Barack Obama is still driving America towards decline
Two words hardly mentioned in Barack Obama’s 65-minute State of the Union address to Congress: freedom and liberty. President Obama’s fourth and possibly last State of the Union speech was long on big government proposals, but short on the principles that have made America the world’s greatest power. His lecturing tone exuded arrogance, and he failed to present a coherent vision for getting the United States back on its feet after three years of economic decline. It was heavy on class-war rhetoric, punitive taxation, and frequent references to the Left-wing mantra of “fairness”, hardly likely to instil confidence in a battered business community that is the lifeblood of the American economy.
Above all, he remains in denial over the levels of federal debt that threaten the country’s long-term prosperity. This was not a speech that was serious about the biggest budget deficits since World War Two. There was no sense at all that America is a superpower on a precipice, sinking in a sea of debt that threatens to undermine America’s power to project global leadership for generations to come. In fact, his interventionist proposals will only make matters worse.
From new federally funded infrastructure projects to increasing regulations on financial institutions, President Obama remains wedded to big government – an approach rejected by a clear majority of Americans, who view it as a millstone around their necks. As Gallup’s polling has found, nearly two thirds of Americans see big government as “the biggest threat” to their country.
This should have been a serious speech addressing the economic problems facing the United States. Instead it was a laundry list of half-baked proposals designed to appease the Left. The president should have been talking about reining in spending, lowering taxes, and fostering greater economic freedom, but he opted for policies that will speed America’s decline, not reverse it.
I want you to know right up front that I am not a pacifist.
I believe in a strong military, and that national defense is one of the Constitutional responsibilities of our government. When a “terrorist” blows up a group of people He should be swiftly put to death.
I believe in a strong national defense and that our obligation is to America first.
But I do not believe in continuous wars, especially the politically-correct ones.
You know what I am talking about.
The types of wars we fight today are, for the most part, offensive, even though our leaders try to convince us that they are necessary for our defense.
Most are not. At least not in my life time. America has been at war somewhere in the world for the entirety of my 59 years on this earth. WWI was known as “the war to end all wars,” which of course it didn’t. It was just a slogan. Americans like slogans. Slogans often masquerade the real issue and make us feel better about jumping on the bandwagon..
The war on terror, the war on drugs, the war on poverty, and the war on ignorance are all nothing more than sloganeering. It is high time the American people came to the realization that each one of those wars was never engaged with victory as the goal. It was the fighting of the war, the funding of the war, and the perpetuation of the war that they were interested in.
Billions of dollars have been thrown down a rat-holes fighting wars that they knew could not be won. And many became rich. The same applies to military wars.
Today we continue to fight in Afghanistan even though America is insolvent.
No one can tell you why we are there. I think it somehow connects to 19 Saudis flying planes into the Twin Towers back in 2001 and “The War on Terror”, but that is just a guess.
Somewhere along the line somebody figured out that there were a lot of dollars to be made in war. Bullets and bombs were needed for war and a sinister group of warmongers figured out a way to make millions by performing their “civic duty” by supplying the ammo…often to both sides.
Christian/conservative Republicans are the greatest promoters of this perpetual-state-of-war. They serve the Prince of Peace by cheering, and voting, for war.
Someone coined the term “Warvangelicals.” They are determined to evangelize the world through the barrel of a rifle. Jesus warned us to be careful…those who live by the sword shall die by the sword.
If you listen closely you will hear the rattle of death reverberating through the American economy. Misuse of the “sword” is bringing death to America.
Wars will not destroy America, but paying for them will. Will the Republican Party even permit you to be a member if you happen to be against the wars?
I am for a strong military, but am against an ever-increasing Department of Defense budget. Did you know that America has military facilities in over 138 different countries including 218 in Germany, 115 in Japan, and 86 in South Korea? “War-mongers”, not liberators,is what the Eastern World calls us.
We have nearly 1.5 million Americans currently serving in the Armed Forces. Nearly 20% of them are deployed overseas. This “Policeman of the World” approach is enriching the Industrial/Military complex, but busting the banks of the American people. Over 400,000 Americans are enriching the economies of other nations through their deployment.
The world has changed, but America is stuck in the “Cold-War” mindset. Why is it the job of Americans to pay for the defense of Germany…or Japan…or South Korea? The American economic coffers are being bled dry. “Those who live by the sword…”
How did war become a Christian/Conservative value?
Christians are soooo confused. Willfully ignorant might be a more appropriate description. Flag-waving Christians are the most ardent supporters of military intervention. Sadly, they know nothing of the theory of just war.
The Principles of Just Wars are:
1. Just cause/right intention: A just war must be fought only for purposes of self-defense against armed attack or to right a serious wrong.
2. Proper authority: A war is just only if waged by a legitimate authority.
3. Last resort: A just war must be the last resort; all peaceful options must be exhausted before the use of force can be justified.
4. Probability of success: There must be a reasonable chance of success; deaths and injury that result from a hopeless cause cannot be morally justified.
5. Beneficial outcome: The outcome of the war must be better than the situation that would exist had the war not taken place.
6. Proportionality: The violence and destruction must be proportional to the injury suffered.Does that sound to you like any of the “conflicts” that we have recently found ourselves embroiled in? America has not fought a “just war” since WWII.
Now, Evangelical favorite Rick Santorum wants to bomb Iran.
My greatest concern from a military point of view is not that Iran may bomb us, but that we are vulnerable to an attack here at home. Fighting in Afghanistan, or keeping Iran from getting a bomb, will not increase security here at home. The enemy is already amongst us. Perhaps we can catch them at the airport!
(Oh I am going to lose half of my friends because of what I am about to say…but I’ve got to say it.)
Much of the reason we are such interventionalists in the Middle East is the position held by most Evangelicals that we have a religious obligation to defend Israel. To say otherwise is to be called “anti-Semitic,” “anti-Israel,” or “un-Biblical.” Listen to how often the Republican candidates mention the word “Israel.” This a Pavlovian trick that makes Evangelicals mouth’s water.
I am not anti-Israel nor anti-Semitic. I am pro-America. If we don’t return to an America-first policy we won’t be able to defend ourselves, let alone our friends in the Middle East.
America has spent a generation arming Israel. Estimates are that Israel is currently in possession of as many as 400 nuclear warheads. American foreign aid to Israel paid for most of their weaponry. They are far and away the most powerful, well armed military in the Middle East.
I understand that God has an “everlasting covenant” with Israel. I understand that those who “bless Israel” will be blessed. I understand that Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East. But I can not find one Biblical admonition to “protect” Israel. I do find the Lord asking us to “pray for the peace of Jerusalem.” Do we “bless Israel” by sending foreign aid to her enemies?
Is it the obligation of the US Government to defend the nation of Israel? The Covenant was a Covenant between God and Israel. God will keep His promise. Why do Christians see it as our obligation to do for Israel what God has promised HE will do? A broken, financially bankrupt America cannot protect Israel. Only God can do that.
The Kingdom of God is a Spiritual Kingdom, not a natural one. It is the “Spiritual Israel” that God has made the Covenant with. Remember, He told us that “My Kingdom is not of this world.” It is to natural-Israel that Jesus will return and set up his “everlasting Kingdom.” Does He need our intervention to help him keep His Word?
Remember that popular bumper sticker after 911…THE POWER OF PRIDE? Perhaps that is our problem.
Warvangelicals are more concerned with protecting Israel than they are in protecting America. There is nothing “Christian” about invading a sovereign nation and killing innocent women and children. Has the American military now become the “Army of God.”
It is not popular to say it in Evangelical circles, but Christians should not rejoice in the killing of innocent Muslim women and children. Each one is a potential child of the Living God and Christians should be more interested in flooding the Middle East with Bibles rather than bombs. Just War…remember? Currently, they are more interested in “spreading democracy” than they are in spreading the Gospel.
God is judging America, not because we are turning our backs on Israel, but because we are a decadent, insolent, greedy, blood-thirsty nation that winks at the shedding of innocent blood in the womb, while we “high-five” the killing of innocent children in other parts of the world. We have rejected God. Our works are “continuously evil in His sight” and our hands are stained with innocent blood.
I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live: Deut. 30:19.
America is dying because we have chosen death and Warvangelicals are the varsity cheerleaders of the War Party.
Slime time radio host Rush Limbaugh took to the air yesterday and declared that GOP presidential candidate Ron Paul “sounds like an Islamic terrorist”.
Limbaugh was commenting on the incident involving Congressman Paul’s son, Senator Rand Paul, who was detained by the TSA in Nashville after refusing to submit to an enhanced pat-down.
Limbaugh exclaimed that Rand Paul had “sent his dad a note about it and it’s become a big story out there.”
Clearly, as far as Limbaugh is concerned, anyone who has a problem with federal goons shoving their hands down people’s pants is probably a terrorist.
Anyone who isn’t for a million plus dead Iraqis is a terrorist. In Limbaugh’s world, anyone who concludes that bombing the living hell out of a country might make the people there hate us is a terrorist.
Limbaugh is right, anyone who isn’t for spending trillions of dollars on building and maintaining thousands of military bases overseas, while bankrupting the US, is a dangerous threat to the nation.
Don’t vote for Ron Paul, keep America safe from dangerous terrorists by empowering the TSA to fondle women and children. Support bombing broken nations and their people into oblivion, and most importantly do listen to Rush Limbaugh.
“If this had been Ron Paul, you couldn’t really blame the TSA.” Limbaugh continued, “You have to admit, Ron Paul almost sounds like an Islamic terrorist sometimes…” he added before sniggering and suggesting he meant the comment as a joke.
As the Greek default (and it is a default no matter what they end up calling it) is finalized this week, the consensus seems to be that failure to reach a deal would cause a global financial apocalypse.
That may be true. And if it is, why aren’t we more worried about Illinois? It’s more or less the same size as Greece, its finances are in the same generally catastrophic shape, and its leaders are just as feckless and dishonest. It owes tens of billions of dollars to various investors and stakeholders and will clearly have to stiff many of them at some point. The following article captures the “failed state” dilemma perfectly:
The question isn’t whether Illinois’ finances are in dreadful shape, it’s how to fix the problem. Or perhaps more accurately, will legislators have the political will to fix it when they return to Springfield for their spring session?
Even though the legislature and Gov. Pat Quinn last year imposed a temporary 67 percent state income tax increase, Quinn’s office expects to have a $500 million budget deficit this year.
Quinn is calling for a 9 percent cut in most areas of state government, except education and health care. But even with cuts at that level, the state would have a projected $800 million budget deficit for fiscal 2015, the year when most of the tax hike expires.
Quinn’s budget spokesman, Kelly Kraft, said the state’s fiscal situation is not pretty.
“These projections clearly demonstrate that action must be taken to control not only Medicaid costs but also (pension) costs, or all other areas of government will continue to be squeezed,” Kraft said.
“He’s the only one of anybody who’s saying anything intelligent about the future of the world…”
– Oliver Stone
Director Oliver Stone On History. And America, Jim Morrison & Ron Paul.
An Exclusive Interview
In this candid conversation with Rock Cellar Magazine, Oliver Stone discusses On History, the new book he co-authored with Tariq Ali, the activist/intellectual who inspired Mick Jagger to write Street Fighting Man.
Stone also chats about his related TV documentary series, rock ’n’ roll, his preference in the current presidential race (Ron Paul?), and oh – the fall of the American empire.
[ Apparently only the "overlords" of society have a "right" to photograph you, fingerprint you, swab you for DNA, catalog you, scan your genitals, and so on, but if you a private citizen who simply likes to take photographs as a hobby, you are now regarded as a potential threat... "Nothing to see here... Move on." ]
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A snapshot of our times
by George Will
Shawn Nee, 35, works in television but hopes to publish a book of photographs. Shane Quentin, 31, repairs bicycles but enjoys photographing industrial scenes at night. The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department probably wishes that both would find other hobbies. Herewith a story of today’s inevitable friction between people exercising, and others protecting, freedom.
When the Los Angeles Police Department developed a Suspicious Activity Report program, the federal government encouraged local law enforcement agencies to adopt its guidelines for gathering information “that could indicate activity or intentions related to” terrorism. From the fact that terrorists might take pictures of potential infrastructure targets (“pre-operational surveillance”), it is a short slide down a slippery slope to the judgment that photography is a potential indicator of terrorism and hence photographers are suspect when taking pictures “with no apparent aesthetic value” (words from the suspicious-activity guidelines).
One reason law enforcement is such a demanding, and admirable, profession is that it requires constant exercises of good judgment in the application of general rules to ambiguous situations. Such judgment is not evenly distributed among America’s 800,000 law enforcement officials and was lacking among the sheriff’s deputies who saw Nee photographing controversial new subway turnstiles. (Subway officials, sadder but wiser about our fallen world, installed turnstiles after operating largely on an honor system regarding ticket purchases.) Deputies detained and searched Nee, asking if he was planning to sell the photos to al-Qaeda. Nee was wearing, in plain view, a device police sometimes use to make video and audio records of interactions with people, and when he told a deputy he was going to exercise his right to remain silent, the deputy said:
“You know, I’ll just submit your name to TLO (the Terrorism Liaison Officer program). Every time your driver’s license gets scanned, every time you take a plane, any time you go on any type of public transit system where they look at your identification, you’re going to be stopped. You will be detained. You’ll be searched. You will be on the FBI’s hit list.”
It is amazing to me that people cannot see that politics is a rigged game.
All you have to do is watch the media-circus in Iowa with its constantly changing “front-runners” to understand the degree to which the media controls our elections.
Polls are not news, but they create the news. Knowing the “herd mentality” of most folks, the media, like good sheep-dogs, do their best to drive the flock in the direction they want them to go. Everyone loves a winner and the polls tell us who the winner will be.
It used to be that the American media was somewhat honest…or at least honest in their attempts at reporting a story…but honesty and objectivity have fallen prey to ideology.
I don’t believe any of them. Not Rush, not Hannity, not Faux News, and certainly not Bill O’Reilly. They all claim to be independent, but that is part of the ruse. They all have strong loyalties and they all have someone who pulls their strings…writes their checks…knows what’s in their closets.
Somewhere “behind the curtain”, the decision was made who the “top tier” candidates were going to be. The job of the media is to make sure that the “establishment” favorites are the ones who make it through the primaries to the final stage.
In 2000, in a speech before the Commonwealth Club of California, straight-shooting radio host Michael Savage said:
“As you know, the media is very badly needed to serve as a thorn in the side of government. In order to keep the government reasonably honest we need the media to be constantly poking at it. However, when the media becomes a thorn in the side of the skeptical private citizen, then it becomes an arm of the government. That’s why I say, “Beware the Government-Media Complex.”
Wake up Zombies. “The People” may get to pick the President, but we sure don’t get to pick who the candidates will be. Can anyone explain to me how John McCain became the Republican nominee in 2008? Did it seem to you like the Republican establishment wanted to lose in 2008? Perhaps they knew the mess that lay on the road ahead.
Are things any different today? Even though he has been in constant campaign mode since 2008, Mitt Romney still cannot get more than 25% of the Republican vote. Yet “they” call him the “front runner”, the only candidate “capable of beating Obama.”
The real story is, everyone knows Romney and 75% of them don’t want him. But the media tells us Mitt is the front-runner and “likely Republican nominee.”
How do they know this?
They don’t. They create the appearance of front-runner status through the use of the latest “public opinion polls.” It is the way they steer the sheep to the winner.
According to its latest annual report, the Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) received $487.4 million in tax dollars over a twelve-month period and performed 329,455 abortions.
In addition, the number of adoption referrals made by the organization continued to decline.
The latest annual report covers the period from July 1, 2009 to June 30, 2010, the PPFA’s fiscal year. The report states that the organization received “government health services grants and reimbursements” totaling $487.4 million.
Previous Planned Parenthood annual reports showed total funding from “government grants and contracts” (which were $363.2 million in 2009), while this year’s report also accounts for payments from Medicaid managed care plans among the payments the group receives from government .
When compared with previous annual reports, the latest one shows an almost steady increase in the number of abortions performed at its clinics: In 2006, Planned Parenthood did 289,750 abortions; in 2007, it did 305,310; in 2009, it did 331,796; and, in 2010, it did 329,445–a small decrease from the previous year.
I never thought I would have to write this: but—incredibly—Congress has now passed the National Defense Appropriations Act, with Amendment 1031, which allows for the military detention of American citizens. The amendment is so loosely worded that any American citizen could be held without due process. The language of this bill can be read to assure Americans that they can challenge their detention — but most people do not realize what this means: at Guantanamo and in other military prisons, one’s lawyer’s calls are monitored, witnesses for one’s defense are not allowed to testify, and one can be forced into nudity and isolation. Incredibly, ninety-three Senators voted to support this bill and now most of Congress: a roster of names that will live in infamy in the history of our nation, and never be expunged from the dark column of the history books.
They may have supported this bill because—although it’s hard to believe—they think the military will only arrest active members of Al Qaida; or maybe, less naively, they believe that ‘at most’, low-level dissenting figures, activists, or troublesome protesters might be subjected to military arrest. But they are forgetting something critical: history shows that those who signed this bill will soon be subject to arrest themselves.
Our leaders appear to be supporting this bill thinking that they will always be what they are now, in the fading light of a once-great democracy — those civilian leaders who safely and securely sit in freedom and DIRECT the military. In inhabiting this bubble, which their own actions are about to destroy, they are cocooned by an arrogance of power, placing their own security in jeopardy by their own hands, and ignoring history and its inevitable laws. The moment this bill becomes law, though Congress is accustomed, in a weak democracy, to being the ones who direct and control the military, the power roles will reverse: Congress will no longer be directing and in charge of the military: rather, the military will be directing and in charge of individual Congressional leaders, as well as in charge of everyone else — as any Parliamentarian in any society who handed this power over to the military can attest.
Perhaps Congress assumes that it will always only be ‘they’ who are targeted for arrest and military detention: but sadly, Parliamentary leaders are the first to face pressure, threats, arrest and even violence when the military obtains to power to make civilian arrests and hold civilians in military facilities without due process. There is no exception to this rule. Just as I traveled the country four years ago warning against the introduction of torture and secret prisons – and confidently offering a hundred thousand dollar reward to anyone who could name a nation that allowed torture of the ‘other’ that did not eventually turn this abuse on its own citizens — (confident because I knew there was no such place) — so today I warn that one cannot name a nation that gave the military the power to make civilian arrests and hold citizens in military detention, that did not almost at once turn that power almost against members of that nation’s own political ruling class. This makes sense — the obverse sense of a democracy, in which power protects you; political power endangers you in a militarized police state: the more powerful a political leader is, the more can be gained in a militarized police state by pressuring, threatening or even arresting him or her.
Mussolini, who created the modern template for fascism, was a duly elected official when he started to direct paramilitary forces against Italian citizens: yes, he sent the Blackshirts to beat up journalists, editors, and union leaders; but where did these militarized groups appear most dramatically and terrifyingly, snapping at last the fragile hold of Italian democracy? In the halls of the Italian Parliament. Whom did they physically attack and intimidate? Mussolini’s former colleagues in Parliament — as they sat, just as our Congress is doing, peacefully deliberating and debating the laws. Whom did Hitler’s Brownshirts arrest in the first wave of mass arrests in 1933? Yes, journalists, union leaders and editors; but they also targeted local and regional political leaders and dragged them off to secret prisons and to torture that the rest of society had turned a blind eye to when it had been directed at the ‘other.’ Who was most at risk from assassination or arrest and torture, after show trials, in Stalin’s Russia? Yes, journalists, editors and dissidents: but also physically endangered, and often arrested by militarized police and tortured or worse, were senior members of the Politburo who had fallen out of favor.
Is this intimidation and arrest by the military a vestige of the past? Hardly. We forget in America that all over the world there are militarized societies in which shells of democracy are propped up — in which Parliament meets regularly and elections are held, but the generals are really in charge, just as the Egyptian military is proposing with upcoming elections and the Constitution itself. That is exactly what will take place if Congress gives the power of arrest and detention to the military: and in those societies if a given political leader does not please the generals, he or she is in physical danger or subjected to military arrest. Whom did John Perkins, author of Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, say he was directed to intimidate and threaten when he worked as a ‘jackal’, putting pressure on the leadership in authoritarian countries? Latin American parliamentarians who were in the position to decide the laws that affected the well-being of his corporate clients. Who is under house arrest by the military in Myanmar? The political leader of the opposition to the military junta. Malalai Joya is an Afghani parliamentarian who has run afoul of the military and has to sleep in a different venue every night — for her own safety. An on, and on, in police states — that is, countries with military detention of civilians — that America is about to join.
This past year has not been a good one for the 99%, and the new year is likely to be even worse. This column deals with the outlook for liberty. The next will deal with the economic outlook.
The outlook for liberty is dismal. Those writers who are critical of Washington’s illegal wars and overthrow of the US Constitution could find themselves in indefinite detainment, because criticism of Washington’s policies can be alleged to be aiding Washington’s enemies, which might include charities that provide aid to bombed Palestinian children and flotillas that attempt to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza. (Source)
The Bush/Obama regimes have put the foundation in place for imprisoning critics of the government without due process of law. The First Amendment is being all but restricted to rah-rah Americans who chant USA! USA! USA! Washington has set itself up as world prosecutor, forever berating other countries for human rights violations, while Washington alone bombs half a dozen countries into the stone age and threatens several more with the same treatment, all the while violating US statutory law and the Geneva Conventions by torturing detainees. (Source)
Washington rounds up assorted foreign politicians, whose countries were afflicted with civil wars, and sends them off to be tried as war criminals, while its own war crimes continue to mount. However, if a person exposes Washington’s war crimes, that person is held without charges in conditions that approximate torture.
While America degenerates into a total police state, politicians constantly invoke “our values.” What are these values? Indefinite imprisonment without conviction in a court. Torture. Warrantless searches and home invasions. An epidemic of police brutality. Curtailment of free speech and peaceful assembly rights. Unprovoked aggression called “preemptive war.” Interference in the elections and internal affairs of other countries. Economic sanctions imposed on foreign populations whose leaders are not in Washington’s pocket.
Bradley Manning is the case in point. Manning, a US soldier, is alleged to be the person who released to WikiLeaks the “Collateral Murder” video, which, in the words of Marjorie Cohn, “depicts U.S. forces in an Apache helicopter killing 12 unarmed civilians, including two Reuters journalists. People trying to rescue the wounded were also fired upon and killed.”
One of the Good Samaritans was a father with two small children. The video reveals the delight that US military personnel experienced in blowing them away from the distant skies. When it became clear that the Warriors Bringing The People Democracy had blown away two small children, instead of remorse we hear an executioner’s voice saying: “that’s what he gets for bringing children into a war zone.”
The quote is from memory, but it is accurate enough. When I first saw this video, I was astonished at the brazen war crime. It is completely obvious that the dozen or so murdered people were simply people walking along a street, threatening no one, unarmed, doing nothing out of the ordinary. It was not a war zone. The horror is that the US soldiers were playing video games with live people. You can tell from their commentary that they were having fun by killing these unsuspecting people walking along the street. They enjoyed killing the father who stopped to help and shooting up his vehicle with the two small children inside.
This was not an accident of a drone, fed with bad information, blowing up a school full of children, or a hospital, or a farmer’s family. This was American soldiers having fun with high tech toys killing anyone that they could pretend might be an enemy.
When I saw this, I realized that America was lost. Evil had prevailed.
I was about to write that nothing has been done about the crime. But something was done about it. An American soldier who recognized the horrific war crime knew that the US military knew about it and had done nothing about it. He also knew that as a US soldier he was required to report war crimes. But to whom? War crimes dismissed as “collateral damage” are the greatest part of Washington’s 21st-century wars.
A soldier with a moral conscience gave the video to WikiLeaks. We don’t know who the soldier is. Washington alleges that the soldier is Bradley Manning, but Washington lies every time it opens its mouth. So we will never know.
All we know is that retribution did not fall on the perpetrators of the war crime. It fell upon the two accused of revealing it — Bradley Manning and Julian Assange.
Manning was held almost two years without charges being presented to a court.
In December’s pre-trial hearings all Washington could come up with was concocted accusations. No evidence whatsoever. The prosecutor, a Captain Fein, told the court, if that is what it is, that Manning had been “trained and trusted to use multiple intelligence systems, and he used that training to defy that trust. He abused our trust.”
In other words, Manning gave the world the truth of a war crime that was being covered up, and Washington and the Pentagon regard a truth teller doing his duty under the US military code as an “abuser of trust.”
In a White House ceremony, he signed the infamous Military Commissions Act (MCA). It authorized torture as official policy.
It also enacted sweeping unconstitutional powers to arrest, interrogate, and prosecute alleged terrorist suspects and collaborators (including US citizens), detain them (without evidence) indefinitely in military prisons, and deny them habeas and other constitutional protections.
It lets presidents call anyone anywhere an “unlawful enemy combatant,” order them arrested, detained and denied all rights.
On the same day, Bush quietly signed the FY 2007 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). Included were hidden Sections 1076 and 333. Major media scoundrels ignored them.
They amended the 1807 Insurrection Act and 1878 Posse Comitatus Act. They prohibited using federal and National Guard troops for law domestic enforcement except as constitutionally allowed or expressly authorized by Congress in times of insurrection or other national emergency.
Henceforth, the executive, by diktat, can claim emergency powers, declare martial law, suspend the Constitution on “national security” grounds, and deploy federal and/or National Guard troops on US streets to suppress whatever’s called disorder – including lawful peaceful protests.
At issue is abolishing fundamental First Amendment freedoms without which all others are at risk. They include free expression, assembly, religion, and right to petition government for redress. No longer.
In 2009, Obama assured military commission continuity by signing the FY 2010 Defense Authorization Act. Its hidden Section 1031 contained the 2009 Military Commissions Act (MCA). The phrase “unprivileged enemy belligerent” replaced “unlawful enemy combatant.”
Language changed but not intent or lawlessness. Obama exceeds Bush extremism. Guantanamo and other torture prisons remain open. US citizens are treated as lawlessly as foreign nationals. Ahead things got worse.
On December 31, he signed the FY 2012 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). It gives presidents unchecked power to order military force arrests and indefinite detentions of US citizens, based solely on uncorroborated accusations of terrorist group associations.
Constitutional, statute and international law protections don’t apply. America’s military may snatch and grab anyone, throw them in torture prisons, and hold them indefinitely without charge or trial, based solely on suspicions, spurious allegations or none at all.
[ The emotive word "dangerous" is semantically relative to the level of cowardice within the heart of the person using the word (or to the target audience of the rhetoric)... Dr. Paul is "dangerous" to neoconservatives because he undermines their assumptions that America must be perpetually be on guard from attacks from other nations... He appears dangerous to "evangelicals" because they have been conditioned never to radically question the status quo, even when that meant acquiescing to moral outrage and ubiquitous corruption, etc. ]
The publisher of the New Hampshire Union Leader said that “Ron Paul is a dangerous man.”
He’s right, and he’s wrong. Ron Paul is dangerous, but in the same way the American founding fathers were dangerous. He is an incorruptible, tenacious, and principled fighter in freedom’s corner. The thugs and tyrants in Washington are right to fear him and call him dangerous.
Peace and freedom are dangerous notions to the war criminals in Washington and Tel Aviv, and to the media maggots who shamelessly defend them in the establishment media. According to these undeclared enemies of America and freedom, we must all accept endless war and permanent slavery like slaves.
But not all of us wish to be slaves. Some of us are dangerous because we think for ourselves rather than blindly trust our hijacked and fascist governments.
Dr. Paul should be dangerous to those in power who fear justice and truth and hate to see the U.S. constitution restored. He is a rebellious, moral, and courageous American with a huge global following. It is obvious why such a remarkable man is unfairly smeared as a racist, isolationist, and conspiracy theorist.
But he is none of these things. Dr. Paul is a genuine American hero and revolutionary, not a dangerous racist.
GOP presidential candidate Ron Paul warned that the National Defense Authorization Act, which was passed by Congress this month, will accelerate the country’s “slip into tyranny” and virtually assures “our descent into totalitarianism.”
“The founders wanted to set a high bar for the government to overcome in order to deprive an individual of life or liberty,” Paul, the libertarian congressman from Texas, said Monday in a weekly phone message to supporters. “To lower that bar is to endanger everyone. When the bar is low enough to include political enemies, our descent into totalitarianism is virtually assured. The Patriot Act, as bad as its violations against the Fourth Amendment was, was just one step down the slippery slope. The recently passed National Defense Authorization Act continues that slip into tyranny, and in fact, accelerates it significantly.”
The NDAA is the nearly $670 billion defense spending bill that covers the military budget and funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
One controversial provision mandates the detention of terror suspects and reaffirms the administration’s authority to detain those suspected of having ties to terrorist organizations.
“The Fifth Amendment is about much more than the right to remain silent in the face of government questioning,” Paul continued. “It contains very basic and very critical stipulations about the due process of law. The government cannot imprison a person for no reason and with no evidence presented and without access to legal council. The danger of the NDAA is its alarmingly vague, undefined criteria for who can be indefinitely detained by the U.S. government without trial.”
For the sake of the children – Obama is living like a king in an economy at the verge of utter meltdown…
Obama’s $4 Million Hawaiian Getaway Adds To National Debt
Around $4 million (£2.6 million) – the expected total cost to the US taxpayer of the Obama Christmas family vacation to Hawaii according to the Hawaii Reporter (hat tip: Rob Bluey at The Foundry). This is an astonishing amount of public money to be spending in an age of austerity – when the president is supposed to be leading efforts to cut the US budget deficit, the largest since World War Two, and a towering $15 trillion national debt:
Hawaii Reporter research shows the total cost for the President’s visit for taxpayers far exceeded $1.5 million in 2010 – but is even more costly this year because he extended his vacation by three days and the cost for Air Force One travel has jumped since last assessed in 2000. In addition, Hawaii Reporter was able to obtain more specifics about the executive expenditures.
The total cost (based on what is known) for the 17-day vacation roundtrip vacation to Hawaii for the President, his family and staff has climbed to more than $4 million.
This $4 million figure is nearly 100 times the average annual salary of an American worker, which currently stands at $41,673. The Hawaii Reporter calculates that travel costs alone for the president and his entourage via Air Force One (plus a separate trip for Michelle Obama who has traveled in advance), in addition to a United States Air Force C-17 cargo aircraft to transport “the presidential limos, helicopters and other support equipment”, amounts to a whopping $3,629,622. Housing for security staff costs an estimated $151,200, and luxurious hotel rooms for the president’s 24-strong staff a further $72,216. Based on these figures the total cost to the federal US taxpayer (and the additional burden on the national debt) is a staggering $3,853,038. If you add in local taxpayer costs of $260,000 (including police overtime and city ambulances), the total public expense is $4,113,038.
The story has of course been ignored by the liberal-dominated mainstream media, which inevitably turns a blind eye to abuses of power by the Obama presidency.
The word chanukah (חֲנֻכָּה) means “dedication,” a word that shares the same root as the Hebrew the word chinukh (חִנּוּךְ), meaning “education.” Just as the Maccabees fought and died for the sake of Torah truth, so we must wage war within ourselves and break the stronghold of apathy and indifference that the present world system engenders (Rom. 12:2; Eph. 6:11-18). We must take time to educate ourselves by studying the Torah and New Testament, for by so doing we will be rededicated to the service of the truth and enabled to resist assimilation into the corrupt world. “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world…” (1 John 2:15).
During this time of year — and especially during this dark hour of history near the prophesied “end of days” — it is imperative to remember that we are in the midst of the great “war of the ages,” where people’s souls and destinies are at stake… This world is likened to the “Valley of Decision,” the corridor to the world to come… We cannot afford to be indifferent to the darkness that continues to blind the eyes of so many people. We must take a stand for God’s truth and be fully equipped to give an account for the hope we have in Yeshua. Ultimately the “cleansing of the Temple” is a matter of the heart….
On December 6, we reported on a document originating from Halliburton subsidiary KBR describing services KBR is looking to farm out to subcontractors. The document was passed on to us by a state government employee.
Our research has since discovered another document that further reveals the ongoing effort by the government to establish FEMA camps and provide services for them in the event of an emergency, including a real or more likely a false flag terrorist event.
In May of 2011, the FedBizOpps.gov website posted a Department of Homeland Security solicitation document entitled “National Responder Support Camp” calling for contractors to construct and operate camps “in which to stage responders and other authorized personnel and assets deployed for occurrences or events requiring a federal government response. The National Responder Support Camps contract will be used by FEMA, or by other federal agencies through FEMA, consistent with the specific authorities of the agency utilizing the contract’s services.”
“During disaster situations or other events, FEMA federal, state and local responders may need a place that provides shelter, food, and additional basic needs,” the document continues. “Hence the need for the procurement of effective and efficient Responder Support Camps is present.”
The DHS document makes a point of stating that FEMA’s role transcends “hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, cyclones, tornadoes, blizzards, acts of terrorism, tsunamis, or avalanches” and includes playing “a role in assisting with events designated by the Secretary of Homeland Security as National Special Security Events (NSSEs) and with respect to National Response Framework activities of federal agencies.”
[ The propaganda artists (i.e. educators) - much like the advertisers of this age - understand that the easiest way to make an idiot out of someone is to flatter them... ]
By Toby Moreland
Young people are incapable of recognizing their own enemy. This is the essential condition required for the peaceful transfer of political power to a world dictatorship.
As a young man who recently received an “education” from one of the finest schools in the U.S., I can state beyond doubt that this condition has been met.
In a society conditioned to champion personal ambition, self-expression and self-empowerment, the educated youth of today are kept intoxicated with illusions. Everyone is looking up, staring at the sun, and unable to stop and think for even a moment out of fear of losing their momentum up the ladder.
Here is the script my generation sticks to.
- Mankind lived in total ignorance until very recently. (Proof: widespread racism, religious fundamentalism, mistreatment and oppression of women, European imperialism, rabid nationalism, xenophobia, etc. were all norms.) Young women and minorities are especially prone to gobble this idea up and congratulate themselves for being an enlightened member of a progressive society. In the interest of being liked and getting laid, young white men follow suit.
- All types of ‘ignorance’ still exist today AND represent the primary threats to peace and stability. (Conclusion: Legislation to protect minorities (anti-hate, anti-religion) is natural progress and shall continue uninterrupted. Religion has become like Al-Qaeda to today’s educated youth. It barely exists, but everyone is convinced it is a powerful beast capable of plucking a person out of his hedonistic bliss at any moment, if not carefully watched.
- Sexual restraint can no longer be taken seriously, as it was an invention of religion to control the masses and women in particular. (Conclusion: Get it when you can, while you can. It’s practice for someone you might really like someday!) There is a tremendous amount of pressure on young women to be able to “handle” emotion-free sex. They have been convinced, mostly through entertainment media, that taking sex seriously is a weakness. It is a bodily need detached from the rest of you. Combined with a social scene set around alcohol, young love is a messy, schizophrenic story where one is very lucky to find someone on the same page.
- Total Moral Relativity : there are no absolute truths; there is no reason to believe in anything too strongly; everything is circumstantial. (Conclusion: yes, everything is corrupt. It has always been that way. Power corrupts. We’re selfish. People are assholes. I’m an asshole, at least I’m willing to admit it.) Result: attitudes are uniform within social groups.
- Politics and religion are not to be discussed amongst friends, therefore they are not. Ever. (Conclusion: agree to disagree. Result: Even the smartest people are never exposed to ideas outside of the mainstream media/academia, but you cannot convince them of this.)
- Communism is a legitimate ideology, only it has never worked. (Result: my generation leans heavily to the left. As the Republican party has become synonymous with Christianity, pro-life, wealthy, white, war, big business, etc., it is no wonder why.) Government involvement in industry seems inevitable to everyone, but few are able to envision future consequences.
With these unquestioned six beliefs alone, defenders of humanistic internationalist doctrine are created. Good, intelligent kids that are just trying to do their best and find their place in the world while fulfilling their parents’ expectations have been conditioned to unwittingly serve and defend the interests of a small group of psychotic criminals.
US Senate today voted 86 to 13 in favor of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012
Exactly 220 years to the date after the Bill of Rights was ratified, the US Senate today voted 86 to 13 in favor of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012, allowing the indefinite detention and torture of Americans.
After a back-and-forth in recent days between both the Senate and House yielded intense criticism from Americans attempting to hold onto their Constitutional rights, NDAA FY2012 is now on its way to the White House, where yesterday the Obama administration revealed that the president would not veto the legislation, cancelling out a warning he offered less than a month earlier.
Obama has finally brought about change to America, but it’s nothing to be hopeful about.
Speaking before the Senate this afternoon, Sen. Lindsey Graham (Rep-SC) told his colleagues, “I hope you believe America is part of the battlefield.” The United States is at war, he insisted, and anyone alleged to be in opposition to the US government’s game will now be subjected to military-style detention indefinitely.
Obama’s U-Turn On Indefinite Detention Bill a “Historic Tragedy” For Rights
The White House demanded removal of language that would have protected U.S. citizens
Paul Joseph Watson
Human Rights Watch has labeled President Obama’s U-turn on his decision to veto the NDAA bill, which empowers the government to indefinitely detain Americans without trial, a “historic tragedy for rights,” but should we really be surprised given the fact that it was Obama’s White House which ensured language that would have protected U.S. citizens was removed from the bill in the first place?
With the House passing a revised version of the bill last night and the Senate set to follow, Obama could sign the legislation into law before the end of the week after the White House dropped its threat to veto the National Defense Authorization Act, which under Section 1031 empowers the government to arrest Americans and hold them in a detention camp with no legal recourse.
“By signing this defense spending bill, President Obama will go down in history as the president who enshrined indefinite detention without trial in US law,” said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. “In the past, Obama has lauded the importance of being on the right side of history, but today he is definitely on the wrong side.”
HRW describes Obama’s about-face as a “historic tragedy for rights”.
