It’s easy for those of us not living in Texas to dismiss the current government-invasion hysteria as a tin-foiled Lone Star brain fart. But have you looked out your window recently? No, not up at the mysterious helicopter squadrons buzzing your neighborhood, but closer . . . at the trees shading your house, at the lawn around them, even at your roof. What do you see? Squirrels in unprecedented sizes and numbers, running and jumping and digging as if they owned the place. WHICH THEY SOON WILL.
That is, if you buy into the unified conspiracy theory of everything that is shorthanded as ‘Agenda 21.’
There’s been a lot of reporting about operation ‘Jade Helm 15,’ the giant joint military exercise taking place in Texas and other Southwestern states. Rightfully so: when government officials (Texas Governor Greg Abbott, Texas Senator Ted Cruz, Texas Congressman Louis Gohmert for starters) take the paranoid fears of a United States ‘takeover’ seriously, it’s time to run for the bunkers. What’s not been widely reported is how the Jade Helm scare is connected to a much larger conspiracy theory — one that has infiltrated many state governments, including my own state of North Carolina’s, and that is silently influencing anti-progressive legislative initiatives.
But what about the squirrels?
Their numbers are increasing, alarmingly . . .
(We’re getting to that.)
Certainly there are things to question about Jade Helm 15. It’s a suspicious moniker for a military exercise, one that calls to mind Chinese erotic novels or self-published James Bond continuations. The ’15’ may be a feeble attempt to give a history to this presumably hostile endeavor (why didn’t people freak out over numbers one to fourteen?). The initials JH recall Cold Warrior Jesse Helms, the North Carolina Senator revered for holding the gubment to account when it deviated from serving wealthy white interests. Back in the real world, one could wonder whether the cost of such a massive training exercise is justified.
Yet when one looks at the anti-Jade Helm protests, they center on different concerns: confiscation of private property and confiscation of guns. Neither of which has anything to do with Jade Helm 15 — but both of which are central to the Agenda 21 conspiracy theory.
The squirrels are locked, loaded, and ready to force us into high-density housing.
When is this stupid blog going to pay attention?
What is Agenda 21? It has been around for decades, both as a real thing (a relatively non-controversial and non-binding 1992 United Nations working paper about sustainable growth) and as a conspiracy thing (a plot for new New World Order domination under the aegis of the U.N.). Backed by such hoary nutcases as Alex Jones and even hoarier nutcase organizations like the John Birch society, the vilification-of-Agenda-21 industry has operated for years, but pretty much under the radar of mainstream reportage. Which is unfortunate.
Not just another inchoate dithyramb against big government, globalization, or the like, the anti-Agenda-21 industry specifically ties environmental regulations and climate change concerns to fears about government infringement of individual property and gun rights. In addition, it promotes financial support for home schooling and religio-ideologically propelled ‘school choice’ (not to mention the disastrous ‘religious freedom’ laws, the only conceivable purpose of which is to green-light bigotry and general my-way-or-the-highway-ness). Oh, less we forget: conspiracists believe that greenbelts, bike trails, and mass transit form part of Agenda 21’s strategy to destroy suburbs, golf courses, and the (aggrieved and besieged white middle-class version of the) American way.
This conspiracy combine is well-financed, not only by the usual suspects but often by tributaries like the ceiling fan industry that may not be aware of the broader agendum when an anti-Agenda-21-er takes up their purely monetary complaints.
First our incandescent lightbulbs, next our ceiling fans.
Gotta stop these squirrel home invasions.
(In 2013, Representative Marsha Blackburn [R-Tennessee] waged war against pending EPA regulations on ceiling fan energy standards.)
The anti-Agenda-21 industry has helped elect a host of conservative Republicans who now control legislative initiatives in many states, including my state of North Carolina. These initiatives are hell-bent on dismantling any regulations concerning the environment or energy conservation or ‘sustainability’ in general, which include the dreadageddon of wealth distribution . . . in the name of states’ rights, constitutional protections, individual freedom, religious liberty, and other squirrely rubrics. (Not to mention the expected opposition to anything connected to gun control or eminent domain or public education.)
“In 2012, the Republican National Committee passed a resolution denouncing Agenda 21 as a ‘destructive and insidious 'scheme that would result in a "socialist/communist redistribution of wealth.”' That same year, the North Carolina Republican Party passed a resolution against Agenda 21 declaring that the plan has been ‘covertly pushed into local governments’ and that ‘free enterprise cannot exist in a managed 'sustainable' society.’ Some of the language in the N.C. GOP resolution appears to have come directly from the John Birch Society's model resolution against Agenda 21.”
— Sue Sturgis, “Meet the NC Officials”
Both Duke Energy NC Governor Pat McCrory and ultra-conservative home schooler NC Lt. Gov. Dan Forest are on record as supporting this legislation. I need not detail the recent North Carolina record on environmental protection, the public education system, firearm laws, separation of church and state . . . (sigh). Health care is in here somewhere, probably under the anti-Agenda 21 rubric of government jackbooting individual choice — unless, of course, the choice in question is a woman’s.
So how to tie together gun control, private property confiscation, ‘education’ autonomy, the war on Christianity, and treasonably unamurican ‘environmentalist’ programs?
“Praise the squirrels. Praise those who feed the squirrels.”
—Glenn Beck, Agenda 21
(Note that the squirrel seems to be leading his devotees in a non-Christian form of prayer.)
According to Glenn Beck’s apocalyptic 2012 novel, the Agenda 21-controlled near future will be run by radical environmentalists who put squirrels (and other non-human species, endangered or not) before people, who make humans produce their own energy through hamster-habitat treadmills, who herd humans into teeny-carbon-footprint urban high-rises, and (perhaps worst of all) who take away our cars as well as our weapons. It goes without saying that these enslaved humans have no access to guns, that the government chooses mates, that ‘education’ is a government plot, and that the elderly and infirm are denied medical care (can we say ‘death panels’?). Not to mention being forced to pay homage to furry rodents.
Glenn Beck may be crazy, but he’s not stupid. He knows how to mine a vein of batshittery that could bring him monetary rewards. Those of us outside his toxic orbit might be well advised to pay some attention to his money-grubbing efforts as they track, even predict (maybe even propel in a minor way) extreme right-wing political trends. At the core, it’s all about those jade-helmeted, United Nations-backed, gun-grabbing, tree-hugging, snail-darter-fetishizing, private-property-rights-trampling, anti-Christian, Protocols of the Elders of Zion revenants who support and promote Agenda 21. And . . . the usurping squirrels, who now that they’ve confiscated your constitutionally protected weapons, are aiming at your windows even as we speak.
Guns don’t kill people. Squirrels kill people.
References
Beck, Glenn with Harriet Parke, Agenda 21. New York: Threshold Editions (Simon & Schuster), 2012.
Bump, Philip. “How Obama’s hostile takeover of the American Southwest (aka Jade Helm) will impact 2016.” The Washington Post Online. 6 May 2015. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2015/05/06/how-obamas-hostile-takeover-of-the-american-southwest-a-k-a-jade-helm-will-impact-2016/?postshare=9571430935698908
‘Felder, Grumpy.’ “Homeschooling Parents Declared to be ‘Bona Fide’ Guardians and Won’t Face Jail.” Agenda 21 News. 17 January 2015. http://agenda21news.com/2015/01/homeschooling-parents-declared-bona-fide-guardians-wont-face-jail/
Fernandez, Manny. “Conspiracy Theories Over Jade Helm Training Exercize Get Traction in Texas.” New York Times Online. 6 May 2015. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/07/us/conspiracy-theories-over-jade-helm-get-some-traction-in-texas.html?smid=fb-nytimes&smtyp=cur&bicmp=AD&bicmlukp=WT.mc_id&bicmst=1409232722000&bicmet=1419773522000&_r=0
Goodwyn, Wade. “Texas Governor Deploys State Guard to Stave Off Obama Takeover.” NPR Online . 2 May 2015. http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2015/05/02/403865824/texas-governor-deploys-national-guard-to-stave-off-obama-takeover?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=npr&utm_term=nprnews&utm_content=20150502
Reynard, Mike. “Blackburn Secures Provision to Save Our Ceiling Fans and Protect American Jobs in FY15 Energy and Water Appropriations Bill.” U.S. Congressman Marha Blackburn (online). 10 Juy 2014. http://blackburn.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=387488
Rice, Neil, Roy Callahan, Karen Schoen. “New Frontier of Evil Part 2: Florida Greenways and Trails.” Agenda 21 Today. 6 February 2014. http://americanfreedomwatchradio.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/6-New-Frontier-of-Evil-Greenways-and-Trails.pdf
Schofield, Rob. “Just how extreme is North Carolina’s new Lieutenant Governor?” NC Policy Watch. 28 November 2012. http://www.ncpolicywatch.com/2012/11/28/just-how-extreme-is-north-carolinas-new-lt-governor/
Southern Poverty Law Center. “Agenda 21: The UN, Sustainability and Right-Wing Conspiracy Theory.” April 2014. http://www.splcenter.org/sites/default/files/downloads/publication/agenda_21_final_web_0.pdf
Sparrow, Jeff. “To the Squirrels.” The New Inquiry 28 January 2013. http://thenewinquiry.com/essays/to-the-squirrels/
Sturgis, Sue. “Meet the NC officials who promoted a far-right conspiracy theory to discredit environmental sustainability.” Facing South (The Institute of Southern Studies). 16 April 2014. http://www.southernstudies.org/2014/04/meet-the-nc-officials-who-promoted-a-far-right-con.html
[Note: This list of references could have been much, much longer. Frankly, after reading hundreds of pages of craziness, and trying to discern an organizing logic, I became very, very weary. I’ve listed representative stories about the Jade Helm panic and some reliable sources about the Agenda 21 paranoia (the Southern Poverty Law Center’s monograph is particularly useful). As far as pro-anti-Agenda 21 stuff goes . . . there’s an incredible amount of it on the web. I really didn’t want to link to much of it. The ones I did note (‘Felder’ and Rice et al, plus of course Beck) seem to me representative of this appalling sub-genre of ‘journalism.’]
No comments:
Post a Comment