In my last arti­cle enti­tled, “As Above, So Below: The Glob­al­ist Agen­da Reflect­ed in Local Pol­i­tics Through ‘Coun­cil of Gov­ern­ments’,” I high­light­ed how COGs have been embed­ded in vir­tu­al­ly every state and every local com­mu­ni­ty inside the Unit­ed States. I described how the COG works with­in their own struc­ture in order to imple­ment UN-based plans at the nation­al, state, and local lev­els. I attempt­ed to pro­vide an exam­ple of how the COGs accom­plish their var­i­ous ini­tia­tives through ini­tia­tives such as the Pen­ny Sales Tax pro­gram that is being intro­duced all across the state of South Carolina.

Clear­ly, any­one who stud­ies the COG, even briefly, can under­stand that deci­sions are being made out­side of the nor­mal demo­c­ra­t­ic process. How­ev­er, a direct con­nec­tion between the COG and Agen­da 21, UN-style pro­grams is some­what hard­er to find … at least at first glance.

Nev­er­the­less, the COG and the con­cept of UN-based “sus­tain­able devel­op­ment” are indeed close­ly linked.

In this regard, the Cal­i­for­nia State COG, the Cal­i­for­nia Asso­ci­a­tion for Coun­cils of Gov­ern­ments (CALCOG), pro­vides us with the most eas­i­ly acces­si­ble information.

Via the CALCOG web­site, it becomes appar­ent that the CALCOG has been instru­men­tal for some time in the fur­ther­ing of “Sus­tain­able Com­mu­ni­ties” ini­tia­tives like Cal­i­for­nia SB 375 or Sus­tain­able Com­mu­ni­ties and Cli­mate Pro­tec­tion Act of 2008. In fact, the Region­al Trans­porta­tion Plan 2012–2035 sec­tion of the web­site with sub­sec­tion “Towards A Sus­tain­able Future,” brags that the South­ern Cal­i­for­nia Asso­ci­a­tion of Gov­ern­ments (SCAG) has been prepar­ing Region­al Trans­porta­tion Plans since 1976.

Thus, it might be inter­est­ing to note that some of the goals list­ed for the Region­al Trans­porta­tion Plans (RTP) by SCAG include, “encour­ag­ing active trans­porta­tion (non-motor­ized trans­porta­tion, such as bicy­cling and walk­ing)” and, more impor­tant­ly, to “Encour­age land use and growth pat­terns that facil­i­tate tran­sit and non-motor­ized trans­porta­tion.” (See Table 1.1 RTP/SCS Goals).

Here, the read­er can see once again anoth­er trend of encour­ag­ing non-motor­ized trans­porta­tion that coin­ci­den­tal­ly tends to be tak­ing place all over the rest of the coun­try as well, par­tic­u­lar­ly in major cities. To be clear, how­ev­er, this writer is not sug­gest­ing that cre­at­ing sys­tems of tran­sit that facil­i­tate walk­ing, cycling, or pub­lic trans­porta­tion is inher­ent­ly evil. This is not the case. With­out a doubt, such trav­el sys­tems should be made avail­able. How­ev­er, we must under­stand that, what­ev­er small and large­ly tem­po­rary ben­e­fits that may result from the COG sys­tem is only part of a larg­er agen­da, and that these ben­e­fits are indeed only of a tran­si­to­ry nature.

Thus, the sec­ond point regard­ing the state­ment, “Encour­age land use and growth pat­terns that facil­i­tate tran­sit and non-motor­ized trans­porta­tion” is very impor­tant because it is here that we see the hall­mark of Agen­da 21 – the cre­ation of a trans­porta­tion sys­tem that dis­cour­ages the use of motor vehi­cles and pri­vate trans­porta­tion. Indeed, such a trans­porta­tion sys­tem places a heavy bur­den upon rur­al com­mu­ni­ties and is only one step in chok­ing off the life­line that allows them to exist in a func­tion­al manner.

The CALCOG also appears to have been involved in California’s Cap and Trade scheme, imple­ment­ed under the 2006 Cal­i­for­nia leg­is­la­tion AB 32 (The Glob­al Warm­ing Solu­tions Act). Such a scheme designed to reduce indus­try and increase the cost of ener­gy for busi­ness­es and indi­vid­u­als alike is tak­ing shape all across the world and the rea­sons for sup­port­ing it from a glob­al­ist and/or eugeni­cist per­spec­tive are legion. At the very least, CALCOG seems to have rec­og­nized the Cap and Trade scheme as a great source of rev­enue for future pet projects fun­neled down to them from the shad­owy forces that form inter­na­tion­al policy.

In this instance, how­ev­er, it is easy enough to deduce that rev­enue gen­er­a­tion was a sec­ondary con­cern at best. First and fore­most are the UN-based man­dates that will inevitably chase bil­lions of peo­ple out of rur­al areas and into cities even as indus­try dis­ap­pears and the ener­gy costs, which are a nec­es­sary com­po­nent to any urban soci­ety, sky­rock­et out of reach for all but the super rich.

For years, much of this type of pub­lic-pri­vate, UN-based activism has been open­ly con­duct­ed by orga­ni­za­tions like the Inter­na­tion­al Coun­cil on Local Envi­ron­men­tal Ini­tia­tives (ICLEI), also known as Local Gov­ern­ments For Sus­tain­abil­i­ty.

ICLEI is an orga­ni­za­tion that is made up of over a thou­sand local gov­ern­ments (the major­i­ty being from the Unit­ed States) who have bypassed Fed­er­al and State law, as well as the Con­sti­tu­tion, in order to imple­ment Agen­da 21 poli­cies. Indeed, most major cities inside the Unit­ed States are now signed onto ICLEI.

As Cas­san­dra Ander­son of MorphCity.com writes in her arti­cle, “ICLEI: Inva­sive in 600 Amer­i­can Cities,” “ICLEI insti­tutes the UN Con­ven­tion on Bio­log­i­cal Diver­si­ty treaty that was with­drawn from a vote on the Sen­ate floor in 1994, so the treaty, designed for UN con­trol, is being imple­ment­ed in cities.”

ICLEI’s own web­site is quite open about their goals. It states:

Inter­na­tion­al Goals

Our pro­grams, and projects pro­mote par­tic­i­pa­to­ry, long-term, strate­gic plan­ning process that address local sus­tain­abil­i­ty while pro­tect­ing glob­al com­mon goods. This approach links local action to inter­na­tion­al­ly agreed-upon goals and tar­gets such as:

Agen­da 21,

the Rio Conventions:

The UN Frame­work Con­ven­tion on Cli­mate Change,

The UN Con­ven­tion on Bio­log­i­cal Diver­si­ty,

– (Source)

Ander­son has also con­duct­ed an inter­view with Richard Roth­schild, the first Coun­ty Com­mis­sion­er to offi­cial­ly oppose the Unit­ed Nations’ Inter­na­tion­al Coun­cil on Local Envi­ron­men­tal Ini­tia­tives, Roth­schild recount­ed some of the pro­vi­sions that prompt­ed him to oppose ICLEI ear­ly on – one of which being the pro­pos­al hav­ing to do with “city cen­ters,” “stacked urban dwellings,” and “pedes­tri­an and bicy­cle acces­si­ble” city cen­ters. Of course, this plan is vir­tu­al­ly iden­ti­cal to the plan being imple­ment­ed by the CALCOG in Cal­i­for­nia and oth­er COGs all over the country.

I, myself, wrote an arti­cle enti­tled, “South Car­oli­na Moves To Imple­ment Agen­da 21 Guide­lines,” where I addressed the same plan which was being pre­sent­ed to South Car­olini­ans at the state lev­el by the South Car­oli­na state leg­is­la­ture in con­junc­tion with the South Car­oli­na COG.

Although many COG mem­bers and gov­ern­ment “offi­cials” would have mem­bers of the pub­lic believe that this is mere coin­ci­dence, such a sug­ges­tion is entire­ly laugh­able. COG – at the nation­al, state, and local lev­els – are intro­duc­ing and imple­ment­ing plans which are iden­ti­cal to those being intro­duced and imple­ment­ed by ICLEI. More often than not, these plans are intro­duced with exact­ly the same language.

With so many inter­twin­ing boards, coun­cils, and com­mis­sions cross­ing between gov­ern­ment, busi­ness, NGOs, foun­da­tions, COGs, ICLEI, and oth­er orga­ni­za­tions, there is lit­tle won­der how so much can be accom­plished so fast with absolute­ly no fan­fare to accom­pa­ny it.

Yet, while most of the rela­tion­ships between COGs and ICLEI remain thor­ough­ly under­cov­er, some are becom­ing much more open.

For instance, it was announced in July 2011 that the Cen­tral Mid­lands COG of South Car­oli­na and the Tri­an­gle J COG of North Car­oli­na had offi­cial­ly become ICLEI affil­i­ates. The ICLEIUSA blog wrote the following:

ICLEI is pleased to wel­come two region­al affil­i­ates to the South­east Region. Hail­ing from the cap­i­tal region of South Car­oli­na, Cen­tral Mid­lands Coun­cil of Gov­ern­ment serves four coun­ties (Fair­field, Lex­ing­ton, New­ber­ry and Rich­land). Recent­ly, Cen­tral Mid­lands COG released and RFP for a region­al sus­tain­abil­i­ty plan cov­er­ing Rich­land and Lex­ing­ton coun­ties as well as Colum­bia, South Carolina’s cap­i­tal and long-time ICLEI mem­ber. ICLEI tools and resources such as the Sus­tain­abil­i­ty Plan­ning Toolk­it will help Cen­tral Mid­lands COG devel­op a strong and effec­tive plan.

Tri­an­gle J COG serves a sev­en-coun­ty region includ­ing North Carolina’s cap­i­tal, Raleigh (see­ing a trend here…) and has been active in the region’s sus­tain­abil­i­ty con­ver­sa­tions for some time now. Sim­i­lar to Cen­tral Mid­lands COG, Tri­an­gle J is start­ing the process to devel­op a region­al cli­mate action plan. The plan will focus on devel­op­ing the clean ener­gy econ­o­my, for which the Tri­an­gle region is already well posi­tions with its lead­ing research insti­tu­tions and man­u­fac­tures in smart grid, bio­fu­els and LED lighting.

The clean ener­gy econ­o­my focus aligns well with the oth­er project Tri­an­gle J is work­ing with ICLEI on: Tri­an­gle J COG was one of four nation­al awardees of Green Busi­ness Chal­lenge Imple­men­ta­tion Packs. This will be the first region­al Green Busi­ness Chal­lenge and will pro­vide recog­ni­tion and guid­ance for busi­ness­es in the region to reduce their ener­gy use and green their operations.

Tri­an­gle J COG facil­i­tates the Coun­cil for a Sus­tain­able Tri­an­gle, a group of sus­tain­abil­i­ty direc­tors from local gov­ern­ments, uni­ver­si­ties, and cor­po­ra­tions in the region. Tri­an­gle J’s region­al work with ICLEI will enhance the pro­grams already being under­tak­en by the sev­er­al ICLEI mem­bers in the region. [Empha­sis added] 

Obvi­ous­ly, the open part­ner­ship between the COG and ICLEI is not iso­lat­ed to the Car­oli­nas alone. In Octo­ber 2010, the North­west Michi­gan COG became an affil­i­ate of ICLEI as well. These are not like­ly to be the only open COG/ICLEI affil­i­ates and they will cer­tain­ly not be the last.

How­ev­er, the main point that needs to be under­stood is that the rela­tion­ship need not be offi­cial to be effec­tive. As I men­tioned ear­li­er, COGs have been imple­ment­ing and intro­duc­ing the very same leg­is­la­tion and pol­i­cy as ICLEI since their inception.

Clear­ly, the COGs are just one more under­cov­er arm of the inter­na­tion­al elite that wish to cage human soci­ety with smart grid tech­nol­o­gy, stacked city dwelling, and a sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduced population.

If anti-Agen­da 21 activists have been at odds for a tar­get in their local com­mu­ni­ties, they now need look no fur­ther than their local Coun­cil of Governments.

Source:  http://activistpost.com/2012/08/as-above-so-below-local-council-of.html

For more on this top­ic, lis­ten to Bran­don Turbeville’s 20-minute audio dis­cus­sion here:  Agen­da 21 & the COG Strat­e­gy Pt. 1