Forever Remember Eleven September

Those who desire to give up freedom in order to gain security will not have, nor do they deserve, either one.  Benjamin Franklin

The Congressional response to Al Qaeda’s terrorist attack on September 11, 2001, was the Patriot Act.  On this day, we stepped onto a slippery slope leading toward what we claim to abhor.  Once, wiretapping required advance approval from a federal judge; now, it requires only that the President sign a National Security Letter.  What is frightening about this is that the president is the nation’s chief law enforcement officer. 

The Constitutional separation of federal powers was intended to act as a counterweight to keep any branch of the federal government from becoming so powerful that it could avoid public scrutiny and accountability.  US legal tradition was that Congressional and Judicial oversight prevented secret, heavy-handed, and unconstitutional law enforcement from taking away our liberties.  This is how things were done in Hitler’s Germany, Pol Pot’s Cambodia, and Fidel Castro’s Cuba.

In the former Soviet Union, a written summons from the KGB or GRU gave Soviets laundry problems.  Here at home, a National Security Letter produces similar results.  The letters carry with them gag orders that criminalize discussing the matter with anyone.  These letters, served on communications service providers like phone companies and ISPs, allow the FBI to secretly demand data about ordinary American citizens' private communications and Internet activity without any meaningful oversight or prior judicial review.

Without such oversight and review, the First Amendment’s guaranty of free speech is countermanded without the public authorizing a Constitutional amendment.  The Act’s provision that authorizes federal agents to seize any tangible thing such as emails, browsing histories, or library records effectively eliminates the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition of unreasonable and warrantless seizures of our persons, houses, papers, and effects.

Libertarians worried that the PA’s nearly unlimited surveillance authority would lead to unlawful abuses by federal officials.  It did, and it was used to investigate non-terrorists' political dissent.  A 2007 report by the Inspector General of the Justice Department found 'widespread and serious abuse' of authority by the F.B.I. under the Patriot Act.  Many of those F.B.I. cases involved people with no clear connection to terrorism.

Prior to the Act’s re-authorization, some Senators proposed amending it so that the FBI would have to prove in advance—requiring authorities to establish probable cause—showing that their intended seizure is directly connected to terrorism.  However, Obama did not demand these protections on condition of signing it.  Conversely, Senator Ron Wyden reports that he has been secretly reinterpreting public laws and statutes to allow him to hide how the Act is currently interpreted.

Wyden wants to repeal the Act’s business-records provision because there is stark difference between what the public thinks the law says and what the American government secretly thinks the law says.  Libertarians embrace a healthy mistrust of government that could be assuaged with transparency.  We recognize that something is amiss when government hides its activities from the governed.

As long as the Patriot Act remains focused on ordinary Americans rather than suspected terrorists, the terrorists -- if you’ll forgive the truism -- have indeed won.

It would be disrespectful to the thousands who died that sad September day to allow memories of that tragic event to justify refashioning the land of liberty into a corrupt totalitarian state.  The victims and their heirs deserve better, and so do we.

Forever remember eleven September.

We Must Watch the Watchers

In Clive Thompson’s WIRED article “Watching the Watchers,” the author addresses the growing popularity of sousveillance, which is the monitoring of events not by those above (surveiller in French) but by citizens, from below (sous-).  Since the Patriot Act ended the rule of law in America and brought with it the blight of totalitarianism, concerned libertarians have begun to ask quisnam vigilo vigilo or “who watches the watchers?” 

Increasingly, individual members of the public feel the need to participate.  There is an app for that; it is Bambuser.  It streams cell phone video directly to the Web.  In an online article by Becca Caddy, the author describes her interview with Hans Erickson, Bambuser’s CEO.  She asked him what sort of users his company had targeted.  He said,    

One of our founding members, Mans Adler, envisaged Bambuser as a global tool that would aid democracy, allowing anyone and everyone a medium to get their message heard.  During the recent Egyptian and Bahraini protests we saw a surge in broadcasts as demonstrators used Bambuser to stream personal videos from inside Tahrir square, Friday prayers and even funerals.

If ignorance is bliss, it is no doubt reassuring to believe that it simply cannot happen here.  Government oppression crushing civilian dissent happens in Tiananmen Square or Tahrir Square, not in Washington Square.  Guess again.  Freedoms to assemble peaceably and, through free political speech, to criticize the acts of government are the first liberties that totalitarians seize.  

Carlos Miller’s Website Photography is not a Crime chronicles a list of police departments and other government entities whose members believe that the public lacks the legal privilege of scrutinizing and criticizing their activities, especially when those activities might be extra-legal.  The extent to which the police have come to serve the interests of the state, rather than to serve and protect the public is alarming.  Voltaire observed that it is dangerous to be right when government is wrong.

When agents of the state hide what they are doing, they are generally up to no good.  When they arrange matters such that they are above the very law that they are sworn to enforce and are unaccountable to the people, the resulting form of government is totalitarian.  Other Constitutional guaranties that have disappeared under the PA are habeas corpus, or the right to force the state to justify holding citizens involuntary and the requirement that the state must demonstrate probable cause prior to arrest.

There are government surveillance systems in all 50 states, ostensibly to make the streets safer for the public; however, there is no safety if we are not safe from the police.  That someone can be arrested for the egregious crime of standing in her own front yard because an agent of the state claimed arbitrarily, subjectively, and expediently that he was uncomfortable is inexcusable.

An attorney for another woman who was arrested in similar circumstances pointed out to Ray Sanchez of ABC News that videotaping is probably the most effective way to protect citizens against police officers who exaggerate or lie.  Judges and juries want to believe law enforcement, he said.  They want to believe police officers and unless you have credible evidence to contradict police officers, it's often very difficult to get judges or juries to believe the word of a citizen over a police officer.

When police prevaricate under oath to get convictions, the government that they represent is fundamentally corrupt because they cannot do this without the tacit approval of both the judicial and legislative branches of that government.  If Paul Revere rode tonight, his clarion call would be, “The totalitarians are coming.”

May your gods be with you.

Once Critical of W, Now O-buma Emulates Him

According to The Washington Examiner, O-buma continues to out-Bush W’s policies.  Civil libertarians once looked to this president to right the constitutional balance. But what Obama has wrought is the same old 'Terror Presidency' with new rhetoric.  In some areas, '44' has gone even further than '43'.  Our new decider launched a war in Libya without so much as a by-your-leave to Congress.  It's nice to have a neocon back in the White House. 

Thirty plus unelected and un-vetted czars creating regulations reveal the president’s fundamental belief that he need not answer to anyone.  Cass Sunstein is Barack’s ideological soul mate and head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs.  He is responsible for overseeing policies relating to privacy, information quality, and statistical programs.  Cass writes that the feds should cognitively infiltrate online groups and websites that have the temerity to expose and condemn the O-bumites’ Official Party Line.  Imagine it, using free political speech to criticize acts of the government.

This none too subtle indoctrination is designed to increase citizens' faith in government officials and undermine the credibility of critics.  Trust me; I’m with the high command.  Sunstein proposed secretly paying propaganda purveyors to bolster the Government's messaging.  It is interesting that the head of O-buma’s Ministry of Truth holds these beliefs.  Close government scrutiny of citizens’ speech and behavior is one of the mommy staters’ favorite schemes.

This article in The Washington Times warns that the government does not need a warrant to access any personal information that has been stored in the cloud for more than 180 days.  The state takes the expedient position that the Fourth Amendment does not apply here.  Another author reports here that Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat serving on the Senate Intelligence Committee harshly criticized the O-bumites’ chicanery.

When the American people find out how their government has secretly interpreted the Patriot Act, they will be stunned and they will be angry…many members of Congress have no idea how the executive branch is secretly interpreting the law, because that interpretation is classified. Members of the public have no access to the executive branch's secret legal interpretations, so they have no idea what their government thinks this law means.... 

Regulating Internet content is merely one part of the cost of maintaining the theft-welfare state.  This article concerning the Small Business Administration’s research on government regulation reveals that the cost of this form of state interference in the lives of individuals increased from $1.1 trillion a year in 2005 to $1.75 late in 2010…including a $445 billion increase in the cost of economic regulation.  $1.75 trillion is more than the government collects from us in income taxes; it is roughly equivalent to Italy’s entire GDP.  

Even more distressing is the fact that we still have not fully accounted for the costs of O-buma’s WelfareHealthCare.  While the financial costs are staggering, lost liberty through over regulation is perhaps the greatest loss of all.

This report by the American Civil Liberties Union advises that new reporting and customer monitoring requirements boost the expense of doing business and expose companies to lawsuits over consumer privacy.  The Patriot Act has eliminated the last vestiges of privacy in this nation.  It enables government to subpoena businesses for any tangible thing, including customer records, library check-out lists, medical records, bank account information, etc.  What makes this law so extraordinary is that Sec. 215 removes the normal requirement to meet the legal standard of 'probable cause'.
 

Revealingly, the reports that businesses are forced to relinquish to the feds are usually about wholly domestic transactions of people in the USA, and do not relate to foreign intelligence information.  There is no judicial review and no notice to the person [to] whom the records relate.
 

The government's totalitarian arrogance is eerily reminiscent of Franz Kafka’s novel The Trial.  The state need not establish probable cause to arrest us.  The government’s philosophy is that being arrested is prima facie evidence of guilt.  After all, the state’s omniscience is such that it would not waste the resources to arrest and try us if we were not guilty.
 

May your gods be with you.      

Constitution? What Constitution?

This is the most outrageous assault on the First Amendment in memory.  It makes the Patriot Act seem benign by comparison.  The scumbags in Dearborn did not invent totalitarian fascism, but they are undoubtedly the most prolific perpetrators in the nation.

That we are blind to the fact that we are shooting ourselves in our collective foot is worrisome; however, that the Europeans recognize that we are allowing the Theftocrats and O-buffoonery to eviscerate us is appalling.

It appears that general McChrystal has thrown himself onto his own sword in order to avoid continuing to conduct a failed experiment.  He is a victim of his can-do attitude.  Trying to fight a war without collateral damage, lacking diplomatic and political support, and with too little manpower typifies the O-buma regime.  We have handcuffed our troops with self-destructive rules of engagement.  They are getting picked off in small numbers that have steadily mounted.  Our federal government is helping the enemy win.

Billionaire investor George Soros has invested heavily in electing Corruptocrats.  His investment seems to be paying off handily these days.  Here is how.  This almost seems as though it is a quid pro quo arrangement.

Sometimes they get it right.  Whether you trust, appreciate, or despise Google, this ruling was proper.

Heck, even Hilarious Clinton gets it right occasionally.

Can rational beings doubt that one of the primary aims of the university education collective is to disseminate propaganda?

Sentient beings should have recognized by now that the theft-by-proxy crowd has engaged in a wholesale importation of welfare recipients by hamstringing ICE.

Behavior that cost Richard Nixon the White House warrants little national coverage among the reprehensibly hypocritical presstitutes.  Where, oh where are the indignant howls for Congressional investigation?

If this drone were armed and authorized to fire on terrorists as they crossed our border, this action might not seem like pointless grandstanding by the self-appointed ruling class elite.

Watching endangered animals at zoos can be fun and enlightening.  It China, the process can be tasty as well.  There is something perverse about this.

May your gods be with you.

O Brother, Where Art Thou?

It would be difficult to overstate the costs of importing welfare recipients into this country.  However, there are other attendant consequences that result from the far too porous border that we share with Mexico.  Tom Tancredo offers insight into the damage that is being wrought by the Mexican cartels' smuggling of terrorists into the US.

Perhaps one reason for the Corruptocrats' intentionally and grossly underfunding ICE is to facilitate another 9-11 type scenario to justify passing a Loopy Left version of the Patriot Act.  Such an law would undoubtedly include draconian criminal punishment for facecrime, thoughtcrime, and most of all for speechcrime for pandering insufficiently to the Theftocrats' permanent entitlement constituencies.

To pay for those constituencies, it is necessary to confiscate the resources of those who are not part of that group.  Wired Magazine reports that Brick-a-Brack Obuma's ecofascist supporters are pushing for significant hikes in taxes on gasoline and other forms of energy.  Worse yet and consistent with the totalitarian aspect of the leftist live-as-we-dictate crowd's desperation to control others, they are proposing federal control of local building codes.

Collectively, these various constituencies comprise the Borg.  There are several Borg characteristics that should be recognized for the purpose of identifying Borg.  First, to gain Borg status one must unquestioningly adopt the prepackaged collection of Borg values and beliefs.  The other precepts follow. 

The prime directive of the party-of-government is to increase the size of their bureaucracy.  Their delusions of grandeur make them think that they know best how everyone should live.  Conforming to the official party line is mandatory.  The loony left's causes are so holy that there are no acts so low that they will not stoop to them in order to achieve their lofty goals.  Ethics are superfluous hindrances.  Tocqueville should be written out of history for recognizing about the US that the republic will not long endure now that the Theftocrats have learned that the people can be bribed with their own money.

Anyone who has had it up to here with the Borg's power and money grabbing might want to try this on for size.  You know, a trillion bucks here, a trillion there, and the next thing you know you're into some real money.

Significant numbers of dollars are also being spent trying to clean up BP's oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.  With any luck, tax dollars spent there should be recovered from the as yet unidentified responsible parties.  So now, O-buma plans a fourth trip to wade through the mess.  What is he doing, and what in the h e double hockey sticks does he hope to accomplish?

He will arrive replete with a fawning entourage of lapdog presstitutes and other hangers on who will scuttle about in unison with him like a bunch of fiddler crabs foraging for dinner.  They will record every word, nuance, and gesture as he frets and struts about barking the tale of an idiot who is full of sound, fury, and baloney.  Thank you, William. 

One of its handlers should inform the Obumessiah that he should stop embarrassing the nation, stay in DC, and pretend to be a leader for a change.

This post ends on a sad note.  Rage, rage against the dying of the light.  A bright beacon of rational deliberation, spirited debate, and ethical consistency has been extinguished from the Bolgosphere.  The Bartaverse is no more.  It will be missed. 


May your gods be with you.