as paranoid, is that what the SPP is doing is almost entirely harmless.
Our sovereignty is not at stake as you claim, nor is american authority being replaced by elites. Where do you get this crazy stuff from? Turn off Lou Dobbs and turn on your brain.
At the most the country whose sovereignty is threatened is Mexico, because they are the target of a lot of the efforts of the SPP. It's their border security and their economy which are at issue. I think the Mexican Lou Dobbs might be close to correct if he complained that the SPP comes close to making Mexico a client state of the US - but isn't that already kind of true?
The ugly truth is that all of these efforts are basically designed to benefit the US, our businesses, our citizens and our government.
Dave
21 - Ian
Dave,
If the SPP/TTC is helping America, then why are companies from other countries purchasing our toll roads? Some of these companies are Cintra, a Spanish company, and Australia's Macquarie Bank. Does this improve our sovereignty?
Read this
Ian
22 - Clavos
And Pan Bimbo (of Mexico) now owns most of the US bread makers, thus is the biggest bakery in the US, Rinker Materials, an Aussie company is the biggest construction materials supplier in the USA, after having bought up several US materials companies. Telmex is a majority stockholder in Southwestern Bell, etc. etc.
How does this hurt our "sovereignty?" It's business, which has been multinational for nearly a hundred years, now, beginning with US companies spreading all over the world. Have other nations sovereignties been destroyed by American companies operating in their territories?
23 - Dave Nalle
Ian, aside from the toll road example, what you're talking about are multinational corporations who may be based in other countries, but are owned internationally. If you look at the shareholder lists of those companies which are nominally foreign you'll find a hell of a lot of Americans owning their stocks. The nationality of companies like that is an illusion. And it's just as likely that US interests will own companies in other countries which you think of as belonging to those countries.
Do you realize that US investment in foreign assets tops 4 trillion dollars? No other country has anything like that amount invested in the US.
As for Cintra and the TTC, I agree that it's a bad idea to have a foreign company getting the contract - but mainly because it was essentially a no-bid contract. But then you have to deal with the question of WHY it was a no-bid contract. And the facts are that there are no US companies which have the experience and resources to run high-speed rail. To get qualified companies you have to go to Europe. All that aside, the TTC is a terrible idea and I think it's pissed off too many people to ever actually get built, but the problems with it have more to do with the huge waste of money, the fact that it's not needed and the violation of property rights, than any conspiracy or foreign involvement.
Dave
24 - STM
I think with all the talk around at the moment of the "Anglosphere", a favourite of the neo-cons (but which actually makes some sense), that kind of stuff feeds into the minds of nutcases and conspiracy theorists. It's possible that the three might at some point (a long way off) form a real and genuine economic union of sorts, with some binding three-way agreements that don't favour one over another, but a North American Super State ... nah. Makes as much sense as us joining forces with New Zealand and Indonesia.
Plus, I'd be worried, on Mexico in particular, that the great tortilla shortage might lead to supply problems in the southern states of the US. Imagine that!
Can't see the borders coming down just yet, either ... specially not in your neck of the woods.
25 - STM
Schanno wrote: "I ain't heard nothing but the woodpecker trying hole my house to death."
Woodpecker? Is that all ... try a whole flock of sulphur crested cockatoos who've flown in from the bush to escape the drought.
Every house and garden in town = breakfast, lunch and dinner. The bastards are getting into my trees and chewing the supports on my front verandah, and they seem to outsmart every single device I use to get rid of them - including various kinds of hand-thrown missiles.
I have this weekend, however, taken possession of a portable hooter of the kind used for surf contests - operated by an aerosal can. These are so loud, surfers can easily hear them from the water at least 100 yards from the beach. I suspect you can also hear them in New Zealand.
The next mob of cockies eating my beautiful front fir tree is going to get an almighty blast. I have warned all the neighbours, so there's no holding back. Perhaps you need one too. I'll keep you posted.