What the U.N. Environmental Wackos Really Want: $1,325 per Year From Each American Family For U.N. Bureaucrats!

By Paul Driessen and Duggan Flanakin

Friday, June 22, 2012 -- Green Jesus in Rio: enviro green or $$$ green?

The affirmations, resolutions and
guidelines are fascinating, but the funding mechanism is even more
eye-opening. Results of the U.N. conference in Rio de Janeiro, which
concluded Friday, calls for annual "donations" from the European Union
and Annex II (Kyoto Protocol) countries amounting to 0.7 percent of
their gross national product (GNP). With the combined GNP of
contributing nations totaling about $45 trillion in 2010, the transfers
would add up to $315 billion per year, or $3.2 trillion per decade.

President
Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton had previously
committed the United States to provide $105 billion annually, based on
our $15 trillion GNP. World Bank data for 2010 put U.S. per capita GNP
at $47,340 - meaning each American family of four would pay $1,325 a
year. [Query - Under our Constitution
only the House of Representatives can appropriate funds, so where did
the President and Secretary of State get the authority to "obligate" the
United States to pay a single red cent?] That may seem like chump change compared to Obamacare or the Obama
stimulus. But over a decade, U.S. citizens would be required to
contribute well over $1 trillion to U.N. sustainability schemes.

To oversee this unprecedented wealth transfer to U.N. bureaucrats and NGO activists, architects of "The FutureWeWant"
would establish "an intergovernmental process" to assess financial
needs; consider the effectiveness, consistency and synergies of existing
instruments and frameworks; evaluate additional initiatives; and
prepare reports on financing strategies. Implementation of this grand
scheme would be handled by an intergovernmental committee of 30
"experts" who would be accountable to no one, except perhaps the U.N.
secretary-general.

[And certainly we can trust the U.N. secretary-general, can't we? Remember how well the "Oil-For-Food" plan went in Iraq?]

The document reassuringly suggests that "aid
architecture has significantly changed in the current decade," and
"fighting corruption and illicit financial flows [has become] a
priority." Diogenes would search in vain for evidence of this.

Indeed,
the very idea of still more aid must be questioned. "Has more than $1
trillion in development assistance over the last several decades made
African people better off?" economist Dambisa Moyo asks in her book,
"Dead Aid." Her answer is an emphatic no.

Nevertheless, the U.N.
is determined to move forward, claiming that somehow, this time the
nations will get it right. Surely, the prospect of promoting
sustainability and saving the planet and its species will convert
scurrilous dictators and their cronies into honest leaders who would
never divert eco-funding to political friends, Swiss bank accounts or
crony-capitalist wind and solar projects.

Following Rio de
Janeiro's Christ the Redeemer statue bathed in green light for the U.N.
confab and the National Religious Partnership for the Environment
proselytizing at Rio+20, surely these sinners will sin no more.

Meanwhile,
Statement 61 helpfully pronounces that "urgent action on unsustainable
patterns of production and consumption ... remains fundamental in
addressing environmental sustainability" and each country should
"consider the implementation of green economy policies in the context of
sustainable development and poverty eradication."

In essence, the
Rio+20 message is, "You got a problem? Team U.N. has an app for that."
From poverty eradication to food security, nutrition and sustainable
agriculture, from water, sanitation and energy to tourism, sustainable
cities and "human settlements," "The FutureWeWant" has it covered. Of course, there are caveats.

Everyone
should have access to safe, sufficient, nutritious food , but
biotechnology, chemical fertilizers and modern mechanized farming are
unsustainable. Electricity is vital, but the 1.4 billion people now
without lights or refrigeration must be content with "green energy."
Health is an indicator of sustainable development, but no DDT, please.[The Environmental Wackos ban on DDT at the cost of millions of lives of African children is a whole other story!]

The
authors promise "full and productive employment, decent work for all
and social protections" for workers. [Isn't
that what Obama promised when his Department of Energy "loaned" $16
billion to "green" companies, 85% of which had junk bond ratings and
promptly declared bankruptcy?]They pledge to clean up the oceans,
stop illegal mining and fishing, and ensure that only "sustainable
forest management" prevails (the kind that produces uncontrollable
wildfires).

[I'm thinking they should hire the Las Vegas illusionist, Criss Angel, as a consultant on producing this illusion they are promising! At least he would be more entertaining than the U.N. bureaucrats living the high-life in N.Y. off bloated budgets while doing nothing productive.]

"TheFutureWeWant" also
lauds women, the scientific and technological community, indigenous
peoples, young people, workers, trade unions, small-scale farmers, NGOs
and "civil society." However, it places additional burdens on
corporations that will be expected to generate trillions for U.N.
sustainability programs.

The document also includes multiple
proposals for technology transfers - absent any references to
protections for patents and intellectual property rights. Not included
in the final text was language "respecting the right to freedom of
association and assembly, in accordance with our obligations under
international law."

This is just a sampling. Recall that there are
283 statements, mostly offering pious and well-intended but naive
sentiments - earnest but contradictory and self-defeating solutions.

Paul
Driessen is senior policy adviser for the Committee for a Constructive
Tomorrow (CFACT.org) and author of "Eco-Imperialism: Green Power, Black
Death" (Merril Press, 2010). Duggan Flanakin is director of research and
international programs for CFACT.