Join us at the next meeting of the RI Tea Party at which we will have members from various groups, local tea parties, and committees share ideas about what has worked and how you can get involved in this most critical election year.   Reception starts at 6:00Pm and meeting commences at 6:45pm.  We’ll also unveil a Starter Kit for local tea parties to assist in organizing most effectively.  Bring your ideas!  We need everyone of you.  Don’t forget to bring a friend or neighbor!

What: RI Tea Party Meeting

Date: March 10, 2010

Time 6:00pm (doors open).  Meeting from 6:45pm-8:30pm

Location: Quonset O Club

200 Lt James Brown Blvd

North Kingstown, RO 02860

Vote HERE for the RI Tea Party under the category of Best Cause/Non-Profit of 2010 in the Providence Phoenix annual “Best Of” contest.

If you were unable to attend the wildly successful and energizing RI Tea Party meeting at the Quonset O Club this week, you can still catch all of the speakers at Anchor Rising (scroll down the page to Jan 27th). Thanks to the almost 400 people who came out for this phenomenal event. If we keep growing at this rate, we’re going to need to rent out the Dunk!

Also, a special thank you to all of the speakers and to Anchor Rising for filming and blogging about the meeting.

Just back from a national non-partisan conference for fiscally conservative grassroots organizers, RI Tea Party members are ready to roll out the most effective strategies to reclaim our state and our country by aiming to elect officials who will defend and protect our constitutionally granted individual rights. If you are like 80% of Americans, who are for smaller government that serves the people, instead of big government which the people must serve, then you are one of us!

January 27, 2010
Quonset O Club
200 Lt. James Brown Rd
North Kingstown, RI
How are we going to get this done in a state dominated by a progressive union- backed state legislature and federal delegation that refuses to listen to the will of the people? Come hear about our strategy at the next RI Tea Party Meeting, this Wednesday, January 27th, at which we will roll out The Rhode Island Model to take back our state and our country! Agenda as follows:

6:00PM: Doors open for Reception (Cash Bar and light snacks)
6:45PM: Meeting Commences: Unveiling “The Rhode Island Model” : Colleen Conley
7:00PM: Keynote Speaker: Steve Laffey
(former Mayor of Cranston)
7:20PM: Transparency and Accountability: Bill Felkner (OSPRI)
7:35PM: Candidate Recruitment and Volunteer Training:
Mark Zaccaria
(Candidate for 2nd Congressional District) and Sandra Thompson (Operation Clean Government)
7:50PM: Break-out Sessions
8:30PM: Recap and Adjourn

This is a CANT MISS MEETING FOR ANYONE WHO CARES ABOUT THE DIRECTION OF OUR STATE AND OUR COUNTRY!

Scott Brown is currently running a close race against Martha Coakley for Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat. If he wins, this would be an historic upset heard round the country in defense of the conservative cause and would stop Harry Reid’s efforts to push through Obamacare. Please click on this website and sign up to make some calls. There is a special section for out of state callers.

http://www.resistnet.com/profiles/blog/show?id=2600775%3ABlogPost%3A1888533

Wouldn’t it be ironic if the Senator who stops Obamacare holds the seat of the “Liberal Lion” who pushed so hard for the government takeover of healthcare for much of his career?

Save the date for the next RI Tea Party Open Meeting, scheduled for January 27, 2010 at 6:30PM. Location will be announced at a future date. Due to the standing room only crowd at the first meeting, we are looking for a larger venue to accommodate all participants. Members of various groups which have formed on our new RI Tea Party networking site (click Here)will share their successes and there will be plenty of opportunity to share new ideas and participate in group activities in a workshop fashion.

We must move beyond protesting to active citizen governance to really make our elected officials take notice. Until we take back our government, THEY will control OUR DESTINY. Are you ready to take it back?

Wither Sovereignty
Executive Order Amended to Immunize INTERPOL In America – Is The ICC Next?
By Steve Schippert, Clyde Middleton | December 23, 2009
Last Thursday, December 17, 2009, The White House released an Executive Order “Amending Executive Order 12425.” It grants INTERPOL (International Criminal Police Organization) a new level of full diplomatic immunity afforded to foreign embassies and select other “International Organizations” as set forth in the United States International Organizations Immunities Act of 1945.

By removing language from President Reagan’s 1983 Executive Order 12425, this international law enforcement body now operates – now operates – on American soil beyond the reach of our own top law enforcement arm, the FBI, and is immune from Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA) requests.

For Immediate Release December 17, 2009
Executive Order — Amending Executive Order 12425
EXECUTIVE ORDER
- – - – - – -
AMENDING EXECUTIVE ORDER 12425 DESIGNATING INTERPOL
AS A PUBLIC INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION ENTITLED TO
ENJOY CERTAIN PRIVILEGES, EXEMPTIONS, AND IMMUNITIES

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including section 1 of the International Organizations Immunities Act (22 U.S.C. 288), and in order to extend the appropriate privileges, exemptions, and immunities to the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL), it is hereby ordered that Executive Order 12425 of June 16, 1983, as amended, is further amended by deleting from the first sentence the words “except those provided by Section 2©, Section 3, Section 4, Section 5, and Section 6 of that Act” and the semicolon that immediately precedes them.

BARACK OBAMA
THE WHITE HOUSE,
December 16, 2009.
After initial review and discussions between the writers of this analysis, the context was spelled out plainly.

Through EO 12425, President Reagan extended to INTERPOL recognition as an “International Organization.” In short, the privileges and immunities afforded foreign diplomats was extended to INTERPOL. Two sets of important privileges and immunities were withheld: Section 2© and the remaining sections cited (all of which deal with differing taxes).

And then comes December 17, 2009, and President Obama. The exemptions in EO 12425 were removed.

Section 2c of the United States International Organizations Immunities Act is the crucial piece.

Property and assets of international organizations, wherever located and by whomsoever held, shall be immune from search, unless such immunity be expressly waived, and from confiscation. The archives of international organizations shall be inviolable. (Emphasis added.)

Inviolable archives means INTERPOL records are beyond US citizens’ Freedom of Information Act requests and from American legal or investigative discovery (”unless such immunity be expressly waived.”)

Property and assets being immune from search and confiscation means precisely that. Wherever they may be in the United States. This could conceivably include human assets – Americans arrested on our soil by INTERPOL officers.

Context: International Criminal Court

The importance of this last crucial point cannot be understated, because this immunity and protection – and elevation above the US Constitution – afforded INTERPOL is likely a precursor to the White House subjecting the United States under the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC). INTERPOL provides a significant enforcement function for the ICC, just as our FBI provides a significant function for our Department of Justice.

We direct the American public to paragraph 28 of the ICC’s Proposed Programme Budget for 2010 (PDF).

29. Additionally, the Court will continue to seek the cooperation of States not party to the Rome Statute and to develop its relationships with regional organizations such as the Organization of American States (OAS), the Arab League (AL), the African Union (AU), the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), ASEAN and CARICOM. We will also continue to engage with subregional and thematic organizations, such as SADC and ECOWAS, and the Commonwealth Secretariat and the OIF. This will be done through high level visits, briefings and, as appropriate, relationship agreements. Work will also be carried out with sectoral organizations such as IDLO and INTERPOL, to increase efficiency.

The United States is not a party to the Rome Statute – the UN treaty that established the International Criminal Court. (See: Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court)

President George W. Bush rejected subjecting the United States to the jurisdiction of the ICC and removed the United States as a signatory. President Bill Clinton had previously signed the Rome Statute during his presidency. Two critical matters are at play. One is an overall matter of sovereignty and the concept of the primacy of American law above those of the rest of the world. But more recently a more over-riding concern principally has been the potential – if not likely – specter of subjecting our Armed Forces to a hostile international body seeking war crimes prosecutions during the execution of an unpopular war.

President Bush in fact went so far as to gain agreement from nations that they would expressly not detain or hand over to the ICC members of the United States armed forces. The fear of a symbolic ICC circus trial as a form of international political protest to American military actions in Iraq and elsewhere was real and palpable.

President Obama’s words have been carefully chosen when directly regarding the ICC. While President Bush outright rejected subjugating American armed forces to any international court as a matter of policy, President Obama said in his 2008 presidential campaign that it is merely “premature to commit” to signing America on.

However, in a Foreign Policy in Focus round-table in 2008, the host group cited his former foreign policy advisor, Samantha Power. She essentially laid down what can be viewed as now-President Obama’s roadmap to America rejoining the ICC. His principal objections are not explained as those of sovereignty, but rather of image and perception.

Obama’s former foreign policy advisor, Samantha Power, said in an early March (2008) interview with The Irish Times that many things need to happen before Obama could think about signing the Rome Treaty.

“Until we’ve closed Guantánamo, gotten out of Iraq responsibly, renounced torture and rendition, shown a different face for America, American membership of the ICC is going to make countries around the world think the ICC is a tool of American hegemony.

The detention center at Guantánamo Bay is nearing its closure and an alternate continental American site for terrorist detention has been selected in Illinois. The time line for Iraq withdrawal has been set. And President Obama has given an abundance of international speeches intended to “show a different face for America.” He has in fact been roundly criticized domestically for the routinely apologetic and critical nature of these speeches.

President Obama has not rejected the concept of ICC jurisdiction over US citizens and service members. He has avoided any direct reference to this while offering praise for the ICC for conducting its trials so far “in America’s interests.” The door thus remains wide open to the skeptical observer.

CONCLUSIONS

In light of what we know and can observe, it is our logical conclusion that President Obama’s Executive Order amending President Ronald Reagans’ 1983 EO 12425 and placing INTERPOL above the United States Constitution and beyond the legal reach of our own top law enforcement is a precursor to more damaging moves.

The pre-requisite conditions regarding the Iraq withdrawal and the Guantanamo Bay terrorist detention facility closure will continue their course. meanwhile, the next move from President Obama is likely an attempt to dissolve the agreements made between President Bush and other states preventing them from turning over American military forces to the ICC (via INTERPOL) for war crimes or any other prosecutions.

When the paths on the road map converge – Iraq withdrawal, Guantánamo closure, perceived American image improved internationally, and an empowered INTERPOL in the United States – it is probable that President Barack Obama will once again make America a signatory to the International Criminal Court. It will be a move that surrenders American sovereignty to an international body whose INTERPOL enforcement arm has already been elevated above the Constitution and American domestic law enforcement.

For an added and disturbing wrinkle, INTERPOL’s central operations office in the United States is within our own Justice Department offices. They are American law enforcement officers working under the aegis of INTERPOL within our own Justice Department. That they now operate with full diplomatic immunity and with “inviolable archives” from within our own buildings should send red flags soaring into the clouds.

This is the disturbing context for President Obama’s quiet release of an amended Executive Order 12425. American sovereignty hangs in the balance if these actions are not prevented through public outcry and political pressure. Some Americans are paying attention, as can be seen from some of the earliest recognitions of this troubling development here, here and here. But the discussion must extend well beyond the Internet and social media.

Ultimately, a detailed verbal explanation is due the American public from the President of the United States detailing why an international law enforcement arm assisting a court we are not a signatory to has been elevated above our Constitution upon our soil.

We are pleased to announce the launch of our new RI Tea Party networking site HERE. The site offers members the opportunity to create groups, join committees, and network with others who are interested in effecting change at the local, state, and national level of our government. We’ve got a tough year ahead and we need each and every one of you to participate in some way!

Look for information on our next Open Meeting, scheduled for the last week in January. It’s time to implement your ideas, so jump on the new site and let’s get the ball rolling!

OCG State of the State Public Access TV Shows

Program #1. R.I. Tea Party: What and Why?

Guest Colleen Conley and host Bruce Lang talk about how the R.I. Tea Party came about and how it has grown and evolved. Following this historical review comes the question “What next and how?” Conley shares some interesting plans for her grassroots organization. Amid this interesting discussion, interviewer Lang poses this question: Can the reform groups affect change in RI government? “Absolutely!” replies Conley as she puts her finger on the reason why this election year will be decidedly different and why she is so hopeful.

Visit the website http://riteaparty.ning.com for more information about the R.I. Tea Party.

Program Note: This is the sixth in a series of interviews with prominent and influential Rhode Islanders, past and present.

Guest: Colleen Conley is President of the RI Tea Party

Host: Bruce Lang

Run time: 30 minutes

Broadcast dates and times:

Saturday, December 12 and 19 at 11:00 PM on Cox channel 13, Verizon channel 32, and Full Channel 9

Sunday, December 13 and 20 at 8:00 AM on Cox channel 13, Verizon channel 32, and Full Channel 9

Monday, December 14 and 21 at 9:00 PM on Cox channel 18, Verizon channel 31, and Full Channel 9

Thursday, December 17 and 24 at 9:00 PM on Cox channel 18, Verizon channel 31, and Full Channel 9