United Nations Presentation

I guess I should mention that I recently went to Geneva Switzerland to speak at the United Nations.



Needless to say, it was quite an honor.

I'll explain later why we were there. But for now, I was in a five person presentation speaking about corporate accountability. This was my presentation:

Possibly the best way to insure corporate accountability is for us all to band together to prevent particular abuses – and when I say all of us, I even mean other corporations – even other corporations that might have been abusers themselves.

Typically when we think of corporate abuses, we think of human rights or environmental abuses. But quite often, an abusing corporation is abusing other corporations also.

When it comes down to corporate survival, even an abusing corporation might be willing to do the right thing, and support the reform of poorly written laws.

I'm here today because I'm convinced that we have a window of opportunity to save my Western Shoshone Homeland – the high deserts and remote mountain ranges of the Great Basin. This is a vast natural area taking up much of the States of Nevada and Utah in the very middle of the American West. Other than mining, very little human development has occurred here because of how little water there is. However, this is exactly what makes the Great Basin so wonderful, it still retains much of the beauty my ancestors have called home for thousands of years.

When the U.S. took this land from our ancestors, we signed the Treaty of Ruby Valley that guaranteed we would not be left homeless and without game to eat or water to drink. Sadly, this treaty has been more a treaty of convenience than integrity. Now, Las Vegas wants to drain much of the Great Basin for its own opulently wasteful uses. It doesn't take a hydrologist to figure out what the consequences are of exporting water from the desert. We are facing the potential “dust bowl” devastation of an area bigger than some of America's smaller States.

And why? Because the U.S. has delegated water laws to the States and our State's water laws are so poorly written. Which is why I'm here today. We need help in keeping my Native Homeland from being robbed of everything it has of value and eventually transformed into our Nation's waste dump. Water is life. And a corporate driven quasi-municipality wants to take our water.

Nevada's water laws were written a century ago to placate miners and farmers. In a nutshell, Nevada's water law states; “First in use, first in right.” Now, it only makes sense that Native Americans were using Nevada's water for thousands of years, so we should have some rights to these waters. Our Treaty with the U.S. Government and the Winter's Doctrine both reinforce these rights. However, Nevada's State water law pretends that Western Shoshone rights to our own Federally recognized water don't exist.

Slicing up the pie for those who can afford to take it is no way to manage water in the desert. In the real world today, “first in use, first in right” translates to “the first to waste our water can have it for free!” The consequences of this corporate give-away water law will be catastrophic for everyone and everything in the long run.

Irrationally, Las Vegas is simply reacting to irrational Nevada water law. Las Vegas wants to export water from the Great Basin because if they don't, multi-national corporations will.

The watergrab isn't really what the people of Las Vegas want. This is what the developers and politicians committed to before the price of desalination dropped. In fact, now; trading desalinated ocean water for a bigger allotment of the Colorado River is cheaper than piping it in from the desert for hundreds of miles.

What we need are water laws that respect Native Americans, Rural residents, future generations, and natural wild areas. What Nevada needs are guidelines for writing sustainable water law – and U.N. help pressuring the U.S. Government to live up to their own commitments with worldwide help pressuring local Nevada corporations (such as Las Vegas hotels) to convince Nevada legislators to re-write these laws.

If this strategy works, it might possibly set a precedent for how to reform water laws across our nation.

Now The Democrats Have To Sell Out Too

Though hardly reported by the mainstream “for profit” media, there's been a major change at the White House.

Every once in a while, buried within the news reports, are gems of information that (taken together) tell a bigger story of what is really going on. The days right after the 2010 mid-term elections hold historic evidence of the response to the Republicans winning control of the House of Representatives.

For instance; when the Democrats lost big, what did President Obama do? He went to India. Was he just sick and tired of those damn fool wing nuts who vote against their own best interests – and had to get away? Well, maybe. But more likely he realized he had to take action to hold onto what power he had left.

It had become obvious that some of the powers-that-be who propelled him into office were now working against him. In 2008, Barack Obama enjoyed hefty contributions from the big banks. In 2010, the tables appear to have turned. American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS spent 38 million dollars running attack ads etc. to defeat Democratic candidates. MSNBC News reports the bulk of funding for the Karl Rove-founded groups American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS “came from a small circle of extremely wealthy Wall Street hedge fund and private equity moguls... These donors have been bitterly opposed to a proposal by congressional Democrats – and endorsed by the Obama administration – to increase the tax rates on compensation that hedge funds pay their partners...”

It appears that Obama has lost his friends in high places.

Talk about fickle. Even after President Obama hired the Geithner team of ex-bankers to run the U.S. Treasury, wealthy Wall Street moguls still turned on him. Apparently, these moguls are insisting on total control. And it looks like they bought it. The mid-term elections have shown us something – the elections can be bought by the highest bidder. The Democrats were simply out bid.

So, what's the most powerful (elected) man in the world to do? Find some new wealthy supporters – fast. Which brings us to India.

Supporters in India would be nice, but not very politically expedient. No. President Obama was in India to support corporations back at home. One of those corporations was likely Monsanto, who wants to turn all of India's rural farms into big agribusiness cash cows. But even more importantly, Obama was likely in India to support our military/industrial complex. In the past, America stopped trading arms with India as a result of India's nuclear weapons development. Most likely, President Obama was in India to assure them that no matter what happens – no matter what India does; America will never halt arms trade to India again.

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President Obama needs powerful friends to counter the angry Wall Street moguls who are trying to take him down. Apparently, those friends are from agribusiness and the military/industrial complex.

So, when it comes to the inevitable austerity measures the new House will be insisting on; don't expect the subject of across-the-board cuts to even be mentioned by the Obama administration. (And you might as well forget about us getting out of Afghanistan any time soon either.) As Obama must see it; waste at the Pentagon will just have to be tolerated to keep him from being forced out of power by Wall Street moguls.

We saw something very similar happen during the Presidency of Bill Clinton. After the fall of the Soviet Union, there just wasn't the need for such high military spending to fight a Cold War (that was over). President Clinton initially made a few cutbacks in military spending, and then changed his spending habits significantly during the Monica Lewinsky scandal. You may remember Bosnia. It appears that President Clinton gave in to the military/industrial complex to keep his job. It appears that to avoid a coup d'etat, Clinton spent our peace dividend.

It also appears that President Obama is now selling arms for our military/industrial complex in order to keep his job. That might not be so controversial had it not been for the fact that we have troops in Pakistan – and a nuclear war between India and Pakistan is far from out of the question. One can only wonder if Obama promised to keep selling U.S. arms to India even if India were to start a nuclear war.

But there's more...

What most Americans don't realize is that we are already involved in a covert war – a world war – a currency war.

We are only beginning to discover just how greedy some Wall Street moguls have become. This isn't just an American issue anymore. Worldwide, financial techniques are being used to take over. What's worse is that this underhanded buyout frenzy is being financed on the backs of ordinary Americans. The Federal Reserve Bank just keeps printing all that money (for the banks, not for us). This is not good. We have even been warned that the last time these techniques were used was just before World War II.

Former Wall Street economist and University Professor Michael Hudson states: “The object of warfare is to take over a country's land, raw materials, and assets... In the past, that used to be done militarily, by invading them. But today, you can do it financially, simply by creating credit, which is what the Federal Reserve has done.”

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The big question is; now that President Obama knows what Wall Street wants to do to him (and the world), will he fight back? I believe the answer to that question lies with us. Will we fight back? President Obama has stooped to supporting big business and arms dealers because so many Americans have given up on supporting him. Many have lost their faith in Obama. But that doesn't mean we should lose faith in ourselves.

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The mid-term elections aren't the end of the world, but they just brought us a lot closer – at a time when we are running out of time.

At stake or our “entitlements.” You know; those social programs which the U.S. supported U.N. Universal Declaration of Human Rights declared as human rights back in 1948.

And also at stake; those pesky environmental laws that were written to keep us all from being poisoned.

And very likely also at stake; the political stability of the world.

If we don't fight back now, we could wind up in an endless world war, with no social safety nets, and pollution everywhere. What we are risking here in America is millions of untreated illnesses, persistent hunger and need, mass poisonings, wide spread aggravation and violence, and the untimely deaths of Americans by the tens of thousands – if not far more... This future is the opposite of what we want. In fact, this sure looks like we're in the process of creating a man-made hell.

This is worth fighting.

Audit The Pentagon

I was watching the "for profit" news this morning and the new house members are all about cutting Government spending.

Of course, they only seem to be about cutting funds that might make it back to the taxpayers who paid in the money. No one even seems to be talking about military spending.

We all know that the Pentagon wastes billions and billions of dollars. So, why isn't Pentagon spending on the table?

It's as if these sell-out politicians want to maximize the killing. They want to keep the cash going to these "wars" (where there never actually has been an enemy army to shoot at), and they want to cut back on "entitlements" (you know; money for civilians such as medicare, social security, law enforcement, etc.).

Let's just find out where we are before we go and make all those entitlement cuts.

Let's audit the Pentagon.

I bet we can save billions without losing any defense services. It would be like money for nothing - which is what they're getting.

If we don't have to make cuts in social services (for the poor and taxpayers) we'll save money and lives.