What TSA reform should look like in this Land of the Free

Cory Doctrow, of boingboing, posted ‘Alaska state rep refuses TSA grope of her mastectomy scars, drives home from Seattle’, which addresses how far Homeland Security’s front line against terrorism in our nation’s airports, the TSA, has overstepped its bounds, again.

One of the comments, submitted by pmocek, sums up the guidelines for what the American people should expect from a bureaucracy that claims to protect us. It is so well written that I could not resist reprinting it here:

So what is to be done? Real reform of TSA procedures would include:

• No more secret laws. TSA has to publish its rules and procedures like every other agency. Any unpublished rule cannot be enforced against citizens. Then the public would have early notice of rules like “You have to either be photographed nude, or groped”. And a flood of negative comments on such proposed rules might dissuade the agency, energize Congress to intervene, or allow a court challenge to be brought — before TSA molests a million more people a day in airports across the country.
• No more groping travelers. Assaults on innocent travelers in a way that the law oif almost every state defines as sexual battery should not be the new standard for Federally-approved suspicionless searches.
• No more suspicionless searches. We are in more danger from physical sexual attack by TSA employees than we are from secret bombers. Terrorism is a minor problem. Drunk drivers are more of a danger to travelers than terrorists. Heart disease kills far more people every week than terrorism did in its worst year. Mandatory heart checkups in lines at the airport would do far more to keep us all alive than mandatory searches. But neither checkups nor searches can be forced on the citizens of a free country. Millions have fought for our freedom; we should not let the government ignore the basic human rights that our families fought to obtain and keep.
• No more secret blacklists or secret “no-fly” orders. The TSA can’t bar “certain people” from flying by secret, extra-judicia administrative orders. If the TSA thinks someone is guilty of something, arrest them and give them their day in court to confront their accusers and defend themselves before a jury, with a presumption of innocence. If TSA can’t arrest them, because they haven’t committed a crime, then it must leave them (and the rest of us) alone.
• No more secret surveillance lists. TSA’s “selectee list” is much larger than the no-fly list. It is how a lot of people end up “randomly” searched every time they go through an airport. Again, if TSA has evidence of a crime, arrest them; otherwise, treat every traveler equally.
• No more lying to the public. TSA claims its searches are random when they aren’t. It claims their machines can’t store nude photos when they can. It claims ID is required when it isn’t. The history of TSA is a history of lying to the public. Congress should make sure it is both a crime and a tort (fraud) for a TSA employee or contractor to lie to a member of the public.
• No more identity checkpoints. Free countries don’t demand that citizens produce their “papers” in order to move around. No more warrantless interrogations (under penalty of denial of travel) or demands for information.
• Restore the right to assemble and the right to travel. Neither the TSA nor any government agency has the right to prevent us from moving around in our own country. If they don’t have cause to arrest us, then we’re presumed innocent and we’re free to move around the airports, the planes, the train stations, the trains, and the country.

It’s up to the public to take action to bring about these changes. So far, the courts have done nothing to stop these abuses or hold the TSA accountable. John Gilmore, for example, sued the TSA in a case that went all the way to the doors of the Supreme Court, over their demand that we identify ourselves in order to move around in our own country. He lost. The issue that he asked the Supreme Court to review was whether an agency like TSA can make up secret rules, never publish them, and require the public to follow them. The Supreme Court declined to take the case.

I fear this is the writing on the wall that U.S. citizens can no longer call this country “the land of the free”. Why more people are not standing up against this injustice is beyond me.

DHS has redefined the term Terrorist. . . to include us all

According to the Department of Homeland Security any act of dissent against the US government either physically or written is now considered an act of terrorism. I am, right now, by simply writing this post, am committing an act of terrorism against the US government.

Long before Homeland Security ever came into existence, voicing our displeasure against the government, or putting it into writing was considered free speech protected under the Bill of Rights. Clearly Secretary Janet Napolitano, is not a fan of James Madison, who is considered to be the ‘Father of the Constitution’ and the ‘Father of the Bill of Rights’.

Since so many of you have lost the true value of what Americans should hold most dear, let me remind you of the rights that the Bill of Rights grants every one of us:

• freedom of speech,
• a free press,
• free assembly,
• free association,
• the right to keep and bear arms.

Janet Napolitano is using the contrived terror threat as justification for the announcement that your every activity is being sent to federal fusion centers, those same fusion centers have been busy defining peaceful assembly, non-violent protest and criticism of the government as domestic terrorism. According to the government’s own definition of what constitutes terrorist activity – you are a terrorist.

Homeland Security is building a gargantuan database of every website you visit, every email you send and every phone conversation you have in order to genuinely hunt down terrorists. They are doing this without our permission, they are doing this because they think they are protecting us.

The driving force behind DHS desire to define domestic terrorism is to chill political dissent and, even more sinister, to justify their funding. Their zeal in pursuing this ridiculous endeavor is labeling some very American behaviors as terrorism. Behaviors such as flying American flags, wearing Levi jeans, being nice, looking “normal” and going scuba diving have all been redefined as signs of domestic terror.

They are taking a page out of George Orwell’s book1984 by encouraging Americans to “report suspicious activity” that includes such behavior. They figure that by making people afraid to exercise their constitutional rights then the only people who do exercise their rights must be terrorists.

Did you know that law enforcement across the country are being told that informed Americans who know their rights are dangerous? Check this out for the details.

Here are just a few ‘potential signs of terrorism’:

• Displaying bumper stickers and other paraphernalia associated with the Constitutional, Campaign for Liberty, and Libertarian parties
• Supporting Congressman Ron Paul
• Supporting former presidential candidate Chuck Baldwin
• Supporting former Congressman Bob Barr
• Opposing the implementation of a North American Union
• Owning gold bullion
• Displaying historical U.S. flags
• Opposing abortion
• Talking about the documentary Zeitgeist

How ridiculous is this list? This list is much longer and is populated with so many stupid entries that it doesn’t even warrant serious consideration.

Under the new definition of what constitutes a terrorist your neighbor will be acting perfectly reasonably when they inform on you to the authorities because you rented a hotel room, used a large amount of cash, or possess a significant amount of alcohol.

This stuff has nothing to do with the defining of a domestic terrorist. It has everything to do discouraging Americans from engaging in any kind of dissent. And this is a very real and clear danger to our constitutionally guaranteed freedom of speech and assembly.

To those of you out there who believe everything this government tells you concerning the definition of a domestic terrorist and say things like ‘If you don’t do anything wrong you don’t have anything to worry about’, I want to slap some sense into you. Under the paranoid and distrustful guidance of Homeland Security, America has become a decrepit and decaying banana republic where the government tells its people to spy on each other, where everyone is a potential terrorist and will come under suspicion if they don’t rigidly conform and ensure that their behavior displays the maximum amount of fealty and subservience to the state.

Little by little citizens are surrendering their liberty to the state. Until one day it seems perfectly reasonable for us to be herded off to internment camps, for our own protection naturally. The terrorists are coming. We'll be safe under the watchful eyes of Homeland Security.

Beware ladies and gentlemen, we are all now the enemy.

What is the Final Solution in Afghanistan?

Chris Floyd of the blog Empire Burlesque made the observation that militarist nationalism (often called "patriotism") is always, in one way or another, a "Final Solution."

He continues: “Set foot on that road, and you will get there. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, maybe not in this generation -- but you will get there. The blood-and-iron logic of domination -- of self-assertion and self-aggrandizement at the expense of all others -- will take you there.

The choice is simple, the choice is stark, the choice is laid upon us all.”

I could not agree more. If we continue on our current path in Afghanistan how can we hope to attain anything other than creating a never-ending treadmill of resentment and lost lives.

The war in Afghanistan has become an aimless absurdity. It began with a reason, to find Osama bin Laden. Or so we were told.

Since then, he ‘may have’ moved into Pakistan. No one knows for certain.

Is it really necessary to continue this seven year long bled letting against a bunch of religious extremists and drug lords many of whom have safe haven in Pakistan, only for the occasional victory? Victories that soon are negated by retaliatory actions of many of the same people we are there to ‘bring into the 21st century’.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s corrupt government skims the very drug trade that funds the indigenous forces NATO forces are fighting against and will therefore never lift a governmental finger to stop it.

The U.S. needs to back away from this messy effort quickly. The lofty goal to create a stable, secure nation-state in hopes of suppressing the spread of the Taliban’s control is miserably implausible. The historical situation is that Afghanistan has been ruled by regional tribal coalitions, often at each others throats, uniting only when a foreign nation enters the fray.

We need to change tactics IF catching Osama bin Laden is truly our goal. And I am willing to bet it is not.

Our troops are dying over an unachievable goal to basically ‘rehabilitate’ a government that refuses to participate in NATO’s game plan. And as long as the leaders of Pakistan and Afghanistan are complicit in their harboring of jihadis and continue to profit from the drug trade the idea of this being a ‘winnable’ war is pure folly.

Frederick Douglass once said: “Power concedes nothing without a demand, it never did and it never will.” Our choice is clear, until the citizens of the world stand united in demanding an end to this stalemate and call for an alternative to using the military to force our ideas onto these nations instead of using diplomacy to work out a more stable solution towards peace, the few countries willing to put their citizens in harms way will continue to pay a bloody price with no hopes of achieving anything worthwhile.

Where do we draw the line on torture?

Michael Vick served 19 months for torturing dogs while Dick Cheney is walking around free. Anyone care to venture a guess as to why this is business as usual?

Possible lessons learned:
1 - torturing people is okay, torturing animals is punishable.

2 - The GOP is the TORTURE-PROMOTING party!

3 – People love dogs more than their fellow humans

4 – It is more acceptable to torture Arabs than dogs?

Decide for yourself.

Cheney’s justification of torture is a house of cards

Former Vice President Dick Cheney continued his crusade to defend his position on the use of torture by speaking at the conservative American Enterprise Institute by saying: "After the most lethal and devastating terrorist attack ever, seven and a half years without a repeat is not a record to be rebuked or scorned, much less criminalized. It is a record to be continued until the danger has passed."

Basing his arguments on the lack of anther attack is flawed logic. There is no proof that another attack was planned. He is being dishonest by stating that his methods prevented another attack.

The inherent effectiveness of terrorism is that they only have to commit one heinous, murderous act to instill the fear they require as proof of their commitment to their cause. Committing this one act puts the world on notice that they are capable and willing to carry out their threats.

This resulting fear that they can do it again causes very great distress among their targeted people. But it did not have to bring about a deterioration of our core principles. That action required a paranoid, mean-spirited and short-sighted leader willing to sacrifice over 200 years of principled jurisprudence and to rip apart our core moral values. That brand of ‘leadership’ was found in the union of George W Bush and Dick Cheney.

And now to satisfy his colossal ego he continues his campaign to convince the American people, and indeed the world, that he was correct. Or is he trying to convince himself?

You could be a terrorist if...

clipped from www.naplesnews.com You're probably a terrorist if you supported former presidential candidates like Ron Paul, Bob Barr, or Chuck Baldwin. The guy with the flip-charts doesn't count. Yet. You're probably a terrorist if you're against the New World Order, the North American Union, and those united numbskulls, the UN. Reading Tom Clancy novels doesn't help your case. You're probably a terrorist if you're against RFIDs (Radio Frequency Identification) and universal service programs. You're probably a terrorist if you're for the US Constitution, for property rights, for national sovereignty, and for Christian ideologies. You're probably a terrorist if you stock up on things like water, baby formula, ammo, cigarettes, alcohol, denim jeans, and medicines. And for all you folks rushing out to buy guns and ammo out of fear that the current administration will enact severe gun restrictions, hey, you may have made the list as well.

If you are a puppet-on-a-string assiduously following every law to the letter, enthusiastically nodding in agreement to everything the government tells you, patriotically turning in your neighbors for every infraction of the law (both written and social), then you have nothing to worry about.

Many Americans, Republican and Democrat, have grown tired of the direction in which this country is headed. The once occasional lapse in ethics has become common place, greed and irresponsibility by our financial institutions are being rewarded in the form of ‘bailout’ tax dollars, citizens have to watch what we say and do and how we do it, self-interest has supplanted “doing what is right for this country”, special interest groups are favored over national security and welfare, food safety has been jeopardized in favor of profit.

Civil unrest is brewing and FEMA detention centers are sprouting up across the nation. http://www.mindfully.org/Reform/2004/FEMA-Concentration-Camps3sep04.htm

Smart Grid: Big Brothers Eyes and Ears

Smart Grid is part of a global initiative to manage information, all information. This is not some dire fictional prediction; it exists right now, right here in the United States, and thanks to President Obama, the Secretary of the Treasury can lend the Western Area Power Administration (WAPA), a division of the Department of Energy, $3.25 billion to implement Smart Grid.

Ostensibly, Smart Grid is about energy efficiency and climate change. This intelligent power grid gathers information about individual energy use via sensors embedded in the transmission lines and in homes and businesses. The government, via WAPA, will know what temperature at which you keep your home or business. If you keep your domicile warmer or cooler than the temperature approved by the federal government, you pay more. To some, this is an acceptable arrangement, until they discover what else Smart Grid can do.

This is another means by which the federal government can keep tabs on what you do and where you go. Think keeping track of thermostat settings is harmless? Think using your credit/debit card to make all of your purchases (travel destinations, pharmaceuticals, books, etc) is harmless? What about drivers licenses that now have electro-magnetic strips on them? How about OnStar, the emergency help system that will eventually be used to stop your vehicle on police command, or cellphone GPS so authorities can track where you are?. All of these seemingly harmless systems taken by themselves are just that, harmless. But, given this latest push to implement this Smart Grid plan within 60 days, a larger more sinister picture is developing.

IBM and GE will receive billions of dollars under the federal governments implementation of Smart Grid. Appliances, cars, home furnishings, even clothing are all becoming more intelligent and the devices that allow this intelligence will be able to be accessed by anyone with the proper equipment. In the wrong (or right) hands data collected from these many devices can tell the government everything about you and anyone who is in your house or place of business, at any time.

The world is becoming increasingly interconnected and interactions between all of these various systems will grow exponentially. A Smart Grid set up to capture and catalog all of those seemingly innocuous transactions can paint a very clear picture of you and your lifestyle. The dire vision as laid out in George Orwell’s book 1984 about our future is coming true, today.

Our political leaders are not the only ones who have been handed a mandate for change. Leaders of businesses and institutions everywhere have a unique opportunity to transform the way the world works.

Global integration is upon us. It is becoming an acceptable and necessary part of our everyday lives and is gently lulling us into a false sense of security. As the world becomes smarter through the integration of systems monitoring such diverse concerns as climate change, global supply chains, money transactions, and security, we are falling under the spell cast by a government that covets as much information as it can get on its citizens.

Homeland Security and the FBI have been obsessing over plans to document palm prints, eye scans and tattoo mapping of every U.S. citizen and anyone who crosses our borders. Will this information assist them in fulfilling their mandate to protect Americans? The vast majority of Americans will never consider committing a terrorist act against their neighbors, family or anyone else. How is collecting information on these people going to better serve the FBI and Homeland Security or us?

The final legal threshold preventing the FBI from monitoring Americans without probable cause was crossed when a special appeals court ruled that criminal prosecutors should be able to request the bugging of suspected terrorists. And the court system consistently sides with law enforcement, in all matters.

A computer system, developed under the Total Information Awareness System by the Bush Administration, was set up to monitor every American’s credit card transactions, phone calls and even borrowed library books in an anti-terrorist measure under the auspices of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. The agency is also funding the development of technologies to allow the Government to track e-mail, internet use, travel, and bank records, medical files and every type of accessible private and public data into what the Pentagon described as “one centralized grand database”.

This “grand database” was authorized under the scare of terrorism. But, who is terrorizing whom?

The Patriot Act increased powers for intelligence agents to monitor citizens.

Bureau of Prisons ordered by US Justice Department to alter its rules to allow the monitoring of lawyer-client conversations without court order or supervision.

A presidential executive order allowed military tribunals for anyone deemed by the Justice Department to be an “enemy combatant”, for which there is no legal definition.

We have already seen laws changed or flat out broken in order to spy on American citizens. We have learned of bills passed allowing data collection of American citizens. We have witnessed the growth of one the largest bureaucracies ever developed (Homeland Security) under the guise of preventing terrorism to reach America’s shores.

And now, the Smart Grid, set up to collect all information possible, is becoming a reality. Do you still need convincing that all of these ‘harmless’ single events does not mean that our government is bent on monitoring every aspect of our daily lives? Does there have to be nefarious reasons for someone to want to implement such an intrusive and all-inclusive system? Once this system is in place evil will find it easier to do as it wishes.

Close Guantanamo, Yes. Prosecute the Detainees, Absolutely

President Obama has ordered the U.S. government to suspend prosecutions of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay for 120 days “in the interest of justice”.

I am all for “justice”. I am for justice for the loss of life of over 3,000 Americans on September 11, 2001. I am all for justice for the countless lives lost in Iraq (members of our armed forces as well as Iraqi citizens). I am all for justice for the lives lost as the result of terrorists who maniacally take other peoples lives for their own glory.

This military prison, set up by the Bush administration in 2002, has become a major issue because critics argue it has become a symbol of mismanagement and overreach in the war on terror.

Don’t let this ‘symbol of mismanagement and overreach’ become the making of another symbol. That being that in the rush to cleanse ourselves of the atrocities of the Bush administration we allow terrorists to go free.

Jamil Dakwar, a representative for the American Civil Liberties Union at the base, said the ACLU believes all charges against the prisoners should be dropped.

Jamil Dakwar is a moron.

Among those facing trial at Guantanamo Bay is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the confessed organizer of the September 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington.

Why should this man go free after his responsibility in killing over 3,000 Americans?

This is the major problem I have with the ACLU. They would rather Americans ‘forgive’ him his murderous actions by turning the other cheek, to allow him and terrorists like him to strike that cheek as well.

Haven’t these bleeding hearts learned anything from the past? Love does not conquer all. Society cannot allow murders and sociopaths to walk free among the very people they feel compelled to kill.

I am a compassionate person. I believe in live and let live. But I also understand the fatalistic flaw of that philosophy. If this world consisted only of people who practiced this philosophy humans rights groups such as the ACLU and Human Rights Watch would not be necessary. Unfortunately, this is not reality. We don’t live in a perfect world where violence is not considered a viable answer.

The true reality is that we are forced to deal with murderous self-interests who are out to eradicate anyone who does not believe as they do. It is our duty, to ourselves, to our future, and to all of the murdered victims, to correctly identify those self-interests and remove them from our society.

The ACLU needs to balance its pursuit of the protection of human rights for the living with demanding justice for the victims of people like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

U.S. and Israel are creating terrorists

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?

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

Fossil Fuel Profits vs Human Rights

On November 4, 2007, a Buddhist monk, writing under the name U Gambira, published an op-ed in The Washington Post advocating democracy for his Southeast Asian nation of Burma.

U Gambira wrote: "It matters little if my life or the lives of colleagues should be sacrificed on this journey. Others will fill our sandals, and more will join and follow."

As U Gambria wrote, the regime already had arrested his father and brother, holding them as hostages to flush him out. It found and arrested him on the same day that his article appeared.

Since then, U Gambira has been forcibly deprived of his monastic robes and tortured in Burma’s notorious Insein Prison. A half-dozen other members of his family have been arrested or forced into internal exile. At age 29, he has been charged with “crimes” that could bring years in prison.

What are those “crimes”? Leading a non-violent demonstration protesting the oppressive rule of Burma’s military leadership and asking for something we in America take for granted: Democracy and basic human rights.

On Tuesday Nov 4, we in America exercised one of our most cherished rights, to vote a change in leadership. The people of Burma don’t have this right. If they did General Than Shwe and his band of murderous, thieving, oppressors would be ousted and the Burmese people would once again enjoy the enlightened lifestyle of a free democratic society.

The brutal and oppressive military leadership of General Than Shwe and his policies have looted and destroyed sacred monasteries in his efforts to round up political and religious leaders. He has brought Burma’s economy to its knees. They have emptied what was once considered the breadbasket of Asia to the point that it cannot feed its own people. Burma, once known as a light for education and literacy now has closed its schools and universities.

Last September, the Burmese people spoke up against General Shwe’s rule and many were imprisoned, tortured and slaughtered for it. That bloodbath brought the world’s attention to Burmese plight but very little has changed. General Than Shwe has since sought to portray this uprising as a singular event, now over. A veneer of quiet has replaced the sounds of gunfire on city streets. Unfortunately, many in the international community buy in and actively support this propaganda.

U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and his special adviser, Ibrahim Gambari, have taken steps to open a dialogue with Burma's generals but little progress is being made.

China and Russia continue to block the UN Security Council from facilitating a dialogue between democratic forces and the regime.

Association of Southeast Asian Nations have condemned the regime's actions but have done little else.

The world's largest democracy, India, continues to provide military assistance and trade deals that help finance the regime's war on its people.

The U.S. claims to be a stalwart of human rights and yet allows human rights atrocities to continue in Burma, Zimbabwe, Tibet, etc. and even writes its laws to allow a U.S.-based corporation to profit from it.

Chevron, based in California, has been making huge profits in Burma as part owner of a natural gas project and is therefore complicit in the human rights abuses through its investment. U.S. sanctions prevent most U.S. companies from working in Burma, but Chevron's investment there existed before the sanctions were imposed and continues under a grandfather clause. The message being sent around the world is “Profit trumps human rights”.

Chevron’s answer to the many letters of protest they have received over their part in Burma is to remove all references to Burma from their webpage.

U Gambira, and many others like him, is willing to die to gain freedom for his fellow countrymen. Chevron and the U.S. is willing to let him die at the hands of a tortuous dictatorial regime in order to make a profit. Now jump to Iraq where Bush’s lies led to hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians to lose their lives in a scheme to enrich his buddies in the oil and gas industry. The main difference between Bush and Shwe is the U.S. Constitution.

Is profiting from fossil fuel worth more than human lives? Those of us who live under ethical and moral standards would say "of course not". But, ask Bush and the CEO of Chevron and we get a much different answer.

Bush feigned moral outrage over Saddam Hussein’s torture of his own people and so therefore felt a "moral obligation" to "save" Iraq from Saddam’s madness. Where is that outrage now against what the Burmese are suffering from? The only difference between Iraq and Burma is that Iraq has more oil reserves.

We owe it to our own conscience to stop supporting Chevron and any other company that makes a profit on the misery of any person.

It is easy to simply buy Chevron gas with our credit card ignoring the fact that in doing so we are aiding Chevron in their complicity in the suffering that the Burmese people endure every day. It is more difficult to think about our actions, tear up that credit card, drive past every Chevron gas pump and not aid and abet in their profiting from human suffering. But really, how difficult is all of that when compared to U Gambira being tortured in a jail cell for standing up for his right to be free?

Further reading:
Words of Power
San Francisco Chronicle

The George W Bush Presidency was a Parody of Our Political System

What do we expect of our President? It is very simple really:

• Keep the economy working for everyone, not just the corporations
• Surround himself/herself with the most knowledgeable advisors in the most critical of fields
• Keep lines of communications open with foreign nations as a means of preventing wars
• Provide moral/ethical leadership
• Protect individual rights to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness
• Foremost, to abide by the rules of government as laid out in our constitution and defend Americas principles and values as defined by the Bill of Rights.

Based on these basic requirements, George W Bush has failed us miserably.

And we have failed ourselves. The ongoing self-imposed ignorance and apathy of the typical American voter set the stage for this presidential farce by keeping themselves uninformed of even the most major issues and that ignorance has allowed themselves to be manipulated and duped into believing this man was right for the presidency of the United States. Unscrupulous campaign architects, with a clear disdain for the political process, devised a plan to thrust a weak-minded, ethically questionable, politically hollow individual onto the national political stage. They found their ideal puppet in George Walker Bush. Known only by his fathers name and propped up by his fathers wealth, he stumbled through a very lackluster tenure as Texas governor, and was therefore ripe to be puppeted by political bosses bent on exploiting the American free enterprise system and hollowing it out for their own personal gain. And they got away with it because the average American does not understand what they are supporting.

Welcome to the Corporafasicist States of America where politicians have subjugated themselves to the whims of corporations. Where our president has opened the coffers of taxpayer dollars to fund corporate welfare and paved the way for easing legal pitfalls that stand in the way of their raping of this nation. Where Americans throw their unbridled support behind anyone that they think will make money for themselves without pondering the consequences. Where the unbridled and seemingly runaway power of the president has used the unabashed greed of capitalism to usurp citizens rights for the benefit of corporate America.

Act one: election scam
This presidential charade began with the 2000 election-scam orchestrated by Florida’s sectary of state Katherine Harris and finalized by a right-leaning U.S. Supreme Court. The fact that GW’s brother Jeb was governor of Florida is not a fact to take lightly. Add to this Daddy Bush’s post-White House lobby work with his deep pocketed friend’s and this election was bought and delivered in a pretty package.

In all fairness to the American voter, politicians reneging on campaign promises has repeatedly sullied the value of our vote to the point of worthlessness. A candidate is paraded before us seemingly from behind the scenes and is cheered by their party as the single greatest thing to ever happen to this country. In an attempt to sell this candidate, through spoon fed speech rhetoric using very slim poll results to determine what voters want, he/she is then allowed to waffle based on current political winds. Near the end of this popularity contest each candidate has given up on trying to convince us they are right for the job and are now expending all their time and money trying to convince us the other person is not right for the job. In the end, the selection process comes down to selecting the person you like least and then voting for the other.

In George W Bush we see an unfortunate example of the type of individual this country’s educational and social systems is producing. Lacking in social graces and ethically bankrupt without an ounce of respect for truth or Americas citizens, he is willing to overlook legal ‘indiscretions’ as long as doing so will benefit him and his party. He is the epitome of the type of person who makes it through life by irreverently joking his way through social situations, immersing himself in the ‘good-ole-boy’ network, in an attempt to cover up the fact that he has no idea how to tackle any real-world problem in any meaningful and ethical manner, much less aspire to be an example of the moral leadership this nation desperately needs in a president sworn to preserve, protect and defend the constitution on which this nation was built.

His loyalty shifted from his voters to corporate leaders in the blink of the presidential inauguration.

Act two: Iraq or Bust
The continuation of this parody is especially heinous for GW’s blind desire to avenge is father’s ‘mistake’ in not taking out Saddam Hussein during Operation Desert Storm in 1991. Bush the second and his machine drummed up support by manufacturing false claims of an Iraq missile development program and using Iraq weapons inspection teams as a cover for justifying the use of American troops to exact his vendetta against Saddam. By falsely claiming Iraq had weapons of mass destruction intended to be used against the U.S. he triggered events that had no recourse but to physically remove this man from power. Soon after invading Iraq it became unwaveringly apparent that these claims were false and that congress was complicit in declaring war on a sovereign nation.
claims were false

By illegally attacking Iraq, a Muslim nation, Bush callously stirred up a hornets nest of Islamic terrorists and targeted every American citizen around the globe for any terrorist group hoping to carve out a name for themselves in the name of Allah. Instead of choosing diplomacy or any other nonviolent option Bush’s “Wild West” mentality resorted to damning rhetoric that painted Saddam as undeterrable and being armed with nuclear weapons direct military action became the only answer. Saddam knew that his use of a nuclear weapon would result in Iraq being obliterated. There was no threat of danger from Iraq but Congress, incredibly, chose to ignore this simple fact and bought into Bush’s 2002 “axis of evil” speech and when the CIA presented its flawed findings, war was inevitable.

Main stream media went along with everything Bush said, seeing an opportunity to ensure this war would be fully covered live. With visions of Nobel prizes and the promise of “exclusive” shocking wartime stories clouding their judgment, 24/7 news programming directors were salivating for raw footage to fill their schedule to satisfy a voyeuristic world public.

After learning that the basis for going to war was formed on false claims, the U.S. Senate put the blame squarely on the CIA, ignoring the fact that G W Bush and company instigated the entire affair.

The outward appearance that U.S. intelligence services failed to stop the September 11 attacks has many believing that the plot was discovered before hand and the White House administration allowed the terrorists to follow through with their plans knowing that the act would bolster Americas support for Bush’s dirty little war. The U.S. then promised to protect Saudi Arabia’s role in those attacks because it was in the U.S. best interest to protect our access to their oil.

And now the main prize is within reach: no-bid oil deals for western oil companies. This truly will finally mean success for Bush’s illegal war in Iraq.

Now, the Bush administration is following a similar script to start a war with Iran. And for what? Because of G W Bush’s blind rage over Iran’s refusal to bow down to him. As a result Russia has become leery over the placement of a so-called U.S. missiles defense system that places Russia squarely within its range and Putin has now grown colder in his relations toward the U.S. Way to go George, you have managed to piss off a peacetime partner destroying years of diplomacy and negotiations to get them to finally trust us. All thanks to your inability to accept that you are not the ordained protector of this planet. The rhetoric you and Cheney have put into place is taking on a life of its own and the entire world will deeply suffer if you ignite the fuse you yourself are responsible for laying down against Iran.

Act three: inner circle of friends
But George’s high jinx didn’t end with an illegal war. He has used the once prestigious White House as the scene of such low-class and immoral atrocities as the character assassination of anyone who dares utter a discouraging word against King George or his cohorts. It didn’t matter if that person was an operative of the CIA (Valerie Plame Wilson) and outing that person meant the loss of countless networks of foreign agents. Or, if that person was the Secretary of State (Colin Powell) because he was becoming more popular with the public than Bush himself. Or a Secretary of Defense (Donald Rumsfeld) because the military didn’t like the way he was handling Iraq. Or a Foreign Secretary (Jack Straw) for speaking his mind.

Bush is famous for going the extra mile to protect his inner-circle of friends, membership to which coincidently requires hefty financial remuneration, to the point of defying the legal process. Since top members of the legal system are a part of his inner-circle neither he nor his friends have to fear recrimination. Several members of that circle of ‘friends’ came to know just how generous GW and his gang could be. The list of donor friends includes Ken Lay, Enron CEO and co-architect of the biggest corporate fraud and market manipulation schemes ever perpetrated in this country. Ken and company became one of the biggest recipients of corporate welfare after donating $3 million to Bush electoral campaigns and the Republican Party.

Oil company executives receive a place of honor among GW’s circle of friends and have all seen record profits because of it. Due to their bought-and-paid-for friendship with George W Bush through campaign contributions big oil and chemical companies have had free reign over environmental concerns and it is no secret that the EPA has elected to go soft on these major polluters. Even now Bush is pushing to lift the offshore drilling ban under the ruse that doing so will help ease fuel prices to American consumers. Lifting this ban will provide no benefit to anyone except for big oil and will destroy coastal economies and the environment.

Anyone who actually worked in the White House is automatically covered by presidential privilege. One such person was Scooter Libby. Scooter, if you remember, was the sacrificial lamb who took the heat for the outing of CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson. As a thank-you to Mr. Libby for his time as Vice President Cheney’s chief of staff and for taking the fall for the true guilty person (many believe Cheney ordered the leak in retaliation against her husband Ambassador Joseph C Wilson), Bush commuted Libby’s sentence. It pays to be friends with the president of the United States.

Presidential cronyism gets you other special privileges such as being appointed to high office, with complete disregard for ability to perform their respective positions. Alberto Gonzalez (Attorney General) is a prime example. Others were Harriet Miers (failed Supreme Court Nominee), and Michael Brown (FEMA Director). Bush will overlook incompetence to the point of seriously damaging his own credibility. That is what ‘good ole’ boys’ do for each other.

Because of Bush’s disregard for the letter of the law and the clearly spelled-out intentions of the U.S. Constitution, this Congress has lost all of its power to subpoena anyone. His leadership (sic) by the wrong example is making it comfortable for any well-heeled law-breaker to laugh at subpoenas and Karl Rove wields this ability to the limit. Best known as the architect of George W Bush’s rise to power, he is without doubt one of the most despicable characters to latch onto a presidential candidate through his use of negative campaign ads, campaign fund raising tactics and the simple fact that he helped orchestrate the selling of George W Bush to an unwary American public using every dirty tactic and lie he had at his disposal. To this day Karl Rove refuses to appear before the House Judiciary Committee to testify on the politicization within the Justice Dept. despite being subpoenaed. He was forced to retire last August under suspicion for his role in the firing of nine U.S. attorneys in 2006 as well as the prosecution of former Gov. Don Siegelman of Alabama, a Democrat. Rove, of course, has denied playing any role in the Siegelman affair. Lying has become second nature to this slug of a human being.

Bush appointee, and U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey refuses a Senate subpoena for files. Why won’t he hand them over? As a personal favor to his good buddy George W Bush. Imagine, the U.S. Attorney General refusing to answer a subpoena. What message do you think that is sending the rest of the country?

Act four: Dismantling of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights
George W Bush has approached the shredding of the constitution with an almost religious zeal and when the U.S. Senate stepped into the realm of the legal system (a clear violation of the separation of government powers as laid out in the constitution) by passing a law that would prevent telecoms from being sued for their part in the warrantless wiretapping scheme, Congress became partners in the dismantling of the very foundation of this once democratic nation. This takes power away from anyone who wishes to go through the courts to sue over the loss of their right to privacy. This new law also dramatically expands the government’s surveillance powers without any meaningful judicial oversight. This total lack of respect for Constitutional law and the refusal to stay within its clearly spelled-out intentions has amounted to an overthrow of our form of government from a Democracy to Fascism. These fools who pass themselves off as protectors of the American people and defenders of the constitution either have no clue as to what they are doing or are too afraid to stand up to the president. Either way American citizens lose. The Constitution has become nothing more than a piece of paper.

How many Americans know the true dangers that the passage of this legislation has presented to us as free citizens? The government now has the right to collect information on non-terrorist-related activities like P2P copyright infringement and online gambling. In short, the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 opens up loopholes that allows the feds spy on anyone they see fit without having to ask for permission. The government is no longer required to identify specific eavesdropping targets.
right to collect information on non-terrorist-related activities

A five-member Privacy and Civil Liberties Board was created in 2004 after being recommended by the 9/11 Commission. President Bush initially refused to nominate anyone at all leaving the commission vacant since the previous board's term ended in January thereby leaving the panel to exist in name only.

The Military Commissions Act, passed in the final hours before Congress adjourned in 2006, cast aside the constitution and the principle of habeas corpus, which protects against unlawful and indefinite imprisonment. Congress also gave the president absolute power to designate enemy combatants, and to set his own definitions for torture.

Bush held fast to the misplaced belief that torture guarantees honest results. Torture and the inflicting of pain on another human being weakens our value as a civil society and brings dishonor upon those individuals knowingly participating in the administration of it. When George W Bush vetoed a ban on waterboarding, finally admitting its practice after lying that the U.S. participated in such atrocities, he became the first American president to openly authorize torture on detainees. He took us a step backwards towards the Dark Ages and formally joined the ranks of the most heinous and hated men this world has ever produced. The black-hearted, evil bloody henchmen of WWII Nazi Germany are among those individuals.

Islamic terrorists are defending their homelands from the illegal invasion of a nation who thinks it has eminent domain over every resource and has to impose its idea of democracy on every nation on the face of this planet. Americans would do the same thing if tables were turned. This idea of manifest destiny that is so embedded into America’s thinking is likened to the Catholic Church of the 13th century who imposed the Holy Inquisition to destroy heretics and non-believers through the use of torture.
Source: Torture Throughout the Ages

This nation has done more to banish the use of torture than any other nation and then along comes George W Bush to undo it all. He has violated America’s treaty obligations, the military code of justice, the United Nations convention against torture, and U.S. law. This savagery is the last vestige of a frustrated, unlawful, uncivilized society.

Due to the acceptance of torture as a viable means of treatment towards prisoners, and the common atrocious wartime practice of presenting the enemy as less than human, this nation created the horror of Abu Ghraib. Individuals, incompetent and sadistic, were allowed and even encouraged to inflict any manner of pain on prisoners never once realizing the irony that one of the reasons the U.S. invaded Iraq was to remove a dictator accused of torturing his citizens. The hypocrisy that is America is best stated thusly: “Do as I Say, Not as I Do”

Even the grunts that Bush’s lies are responsible for maiming and killing in his illegal war are tossed aside after their ‘usefulness’ has ebbed. He shows no concern for their welfare unless forced to do so. And then he stages a teleconference with troops to show his “support”.

Hurricane Katrina put the spot light on how much this administration gives a damn about disaster victims in this country. FEMA trailers are rotting away behind locked gates. Supplies stockpiled in warehouses while needy victims are still waiting for relief. FEMA knew they were incompetent in fulfilling their duties and instead of devising a plan to correct their shortcomings, they staged a press conference stocked with their own people, and did not invite the press, in an attempt to regain the respect of the American people. This is the best solution that our leaders can come up with!. After three years victims of Katrina are still waiting for assistance.

Grand Finale: Destroying the World’s Economy
The sub-prime mortgage debacle screwed more than the people who lost their homes. Taxpayers once again will feel the screws tighten even tighter because of the upcoming bailout required to keep Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac solvent. This is another example of how corporations can screw people out of tons of money and run their respective corporations into the ground without any fear of reprisal because of the knowledge that the federal government (taxpayers) will always bail them out. And the crooked participants always walk away richer for it.

There are currently 76 banks under threat of collapsing, as reported by the FDIC, a 52% increase over last year. Next year, the number is expected to reach over 200. Not since the flood of bank failures after the Savings and Loan bailout by the federal government in the 1989 has our banking system been in this much trouble. The larger problem is the potential tightening of credit provided by major banks which is the life blood of the economy. Without new loans, we are all in deep trouble. The leading cause of all of this trouble is most regulators failed to scrutinize many banks who were overly eager to provide home loans to borderline recipients. When these loans began to become delinquent many small banks suffered. The domino effect is bringing down much more than those small banks. If there are not enough strong banks to take on assets and deposits of these smaller failed banks then we are headed for a depression.

This economic situation is the main reason we are paying record high prices for gas, record high prices for food, record budget deficits, record trade deficits, record number of Americans without health insurance, record number of home mortgage loan failures. While Bush is giving money away to his rich friends through tax cuts and subsidies this nation has suffered through two recessions and is currently threatened with another depression. This poor excuse for a leader and this spineless congress have no idea how to effectively manage economic matters. They spend their time writing laws to benefit large-donor corporations and financially generous lobby groups, and lining the pockets of their richest constituents with pork but when it comes down to actually doing something useful or meaningful for the people who are paying their salaries they are clueless.

Bush’s economic policy is simple: “all money should flow to corporate entities and any other consideration is counterproductive”.

And now it has come out that favors are being offered in return for donations to the presidential library. This guy is laughing at anything that resembles class or ethics.
paying for access to presidential library

We are leaderless, and this imposter who calls himself president is robbing us blind.

What is truly terrifying is the number of people who are backing the Bush clone John McCain. They are actually asking that this eight-year-nightmare not end.

You know, you can dress up an ignorant rich boy and elect him president of the United States but you can’t make him give a damn about his fellow citizens.

We may have the physical structure of the government that our founding fathers laid out for us, but we no longer abide by the spirit of what they intended. Our founding fathers would shudder if they could see what their vision of America has been reduced to.

In their own words from the Declaration of Independence: “But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.”

People, I beg of you, pay more attention to national and international news, not just from main stream media, from alternative sources so we can all be better informed and stop this madness of electing someone just because someone you know did, or just because he/she is cute, or just because of sex or race. We need to be informed and we can only do it for ourselves.

Where Are We Going?

Do we have a direction for this country? What are America’s goals? After living (stumbling) under what passes for “leadership” these days, I feel this country is more lost today than ever.

Actually, we are headed in several directions. We are headed for a second great depression, according to economic experts; we are headed for war with Iran, according to U.S. News and World Report and according to the rhetoric that our paranoid, war-hawkish ‘leaders’ are spouting; we are headed toward environmental disaster, according to environmentalists everywhere; we are headed toward third world status, according to our downward trend on the list of information technology rankings. Our increasing illiteracy, our increasing waistlines and our vanishing chances of having a workable and equitable healthcare plan has us decreasing in the rankings of the world’s healthiest nations. We are leading the world in number of incarcerated individuals, a dubious honor at best.

In a recent poll, 70% of respondents to a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey say things are going badly for this country.

We are told as individuals that we should have a 5-year plan, a 10-year-plan, and beyond. Can anyone tell me what those plans are for this country?

The U.S. has become more dangerously polarized through our blind impassioned pursuit of terrorist (that we certainly have had a hand in creating) and we are antagonizing them even more with each sip of oil from foreign wells.

As a nation, we have lost our sense of what is right and wrong, fair and unfair, just and unjust. George Bush’s gang thought it right that we destroy a nation to protect our interests and access to oil. They thought it just to use telecoms to secretly gather information on millions of Americans in their pursuit of terrorists that, oddly enough, has not led to any arrests. They thought it fair to hold hundreds of those who they consider to be ‘enemy combatants’ for years without a trial. They thought it fair to place unqualified cronies in such high government positions as the head of the U.S. Attorneys Office, Director of FEMA, Commissioner FDA, Chair of Corporation for Public Broadcasting and Administrator of Medicare & Medicaid Services. But ask any individual you come into contact with throughout your busy day for their opinion on any of these topics and they will give you a very different version of what is right, fair and just.

Our emerging world market economy is creating an ‘every-man-for-himself’ value system. Traditional morality, i.e., selflessness, altruism, sharing and cooperation, is the glue that built our society and it is crumbling.

This is the key factor behind much of the social unrest globally, according to George Matafonov, author of a new book entitled Fire & Water: Market Morality & Civil Society. "While the threat of terrorism and multiculturalism are often convenient and easy scapegoats, the root causes of social unrest globally lie in the experiment in trying to model the moral core of society on economic theory, rather than traditional human values," said Matafonov. "While economic theory results in efficiency in competitive markets, it has no place outside the market," he added.

As humans, we have been living in societies for tens of thousands of years and have developed values and a sense of morality to enable us to live in peace, harmony and prosperity. In the space of less than 50 years, economic theory has turned all this upside down by insisting our chief value should be competitive self-interest.

Religion has taken a beating by people who lack the incentive or the inclination to give it a ‘test drive’ and by reports that prove clergy are humans. Catholic church sex scandals have become legendary. Evangelical church leaders become involved in sexual immoral conduct, tax evasion, extramarital affairs, shameless theatrics to raise money, and infighting. Christianity has taken on so many different doctrines that there is no longer one central belief. Even the idea of God holding dominion over earth as its creator is no longer acceptable to a growing number of people. Supreme Court decisions that ban recognition of God in public life have the effect of abolishing Christianity in public life and discrediting Christianity in private life. These Supreme Court decisions are driven by organizations such as American Atheists, the group founded by Madelyn Murray O'Hair in 1963, the American Civil Liberties Union and many others.

Family values are deteriorating through moral decay that allows adulterous relationships that in turn increases the divorce rate. The resulting increased divorce rate increases out-of-wedlock pregnancies that are costing taxpayers more than $112 billion annually. The unfortunate side effect of divorce is a single-parent family that is subject to a life filled with early pregnancy, school dropout, and delinquent behavior. Children who grow up without a father present, even when adjustments are made for income, are 375% more likely to need professional assistance for emotional problems, twice as likely to repeat a grade of school, and more likely to suffer a wide variety of other disorders including anxiety, peer conflict, and hyperactivity. While television and the movies gather headlines as the motivation behind teen violence, school administrators blame "family breakup" for violence in the schools. As a result of economic pressures to work longer hours or multiple jobs, children of single-parent families find themselves unsupervised. They can’t help but have feelings of abandonment even if they understand why they are left alone.

The idea of a democratically elected government has become a joke. Our elected officials are guided more by whichever corporation has the most lobbyist who gets the most attention with the most money as opposed to what the taxpayers really need in their struggle to survive. Super delegates have a disproportionate voting power and can back any candidate they want regardless of who their peers vote for.

As we search for alternative energy sources in an attempt to wean ourselves from fossil based fuel, the very symbols of what we are fighting against, big oil, is busy developing a corporate environmentalism designed to appeal to green consumers, while fighting tooth and nail any legislation that would interfere with their financial bottom line. This hypocrisy is nothing more than an overt attempt to maintain their influence, and product brand, over a society that should be focused on finding alternative energy sources.

David Suzuki, a noted environmental activist, author and host of CBC Television science magazine, published a post on guardian.co.uk on how humans have lost the vital skill of forethought. He asks why we choose to ignore the warnings from the worlds leading scientists and Nobel prize winners of the coming ecological disaster. We have the capacity to alter our current course of ‘the degradation of our very life support systems - air, water, soil, energy and biodiversity’ and yet we choose to devote our attention to ‘every antic of Paris Hilton or Britney Spears’.

All in all, this is a pretty dismal picture of life in America. As long as this nation is devoid of strong moral leadership we cannot hope to focus our many talents and our creativity towards finding equitable and viable solutions that will benefit everyone.

What lies ahead is anybody’s guess. Somehow, just making more money seems pretty unfulfilling. What do you think?