If President Obama signs the global climate treaty in Copenhagen, he will unravel the U.S. Constitution and usher in a one-world government. That, at least, is the dire warning of global warming skeptic Christopher Monckton in a speech to the Minnesota Free Market Institute. The video of his speech has been circulating through the conservative blogosphere at a breakneck pace.

Clearly, his conspiracy theories struck a nerve:

I read that treaty. And what it says is this, that a world government is going to be created. The word 'government' actually appears as the first of three purposes of the new entity. The second purpose is the transfer of wealth from the countries of the West to third world countries, in satisfaction of what is called, coyly, 'climate debt' - because we've been burning CO2 and they haven't. We've been screwing up the climate and they haven't. And the third purpose of this new entity, this government, is enforcement.

While Monckton's words were swiftly dismissed by the few liberals who bothered to react, a slew of conservative pundits approvingly linked to the video, including blogger Michelle Malkin, radio host Alex Jones, "birther" lawyer Orly Taitz, and that clearinghouse of conservative news, World Net Daily. If nothing else, the burst of reaction illustrates how far right-wing fears about Obama's loyalties have gone, with many playing on the theme of whether the president is planning to "cede U.S. sovereignty."

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John Hudson