Dissecting condescending newspaper column re: Secure
Arkansas/Tea Party
Unintended consequences?
No doubt…but we thank John Brummett for bringing attention to matters of
extreme concern to savvy taxpaying loyal citizens. Since we are the ones footing all the
government bills we’d better educate ourselves on what they and their “partnersâ€
are doing and why…most done to our detriment.
Comments & clarification follow after you read
Mr. Brummett’s screed.
Posted
on 16 March 2010
By John Brummett
CONWAY — I wrote a few weeks ago
that people in the Tea Party movement are irrational extremists.
So the McClanahans of Conway —
Lowell, a prominent Rotarian, and his wife, Marsha — invited me to the next
meeting of the Faulkner County Tea Party to see that they aren’t so crazed.
This gathering took place Thursday
night. I am here to tell you that, indeed, they are not irrational at all. The
McClanahans, I mean.
But some of the 135 people in the
audience and the evening’s guest speaker, a woman named Jeannie Burlsworth —
well, let me be careful not to overstate with incendiary language: They trouble
me in the way they let their imaginations run wild to fuel their distrust of
anything having to do with government.
First the better news: Lowell
McClanahan strikes me as a perfectly reasonable man.
He explained that he became alarmed
at what he, as a thorough conservative, viewed as a leftward lurch of the Obama
administration. He said he helped found this local Tea Party organization only
to advance constitutionally limited government and fiscal responsibility,
principles we all ought to endorse.
He said he is interested in
strategic goals, not general cries to “take our country back.â€
McClanahan stressed that the Tea
Party, at least in Faulkner County, practices open attendance and free
expression. That’s admirable. So, he said, I should not ascribe to all Tea
Partiers everything that gets spouted either from the audience or by a guest
speaker.
That brings me to Jeannie
Burlsworth. (1) She’s the chairman of
Secure Arkansas, which has never quite gotten its act together to get its
ballot initiative before the voters to deny public benefits to anyone 14 or
older not properly documented for citizenship. (2)
She kept going off on tangents in
her presentation (3) — about health care reform, or Barack Obama, or
cap-and-trade, or lost sovereignty, or Patrick Henry Hays — only to say she
didn’t have time to give everyone a full report on each.
Patrick Henry Hays?
I’ll come back to that in a minute.
If there is a central theme in
Burlsworth’s scatter-shooting oratory, it would seem to be that American
politicians at all levels and off all stripes, even Republicans in many cases,
are conspiring to sell out our individual American liberties to sinister
one-world control. (4)
Here’s an example from Burlsworth of
how politicians allegedly work against the people: Attorney General Dustin
McDaniel’s job includes assessing citizen proposals for ballot initiatives,
such as those Burlsworth’s group puts forward, for fair phrasing and technical
correctness. This means his office sometimes tells Burlsworth’s group to
rewrite something before he’ll give it an all-clear for signature-gathering.
So, in Burlsworth’s view, this means
that McDaniel was trained at the elitist Aspen Institute(5), to which he
won a fellowship a few years ago, in how to keep the people down by resisting
noble initiatives arising from their attempted exercise of liberty. (6)
This Aspen Institute is one of those
self-important think tanks depleting foundation money, which has to go
somewhere, on conferences and retreats and the gifted higher thinking amid
rarefied air of a more sophisticated class.
I know Dustin McDaniel. He went to
the Aspen Institute because it made him feel like a hot-shot and was a resume
enhancer. (7)
Anyway, his office has been
approving these initiatives by Secure Arkansas, after improving them to make
them less vulnerable to legal challenge. The problem for Secure Arkansas has
been that the group hasn’t had the wherewithal to collect the signatures.
Now to Patrick Henry Hays. He’s the
veteran mayor of North Little Rock. But that, Burlsworth asserts, is the very
least of it. (8)
There’s this thing called ICLEI,
standing for International Council of Local Environmental Initiatives. It is a
collection of municipal government officials from around the world who seek to
advance ideas for sustainable economic growth deploying so-called green
initiatives. (9)
Because he wanted to feel important
by joining such a thing, and because he’s been around a long time, Hays has
risen to the current board chairmanship of the American division.
Burlsworth sees this ICLEI as a
vital cog in an international conspiracy to fabricate a global-warming scare
through which politicians worldwide, led by Patrick Henry Hays of North Little
Rock, Ark., will avail themselves of this coded phrase, sustainable growth, to
take over our free and independent country. (10)
She said Gov. Mike Beebe must report
to Hays periodically on how much he has done to deliver Arkansas to this global
control.
I know Mike Beebe, too. And I know
Patrick Henry Hays. Somehow I can’t picture Beebe reporting diddly to Hays.
But some of these people would think
I’m naive, or in on the fix.(11)
——-
John Brummett is a columnist for the Arkansas News Bureau in Little Rock. His
e-mail address is jbrummett@arkansasnews.com; his telephone number is (501)
374-0699.
Regarding the above Brummett
article:
This kind of journalism is just what
we have come to expect regarding anything
politically incorrect, e.g. the Constitution, rule of law, individual
rights/responsibilities/freedoms, etc.
1.
Jeannie Burlsworth is a lady of
considerable intelligence, oratory abilities and ethically impeccable.
2.
Denial of benefits, not mandated by
the federal government, to illegal aliens.
3.
Burlsworth is passionate about the
reality of the many undermining attacks occurring in/on our republic. (There
are so many, you cannot come close to covering them all in one limited speech.)
4.
Anyone not in denial or complicit
knows there is no real difference in the two parties ultimate goals…power &
control.
5.
Aspen Institute of Humanistic
Studies is a global organization with offices around the world. Environment, education, and health are major concerns for this “international
non-profit organization dedicated to informed dialogue and inquiry on issues of
global concern.” (Newspeak for
global Collectivism)
6.
The AIHS targets “leadersâ€
in the public & private sectors, unlike ACORN which targets the “disaffectedâ€â€¦.both
are organizers with specific goals, none of which is good for the American
middleclass. A.G. Dustin McDaniel was not randomly chosen in order to make him
feel like a “big shotâ€, he was selected because he was seen as a “playerâ€.
7.
2009: McDaniel
took a Middle East trip, including Egypt, with Aspen ($13,232) and attended
their Seminar in Aspen, CO. ($2,224) The Institute did not subsidize these
trips for the fun of it. Also, the trips were taken during the height of the
Arkansas Legislative session—why was his presence not mandatory and what were
citizens paying him to do?
Aspen
Strategy Group Members (A selected few for those who are familiar with famous Neo-Cons &
Progressives…a veritable “Who’s Who†of anti-American Globalists.)
·
Joesph S. Nye, Jr. – (Group Chairmen)
·
Brent Scowcroft – (Group Chairmen)
·
Sam Nunn
·
Michael Eisner
·
Mortimer
Zuckerman
·
Mickey Edwards
8. The same is true of ICLEI…a global organization
dedicated to the destruction of individual, state, and country
sovereignty. Their mission statement=†Local Governments for Sustainability
is an international association of local governments as well as national and
regional local government organizations that have made a commitment to
sustainable developmentâ€.
Translation=Government control of every facet of your life. Extremely interesting that the North Little
Rock mayor is the president/CEO of the entire USA division and he didn’t rise
to such an important global position by wanting to “feel importantâ€. He was selected because he was seen as one
who would work to move their agenda effectively.
9. “Over 1107 cities, towns, counties, and their associations
worldwide comprise ICLEI’s growing membership. ICLEI works with these and
hundreds of other local governments through international performance-based,
results-oriented campaigns and programs.†(ICLEI website)
10. “Our
campaigns, programs, and projects promote Local Agenda 21 as a participatory,
long-term, strategic planning process that addresses local sustainability while
protecting global common goods. Linking local action to internationally agreed
upon goals and targets such as Agenda 21, the Rio Conventions, the Habitat
Agenda, the Millennium Development Goals and the Johannesburg Plan of
Implementation is an essential component.†(ICLEI website)
11. Brummett could be either naïve or complicit…or
both. Hard to tell. The point is that asking bold, direct
questions can now make a citizen a target of some ugly repercussions, making it
uncomfortable, even unsavory to question boldly, which of course is the goal.
Those who are familiar
with Brummett’s columns understand that he is a Progressive, constantly &
consistently advancing the Collectivist agenda, but in this particular piece he
may have angered his mentors by commenting on their activities…including
Governor Beebe. In any case we are glad
to see these activities discussed in a newspaper and brought to the attention
of the public.