Unlimited property confiscation
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Saturday, August 18, 2001
By Henry Lamb© 2001 WorldNetDaily.com
Adolph Hitler believed that the Jews were inferior to Aryans, and felt perfectly justified to use the power of his government to confiscate the property of the Jews for himself, his cronies and his government. Hitler did not snatch his belief out of the air – it was a "philosophy" carefully constructed by the European Eugenics Society throughout the first half of the 20th century.
Hindsight is 20-20. Today, few will deny that the so-called philosophy of the Eugenics Society was little more than an effort by a few academics and scientists to provide an excuse for the elite to control that segment of society they believed to be of less value than themselves – using the color of science for justification.
The leader of the Eugenics Society was one Julian Huxley – the same Julian Huxley who organized UNESCO in 1946, and became its first director. The same Julian Huxley who organized the International Union for the Conservation of Nature in 1948.
These two organizations gave rise to the notion that "all species are of equal intrinsic value," a philosophy on which several international treaties are founded, particularly the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, and the Convention on Biological Diversity.
In pursuit of these two treaties, not just the Jews, but all humanity has been designated of less value than certain species of bugs and beetles. The now-famous Klamath Lake suckerfish has been declared to be more valuable than the property of 1,400 farm families, whose property in their land and crops has been effectively confiscated, through the power of government, to satisfy the whims of government policy based on the color of science.
At its core, is this policy different from Hitler's?
Have not a few academics and scientists constructed a belief system to lend the color of science to policies that justify the confiscation of property to be held, or controlled by themselves, their cronies and the government?
The so-called science which underlies the Endangered Species Act – and the U.N. treaties which spawned it – is, at best, a stretch. No one can prove (or disprove) that human activity has, or will cause biological degradation to the extent that human life will be jeopardized. It is an easy stretch, especially when the "precautionary principle" is invoked, and when a lazy media would rather regurgitate press releases from prominent environmental organizations, than do the research required to fairly present the actual scientific evidence.
The precautionary principle, adopted at the U.N. Conference on Environment and Development in 1992, by 179 nations, including the United States, says that "where there is a threat of serious or irreversible damage," policy action should not wait for scientific evidence. Who determines when a perceived threat is "serious" or poses "irreversible damage?" The U.N., of course, often upon the advice of its special consultant, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.
So entrenched is this policy of government confiscation based on the color of science, that we accept the sacrifice of the Klamath farmers. We say "ho-hum," when the Bureau of Land Management confiscates cattle from Nevada ranchers Ben Colvin and Jack Vogt – the most recent victims of property confiscation by the government. We pay little attention to the awful practice publicized in the federal Register, called mitigation, which requires Leslie Adams, a resident of Bastrop County, Texas, to pay $2000 to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation expressly for the purpose of buying land for the Houston toad. This "fee" is required by the government before Leslie is allowed to build a home on his own private property.
It may be called "mitigation," but it is, in fact, extortion, theft, confiscation – call it what you will – and it is wrong, wrong, wrong.
Some people will be offended by this comparison of Hitler's philosophy to the philosophy which guides the U.S. government's environmental policy. There are, however, undeniable similarities. The European Eugenics Society consisted of the most prominent scholars and scientists of the day. They shaped their philosophy outside of government, but used government to legitimize the philosophy through public policy. An elite few used the power of government to force people to live (or die) to satisfy their view of how people ought to live.
U.S. environmental policy is shaped by, ironically, the grandchild of the same organization that shaped Hitler's policies. Using the same techniques, this International Union for the Conservation (read: confiscation) of Nature, lets the United Nations legitimize its philosophy through international treaties, which the United States has been only too willing to implement. What we have here, exactly as it was in Hitler's day, is an elite few, using the power of government to force people to live (or, perhaps, to die) in order to satisfy their own view of how people ought to live.
Shame on us for allowing such a situation to exist!
Americans paid little attention when Hitler first began confiscating property of the Jews. We chose to disbelieve the reports, as exaggerations of the ultra right-wing. It took years for Americans to be convinced that Hitler was not only taking property, but the lives of human beings – by the millions. But eventually, America did awaken – and woe be unto the culprit who arouses the wrath of the American people. Hitler is history!
Woe be unto the culprit(s) who arouse the wrath of the American voters. Americans have been slow to realize that their government has relegated them to a position just below the suckerfish and the Houston toad on its value scale. They are awakening, however.
It's not just the Klamath farmers who are taking a stand on the Oregon-California border. Real Americans are pouring into the area from all over the country, taking turns hauling buckets and constructing pipelines, and waving banners and signs. Dollars are arriving daily to help keep the farmers alive so they don't have to sell their land at fire-sale prices. Even the main-stream media can no longer ignore the injustice being imposed by government upon human beings, for the benefit of non-human species.
When Senator Fitzgerald, R-Ill., joined Senators Chaffee, R-R.I., and Jeffords, I-Vt., to defeat an amendment which would have exempted the Klamath farmers from the Endangered Species Act, he became an endangered political species – at least in the voting districts outside of Chicago.
Chaffee and Jeffords are not yet endangered, they are simply on the list of "threatened" political species – their eastern constituencies are not yet awake enough to realize that if the government can take land in Oregon, and cattle in Nevada, and dollars from a Texas homeowner – the government can also take whatever it wishes from the people of Rhode Island or Vermont.
The whole idea that an elite few should decide how everyone else should live, was rejected soundly by another generation of Americans whose wrath was aroused. Now, like a thermometer yielding to the inevitable summer, there is evidence that the heat is rising across America, caused by the friction of excessive government restrictions. It may not be this year. But as surely as fall follows summer, the time will come when once again the wrath of the American people will make them see red – as red as the color of the science that underlies the restrictive, collectivists policies promulgated by the elite few.
Americans are historically slow to anger, as indeed we should be. But when the injustice is clear, and the cause is certain – woe be unto all who paint public policy the color of science.
Henry Lamb is the executive vice president of the Environmental Conservation Organization and chairman of Sovereignty International.