...at least with the United Nations people know what they are getting. In the economic sphere, so much of the push toward globalization is taking place in secret and behind closed doors that most people don't even have a clue that it is taking place. Case in point: the TPP.
To long-term subscribers of The International Forecaster, the basic concept of the drive toward global government should be all too familiar by now. The Powers That Shouldn't Be create a problem, hype up and exacerbate that problem, and then offer their pre-ordained solution to that problem: global government. We see this economically through the rise of regional trading and currency blocks. We see it geopolitically in the reaction against the increasing insanity of American military unilateralism. We see it socially in the push toward homogenization of culture and values. In every case, the answer that has been prepared in advance is the same: global government. Only a unified global government can provide financial stability in this post-Lehman era. Only a global government can rein in the military adventurism of the NATO powers. Only a global government can provide an international rule of law.
This “solution” is no solution at all, of course. It is a carefully crafted lie that has been implanted in our culture and infects us almost from the moment of birth through a steady stream of propaganda ranging from the innocuous (model United Nations in our schools) to the overt (the creation of chairs, scholarships and entire fields of study devoted to furthering global governance). The trick is that the globalization of the elites wraps itself up in nice sounding platitudes and lofty noble intentions that co-opt the common sense notions of global trade and cooperation amongst neighbors that most aspire to. Rather than the breaking down of arbitrary lines on a map, this elite-driven globalization seeks to draw one big line around the entire earth and to claim everything within that line as the elite's jurisdiction.
We've seen a number of cases in point illustrating this idea in recent months. Perhaps the most obvious of these is the way in which the United Nations has been seemingly re-legitimized as the “international keeper of the peace” in the Syrian situation. Exactly as feared, the UN has become the linchpin of the diplomatic wrangling over the soul of the Syria to the detriment of Syrian sovereignty. From the chemical weapons inspection team that Assad was pressured to let into the country in the first place (and after the debacle in Iraq, what leader would see the presence of such a team as anything but a prelude to invasion?) to the deployment of that team to deliver an “authoritative account” of the August 21st attack in Damascus (whose scope of investigation didn't actually include the determination of blame for the attack) to the use of the Security Council chambers as a debating ground for resolutions seeking authority to invade (or prevent the invasion of the country), it is the UN itself that consistently comes off as the winner, the noble, virtuous, neutral, cool-headed arbitrator, the wise sage that can rule on the best course of action for any state.
Now the UN is seeking to increase that status even further. Last Wednesday the UN Security Council rebuked Syria for preventing the free flow of international aid across its borders. In an article devoted to the subject, NBC News spent 17 paragraphs painting Assad's government as murderous and barbarous for hampering “humanitarian efforts” before admitting in the 18th paragraph that certain supposed “aid” groups were suspected of using humanitarian cover to covertly ship arms in to supply Syria's terrorist insurgency, exactly as has been happening throughout the conflict and in countless similar conflicts in the past.
This is the way of UN propaganda. It constantly wraps itself in a cloak of “humanitarianism” and “responsibility to protect” and “global stability” that is only much later revealed to be a ruse designed to allow the UN to accrue more powers to act within the borders of supposedly sovereign states. Much like how the UN's “Universal Declaration of Human Rights” spends 28 Articles magnanimously bestowing a series of wonderful-sounding rights on the peoples of the world before blithely admitting in the 29th that those rights can be freely granted or revoked by the UN at any time it sees fit.
But at least with the United Nations people know what they are getting. In the economic sphere, so much of the push toward globalization is taking place in secret and behind closed doors that most people don't even have a clue that it is taking place. Case in point: the TPP. For those not in the know (i.e. just about everyone), the TPP is the “Trans-Pacific Partnership,” a 12-member free trade bloc of (you guessed it) Pacific nations, including the world first and third biggest economies (the US and Japan) and a number of smaller emerging economies, including Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei and Peru. Although there has been some coverage in the alternative press and widespread consternation in some quarters (online liberties activists, Japanese farmers, anti-shale gas mining campaigners in New Zealand, proponents of generic medicines in developing economies, etc.), most people still have never even heard of this treaty, which some say will be the final nail in the coffin of US sovereignty (not to mention that of the other signatories). This has been part of a deliberate strategy of holding text of the treaty under lock and key and using unprecedented security measures to keep the public from learning what the treaty actually contains, although ominous hints about “NAFTA on steroids” have been routinely floated by those with knowledge of the deal.
Now the TPP negotiations are in the home stretch, with a summit taking place in Indonesia next Tuesday that is expected to arrive at a basic agreement ahead of a full deal within the year. The only tiny sliver of hope comes from the fact that Obama—who was expected to helm the upcoming summit as they work toward agreement on a number of contentious topics—will not be able to attend because of the government “shutdown” farce currently taking place in Washington. He has asked Secretary of State Kerry to attend in his place instead. This may hamper negotiations somewhat, but progress toward the finalization of the treaty seems inevitable at this point. In this case, the TPP (like the WTO, the IMF, the BIS and other globalist financial institutions) is set to create a whole infrastructure governing international trade without the knowledge, participation or consent of the vast swathes of the population that it will directly impact.
The worst part about this drive toward globalism is that even institutions created with the best of intentions can still be used to serve an overall agenda of global enslavement. Much has been made, for example, of the recent announcement that Brazil is spearheading a type of “alternative internet” in protest of the recent revelations of ubiquitous NSA surveillance online. The plan calls for an “Optical Ring” of independently-operated optical cable to join 12 South American nations directly with Europe and Africa, completely bypassing the existing internet infrastructure which runs through the United States. The project is nothing if not ambitious, involving the laying of some 10,000 kilometers of cable, with work expected to start next year.
But is this being done for altruistic reasons or simply so that Brazil and the governments of the other countries involved can replace the NSA as the Big Brother of their own netizens? As Glenn Greenwald himself warns, just because this group of governments is setting up an alternative internet to bypass the United States, that doesn't mean that they won't ultimately resort to the NSA's tricks: “There is a temptation on the part of every power faction to try and exploit the Internet to erode privacy and to increase their own surveillance. And I think that a lot of vigilance is going to have to be devoted to these alternatives as well and make sure that they don't end up being as bad just in different ways.”
Whether in public at the UN, in private at the TPP Summit, or through the back door via government-supplied anti-spying “solutions,” we consistently arrive back at the same spot: the same groups of thugs who consider themselves to be the representatives of the people are hell-bent on increasing their own power, riches, and control at the expense of the public that they so cynically manipulate. This is the true face of the global government that is being set up behind the scenes. It is a government by and for the ruling cliques, for the preservation of their own power and fortune at the expense of the many.
So what is the real solution to this conundrum? The answer self-evidently can't come from the self-same politicians and corrupt businessmen who are busy setting up their elite-run global government behind the scenes. Instead, it must originate in the people. It is up to the people to steer the shape of this globally-connected era, by either signing on to the systems of global governmental control or creating the alternative infrastructures that will be the only hope of escaping this encroaching tyranny. The truly incredible technology of this era, from mesh networking and other internet-alternatives to 3D Printing technology to the open source revolution, remain as a potential tool for the people to use in an era of global peace and cooperation. Conversely, the technologies of control, from NSA spying to the universal ID biometric grid to the drive toward the cashless society, can be used to create a globally-run, globally-enforced surveillance control grid. We have a narrow window of opportunity to act to stop the globalists before they get their way. It remains to be seen whether we will take advantage of that window or merely acquiesce as the UN, the TPP, the WTO, the NSA and other such institutions continue to chip away at our freedoms and sovereignty.