It seems the U.S. and Israel have been the ‘bully’s on the block’ for far too long. They both take strong actions against terrorism while enlisting the very same tactics. Do they think that because they are so big no one can stop them? Are they too big to fail? I don’t think so.
This latest escalation in brutality between Israel and Hamas is a reminder that each desires the complete extermination of the other. Hamas openly calls for the genocide of Israel and Israel, being the more powerful of the two, actively carries out the threat. Despite any third parties’ attempts to broker peace between these two, they both actively participate in breaking down any and all gains made in reaching a cease-fire.
Hamas indiscriminately fires rockets into Israel fully realizing that innocent children could be killed. Israel launches targeted missile-strikes knowing full well that innocent children are being killed. Each views this ‘unfortunate’ side effect of their never-ending war as the successful elimination of future enemy forces.
Israel has, once again, committed severe violations of international humanitarian law as defined in the Geneva Convention. A Russian news outlet, Russia Today, listed the violations with complete disregard for their commission of these same violations against Georgia. The obvious hypocrisy has been lost on them.
The violations are:
Collective punishment – the entire 1.5 million people who live in the crowded Gaza Strip are being punished for the actions of a few militants.
Targeting civilians – the air strikes were aimed at civilian areas in one of the most crowded stretches of land in the world, certainly the most densely populated area of the Middle East.
Disproportionate military response – the air strikes have not only destroyed every police and security office of Gaza's elected government, but have killed and injured hundreds of civilians; at least one strike reportedly hit groups of students attempting to find transportation home from the university.
Earlier Israeli actions, specifically the complete sealing off of entry and exit to and from the Gaza Strip, have led to severe shortages of medicine and fuel (as well as food), resulting in the inability of ambulances to respond to the injured, the inability of hospitals to adequately provide medicine or necessary equipment for the injured, and the inability of Gaza's besieged doctors and other medical workers to sufficiently treat the victims.
Iran’s Ayatollah Khamenei called for all Muslims to come to the defense of their Palestinian brothers. He said they are “duty-bound to defend” Palestinians under siege by Israeli bombardment and even claimed that anyone who dies while defending Hamas will be declared ‘martyrs’.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-arab-protests29-2008dec29,0,6042138.story
Any world figure who issues a ‘call to arms’ and declares it is an ‘obligation’ to do so and declares those who die in the conflict as martyrs needs to be ostracized from civil society, for he holds just as much criminal culpability as both Israel and Hamas.
I read something someone on Clipmarks wrote, “How to make a terrorist: kill his family, destroy his home, show no mercy”.
The outcome of this type of behavior can only be to create more enemies. Does each side believe that through the constant onslaught of violence the other side will suddenly become completely submissive to them? Have we not learned anything from history? Peace does not grow out of violence.
Hamas is an admitted militant society. They are open and honest about this description. Israel on the other hand does not want to admit that they have become exactly the same thing. The U.S. chastises Hamas for their hatred towards Israel, the U.S. backs Israel. How can we Americans continue to back a terrorist regime? Our brothers and sisters have died and continue to die fighting against terror and yet our politicians back a terrorist society.
This senseless fighting needs to come to an end, in Gaza, as well as in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Using our vote to cleanse our government of those who support genocide and the policies of collective punishment should be one of our greatest priorities in every election cycle. The psyche of this nation cannot afford to continue to tolerate anyone who sees violence as a viable solution to the world’s problems.
The U.S. and Israel are creating terrorists. We are bringing about our own demise. Killing each other over territory, resources, revenge, political ideology, religious dogma, is leading us towards the apocalypse. If there will be nobody left, what is the point?
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Friday, December 26, 2008
Amidst Increased Security, We Get Ripped Off
Securities fraud cases are down 87% since 2000. Great News! On the surface, it appears that Wall Street has finally turned away from the dark side and the free market system of letting the market take care of itself is working for the good of everyone.
Don’t bet your life savings on it. This ‘miraculous’ turn of events is simply another Ponzi scheme. Instead of shifting money around to cover other debts, as is the idea of the Ponzi scheme, the federal government has been shifting investigative resources towards preventing terrorism and away from preventing the U.S. economy from being ripped off.
As a result of spending less time ferreting out the con artists that everyone knows are there, the FBI and the SEC has allowed the American taxpayer to be ripped off to the tune of billions of dollars to bailout the economy. How did our government best serve our interests in this brilliant maneuver?
We now have armed security forces roaming our airports rummaging through our luggage forcing us to take off our shoes and empty our water bottles. They see through our clothing to view every personal detail of our bodies. When they see fit, they confiscate our electronic equipment and force us to sit in rooms designated as ‘international zones’ so that the ‘authorities’ are not encumbered with Americans’ civil rights while we await further investigation. All this so we can visit relatives and friends. We are subjected to this humiliation while our fellow Americans on Wall Street are allowed to rip us off of our savings and our government further rips us off to bail them out. What a country.
Have we even had any terrorist threat to our airline industry since 2001? Some will argue that its because of all the security that we haven’t had any threats. How about using that same logic on Wall Street? If we watched our money handlers as stringently as we scrutinize our ‘friendly skies’ we wouldn’t be in this financial mess.
Wall Street claims it doesn’t need to be regulated. Free market cheerleaders say the economy should handle itself. The current state of the economy, swirling down the toilet, is a great argument for more regulation and less ‘free’ market.
It always comes down to humans cannot be trusted with other people’s money.
We will never see an end to corporate abuse. Even if there was a regulatory investigator on every corporate staff, there would not be enough honest, un-corruptible individuals to rid the American people of this type of evil.
To these guys, money no longer represents a hard working individual trying to make a better living for himself and his family by buying into the stock market dream of having your money work for you. This money becomes nothing more than another commodity that can and should be controlled and used to make more money for the fund manager. The implied promise to protect the owners investment becomes secondary. And if they have to bend a few rules or make unethical decisions that could result in a quick profit for themselves while there is no one watching over his shoulder then he will take that chance.
Obama has promised an overhaul of the SEC, but this is just a matter of course for an incoming authority when the current system has failed. In the end, nothing will really change, as long as humans are handling other peoples money, unregulated and without the threat of severe punishment, there will be fraud and deception.
Don’t bet your life savings on it. This ‘miraculous’ turn of events is simply another Ponzi scheme. Instead of shifting money around to cover other debts, as is the idea of the Ponzi scheme, the federal government has been shifting investigative resources towards preventing terrorism and away from preventing the U.S. economy from being ripped off.
As a result of spending less time ferreting out the con artists that everyone knows are there, the FBI and the SEC has allowed the American taxpayer to be ripped off to the tune of billions of dollars to bailout the economy. How did our government best serve our interests in this brilliant maneuver?
We now have armed security forces roaming our airports rummaging through our luggage forcing us to take off our shoes and empty our water bottles. They see through our clothing to view every personal detail of our bodies. When they see fit, they confiscate our electronic equipment and force us to sit in rooms designated as ‘international zones’ so that the ‘authorities’ are not encumbered with Americans’ civil rights while we await further investigation. All this so we can visit relatives and friends. We are subjected to this humiliation while our fellow Americans on Wall Street are allowed to rip us off of our savings and our government further rips us off to bail them out. What a country.
Have we even had any terrorist threat to our airline industry since 2001? Some will argue that its because of all the security that we haven’t had any threats. How about using that same logic on Wall Street? If we watched our money handlers as stringently as we scrutinize our ‘friendly skies’ we wouldn’t be in this financial mess.
Wall Street claims it doesn’t need to be regulated. Free market cheerleaders say the economy should handle itself. The current state of the economy, swirling down the toilet, is a great argument for more regulation and less ‘free’ market.
It always comes down to humans cannot be trusted with other people’s money.
We will never see an end to corporate abuse. Even if there was a regulatory investigator on every corporate staff, there would not be enough honest, un-corruptible individuals to rid the American people of this type of evil.
To these guys, money no longer represents a hard working individual trying to make a better living for himself and his family by buying into the stock market dream of having your money work for you. This money becomes nothing more than another commodity that can and should be controlled and used to make more money for the fund manager. The implied promise to protect the owners investment becomes secondary. And if they have to bend a few rules or make unethical decisions that could result in a quick profit for themselves while there is no one watching over his shoulder then he will take that chance.
Obama has promised an overhaul of the SEC, but this is just a matter of course for an incoming authority when the current system has failed. In the end, nothing will really change, as long as humans are handling other peoples money, unregulated and without the threat of severe punishment, there will be fraud and deception.
Monday, December 22, 2008
Human Rights, Democracy and Fascism
Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe’s president, made the statement that Zimbabwe was his. His ‘dictatorship in democracy clothing’ is showing through, again.
The world sat back and watched as Mugabe systematically evicted white landowners off of their farms, which led to the downfall of the entire economy.
The world sat back and watched as Mugabe’s military coerced the people of Zimbabwe through violence to vote for him.
The world sat back and watched as Mugabe closed down hospitals amidst the worst outbreak of cholera in recent memory. He claims the cholera epidemic is over even while thousands overflowed into neighboring countries desperate for medical help they were denied in their home country. He is silencing health workers and restricting access to the huge number of death certificates that give the same cause of death in order to cover up the true numbers.
He does all this while hanging onto the claim that he is running a democratic state.
All we have heard from the U.S. on these matters is a disagreement to Robert Mugabe claiming Zimbabwe as his.
State Department spokesperson Sean McCormack told reporters "He (Mugabe) thinks that the state of Zimbabwe and the people of Zimbabwe are there only to serve his interest. It's the other way around - or it should be the other way around."
This is a true statement, but when it comes from a representative of an administration that has repeatedly gone against the wishes of the vast majority of American people and stepped on their constitutional rights in the process, it is a hypocritical statement.
He went on to say "Those who govern should govern in the interest of the governed. The governed should be able to determine who governs them and in what manner."
Saddam Hussein came into power as a result of a coup and ruled Iraq with an iron fist but the Iraqi people boasted a strong economy building new schools, universities, hospitals, and factories. Any internal opposition to his rule was quickly and brutally squashed.
China’s leadership is appointed by party officials and controls its people through censorship of political speech in the interest of social stability. Widespread civil rights violations are well known, such as, systematic use of lengthy detention without trial, forced confessions, torture, mistreatment of prisoners, restrictions of freedom of speech, assembly, association, religion, the press, and labor rights. In order to host the 2008 Summer Olympics, China promised to issue permits allowing people to protest in so-called 'protest parks' during the Games, but it was reported that of 77 applications, 74 were withdrawn, two suspended and one vetoed.
The military junta in Burma (Myanmar) came into power as the result of a coup and, after a brief attempt at democracy, became one of the world's most repressive and abusive regimes. The military tightly controls the judiciary, rules by decree, suppresses all basic rights, and commits human rights abuses with impunity. Official corruption is reportedly rampant both at the higher and local levels.
Robert Mugabe was given control of Zimbabwe in 1980 by British authorities decolonizing their holdings in Africa. Since then, he has systematically taken away the rights to shelter, food, freedom of movement and residence, freedom of assembly, and the protection of the law. There are assaults on the media, political opposition, civil society activists, and human rights defenders.
George W Bush was given the presidential office in 2000 by the electorate not the popular vote. Al Gore received more popular votes than did George W Bush and still lost the election due to electoral votes. Since then he has stepped on constitutional rights through domestic spying and created Homeland Security which only cements the federal governments control over its citizenry.
The record of human rights violations of these nations, as well as many others, are documented and well known to the international community.
The U.S. claims to hold the protection of human rights as a cornerstone of democracy, and may actually voice its opinion condemning those leaders whose actions corrupt this idea. But, if the offending country has valuable resources, as does Iraq, and it is calculated that the U.S. military can quickly overthrow that government and gain access to those resources our leadership will resort to lies in order to do so.
China is of course too powerful for America to repeat what it did to Iraq, so we just put on the show of protesting their practices while at the same time helping to prop up their economy with billions of dollars a year for their goods.
In Burma, well America could kick their butts in a heart beat but, U.S. based companies already have an inroad to their resources so the U.S. government only occasionally and mildly protests that junta’s treatment of its citizens and continue to support them by purchasing the products exported by those same American companies. Americans ignore the fact that the impoverished people of Burma are forced into slave labor, raped, murdered and jailed for speaking out as long as they get access to their resources.
Zimbabwe does not have any resources that the U.S. wants so the U.S. basically ignores them until the international cry gets so loud that turning a blind eye is no longer an option. And in the end what does the U.S. object to? Mugabe’s rhetoric in claiming Zimbabwe as his.
You think maybe America’s priorities are a just a bit skewed?
While it is true that we in America have the right to vote without the threat of violence, we have very little sway over who really gets chosen run or over what the elected official does once they are in office. As illustrated when President Bush (owner of the lowest popularity ranking of any American president in history) reneged on many of his campaign promises, which is truly the only thing we voters have to base our decision on.
American democracy in many respects is a sham which can easily by manipulated by ‘masters of the game’. America was manipulated into going to war with Iraq, against the will of the American people, through the use of strategically released misinformation concerning Iraq’s intentions to use WMD’s against the American people. Saddam was deemed a threat to a nation much stronger than his. His refusal to be bullied into opening his borders to foreign inspectors gave the Bush administration the stage from which to launch a plan to build military bases within Iraq’s borders and to gain access to its oil reserves. An entire bureaucracy, Homeland Security, has been created out of the fear of a repeat of September 11, 2001.
Democracy has been stepped on and constitutional guarantees tossed aside by an administration legally bound to uphold American citizens rights when it conducted secret surveillance on American citizens on American soil under the claim of protecting us against terrorism. The only terrorist attacks so far have come from this administration on our civil rights.
Long standing adherence to human rights were suspended when “enemy combatants” were thrown into Guantanamo and held without the right to trial and then tortured. You can label waterboarding by its sanitized description of “aggressive interrogation techniques” if you want but it is still torture, something the American people abhor and, before George W Bush, never thought our government would stoop to.
Our airports have become mini-fascist states. Just ask Australian-born U.S. citizen Anne Summers of her recent experiences with armed agents at LAX. She, like many others, has fallen victim to an overly-suspicious, power-mad agents’ interrogation for ‘your own protection’. I understand the need for vigilance but courtesy and respect for human dignity should not be tossed aside when an agent is given a badge. Reports are rampant of condescending agents exhibiting intimidation, animosity and complete disdain for having to be bothered to deal with what they consider a possible terrorist suspect. Here’s an account of a passenger arriving at JFK Airport from Syria who received inexcusable treatment in the name of national security.
In our zeal to expose a terrorist plot behind every anti-war protest, every person crossing our border, and every passenger who forgets to empty his/her water bottle before entering a security checkpoint, we are turning our country into a fascist state. Or rather, the Bush administration has taken advantage of fear of another terrorist attack in order to do so. But then that’s how fascism spreads, isn’t it? When the World Trade Center was attacked on September 11, 2001 the ‘terrorist’ accomplished their goal to put America on alert that they will not tolerate the disrespectful treatment westerners have shown the rest of the world. With this single act they now only have to threaten the U.S. to get us to react. They don’t have to actually conduct an attack on U.S. soil because they have already shown they are willing to do so.
Fear and Fascism go hand in hand. The measures that are being forced onto us in the name of protection is a response to fear and they are eroding our rights and freedoms.
Fascists invoke an external and internal threat in order to convince the population to grant their rulers extraordinary powers. In the case of George W Bush, he evoked these extraordinary powers through the use of presidential decrees. Much as Burma’s ruling Junta does.
They establish secret prisons that practice torture, prisons that are initially few in number and only incarcerate social pariahs, but that quickly multiply and soon imprison "opposition leaders, outspoken clergy, union leaders, well-known performers, publishers, and journalists."
They develop a paramilitary force that operates without legal restraint. Blackwater International is just such a force.
They set up a system of intense domestic surveillance that gathers information for the purposes of intimidating and blackmailing citizens. If domestic surveillance continues unabated who can honestly say it will not be used for the purposes of intimidating and blackmailing citizens?
They infiltrate, monitor, and disorganize citizens' groups.
They arbitrarily detain and release citizens, especially at borders.
They target key individuals like civil servants, academics, and artists in order to ensure their complicity or silence.
Dismissal of eight U.S. attorneys for political reasons.
eight U.S. attorneys
They take control of the press. The Committee to Protect Journalists says arrests of US journalists are at an all-time high: Josh Wolf, a blogger in San Francisco, has been put in jail for a year for refusing to turn over video of an anti-war demonstration; Homeland Security brought a criminal complaint against reporter Greg Palast, claiming he threatened "critical infrastructure" when he and a TV producer were filming victims of Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana. Palast had written a bestseller critical of the Bush administration.
The Committee to Protect Journalists has documented multiple accounts of the US military in Iraq firing upon or threatening to fire upon unembedded (meaning independent) reporters and camera operators from organizations ranging from al-Jazeera to the BBC.
You won't have a shutdown of news in modern America - it is not possible. But you can have, as Frank Rich and Sidney Blumenthal have pointed out, a steady stream of lies polluting the news well. What you already have is a White House directing a stream of false information that is so relentless that it is increasingly hard to sort out truth from untruth. In a fascist system, it's not the lies that count but the muddying. When citizens can't tell real news from fake, they give up their demands for accountability bit by bit.
They publicly equate dissent with treason. Most Americans do not realize that when Congress wrongly, foolishly, passed the Military Commissions Act of 2006 the president has the power to call any US citizen an "enemy combatant". He has the power to define what "enemy combatant" means. The president can also delegate to anyone he chooses in the executive branch the right to define "enemy combatant" any way he or she wants and then seize Americans accordingly.
They suspend the rule of law. The John Warner Defense Authorization Act of 2007 gave the president new powers over the national guard. This means that in a national emergency - which the president now has enhanced powers to declare - he can send Michigan's militia to enforce a state of emergency that he has declared in Oregon, over the objections of the state's governor and its citizens.
A disturbing recent phenomenon in Washington is that laws that strike to the heart of American democracy have been passed in the dead of night. Beyond actual insurrection, the president may now use military troops as a domestic police force in response to a natural disaster, a disease outbreak, terrorist attack or any 'other condition’. And the Pentagon is currently reserving 20,000 troops for domestic emergencies.
All of these strategies are being employed in America today.
America only cares about human rights when it is convenient or advantageous to do so. Only when everything that has happened in recent years are taken together can we see the path that America is headed down.
Right now, only a handful of patriots are trying to hold back the tide of tyranny for the rest of us - staff at the Center for Constitutional Rights, who faced death threats for representing Guantanamo detainees yet persisted all the way to the Supreme Court; activists at the American Civil Liberties Union; and prominent conservatives trying to roll back corrosive new laws, under the banner of a new group called the American Freedom Agenda. This small, disparate collection of people needs everybody's help, including that of Europeans and others internationally who are willing to put pressure on the administration because they can see what a US unrestrained by real democracy at home can mean for the rest of the world.
Further reading
CIA Holds Terror Suspects in Secret Prisons
U.S. Secret Prison Ships Hold Untold Number of Detainees
America is going Fascist
Watching out for an American paramilitary
FBI Spied on Peace Group Because os Antiwar Views
U.S. Government Spying and Infiltration
Homeland Security? Abuses by Border Patrol in Arizona
Nightmare at Reagan National Airport
Fired U.S. Attorneys
The world sat back and watched as Mugabe systematically evicted white landowners off of their farms, which led to the downfall of the entire economy.
The world sat back and watched as Mugabe’s military coerced the people of Zimbabwe through violence to vote for him.
The world sat back and watched as Mugabe closed down hospitals amidst the worst outbreak of cholera in recent memory. He claims the cholera epidemic is over even while thousands overflowed into neighboring countries desperate for medical help they were denied in their home country. He is silencing health workers and restricting access to the huge number of death certificates that give the same cause of death in order to cover up the true numbers.
He does all this while hanging onto the claim that he is running a democratic state.
All we have heard from the U.S. on these matters is a disagreement to Robert Mugabe claiming Zimbabwe as his.
State Department spokesperson Sean McCormack told reporters "He (Mugabe) thinks that the state of Zimbabwe and the people of Zimbabwe are there only to serve his interest. It's the other way around - or it should be the other way around."
This is a true statement, but when it comes from a representative of an administration that has repeatedly gone against the wishes of the vast majority of American people and stepped on their constitutional rights in the process, it is a hypocritical statement.
He went on to say "Those who govern should govern in the interest of the governed. The governed should be able to determine who governs them and in what manner."
Saddam Hussein came into power as a result of a coup and ruled Iraq with an iron fist but the Iraqi people boasted a strong economy building new schools, universities, hospitals, and factories. Any internal opposition to his rule was quickly and brutally squashed.
China’s leadership is appointed by party officials and controls its people through censorship of political speech in the interest of social stability. Widespread civil rights violations are well known, such as, systematic use of lengthy detention without trial, forced confessions, torture, mistreatment of prisoners, restrictions of freedom of speech, assembly, association, religion, the press, and labor rights. In order to host the 2008 Summer Olympics, China promised to issue permits allowing people to protest in so-called 'protest parks' during the Games, but it was reported that of 77 applications, 74 were withdrawn, two suspended and one vetoed.
The military junta in Burma (Myanmar) came into power as the result of a coup and, after a brief attempt at democracy, became one of the world's most repressive and abusive regimes. The military tightly controls the judiciary, rules by decree, suppresses all basic rights, and commits human rights abuses with impunity. Official corruption is reportedly rampant both at the higher and local levels.
Robert Mugabe was given control of Zimbabwe in 1980 by British authorities decolonizing their holdings in Africa. Since then, he has systematically taken away the rights to shelter, food, freedom of movement and residence, freedom of assembly, and the protection of the law. There are assaults on the media, political opposition, civil society activists, and human rights defenders.
George W Bush was given the presidential office in 2000 by the electorate not the popular vote. Al Gore received more popular votes than did George W Bush and still lost the election due to electoral votes. Since then he has stepped on constitutional rights through domestic spying and created Homeland Security which only cements the federal governments control over its citizenry.
The record of human rights violations of these nations, as well as many others, are documented and well known to the international community.
The U.S. claims to hold the protection of human rights as a cornerstone of democracy, and may actually voice its opinion condemning those leaders whose actions corrupt this idea. But, if the offending country has valuable resources, as does Iraq, and it is calculated that the U.S. military can quickly overthrow that government and gain access to those resources our leadership will resort to lies in order to do so.
China is of course too powerful for America to repeat what it did to Iraq, so we just put on the show of protesting their practices while at the same time helping to prop up their economy with billions of dollars a year for their goods.
In Burma, well America could kick their butts in a heart beat but, U.S. based companies already have an inroad to their resources so the U.S. government only occasionally and mildly protests that junta’s treatment of its citizens and continue to support them by purchasing the products exported by those same American companies. Americans ignore the fact that the impoverished people of Burma are forced into slave labor, raped, murdered and jailed for speaking out as long as they get access to their resources.
Zimbabwe does not have any resources that the U.S. wants so the U.S. basically ignores them until the international cry gets so loud that turning a blind eye is no longer an option. And in the end what does the U.S. object to? Mugabe’s rhetoric in claiming Zimbabwe as his.
You think maybe America’s priorities are a just a bit skewed?
While it is true that we in America have the right to vote without the threat of violence, we have very little sway over who really gets chosen run or over what the elected official does once they are in office. As illustrated when President Bush (owner of the lowest popularity ranking of any American president in history) reneged on many of his campaign promises, which is truly the only thing we voters have to base our decision on.
American democracy in many respects is a sham which can easily by manipulated by ‘masters of the game’. America was manipulated into going to war with Iraq, against the will of the American people, through the use of strategically released misinformation concerning Iraq’s intentions to use WMD’s against the American people. Saddam was deemed a threat to a nation much stronger than his. His refusal to be bullied into opening his borders to foreign inspectors gave the Bush administration the stage from which to launch a plan to build military bases within Iraq’s borders and to gain access to its oil reserves. An entire bureaucracy, Homeland Security, has been created out of the fear of a repeat of September 11, 2001.
Democracy has been stepped on and constitutional guarantees tossed aside by an administration legally bound to uphold American citizens rights when it conducted secret surveillance on American citizens on American soil under the claim of protecting us against terrorism. The only terrorist attacks so far have come from this administration on our civil rights.
Long standing adherence to human rights were suspended when “enemy combatants” were thrown into Guantanamo and held without the right to trial and then tortured. You can label waterboarding by its sanitized description of “aggressive interrogation techniques” if you want but it is still torture, something the American people abhor and, before George W Bush, never thought our government would stoop to.
Our airports have become mini-fascist states. Just ask Australian-born U.S. citizen Anne Summers of her recent experiences with armed agents at LAX. She, like many others, has fallen victim to an overly-suspicious, power-mad agents’ interrogation for ‘your own protection’. I understand the need for vigilance but courtesy and respect for human dignity should not be tossed aside when an agent is given a badge. Reports are rampant of condescending agents exhibiting intimidation, animosity and complete disdain for having to be bothered to deal with what they consider a possible terrorist suspect. Here’s an account of a passenger arriving at JFK Airport from Syria who received inexcusable treatment in the name of national security.
In our zeal to expose a terrorist plot behind every anti-war protest, every person crossing our border, and every passenger who forgets to empty his/her water bottle before entering a security checkpoint, we are turning our country into a fascist state. Or rather, the Bush administration has taken advantage of fear of another terrorist attack in order to do so. But then that’s how fascism spreads, isn’t it? When the World Trade Center was attacked on September 11, 2001 the ‘terrorist’ accomplished their goal to put America on alert that they will not tolerate the disrespectful treatment westerners have shown the rest of the world. With this single act they now only have to threaten the U.S. to get us to react. They don’t have to actually conduct an attack on U.S. soil because they have already shown they are willing to do so.
Fear and Fascism go hand in hand. The measures that are being forced onto us in the name of protection is a response to fear and they are eroding our rights and freedoms.
Fascists invoke an external and internal threat in order to convince the population to grant their rulers extraordinary powers. In the case of George W Bush, he evoked these extraordinary powers through the use of presidential decrees. Much as Burma’s ruling Junta does.
They establish secret prisons that practice torture, prisons that are initially few in number and only incarcerate social pariahs, but that quickly multiply and soon imprison "opposition leaders, outspoken clergy, union leaders, well-known performers, publishers, and journalists."
They develop a paramilitary force that operates without legal restraint. Blackwater International is just such a force.
They set up a system of intense domestic surveillance that gathers information for the purposes of intimidating and blackmailing citizens. If domestic surveillance continues unabated who can honestly say it will not be used for the purposes of intimidating and blackmailing citizens?
They infiltrate, monitor, and disorganize citizens' groups.
They arbitrarily detain and release citizens, especially at borders.
They target key individuals like civil servants, academics, and artists in order to ensure their complicity or silence.
Dismissal of eight U.S. attorneys for political reasons.
eight U.S. attorneys
They take control of the press. The Committee to Protect Journalists says arrests of US journalists are at an all-time high: Josh Wolf, a blogger in San Francisco, has been put in jail for a year for refusing to turn over video of an anti-war demonstration; Homeland Security brought a criminal complaint against reporter Greg Palast, claiming he threatened "critical infrastructure" when he and a TV producer were filming victims of Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana. Palast had written a bestseller critical of the Bush administration.
The Committee to Protect Journalists has documented multiple accounts of the US military in Iraq firing upon or threatening to fire upon unembedded (meaning independent) reporters and camera operators from organizations ranging from al-Jazeera to the BBC.
You won't have a shutdown of news in modern America - it is not possible. But you can have, as Frank Rich and Sidney Blumenthal have pointed out, a steady stream of lies polluting the news well. What you already have is a White House directing a stream of false information that is so relentless that it is increasingly hard to sort out truth from untruth. In a fascist system, it's not the lies that count but the muddying. When citizens can't tell real news from fake, they give up their demands for accountability bit by bit.
They publicly equate dissent with treason. Most Americans do not realize that when Congress wrongly, foolishly, passed the Military Commissions Act of 2006 the president has the power to call any US citizen an "enemy combatant". He has the power to define what "enemy combatant" means. The president can also delegate to anyone he chooses in the executive branch the right to define "enemy combatant" any way he or she wants and then seize Americans accordingly.
They suspend the rule of law. The John Warner Defense Authorization Act of 2007 gave the president new powers over the national guard. This means that in a national emergency - which the president now has enhanced powers to declare - he can send Michigan's militia to enforce a state of emergency that he has declared in Oregon, over the objections of the state's governor and its citizens.
A disturbing recent phenomenon in Washington is that laws that strike to the heart of American democracy have been passed in the dead of night. Beyond actual insurrection, the president may now use military troops as a domestic police force in response to a natural disaster, a disease outbreak, terrorist attack or any 'other condition’. And the Pentagon is currently reserving 20,000 troops for domestic emergencies.
All of these strategies are being employed in America today.
America only cares about human rights when it is convenient or advantageous to do so. Only when everything that has happened in recent years are taken together can we see the path that America is headed down.
Right now, only a handful of patriots are trying to hold back the tide of tyranny for the rest of us - staff at the Center for Constitutional Rights, who faced death threats for representing Guantanamo detainees yet persisted all the way to the Supreme Court; activists at the American Civil Liberties Union; and prominent conservatives trying to roll back corrosive new laws, under the banner of a new group called the American Freedom Agenda. This small, disparate collection of people needs everybody's help, including that of Europeans and others internationally who are willing to put pressure on the administration because they can see what a US unrestrained by real democracy at home can mean for the rest of the world.
Further reading
CIA Holds Terror Suspects in Secret Prisons
U.S. Secret Prison Ships Hold Untold Number of Detainees
America is going Fascist
Watching out for an American paramilitary
FBI Spied on Peace Group Because os Antiwar Views
U.S. Government Spying and Infiltration
Homeland Security? Abuses by Border Patrol in Arizona
Nightmare at Reagan National Airport
Fired U.S. Attorneys
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Reconstruction in Iraq and Our Economy Are Failing for the Same Reason
An unpublished, 513-page federal history of the U.S.-led reconstruction of Iraq depicts an effort crippled before the invasion by Pentagon planners who were hostile to the idea of rebuilding a foreign country.
The reconstruction effort is being hampered by fake numbers, mismanaged funds, ill-thought out plans, technical ineptness, poor organizational structure, political turf wars, personal greed, and a ‘cover-your-ass’ mentality. Our economic leadership has been guilty of the same short-comings. This is yet another legacy that Bush cannot hide from.
The only ‘success’ that has come out of the rebuilding effort thus far can be claimed by the CEOs of the construction companies and building-materials suppliers that were given contracts by a corrupted bidding system. Contractors working in Iraq know they are being paid for slip-shod work and they are well aware of the mismanagement of funds and lack of over-sight. Yet their conscience will be placated by the overly exaggerated paychecks they receive. Paychecks funded in part by their fellow Americans’ tax dollars.
These ‘leaders of industry’, these so-called ‘professionals’ were given the task of rebuilding Iraq and the single most driving force to ‘win’ the contract was not in producing quality workmanship, but in how to make the most money for themselves. How to set up companies and an infrastructure that would funnel the most money into their own pockets.
The only ‘success’ to come out of the banking system bailout goes to the CEO’s who received outrageous bonuses and to mortgage brokers who made money from taking advantage of the ‘dream of home ownership’ of families they knew would not be able to payoff the loans. They were all aware of the failings of the system but sloughed off their responsibility and took their paychecks and walked away from it.
These leaders of the banking and home mortgage industry who kept a close watch on the pulse of our economy knew how to make the most money from the unwary and under-informed consumer and manipulated the system to funnel the most money into their own pockets.
We Americans have collectively been bilked out of billions of dollars over the course of our history by conniving, thieving individuals who greased the palms of corrupted political office holders in order to have money diverted from more deserving projects to fall under their control. Cost overruns are nothing new to construction projects and the manipulation of the contract bidding process has become an art for those who know how to do it. Especially when you have politicians pushing and pulling for you on the inside.
If we take a leap of faith, and conclude that politicians are being taken advantage of by contractors in regards to how contracts are awarded and money is managed and spent, then it is time for our government to put in place strict controls over how contracts are awarded and how money is used. We also need to have stricter over-sight on how the process is overseen. Corruption that has become inherent in this capitalist society has made this type of bureaucracy management an unfortunate necessity.
Capitalism has taken too great a hold on this country for us to ever get anything done without the expectation of every individual involved to arrive with their hand out.
Before Iraq reconstruction plans were put to paper the planning was disjointed and botched due to jostling of position of who was going to get the biggest cut. American homes and office buildings are constructed in record time in the U.S. There is no reason why these buildings cannot go up just as quickly and just as cheaply in Iraq unless delaying the process meant more money for project managers and workers. The construction field is filled with areas where a master of manipulating costs can exaggerate building time and increase building materials costs because of a lack of honest oversight.
We are a nation that is supposed to work together for a common cause. We have flag-waving politicians who tirelessly spout off about how we Americans stick together against outside forces bent on our destruction, yet behind closed doors they plan and scheme on how to take the American tax payer for even more money to bail out a banking system that they themselves refuse to regulate. Anytime any politician slings his/her line of crap under the banner of patriotism and not have to gargle to rid themselves of the resulting foul taste is a crooked politician corrupted beyond redemption. They cannot possibly believe their own rhetoric. We sure as hell don’t.
Money for construction projects are divided up by a spoils system controlled by neighborhood politicians and tribal chiefs. "Our district council chairman has become the Tony Soprano of Rasheed, in terms of controlling resources," said a U.S. Embassy official working in a dangerous Baghdad neighborhood, referring to the popular TV mob boss. “You will use my contractor or the work will not get done.”
Pentagon officials should be held to account for mismanagement and the inflated numbers (lies) it gave the public and the administration to show progress being made in Iraq. These officials are more concerned with covering their own asses when reality doesn’t look as rosy as their expectations or when things go wrong than they are in working to improve the situation.
The reconstruction effort has failed because no single agency in the U.S. government has responsibility for the job.
This can also be said for the current collapsing economy we Americans are being forced to endure.
The reconstruction effort is being hampered by fake numbers, mismanaged funds, ill-thought out plans, technical ineptness, poor organizational structure, political turf wars, personal greed, and a ‘cover-your-ass’ mentality. Our economic leadership has been guilty of the same short-comings. This is yet another legacy that Bush cannot hide from.
The only ‘success’ that has come out of the rebuilding effort thus far can be claimed by the CEOs of the construction companies and building-materials suppliers that were given contracts by a corrupted bidding system. Contractors working in Iraq know they are being paid for slip-shod work and they are well aware of the mismanagement of funds and lack of over-sight. Yet their conscience will be placated by the overly exaggerated paychecks they receive. Paychecks funded in part by their fellow Americans’ tax dollars.
These ‘leaders of industry’, these so-called ‘professionals’ were given the task of rebuilding Iraq and the single most driving force to ‘win’ the contract was not in producing quality workmanship, but in how to make the most money for themselves. How to set up companies and an infrastructure that would funnel the most money into their own pockets.
The only ‘success’ to come out of the banking system bailout goes to the CEO’s who received outrageous bonuses and to mortgage brokers who made money from taking advantage of the ‘dream of home ownership’ of families they knew would not be able to payoff the loans. They were all aware of the failings of the system but sloughed off their responsibility and took their paychecks and walked away from it.
These leaders of the banking and home mortgage industry who kept a close watch on the pulse of our economy knew how to make the most money from the unwary and under-informed consumer and manipulated the system to funnel the most money into their own pockets.
We Americans have collectively been bilked out of billions of dollars over the course of our history by conniving, thieving individuals who greased the palms of corrupted political office holders in order to have money diverted from more deserving projects to fall under their control. Cost overruns are nothing new to construction projects and the manipulation of the contract bidding process has become an art for those who know how to do it. Especially when you have politicians pushing and pulling for you on the inside.
If we take a leap of faith, and conclude that politicians are being taken advantage of by contractors in regards to how contracts are awarded and money is managed and spent, then it is time for our government to put in place strict controls over how contracts are awarded and how money is used. We also need to have stricter over-sight on how the process is overseen. Corruption that has become inherent in this capitalist society has made this type of bureaucracy management an unfortunate necessity.
Capitalism has taken too great a hold on this country for us to ever get anything done without the expectation of every individual involved to arrive with their hand out.
Before Iraq reconstruction plans were put to paper the planning was disjointed and botched due to jostling of position of who was going to get the biggest cut. American homes and office buildings are constructed in record time in the U.S. There is no reason why these buildings cannot go up just as quickly and just as cheaply in Iraq unless delaying the process meant more money for project managers and workers. The construction field is filled with areas where a master of manipulating costs can exaggerate building time and increase building materials costs because of a lack of honest oversight.
We are a nation that is supposed to work together for a common cause. We have flag-waving politicians who tirelessly spout off about how we Americans stick together against outside forces bent on our destruction, yet behind closed doors they plan and scheme on how to take the American tax payer for even more money to bail out a banking system that they themselves refuse to regulate. Anytime any politician slings his/her line of crap under the banner of patriotism and not have to gargle to rid themselves of the resulting foul taste is a crooked politician corrupted beyond redemption. They cannot possibly believe their own rhetoric. We sure as hell don’t.
Money for construction projects are divided up by a spoils system controlled by neighborhood politicians and tribal chiefs. "Our district council chairman has become the Tony Soprano of Rasheed, in terms of controlling resources," said a U.S. Embassy official working in a dangerous Baghdad neighborhood, referring to the popular TV mob boss. “You will use my contractor or the work will not get done.”
Pentagon officials should be held to account for mismanagement and the inflated numbers (lies) it gave the public and the administration to show progress being made in Iraq. These officials are more concerned with covering their own asses when reality doesn’t look as rosy as their expectations or when things go wrong than they are in working to improve the situation.
The reconstruction effort has failed because no single agency in the U.S. government has responsibility for the job.
This can also be said for the current collapsing economy we Americans are being forced to endure.
Thursday, December 11, 2008
SWAT action of Family Farm? Where Is the Media Coverage?
On December 1, 2008, a family-run food co-op in LaGrange Ohio, was the scene of a home invasion. These “home invaders” won’t match the images you may have of drug-crazed-addicts or some street gang bent on ripping-off the family of their possessions. No, this highly organized and heavily armed ‘gang’ was made up of police officers ordered to confiscate the livelihood and personal property of the family who runs Manna Storehouse by the Ohio Department of Agriculture.
I found this comment concerning the raid on a blog called The Complete Patient:
The family that runs the co-op tells me they were herded into the living room for 8 hours while the home and business was torn apart. They were not given reason, saying they were under investigation. All of their computers and phones, and customer information were taken, as well as $10,000 worth of beef. A ‘warrant’ which didn’t appear to be valid, showed the reason for investigation, was ‘beef’.
According to this second-hand information (neither police nor government officials deny or collaborate the story) our government, in full riot gear with semi-automatic weapons pointed at the heads of this family (children included) raided a family business who was providing grass-fed beef, lamb, pastured poultry and other Weston-Price-style foods.
There is no official story in the main stream media about this raid nor is there any official press release from Ohio Department of Agriculture, however, I did find one ‘sanitized’ report in a local paper, which is how many of the family’s neighbors heard of it. (Is the internet the last stand for true freedom of the press?). The lack of coverage, considering the level of force used in a raid of this sort, is disturbing at best. Normally, the news media is all over this type of raid. The family did say they are not talking to the press in order to protect themselves.
What little background information could be found regarding this situation still does not show that the SWAT action was warranted. It seems that the discovery of a bit of non-institutional beef in an Oberlin College food service freezer a year ago (November 2007) was tracked down by a county sanitation official to Manna Storehouse. Oberlin College’s student food coop is widely known for its strident ideological stance about eating organic foods. It seems that the Oberlin student food cooperative had joined the Manna Storehouse food cooperative in order to buy organic foods in bulk from the national organic food distributor United, which services buying clubs across the nation. The sanitation official, James Boddy, evidently contacted the Ohio Department of Agriculture. After the first contact by state ODA officials, Manna Storehouse reportedly wrote them a letter requesting assistance and guidelines for complying with the law. This letter was never answered. Rather, the ODA agent tried several times to infiltrate the coop. When his attempts failed, the SWAT team showed up!
As of December 9, the family has not been charged with any crime, nor have they been contacted by anyone concerning this raid. The speculation that the business was operating without a license is simply that, speculation. They have sent a plea for any information regarding the Ohio Department of Agriculture laws governing their enterprise and what they may have done to prompt such a raid.
All three questions are disturbing.
Did this SWAT action take place?
Did SWAT swoop down and ‘terrorize’ this ‘innocent’ family as the commenter reported, or is this an exaggeration to garner sympathy for the plight of family-owned businesses who don’t want to be regulated by the government?
Whether the raid was conducted with weapons drawn or not, the raid did take place and this issue needs to be addressed. Since when does the enforcement of health and/or commerce policies warrant the use of SWAT? Why did the Health Department not simply conduct a health inspection? I am certain there are rules in place to cover this situation that are more in line with good public relations than involving law enforcement.
If the government did use such heavy-handed Gestapo-type tactics simply to confiscate this family’s business records and personal food items, then a complaint should be filed with their congressperson and violation of civil rights charges brought against ODA. Bringing such matters to light is the most obvious way of ensuring any wrongdoing by the government is exposed. However, if this family sensationalized their story simply to further their cause and attempt to manipulate public opinion, should we buy into it?
The use of a SWAT team indicates a belief that this family was “armed to the teeth” and therefore the use of such equipment was deemed necessary for the protection of team members. Absent any prior knowledge that they family was an outlaw gang, such use of law enforcement was not only irresponsible but a danger to the public.
Certainly, this alleged method belies the faith we have in our government officials to protect us from harm and they should therefore be made to pay.
At any rate, what psychological effect this raid will have on these children is anybody’s guess. And what did this experience teach them about their country, their leaders, their government, and their local law enforcement?
I realize the police are ordered from ‘on high’ to behave in the manner in which they do, but at some point the individual wearing the uniform has to take personal responsibility for his/her participation in these tyrannical methods. They must consult their moral conscience to face the fact that they can no longer shrug off their part in what they did to this family to “just doing my job”.
All of us who feel that our constitution, and the freedoms granted therein, is worth fighting for must, sooner or later, be moved to action against these atrocities, to voice our opinions and fight against this kind of tyranny.
Is there some diabolical master-plan to wipe out all corporate competition?
Why did the ODA feel it was necessary to raid a family owned and run business using law enforcement and the threat of violence instead of using a less oppressive method such as serving notice of an inspection for possible health or commerce violations?
Is the FDA and Department of Agriculture protecting us from the mean ole independent businesses promoting ‘bioterrorism’ or are they protecting a market for major corporations who only view consumers as open wallets for their own financial benefit? Keep in mind that these are the same corporations who reduce their product package size and claim to be helping the economy by not raising their prices.
The FDA has a history of conducting raids on business operations selling natural herbs and nutritional supplements with claims of promoting health. The 1990 raid on Highland Laboratories, a small vitamin company in rural Oregon; 1987 raid on Life Extension Foundation in Florida; 2007 raid of Fullife Natural Options; for a list of similar raids click here.
We are all aware of the downside of large corporations. Labor Unions have been fighting this beast on the side of the little guy for a very long time. Often times resorting to violence to get their voices heard over management for simple human rights such as a decent wage, safe working conditions, reasonable work day lengths, affordable health coverage, and other benefits that those without a union will never have. Corporations are in place to feed their financial bottom-line. And if they could cut costs like health insurance, safety procedures, and even salary, they would do it.
Wal-Mart is the poster child of ‘large corporation’ vs. the ‘little guy’ and has certainly done their part to wipe-out local businesses wherever they build their stores. Despite their initial claims to the community in which they choose to spread their empire, small businesses dry up. The resulting job gains for Wal-Mart never amount to the losses suffered from these closings. The vast majority of Wal-Mart employees are paid part time wages and work without sufficient benefits which forces taxpayers to subsidize them through food stamps and Medicaid. Money earned by Wal-Mart leaves the local economy and is pumped to its headquarters therefore local banks do not benefit from Wal-Marts’ presence. Wal-Mart buys its bulk of goods from China forcing American suppliers to cut approximately 17,000 U.S. manufacturing jobs between 2001 and 2006. In 2007, Wal-Mart brought $26.7 billion of Chinese goods into the United States and cost American workers more than 200,000 jobs.
It has taken laws to be passed to protect the interests of the worker and consumer, but now corporations have bought politicians through lobby groups and outright bribes to protect themselves against the worker and our economy is suffering for it.
Multinational corporations are taking control of seeds, animals, food, and all natural substances worldwide and the police are at their beck and call to enforce governments’ and corporations’ sway over the ‘little guy’.
The Community Alliance for Responsible Eco-farming (CARE), a private group of farmers and consumers in Pennsylvania, recently released a statement regarding the relationship between private citizens and constitutional government. Their position is basically that the government has a right to control and regulate what the government creates. If, for example, the government creates a corporation (essentially conferring “person” status to that entity) then it has every right, every duty even, to oversee it. But men are not artificial entities created by government. Men are natural, and when they act as private citizens, government must stay out of their way. In fact, government is supposed to protect citizens from the actions of any entity that might inhibit the free exercise of their natural rights. When government does otherwise it blurs the line between private and public, effectively deeming EVERYTHING public, and thus making constitutions irrelevant.
As for the ongoing attack on free enterprise, the general public does not know enough to know what is real and what is speculation because the press has yet to mount an investigation into what is happening.
Where is the media coverage?
Why is there no mainstream media coverage of how this and other family owned businesses across the country are being dealt with in such a Gestapo-like manner?
It isn’t just the local media that should be held to account, national media as well bear the blame. Blogs and word of mouth are doing what they can to get the word out but they are no real substitute for gaining national attention. We need a concerted effort along with main stream media to bring this situation into the main stream consciousness. This cannot continue to go on without public scrutiny.
The media did not cover the story of the tea man. What else are we not being told?
Summation:
We have a SWAT action on a family farm to confiscate all business-related property without revealing charges.
We have government officials imposing rules and regulations on individuals who want nothing to do with them.
We have a media that does not cover these actions.
We have a populace who looks the other way, some of which are members of law-enforcement, government and media.
These are the ingredients necessary to allow a corprafascist state to exist.
We all need to rise up against this trend before it is too late.
History is repeating itself.
Further Reading:
True history of FDA raids on healers, vitamin shops and supplement companies
Center for Micro Eco-Farming Movement
Whole Farm Coop, Local Harvest
Benefits of Healthy Whole Foods
Herbal Supplements Guide
I found this comment concerning the raid on a blog called The Complete Patient:
The family that runs the co-op tells me they were herded into the living room for 8 hours while the home and business was torn apart. They were not given reason, saying they were under investigation. All of their computers and phones, and customer information were taken, as well as $10,000 worth of beef. A ‘warrant’ which didn’t appear to be valid, showed the reason for investigation, was ‘beef’.
According to this second-hand information (neither police nor government officials deny or collaborate the story) our government, in full riot gear with semi-automatic weapons pointed at the heads of this family (children included) raided a family business who was providing grass-fed beef, lamb, pastured poultry and other Weston-Price-style foods.
There is no official story in the main stream media about this raid nor is there any official press release from Ohio Department of Agriculture, however, I did find one ‘sanitized’ report in a local paper, which is how many of the family’s neighbors heard of it. (Is the internet the last stand for true freedom of the press?). The lack of coverage, considering the level of force used in a raid of this sort, is disturbing at best. Normally, the news media is all over this type of raid. The family did say they are not talking to the press in order to protect themselves.
What little background information could be found regarding this situation still does not show that the SWAT action was warranted. It seems that the discovery of a bit of non-institutional beef in an Oberlin College food service freezer a year ago (November 2007) was tracked down by a county sanitation official to Manna Storehouse. Oberlin College’s student food coop is widely known for its strident ideological stance about eating organic foods. It seems that the Oberlin student food cooperative had joined the Manna Storehouse food cooperative in order to buy organic foods in bulk from the national organic food distributor United, which services buying clubs across the nation. The sanitation official, James Boddy, evidently contacted the Ohio Department of Agriculture. After the first contact by state ODA officials, Manna Storehouse reportedly wrote them a letter requesting assistance and guidelines for complying with the law. This letter was never answered. Rather, the ODA agent tried several times to infiltrate the coop. When his attempts failed, the SWAT team showed up!
As of December 9, the family has not been charged with any crime, nor have they been contacted by anyone concerning this raid. The speculation that the business was operating without a license is simply that, speculation. They have sent a plea for any information regarding the Ohio Department of Agriculture laws governing their enterprise and what they may have done to prompt such a raid.
Three important questions arising from this incident need to be addressed.
1: Did this SWAT action take place as reported, thus far by word of mouth, or is it a fabrication to garner sympathy for the plight of the ‘little guy’?
2: Is ODA guilty of participating in a nationwide attempt to discredit small-time local food groups in favor of corporate interests?
3: Where is the media coverage?
All three questions are disturbing.
Did this SWAT action take place?
Did SWAT swoop down and ‘terrorize’ this ‘innocent’ family as the commenter reported, or is this an exaggeration to garner sympathy for the plight of family-owned businesses who don’t want to be regulated by the government?
Whether the raid was conducted with weapons drawn or not, the raid did take place and this issue needs to be addressed. Since when does the enforcement of health and/or commerce policies warrant the use of SWAT? Why did the Health Department not simply conduct a health inspection? I am certain there are rules in place to cover this situation that are more in line with good public relations than involving law enforcement.
If the government did use such heavy-handed Gestapo-type tactics simply to confiscate this family’s business records and personal food items, then a complaint should be filed with their congressperson and violation of civil rights charges brought against ODA. Bringing such matters to light is the most obvious way of ensuring any wrongdoing by the government is exposed. However, if this family sensationalized their story simply to further their cause and attempt to manipulate public opinion, should we buy into it?
The use of a SWAT team indicates a belief that this family was “armed to the teeth” and therefore the use of such equipment was deemed necessary for the protection of team members. Absent any prior knowledge that they family was an outlaw gang, such use of law enforcement was not only irresponsible but a danger to the public.
Certainly, this alleged method belies the faith we have in our government officials to protect us from harm and they should therefore be made to pay.
At any rate, what psychological effect this raid will have on these children is anybody’s guess. And what did this experience teach them about their country, their leaders, their government, and their local law enforcement?
I realize the police are ordered from ‘on high’ to behave in the manner in which they do, but at some point the individual wearing the uniform has to take personal responsibility for his/her participation in these tyrannical methods. They must consult their moral conscience to face the fact that they can no longer shrug off their part in what they did to this family to “just doing my job”.
All of us who feel that our constitution, and the freedoms granted therein, is worth fighting for must, sooner or later, be moved to action against these atrocities, to voice our opinions and fight against this kind of tyranny.
Is there some diabolical master-plan to wipe out all corporate competition?
Why did the ODA feel it was necessary to raid a family owned and run business using law enforcement and the threat of violence instead of using a less oppressive method such as serving notice of an inspection for possible health or commerce violations?
Is the FDA and Department of Agriculture protecting us from the mean ole independent businesses promoting ‘bioterrorism’ or are they protecting a market for major corporations who only view consumers as open wallets for their own financial benefit? Keep in mind that these are the same corporations who reduce their product package size and claim to be helping the economy by not raising their prices.
The FDA has a history of conducting raids on business operations selling natural herbs and nutritional supplements with claims of promoting health. The 1990 raid on Highland Laboratories, a small vitamin company in rural Oregon; 1987 raid on Life Extension Foundation in Florida; 2007 raid of Fullife Natural Options; for a list of similar raids click here.
We are all aware of the downside of large corporations. Labor Unions have been fighting this beast on the side of the little guy for a very long time. Often times resorting to violence to get their voices heard over management for simple human rights such as a decent wage, safe working conditions, reasonable work day lengths, affordable health coverage, and other benefits that those without a union will never have. Corporations are in place to feed their financial bottom-line. And if they could cut costs like health insurance, safety procedures, and even salary, they would do it.
Wal-Mart is the poster child of ‘large corporation’ vs. the ‘little guy’ and has certainly done their part to wipe-out local businesses wherever they build their stores. Despite their initial claims to the community in which they choose to spread their empire, small businesses dry up. The resulting job gains for Wal-Mart never amount to the losses suffered from these closings. The vast majority of Wal-Mart employees are paid part time wages and work without sufficient benefits which forces taxpayers to subsidize them through food stamps and Medicaid. Money earned by Wal-Mart leaves the local economy and is pumped to its headquarters therefore local banks do not benefit from Wal-Marts’ presence. Wal-Mart buys its bulk of goods from China forcing American suppliers to cut approximately 17,000 U.S. manufacturing jobs between 2001 and 2006. In 2007, Wal-Mart brought $26.7 billion of Chinese goods into the United States and cost American workers more than 200,000 jobs.
It has taken laws to be passed to protect the interests of the worker and consumer, but now corporations have bought politicians through lobby groups and outright bribes to protect themselves against the worker and our economy is suffering for it.
Multinational corporations are taking control of seeds, animals, food, and all natural substances worldwide and the police are at their beck and call to enforce governments’ and corporations’ sway over the ‘little guy’.
The Community Alliance for Responsible Eco-farming (CARE), a private group of farmers and consumers in Pennsylvania, recently released a statement regarding the relationship between private citizens and constitutional government. Their position is basically that the government has a right to control and regulate what the government creates. If, for example, the government creates a corporation (essentially conferring “person” status to that entity) then it has every right, every duty even, to oversee it. But men are not artificial entities created by government. Men are natural, and when they act as private citizens, government must stay out of their way. In fact, government is supposed to protect citizens from the actions of any entity that might inhibit the free exercise of their natural rights. When government does otherwise it blurs the line between private and public, effectively deeming EVERYTHING public, and thus making constitutions irrelevant.
As for the ongoing attack on free enterprise, the general public does not know enough to know what is real and what is speculation because the press has yet to mount an investigation into what is happening.
Where is the media coverage?
Why is there no mainstream media coverage of how this and other family owned businesses across the country are being dealt with in such a Gestapo-like manner?
It isn’t just the local media that should be held to account, national media as well bear the blame. Blogs and word of mouth are doing what they can to get the word out but they are no real substitute for gaining national attention. We need a concerted effort along with main stream media to bring this situation into the main stream consciousness. This cannot continue to go on without public scrutiny.
The media did not cover the story of the tea man. What else are we not being told?
Summation:
We have a SWAT action on a family farm to confiscate all business-related property without revealing charges.
We have government officials imposing rules and regulations on individuals who want nothing to do with them.
We have a media that does not cover these actions.
We have a populace who looks the other way, some of which are members of law-enforcement, government and media.
These are the ingredients necessary to allow a corprafascist state to exist.
We all need to rise up against this trend before it is too late.
History is repeating itself.
Further Reading:
True history of FDA raids on healers, vitamin shops and supplement companies
Center for Micro Eco-Farming Movement
Whole Farm Coop, Local Harvest
Benefits of Healthy Whole Foods
Herbal Supplements Guide
Monday, December 8, 2008
Blackwater Victims and Americans Need Justice
The five Blackwater security guards accused of killing 17 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad are expected to hand themselves over to federal authorities by today.
Charges to be brought against them are expected to be for manslaughter.
The five men's identities had been kept secret for more than a year, but were also released yesterday, Dec 7, 2008. They are: Evan Liberty and Donald Ball, both 26-year-old former marines, Dustin Heard, a 27-year-old ex-marine, Nick Slatten, 25, an ex-army sergeant, and Paul Slough, a 29-year-old army veteran.
A sixth guard, who has not been named, has reached a plea bargain deal with prosecutors to avoid a mandatory 30-year prison sentence.
According to Blackwater officials, the guards were returning fire after their convoy was shot at in Baghdad's al-Nisoor Square. However, FBI investigators found in late 2007 that most of the 17 deaths had been unjustified. An Iraqi government spokesman has said that they believed that the attack were tantamount to deliberate murder.
I sincerely hope that the families of these innocent people, gunned down by an arrogant Blackwater private security force, will get justice.
The American people need to know that our military will not condone the actions of a few ‘hired guns’. Actions by this administration have severely damaged the hard fought-for respect that our fathers and brothers in the military died to earn. This nation cannot be associated with ‘soldiers of fortune’ if we are to retain that respect.
The hiring of private security forces is a step towards fascism and in this case was put in place for the financial benefit of current and ex-government and military officials. Bush, Cheney and all Department of Defense officials should be held accountable for the atmosphere created by this misguided and irresponsible decision.
The U.S. made a major mistake in hiring what amounts to a private militia to take over what has been traditionally a military role, and the practice should be abandoned.
Allowing these individuals to go unpunished will be a major blow against U.S. foreign relations and the American people for years to come.
Charges to be brought against them are expected to be for manslaughter.
The five men's identities had been kept secret for more than a year, but were also released yesterday, Dec 7, 2008. They are: Evan Liberty and Donald Ball, both 26-year-old former marines, Dustin Heard, a 27-year-old ex-marine, Nick Slatten, 25, an ex-army sergeant, and Paul Slough, a 29-year-old army veteran.
A sixth guard, who has not been named, has reached a plea bargain deal with prosecutors to avoid a mandatory 30-year prison sentence.
According to Blackwater officials, the guards were returning fire after their convoy was shot at in Baghdad's al-Nisoor Square. However, FBI investigators found in late 2007 that most of the 17 deaths had been unjustified. An Iraqi government spokesman has said that they believed that the attack were tantamount to deliberate murder.
I sincerely hope that the families of these innocent people, gunned down by an arrogant Blackwater private security force, will get justice.
The American people need to know that our military will not condone the actions of a few ‘hired guns’. Actions by this administration have severely damaged the hard fought-for respect that our fathers and brothers in the military died to earn. This nation cannot be associated with ‘soldiers of fortune’ if we are to retain that respect.
The hiring of private security forces is a step towards fascism and in this case was put in place for the financial benefit of current and ex-government and military officials. Bush, Cheney and all Department of Defense officials should be held accountable for the atmosphere created by this misguided and irresponsible decision.
The U.S. made a major mistake in hiring what amounts to a private militia to take over what has been traditionally a military role, and the practice should be abandoned.
Allowing these individuals to go unpunished will be a major blow against U.S. foreign relations and the American people for years to come.
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
Bailout Demands Increase
Now states are asking to be bailed out. Is there no end to this? Taxpayers are overwhelmed enough without having to bailout everyone affected by how one industry screwed us all in the name of profit.
We need to prosecute everyone involved with throwing caution to the wind to allow loans without collateral, everyone who looked the other way while these institutions raped us and foremost we need to stop the government from raiding that great ATM called the American taxpayer to reward everyone affected.
We are in a recession because our government relaxed regulations and did nothing while the banking industry irresponsibly created this economic nightmare. And where in the long line of handouts are we? At the very end, if we are allowed to join the line at all.
Ohio Governor Strickland wants the federal government to grant $5 billion to help cover the tax shortfall created by our latest recession.
The three governors and six U.S. senators from Connecticut, New York and New Jersey have asked the federal labor secretary for $48.2 million to retrain people who've lost jobs because of the crisis on Wall Street.
Governor Jim Doyle Tuesday said Barack Obama is likely to have a bill that would help Wisconsin and 44 other states dealing with budget shortfalls either this year or next dig their way out of the financial hole.
Sure we are all suffering and will soon will be suffering even more from the increased taxes that our elected official see fit to raise to cover their shortfalls. But what recourse do we taxpayers have to cover our shortfalls? We are all going to have to tighten our belts to get through this. We need to stop this gift wagon that is the federal government bailout system that only makes the problem worse for the taxpayer. Those of us losing jobs cannot afford to bailout others and still expect to feed, house and clothe our families.
Put an end to this madness, now.
I have some sobering news for all of you with your hands out, the well is running dry.
We need to prosecute everyone involved with throwing caution to the wind to allow loans without collateral, everyone who looked the other way while these institutions raped us and foremost we need to stop the government from raiding that great ATM called the American taxpayer to reward everyone affected.
We are in a recession because our government relaxed regulations and did nothing while the banking industry irresponsibly created this economic nightmare. And where in the long line of handouts are we? At the very end, if we are allowed to join the line at all.
Ohio Governor Strickland wants the federal government to grant $5 billion to help cover the tax shortfall created by our latest recession.
The three governors and six U.S. senators from Connecticut, New York and New Jersey have asked the federal labor secretary for $48.2 million to retrain people who've lost jobs because of the crisis on Wall Street.
Governor Jim Doyle Tuesday said Barack Obama is likely to have a bill that would help Wisconsin and 44 other states dealing with budget shortfalls either this year or next dig their way out of the financial hole.
Sure we are all suffering and will soon will be suffering even more from the increased taxes that our elected official see fit to raise to cover their shortfalls. But what recourse do we taxpayers have to cover our shortfalls? We are all going to have to tighten our belts to get through this. We need to stop this gift wagon that is the federal government bailout system that only makes the problem worse for the taxpayer. Those of us losing jobs cannot afford to bailout others and still expect to feed, house and clothe our families.
Put an end to this madness, now.
I have some sobering news for all of you with your hands out, the well is running dry.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)