The administration is lying through its teeth trying to stuff this monster down our throats!

Senator Vitter Leads Assault on UN’s Sea Treaty

By Cliff Kincaid

October 01, 2007

Editor's note: Learn about the LOST in this 8-minute presentation.

 The media have been pummeling conservative Republican Senator David Vitter of Louisiana for apologizing for sexual indiscretions. But America should be grateful he stayed in the Senate and did not resign in the wake of the media assault. The senator demonstrated on Thursday, during a hearing into the U.N.’s Law of the Sea Treaty, that he is going to continue to do the job he was elected to do. Vitter’s performance was so effective that he left State and Defense Department officials either speechless or caught up in embarrassing contradictions about the impact of this international agreement on America’s security and sovereignty. It should now be perfectly obvious that Bush Administration officials, in collusion with liberal Senators, are trying to bamboozle the Senate into quickly ratifying a very dangerous pact.

One area of concern is how other nations and international lawyers could use the treaty against the U.S. in a back-door effort to implement the (unratified) global warming treaty, with the result being higher gas prices for the American people and perhaps even energy rationing. The Law of the Sea treaty creates a tribunal and various bodies, including dispute resolution or arbitral panels, to resolve conflicts which may arise. Major parts of the treaty mandate international regulation of U.S. economic and industrial activities on land. Greenhouse gases, for example, could be viewed under the terms of the treaty as contributing to pollution of the oceans.

Negroponte Caught in Falsehood

Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte told the Senate committee that the U.N. body established by the treaty has “no jurisdiction over marine pollution disputes involving land-based sources.” He said, “that’s just not covered by the treaty.” Negroponte’s sidekick, State Department Legal Adviser John B. Bellinger III, said, “It clearly does not allow regulation over land-based pollution sources. That would stop at the water’s edge.” But Vitter shot back, “…why is there a section entitled pollution from land-based sources?” Not only is there a section by that name, Vitter pointed out, but there is a section on enforcement. The section is Article 207, “Pollution from land-based sources.” Anybody can look it up. But apparently our top officials and lawyers have not. Either that or they are trying to mislead the people about the ramifications of this treaty. In either case, we are sunk if this treaty goes through.

It was absolutely clear to anyone paying attention that Negroponte and Bellinger either had no real understanding of what was in the treaty or didn’t want to tell the American people what was really in it. In the end, under withering fire from Vitter, Bellinger insisted that the controversy was too “technical” to discuss at the hearing and that he would submit something in writing. Senator Jim Webb, chairing the hearing, suggested he do so, attempting to save Bellinger from further embarrassment. Our liberal media favoring this treaty will, of course, not bother to point out that one of the top brains in the State Department had been caught in the act of trying to mislead the U.S. Senate.

This wasn’t the only exchange in which Vitter caught Bush Administration officials saying things that were untrue. He caught them in evasions and obfuscations over the claim that U.S. military and intelligence activities on the high seas cannot be restricted by the treaty. U.S. officials are making that claim in a declaration in the Senate resolution of ratification. It is one of 24 declarations or understandings being made by the U.S. for a treaty that administration witnesses repeatedly claimed would provide “legal certainty” about what nations can and cannot do on the high seas.

If the treaty is so definitive and clear, then why is there a need for 24 declarations and understandings? To make matters worse, these declarations and understandings have no legal validity under the treaty.

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With sadness--I will clip below, the response I got from Senator Johnny Isakson of Georgia. I have believed that he was for the people, his cooperation with Ted Kennedy on amnesty was a blow to me, now this:

He may not know it, but to me this appears a typical political answer when you do not want your constituents to know you are for something they are against.
Sincerely,
Johnny Isakson
United States Senator

Title: SUPREME COURT CASE PREVIEWS DAMAGE OF LOST! [Law of Sea Treaty]
Source: Eagle Forum
URL Source: http://eagleforum.org/blog/2007/10/supreme-court-case-previews-damage-of.html
Published: Oct 15, 2007
Author: Phyllis Schlaffly
Post Date: 2007-10-15 16:04:30 by OKCSubmariner
Ping List: *Sovereignty List*

SUPREME COURT CASE PREVIEWS DAMAGE OF LOST!

Tell Your Senator to vote NO on the Law of the Sea Treaty!!

Just this week, the United States Supreme Court gave us an important look into what kind of global power grabs we face if the Senate ratifies the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST). On October 10, the Supreme Court heard arguments in the case of Jose Medellin, an illegal alien rapist-murderer now on death row in Texas. Medellin, a citizen of Mexico who lived illegally in the United States, was convicted and sentenced to death after he confessed in 1993 to the brutal rape and murder of two teenage girls in Houston.

Long after Medellin had received the full due process of the American legal system, in 2003 the Mexican government sued the United States in the International Court of Justice (known as the "World Court"), an agency of the United Nations which sits at The Hague in The Netherlands.

In 2004 the World Court ruled in favor of Mexico and ordered the United States to give Medellin another hearing, or perhaps another trial, at which he could receive the assistance of Mexican consular employees.

A 1963 treaty known as the Vienna Convention, which both the United States and Mexico have signed and ratified, provides that aliens who are accused of crimes in a foreign country are entitled to request the assistance of consular officials of their home country. Medellin never requested such assistance until long after he was tried, convicted and sentenced, and after all his appeals were denied.

Of course, Medellin did receive the assistance of competent American legal defense lawyers throughout the process, and there is no reason to think that the presence of a Mexican consul could have made any difference in the outcome.

Incredibly, the Bush Administration has knuckled under to the World Court and tried to order the Texas courts to give Medellin another hearing. The Texas courts properly refused to honor this unconstitutional interference, and the Texas decision was upheld by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.

This case shows why the U.S. Senate should not agree to diminish American sovereignty by ratifying another UN treaty called the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST).

LOST would be a form of world government with power to decide all matters relating to the two-thirds of the earth's surface covered by the oceans. All disputes arising from man's use of the sea would be heard and decided by the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, a 21-member international court that sits in Hamburg, Germany. There is no appeal from that court, which has the power to disregard or override U.S. laws and even the U.S. Constitution.

President Ronald Reagan opposed the treaty because it would erode U.S. sovereignty. Read more about that here: Another U.N. Power Grab by William P. Clark and Edwin Meese .

Take Action

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee could vote on LOST any time! Tell your Senators to reject this give-away of our sovereignty and to vote NO on ratification!

Members of the Foreign Relations Committee: Biden, Boxer, Cardin, Casey, Coleman, Corker, DeMint, Dodd, Feingold, Hagel, Isakson, Kerry, Lugar, Menendez, Murkowski, Nelson (FL), Obama, Sununu, Vitter, Voinovich, Webb

Call Your Senators Today!

Capitol Switchboard: (202)-224-3121

Law of the Sea Treaty on Fast Track to Ratification