CD-ROM Aktief 1995 #3/CDA3.iso/survival/pp940822.txt

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Putting People First / August 22, 1994
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Washington Report

FROM THE TRENCHES

by Kathleen Marquardt
Chairman, Putting People First

...A weekly opinion column about the struggle against "animal rights" and
   eco-extremists.

Copyright@1994 Putting People First
Permission to reproduce this column is freely granted on the condition that
credit is given to Putting People First.

Putting People First is a nonprofit organization of citizens who believe in
western civilization; that we need to return to common sense in man's
relationship with his fellow man; and that public policy should be based on
science and rationality, not emotionalism.

Putting People First
PO Box 1707
Helena, Montana 59624
[phone]
Fax [phone]

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                Biodiversity Treaty Threatens US Sovereignty

     We have just won a short reprieve on this year's most important
Senate vote.  Not the crime bill, or the health bill, or welfare reform.
Those are important, but they are really diversions, designed to
distract us from the real anti-human agenda of the animal rights/Green
extremists and their friends in Washington, DC.

     This year's most important Senate vote will be whether to ratify a
little known international agreement that would sacrifice human rights
and (as an afterthought) U.S. sovereignty on the altar of animal rights
and Green emotionalism.  It is called the "Biodiversity Treaty."

     The Biodiversity Treaty may be the most dangerous government action
we have had to address so far.  Here we a few reasons why:

* The Biodiversity Treaty makes all species equal.  Human existence
shall have no more judicial rights than any lesser species.  Because
they are caused by a virus, AIDS and polio are "species" under this
scheme.

* The body of the treaty has not been written yet, but the Senate is
still supposed to sign it -- giving carte blanche to whatever may be
written in the future.  And the United States is to foot a large portion
of the bill.

* Science is no longer to be the basis for determining what is good and
what is bad for the earth's ecosystem.

* "Sustainable Use" -- as defined by the writers of the Treaty -- will
be the basis for all "protocols."

     ** Productive development and use of private property is an
        obstacle to "sustainable use."

     ** Most human activities, including farming, hunting and fishing,
        mining, and logging, violate "sustainable use."

* If the Senate ratifies the Biodiversity Treaty, the United States will
be legally bound to implement all stipulations of the agreement --
whether they are Constitutional or not.  In other words, our sovereignty
can be overruled.

     Senators are being pressed to ratify the treaty right away so the
United States will be a full member when the first drafting meeting is
held this November in Cairo.  If the Senate does not sign, the U.S. can
still have a representative there, but a non-voting one.

     That would be the best position the U.S. could take at the treaty
conference.  Then the treaty would have to be written to entice the U.S.
to want to belong.  If we sign now, we have no leverage to make the
treaty reasonable.

UNLESS WE CAN STOP THIS TREATY FROM BEING RATIFIED, WE ARE IN TROUBLE.
Make no mistake --this cannot easily be undone when the Senators realize
the magnitude of their error.  It is now or never.

     We can predict most of what will be in the treaty by looking at
what its designers have said in the past.  Perhaps the mildest statement
comes from Maurice Strong, a Canadian multimillionaire, official
spokesman for the United Nations at the Earth Summit, who believes that
the promotion of high-technology agriculture and energy production must
be ended.

     Elisabeth Dowdeswell, who is the UN's chief factotum in charge of
the Biodiversity Treaty, views the treaty as a means to "change the
conception of man from being the crown of the creation to being an equal
with the family of all species.  This includes the elimination of
national frontiers, national sovereignty,and even the concept of private
property."  She says,  "Every species has a right to survival because
its existence is linked to that of the entire community of life on
earth."

     Dowdeswell has said that one of the chief forces threatening the
planet is technology.

     Understand that this "technology" that Dowdeswell, Strong, and
friends find so distasteful is what gives the United States the best
environmental record on earth.  Without technology and all it provides
for us, we would not have time to worry about our rivers, trees, air,
and all the rest of our environment.  We would be like the people of
Third World countries: we would be struggling for survival and we would
be consuming whatever we could -- be it plants, animals or whatever --
without regard to sustainability or anything else.

     Because the U.S. has advanced technology, we have lifestyles that
give us time to care about things other than survival -- we care about
the poor, needy, and sick.  We care about our environment and threatened
species.  We care what kind of world we are leaving our children and
grandchildren because technology has given us the freedom to care and
the means to protect the ecology.  We no longer need to have lots of
children in hopes of having one or two survive -- people in Third World
countries have to do just that because they do not have the technology
to keep their babies alive and they do not have the copious and
untainted food supply that we enjoy because of technological advances.

     It stands to reason that if we want the people of third world
countries to care about their environment, we should try to make them as
technologically advanced as we are.  North America and Western Europe
are both technologically advanced and have, for the most part, healthy
environments; the two go together like a hand and a glove.

     Yet what the Greens are trying to do with the Biodiversity Treaty
is to turn logic on its head.  They want to reduce technology -- to take
us backwards to "simpler times."  What will that do? Logically, it will
take more land to grow our food -- not good for the environment -- they
want us to stop using nuclear power and fossil fuels -- we will have to
burn more trees -- bad for the air.  They want us to quit eating meat --
think of how much more land we would have to devote to producing grain
to provide for the world population, and where would we get enough
vitamin B12?

     But things get even worse.  Even though the Senate has not yet
voted on the Biodiversity Treaty, our government already is implementing
the policies of Agenda 21 through the President's Council on Sustainable
Development(PCSD).  Its mission is to develop "policy recommendations
for a national strategy that can be implemented at the public and
private  sectors."

     If you want to get really scared about the PCSD, look at its
"players."  Its chairman is Jonathan Lash, President of the World
Resources Institute; the executive director is Molly Harris Olson,
former leader of Greenpeace, Australia.  Also on the Council are
Secretary of Interior Bruce Babbitt; Carol Browner,Chief of EPA; former
Senator Tim Wirth, now with the State Department; John Adams, of the
National Resources Defense Council; Jay Hair, President of National
Wildlife Federation; Fred Krupp of the Environmental Defense Fund;
Michele Perrault, president of the Sierra Club; John Sawhill, president
of The Nature Conservancy; and more.  Not exactly your well-balanced
board -- in fact, it would be hard to find a "Greener" group of people.

     Unless you are willing to turn your life over to these people with
their ideals, do something.

     Write to your Senators -- NOW! Ask them to oppose ratification of
the Biodiversity Treaty known as Senate Treaty Doc. 103-20.  Your
livelihood, our way-of-life, your Constitutionally guaranteed freedoms
depend on defeating this treaty.