In a bold attack upon our national sovereignty, French President François Hollande (shown, left) and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon (shown, center) insisted on Tuesday that the United States “must respect the commitments it has undertaken” with the global 2015 Paris Agreement on Climate Change, because the agreement is “irreversible.” But it is not.
Though President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry certainly made a “commitment” to the deal last year, the U.S. Senate did not. And, under the Constitution of the United States, which is the “supreme law of the land,” the president does have the power, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make treaties but only provided two thirds of the senators present concur (Article II, Section 2 of the Constitution).
Hollande told representatives from almost 200 nations, meeting in Morocco, that inaction to stop “global warming” would be “disastrous for future generations and it would be dangerous for peace.”
It is not clear exactly how such inaction would be “dangerous for peace”; however, ignoring the clear wording of the U.S. Constitution would certainly be deadly for the concepts of liberty, respect for the Constitution, and the national sovereignty of the United States.
Hollande and Ban were architects of the Paris Agreement, and called upon President-elect Trump to revoke his campaign pledge to cancel the global climate-change deal, which proposes to shift the world from fossil fuels to cleaner energies. Trump has called man-made global warming a hoax.
Hollande declared, “The United States, the largest economic power in the world, the second largest greenhouse gas emitter, must respect the commitments it has undertaken.”
Ban agreed, insisting, “What was once unthinkable has become unstoppable.”
The 2015 Paris Agreement on Climate Change went into effect on November 4, but it has never been ratified by the U.S. Senate. Therefore, the United States has never made any “commitment” to it, regardless of what Obama and Kerry have said or done.
Ban predicted that Trump would change his mind, because he is a “very successful business person” who would understand that the world economy is shifting away from fossil fuels toward “cleaner energies,” such as wind and solar. “I am sure he will make a fast and wise decision,” Ban insisted, adding that he hoped to meet with Trump soon.
Trump, on the other hand, has declared that he will boost the U.S. coal, oil, and shale industries, despite Obama’s announced goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions to 26-28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025.
Ban stated that many corporate giants, as well as states such as California, were already working to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. Additionally, dozens of nations have reaffirmed support for the Paris Agreement at the talks. Saudi Energy Minister Khalid al-Falih said that his country was “committed to meeting the world’s energy needs via the gradual transition towards a more environmentally sustainable future.”
Zimbabwean dictator Robert Mugabe likewise strongly supports the Paris deal. “It’s a matter of life and death,” he claimed, adding, “Let’s not squander the Paris Agreement through old bad habits.”
Mugabe should know quite a bit about “old bad habits.” He has ruled Zimbabwe with an iron fist for 36 years, in a brutal reign characterized by gross human rights violations. He has crafted a one-party state, periodically crushing his opposition. Between 1982-1985, it is estimated that around 20,000 Zimbabweans were killed in what has been described as “ethnic cleansing” — with Mugabe burying political opponents in mass graves.
Under Mugabe’s rule, Zimbabwe has been used as an example by economists of the terrors of hyperinflation. The nation’s gross domestic product (GDP) has declined 40 percent since 2000.
It is not surprising that authoritarians such as those found in Zimbabwe and Saudi Arabia do not worry about such constitutional restrictions on presidential power as found in the United States. However, both Obama and Kerry took oaths to follow the Constitution of the United States, and that would include submitting any agreements they reach to the Senate for ratification, as required under the Constitution.
A member of Trump’s transition team has reportedly said that the president-elect is examining how best to withdraw from the Paris Agreement within a year, rather than waiting the four years “required” by the deal agreed to by Obama and Kerry.
Hopefully, Trump will react to this globalist pressure to submit to the deal agreed to by Obama (but not yet ratified by the Senate) in a manner similar to the reaction of President Ronald Reagan in 1981 to demands that he support the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST). Very early in Reagan’s presidency, Secretary of State Alexander Haig asked Reagan to approve his continuing negotiations for LOST. Writing in his book Ronald Reagan, Dinesh D’Souza explained that LOST “was based on the premise that the mineral and natural resources of the oceans do not belong to the country that extracts them from the seabed; rather, they are the common property of all nations and should be shared according to some agreed-on formula.”
As D’Souza said of the tense confrontation between Reagan and Haig, instead of giving Haig the go-ahead, Reagan directed him to cease negotiations, and informed his secretary of state that he did not support the treaty. Haig protested Reagan’s position, arguing that negotiations had been carried on for years and that all the recent presidents supported the treaty, as well as most major political figures of both parties. Therefore, under this reasoning, Reagan really had no choice. In the words of the president of France, U.S. support for LOST was irreversible.
“Well, yes,” Reagan admitted, “but you see, Al, that’s what the last election was all about.”
“What?” Haig retorted. “About the Law of the Sea Treaty?”
“No, it was about not doing things just because that’s the way they’ve been done before.”
The same thing can be said about this election. Trump’s surprising win of the Republican Party nomination over 16 other candidates, many of whom can be described as political heavyweights, and then his upset victory over Democratic Party nominee Hillary Clinton, can certainly be characterized as an indication that the voters want to see things done differently from the way they have been done for the past many years.
Writing in The Internationalist, a blog of the globalist Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), Stewart Patrick lamented that Trump’s win was “because he recognized and tapped into deep public anxieties about the direction of the United States and its role in the world. Specifically, he understood that a growing number of Americans mistrust globalization, are weary of overseas commitments, and are determined to reassert sovereign control over U.S. borders.”
Patrick, who described himself as a supporter of globalism, cautioned his readers, “This theme of restoring U.S. sovereignty will surely be central to the Trump presidency.”
We can certainly hope so. How Trump reacts to these globalist threats from the president of France, the secretary-general of the UN, and the globalist elites in our own country will give us an early indication of whether he will successfully respond to this serious threat to the national sovereignty of the United States.
Photo: AP Images
