John Holdren

The President’s panderfest

More disgusting still is the fallacious premise for all of this, being that homosexuals are somehow oppressed in America. They are not. Equating the opposition of Americans toward gay "marriage" (an oxymoron anyway) with oppression, and labeling all who do not unconditionally embrace the gay political agenda as homophobes is beyond disingenuous. — Erik Rush

Last month President Obama proclaimed June 2009 "Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Pride Month," and called "upon the people of the United States to turn back discrimination and prejudice everywhere it exists."

Although that proclamation resonates with noble sentiments, Erik Rush (in his article "The Myth of Homosexual Oppression") regards the President’s "shameless pandering" to the gay lobby as political payback to them for helping him get elected:

What’s even more disgusting is that during his June 29 panderfest, Obama equated the "struggle" of gay Americans for "equality" with American blacks’ quest for civil rights in the 1950s and 1960s. Now, all the junk science in the world isn’t going to alter the fact that homosexuality is a choice. There are sufficient experiential commonalities amongst gays that validate this assertion, and no evidence in the area of biological science to suggest otherwise. As such, I have always considered those who make the comparison between blacks and gays as the worst kind of scum.

In Rush’s view, the gay lobby is a front group for some unsavory political ideas:

At this juncture, neither I, nor any other conscientious Americans, seek to disenfranchise gays; we are simply opposed to their lobby’s far-left entrenchment and their attempts to redefine morality, marriage and their Orwellian desire for universal "imposed legitimacy." What’s going on now is nothing more than boilerplate far left intimidation and mass-scale brainwashing.

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He wrote what?

The progressive spirit seems unquenchable. Consider, for instance, John Holdren, the Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy — or simply President Obama’s "Science Czar." According to the anonymous individual who runs the zombietime weblog, Holdren has a lot of ‘splainin’ to do:

In a book [Ecoscience] Holdren co-authored [with Paul and Anne Erlich] in 1977, the man now firmly in control of science policy in this country wrote that:

• Women could be forced to abort their pregnancies, whether they wanted to or not;
• The population at large could be sterilized by infertility drugs intentionally put into the nation’s drinking water or in food;
• Single mothers and teen mothers should have their babies seized from them against their will and given away to other couples to raise;
• People who "contribute to social deterioration" (i.e., undesirables) "can be required by law to exercise reproductive responsibility" — in other words, be compelled to have abortions or be sterilized;
• A transnational "Planetary Regime" should assume control of the global economy and also dictate the most intimate details of Americans’ lives — using an armed international police force.

Impossible, you say? That must be an exaggeration or a hoax. No one in their right mind would say such things.

Well, I hate to break the news to you, but it is no hoax, no exaggeration. John Holdren really did say those things, and this report contains the proof.

In advocating "those things," might Holdren be excused for exaggerating just a bit? The zombie blogger, however, isn’t willing to cut him any slack:

Holdren wrote these things in the framework of a book he co-authored about what he imagined at the time (late 1970s) was an apocalyptic crisis facing mankind: overpopulation. He felt extreme measures would be required to combat an extreme problem. Whether or not you think this provides him a valid "excuse" for having descended into a totalitarian fantasy is up to you: personally, I don’t think it’s a valid excuse at all, since the crisis he was in a panic over was mostly in his imagination. Totalitarian regimes and unhinged people almost always have what seems internally like a reasonable justification for actions which to the outside world seem incomprehensible.

In his book, Holdren tacitly approves of putting sterilants in the water suppy, without any apparent reservations:

The fact that Holdren has no moral qualms about such a deeply invasive and unethical scheme (aside from the fact that it would be difficult to implement) is extremely unsettling and in a sane world all by itself would disqualify him from holding a position of power in the government.

But perhaps Holdren was just engaging in a few harmless gedankenexperiments, airing out ideas such as forced sterilization to prevent "social deterioration." The zombie blogger is dubious:

… it’s a different matter when the Science Czar of the United States suggests the very same thing officially in print. It ceases being a harmless fantasy, and suddenly the possibility looms that it could become government policy. And then it’s not so funny anymore …. Many of the bizarre schemes suggested in Ecoscience [Holdren’s book] rely on seriously flawed legal reasoning. The book is not so much about science, but instead is about reinterpreting the Constitution to allow totalitarian population-control measures.

If Holdren and the progressives have their way, there just might be a Planetary Regime in your future. Here’s a quote from his book:

Perhaps those agencies, combined with UNEP and the United Nations population agencies, might eventually be developed into a Planetary Regime—sort of an international superagency for population, resources, and environment. Such a comprehensive Planetary Regime could control the development, administration, conservation, and distribution of all natural resources, renewable or nonrenewable, at least insofar as international implications exist. Thus the Regime could have the power to control pollution not only in the atmosphere and oceans, but also in such freshwater bodies as rivers and lakes that cross international boundaries or that discharge into the oceans. The Regime might also be a logical central agency for regulating all international trade, perhaps including assistance from DCs to LDCs, and including all food on the international market. [Note: DCs = Developed Countries; LDCs = Least Developed Countries.]

The Planetary Regime might be given responsibility for determining the optimum population for the world and for each region and for arbitrating various countries’ shares within their regional limits. Control of population size might remain the responsibility of each government, but the Regime would have some power to enforce the agreed limits.

Like the song says, Everybody wants to rule the world — but since it’s all for our own good, who could possibly object? Do I hear a nomination for Planetary President? Why don’t we save some time and by unanimous consent simply appoint the guy already in the Oval Office?

Mike Gray