President Quietly Creating 'NAFTA Plus'

Without announcing his intentions to do so, President Bush has decided to support the creation of a North American Union through a process of governmental regulations, never having to bring the issue before the American people for a clear referendum or vote.

The Bush Administration has decided to "back-door" the creation of a North American Union political entity that would effectively erase our borders with Mexico and Canada and create several super-regional governing bodies that would have jurisdiction over the U.S. Congress and the U.S. Supreme Court.

This analysis has been advanced by economist Miguel Pickard at the Center for Economic and Political Research for Community Action (CIEPAC) in Chiapas, Mexico. Writing for the International Relations Center in New Mexico, Pickard explains how what he calls "NAFTA Plus" is being put in place by political elites in the U.S., Mexico, and Canada [this link is long, but a must read], largely without explanation to or understanding by the public in any of the three countries:

Contrary to NAFTA, whose tenets were laid out in a single negotiated treaty subjected to at least cursory review by the legislatures of the participating countries, NAFTA Plus is more the elites’ shared vision of what a merged future will look like. Their ideas are being implemented through the signing of "regulations," not subject to citizens' review. The vision may initially have been labeled NAFTA Plus, but the name gives a mistaken impression of what is at hand, since there will be no single treaty text, no unique label to facilitate keeping tabs. Perhaps for this reason, some civil society groups are calling the phenomenon by another name, the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPPNA), an official sobriquet for the summits held by the three chief executives to agree on the future of "North America."

Packard argues that a driving reason Bush has embraced the idea of creating the North American Union is to secure natural resources -- Canadian water as well as oil and natural from both Canada and Mexico. Regarding water, Packard notes that "Bush declared that Canada’s water was part of the United States' energy security." As evidence, he cites "mega-projects" proposed by the U.S., such as a "Grand Canal" that would transport "plentiful water from Canadian rivers and lakes to the Great Lakes." Regarding oil and natural gas, Packard comments that a North American Union would "guarantee a relatively cheap flow of oil," making the idea of creating a single North American space suddenly "not so ludicrous."

Wikipedia entry on the North American Union

Security and Prosperity Partnership Of North America

Building a North American Community - A Task Force Report from the Council on Foreign Relations