By Tom DeWeese
On July 23, 2004, Tom DeWeese, president of the American Policy Center, addressed the fifth annual Freedom 21 Conference in Reno, Nevada. The following is the first of two parts of his address on the agenda, the threat, and the defeat of "Sustainable Development."
My friends, we come here today from many walks of life. A wide variety of reasons got each of us started on the road to activism.
Some of us started simply because we noticed something funny about our child's curriculum in school. Some of us were outraged by government trying to take away our guns. A good many of us suddenly found government agents and members of private groups plotting to take away our land. Some have had their livestock confiscated. Some have found themselves facing jail - just for doing what their fathers and grandfathers have done on the same land for decades.
Some of us just wanted to be allowed to go to church, pray to God, and celebrate Christmas without being fined for it. A few of us would even like to be able to go to a restaurant and order food we like - even if it is greasy, fattening and full of carbs and calories.
All of us just want to live in an America where our rights and pursuit of happiness is protected. And, so we fight. And, now, we've found ourselves here today in a room with hundreds of others in the same boat.
I have one thing to tell you. You are not going to win. Because the other side has cut us up into little pieces. They've divided us, and conquered us.
They've succeeded because you think your fight is against gun control. Because you think your fight is against bad schools. Because you think your fight is against the Endangered Species Act and roadless programs, and wetlands regulations, and water rights and Heritage Areas. Because you think your fight is against Democrats, and not Republicans. Because you think it's a fight between evil liberals and good guy conservatives.
You're wrong. Your fight is against a well-planned, well orchestrated agenda for the complete transformation of America. And, unless you learn that fact now, today... and, unless you fully educate yourselves to every aspect of that agenda and fight it on the proper terms - then you cannot win!
I'm here to tell you that every one of these issues you are facing is interrelated. There is an agenda being implemented before your very eyes. It's called Sustainable Development.
And I will tell you now, if you want to keep your guns, your property, your children, and your God - if you love liberty - then Sustainable Development is your enemy!
So, what is Sustainable Development? Imagine an America in which a specific "ruling principle" is created to decide proper societal conduct for every citizen.
That principle would be used to consider everything you eat, what you wear, the kind of homes you live in, the method of transportation used to get to work, the way you dispose of waste, perhaps the number of children you may have, even your education and employment decisions.
Sustainable Development is that "ruling principle" for the implementation of what former Vice President Al Gore said we must all suffer through in order to purify our nation from the horrors of the Twentieth Century's industrial revolution.
In his book, Earth in the Balance, Gore called it a "wrenching transformation of society." Those are pretty powerful words, that should concern anyone who values liberty. It's a warning that the rules are changing. That a new power elite is taking control.
Perhaps you are beginning to notice such changes as you go about your daily routine, but haven't understood where those changes, and the ideas behind them, are coming from. But Sustainable Development is a very difficult concept to grasp. It's written in an almost foreign language - designed to mislead and refrain from alarming you.
Let me put it in the simplest language I possibly can. The Atkins Diet is not sustainable. Now, why do I say that? Because on page 350 of the U.N.'s Global Biodiversity Assessment Report it says that the grazing of livestock, including cows, sheep, goats, and horses is not sustainable. One reason for that concept is because Sustainablists contend that the animals pollute and damage the banks of streams.
Getting us to stop eating beef is a major effort needed to fully implement the Sustainable Agenda. Since they are cowards, who fear your reaction to an outright banning of eating meat, they have to try to trick you into thinking that not eating meat is your idea. So, they use scare tactics. For years, they have told you that eating meat raises your cholesterol. Fat is bad for you. Meat causes heart attacks. With PETA's help they were succeeding in turning us all into little sissies eating salads.
Then, along comes Dr. Atkins who shows us that a low carb beef diet will help you lose weight, in a healthy way. Suddenly, the nation has gone Atkins crazy. Beef sales are sky rocketing. The Sustainablists are in a tail spin. They've lost control of your eating habits.
Now, watch what they are doing to get you back on track. Suddenly, reports are being published in leading women's magazines about Atkins being dangerous to your health. Lawsuits have begun to pop up against the diet.
Do you see how it works? That's how the Sustainable Development agenda is implemented. Behavior modification, based on fear. Freedom of choice is not part of Sustainable Development. And, so I repeat, - the Atkins Diet is not sustainable.
Now, perhaps you'll understand why there are Sustainable Development papers, guidelines and regulations to impose the ruling principle:
On our public education system - to prepare our children to live in a sustainable world.
On our economy - to create partnerships between business and government, making sure business becomes a tool to help implement the policies.
On the environment - leading to controls on private property and business.
On health care - the new drive against obesity is leading directly toward controls on what we eat.
On farming - Sustainable Development policies affect farmers' ability to produce more crops by regulating or banning precious chemicals, biotechnology, and genetic engineering in the name of environmental protection.
On our social and cultural environment - where political correctness is controlling policy hiring practices, immigration policy, multiculturalism, marriage laws, etc.
On our mobility - with emphasis on carpools and public transportation, and away from the freedom of personal transportation.
And on public safety - where the rule of law and the court system is being challenged by new regulations that affect the right to privacy and unreasonable search and seizures.
It's important to understand that these leading issues we face today are not just random concerns that find their way into the forefront of political debate. They are all interconnected to the policies of Sustainable Development.
And, you must understand that Sustainable Development is the official policy of the government of the United States of America - and every state, city, and small burg in the nation.
It is completely bi-partisan. It is being equally implemented by Republicans and Democrats. No matter the outcome of any election - the Sustainable Development agenda moves forward, unabated.
What we are telling you here today, my friends, is that Sustainable Development isn't just some land use policy. It is a complete transformation of American society; away from the rule of law; away from the ideals of property ownership, free enterprise, free travel, and even free association.
Sustainable Development. It's a life plan. Planned by someone else. Not you.
And, Sustainable Development is not a myth, or a theory, or a conspiracy - as I've heard some in our own movement call it.
Since the 1970s, literally hundreds of issue papers, charters, guidelines, and treaties have been presented at scores of international meetings, each becoming a building block in the creation of what would eventually become Sustainable Development.
Finally in 1992, the U.N.'s Earth Summit in Brazil brought all of these ideas together in two major documents called Agenda 21 and the Biodiversity Treaty. Here, the ideas were officially presented to world leaders that all government on every level, needed to be transformed into top-down control over housing, food production, energy, water, private property education, population control, gun control, transportation, social welfare, medical care, and literally, every aspect of our lives.
To get the full picture, add to these the U.N.'s Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women, both of which create U.N.-mandates on abortion, child rearing and government interference on families.
In 1993 President Clinton created the President's Council on Sustainable Development. From that Council, came a flood of policy papers and recommendations to enforce it as government policy.
And, the Clinton Administration didn't need Congress to get into the act. All Cabinet officials had to do was change some wording of existing programs, and reroute already-approved funding to begin to implement the agenda - without Congress and without debate. Former Commerce Secretary Ron Brown told a meeting of the President's Council that he could implement 67 percent of the Sustainable Development agenda in his agency with no new legislation. Other agencies like Interior, EPA, HUD, and more did the same thing. To help it all along, Clinton issued a blizzard of Executive Orders.
The American Heritage Rivers Initiative was born that way. So were roadless policies designed to stop logging in national forests. National parks have become core biosphere reserves designed to shut out any human activity. And, the buffer zones around them are designed to shut off existing human activity, allowing the core to continually grow like a cancer tumor.
Any possible excuse to control human development or activities began to sprout up - from rails-to-trails bikeways to wetlands regulations to historic preservation projects. Endangered species, real or made up, have been used to close down industry and steal private lands. Valuable natural resources have been locked away in national parks and preserves.
In this way, an international agenda to transform the world into
global governance under Sustainable Development policy took hold, and
became official policy of the United States of America.
Tom DeWeese is the president of the American Policy Center and publisher/editor of "The DeWeese Report," a monthly public affairs newsletter.