BELFAST, Maine — The lunchtime crowd walking downtown on Wednesday may have wondered what ICLEI is and why it needed to be kicked out of town, as banners held on all four corners of the intersection of Main and High streets urged be done.
Protesters from the John Birch Society, a conservative group formed in 1958 to push for limited government and personal freedoms, said that the city was a member of the International Council on Local Environmental Initiatives. That group advocates for municipal policies that reduce energy consumption and mitigate climate change.
The John Birch Society protesters — about a dozen in all — also drew a connection between ICLEI and the United Nations’ Agenda 21, a land-use planning initiative.
But it turns out the city is not a member of ICLEI.
A city committee, the Belfast Climate and Energy Committee, joined ICLEI and paid the $600 annual dues a few years ago to get information about how to reduce energy consumption in municipal buildings and promote similar strategies for residences and businesses, Belfast Assistant Planner James Francomano said Wednesday.
Roger Lee, a three-term city councilor seeking a fourth term, was a member of that committee and said Wednesday it is essentially defunct. The city stopped paying dues to ICLEI in 2010, but the organization’s website still lists Belfast as a member.
Hal Shurtleff of Boston, a regional field director of the John Birch Society who was among the protesters, said he concluded that Belfast was a member by reviewing ICLEI’s website. Wednesday’s protest was still valid, he said after the banners were taken down, because ICLEI is part of a larger effort to limit personal freedom.
“ICLEI is one tentacle” of other, larger efforts to impose limits on personal freedom, he said.
Two women holding the banners joined Shurtleff in denouncing ICLEI, saying the organization wanted to prevent people from purchasing certain kinds of vehicles and ending single residences because of their impact on climate change. Shurtleff said climate change was a myth.
Shurtleff is scheduled to present information about Agenda 21 at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 7, at the Belfast Free Library.
City officials contacted ICLEI Wednesday to ask that Belfast be removed from the list of members.
Lee expressed dismay that ICLEI was cast as a villain.
“They’re a perfectly fine organization. They’re assisting municipalities all over the world,” he said.
Membership allowed the committee to receive software to estimate how energy use might be cut in municipal buildings. Committee members also were able to attend regional meetings to learn what other towns and cities were doing on the energy-efficiency front, Lee said.
“It’s pretty small-scale stuff,” he said. ICLEI does have “a particular regimen they want you to follow. Our committee never did that.”
The city has improved energy efficiency at City Hall, and plans to do the same at the police station, the Belfast Free Library and the Boat House, Lee said.
A handout given to pedestrians on Wednesday featuring Shurtleff’s photo and biography noted that “ Agenda 21 will require a profound reorientation of all human society, unlike anything the world has ever experienced.”
During the protest, Shurtleff said planning and environmental initiatives conflicted with the personal liberty protections of the U.S. Constitution.
Lee remained perplexed.
“It’s hard to even understand [the protesters’] position,” Lee said. “Apparently there’s something wrong with trying to live sustainably.”
“Wednesday’s protest was still valid, he said”
Um, no Hal, it was not.
Government regulation is bad. It’s strangling our economy.
There should be no requirement for plumber licenses, no electrician licenses, no oil burner licenses, no undertaker licenses, no barber licenses, no lawyer licenses, no nurse licenses, no doctor’s licenses, no real estate licenses.
Government should stop over regulating and get out of the way so I can compete on a level playing field when I try out these professions and charge low, low prices taking customers from so-called small businesses who can over charge due to government regulations.
So you would prefer to be able to get your medical advice from a witch doctor and buy your medicines from a guy using a donkey to pull a wagon and calling a bottle of soda water and ginger a “cure all” for what ails you. No thanks. The 1800s called and they want you back.
I’ll wire and plumb your house for 15 bucks an hour. Can’t promise it won’t burn down though, I really don’t know what I’m doing.
Open heart surgery though, that’s complicated, so I charge top dollar for that – $20 an hour. Give me a call next time you need a good doctor.
It was great to get a good laugh amid all of the branding of us -the 47 per cent, as “Communist, Leftist, Socialist, Reds” and what ever.
Revamping the banking rules stopped overcharging on credit cards. Rum and Rye plan to kill that. The much needed – already working – health care reform is helping millions of us deal with high pill and other medical costs. Rum and Rye will dump that.
The Tea Party believes lifting all regulations will permit business to run more freely. But as you point out, it will have some very bad results. Permits and licensing requirements are necessary in order to maintain professional levels of service.
While I acknowledge the need to cut back spending and reduce red tape where appropriate, policies that will lead to unsafe homes, unsafe roads, unsafe food supplies, unsafe water supplies…it really is madness. Eliminate all taxes…for what? So people can save a few more dollars each paycheck? What good is that extra cash going to be in such a world?
The irony of course about the 47% thing, which is lost on many of these folks, is that they are part of it – the very people they rail against are the ones they look at in the mirror each morning. They can’t seem to see that Mitt’s not laughing with them, he’s laughing at them. Alas…
Welcome to Plutocracy.
How so?
The City Council contacted ICLEI which in turn dropped Belfast from its membership list.
The John Birch Society couldn’t ask for a better result.
The protest was very effective.
The city removed itself as a member in 2010. Are you suggesting that this protest yesterday was effective because it caused ICLEI to update their website? Earth-shaking stuff right there!
This makes me sick to my stomach. Most people don’t have any idea what Agenda 21 is or probably assume it will help reverse climate change, but it does so much more. We’re talking about Chinese-style control from remote power-brokers who do not care about Maine. And don’t be fooled- this ICLEI is reaching its tentacles into every neighborhood to lay the groundwork for a globalist agenda & no matter how much we tell our elected officials we don’t want this kind of government control, it just keeps coming. A massive increase in rural land acquisition is next. Don’t say we didn’t warn you.
So it makes you nuts that the American public doesn’t know enough to buy into a paranoid conspiracy theory; but it doesn’t bother you that John Birchers launch a protest against Belfast for belonging to an organization that they don’t actually belong to? Now who is really the uninformed party here; you or the facts?
paranoid conspiracy theory? have you even read about Agenda 21? it is right there in black and white, a big socialist land grab. check out the UN website, they make no attempt to hide their agenda
I have, and personally I am not too concerned about a non-binding resolution. I generally worry about real problems, not made up ones.
Speaking of agendas …
so what makes you the final arbiter of whats a paranoid conspiracy theory these days? should we all check with ltr77 first? — is GMO corn safe to eat? Is global warming real? did we land on the moon? Does mercury cause autism? Is the holocaust a paranoid conspiracy myth too? I going have to say you must be a troll.
Where to start, GMO Corn safe to eat? Who knows, the jury is still out on that one. Global Warming, absolutely real and verified by science. Moon Landing, real verified by science and proof. Mercury and Autism, no link has been proven. Holocaust real and real and very well documented. Agenda 21 a non-binding treaty suggesting that we protect our forest and resources, absolutely real, however paranoia over it, absolutely insane…. any other questions?
Thanks for the box score. I’d only modify by saying that GMO corn will be (or even has been) found to be safe to eat.
Just to address one of those points-the mercury/autism crap was propagated by a Playmate and a doctor whose license in the UK has been stripped.Parents who take their info from people like that instead of respected scientists deserve what they get.
And the moon landing was questioned by some Red Sox player a few years ago.Another uneducated person with a pulpit.
You seem to have a lousy track record on such arbitration.
It makes me sick to my stomach that the JOHN BIRCH society is ineptly,inaccuaretly and innocently described as merely a smaller government and personal freedomn org. That is a TOTAL fabrication .
koo-koo
koo-koo
koo-koo
What’s up with these looneys? They’re pushing for limited govt. and personal freedom…and prevent people from buying certain cars…and share our hard earned homesteads, with who? Guess they’ll pick them too. I haven’t heard of the John Birch Society since the 50’s. Get a job.
I might hazard a guess that all the John Birch Society members are also members of the Tea Party. Same church different pew.
And members of both are loonies.
so they support Local Control and have a lawful demonstration to express their viewpoint to the public (what could be more American than that), you just sit there painting with a broad brush. I guess if they were all for gay marriage or taxpayer supported methadone, for example you wouldn’t consider them loonies huh? seems to me you are biased.
I am biased. I tend to agree with those people in our society who take time to learn about issues and understand their opinions before they state them. I suppose these John Birchers would call me a ‘Commie’.
They don’t support local control. Do you know how you can tell? A man from Boston organizes a protest to protest what a government in Maine does (although the fact that they didn’t actually do it seems to be lost on the nutjobs who “support local control”). How are some ill-informed busy bodies from Boston telling local Mainers what to do respecting local control?
It’s a membership drive hidden under a cloak of “respectibility “.It would be nice in the BDN staff did some independent research instead of using their own press release.
maybe so, but they are right……Agenda 21 is just another attempt at this government to gain more control of the citzens. Local or out of state does not matter much, it is the message behind the protest.
What are you on about? Paul Le Page is Koch brothers Tea Party-supported. He has total control of this state. He is a dictator.
Here we go again……… No he doesn’t have total control. Any efforts by him have gone through the process. You speak as if LePage has the ability to do what he wants. If he is so bad, get together a movement to remove him from office or ensure he doesn’t get re-elected. Stop complaining and take action.
Look at some history –not that cleansed BY wiki or the herititage center.
If either of those groups had a demonstration it would draw more than a dozen sorry carpetbaggers.
So folks from away come to Belfast to demand that something that isn’t going on in Belfast gets kicked out of town. Now it really doesn’t make much difference to who the group is that is behind this protest of something that isn’t happening in this town but even you have to admit that it is kind of nutso.
The “loonies” society has to watch our for are the loonies promoting Marxism, socialism, and secular humanism.
All leftists immediately resort to name-calling when they have lost an argument.
Wow! Sounds like non-factual blather on your part. Reminiscent of a certain Senator and his infamous committee.
Why not use that great source of blather’s word Malarly and not worry about a Senator from five decades ago’s truthful asertation that communists had influenced this country.
His mistake was picking a fight with people that buy ink by the drum and paper by the train car load.
His mistake was making up charges and launching a witch hunt. His mistake was assuming that you could not in fact be American and have freedom of association. His mistake was being a political hack with no decency.
He was correct, Hollywood and the State Department were and are full of Progressives Socialists and Communists.
How do you define Tea Party?
Define Tea Party???
They seem to be a group of people that are using their 1st Amendment rights to peacefully ask the Government to stop spending more than it can possibly take in with taxes, to stop trying to define normal down, and to basically leave us alone.
YOU can define them any way you want, but you should at least talk to one or two members to find out for yourself and not let the political establishment form your opinion.
We, the sleeping 47 per cent, were wide awake to your anti black president attacks in D.C.
The jolly freedom loving Tea Party offers voter suppression for minorities, especially Blacks. They also obstruct government and delay recovery during a recession.
They’re for less, only if it gives the one percent more.
That is nonsense and if you would just be honest with yourself you would be able to see that.
If you won’t be honest with yourself, you can’t be honest with anybody.
We of the 47 per cent have a legitimate fear of Plutocracy. With a slight twist, it’s hard to figure which is worse – Plutocracy, or, Communism. The former relegates workers to the gutter. The latter also has two distinct levels – workers and one big boss.
As a Democrat, I despise both systems, just as much as the loony people who frivolously drape these labels around our necks.
First and foremost, I resent these insults, as a hard working American veteran who believes in the Constitution and a free America, where people can express their opinions without being castigated for having the “wrong one.”
For the past four years, the Republican party, assisted, or managed by the unscrupulous tea party, has with much success, blocked government functions. Their stated goal of “less government” fringes on no government – anarchy, where only the rich rule – not the people. We have a Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell telling Americans for the past four years, that his only goal is make sure President Obama has just one term.
Republicans have no objections about one man telling the country that he rules – one man. Despite unemployment, a deep recession, and paying off two wars, we have a Plutocrat ruling the country assisted by tea party minions.
In actuality there is little difference between the Tea Party and the John Birch Society – less government being the most popular criteria of both groups. This leaves one to ponder who will govern if government is dispensed with? Is less – more? How can we elect some one not in step with the goals of Plutocracy. The rich already control the elections in America. What’s to stop them from dispensing with elections?
Do you know ANYONE that is in a Tea Party group? Stop believing the crap from the political establishment in government, Media and both political parties and see what is happening. WAKE UP.
We are wide awake to your radical ideological espousing of Plutocracy.
We watch daily as the Koch Tea Party – supported Le Page, a Censor and Dictator decides for us what we can view. We watch and closely listen as he espouses an attempt to relegate a broad swath of Maine land solely for Canadian enterprise – an East West Traffic Corridor.
That’s one of ’em. Another – Rand Paul, son of Ron; manacled a reporter to a radiator when he asked the “wrong” question during his election bid. Other reporters were mauled by his heavies. The Tea Party candidates are surrounded by burly bodyguards.
Less to the Tea Party, means More for the one Per Cent.
Tea Party jollies – Romney and Ryan threaten once in, to kill Reformed Health Care, a vital necessity for anyone who gets sick. Tea Party people usually rely on a giant handout from the Federal Government for their pills. For us one per centers to continue Medicare-which we pay into – that to them is “communism- socialism.” For them – it’s part of the job.
Social Security is threatened. Either to be obliterated or reformed. For years it’s been targeted by the right, simply because FDR thought during a bad recession, people should have something to fall back on when they are too old to work – crippled, handicapped. Or, just old enough to enjoy life at last.
Not heard one thing – one item – from you Tea Party people – the Jolly Happy one per centers, that offers any hope for the people, or the country. The tyrannical attitude of the Tea Party during the past four years should wake up a lot of people on Food Stamps, Social Security, Veterans, and those with Cancer, Diabetes, and a multitude of other problems.
The Tea Party is a self serving selfish bunch of people too well endowed to understand that others not so fortunate live in the United States.
You are the reason that the US is going to become nothing better than Europe. Grow up and look at the truth.
We should be protesting the JBS rather than ICLEI.Really,who even knew that JBS still existed?
They do, they just changed names to the Tea Party.
So many ‘likes’ for calling someone a childish name?
The Reds must be out in force today.
And no likies for you.Poor baby.I hope the UN takes your land first.
Of course you do.
Spoken like a true Red.
SON:
I suggest that you do some research into the historic defamation lawsuit entitled Elmer Gertz vs. Robert Welch, Inc.
The JBS magazine at that time (American Opinion) published an article which made the exact same type of ad hominem slurs about Gertz as YOU are using in this thread. The JBS described Gertz as a “Leninist”, a “Marxist”, a “Communist fronter” and someone engaged in a “conspiracy”.
Two different juries on two different occasions concluded that the JBS libeled Gertz with FALSE charges.
Every appeals court upheld each jury’s decision. The U.S. Supreme Court concluded that Gertz had indeed been libeled by the Birch Society.
The reason why it was permissible to award punitive damages ($300,000) was because the juries decided that the JBS was guilty of malice.
Similarly, YOUR approach to debate or discussion reveals that if anyone dares to contradict something you prefer to believe — then you are prepared to maliciously libel that person — in an effort to pretend that YOU and ONLY YOU have any respect for facts, morality, or decency.
Shame on you!
I guess calling people colors is your none childish idea of not name calling? Hilarious. Go read your bible.
Sen. Joe McCarthy was renowned for his “red baiting” tactics during that infamous Red Scare period of the 50’s.
Some, including you, embrace this ridiculous name calling game purely to attract attention, as the drunken McCarthy did. Up until his debacle as an inquisitor, he led a worthless Senate career.
The grainy black and white newsreels of the day captured an erratic, irresponsible, and ruthless drunken man in a mid-life crisis, yelling and screaming at people who were hauled before a Senate Sub-Committee to defend their honor as Americans.
Just calling people “Reds” was enough. Dozens were “Black Listed” and ruined. Creative artists left the country and worked under assumed names. One movie star – John Garfield – was stricken and died with a heart attack, a day prior to testifying before the committee.
It was a disgusting time in American history where hate was freely allowed to raise its distorted head – to condemn and destroy. The Congress sat back. Only our own Senator Margaret Chase Smith was the only senator with guts enough to step up to the podium and question the conscience of this man which led to his ultimate fall. Good riddance.
I’d want to make a small change. “Same NON TAX paying church,different phew!”Tax the churches NOW and balance the budget!
Koch – you’re right.
Guess the gathering should have been an anti-war, liberal group-hug or global warming protest, then the idea of someone speaking out and exercising their freedom of speech might get a little more respect from the commenters.
Respect is earned, not seen here.
I don’t have to ‘respect’ anything that anyone has to say. What I have the right to do is acknowledge what they have said, but then I also reserve the right to say ‘That is #@%^&*%@# stupid, are you kidding me?’
There all scumbags .
it’s the John Birch society that should be tossed out of town. It has long ties as a blatantly racist group. Calling it an organiztion that promotes smaller goverment and personal freedom is like an adult believing in the tooth fairy —pure fantasy .Talk about putting lipstick on a pig KKK dressed up in a suit.
What is your opinion of Karl Marx? Lenin? Stalin?
You sound like a Red, pure and simple.
No real American would call for their fellow citizens to be silenced.
Let’s put all our cards on the table.
A Red ? Hilarious. Well while we’re picking out colors I’d say you’re yellow, pure and simple.
No ‘real’ American is anyone who doesn’t share your religious craziness and made up facts that you like to spew. I’ll take a ‘no real American’ anytime over someone who is like you any day. Oy.
He has 4 aces, you have a 4, a 6, and a pair of 2’s. he wins. BTW, is that you Joe McCarthy?
Nobody’s calling for these gits to be silenced. In fact, your criticism of people who express a different viewpoint from what the JBS people were, wrongly, kinda turns the tables back on you, now doesn’t it? And calling people “red?” Really? What era are you living in?
Romney had the ” great presence of mind” to warn us a few weeks back that the “Soviet Union” was our biggest threat. Poor Mitt – an expert on foreign affairs.
At the debate table he qualified his remarks, as he has had to throughout his never ending apologetic campaign to rule America.
Joe “Tail Gunner” Joe McCarthy in the 50’s saw a red under every bed in America. He even subpoenaed red headed Lucille Ball. At the time we laughed disgustedly at this sham and the man who perpetrated it against Americans.
In Korea fighting the “Communist Hordes” we were warned not to sport a red necktie on our return, as it meant your butt could be hauled before a congressional inquiry.
A lot of us believe that those tossing these Marxist, Commie neckties around, sound more like the Communist Chinese interrogators of POW’s. You either agree, or get shot. No opinions allowed. You just follow the party line. Isn’t it a rotten shame that Americans believe that unless you’re a republican, a tea party John Birch afficionado, you are a Marxist, Stalinist, Leninist pawn.
What Piffle.
“A lot of us believe that those tossing these Marxist, Commie neckties around, sound more like the Communist Chinese interrogators of POW’s. You either agree, or get shot. No opinions allowed.”
You’re right. You either believe in freedom, liberty, and our constitution or you are an enemy of me and my country where I was born. I will have absolutely zero hesitation in defending our nation and our constitution against domestic threats to said liberty such as you and your family, and any other who does not believe in freedom and liberty.
Red, commie, marxist, call it what you like, it is irrelevant. The simple fact is that progressives and progressive policies are NOT compatible with freedom and liberty and will therefore be dissolved over time, whether it be through the ballot box, the barrell of a gun, or through simple marketplace forces.
The modern day progressive is equivalent to the dejected and shamed loyalists of 1776.
You SHALL be overcome.
If you will notice, places where Loyalists seemed to be more prevalent are the same places that currently vote in Conservative politicians. Loyalists had the same mindset as the modern conservative, if someone got rich it is because they deserve it, no matter how they got rich.
I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and Constitutions. But
laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the
human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new
discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions
change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also
to keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear
still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to
remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.
Jefferson
Every successful country in the modern world balances economics somewhere between socialism and capitalism. Give or take 10% from center is ideal. Too much of either extreme is to be avoided.
Spare us with the violent rhetoric Jackson, it’s not impressing anyone.
Like all Birchers and the KKK., you threaten and hide behind a shield of anonymity, or a white sheet.
I was protecting you and “your country” long before your mommy put you in your first high chair. Now you’re threatening me and my family with death for not agreeing with your radicalism?
Prove your allegiance to the flag – Enlist. Do a couple of tours in the mountains and desert, then come find me.
Remember, as an American you are FREE to say anything you so desire. But, also remember that I, as an American have just as much right to disagree. That’s what America is all about.
It’s you scrawling on the walls with your graffiti – “Communist, Marxist” and whatever, which you also claim to be “irrelevant.” What is it?
Next thing you know they’ll be after fluoridation…
…Oh wait!
LOL
creeps
Yessah
The hissing you hear in these comments is from the snakes.
Communist infiltration of our government is real.
Don’t believe me?
Take it up with President Herbert Hoover, who explained Red infiltration of the F.D.R. administration in his book “Freedom Betrayed.”
My experience is that most people who cry “conspiracy theorist” are themselves part of the conspiracy.
No, the “hissing” (more like contempt) for the unfounded, paranoid hysterics.
classic sociopath response….
these people are programmed to respond in this manner…
anybody ever read any papers published by a gentleman named Pavlov?
or how about Mr. Bernays, the father of modern day PR (i.e. propaganda)?
“The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions ofthe masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate
this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is
the true ruling power of our country” – Edward Bernays
True, all too true…
It all started with Freud and Bernays.
You must be an avid follower of Fox News and its owner – Propagandist In-Chief Rupert Murdoch.
Rupert and his minions are skilled propagandists who have successfully remodeled the thinking of millions, both here and abroad, into accepting the Plutocracy doctrine: Rich for the Rich. Murdoch’s entanglement with the radical Tea Party, has successfully taken over the once Conservative Republican Party.
His puppets are charged with blocking normal functions of government and pushing candidates steeped in Tea Party ideology. Their hollow and self serving cries for less government promote the establishment of a ruling rich class.
Already the staging platform was constructed during George W. Bush’s reign. His massive tax cuts for the ultra wealthy with subsidies for mega rich oil companies have been pushed by the ruling Republicans. Held hostage by the likes of Mitch McConnell and John Boehner and gang, no approval of legislation unless tax cuts and subsistence to big oil are continued.
And Hoover did SUCH a great job running things.Look up “Hoovervilles”It’s not a vacuum cleaner.
and if you don’t understand how the policies of the FEDERAL RESERVE prior to Hoover’s administration fed into the central banking heist and ultimate nightmare that became known as the great depression, you are just as uneducated and brainwashed as all the other ‘non-conspiracy-theorist’ folks out there…
Herbert Hoover was a great man, and saved tens of millions of people from starvation.
The Great Depression started on the Vienna stock market, not in America.
been going to too many john birch society meetings I heard they’ve been doing a “revivial ” Known racist group they hate everyone. Their biggest target in the past were catholics and immigrants. smaller government personal freedoms is that what they are calling ” a hate group” now?? They are hoping peole don’t remember what they stand for? and they can “cleanse their identity via the internet ” ?
Well… if you’ve ever ready anything ‘Son’ has written you will see that he fits right in with all the JBS ridiculous paranoid conspiracy theories, his overt intolerance of others who are not carbon copies of him or of his views or his beliefs and who is inanely uneducated about relevant social topics. Frankly Son is nothing less than anything you have described so very well. He’s a white, religious, middle aged guy who likes to spew his vitriol at others all under the guise of religion and his manufactured psuedo ‘facts.’
This is a classic example….
Your screen name summarizes your message: The Birch Society has NEVER been anti-Catholic. In fact, during its formative years, as many as 60% of the leaders of the JBS were Catholic and about 40% of the membership was Catholic. In addition, a Catholic priest, Father Francis Fenton, served on the JBS National Council — the governing body of the Society.
Nor is the JBS a “known racist group”. The JBS has always welcomed African-Americans and other minorities into its ranks as members, as writers, as speakers, and as chapter leaders, section leaders, and Coordinators. Furthermore, one prominent FBI informant who infiltrated the most violent Klan in our nation (The White Knights of the KKK of Mississippi) — was a JBS member and after he surfaced as an FBI informant, he was employed by the Birch Society and made speeches around the country about the evil and subversive danger which the KKK represented.
One reason why Birchers often are able to “win” public debates is because of hostile and ill-informed critics such as yourself! Spreading false and malicious libels about any person or organization cannot help us understand why such persons or organizations should be opposed or rejected.
The Birchers are the group that accused president Eisenhower of treason, among many others. A vast wasteland of kookery this all is. I just hope their kookery will even out the kookery from the Agenda 21 crowd and dilute each other.
Both groups will support various forms of freedom, just not the ones they don’t want others to have. SOS, new day.
The real tragedy here is the Belfast folks wasting all that money on the expensive advice they could have easily read on the internet or from free energy audits provided to municipalities by various State organizations.
They’re not part of the conspiracy (which is actually a well-laid business plan and highly effective), they are merely the useful idiots who allow the powerful to retain power and continue to extract the wealth of our nation to their private coffers. They’ve got them so brainwashed at this point, that they actually believe the sociopaths in power are out to help them and their families.
The misery that falls on this lot over the coming years, will truly be the most heartwrenching to whitness, because they are just so clueless….even to the point of violence, as it appears now
Son of Bangor: If you review FBI investigative files regarding the actual number of “Communists” who infiltrated our government — and then compare that number to what people like yourself claim, the discrepancy is MASSIVE.
As another example: Compare Senator McCarthy’s assertions to the careful research done by one of our nation’s most prominent scholars of that period in our history. See these articles by Dr. John Earl Haynes:
(a) Senator Joseph McCarthy’s Lists and Venona
http://www.johnearlhaynes.org/page62.html
(b) Exchange with Arthur Herman re: Venona
http://www.johnearlhaynes.org/page58.html
ALSO CONSIDER THIS MESSAGE BY DR. JOHN EARL HAYNES TO ME:
“Harvey Klehr and I have repeated made clear that neither Venona, Moscow archival material, nor Vassiliev’s notebooks provide any meaningful vindication for McCarthy.
First, that there had been significant Soviet espionage and Communist infiltration of key government agencies was not a view originating with McCarthy. That point had been publicly and vigorously advanced years before McCarthy arrived on the scene by, among others, Elizabeth Bentley, Whittaker Chambers, and Louis Budenz. The evidence that has emerged since the early 1990s certainly corroborates and vindicates their charges and the particulars of their testimony.
Second, Joseph McCarthy, however, went beyond them by claiming that the espionage and infiltration occurred with the knowledge and assistance of key Truman administration officials, namely Secretary of Defense and State George Marshall and Secretary of State Dean
Acheson, both part of McCarthy’s ‘a conspiracy so immense’.
There is no support in the new evidence for what was new in McCarthy’s charges or for the particular persons he named such as Acheson and Marshall. When McCarthy was right, he was not original and was only repeating charges made years earlier by others. When he was original, he was wrong.
For my view of McCarthy, see
http://www.johnearlhaynes.org/page58.html and
http://www.washingtondecoded.com/site/2007/12/mccarthy-accord.html
I have read my copy of Freedom Betrayed, and you are correct about the infiltration that went on in both the FDR and also in the Truman administrations. I suggest that some of those posting here read The President’s Council on Sustainable Development (PCSD) signed into “law” with President Clinton’s 1993 Executive Order – which is very similar to the Rio Declaration of 1992 that created the Agenda 21 document, and PCSD being used to implement it here in the US! I thought all legislation was to be enacted by Congress, then signed (or vetoed) by the President. The current administration does not believe in what the Constitution says in Article I, Section 1, either.
I have also studied the Agenda 21 document, and nearly every Chapter has provisions for the transfer of wealth from developed countries (chiefly the US) to developing countries through the IMF & World Bank. That is the goal of Agenda 21, and The PCSD (above) is implementing much of it deceptively through the “back door” under other names like “Smart Growth”, Social Justice, “Gateway One”, and many more.
Also, people should go to the ICLEI web site, and see what Maine towns are members. Compare what is happening there, and what is happening around the US in other member cities/towns. Just a suggestion.
Thank you, Sir.
All people have to do is read the Wikipedia entry on Harry Dexter White, the Soviet agent who was the first president of the International Monetary Fund.
“There is no conspiracy.”
What a laugh!
Acknowledging one fact or a set of facts does not mean one must acknowledge as accurate and truthful every statement or conclusion made by a political extremist group.
Read Margaret Chase Smith’s autobiography.
She explains that her attack on the great Senator Joe McCarthy was instigated by the Red, Walter Lippmann.
After she attacked McCarthy, she instantly became the darling of the liberal establishment, and has been a liberal icon ever since.
Oh my, someone is really wound up now. I’d worry more about you.
That’s a typical liberal response, right out of Saul Alinksy’s playbook.
You lose on the facts, so you immediately resort to name-calling.
I might have name called in another comment (actually, a very old joke from my collge days) but I surely didn’t here. All I’ve seen from the JBS and their fellow travelers is conspiracies, non-facts, and yes, name-calling and non-valid labeling.
Son: Saul Alinsky did not invent “name-calling” — it is a common tactic used by many ideologues (left wing and right wing). Ad hominem attacks usually occur when someone cannot present contradictory fact-based evidence — such as resorting to broad derogatory generalizations like describing someone as “a dupe of the Reds” — instead of acknowledging that totally honorable, decent people can simply be mistaken — without being a “dupe” of anybody — much less persons who are generally believed to be subversive.
Well, the facts are there for anyone to read in her autobiography.
She didn’t write her great “Freedom of Conscience Speech” attacking the great American hero, Joe McCarthy.
She was a dupe of the Reds, and that is why she is still a liberal icon.
Your “great” republican Joe was a blow hard, with an acute case of alcoholism. He was finally censured by the Senate.
But, not before ruining dozens of lives by calling them “Reds.” He even suggested that President Harry Truman was a Red and should be impeached.
As senator, other than mouthing off about everyone not in tandem with his holier than thou outbursts, his contribution to the Senate and the country was zero.
Bullheaded lying accusations defamed everyone who crossed him in between his bouts with the bottle – especially his political opponents.
Senator Smith castigated McCarthy as did many other respected republicans, including Ike. But it was the senator’s speech against McCarthy that shook the Senate’s conscience and woke them up to censure him.
Calling people reds, commies, as you do, is just a continuance of McCarthyism – nothing but reckless and unsubstantiated charges against anonymous people of whom you know nothing. Just like Joe – “Tail Gunner.”
Such blind and wasted adherence to a drunk’s ideology is pitiful. Stalin is dead. So is Marx, Kruschev and Adolph.
Maggie Smith must be rolling over splitting her sides to know someone is calling her a Red. There was one true republican.
Son: It is standard extreme right dogma that ALL persons who were critics or opponents of Sen. Joe McCarthy were “dupes” of the Reds. Significantly, however, even many of Senator McCarthy’s closest friends and allies recognized that McCarthy was irresponsible and was prone to making inflammatory and factually deficient accusations.
“The great Mccarthy”Seriously?He died a disgraced drunk.
Anybody want to guess whose brothers’ father was a founder of the Birch Society? You’re right! The Koch brothers! Their father Fred was a founder of the John Birch Society. Big surprise!
Fred Koch resigned from the Birch Society because (according to his wife), he thought the views of JBS founder, Robert Welch, were “too extreme”.
Fred’s son, Charles Koch, was a JBS member but he resigned in May 1968 — apparently due to pressure from Robert Welch because Charles Koch and another Wichita-based JBS member (Robert Love) paid for a full-page advertisement in their local newspaper to advocate U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam.
Charles Koch refuses to answer questions about his previous JBS membership or whether or not he continues to accept basic JBS predicates.
I didn’t know the Birch John Society (whoops, Freudian slip) was still active. Guess I should be worried.
it would be amusing if the bdn did an in-depth interview with some of these folks’
http://www.jbs.org/
That’s the last thing we need is my subscription money being spent on those crackpots.
Where’s the story on Scott Desjarlais?Another “do as I say,not as I do”R anti choice nut.
BDN did. Too bad the result wasn’t printed. ICLEI provides information about reducing energy needs, which is good. It also pushes the confiscation without compensation of the right to develop land, which is bad. Deprivation of property without compensation is a violation of the Constitution. Call my a right-wing extremist for defending the Constitution and I will call the insult a badge of honor.
Agenda 21 is a legitimate concern to folks who value local control and national sovereignty. Unfortunately once you get the JBS involved the issue goes down a rabbit hole of conspiracy theories and paranoid delusions.
I would suggest folks educate themselves on the issue, rather than jumping to conclusions.
Agenda 21 is a UN non binding resolution regarding sustainable development. George Bush 1 signed the agreement. Our paranoid people far out to the right see it as a threat to our freedom. Good focus. It gives them something harmless to do.
Let’s hope they stay “harmless”.
yeah, we’ll see who the harmless ones are after Barry loses in a landslide…
Protesting the town for joining an organization that mayhave been useful to help it reduce energy consumption seems more that a littlestrange and extreme to me. If they don’t like people or organizations “from away” influencing ourtown government , they really should be protesting ALEC and all out-of-state money coming here to back ourpeople running for office or paying for ads for or against our referendum questions.That should be something useful for a
change.
Personal freedom ends when you pollute my (our) water, my (our) air, my (our) right to peace of mind, my (our) personal freedom. Your freedom does not mean that you can do anything you want at the expensive of the environment and other citizens. John Birch Society, get out of town!
I was there and held a banner. We did not commit violent acts or take what rightly belongs to others. We peacefully expressed an opinion. Disagree with us if you wish, but do not pronounce us enemies. I believe in clean air, clean water, and safe energy. I also believe in property rights. If a landowner finds pollution in his/her land or water, the landowner will be enraged and has good legal remedies already. Same for all of us who are forced to breathe bad air. Sure, local ordinances can be passed to protect these things and prevent hazardous gas tanks too. I have no problem with towns and their right to make reasonable regulations. When the United Nations starts infiltrating our towns and starts imposing its agenda from on high, we are surrendering our sovereignty as American citizens. We need to guard against that. I am protesting the process, not the details of what anti-pollution regulation is or is not passed.
EJ: I certainly understand your sentiment about wanting to express your viewpoints without being characterized as “an enemy”.
However, I suggest that you contact the leadership of the John Birch Society! For over 53 years, the JBS has described virtually all of its critics and opponents as “traitors” or as “agents” of a “conspiracy of gangsters” who consciously are working to eviscerate our
Constitution and destroy our way of life.
In the Birch Society scheme of things, there is no such thing as an intelligent, decent, honorable, principled, patriotic and legitimate competing viewpoint or agenda to what the Birch Society believes or desires.
That is why, for example, the Birch Society has described most of our Presidents and many of our U.S. Senators and Representatives over the past 80 years as “traitors” or as
“Communist sympathizers” or “agents” of a conspiracy. [The official JBS position is that Presidents Carter and Clinton were guilty of, and should have been impeached for, “treason” and President Eisenhower was a “dedicated conscious agent of the Communist conspiracy”.]
That is also why, for example, the Birch Society lost an historic precedent-setting libel lawsuit after 14 years of litigation – including two jury trials, multiple appeals, and review by the U.S. Supreme Court – and then was required to pay the plaintiff $100,000
in compensatory damages and $300,000 in punitive damages for “malice” – which,
in legalese, refers to a reckless disregard for truth.
Look, your government has aided Goldman Sachs and the Federal Reserve in looting the American people.
If that is not a massive conspiracy, what is it?
Your comment is not relevant to mine. One does not have to accept every falsehood disseminated by the Birch Society in order to prove that one is appalled by bad behavior from financial institutions.
I suggest you review the various defamation trials where either the JBS as a corporate entity or its surrogates around the country utilized JBS arguments against persons they perceived as “Communist”, “Communist sympathizer”, “Communist-fronter”, or other comparable terminology. In every case, they were found guilty of libel.
The most famous defamation trial (Elmer Gertz v. Robert Welch Inc.) involved 14 years of litigation. During oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court, the lawyer representing Robert Welch Inc. (Clyde Watts, a JBS National Council member), acknowledged in answer to an inquiry from a Justice that the JBS had stated during one of its trials that some of the statements in the JBS magazine article about Gertz were “false” and could be considered libelous under Illinois law. The Supreme Court decision explicitly identified several of those libelous falsehoods.
More importantly, consider this: JBS founder Robert Welch and senior JBS officials have always effusively praised J. Edgar’s Hoover’s FBI as our nation’s most knowledgeable, reliable, and authoritative source of factual information about the communist movement and internal security generally. Significantly, Hoover’s FBI falsified most of the predicates of JBS ideology — which is why senior FBI officials declared in internal FBI memos that the JBS was “extremist”, “irrational”, “irresponsible”, “fanatics” and “lunatic fringe” — their words (not mine).
That is also why virtually the entire conservative movement rejected Robert Welch and the assertions he and the JBS made.
SonofBangor:
I have one question for you which will clearly settle our dispute about the Birch Society (but I will give you two options)
(1) Specify the names of TWO persons whom you consider to be critics or opponents of the Birch Society — and whose viewpoints/statements you disagree with — BUT, nevertheless, you acknowledge them to be intelligent, thoughtful, principled, honorable and patriotic individuals.
Just TWO.
(2) Alternatively, give us the titles of TWO books, or two book chapters, or two articles which are critical of the Birch Society which you acknowledge to be fair-minded, accurate, and truthful critiques of the JBS.
Just TWO.
If you cannot or will not identify two individuals or two publications critical of the JBS which you are willing to acknowledge as entirely legitimate and acceptable contributions to a debate about the JBS — THEN — is it your position that NO criticism of the JBS or its assertions are acceptable?
In other words, the JBS is infallible and ALL of its critics and opponents are morally and intellectually defective?
Look, your government has aided Goldman Sachs and the Federal Reserve in looting the American people.
If that is not a massive conspiracy, what is it?
YOUR freedom ends the second you reject the individual and accept the collective, when you espouse the supposed virtues of public property over private property.
We the PEOPLE (a collection of INDIVIDUALS) will ride you and the other collectivists out of town and out of the state, where you belong!
You might have heard that there is a vast number of conspiracy theorists who are convinced that Agenda 21 is an evil globalist plan. Didn’t all this originate with some billionaire who, being somewhat constrained in his business dealings, started the John Birch Society?
I think Agenda 21 is a plan for sustainable living. Read it and see if anything in there terrifies you as it does our John Birch friends.
Another program that also worries John Birch billionaires (who need multitudes of hungry, fecund, uneducated people willing to work for food) has another name, I believe. You can probably tell me what it is.
You can see what deep pockets can do when one or two billionaires can convince millions of the
working poor that population control and sustainable living are communist plots of a world government that wants to eliminate “freedom.”
How many working people who attend John Birch meetings do you think would be able to write a comprehensive essay outlining the pros and cons of the need for some kind of business regulation?
How many working people who attend John Birch meetings do you think religiously vote to make billionaires richer? Ride up and down the road this week. Look at the political signs and ask yourself how many of your friends plan to vote to lower their own wages.
Getting working people and small business owners to vote against their own economic interests is a science that has been perfected in America.
Luckily for the Republican party, voters do not have to write a credible thesis supporting the group that will stand to benefit by their vote — the super rich or the working people and small business owners.
Ever since men moved out of caves, in every age in every land there has been a constant struggle of the rich trying to get more from the poor. Is the John Birch Society one of the more efficacious tools being used to that end in this country today? As you have read, years ago an English farmer even had to walk his cow home from the pasture across the rich man’s land — so the rich man would get those valuable droppings.
Although there isn’t a country where this struggle for the distribution of wealth isn’t going on today, can you name a few countries where working people have successfully voted to get their fair share of the pie?
Would a seven-year university system available to all Americans enable us to become one
of them?
The humble Farmer
How do you achieve ‘sustainable living’ with a non-sustainable currency?
a non-sustainable, centralized and bloated federalist system of government?
a non-sustainable system of industrialized agriculture that is propped up by the bloated, centralized government?
a non-sustainable system of wealth redistribution that exists on borrowed time though borrowed dollars and printed money that is rooted in debt?
All the folks out there who are chirping on and on, ad nauseam, about sustainability haven’t even the first CLUE about sustainability. And their strong track record of consistently voting for democrat progressive law makers adds a great deal of support to the notion.
I have read Agenda 21, and nearly every Chapter scares me about the redistribution of wealth from developed to developing nations, the control of property, the loss of sovereignty. It is a dangerous document, as is the Presidents Council on Sustainable Development that’s being used in the US to implement Agenda 21. Compare the two. We did not sign the Agenda 21 ‘treaty’, I recently met a person who attended that 1992 Convention in Brazil, and met and sat very near Barbara Bush, and says that George H.W. Bush did not sign it in Rio. Even if he signed it later (possibly, although I do not believe it), it was never approved by our Congress. That was the reason for Pres. Clinton’s E.O. creating the PCSD.
It’s not a treaty, it is a non-binding resolution. This means that we should do our best to adhere to it, but there is no penalty if we don’t. I fail to see how that is scary.
What Agenda 21 contains, although not a ‘treaty’ signed or agreed to by our Congress, is scary because its contents are being implemented gradually – in disguise through the gradual persuasion of people in this republic, and nations around the world, by specially trained ‘facilitators’ that the control of private property and functions of everyday lives by some international entity is all right. IT IS NOT ALL RIGHT, especially in a nation that was founded on the principles of inherent and unalienable rights, one of which is the right to own and sustain your own body. This MUST include the right to property, and its control, so long as one does not negate another’s similar right. I have not the time right now to explain all facets of how Agenda 21 is being spoon fed to the ‘progressives’, but if you examine the document, zoning laws, the International Property Maintenance Code (which is in place in all 50 states), I believe you’ll find many examples of the amount of control that’s already been taken.
FBI FILES ON BIRCH SOCIETY AND ITS ASSERTIONS:
This 204-page report explains why J. Edgar Hoover and senior FBI officials within
the Bureau’s Domestic Intelligence Division concluded in FBI memos that the JBS
was “extremist”, “irrational” and “irresponsible”
http://sites.google.com/site/ernie124102/jbs-1
CONSERVATIVE CRITICS OF ROBERT WELCH and BIRCH SOCIETY:
Contrary to claims made by the Birch Society about the alleged “left-wing” origins of JBS criticism, the most potent adverse comments about the JBS have always originated from the right-side of the political spectrum. This report presents a representative sample of such comments.
http://sites.google.com/site/ernie124102/jbs-4
Critics have included such prominent Americans as: Sen. Barry Goldwater, Cong. Walter Judd,
Gen. Albert C. Wedemeyer, Russell Kirk, Eugene Lyons, Willmoore Kendall, James Burnham, Robert Bork, J. Edgar Hoover, Herbert Philbrick, Frank S. Meyer, Cong. Gordon H. Scherer, William F. Buckley Jr., Patrick Buchanan, Fred Schwarz, Lee Edwards, the editors of the conservative newspaper, Human Events, George Sokolsky, Roy Cohn, Anthony Bouscaren, plus even many former Birchers such as: Alan Stang, Gary Allen, Milorad Draskovich, John Rees, William Norman Grigg, Mrs. Robert Welch — and many many more.
DOCUMENTARY HISTORY OF THE JOHN BIRCH SOCIETY:
This report presents documents which, generally, have never been previously publicly available — including private correspondence between Robert Welch and numerous individuals and correspondence by JBS National Council members during the formative years of the Birch
Society. This report is a work-in-progress and considerable new material will be added over the next few months.
JBS 9-1 https://sites.google.com/site/ernie1241/
JBS 9-2 https://sites.google.com/site/ernie1241a/
JBS 9-3 https://sites.google.com/site/ernie1241b/
Belfast is an equal opportunity home for Moonbats of all stripes. We are three times crazier than your town. :) Pass me the chlorinated beverage please.
Did baby huey make the sign himself? The red cross should go in front of what one is objecting to, not behind it. Whoops! :D
Lee needs to far away….. He’d be ok if America’s enemies occupied the City so long as his agenda is forefront. LImits rights in exchange for green initiative.