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May 22, 2013

John Thorne: They launched the 'Arab Spring' but now yearn for the good old days of a strongman

John Rosemond: 'Disciplinary math' adds up to parental successl

Warren Richey: Are prayers before public meetings OK? Supreme Court to decide
Rick Montgomery: Use of ADHD drugs as study aid raises concern on campuses

Brierley Wright, M.S., R.D.: 6 convincing reasons you should keep carbs in your diet

Eoin O'Carroll: Scientists examine nothing, find something

The Kosher Gourmet by Carole Kotkin: This soup is made from one of the great pleasures of spring: A wonderful pairing of rosy color and earthy tang

May 20, 2013

Richard A. Serrano: Is Meir Kahane's assassin now a changed man?

Hannan Adely: Town raises Palestinian flag at City Hall

Melissa Healy: Genetic copies of living people from embryos no longer science fiction
Morgan Housel: When smart investors do stupid things

Sharon Saloman, M.S., R.D.: Hunger games: Eat more, weigh less, without starving

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Jews Inducted into Rock Hall of Fame; Anton Yelchin co-stars in New "Trek" film; Kutcher (but not Kunis) visits Israel; Jewish TV Star Praises Jewish Rap Star

The Kosher Gourmet by Cathy Pollak: WARNING: This WALNUT CAKE WITH PRALINE FROSTING, perfect for afternoon coffee, is addicting

May 13, 2013

Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Why the giving of the document that would permanently change the world could only be done in desolation

David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church

Emily Alpert: Recession dragged down birth rates for less-educated women
Morgan Housel: The deep downside of home ownership

Peter Teffer: Will Dutch police soon be stalking cybercriminals on your computer?

Heidi McIndoo, M.S., R.D.: Meatless 'meat' can have its own set of problems

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: Celebrate! This must-try appetizer is delicate yet has depth of flavor: Corn-Leek Cakes with Caviar, Smoked Salmon and Creme Fraiche

May 10, 2013

Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be

Caroline B. Glick: The dirty little secret about Israel's Arabs

Mona Charen: Hawking's Moral Calculus: The man and the movement he embraces
Morgan Housel: The biggest retirement myth ever told

Sandi Doughton: Eyes may provide new insight into brain problems

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : The Great Gatsby's Jewish Ties; Jews in the "Time 100 list" List; People's Most Beautiful Women

The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer: A sweet-hot meal: Pear salsa spices up salmon

May 8, 2013

Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas

Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate

Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
Amanda Paulson: Study reveals sad truths about community colleges

Harvard Health Letters: Evidence weak that zinc, echinacea are beneficial

The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility

May 6, 2013

Edmund Sanders and Patrick J. McDonnell: Think Israel's objective in Syria is to weaken Assad or embolden the rebels? Think again

Brian Bennett: Israeli airstrikes may show weakness in Syrian defense

Michael Ollove: Millions of ex-felons, parolees and those on probation are about to be entitled to tax-payer paid health coverage
Karen Kaplan: Most men can skip PSA test for prostate cancer, urologists say

Kimberly Lankford: How to track down a lost life insurance policy

Dream of Mars exploration achievable, experts say

The Kosher Gourmet by Susan M. Selasky: EGGPLANT WRAPS are an easy, sumptuous and scrumptious meal

May 3, 2013

Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Human Courage and the Unavoidable, Disturbing Text

Steven Emerson: Attorney General Fights CAIR in Court, Lauds it in Public

Mediterranean diet helps beat dementia: study
Harvard Health Letters: When to be screened for a hearing problem

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Iron Man's Jewish Connections; Marc Maron's New TV Show; Martin Landau Grows Up with Israel; Shalom, Allan Arbus

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: A sweet surprise for Mother's Day dessert

May 1, 2013

Jonathan Rosenblum: An Improbable Journey to Orthodoxy

Jonathan Tobin: Blame Obama, Not Israel for Syria Push

Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Halena M. Gazelka, M.D.: Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: What you need to know about implanted pain relief devices

Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine

Jessica Shugart: When it comes to math, MRIs may be better than IQs

The Kosher Gourmet by Mario Batali: The celebrated chef on how high-maintenance ASPARAGUS RISOTTO need not be

April 29, 2013

Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust

Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?

Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Morgan Housel: He's rich, smart and old: Listen to him

Thomas Salinas, D.D.S.: Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: The safety of amalgam fillings

Harvard Health Letters: Tomatoes and stroke protection

Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: Swing into spring with lemon cream pie

April 26, 2013

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: The world is a mirror

Caroline B. Glick: Time to confront Obama

Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Kimberly Lankford: New strategies ease pain of paying for long-term care insurance

Howard LeWine, M.D.: Ask the Harvard Experts: Too much ibuprofen?

Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom: Jewish Major Leaguers, 2013; New Movies and Comedy Show; Shalom, 'Lumpy' (Leave it to Beaver)

The Kosher Gourmet by Emily Ho : A bright and cheerful salad to herald the warmer months ahead

April 24, 2013

Steven Emerson: Boston Bomber Exposes Islamist Secret

Morgan Housel Admit it: No one has any idea what's going on
Harvard Health Letters: Can you get headaches from headache medication?

Kerri-Ann Jennings, M.S., R.D.: How to easily get more Omega-3s in your diet

Melissa Healy: Pot in a pill: All the pain relief without the smoke

The Kosher Gourmet by Susan Russo: Chipotle Chili Butternut Squash Soup is bold, zesty, hot

April 22, 2013

Ken Dilanian: Counterterrorism's future is unclear

US man departing country arrested on terror charges
Barbara Williams: An unorthodox but growing treatment in a 9-year-old's battle against cancer

P.J. Skerrett, M.D.: How to recognize a good whole grain product

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom: Teen actor Jonah Bobo in New Flick: Hunky James Wolk on Mad Men; Erich Segal's Daughter Writes Prize-Winning Jewish Novel


Jewish World Review August 21, 2007 / 7 Elul, 5767

Eroding sovereignty

By Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | A likely upshot of President Bush's meetings this week with his Canadian and Mexican counterparts in Montebello, Canada, will be a further impetus to the effort to engage in what is euphemistically called the "harmonization" of the three countries' economies, regulatory systems and policies. The effect will be to contribute to what is on track to become one of the most worrying legacies of George W. Bush's presidency: a significant, and possibly irreversible, erosion in the nation's sovereignty.


Sovereignty is an abstraction to which few Americans give much thought. We take it for granted, like the air we breathe or the water we drink. Yet, the essence of the most successful political experiment in history — the United States of America — is the sovereign power entrusted by the people via our Constitution to our elected, accountable representatives.


Unfortunately, such sovereignty is endangered by those who believe the world of nation-states is too disorderly for efficient global commerce and the peaceable resolution of disputes. Call them the Transnational Progressives (conservative wit John O'Sullivan coined an abbreviation he insists must be spelled Tranzies). They prefer supranational arrangements like the European Union, run by wholly unaccountable bureaucrats.


The trouble for the Tranzies is that a lot of folks who value their freedoms — notably, the American people and many who represent them in Congress — generally don't fancy such arrangements. They see them for what they are: big government on steroids, unwieldy, unchecked and unresponsive to the will of the ruled.


So it is necessary for the Tranzies to resort to extraordinary means to supplant national governments. The European Union's architects have acknowledged privately they could never have pulled it off if the publics of the Continent's various nations understood what was afoot.


Today, we know a similar effort is at work behind the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) on the agenda at the Montebello Summit. In fact, thanks to Freedom of Information Act requests doggedly pursued by Judicial Watch, we know there are some two-dozen trilateral "working groups" whittling away our sovereignty — er, "harmonizing" our rules and regulations on immigration, the environment and health care with those of Mexico and Canada. This effort, as one of the SPP's admirers has put it, involves the nation-state's "erosion by stealth."


The way this is being done in the U.S. is by having the working groups operate secretively, with essentially no transparency or accountability to Congress, the media or the public.


In fact, even some proponents of the SPP and the North American Union (NAU) it ultimately seeks to institute, Greg Anderson of the University of Alberta and Christopher Sands of the Hudson Institute are beginning to worry about an approach they describe as "eschewing the more traditional diplomatic and trade negotiation models in favor of talks among civil service professionals and subject matter experts within each government... [which] places the negotiation fully within the authority of the executive branch in the United States."


They went on in a paper prepared for a recent Hudson event to declare "the [SPP negotiating] process must be made more transparent to answer legitimate citizen concerns about potential outcomes. ... The design of the SPP is flawed by the exclusion of Congress from the process."


At the same time the Bush administration is complicit in stealthy negotiations eroding U.S. sovereignty in our hemisphere, it is responding to aggressive behavior by others in ways that seem sure to encourage still more such erosions — if not vast new threats to our security.


For example, Russia's KGB thug-turned-president, Vladimir Putin, has announced his country would resume its Cold War practice of sending nuclear-capable, long-range aircraft on forays into or near the airspace of various Free World nations, including ours. According to the New York Times, during such a mission in July near U.S. bases on Guam, the Pentagon says it did not even bother scrambling fighters to intercept the Russian bombers.


A White House spokesman pooh-poohed this ominous behavior, saying "Militaries around the world engage in a variety of different activities" and that "it is not entirely surprising" that the Russians would engage in this one.


Meanwhile, The Washington Times' Bill Gertz reports the Chinese military recently proposed that the Pacific be divided into spheres of influence. Presumably, what the PRC has in mind is getting the part that includes Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Southeast Asia and the Philippines and acceding (for the moment at least) to the United States having Hawaii. While a senior American general scoffed at the idea, Mr. Gertz says: "Some pro-China officials in the U.S. government ... are said to favor the Chinese proposal."


Then, there is the Tranzies' defective Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST). The Bush administration hopes to get it ratified this fall with help from senators willing to join in entrusting 70 percent of the world's surface — its oceans and international seabeds — to supranational agencies and tribunals. Think this can't impinge upon our sovereignty? In fact, LOST lends itself to myriad erosions of U.S. sovereign conduct via the treaty's provisions with sweeping environmental, tax, business-related and military implications.


The 2008 presidential election is an opportune moment for a national debate about safeguarding America's sovereignty. The question is: Will there be much of it left to safeguard 14 months from now?


Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.

JWR contributor Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. heads the Center for Security Policy. Comments by clicking here.

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