CHARTER CHANGE IN THE US

CHARTER CHANGE IN THE US

by Erick San Juan

Filipinos do not seem to own the monopoly of resistance to any attempt at amending their fundamental law. Even the Americans do. They - the political activists, at least - are generally furious about the idea of mangling their charter. In fact, it is a big deal for them, because they have not had this since 1787.

Just like in the Philippines, the Americans are upset about the talks to introduce innovation into their charter, to accommodate provisions that could formalize their status – or reputation – of being the world’s policeman endowed with an air of braggadocio being the biggest superpower.

Even the American Policy Center (APC) had to apologize profusely because it got caught with its pants down. It claims that “this malignancy most foul remained undetected by our radars until a good friend brought it to our attention” only last Wednesday. This triggered swift action!!!

A “snow-balling effect” is what they fear most.

One of the most important action alerts ever issued by the APC is one entitled: “Extremely urgent: US only two States Away from Constitutional Convention. Whether true or not, many of them fear that if the proposition for a Cha-Cha gets approved by the Ohio legislature, it would need only another State to pass a similar action and similar actions are expected to come after another. This could induce the US Congress to have no choice but to call for a convention, thus throwing their Charter up for grabs. To them, the threat posed by the vote in Ohio is grave enough to merit a call for immediate action – to call their respective congressmen.

To the APC, It does not matter where you live. Ohio's vote today endangers everyone in every state in the Union, so we must pressure Ohio lawmakers to discard this disastrous legislative effort thirty-two (32) other states have already called for a Con Con (allegedly to add a Balanced Budget Amendment to the Constitution). 34 states are all that is required, and then Congress MUST call for Convention.

Similar to the Philippines , the U.S. Constitution places no restriction on the purposes for which the states can call for a Convention. If Ohio votes to call a Con Con, for whatever purpose, “the United States will be only one state away from total destruction.” And it's a safe bet that those who hate America and all that she stands for, are merely waiting to pounce upon this chance to re-write the US charter.

Certainly all loyal Americans want government to have a balanced budget. But they believe that calling a Con Con is taking risks about facing some revolutionary changes in their form of government. They are almost sure that its ultimate outcome will likely be a new constitution; one that would possibly eliminate the restriction to the coinage of real money or even eliminate gun or property rights. “So what may look like a good idea to the legislators driving this effort - all Republicans - will certainly make them prey to the law of unintended consequences - at the very least insuring the U.S. will never have a balanced budget - while destroying what vestiges of liberty the government still allows?”

While it may be true that some of those 32 states have voted to rescind their calls but under Article V of the US Constitution, “Congress must call a Constitutional Convention whenever 2/3 (or 34) of the states apply.”

The US Charter has no provision on a state of rescission. Advocates of the convention are said to be waiting to capture just two more states - Ohio , and one other. Then, they may start challenging the other states' rescissions in the courts “while going ahead with the Convention.” Given this, Congress alone then decides whether state legislatures or state conventions ratify proposed amendments.

Certainly, like in the Philippines , the individual States in the USA can control the subject of any convention. Truth to tell, no restrictive language can limit the scope or outcome of a ConCon! Once a Convention is called, Congress’s role is only to determine how the delegates are chosen. Once chosen, those delegates acquire more powers than do Congress itself!

The Convention of 1787 was called to introduce minor revisions in the Articles of Confederation. That was the only ConCon Americans can remember. In fact, several states first passed resolutions requiring their delegates to discuss only, amendments to the Charter, forbidding even discussion of foundational changes.

After the delegates' first agreement that their meetings be in secret however, their second act was to agree to debate those state restrictions and to nullify the Articles of Confederation. They also changed the ratification process, reducing the required states' approval from 100% to 75%. We can’t see enough reason to believe that a contemporary Con Con wouldn't tamper with Article V restrictions to suit its purpose.

Quoting a letter former Chief Justice Warren Burger sent to Phyllis Schlafly, President of Eagle Forum he said that there is no sure-fire way to limit or, muzzle the actions of a Constitutional Convention. The convention, a sovereign body, has its own agenda. Congress may pass a law limiting to just one the articles to be amended, but the Convention can vote later to do as it pleases. It would be too late to stop the convention from doing what it likes.

Americans were blessed that the delegates to the1787 Con Con were the leaders of a freedom movement that had just cleansed the US of tyranny. Today's corrupt politicians and judges would like nothing better than the ability to legally ignore the Constitution - to modify its "problematic" provisions to reflect the philosophical and socials mores of our contemporary society.

It would be such a crazy scheme to amend the US Charter at this time, because the US has just voted a dedicated progressive as its President and that the Republicans are seen at its weakest right now.

Whether in the US or the Philippines, if a ConCon is done now, can anybody guaranty that the debates can be controlled and that civil liberties will not be revised into a government-controlled privileges; replace the policy of collective right to self defense; abolish the Bill of Rights; include the non-existent principle of Separation of the Church and the State; population control, abortion and euthanasia and other issues.

Peoples’ unique concept of individual rights, endowed by God, would be quickly banish as an anachronistic relic of the past; replaced by new "collective" rights, awarded and enforced by government for the "common good". The problems our nation faces are not a result of deficiencies in our Constitution; rather, they are the direct result of our disregard for that Bill of Rights.

There is no challenge faced by this nation that cannot be solved by enforcing existing law.

With a Charter patterned after the US , we can safely say that mango trees never yield tomatoes! Think it over.

A TOTALITARIAN WORLD

A TOTALITARIAN WORLD

by Erick San Juan

Hints have been dropped that we can soon wake up one fine morning to find that the entire humanity is already under a system of governance that is based on some kind of autocratic if not entirely totalitarian principles. In fact, the Financial Times, one of the most respected and widely read newspapers on the planet, featured last Tuesday an editorial that openly admits the agenda to create a world government based on anti-democratic principles and concedes that the term “global governance” is merely a euphemism for the move towards a centralized global government.

Throughout the 1990s, people who have been warning us about the elite’s plans to centralize global power and destroy American sovereignty have been called by popular culture and the media as “right-wing lunatics for sounding the alarm bells.

Now their agenda has been unmasked. And these hawks are left with no more spears to shoot at people trying to put them under check.

An unexpected editorial written by the Financial Times’ chief foreign affairs commentator Gideon Rachman entitled ‘And now for a world government’ spells out the plan for global government and the manner it is being pushed with deceptive language and euphemisms in order to avoid steering the so-called hornets’ nest.

“For the first time in my life, I think the formation of some sort of world government is plausible,” writes Rachman. By citing the financial crisis, “global warming” and the “global war on terror” would most likely be the three major pretexts through which it is being introduced by advocates of globalism.

Sounding the alarm bells much louder than we had done before, Rachman writes that “global governance” could be introduced much sooner than many expect and that President-elect Barack Obama has already expressed his desire to achieve that goal, making reference to Obama’s circle of advisors which includes Strobe Talbott. It will be recalled that in 1992 Talbott stated that “in the next century, nations as we know, it will be obsolete; all states will recognize a single, global authority. National sovereignty wasn’t such a great idea after all.”

In his editorial, Rachman then agrees that the more abstract term “global governance,” which is commonly used by David Rockefeller and other advocates of a single world government as a shroud to hide their real desire of establishing a centralized global government, is merely a ploy used to prevent “people reaching for their rifles in America ’s talk-radio heartland”.

But some learned European of what is really going on around them, says Rachman. He points to Jacques Attali, an adviser to President Nicolas Sarkozy of France , as one who argues that: “Global governance is just a euphemism for global government.” As far as Attali is concerned, some form of global government cannot come too soon. He believes that the “core of the international financial crisis is that we have global financial markets and no global rule of law”.

Rachman also outlined how an official world government would evolve, which would feature the creation of “a legally binding climate-change agreement negotiated under the auspices of the UN and the creation of a 50,000-strong UN peacekeeping force”.

He insisted that a “world government” would involve much more than just the co-operation between nations, but it would also be an entity with state-like characteristics, backed by a body of laws.

These globalists are likely to pattern their world government after the continental government for 27 nations which the European Union has set up as a model.

The EU has a supreme court, a currency, thousands of pages of law, a large civil service and the ability to deploy military force.”

Acknowledging that the path to global government will be “slow and painful,” Rachman concludes that everything is in place considering that for the first time since man learned to write on cave walls, there is an argument, an opportunity and a means to achieve a world government.”

Citing the continual rejection of EU expansion when the question is put to a vote, Rachman concedes that international governance tends to be effective, only when it is anti-democratic.

“In general, the Union has progressed fastest when far-reaching deals have been agreed by technocrats and politicians – and then pushed through without direct reference to the voters,” Rachman wrote.

So there you have it – to be able to achieve a world government, dictatorial measures will have to be employed because majority of the people are openly against losing their sovereignty says one of the world’s top newspapers.

In view of the admission by the world’s most influential newspapers on the pursuit of the globalists’ self-interested, centralized, unrepresentative and dictatorial world government as their real agenda, would the advocates of globalism and their propagandists still persist in labeling us as paranoid conspiracy theorists for warning that a system of dictatorial world government is being set up? Wake up guys!!

MUMBAI: A CON GAME?

MUMBAI: A CON GAME?

by Erick San Juan

If the claim made by some Mumbai-based group of activists and intellectuals are true, then, it will require a very influential and determined world leader to show the way into nipping the security menace at it’s bud.

For sure, the cure to this world problem will depend so much upon the demeanor that President-elect Barrack Obama of the United States will display as soon as his watch begins. If Obama leans towards one way or the other, it will be towards that direction that the series of conflicts in various parts of the world will head to.

A move favoring the power elite, the compradors and their domestic subalterns is seen to aggravate the prevailing exploitative situation. This can ignite more protest actions – some may be violent.

On the other hand, favoring the less empowered and the working class could be taken by the king-makers as an affront upon them and could result in an assassination in a manner they had done to President Abraham Lincoln when he planted the seeds that eventually eradicated slavery in the US and to the late President John F. Kennedy, who exerted much efforts at reforming the banking industry of the US and its Federal Reserves. But if Obama behaves the way Pontius Pilate did during the public trial of Jesus Christ, the status quo will prevail and bloodshed could also escalate beyond what we all can imagine.

On December 4, 2008, the India Daily quoted the group of activists and intellectuals at a press conference in the business capital of Mumbai , India , that "there is enough evidence that the Al-Qaeda is a front organization of the CIA and MOSSAD. The Bush junta has used the bogey of terror and of Al Qaeda to justify his unending and ever expanding Global War on Terror, which is only a means of capturing the resources of the world and of establishing the sole hegemony of Israel in West Asia ." To the “birds of prey,” selling their war machines before and during any war and the ensuing post-war reconstruction phase are opportunities that they must be able to corner.

It is a well known fact that no weapons of mass destruction (WMD) were found in Iraq even after Saddam Hussein was ousted, tried and executed. The same is true with what was once Taliban-dominated Afghanistan whose people the world’s power elite “is punishing” for cuddling Osama Bin Laden, the Saudi intellectual whose undercover activities the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) used to bank-roll.

The propagandists of these syndicate of power-hungry "globalists" has repeatedly and consistently hammered on the necessity to hunt down and neutralize personalities who they refuse to acknowledge as their own operation accomplices of the 9/11 attack (on the WTC).

As a result, the spokesman of the Mumbai-based activists said that the exploiters’ propaganda has been widely written about in USA and Europe itself. In fact, more than 50% of the American people and far more Europeans now believe and are convinced about the lies they have been passing on.

In fact, sections of the ruling political and military elite of India have been lured into importing the same Bush-Olmert formula. "The increasing terror attacks only serve the cause of the Indian elite and divide the masses along communal lines. It is only the ordinary Indians who are the victims of terror either in temples, mosques, buses or trains," he said adding that practically no political leader suffers a similar fate, where the terrorists are apprehended and killed in cold-blood, that are passed off as “encounters.”

"Every terror attack is meant to push and drag the Indian masses further into the waiting arms of Uncle Sam and the Israeli Goliath. Every terror attack spreads further hatred for the adherents of Islam and weakens the Indian Muslim community," said the Indian intellectuals.

To the descendants of the "globalists", What sin have the people of the world done to the power elite that they have to be treated in this kind of a con game? Just asking?

THE WORLD NEVER LEARN

THE WORLD NEVER LEARN

by Erick San Juan

Here we go again!!!



The recent carnage allegedly pulled by Pakistanis and their Indian cohorts in the business capital of Mumbai could very well be part of a well oiled plan to create havoc and more divisions among two brother Asian nations - India and Pakistan. No doubt, the unfortunate incident can kindle more fire and complicate their efforts at nurturing peace in that area, given that the issue of Kashmir , a very nice resort straddling on their common borders has yet to set aside.

But who do you think stands to benefit from that dastardly act, where hundreds were slain and hundreds more got injured and with businesses affected? This adventurism sowed terror not only to Indian big businesses, but also among expatriates. Mumbai is the business center of India .



It is a pity that a synagogue, in the heart of Mumbai's financial district was badly shaken by the terrorist attack. However, it could also be a plot using the siege of the Keneseth Eliyahoo Synagogue as collateral damage to anger not only the Indian Jews, but the global Jewish communities as well.

Strategic analyst friends of mine are wondering why it happened only now? Prior to this, anti-semitism never existed throughout India’s colorful history. Different religious congregations co-existed in India for so long.

As reported, the "soldiers of fortune" who disguised themselves as Pakistani terrorists were good in symbolisms, according to H.D.S. Greenway of Boston Globe. The Mumbai attack, as hyped, was the equivalent of striking New York with Hollywood thrown in. A thorough background check must be done as to the real identity of the culprits and whoever trained them for that mission, a move considered as an imperative if we are to link or connect the dots.



To do this, India and Pakistan need to set aside the blame-game. They should analyze carefully if possible and without any intervention from other nations to get to the bottom of the problem. Both of them need to learn how nation-states wage wars that are masterminded by a "third force". These intricacies will surely be fanned and could trigger not only word wars but could likely evolve into real shooting wars. Both governments should offer cooperation and no finger pointing at the moment.



Both Pakistan and India need to learn from the experiences of warring nations in the region i.e., the Iran-Iraq War, the Iraq-Kuwait War, etc.



Look at the aftermath of each war? Again, who benefits from such wars? Who sells the arms and the equipment used in killing the enemies? Who corners the contracts in the ensuing reconstruction phase? What do they say about the likes of Bechtel and Halliburton? Who are their beneficial owners?



And here is the danger. Incoming U.S. President Barack Obama could be lured into stomping his feet, if only to avert the escalation of wars. Perhaps, he could, over a portable US military base set up in the conflicted boundary or, he could ask the United Nations to send over a peacekeeping contingent.



Then, people will start asking: When will the world ever learn????

A TRIGGERLESS GUN

A TRIGGERLESS GUN

By Erick A. San Juan

Filipinos, particularly the restless opposition, need to unify its ranks and find an appropriate issue which they need to equip with a triggering mechanism, if they want to succeed in deposing President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo on their nth attempt.

Like in Thailand, the Philippine opposition’s main issue against the current administration is graft and corruption. That is their gun. It worked in Thailand. But, does their gun have a trigger? What about their bullet, isn’t it a dud?

No doubt, the stooges who, for ages now, have been wanting to snatch the right to dwell in Malacanang Palace are startled with awe and envy over the fete achieved by their Thai counterparts, whose series of protest actions was able to snowball into a gradual occupation of the airports, which eventually triggered a supreme court ruling that equally banned for corruption, the three leading political parties of Thailand, finally ousting the Prime Minister.

Now that the reformist people of Thailand are successful in deposing what they call “a corrupt regime that replaced an equally corrupt administration,” all that their Filipino counterparts could do is to just watch and at best, try to nibble their fingers for some formulas that they hope can effectively work in giving their own corrupt leaders the boot.

The world sees the achievement of the Thais as another triumph of their own variation of the “Peoples’ Power” which the Filipinos invented.

While there seem to be some similarities of issues being raised in both countries, the realities on the ground are different. First of all, Thailand’s monarchy is real, while in the Philippines, some powers that be are just hoping they are the monarchy. They may not be claiming these and those as theirs, but they have been trying to enrich themselves in power - with some touches of legitimacy?

But many are skeptical if the use of Peoples Power could result in the ouster of President Arroyo this time. To boot her out needs a determined and charismatic leader who has a popular issue that has a trigger, a critical mass into a consistent mass action. This leader must never be another political opportunist. This is what appears to be wanting in our present crop of leaders.

Let us recall that the opposition, using as main issue the widespread fraud that attended the 1985 snap presidential elections, was able to drive the late President Ferdinand E. Marcos out of Malacanang. But as it turned out, the conquerors evolved to be more crooked than the one they fired! The next regimes accomplished only one thing. They bled our coffers dry – all of our assets have been sold out as a result of a total breakdown of the Philippine government’s revenue generation system.

Then, followed the administration of President Jose Marcelo Ejercito a.k.a. Joseph Estrada, who stayed in office for a little more than 2 years only. Amid charges of massive corruption (for which he was never convicted by the impeachment court), the impeachment proceedings was aborted by a walkout that marred the trial. This triggered the massive rallies and the eventual withdrawal of support from the military, whose leaders are now the “immortal” officials to whom President Arroyo is paying for past favors, for providing her an opportunity to sit where she is.

For the past four years there have been foiled impeachment moves against the President whose popularity has unceasingly been inching closer to the rock bottom. In some other nations, their leaders get the boot when they get this far below - not in the Philippines.

Sad to say, the recycling of issues and the repeated investigations – in aid of election and extortion at the Senate – and even the entry cum spirited participation of the discredited former Speaker Joe de Venecia into the ranks of opposition may be able to help in creating some noise, but triggering her ouster from power may just be another dream.

But Filipinos are generally stubborn. They don’t just give up. Or, shall we call that perseverance? If their formula does not work, they can always regroup and try to map out another strategy and apply it until it turns out to be a “tragedy.”

Let us not be surprised if one day, they will start dressing former President Fidel V. Ramos in a manner the Thais look up to King Bumibol of Siam. Also, now that President Ramos had left for a speaking engagement in Guam, let us not be surprised if some pivotal developments evolve before he returns.

But the question that needs to be answered quickly is: Does President Ramos have the quality and the willingness to be the catalyst for a regime of change ala King of Thailand? He's known to be a man of peace and has saved GMA during the so called "Hyatt 10 coup" to avert a possible civil war. Will he save her this time? Yesterday, in a press conference in his Makati office, PFVR was quoted saying, "GMA is lucky for herself but not for the majority of the Filipinos!". There's a move to use People power, but it will not be repeated." Read my lips?