Immigration Called 'Diversion' For Shadowy North American Union

http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewPolitics.asp ... 0618a.html

By Nathan Burchfiel
CNSNews.com Staff Writer
June 18, 2007

(CNSNews.com) - The debate over illegal immigration is a "diversion" to distract Americans from government efforts to enter into a North American Union with Canada and Mexico, in the view of activists protesting in Washington, D.C., on Friday.

"The illegal alien problem is a mechanism for leveraging what is yet to come," Daneen Peterson, a researcher who studies the North American Union issue, said at the small rally, which drew about 40 protestors.

"Once the civil unrest and chaos caused by the overwhelming human tsunami of illegal aliens and MS-13 gang members reduces America to complete anarchy ... the federal government will institute martial law," Peterson said.

Peterson, a former university professor, predicted that martial law would then "allow the shadow government to step forward and visibly take over this country. They will use martial law to install a fascist One World Order, dictatorial government in plain sight instead of operating clandestinely as they do now."

She accused the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), a foreign policy think tank, of designing and implementing a "shadow government" dedicated to uniting Canada, Mexico and the United States under one government.

"If you continue to believe that the illegal alien invasion is the biggest threat to America, you will never understand that there is something far more dangerous to our country called the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America," Peterson said, referring to the trilateral dialogue between the North American countries.

According to its government-hosted website, the SPP is a "trilateral effort to increase security and enhance prosperity among the United States, Canada and Mexico through greater cooperation and information sharing." Activists like Peterson, however, believe it is a step toward relinquishing United States sovereignty.

"Their goal is to destroy our constitutional republic," she said, repeatedly referring to the "shadow government" and a "cabal" of government officials conspiring to bring the U.S. into a North American Union. Peterson said the argument that three nations are merely engaging in dialogue is "a blatant lie."

The SPP website refutes allegations made by critics like Peterson. It says the conversations among leaders of the three nations "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."

More bluntly, the site says 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."

Nonetheless, U.S. Rep. Virgil Goode (R-Va.) in January introduced a sense of Congress resolution stating that the United States should not enter into a union with its neighbors to the North and South.

Goode addressed the rally Friday. He said the SPP "will send us on a glide path to the destruction of our sovereignty, and I always want the United States to be the best country in the world as it is today, and it won't be if we're part of a North American Union."

Robert Pastor, vice president of international affairs at American University and one of the leading proponents of a "North American Community," called Peterson's predictions "completely unrealistic" and "totally absurd."

"Every important initiative requires the consent of our elected officials. None of this can be done by stealth or in secret," he told Cybercast News Service.

"The idea that somehow or other they're going to wake up one day and George Bush will have stolen American sovereignty, or that I would have, or the Council on Foreign Relations, is totally absurd. That doesn't really require a serious conversation," Pastor said.

He called the North American Union a "straw man," explaining that "a union is a unified national state, so if you believe the North American Union, you would be in favor of dissolving the United States ... I don't know anyone who is proposing that."

Pastor said the North American community he envisions "begins with a simple premise, and that is that if our neighbors do well, we will do well. And if our neighbors have problems, we may not be able to contain them. It's a simple principle of interdependence."

"America's strength has always come from opening its doors and embracing and adapting the best in the world," he said. "We ought to continue to adapt our institutions to changes in the world, and that's what's required to advance our interests."

Addressing concerns that his plan would sacrifice American sovereignty, Pastor said the United States has "agreements with hundreds of countries, we belong to hundreds of international organizations. Every treaty we have involves us sharing some responsibility with other countries, sharing some power in the United Nations. That's the real world that we're in today."

But as Cybercast News Service has previously reported, Pastor is not optimistic that the leaders of the three nations are serious about working together to build the community.

"I don't anticipate any serious forward movement during this meeting," he said of a meeting between President Bush, Mexican President Felipe Calderon, and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper scheduled for August.

"The fact they're having a meeting is a positive step and will offer the three governments a chance to hopefully move the relationship forward in a positive manner," Pastor said. "But having said that, my impression from consultations is that this is a very low priority in all three governments."