Stuck before you know it

By Henry Lamb
web posted January 14, 2002

Some years ago, I left Florida in the midst of a rainstorm, driving
North. Just across the Georgia line, I noticed that the rain
seemed to be accumulating on the windshield wipers. I noticed
that the fences along the road seemed to glisten. Before I knew
it, the centerline disappeared and the road was white. Unfamiliar
with these conditions, I touched the brake, which resulted in a
spin-out and a backward slide down a 20-foot embankment. I
was stuck.

Like the unexpected Southern snowstorm, global governance is
likely to ensnare us before we recognize what it is, or its power
to stifle our freedom.

I get letters from readers regularly, who say things such as: "I'll
never accept world government!" The truth is, we are already in
its grip. Global governance, or world government, will not march
on Washington in the form of blue-helmeted troops. It is
marching into our towns in the form of "smart growth" proposals;
into our schools in the form of "tolerance" curricula; into our
churches in the form of "The National Religious Partnership for
the Environment;" and into our government in the form of a
parade of bills to promote everything from global taxation (***
http://www.ceedweb.org/iirp/ushouseres.htm HCONRES301
***), to a Department of Peace inspired by UNESCO (***
http://thomas.loc.gov/home/thomas2.html HR2459 ***).

Global governance is all around us; we just don't recognize it as
such. Nowhere is global governance more apparent than in our
land use policies. Way back in 1976, the U.N. set forth its ***
http://sovereignty.freedom.org/p/land/unproprts.htm policy on
land use ***, saying:

"Land...cannot be treated as an ordinary asset, controlled by
individuals and subject to the pressures and inefficiencies of the
market. Private land ownership is also a principal instrument of
accumulation and concentration of wealth and therefore
contributes to social injustice; if unchecked, it may become a
major obstacle in the planning and implementation of
development schemes. The provision of decent dwellings and
healthy conditions for the people can only be achieved if land is
used in the interests of society as a whole. Public control of land
use is therefore indispensable...."

Since then, through a series of treaties, agreements, laws, and
administrative initiatives, the federal government has moved
relentlessly to acquire land where possible, and control its use
through regulation - where acquisition has not yet been achieved.

The Convention on Biological Diversity requires that each State
Party initiate "a system of protected areas." The instruction book
for implementation, the <i>Global Biodiversity Assessment</i>,
identifies " *** http://eco.freedom.org/col/?i=1994/9 The
Wildlands Project *** (members only)" as the ideal system for
protecting biodiversity.

The Wildlands Project seeks to set aside 50% of the total land
area as wilderness. John Heilprin reports, in the <i>***
http://www.adn.com/alaska/story/748443p-801100c.html
Anchorage Daily News ***, that since 1970, designated
wilderness areas have grown from 247 to 741 million acres - to
encompass about 15% of the total land area of the continent.

When Congressmen introduce wilderness bills, they never say
that the purpose of the bill is to comply with the U.N. policy of
land use control. They say it is to "protect" the land and its
resources for future generations. When Bill Clinton designated
his Monuments and "roadless areas," he didn't say it was to
advance to policy of the United Nations, he said it was to
"protect" the land and its resources for future generations.

If the land and its resources are owned, or controlled by the
government, it will be of no more value to future generations than
it is to the present generation from which it is being taken.

Once land is owned by, or under the control of a government
entangled in land use treaties, our government becomes little
more than an administrative unit for the implementation of global
governance policies.

The rash of "sustainable communities" initiatives that continue to
plague cities in every state, did not emerge as the result of a
spontaneous demand by citizens. It has been carefully calculated,
orchestrated, and implemented by the international community of
U.N. agencies and organizations, and a host of cooperating non-
government organizations (NGOs).

As people are forced off their rural lands in pursuit of the 50%
wilderness panacea, they are to move to "sustainable
communities," designed by government bureaucrats for easy
control. The idea that a person should live where he chooses, in
the home he chooses - is anathema to global governance. The
1976 U.N. policy statement on land actually recommends a
national commission on population distribution. Global
governance presumes the wisdom, and the authority, to dictate
not only where, but how, private citizens should live.

I sat in my car until just before dawn, watching the snow
accumulate around me. Finally, an old farmer, on an even older
John Deere tractor came down the road. He hooked a chain
onto my bumper, and with considerable effort, dragged my car
back onto the road and helped me get headed in the right
direction.

When enough people recognize that global governance is burying
our freedom, we may be able to collectively pull our country
back onto the road paved by our Constitution, and get this
nation headed again, in the right direction.

___ *** (mailto:henry@freedom.org) Henry Lamb *** is the
executive vice president of the *** (http:
//www.eco.freedom.org/el/) Environmental Conservation
Organization *** (ECO), and chairman of *** (http:
//www.sovereignty.net) Sovereignty International ***.

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