BULGARIA TO SOON RATIFY LISBON

PREMEDITATED MERGER Resolution fights North American Union
Urges U.S. to withdraw from Security and Prosperity Partnership
February 1, 2008 By Jerome R. Corsi 2008 WorldNetDaily.com

Utah state Rep. Stephen Sandstrom

A state lawmaker in Utah has introduced a resolution encouraging the U.S. to withdraw from the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America and any other bilateral activity that would move the country toward an EU-style continental merger. Republican state Rep. Stephen Sandstrom introduced House Resolution 1 to the Utah legislature this week after a similar measure passed the House last year by a 47-24 vote but was blocked by a Senate committee just before the session's close. I feel confident we will get this resolution passed this year, Sandstrom told WND. We learned a lot last year about our opponents, and this year we are better prepared to anticipate their legislative moves to block us.The resolution reads in part: The gradual creation of such a North American Union from a merger of the United States, Mexico and Canada would be a direct threat to the United States Constitution and the national independence of the United States and would imply an eventual end to national borders within North America.

In a speech given in Salt Lake City to the Utah Eagle Forum's annual convention Jan. 19, Sandstrom compared the move toward a North American Union to the stealth methodology used by corporate elite to move Europe toward the European Union. The 50-year process began with the European Coal and Steel Agreement in 1957. While the newspaper articles and reporters published the sequential events of European integration, most people in the European Community nations thought, Ho-hum – no big deal, Sandstrom told the Eagle Forum meeting. As a matter of fact, the Europeans continued to sleep like Gulliver until they were jolted awake when the euro replaced their national currencies.When the euro was introduced, Sandstrom explained, fortunes were made and lost, savings were devalued, prices and commodities were suddenly revalued, borders essentially evaporated and individual countries could no longer control their own immigration laws. Even their national flags – for which their ancestors had fought and died – were slowly being replaced by the flag of the European community, with its twelve golden stars on a blue background, he continued. When that happened, many political leaders and vast numbers of usurped citizens wanted to stop the pan-European train and get off, but it was too late, he said. Too late, because they were part and parcel of the European Union – now and forever.Sandstrom explained he introduced H.R. 1 a second time because he wants to stop the forward movement of the Security and Prosperity Partnership into a North American market, following the European model in which economic integration inevitably led to political integration. Just as in the European market decades ago, he told the Eagle Forum audience, now there are both official and ad hoc forces here in the U.S. that continually press for further integration and harmonization at every opportunity.As evidence, Sandstrom cited the free flow of labor invited to the U.S. by the failure to secure the border with Mexico, the push by the Bush administration to expand NAFTA and CAFTA by a series of individual free trade agreements seeking to push open markets country by country – first into Peru, followed by Columbia and Panama – and the bureaucratic trilateral working groups seeking under SPP to integrate and harmonize U.S. administrative laws with those in Mexico and Canada.

We cannot and will not tolerate – not without a fight – the tearing down of 232 years of sovereign progress in which American has protected the etched-in-stone, under-God principles that were bequeathed to us by our founding fathers, he concluded. According to tabulation on StopTheNau.org, 13 states have now passed similar resolutions opposing the SPP and the movement toward a future North American Union. Utah is among six states considering a resolution against the SPP. As WND reported, Rep. Virgil Goode, R-Va., has introduced into the U.S. House of Representatives a resolution expressing congressional opposition to construction of a NAFTA super highway system or entry into a North American Union with Mexico and Canada. Goode's House Concurrent Resolution 40 currently has 43 bipartisan co-sponsors.

Slovenia, a presidency blowing from the East
By Jean-Séb 2.0 on Friday, February 1 2008, 10:59 - The investigations of the Parisienne.

In the little European world, let’s bet history will remember this beginning of 2008; but why? you will ask … Since for the fist time, a new member country from the 2004 eastern enlargement will preside over the EU. I name Slovenia, a small country of 2 million inhabitants, stuck between Italy, Austria and the Balkans.Before even talking about Slovenia and the imagination that women in this country ignites, one existential question: the EU presidency, what is the fuss all about?

This is a rotating presidency system where every six month a country hands it over to another one in order to avoid any possibility of jealousy.The country who inherits of this honor presides the two European Council meetings and meetings of the EU Council and the working bodies to prepare the Council’s work. It is then to represent the EU by other the organs and institutions of the EU and become the EU representative within the international institutions and third-countries.

This is job to define the working priorities.

The next presidencies work together so the orientations do not drastically change every six months. The Slovenian representatives are then in touch with the French and Czech ones and had planned their agenda in collaboration with Portugal.

What will Slovenia be up to in the next six months?

·Treaty of Lisbon: have the treaty ratified as soon as possible by all the EU members. Most of the countries have planned to do so through a parliamentary vote, except Ireland whose constitution requires a referendum to be held. So far, only Hungary did it and France plans on ratifying it in February 2008.

·Growth and employment: ensure implementation of the Lisbon Strategy that will make Europe the most competitive economy by 2010. Right now, we are not even close since besides some vague objectives, everything has been left to the States’ responsibility. And some countries seem to be reluctant to follow the general indications such as the increase of the R&D and higher education budgets.

·Energy and climate change: Slovenia is willing to keep up the efforts that the EU has made as far as environment and its protection are concerned. In January a new strategy should be taken on. And we shall not forget the international discussions in progress on the negotiation of an after-Kyoto.

·Western Balkans: Slovenia is the frontier-country where Western Balkans begin and was as well created out of the former Yugoslavia. This region will be an international key-priority with the negotiations on the independence of Kosovo and the EU enlargement process to Croatia that Slovenia strongly supports.

The teacher’s pet

Slovenia got out of communism 17 years ago, into the EU 4 years ago and adopted the Euro in 2007: an absolutely flawless school report. With an average national growth of 5% for a 4, 4% unemployment rate and a GDP per inhabitants of 15 000 euros, this economic dynamism might make some others jealous in Western Europe.One snag though: for about a year, inflation have come back. Some may explain it with the Euro adoption; however it seems coming from the increasing prices of oil, raw materials and from a lack of concurrence in the services.

Relations with France

Between Paris and Lubjana there has never been passionate love, just the right amount needed. In deed, after the dismantling of Yugoslavia, France had hesitated to recognize the independence of Slovenia. But the country managed to avoid the bloody wars between 1991 and 1995 due to the distance with Belgrade and its ethnic homogeneity. And France will help during the Slovenian presidency. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs will lend its embassies in countries where Slovenia does not have one.

Slov-what?

One problem remains on the international level for Slovenia. Its name. Often mixed up with Slovakia. Every year, 600kg of mails are lost between the two countries. So you know: in 1999, G .W. Bush, governor of Texas at that time and candidate to the White House declared to a Slovakian journalist: all I know about Slovakia is what your Prime Minister told me when he came to Texas – that is not much since he actually refers to the visit of Janez Drnovsek, Prime Minister of Slovenia… Guess who’s taking over after Slovenia for the second semester of 2008? France, of course!

Bulgaria and the World,Cabinet submits Lisbon Treaty for Parliament ratification 10:27 Fri 01 Feb 2008 - Alex Bivol

Bulgaria's Cabinet approved on January 31 the EU's Lisbon Treaty, submitting it for ratification to Parliament.Signed on December 13 2007, the treaty reforms the way the 27-country bloc will operate starting from 2014, but stopped short of the complete overhaul envisioned by the proposed EU constitution, shot down at referendums in France and the Netherlands.Bulgaria has secured two notable concessions in the treaty - it would have an unchanged number of seats in European Parliament and would be allowed to spell the common European currency as 'evro', the way it is written in Cyrillic and pronounced in Bulgarian, rather than the uniform 'euro', on which the European Central Bank insisted, the Cabinet said in a statement.The treaty has been already ratified by Slovenia, the current holder of the rotating presidency of the bloc, Malta and Hungary.It would enter into force on January 1 2009, provided all countries ratify it during 2008.

Report: Military not ready for WMD strike
Commission on National Guard cites troop, equipment, training shortages Visar Kryeziu / AP file

updated 2:44 p.m. ET, Thurs., Jan. 31, 2008
WASHINGTON - The U.S. military isn't ready for a catastrophic attack on the country, and National Guard forces don't have the equipment or training they need for the job, a commission charged by Congress reported Thursday.Even fewer Army National Guard units are combat-ready today than were nearly a year ago when the Commission on the National Guard and Reserves determined that 88 percent of the units were not prepared for the fight, the panel said in its report.The independent commission is charged by Congress to recommend changes in law and policy concerning the Guard and Reserves.The commission's 400-page report concludes that the nation does not have sufficient trained, ready forces available to respond to a chemical, biological or nuclear weapons incident, an appalling gap that places the nation and its citizens at greater risk.

Right now we don't have the forces we need, we don't have them trained, we don't have the equipment, commission Chairman Arnold Punaro said in an interview with The Associated Press. Even though there is a lot going on in this area, we need to do a lot more. ... There's a lot of things in the pipeline, but in the world we live in — you're either ready or you're not.

Not as robust ... but I could respond

In response, Air Force Gen. Gene Renuart, chief of U.S. Northern command, said the Pentagon is putting together a specialized military team that would be designed to respond to such catastrophic events.The capability for the Defense Department to respond to a chemical, biological event exists now, Renuart told the AP. It, today, is not as robust as we would like because of the demand on the forces that we've placed across the country. ... I can do it today. It would be harder on the (military) services, but I could respond.Over the next year, Renuart said, specific active duty, Guard and Reserve units will be trained, equipped and assigned to a three-tiered response force totaling about 4,000 troops. There would be a few hundred first responders, who would be followed by a second wave of about 1,200 troops that would include medical and logistics forces.The third wave, with the remainder of that initial 4,000 troops, would include aircraft units, engineers, and other support forces, depending on the type of incident.Punaro, a retired Marine Corps major general, had sharp criticism for Northern Command, saying that commanders there have made little progress developing detailed response plans for attacks against the homeland.NorthCom has got to get religion in this area, said Punaro. He said the military needs to avoid pickup game type responses, such as the much-criticized federal reaction to Hurricane Katrina, and put in place the kind of detailed plans that exist for virtually any international crisis.

No. 1 recommendation

He also underscored the commission's main finding: the Pentagon must move toward making the National Guard and Reserves an integral part of the U.S. military.The panel, in its No. 1 recommendation, said the Defense Department must use the nation's citizen soldiers to create an operational force that would be fully trained, equipped and ready to defend the nation, respond to crises and supplement the active duty troops in combat.Pointing to the continued strain on the military, as it fights wars on two fronts, the panel said the U.S. has no reasonable alternative other than to continue to rely heavily on the reserves to supplement the active duty forces both at home and abroad.Using reserves as a permanent, ready force, the commission argued, is a much more cost effective way to supplement the military since they are about 70 percent cheaper than active duty troops.Asked how much it would cost to implement the panel's recommendations, Punaro said it will take billions to fully equip the Guard. The commission is going to ask the Congressional Budget Office to do a cost analysis, he said.In perhaps its most controversial recommendation, the panel again said that the nation's governors should be given the authority to direct active-duty troops responding to an emergency in their states. That recommendation, when it first surfaced last year, was rebuffed by the military and quickly rejected by Defense Secretary Robert Gates.

I believe we're going to wear him down, said Punaro.

Renuart, however, said he believes it is unlikely that Gates will reverse himself. Renuart said he's talked to a number of state leaders on the matter, and most don't want full command of active duty troops _ to include their care, feeding, discipline and logistics demands. Instead, he said, governors want to know that in a crisis, their needs will be met.The report is online at www.cngr.gov.