Community Fascism coming to your town next?

March 20, 2010 09:59


Green groups are pushing city councils to use ’emergency powers’ to push global warming agenda locally without public input.

Peter Wilson at American Thinker writes:

The Cambridge, Massachusetts Climate Emergency Congress (CEC) is more than a grassroots group of out-of-touch leftists. Rather, it is a casebook study of a new movement of “climate community activism” that pushes sustainability issues in municipal governments. It is a worldwide movement that bears watching.

The largest player in this movement was founded in 1990 to fight ozone pollution under the name “International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives.” It is now known as the ICLEI-Local Governments for Sustainability. ICLEI is a global organization of 1,124 municipalities and regional organizations. The Clinton Foundation’s Climate Initiative is also a major force in organizing municipalities through their C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group.
Through the ICLEI, Cambridge is a member of the Copenhagen Catalogue of City Commitments to Combat Climate Change (CCCCCCC? C7?) and a member of Local Agenda 21 (LA21), an initiative created “with support of the UN Secretariat for the World Summit on Sustainable Development and in collaboration with the UN Development Programme Capacity 21.” The LA21 survey reveals that “6,416 local authorities in 113 countries have … made a formal commitment to Local Agenda 21.”
The first step the Cambridge City Council (CCC? C3?) took, in May 2009, was the declaration of a Climate Emergency. At the time it seemed a bit melodramatic, but it was actually an ingenious move. Consider this quote from the CEC Final Proposal.
That where the city lacks the necessary legal authority to exert such preferences, it attempts to obtain this authority as justified by the city’s emergency powers in accordance with the law.
“Emergency powers”? The declaration of emergency powers has been used legitimately in times of war, but frequently it is a pretext for petty tyrants like Hugo Chávez to suppress democracy. I doubt we’ll see martial law in Cambridge, but the declaration of a climate emergency served the important role of justifying every action taken afterward, as is apparent in the opening of the Final Proposal:
Whereas The Cambridge City Council has recognized a Climate Emergency …
Whereas There is now a global Climate Emergency that requires urgent action …
The next step taken was the formation of the Climate Congress. The LA21 literature describes this strategy precisely:
Establish a multi-sector stakeholder group to oversee the LA21 process, consisting of representatives from all sectors of the community, that will be formally involved in the development and implementation of all actions aiming at the achievement of the LA21 Campaign milestones.
Cambridge Mayor Denise Simmons followed this playbook by issuing the following announcement:
While world leaders delay on taking serious action on climate change, the City of Cambridge, along with other cities world-wide, is weighing in. We know that time is short to deal with the climate crisis, and we know that we can take actions that will … reduce our contributions to global climate change…
I am inviting organizations of all kinds, community groups, businesses, institutions and faith-based organizations, to nominate representatives to participate in the Congress. Individuals are also invited to apply. Up to 100 delegates will be selected to represent the full diversity of Cambridge’s population, institutions, and organizations.
Again, this is an ingenious move. The City Council wishes to pass a sweeping set of legislative changes, but rather than holding a series of public hearings discussing whether action should be taken, they created a “stakeholder” group with the explicit purpose of responding to the agreed-upon climate emergency.


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