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The Right Hook, a weekly segment which covers the machinations of the right wing, from the Republican Party to the Tea Party Patriots, and beyond. By Chris Bennett

After helping Republicans to win the U.S. House of Representatives three weeks ago, the Tea Partiers are coming to your local planning and zoning boards. Tea Partiers are convinced that local planning commissions engaged in sustainable development projects are really part of a United Nations conspiracy to destroy America’s freedoms, and to force citizens to live in “human habitation zones.” The source of this Tea Party paranoia is an eighteen-year old U.N. plan called Agenda 21. The Preamble to Agenda 21 states that greater attention to the environment will lead to “the fulfillment of basic needs, improved living standards for all, better protected and managed ecosystems and a safer, more prosperous future.” But Tea Party activists see sustainable, “smart growth” projects as part of a plot to remove them from their suburban homes and into so-called “hobbit homes” in congested cities. Stephanie Mencimer, writing for Mother Jones, reveals that the activists are inherently suburban in nature, and effectively part of a new pro-sprawl lobby. The Tea Party activists are bringing a new hostility to the planning meetings as well. They are angry at the growth planners, who they view as “the elites” planning “smart-growth communism.” While the Tea Party activists are showing up to meetings big on anger and short on facts, they are still quite capable of derailing sustainable growth projects. As in Tampa, Florida. Tampa is ranked as the nation’s worst city for commuters among the top 60 largest metro areas. City planners there sought to build a light-rail system to ease congestion. The conservative Tampa Bay Examiner wrote that sustainable development was “cover for an agenda to transfer American sovereignty to various tentacles of the United Nations.” Look for Tea Partiers to oppose anything that smacks of smart-growth, or sustainable economic development, or even a common sense solution, as part of a vast U.N. conspiracy to build black helicopter landing pads in America’s suburbs.

Sarah Palin recently weighed in on the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty. Writing her nuclear policy position in . . . Facebook, Palin says “And for those of you joining the United States Senate, don’t listen to desperate, politically-motivated arguments about the need for hasty consideration of the “New START” treaty. . . No New START in the lame duck!” However, Secretary of Defense Bob Gates said in the Wall Street Journal months ago that New START enjoyed the “unanimous support of America’s military leadership.” And the former head of Central Command and Pacific Command, retired Admiral William J. Fallon, calls the New START “an absolute no-brainer.” With a new TV reality series, and an upcoming book tour heavy on dates in Iowa and South Carolina, Palin has decided that now is a good time to bring partisan politics into the issue of international nuclear security.

Saul Anuzis, former chairman of the Michigan Republican Party, announced that he will run to replace Michael Steele as head of the Republican National Committee. Anuzis ran and lost against Steele in 2009. Speaking with Fox’s Neil Cavuto recently, Anuzis said he “just wanted to make the trains run on time.” Last week, the Southern Poverty Law Center revealed that Anuzis once endorsed a right-wing extremist, Kyle Bristow. While Bristow was president of Michigan State University’s Young Americans for Freedom, the SPLC listed the Young Americans as a hate group. During the time Bristow was affiliated with YAF, the group staged events such as “Catch an Illegal Immigrant Day,” held a “Koran Desecration” competition, and even threatened to distribute smallpox infested blankets to Native American students– but that was only a joke. A full year after Bristow’s exploits at MSU, Saul Anuzis said of him: “This is exactly the type of young kid we want out there.” Bristow for his part, has gone on to attend the Toledo College of Law. And, he’s become an author. His new book is “White Apocalypse.” According to the SPLC’s HateWatch, the plot revolves around “violent revenge fantasies against Jewish professors, [and] Latino and Native American activists.”

The Right Hook– Reality Based News and Views