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Biden’s 30 x 30 Land Grab

Feb 21

Posted by admin in Agenda 30/30, Government Overreach | No Comments

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2024/02/bidens_30_x_30_land_grab.html

Biden’s 30 x 30 Land Grab

By Janet Levy

Our Founding Fathers recognized private property rights and understood they were a chief basis of prosperity and freedom. 

But of late, the administrative state has been usurping vast amounts of land and has overstepped its authority. 

State and local governments -– and, needless to say, citizens and businesses -– have no part in the decision-making.  Your land could any time cease to be yours at the federal government’s will.

This extensive land-grab in America is part of the global ‘Half Earth’ agenda, initiated by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) at the Earth Summit 2012 in Rio de Janeiro.  One of its aims: the setting aside of 50% of the world’s land and water for conservation by 2050.  In 2021, it suggested that “at least 30% and up to 70% or more” should be protected.

President Biden signaled commitment to this preposterous agenda within days of taking office: his Executive Order 14008, a.k.a. ‘America the Beautiful’ or 30 x 30, is a blatant departure from constitutional principles of private property and hopes to place 30% of land and water in the U.S. under permanent protection by 2030.  In tandem, the Department of Interior issued secretarial order (SO) 3396, rescinding the Trump administration’s SO 3388 and removing state and local veto power over federal land acquisitions.

Under the pretext of reversing “human caused climate change,” the program works in the sinister shadow of George Soros and his cabal of billionaire elite.  By controlling land, water, and food through ownership by pliant governments, they will eventually control people.  That is the real purpose. 

It cannot be saving the planet, for the numbers do not add up.  Against a purported loss of 11 million acres per decade, another 680 million acres of land is to be placed under so-called protection, when already, 270 million acres – about 25 times the decadal loss – is “permanently protected.”  What is this if not a colossal land-grab?

The reasoning that the government is better at conservation than landowners does not hold either.  According to a congressional report, four federal agencies -– the Bureau of Land Management, the Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Park Service, and the Forest Service -– had a combined maintenance backlog of $19.38 billion in 2018.  Imagine exposing another 680 million acres to government inefficiency. 

Private owners, on the other hand, are the best caretakers of land, producing at the same time the food, energy, and minerals our nation requires.  Their livelihood, after all, depends on the integrity of their land holdings.  This is the research-based argument made by the American Stewards of Liberty, a non-profit dedicated to protecting “private property rights and the liberties they secure.” It maintains there is no scientific data to suggest that “preserving” land will “cure” climate change; also, that 36% of U.S. land is already owned or protected by federal and state governments.

Meanwhile, the big, federal land-grab continues apace, a favored instrument being the Antiquities Act of 1906.  However, these depredations are not going unchallenged.  Some recent instances, and the lawsuits challenging them, are listed below:

  • Last summer, Biden designated a new monument, the Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni-Ancestral Footprints of the Grand Canyon National Monument.  Located near the Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona, it is spread over 1,562 square miles.  That’s nearly 1 million acres, though the Antiquities Act specifies that such designations be confined to the “smallest area compatible with proper care and management of the objects to be protected.”
    • Shortly after, two Republican Arizona representatives – Warren Petersen and Ben Toma – filed a lawsuit that Biden had exceeded his presidential authority in declaring the land protected.  State officials say Biden is appeasing radical environmentalists, and that curtailing mining, ranching, and activities vital for food and energy production would have far-reaching national security repercussions.
    • Chris Heaton, a rancher who runs a 50,000 acre ranch on public and private land, is also suing Biden and the federal government, since he is losing the grasslands and creek where his cattle graze and water.  He now faces criminal penalties for an activity his family has been engaged in for six generations.  He is being represented pro bono by the Pacific Legal Foundation.
  • In October 2021, Biden ordered two national monuments – Bear Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante – in Utah to be expanded to a combined 3.2 million acres.  This curtails decades-long ranching and recreational activity in the area.
  • In September 2016, President Obama declared 5,000 square miles – that is, 3.2 million acres, and roughly the size of Connecticut – of the Georges Bank area of the Atlantic Ocean a national monument, ignoring the “smallest area” caveat and robbing New England fishing communities of their livelihood.

In general, courts have been deferential to the executive branch’s efforts to withdraw land and natural resources from private use.  However, in the lobstermen’s association case, Chief Justice John Roberts made the critical observation that the Antiquities Act failed to “pose any meaningful restraint” on presidents, allowing them limitless power to “set aside vast and amorphous expanses of terrain above and below sea level.”

On close scrutiny, it is apparent that this movement away from the constitutional principles of private property towards control of land and natural resources by the administrative state is part of a global plan to achieve total control over people.

The attempt to extinguish individual freedom in the name of saving the planet began at the 1992 U.N. Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro, the first Earth Summit.  Member states signed a supposedly non-binding Agenda 21 to promote sustainable development goals (SDGs).  This was the thin edge of the wedge, handing over decision making to experts and technocrats controlled by a powerful global elite.

Agenda 21 grew into Agenda 2030, including 17 SDGs. The driving force behind Agenda 2030 was the IUCN, which called for the ‘Half Earth’ agenda through Motion 101, with its devious call for protecting “30% by 2030,” and “70% or more” ultimately.  The IUCN Congress, comprising 1,400 governmental and NGO groups from 170 countries, meets every four years to set the global conservation agenda.  Leaders from government, academia, and business attend the congress; the influence of the global elite over them through funding is only now becoming evident.

An example from the U.S. will indicate how the web of influence works.  In 2019, the Center for American Program (CAP), published a report titled How Much Nature Should America Keep.  The CAP is a think tank backed by Soros.  It has links to the Democratic Party, and helped the Obama administration formulate many policies.

Shortly after the CAP report, two members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC) -– Sen. Tom Udall (D-NM) and Representative Deb Haaland (D-NM) -– introduced resolutions (S.R. 372 and H.R. 835) in the Senate and the House to push the 30% by 2030 goal.  The caucus has ties to the Communist Party USA.  In 2020, Biden made Ms. Haaland Secretary of the Interior.

Liberals and progressives, communists, Soros, the World Economic Forum -– it’s the elite network at work, once again. Its influence must be reversed.

Image: Eminent domain by Nick Youngson CC BY-SA 3.0 Pix4free

Egypt Valley Wildlife Update

Feb 14

Posted by admin in Agenda 30/30, Egypt Valley Wildlife Area, Government Overreach | No Comments

EGYPT VALLEY WILDLIFE AREA is a large expanse of land, up to 28,000 acres located north of I-70 in Belmont county, mostly Kirkwood Township. Title to EVWA is held by the Ohio Dept of Natural Resources. What is it? What is it for? Who profits from it, and who does not?

The best informative web site on EVWA was built by the Belmont County Tourism Council. https://www.visitbelmontcounty.com/visit/egypt-valley-wildlife-area/ This site shows the jungle and wilderness acreage at it’s best.

When driving I-70 the big signs along the interstate indicate that something worthwhile is ahead. These large signs cost a private business $2300 per year for one sixth of this sign. Governments do not charge governments for signs. This is tax payer supported 100%.

DRIVE THROUGH EVWA — 2-1-24

When entering EVWA these signs welcome guests. Much of the land has been ignored of any management care for over 20 years and has grown into briars and brush/jungle impossible to hunt or even enter.

Gates have been installed with “No vehicle beyond this sign” This eliminates travel on historic mining, hunting and timber roads that crisscrossed EVLA.

Although EVWA is dozens of square miles, hunters are not allowed to drive on EVWA, so hunting is only done near county or township roads. Deer must be hand-carried off EVWA. As a result EVWA is not considered a good area to hunt. Don’t kill a deer further from the road than you can carry it. This is not hunter friendly.

Due to the large land area of EVWA the local townships spend a large part of their budgets installing cement culverts, and graveling roads to eliminate erosion.

Due to no physical management or supervision EVWA has become a huge free dump area. Disposable trash is dumped, or tossed into flowing creeks. These secluded areas are also popular for illegal drug sales and use.Due to no physical management or supervision EVWA has become a huge free dump area. Disposable trash is dumped, or tossed into flowing creeks. These secluded areas are also popular for illegal drug sales and use.

Although signs welcome hunting and fishing, the steel barriers make a very different statement. As a result of over 20 years of jungle growth land values in EVWA have deteriorated. The cost of reclaiming for useful farming or ranching, or food productions will be financially impossible.

Due to no select cut harvest of timber by ODNR, nor spraying for Blister Rust and Ash Borer, much of the timber value is gone. Beautiful forests have rotted. Lack of management has cost jobs and millions of dollars of timber value for the area.

EVWA roads are maintained by county and townships. The chipping and cleaning of right of ways cost above $200 per hour, which local tax payers fund due to the refusal of ODNA to assist with any funding.

As of 2-02-2024 ODNR pays no tax on the 28,000 acres. They do not assist with roads, libraries, schools, law enforcement, or any cost of community services. Just to consider the sucking-away of prosperity from the area, loss in taxes and normal property profits, ODNR has taken more in the last two dozen years from the people of Belmont county than Al Capone’s life time earnings in the city of Chicago.

This is what private ownership of property looks like in the same area of EVWA. The land produces food, fiber, and timber for families, and they pay taxes to support other good local things for their neighbors.

Private land ownership, care of the soil, love of the land and hard work look very different than government controlled land. Know the difference. The governments should not own any agriculture land. They have no ability or knowledge to manage it, nor the generational love of the land to care.

Egypt Valley Waste Land committee. 2-3-24
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The Green Campaign To Reduce Cattle Numbers Through Regulatory Action

Dec 15

Posted by admin in Agenda 30/30, Government Overreach, Green Agenda | No Comments

https://howardstores.com/blogs/news/the-green-campaign-to-reduce-cattle-numbers-through-regulatory-action

By Norman Leahy

December 13, 2023

It’s no secret that some green activists have a profound dislike for gasses and products of varying types and want governments to ban their use (natural gas-powered appliances being a prime example).

But the most ardent green campaigners also have a thing against cows. Cattle, you see, are prodigious produces of methane gas – a potent greenhouse gas. As such these same campaigners are out to do whatever is necessary to cut down on the number of cattle as a way to cut methane emissions.

But banning cattle is tough. Instead, they are looking at what could be called powerful “nudges” – taxes, mandates, and regulations – to make meat and dairy products too expensive for the average consumer to purchase.

It’s a triple bank shot way of making the world go vegetarian…to save the planet. As the Wall Street Journal’s Allysia Finley writes:

California requires dairy and livestock operations statewide to reduce methane emissions to 40% below 2013 levels by 2030. Sacramento plans to achieve this target with costly regulations that drive farmers out of business. Consider the state’s mandates that more space be given to farm animals under the guise of improving animal welfare. The real purpose of these regulations is to increase the cost of livestock production and thus reduce farmers’ output.

California’s farming rules will have a national effect, because they apply to any livestock raised in the U.S. and then sold in the state. Thousands of pork producers nationwide warn they may be forced to shut down because of the high cost of compliance. Congressional members from 21 farm states this summer introduced legislation to block California from regulating farmers outside its borders—much to the consternation of green groups.

But green advocates aren’t entirely coercive. Like well-practiced statists everywhere, they are keen on subsidies, too:

California and the federal government also provide regulatory credits for dairy farms to capture methane from manure. These credits are literal cash cows, worth nearly $2,000 a head. An April 2022 presentation at the California Air Resources Board titled “What’s Worth More: A Cow’s Milk or Its Poop?” mused that these subsidies might become so rich that farmers may begin to “farm methane rather than milk.”

The thing about the Air Resource Board presentation is this doesn’t have to be a binary choice. Using cow flatulence as an energy source makes good sense.

As for punitive taxation on meat and dairy products…that’s just extracting wealth from those who can least afford it and handing the proceeds to the state. The well off will still be able to get whatever they want. The less fortunate? It’s tough to be you, but this is for the Earth, after all. Pipe down and eat your carrots.

Is Progressivism the new Communism?

May 2

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https://archive.tcpalm.com/opinion/susan-stamper-brown-is-progressivism-the-new-communism-yes-communists-socialists-attempt-to-use–ep–343262992.html/

Yes: Communists, Socialists attempt to use progressives, Democratic Party to infiltrate government

By Susan Stamper Brown, Washington, D.C., And Nashville, Is A Columnist, Motivational Speaker, Military Family Advocate And Grief Counselor. Email: Writestamper@Gmail.Com.

In politics, truth-telling can get you into trouble, even if you stumble upon it by accident. Just ask Rep. Allen West, R-Fla.

West is feeling the heat for a pregnant pause he took during a town hall meeting after he was asked, “What percentage of the American Legislature do you think are card-carrying Marxists or International Socialists?”

“It’s a good question,” West responded, “I believe there’s about 78 to 81 members of the Democrat Party who are members of the Communist Party (long pause). They don’t actually hide. It’s called the Congressional Progressive Caucus.”

The left became unhinged.

Obviously West touched a nerve; before long, members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus drafted their response: “Calling fellow members of Congress ‘Communists’ is reminiscent of the days when Joe McCarthy divided Americans with name-calling and modern-day witch hunts that don’t advance policies to benefit people’s lives … “

The CPC’s response is just another sign of the political times we live in. But something about their argument doesn’t pass the “smell test.”

While there may not be large numbers of card-carrying communists lining the halls of Congress, there is a clear tie between the Democratic Party’s Congressional Progressive Caucus, Communist Party USA (CPUSA) and the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).

It really boils down to marketing. In marketing, many times the same product is given a different name or label to increase its appeal to certain groups. Names are sometimes changed due to the product’s connection to other products, or the public’s association to a prior name.

Although progressives share much in common with CPUSA and DSA, they are shrewd enough to understand the terms “communist” or “socialist” are unpalatable for most Americans. Hence, the word “progressive” was injected into American political verbiage. While the words are not interchangeable, one thing is for sure: The CPC is doing its part to further the goals of modern Communists and Socialists who have found a voice in the Democratic Party.

In 2002, Communist Party USA PAC leader Joelle Fishman reported CPUSA uses the Congressional Progressive Caucus as “an important lever” to “move the debate to the left.” A Feb. 2, 2010, Communist Party USA article, “Convention Discussion: A Time to Grow,” explained they plan to meet their goals by running for office “within the auspices of the Democratic Party” because “conditions rarely if ever allow us to run open Communists for office.”

The same article praised the presidential election asserting, “We have the opportunity to build something big, a large, influential and effective Communist Party USA. After the incredible movement to elect Barack Obama, more far-reaching solutions and socialism in particular are back at the dinner table for discussion.”

It seems they are moving toward attaining their goals. Obama’s election, in conjunction with progressives cannibalizing the Democratic Party by ousting common sense Blue Dogs, aided in a severe shift to the left. Americans have witnessed the deterioration of this nation by way of the same type of race-baiting and class warfare Communism cannot exist without.

Unbecoming to an American president, Obama has led the charge in attacks against job-creators, extended the olive branch to “99 Percent” anarchists, and publicly castigated the third (and his equal) branch of government. Americans have had zero control over the appointments of unsavory anti-capitalist Cabinet members such as former “Green Czar” and avowed Communist Van Jones.

All things considered, “Washington’s newest breath of fresh air,” West, is dead-on in his assessment of Democratic Party progressives. West once said progressives should take their message “and get the hell out of America.” I think most of us would be happy if they would just “get the hell out of” the Democratic Party and run on their own ticket.