statism watch

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Dana Gabriel, BeYourOwnLeader
June 29, 2010

The Arctic has been the subject of dispute between Canada, Denmark, the U.S., Russia and Norway with each country taking steps to expand their scientific research and military presence. Its vast untapped oil, natural gas and mineral resources represent a tremendous economic potential, but control of the region is also important from a strategic standpoint. Increased cooperation and military integration could be used to further secure interests in the area. Canada and Denmark recently signed an agreement which will promote defence and security collaboration in the Arctic. In August, Canadian Forces operations in the far North will include Danish and American participation. There are also calls for U.S.-Canada joint security of North America’s Arctic waters and skies.

Canada continues to assert its military presence in its northernmost boundaries. Operation Nunalivut which ran in the Arctic from April 6-26, is one of three sovereignty exercises conducted each year by Canadian Forces (CF). This year’s joint maneuvers included, “the first landing and takeoff of an Air Force CC-177 Globemaster III aircraft at CFS Alert, from a gravel and ice covered airfield and the first CF dive in the high Arctic, which was the longest sustained ice dive operation in CF history. In addition, the Arctic Response Company Group conducted concurrent training with the Canadian Rangers for the first time in the Arctic, while a team of nine Regular and Reserve Force Signallers tested a new series of Iridium, high frequency and satellite communication systems.” As part of ongoing efforts by Canada-Denmark to strengthen diplomatic and security relations in the Arctic, the operation featured, “combined training with the Danish military’s SIRIUS Dog Sledge patrol.” An agreement reached between Russia and Norway over the long-disputed area in the Barents Sea has also prompted Canada to take steps to resolve conflicting Arctic offshore boundary claims with Denmark and the United States.

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Problem, reaction, solution: globalist bankers have been successful at blowing out the US dollar and the Euro and bringing them to the brink via massive wealth destruction through the sale of fraudulent derivative securities, the monetization of the resultant debt, and “stimulus” inflation. This artificial debt bubble is just about set to pop, and a new solution is being offered by the same people, in much the same way a crack dealer strings along his victims.Want a hit? The first one’s free.

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Gabriella Casanas, Mick B. Krever, CNN
June 29, 2010

The dollar is an unreliable international currency and should be replaced by a more stable system, the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs said in a report released Tuesday.

The use of the dollar for international trade came under increasing scrutiny when the U.S. economy fell into recession. “The dollar has proved not to be a stable store of value, which is a requisite for a stable reserve currency,” the report said.

Many countries, in Asia in particular, have been building up massive dollar reserves. As a result, those countries’ currencies have become undervalued, decreasing their ability to import goods from abroad.

The World Economic and Social Survey 2010 is supporting a proposal long advocated by the International Monetary Fund to create a standardized international system for liquidity transfer.

Under this proposed system, countries would no longer have to buy up foreign currencies, as China has long done with the U.S. dollar. Rather, they would accumulate the right to claim foreign currencies, or special drawing rights, or SDRs, rather than the currencies themselves.

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While we must admire Mr. Corcoran’s optimism, there is reason to fear it may be dashed all too soon – there is always some new war, some new pretext for globalizing treaties waiting around the corner. COP 16 (Mexico) and the Seoul G20 are both scheduled for November this year. Certainly the globalist agenda ius on its heels, and reporting from the Bilderberg group this year affirms this – but as the saying goes, the price of freedom is eternal vigilance. And though the gridlock of the $1.2 billion G20 summit deserves a cheer, our vigilance has been sorely lacking of late.

Related: How will democracy fare under the G20’s new world order? | Blame Canada: How Paul Martin, Larry Summers sketched out G20 new world order | G20 agenda named as “global government” by thinktank, Toronto summit set to sit on hands | Harper calls for global economic governance, lauds G20 as ruling forum | Terence Corcoran: The rise of global statism | For more, see the G20 Coverage page feature

Terence Corcoran, The Financial Post
June 27, 2010

Global governance, one of the drearier hallucinations of statist think tanks and back-room bureaucrats — and the phantasmagorial nightmare of anti-capitalist black-clad ideological crazies — crashed into the great wall of national realities at the G8 and G20 Toronto summits and went up in smoke. But that does not make the Toronto summits a failure. What still stands tall in the world economy and in global politics — as it should — is national sovereignty.

The governance camp will try to scrounge fragments of globalist achievement out of the official verbal and rhetorical shambles generated in the final communiqués and closing comments of the Toronto summit leaders. But there is little in the end that could be reassembled into a coherent statement of collective action. Prime Minister Stephen Harper, host of the summits, tried on Sunday to claim summit unity on the basis that the summits established a “framework” for common cause and policy convergence.

But in fact the Toronto summits represent a near total collapse of efforts to create some kind of overarching centre of global economic power. Despite repeated reference to strong collective commitments to international cooperation, sustainable development and macroeconomic co-ordination, the G8/G20 separately and jointly agreed to go their own ways and avoid collective action as much as possible.

On everything from deficit reduction to climate change, from financial regulation to trade, foreign aid, currencies and Afghanistan, the G20 ultimately marched off in 20 separate directions.

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The new rules are to be drafted by the Basel committee, the working group of the Bank of International Settlements (BIS). It’s the sort of thing banks ought to be doing anyways in order to avoid some of the more dangerous and fraudulent corollaries of the system of fractional reserve banking. But two questions hang in the air – will this move then provide justification for the continued virtualization of monetary instruments? And what will the long-term consequences on the economic sovereignty of nations be of the unspoken precedent being set here – increased centralization of economic regulation power in the hands of the world’s central bank, the BIS? It’s just as Trichet said back in April at the CFR, when the G20 communique was actually being worked out (prior to this lavish coming out party we’ve just seen in Toronto): the Global Economy Meeting (GEM), which regularly meets at the BIS headquarters in Basel, “Has become the prime group for global governance among central banks”. But you’re not supposed to know about this. You’re not supposed to care while a new global economic architecture is built up around you. Well, you’d better figure out what it means that the same central bankers, the same casino system that brought you the global economic crisis in the first place are accruing more power and centralizing it under the rubric of ‘global governance’. You’d better figure out what that means to you and your family real fast. You might call it the real Secret of Oz (2 3 4) – what’s behind the curtain? Pull it aside and you begin to see that the contours of history are shaped by the battle over the ability to manipulate currency, the power to plunge economies into debt in the same way individuals have been controlled throughout history by countless sharecropping scams – it’s the company store, it’s your credit card, it’s the protection racket of income tax, it’s the inflation of paper dollars. You’re watching a financial coup in slow motion, and it must be resisted. The first place to begin is by looking at the difference between Keynesian and Austrian economic theory. One fun place to start is this short video: Fear the Boom and Bust.

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Larry Elliott, Patrick Wintour, The Guardian
June 27, 2010

Under a plan to be finalised for the next G20 meeting banks will have to improve both the quantity and quality of the capital they hold

Tough rules designed to ensure banks make themselves strong enough to withstand a crisis without taxpayer bailouts have been backed by the G20.

Under a plan to be finalised for the next G20 meeting in South Korea in November, banks will over the next few years have to improve both the quantity and quality of the capital they hold. But in a compromise insisted upon by European G20 members, the proposal to have a regime by the end of 2012 has been shelved and governments will be given time to ensure their banks meet the standards.

Britain and the US were pressing for urgent reform, but believe the trade-off is the best way of ensuring that standards are enforced globally. Chancellor George Osborne said G20 had made “a significant step forward”.

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Elena Moya, The Guardian
June 24, 2010

Desperate attempt to repay debts also driven by inability to find funds to develop infrastructure on islands

There’s little that shouts “seriously rich” as much as a little island in the sun to call your own. For Sir Richard Branson it is Neckar in the Caribbean, the billionaire Barclay brothers prefer Brecqhou in the Channel Islands, while Aristotle Onassis married Jackie Kennedy on Skorpios, his Greek hideway.

Now Greece is making it easier for the rich and famous to fulfill their dreams by preparing to sell, or offering long-term leases on, some of its 6,000 sunkissed islands in a desperate attempt to repay its mountainous debts.

The Guardian has learned that an area in Mykonos, one of Greece’s top tourist destinations, is one of the sites for sale. The area is one-third owned by the government, which is looking for a buyer willing to inject capital and develop a luxury tourism complex, according to a source close to the negotiations.

Potential investors also looking at property on the island of Rhodes, are mostly Russian and Chinese. Investors in both countries are looking for a little bit of the Mediterranean as holiday destinations for their increasingly affluent populations. Roman Abramovich, the billionaire owner of Chelsea football club, is among those understood to be interested, although a spokesman denied he was about to invest.

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Important issues this Star article doesn’t include:

Development: (CBC) “We have a lot of unresolved issues we need to see addressed domestically, without Stephen Harper talking about going overseas and dealing with development there.” The protesters highlighted First Nations land claims and the still unsolved cases of more than 500 aboriginal women who have been slain or gone missing across Canada in the last three decades.

Electoral Self-Determination: (Globe) Marylynn Pouchache, a spokesperson for the Barriere Lake solidarity group, said they were marching to protest the federal government’s imposition of Section 74 of the Indian Act, which sets out a one-member, one-vote system for band elections. Barriere Lake uses a traditional selection system. “You have to be connected to the land to be able to have a say in a traditional governing system,” she said, noting the Indian Act system allows band members to vote regardless of where they live or what language they speak.

Related: Shrugs greet historic $145M Toronto land claim settlement | Ontario closer to handing over Ipperwash park to Chippewas | B.C. Nisga’a First Nation approves private property rights | BC Native tribe will petition Ottawa to remove its Indian status | Court upholds aboriginal fishing rights on Vancouver Island | BC chiefs kill flawed aboriginal rights law | Akwesasne chief pushes for Mohawk sovereignty | Title law would undermine native rights, lawyers say | BC Court Tells Ottawa to Amend Status Rules for Natives | Quebec First Nations declare sovereignty, opposition to provincial development plans | OPP threatened natives to end blockade | Alberta natives protest oil exploration on their land | Native leaders vow to fight mining law in Ontario | Mohawk protesters set up blockade in eastern Ont. town | For more, see the G20 Coverage page feature

Peter Edwards, Toronto Star
June 24, 2010

Canada was given a failing grade on aboriginal human rights by First Nations groups protesting the G8/G20 economic summits.

“Canada has failed,” said Cathryn Mandoka, 59, of the Stoney Point First Nation near Sarnia. “Canada gets an F.”

As she made her comments, Mandoka, a member of the Association of Iroquois and Allied Indians, passed out mock report cards for Canada, giving the country failing grades in several categories, including the failure to adopt the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and a failure on environmental issues, like protection of lands and resources.

Mandoka was one of about 1,000 Native people and supporters who gathered outside Queen’s Park, and then marched through downtown Toronto on Thursday afternoon.

The march was peaceful, as stressed in handouts given by organizers. Some of the marchers carried sacred eagle feathers, feathered fans and traditional hand drums.

Among the rules outlined in flyers given to protesters:

• “No masks or bandanas covering your face: If you are wearing a bandana you will be respectfully approached to remove it. You may keep a bandana in your pocket soaked in vinegar in the case of tear gas or pepper spray attacks by police.”

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Marta Andreasen, The Telegraph
June 20, 2010

As the debate continues over the European Commission’s proposals for “peer review” of national budgets, Marta Andreasen, the European Commission’s former chief accountant, gives her blunt opinion.

What does the EU do best? Blame others and grab power.

That is the only sensible conclusion to be drawn from the European Commission’s intention to press on with its insistence on scrutinising national governments’ budget plans, including that of Britain.

At last week’s EU summit David Cameron, in his first Brussels outing as the newly-elected Prime Minister, made clear that the UK was not happy at the prospect of having its tax and spending “peer reviewed” by other EU members before it could be put into effect.

But within minutes of the meeting ending, and despite signs that other countries recognised the problem for Britain, the Commission said it would bring forward its proposals just the same, by the end of this month.

While we are all trying to swim through this financial crisis without knowing exactly when and how it will end, the EU bureaucracy immediately looks around to find someone to blame.

But the fact is that this very bureaucracy is responsible for the crisis, because it brought countries into the single currency in the knowledge that their economies were not up to speed.

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The New World Order is not “a new and progressive era of international cooperation”, as Gordon Brown would have us believe. It heralds instead the degradation of national sovereignty and the takeover of nation states by corrupt global banking and multinational corporate interests. (Which, by the way, has nothing to do with free market capitalism). It’s only now, after decades in which people might have been having this discussion, but were instead steered firmly away through media suppression and derision of that topic only crazy people and conspiracy theorists talked about – it’s only now that it’s ready for launch that the new world order is announced calmly as a fait accompli. You’re living in the twilight of Western democracy. Teach your children well. And remember this time.

Related: Blame Canada: How Paul Martin, Larry Summers sketched out G20 new world order | For more, see the G20 Coverage page feature

Olivia Ward, Toronto Star
June 19, 2010

The club that shapes the world’s economy has grown to include many less-democratic countries that have, however, economic clout

Close your eyes and name the G20 countries.

Can’t? Then you’ll be right up there with the majority of Canadians scratching their heads over just who is coming to that multi-million-dollar dinner in Toronto next week, and why we should care.

For some the G20 is just a bigger group of rich guys than the G8. For others, a gang of up-and-comers with an uncertain claim to fame.

But for all its little-understood qualities, the G20 is the much-heralded New World Order: the world’s economic steering committee. The A-list of countries whose calls are always returned.

Among them, they produce 85 per cent of the world’s gross national product, dominate 80 per cent of trade, and represent two-thirds of global population, spread through every region. But beyond economics, they are also shaping the political landscape of the future.

For some, that’s a good thing.

The G20 grew out of an informal meeting of finance ministers from wealthy countries that morphed into the G7, added Russia, and became the G8. But the 2008 global financial meltdown prompted G8 leaders to bring in reinforcements from emerging countries that wielded economic weight, and it has rapidly become an institution.

“I think the New World Order is emerging, and with it the foundations of a new and progressive era of international co-operation,” declared then-British prime minister Gordon Brown at the G20 meeting last year.

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And they should anyone in Iceland care, precisely? So that they can yoke their currency to the collapsing Euro? Iceland stands as the canary in the coal mine of the new world order and if they don’t want to play ball with the regional system, well, they’re to be commended for their foresight. Go fish. As covered here, Icelanders were given the shaft by a group of international criminals that ran the Landsbanki ponzi scheme and proceeded to scurry off to London where they reportedly maintain operations. Objectively, the obligations owed by the Icelandic people to Europe on these grounds equal zero dollars. If your credit card gets stolen, should you be on the hook for he charges? There’s a term for this – fraud. European jurisdictions may want to question the Russian, ermn, ‘businessmen’, involved about where their money went instead.

Related: Iceland Unanimously Approves ‘Wikileaks Bill’ To Establish Free Speech Press Haven | Frustrated Icelanders vent rage by voting no in referendum | Icelanders to vote no on debt deal | Iceland stares into Icesave abyss | EU executive recommends fast-track membership for Iceland | No solution in dispute over Iceland deposits | Iceland sets date for Icesave vote | Iceland says IMF aid likely delayed | Iceland blocks central bank debt repayment deal | Icelandic parliament rolls over, votes for EU membership | Iceland to be fast-tracked into the EU | Iceland’s government collapses | In Iceland, the heat is on | Police fire pepper spray at Iceland protesters | Icelanders storm central bank in protest | Iceland inflation soars to 17.1% | 5 injured during protest in Iceland over economic meltdown

Ian Traynor
June 17, 2010

Iceland put on fast-track to join the EU but acrimony lingers over £2.3bn owed from Icesave collapse

Iceland was put on a fast track to join the European Union today, but the Cameron government served notice that it could block the country’s membership unless it settled the £2.3bn Britain says it is owed as a result of the country’s financial collapse two years ago.

European government chiefs at a Brussels summit decided that “accession negotiations should be opened” with Iceland. At British and Dutch insistence, however, the summit said that Iceland would have to address “existing obligations such as those identified by the European free trade area surveillance authority”, a reference to the fallout from the collapse of Icesave in 2008 that left 400,000 depositors in Britain and the Netherlands fearing for their savings.

The Icesave dispute generated acrimonious negotiations, with the terms for reimbursing the British and Dutch rejected first by Iceland’s president and then by the Icelandic public in a referendum.

Earlier this week, William Hague, the foreign secretary, made it plain that Britain could veto membership unless the dispute was settled. “Iceland will have to recognise its obligations,” he said. “We won’t block [opening negotiations], but we will want it clear at the start that Iceland meets its financial and legal obligations.”

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Chris Windeyer, Nunatsiaq News
June 17, 2010

IQALUIT, Nunavut — Operation Nanook, the Canadian Forces’ summer Arctic sovereignty exercise, moves north of the Arctic Circle for the first time this summer, and in a twist will include ships from the Danish and American navies, plus a ship and dive team from the United States Coast Guard.

The participation by the Dutch and Americans is notable for a Canadian sovereignty exercise, since Canada has lingering offshore boundary disputes with both Denmark and the U.S.

But Lt.-Cmdr. Albert Wong of Canada Command in Ottawa said the two countries are “our allies. Collaboration is part of what Canada does.”

Soldiers from all three branches of the Canadian Forces, plus Canadian Rangers, coast guard and other government personnel will descend on Pond Inlet, Resolute Bay and Grise Fiord, in Nunavut in the eastern Arctic, for a series of exercises from Aug. 6 to 29.

In addition to military exercises, Operation Nanook will feature a coast guard-led oil spill simulation in Lancaster Sound, north of Baffin Island.

Coast guard spokeswoman Carol Launderville said there will be no actual oil spilled. She said the exercise will consist of planning responses to oil spills and practising the deployment of containment booms.

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