Post by Watchman on Dec 1, 2006 13:37:37 GMT -5
By Patrick Wood
Volume 5, Issue 12
This writer has never been accused of charging that all large corporations are guilty of initiating and perpetuating globalization. There are many businesses, including banks, who are led by moral, ethical and good-hearted businessmen or businesswomen. Just because a company might touch globalism does not mean it and its management or employees are evil.
Every bit of thirty-five years of research indicates that there is a relatively small yet diverse group of global players who have been the planners and instigators behind globalization for many decades. The primary driving force that moves this "clique" is greed; the secondary force is the lust for power. In the case of the academics who are key to globalism, a third force is professional recognition and acceptance (a subtle form of egoism and power.)
It is also important to understand that core globalists have full understanding of their goals, plans and actions. They are not dimwitted, ignorant, missinformed or naive.
The global elite march in three essential columns: Corporate, Political and Academic. For the sake of clarity, these names will be used herein to refer to these three groups.
In general, the goals for globalism are created by Corporate. Academic then provides studies and white papers that justify Corporate's goals. Political sells Academic's arguments to the public and if necessary, changes laws to accommodate and facilitate Corporate in getting what it wants.
An important ancillary player in globalism is the media, which we will call Press in this report. Press is necessary to filter Corporate, Academic and Political's communications to the public. Press is not a fourth column, however, because it's purpose is merely reflective. However, we will see that Press is dominated by members of Corporate, Political and Academic who sit on the various boards of directors of major Press organizations.
This report will attempt to identify and label the core players in the globalization process. The intent is to show the makeup and pattern of the core, not to list every person in it. Nevertheless, many people will be named and their associations and connections revealed. This is done for two reasons.
First, it will equip the reader be able to accurately identify other core players as they are brought into focus. Secondly, the reader will be able to pass over minor players who may sound like "big fish" but in fact are only pedestrians.
Organizational Memberships
The old saying, "Birds of a feather, flock together" is appropriate for the perpetrators of globalism. Sociologically speaking, they are like any other people group with like interests: they naturally tend to form societies that will help them achieve their common interests. A side-benefit of fellowship is mutual support and encouragement. Once formed, such groups tend to be self-perpetuating, at least as long as common interests remain.
In modern history, the pinnacle of global drivers has been the Trilateral Commission. Founded in 1973 by David Rockefeller and Zbigniew Brzezinski, this group is credited with being the founder of the New International Economic Order that has given rise to the globalization we see today.
The Council on Foreign Relations
Prior to the founding of the Trilateral Commission, the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) was the most significant body of global-minded elitists in the United States. As far back as 1959, the CFR was explicit about a need for world government:
"The U.S. must strive to build a new international order... including states labeling themselves as 'socialist'... to maintain and gradually increase the authority of the United Nations."
The site for the United Nations headquarters in New York was originally donated by the Rockefeller family, and the CFR world architects worked for many years to use the U.N. as a means to develop an image of world order. Indeed, the CFR membership roster has been, and still is a Who's Who of the elitist eastern establishment.
The first problem with the CFR is that it became too large and too diverse to act as a "cutting edge" in global policy creation. The second problem is that it's membership was limited to north America: What group could effect global changes without a global membership?
The CFR continues to be significant in the sense that politicians often look to its membership when searching for people to fill various appointments in government. It also continues to be a policy mill through its official organ, Foreign Policy.
While there are a several core global elitists in the ranks of the CFR, they represent a very small percentage of the total membership. Conversely, there are many CFR members who are only lightly involved with globalism. For this reason, we do not count the CFR as being central to globalization today.
The Trilateral Commission
David Rockefeller recognized the shortcomings of the CFR when he founded the Trilateral Commission in 1973 with Zbigniew Brzezinski. Rockefeller represented Corporate and Brzezinski represented Academic.
Together, they chose approximately 300 members from north America, Europe and Japan, whom they viewed as being their "birds of a feather." These members were at the pinnacle of their profession, whether Corporate, Academic, Political or Press. It is a testimony to the influence of Rockefeller and Brzezinski that they could get this many people to say "Yes" when they were tapped for membership.
Out of the 54 original U.S. members of the Trilateral Commission, Jimmy Carter was fronted to win the presidential election in 1976. Once inaugurated, Carter brought no less than 18 fellow members of the Commission into top-level cabinet and government agencies.
Perhaps no one has described the Trilateral operation as succinctly as veteran reporter Jeremiah Novak in the Christian Science Monitor (February 7, 1977):
"Today a new crop of economists, working in an organization known as the Trilateral Commission, is on the verge of creating a new international economic system, one designed by men as brilliant as Keynes and White. Their names are not well known, but these modern thinkers are as important to our age as Keynes and White were to theirs.
"Moreover, these economists, like their World War II counterparts, are working closely with high government officials, in this case President Jimmy Carter and Vice President Walter Mondale. And what is now being discussed at the highest levels of government, in both the United States and abroad, is the creation of a new world economic system - a system that will affect jobs in America and elsewhere, the prices consumers pay, and the freedom of individuals, corporations, and nations to enter into a truly planetary economic system. Indeed, many observers see the advent of the Carter administration and what is now being called the "Trilateral" cabinet as the harbinger of this new era."1
The pernicious influence of the Commission and its dominance of the U.S. Executive branch remains unchallenged to this day.
Ronald Reagan was not a member of the Trilateral Commission, but his Vice President, George H. W. Bush, was a member. The Commission's influence was safely perpetuated into the Reagan years.
The 1988 election of George H.W. Bush to the presidency further consolidated Trilateral influence in the U.S.
In 1992, Trilateral member William Jefferson Clinton followed in the presidency and contributed greatly to the cause of globalization.
In 2000, George W. Bush assumed the presidency. While it can be demonstrated that Bush is closely aligned with and totally dedicated to Trilateral goals, he is not a member of the Commission. However, Vice President Dick Cheney is a member of the Commission.
Obviously, Corporate's partnerships with Political, Academic and Press has been very successful.
The Original Membership: 1973-1978
A short look at the first U.S. membership list is instructive. We have taken liberty to organize the names according to broad functions, which is not fully adequate to explain the interrelationships. As one examines the biographies of these individuals, one sees a "revolving door" phenomenon where people rotate in and out of government, business, think-tanks, etc., on a regular basis. This is one several tests used to identify a member of the true core of global elite.
Trilateral Commission Membership, 19732
Banking Related
Ernest C. Arbuckle Chairman, Wells Fargo Bank
George W. Ball Senior Partner, Lehman Brothers
Alden W. Clausen President, Bank of America
Archibald K. Davis Chairman, Wachovia Bank and Trust Company
*Peter G. Peterson Chairman, Lehman Brothers
*David Rockefeller Chairman, Chase Manhattan Bank
Robert V. Roosa Partner, Brown Brothers Harriman & Company
Bruce K. MacLaury President, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis
John H. Perkins President, Continental Illinois National Bank and Trust Company
Press Related
Doris Anderson Editor, Chantelaine Magazine
Emmett Dedmon Vice-President and Editorial Director, Field Enterprises, Inc.
Hedley Donovan Editor-in-Chief, Time, Inc.
Carl T. Rowan Columnist
Arthur R. Taylor President, Columbia Broadcasting System, Inc.
Labor Related
*I. W. Abel, President United Steelworkers of America
Leonard Woodcock President, United Automobile Workers
Lane Kirkland Secretary-Treasurer, AFL-CIO
Senate/Congress
John B. Anderson House of Representatives
Lawton Chiles United States Senate
Barber B. Conable, Jr. House of Representatives
John C. Culver United States Senate
Wilbur D. Mills House of Representatives
Walter F. Mondale United States Senate
William V. Roth, Jr. United States Senate
Robert Taft Jr. United States Senate
Other Political
James E. Carter, Jr. Governor of Georgia
Daniel J. Evans Governor of Washington
*William W. Scranton Former Governor of Pennsylvania
Corporate
J. Paul Austin Chairman, The Coca-Cola Company
W. Michael Blumenthal Chairman, Bendix Corporation
*Patrick E. Haggerty Chairman, Texas Instruments
William A. Hewitt Chairman, Deere and Company
Edgar F. Kaiser Chairman, Kaiser Industries Corporation
Lee L. Morgan President, Caterpillar Tractor Company
David Packard Chairman, Hewlett-Packard Company
Charles W. Robinson President, Marcona Corporation
Arthur M. Wood Chairman, Sears, Roebuck & Company
William M. Roth Roth Properties
Academic
David M. Abshire Chairman, Georgetown University Center for Strategic and International Studies
Graham Allison Professor of Politics, Harvard University
Robert R. Bowie Clarence Dillon Professor of International Affairs, Harvard University
*Harold Brown President, California Institute of Technology
Richard N. Cooper Provost and Frank Altschul Professor of International Economics, Yale University
Paul W. McCracken Edmund Ezra Day Professor of Business Administration, University of Michigan
Marina von N. Whitman Distinguished Public Service Professor of Economics, University of Pittsburgh
Carroll L. Wilson Professor of Management, Alfred P. Sloan School of Management, MIT
Edwin O. Reischauer University Professor, Harvard University; former U.S. Ambassador to Japan
Law Firms
Warren Christopher Partner, O’Melveny and Myers
William T. Coleman, Jr. Senior Partner, Dilworth, Paxson, Kalish, Levy & Coleman
Lloyd N. Cutler Partner, Wilmer, Cutler, and Pickering
*Gerard C. Smith Counsel, Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering
Cyrus R. Vance Partner, Simpson, Thacher and Bartlett
*Paul C. Warnke
Partner, Clifford, Warnke, Glass, McIlwain & Finney
Associations
Lucy Wilson Benson President, League of Women Voters of the United States
Kenneth D. Naden Executive Vice President, National Council of Farmer Cooperatives
Think-Tanks
Thomas L. Hughes President, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Henry D. Owen Director, Foreign Policy Studies Program, the Brookings Institution
Miscellaneous
Anthony Solomon Consultant
* Indicates member of Executive Committee
Rockefeller and Brzezinski's strategy was nefarious, yet brilliant.
The election of democrat James Earl "I will never lie to you" Carter was assured by delivering the mostly democratic labor vote. This was accomplished by adding to the inner core: Leonard Woodcock (UAW), I.W. Abel (United Steelworkers) and Lane Kirkland (AFL-CIO).
By 1977, three more labor leaders were added to the membership: Glenn E. Watts (Communications Workers of America), Martin J. Ward (president of United Association of Journeymen and Apprentices), and Sol Chaikin, president of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union.
Leonard Woodcock served as Chief Envoy to China under Carter, and was largely responsible for solidifying economic and political ties with Communist China. [Editor's note: Any reader who is or was a member of one of these unions will instantly have flashes of insight as to the enduring duplicity of labor management -- you were effectively "sold down the river" starting 1973 and continuing into the present.]
Those commissioners who Carter brought into his administration (the initial "steering committee", if you will) were Walter Mondale (Vice President), Zbigniew Brzezinski (National Security Advisor), Cyrus Vance (Secretary of State), Harold Brown (Secretary of Defense) and W. Michael Blumenthal (Secretary of the Treasury,) among others.
As the Washington Post phrased it:
"Trilateralists are not three-sided people. They are members of a private, though not secret, international organization put together by the wealthy banker, David Rockefeller, to stimulate the establishment dialogue between Western Europe, Japan and the United States.
"But here is the unsettling thing about the Trilateral Commission. The President-elect is a member. So is Vice-President-elect Walter F. Mondale. So are the new Secretaries of State, Defense and Treasury, Cyrus R. Vance, Harold Brown and W. Michael Blumenthal. So is Zbigniew Brzezinski, who is a former Trilateral director, and, Carter's national security advisor, also a bunch of others who will make foreign policy for America in the next four years."3
Before Carter's term was completed, no less than 18 members (thirty percent of the U.S. Commission membership) of the Trilateral Commission served in his administration. Coincidence? Hardly!
This article purposely leaves out discussion of the non-U.S. membership of the Commission membership, which will be saved for another day. Suffice it to say that the European and Japanese contingents were just as powerful and effective in their respective home countries. Approximately one-third of the membership came from Europe and the other third from Japan. The joint membership met annually (no press allowed) to formulate policy and action plans for their respective regions. Many, if not most, of their policies were published in the Commission's quarterly journal, Trialogue.
The most damning argument ever launched against the Trilateral Commission is the unconstitutional influence of other governments and forces upon the U.S. For instance, Commission members are not elected nor representative of the general population of the U.S., yet they effectively dominated the Executive Branch of the U.S. government. When the Commission resolved policies (behind closed-doors) with non-U.S. members, who were a mere one-third minority, could it be said that foreign influences effectively controlled U.S. policy?
These concerns were never addressed by Congress or the Judiciary. The Executive branch would have nothing to address because it has been continuously dominated by Commission members -- who repeatedly assured us that there was no such conflict of interest. Of course, the answer to these questions are self-evident: U.S. interests, economic and political, have been subverted.
The economic subversion of the U.S. was studied in The August Review's For Sale: The United States of America and was likened to the plundering of a nation, the likes of which have not been seen in modern history.
Current Trilateral Membership
The following list of north American members is not exhaustive. These are selected because of their high visibility in positions within Corporate, Political or Economic and Press. A future installment of The August Review will examine the entire membership list more carefully and completely. The purpose here is to show that the Trilateral Commission has grown, rather than declined, in strength over the years.
Keep in mind that there is no enrollment or application process to belong to the Trilateral Commission. One is invited to join in a manner similar to a college student being "tapped" for membership in a fraternity. Thus, the process is highly selective and discrete. Candidates are thoroughly screened before invitation is delivered. For this reason, one can be relatively sure that anyone who is or who has ever been a member of the Commission is in the core of the global elite. There are likely a few members who are not truly a part of the core, but for the sake of aggregate analysis, this is not an important issue.
Volume 5, Issue 12
This writer has never been accused of charging that all large corporations are guilty of initiating and perpetuating globalization. There are many businesses, including banks, who are led by moral, ethical and good-hearted businessmen or businesswomen. Just because a company might touch globalism does not mean it and its management or employees are evil.
Every bit of thirty-five years of research indicates that there is a relatively small yet diverse group of global players who have been the planners and instigators behind globalization for many decades. The primary driving force that moves this "clique" is greed; the secondary force is the lust for power. In the case of the academics who are key to globalism, a third force is professional recognition and acceptance (a subtle form of egoism and power.)
It is also important to understand that core globalists have full understanding of their goals, plans and actions. They are not dimwitted, ignorant, missinformed or naive.
The global elite march in three essential columns: Corporate, Political and Academic. For the sake of clarity, these names will be used herein to refer to these three groups.
In general, the goals for globalism are created by Corporate. Academic then provides studies and white papers that justify Corporate's goals. Political sells Academic's arguments to the public and if necessary, changes laws to accommodate and facilitate Corporate in getting what it wants.
An important ancillary player in globalism is the media, which we will call Press in this report. Press is necessary to filter Corporate, Academic and Political's communications to the public. Press is not a fourth column, however, because it's purpose is merely reflective. However, we will see that Press is dominated by members of Corporate, Political and Academic who sit on the various boards of directors of major Press organizations.
This report will attempt to identify and label the core players in the globalization process. The intent is to show the makeup and pattern of the core, not to list every person in it. Nevertheless, many people will be named and their associations and connections revealed. This is done for two reasons.
First, it will equip the reader be able to accurately identify other core players as they are brought into focus. Secondly, the reader will be able to pass over minor players who may sound like "big fish" but in fact are only pedestrians.
Organizational Memberships
The old saying, "Birds of a feather, flock together" is appropriate for the perpetrators of globalism. Sociologically speaking, they are like any other people group with like interests: they naturally tend to form societies that will help them achieve their common interests. A side-benefit of fellowship is mutual support and encouragement. Once formed, such groups tend to be self-perpetuating, at least as long as common interests remain.
In modern history, the pinnacle of global drivers has been the Trilateral Commission. Founded in 1973 by David Rockefeller and Zbigniew Brzezinski, this group is credited with being the founder of the New International Economic Order that has given rise to the globalization we see today.
The Council on Foreign Relations
Prior to the founding of the Trilateral Commission, the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) was the most significant body of global-minded elitists in the United States. As far back as 1959, the CFR was explicit about a need for world government:
"The U.S. must strive to build a new international order... including states labeling themselves as 'socialist'... to maintain and gradually increase the authority of the United Nations."
The site for the United Nations headquarters in New York was originally donated by the Rockefeller family, and the CFR world architects worked for many years to use the U.N. as a means to develop an image of world order. Indeed, the CFR membership roster has been, and still is a Who's Who of the elitist eastern establishment.
The first problem with the CFR is that it became too large and too diverse to act as a "cutting edge" in global policy creation. The second problem is that it's membership was limited to north America: What group could effect global changes without a global membership?
The CFR continues to be significant in the sense that politicians often look to its membership when searching for people to fill various appointments in government. It also continues to be a policy mill through its official organ, Foreign Policy.
While there are a several core global elitists in the ranks of the CFR, they represent a very small percentage of the total membership. Conversely, there are many CFR members who are only lightly involved with globalism. For this reason, we do not count the CFR as being central to globalization today.
The Trilateral Commission
David Rockefeller recognized the shortcomings of the CFR when he founded the Trilateral Commission in 1973 with Zbigniew Brzezinski. Rockefeller represented Corporate and Brzezinski represented Academic.
Together, they chose approximately 300 members from north America, Europe and Japan, whom they viewed as being their "birds of a feather." These members were at the pinnacle of their profession, whether Corporate, Academic, Political or Press. It is a testimony to the influence of Rockefeller and Brzezinski that they could get this many people to say "Yes" when they were tapped for membership.
Out of the 54 original U.S. members of the Trilateral Commission, Jimmy Carter was fronted to win the presidential election in 1976. Once inaugurated, Carter brought no less than 18 fellow members of the Commission into top-level cabinet and government agencies.
Perhaps no one has described the Trilateral operation as succinctly as veteran reporter Jeremiah Novak in the Christian Science Monitor (February 7, 1977):
"Today a new crop of economists, working in an organization known as the Trilateral Commission, is on the verge of creating a new international economic system, one designed by men as brilliant as Keynes and White. Their names are not well known, but these modern thinkers are as important to our age as Keynes and White were to theirs.
"Moreover, these economists, like their World War II counterparts, are working closely with high government officials, in this case President Jimmy Carter and Vice President Walter Mondale. And what is now being discussed at the highest levels of government, in both the United States and abroad, is the creation of a new world economic system - a system that will affect jobs in America and elsewhere, the prices consumers pay, and the freedom of individuals, corporations, and nations to enter into a truly planetary economic system. Indeed, many observers see the advent of the Carter administration and what is now being called the "Trilateral" cabinet as the harbinger of this new era."1
The pernicious influence of the Commission and its dominance of the U.S. Executive branch remains unchallenged to this day.
Ronald Reagan was not a member of the Trilateral Commission, but his Vice President, George H. W. Bush, was a member. The Commission's influence was safely perpetuated into the Reagan years.
The 1988 election of George H.W. Bush to the presidency further consolidated Trilateral influence in the U.S.
In 1992, Trilateral member William Jefferson Clinton followed in the presidency and contributed greatly to the cause of globalization.
In 2000, George W. Bush assumed the presidency. While it can be demonstrated that Bush is closely aligned with and totally dedicated to Trilateral goals, he is not a member of the Commission. However, Vice President Dick Cheney is a member of the Commission.
Obviously, Corporate's partnerships with Political, Academic and Press has been very successful.
The Original Membership: 1973-1978
A short look at the first U.S. membership list is instructive. We have taken liberty to organize the names according to broad functions, which is not fully adequate to explain the interrelationships. As one examines the biographies of these individuals, one sees a "revolving door" phenomenon where people rotate in and out of government, business, think-tanks, etc., on a regular basis. This is one several tests used to identify a member of the true core of global elite.
Trilateral Commission Membership, 19732
Banking Related
Ernest C. Arbuckle Chairman, Wells Fargo Bank
George W. Ball Senior Partner, Lehman Brothers
Alden W. Clausen President, Bank of America
Archibald K. Davis Chairman, Wachovia Bank and Trust Company
*Peter G. Peterson Chairman, Lehman Brothers
*David Rockefeller Chairman, Chase Manhattan Bank
Robert V. Roosa Partner, Brown Brothers Harriman & Company
Bruce K. MacLaury President, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis
John H. Perkins President, Continental Illinois National Bank and Trust Company
Press Related
Doris Anderson Editor, Chantelaine Magazine
Emmett Dedmon Vice-President and Editorial Director, Field Enterprises, Inc.
Hedley Donovan Editor-in-Chief, Time, Inc.
Carl T. Rowan Columnist
Arthur R. Taylor President, Columbia Broadcasting System, Inc.
Labor Related
*I. W. Abel, President United Steelworkers of America
Leonard Woodcock President, United Automobile Workers
Lane Kirkland Secretary-Treasurer, AFL-CIO
Senate/Congress
John B. Anderson House of Representatives
Lawton Chiles United States Senate
Barber B. Conable, Jr. House of Representatives
John C. Culver United States Senate
Wilbur D. Mills House of Representatives
Walter F. Mondale United States Senate
William V. Roth, Jr. United States Senate
Robert Taft Jr. United States Senate
Other Political
James E. Carter, Jr. Governor of Georgia
Daniel J. Evans Governor of Washington
*William W. Scranton Former Governor of Pennsylvania
Corporate
J. Paul Austin Chairman, The Coca-Cola Company
W. Michael Blumenthal Chairman, Bendix Corporation
*Patrick E. Haggerty Chairman, Texas Instruments
William A. Hewitt Chairman, Deere and Company
Edgar F. Kaiser Chairman, Kaiser Industries Corporation
Lee L. Morgan President, Caterpillar Tractor Company
David Packard Chairman, Hewlett-Packard Company
Charles W. Robinson President, Marcona Corporation
Arthur M. Wood Chairman, Sears, Roebuck & Company
William M. Roth Roth Properties
Academic
David M. Abshire Chairman, Georgetown University Center for Strategic and International Studies
Graham Allison Professor of Politics, Harvard University
Robert R. Bowie Clarence Dillon Professor of International Affairs, Harvard University
*Harold Brown President, California Institute of Technology
Richard N. Cooper Provost and Frank Altschul Professor of International Economics, Yale University
Paul W. McCracken Edmund Ezra Day Professor of Business Administration, University of Michigan
Marina von N. Whitman Distinguished Public Service Professor of Economics, University of Pittsburgh
Carroll L. Wilson Professor of Management, Alfred P. Sloan School of Management, MIT
Edwin O. Reischauer University Professor, Harvard University; former U.S. Ambassador to Japan
Law Firms
Warren Christopher Partner, O’Melveny and Myers
William T. Coleman, Jr. Senior Partner, Dilworth, Paxson, Kalish, Levy & Coleman
Lloyd N. Cutler Partner, Wilmer, Cutler, and Pickering
*Gerard C. Smith Counsel, Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering
Cyrus R. Vance Partner, Simpson, Thacher and Bartlett
*Paul C. Warnke
Partner, Clifford, Warnke, Glass, McIlwain & Finney
Associations
Lucy Wilson Benson President, League of Women Voters of the United States
Kenneth D. Naden Executive Vice President, National Council of Farmer Cooperatives
Think-Tanks
Thomas L. Hughes President, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Henry D. Owen Director, Foreign Policy Studies Program, the Brookings Institution
Miscellaneous
Anthony Solomon Consultant
* Indicates member of Executive Committee
Rockefeller and Brzezinski's strategy was nefarious, yet brilliant.
The election of democrat James Earl "I will never lie to you" Carter was assured by delivering the mostly democratic labor vote. This was accomplished by adding to the inner core: Leonard Woodcock (UAW), I.W. Abel (United Steelworkers) and Lane Kirkland (AFL-CIO).
By 1977, three more labor leaders were added to the membership: Glenn E. Watts (Communications Workers of America), Martin J. Ward (president of United Association of Journeymen and Apprentices), and Sol Chaikin, president of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union.
Leonard Woodcock served as Chief Envoy to China under Carter, and was largely responsible for solidifying economic and political ties with Communist China. [Editor's note: Any reader who is or was a member of one of these unions will instantly have flashes of insight as to the enduring duplicity of labor management -- you were effectively "sold down the river" starting 1973 and continuing into the present.]
Those commissioners who Carter brought into his administration (the initial "steering committee", if you will) were Walter Mondale (Vice President), Zbigniew Brzezinski (National Security Advisor), Cyrus Vance (Secretary of State), Harold Brown (Secretary of Defense) and W. Michael Blumenthal (Secretary of the Treasury,) among others.
As the Washington Post phrased it:
"Trilateralists are not three-sided people. They are members of a private, though not secret, international organization put together by the wealthy banker, David Rockefeller, to stimulate the establishment dialogue between Western Europe, Japan and the United States.
"But here is the unsettling thing about the Trilateral Commission. The President-elect is a member. So is Vice-President-elect Walter F. Mondale. So are the new Secretaries of State, Defense and Treasury, Cyrus R. Vance, Harold Brown and W. Michael Blumenthal. So is Zbigniew Brzezinski, who is a former Trilateral director, and, Carter's national security advisor, also a bunch of others who will make foreign policy for America in the next four years."3
Before Carter's term was completed, no less than 18 members (thirty percent of the U.S. Commission membership) of the Trilateral Commission served in his administration. Coincidence? Hardly!
This article purposely leaves out discussion of the non-U.S. membership of the Commission membership, which will be saved for another day. Suffice it to say that the European and Japanese contingents were just as powerful and effective in their respective home countries. Approximately one-third of the membership came from Europe and the other third from Japan. The joint membership met annually (no press allowed) to formulate policy and action plans for their respective regions. Many, if not most, of their policies were published in the Commission's quarterly journal, Trialogue.
The most damning argument ever launched against the Trilateral Commission is the unconstitutional influence of other governments and forces upon the U.S. For instance, Commission members are not elected nor representative of the general population of the U.S., yet they effectively dominated the Executive Branch of the U.S. government. When the Commission resolved policies (behind closed-doors) with non-U.S. members, who were a mere one-third minority, could it be said that foreign influences effectively controlled U.S. policy?
These concerns were never addressed by Congress or the Judiciary. The Executive branch would have nothing to address because it has been continuously dominated by Commission members -- who repeatedly assured us that there was no such conflict of interest. Of course, the answer to these questions are self-evident: U.S. interests, economic and political, have been subverted.
The economic subversion of the U.S. was studied in The August Review's For Sale: The United States of America and was likened to the plundering of a nation, the likes of which have not been seen in modern history.
Current Trilateral Membership
The following list of north American members is not exhaustive. These are selected because of their high visibility in positions within Corporate, Political or Economic and Press. A future installment of The August Review will examine the entire membership list more carefully and completely. The purpose here is to show that the Trilateral Commission has grown, rather than declined, in strength over the years.
Keep in mind that there is no enrollment or application process to belong to the Trilateral Commission. One is invited to join in a manner similar to a college student being "tapped" for membership in a fraternity. Thus, the process is highly selective and discrete. Candidates are thoroughly screened before invitation is delivered. For this reason, one can be relatively sure that anyone who is or who has ever been a member of the Commission is in the core of the global elite. There are likely a few members who are not truly a part of the core, but for the sake of aggregate analysis, this is not an important issue.