[Pops]

How have we changed?

Are we safer, or less so?

More free or less?

What is different for our future?

[Pops]

False flag and other conspiracy stuff goes elsewhere please.

[Sixstrings]

Here's one way we're different:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'C')anadians with mental illnesses denied U.S. entry
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2011/09/08/f-border-mental-health-privacy.html

[sicophiliac]

Were a trillion or so dollars more in debt that we otherwise would have been. All to protect from the jihadist boogyman who is waiting at every stop light, grocery store,mall airport and so on with deadly anthrax or explosives! As sad as loosing 3000 people on September 11th was, we loose people all the time to gang violence, drunk drivers, cancer and various other diseases all the time. 9/11 was captured in camera as one big tragic event that everybody can remember and get emotional about though. I think statistically you are more likely to hit a deer on the freeway and die as a result of that accident,then you are likely to be killed by a terrorist.

[dolanbaker]

From this side of the pond, the USA (the rest of America is different) seems to have become completely paranoid and Americans appear scared of their own shadows.
To me it appears that Osama Bin Laden has had total success in creating an atmosphere of terror in the US.

[MD]

Those that are ascribing paranoia to the American people are basing far too much of their opinion on American Media.

If so, that's an error on your part. Those of us that -do- get it are working very hard to hold it together, despite the ninnies that surround us.

[SeaGypsy]

American history is so paradoxical, so great yet so tragic, so potent yet frustrated. The intensity of the period defined by this date is seemingly beyond paralell. It's kind of like all those people prayin' to Jesus does something, dan'ged if'n ah no

[dolanbaker]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MD', 'T')hose that are ascribing paranoia to the American people are basing far too much of their opinion on American Media.

If so, that's an error on your part. Those of us that -do- get it are working very hard to hold it together, despite the ninnies that surround us.

[pedalling_faster]

Certainly.

Millions of Americans who never gave much thought to Israel are now aware of the Israeli habit of Killing Gentiles.

http://www.IsraelDid9-11.com/

[MD]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pedalling_faster', 'C')ertainly.

Millions of Americans who never gave much thought to Israel are now aware of the Israeli habit of Killing Gentiles.

http://www.IsraelDid9-11.com/

[Pops]

I'm not sure we're safer, at least sufficiently so to justify the lives and cost.

Paramilitary costumed police walking around big cities, airports, etc. with automatic weapons is now a pretty common sight and for some reason that doesn't comfort me. We also sport a large number of unemployed kids who just happen to have a lot of military training and real world experience in urban warfare that can't find a job, not too warm and fuzzy there either.

And we have DHS. I don't know what it is about the term 'homeland' that makes me uncomfortable but it surely has a distopian connotation for me. I've never heard anyone say 'homeland' in reference to the US except government officials. It makes me think they are talking about somewhere different, maybe they are.

Speaking of distopian, I'm reading Orwell's 1984 again after who knows how long, probably since '84. Yesterday hearing Bloomberg et al repeat over and over "See Something Say Something" kind of made me wonder when the Scouts are going to start giving a merit badge for turning parents into the Thought Police. Continuos war was the norm in the book, not for territory or resources but for diversion, political conformity and to use up all the excess production the machines pumped out. War is Peace

And of course I'm tapping into the "telescreen" right now and big bro will open my mail as soon as I hit submit. There is absolutely no technological reason why he doesn't know my every keystroke without me sending anything and in fact there's no reason why I couldn't be under video surveillance right now as well. We all know there is no legal protection any longer.

Unfortunately I think the US was co-opted by some pretty paranoid leadership at the time. I'm all in favor of preparation but the administration went into bunker defense mode with the survival of the leadership upmost in it's mind and the survival of what it was protecting taking a distant second place.
The VP is in and undisclosed, secure location so feel free to go shopping.

I think there is little doubt we're less free.

[Cloud9]

Pstar wrote: “Yes. Americans are more paranoid, angry, desperate, confused, isolated, uneducated, uncultured, uncouth and thus vulnerable to domestic terrorism from right-wing christian extremists who hate women, freedom, commies, fags, artists, socialists, liberals, gays, intellectuals, government workers, unionists, artists, city people, blacks, puerto ricans, mexicans, and the french. Doesn't bode well at all.”

I thought we elected a young metrosexual black male who was supposed to get rid of all that. Instead, the whole country is in lock down to protect two cities that fell victim to a highly successful one of a kind fraternity prank. Each side is projecting the face of its perceived boogey man onto the collective consciousness. The one side fears some scraggly bearded Middle Eastern guy. The other side is afraid of some straight, racist, white guy.

In truth we are guarding the barn door after the animals have left.

Meanwhile out of fear and paranoia we build self perpetuating bureaucracies that become their own fiefdoms and spin out of control. These fiefdoms destroy our civil liberties and kill our own citizens. Operation Fast and Furious is one of the most recent examples.

The militarization of local law enforcement has been a long and ongoing process beginning with the war on crime and the war on drugs. The end result is that we have created a vast number of local paramilitaries in our police and sheriff departments. We have huge local standing armies that are all dressed up looking for a fight. We lock up more people percapita than any other place on the planet. Those that we don’t lock up we kill. Google fiery standoff some time when you are bored, you may be surprised at the number of hits you get from around the country.

Decentralization and localization will be a natural consequence of dwindling energy supplies. With any luck, the energy will drain from these paramilitaries we have created. Already, there are a number of state initiatives aimed at trimming the powers of federal agencies. Efforts to criminalize some of the agendas of the ATF serve as an example. State law enforcement will become less active when the federal tit dries up.

In truth, we need to decriminalize a lot of things. Government needs to get out of the private lives of our citizens. Pstar who you sleep with is none of the government’s business. Neither is what I have in my gun case.

[Alan Cain]

In my small town of 800 people I am the chairperson of the planning commission - we require that the commission be composed mostly of residents of the community, with the head of the public works department and a councilperson as well.

In our capital acquisitions portion of the budget I found a few line items that were quite bothersome. Mind you, we have 8 full time cops and 6 part timers (did I mention the population is 800 people and 6000 in a twenty MILE radius?). Anyway, in the budget the police department requested 16 M-16 rifles (two spares, I suppose) and a serious sniper platform (way beyond a "rifle" or battle weapon) with a budget price on it alone of more than ten thousand dollars. To go with this stuff, they were budgeting 6 night vision scopes (what is it now- class 5 is the latest and greatest) and lots of body armor; someone had also offered an armored assault vehicle but the transport and upkeep are a problem.

Are we paranoid? Do I feel safer? Well, I never felt unsafe in the first place. More people are killed by drunk driving in a month than in the "holy twin towers"; the ones who are less safe are those who lived in Iraq and Afghanistan, where we continue to commit war crimes. and have killed, oh, call it a million, innocent people in the name of our own oil jihad. We have predator drones over Pakistan, over Afghanistan and Iraq, and over Phoenix and Detroit.

Free? Liberty? Not any longer, if we ever were in the sense of what we were taught freedom was.

We as a people should be embarrassed at the appalling things our leaders now do in our names. Simply put, they are called war crimes; Bush and Co. started it, and Obama and Co. continue it. The next president and Co. will continue it, without end, unless we, the people demand it stop. The entire inertia of our government and the financial "leaders" compels it.

Without our ongoing wars, our economy would be toast. World trade is composed of the three big ones followed by little stuff.

The big three are oil, guns and drugs. It is like the trade triangle of the 18th century - slaves, rum and whatever the third leg was - I have to go pack for a trip or I would look it up.

Note to the NSA: I am not a terrorist.

[evilgenius]

I was listening to Fresh Air last night. Terri Gross was interviewing a war correspondent about Afghanistan. He said that he couldn't see a reason for all of the little skirmishes he had witnessed there in the last many years. There seemed to be no overall strategic reason, I guess is what he meant. You don't suppose that means we have occupied the country needlessly for a long time and can't admit the mistake? People are actually talking about trying to exit the place in a manner in which it doesn't fall apart until after we do so, not while we do so.

When you think about it the emotional outpouring after 9/11 never needed any structure. It was pure energy that was destined to last over a significant period of time. Initially there were a couple of weeks right after the event that saw Americans walking around realizing that this 'probably was a result of how much we have bullied other countries'. That quickly changed into a kind of, 'There are bad guys and we will get them'. Now that has become, 'There are permanent bad guys and we will always stand against them'. From the beginning there were many who sought to institutionalize this thing. They, however, just were able to look ahead of the curve. I don't know if you can fault them as much as we would like to think for taking our liberties. We let them, after all.

I suppose any view of what kind of mess, or not, we are in has to eventually settle upon the plight of your average twenty year old of today. They are the ones, when it comes down to it, whose lives were guided the most by the post-9/11 reaction. In the same way that from ten to twenty years of age is when basic things like language accents are picked up the thought structure imposed upon a person by society is also picked up. There is no way that deep thinking can be expected from a group like that when any deep thinking they might have done while developing would have led them to kick against what they were experiencing. At the same time society all around them was not accepting any kicking. There were very many mass activities directed at continual communal mourning and communal belly gazing style suffering and re-suffering. Those kids are quite likely to have developed into a pragmatic generation as a result of all that. They will be a can do people who will do whatever is asked of them, even if tomorrow that should be the opposite of today. That might not be as bad as it sounds, though. When it comes to things like adopting the scientific method, with its experimentation, they might do a lot better than those before them. Should wars of much greater import to our future survival arise, they will be the ones who comprise a new 'greatest generation' able to go and do what needs to be done without endlessly talking about it. At the same time, the danger of a return to that Fifties style barbarism of the uninspected soul is great.

[Cloud9]

We have the same thing going on in my small county. Our local sheriff’s office has at least one Cadillac Gage APC. All have M-16 variants in their cruisers. I know a lot of the cops locally. Many of them I taught in school. A lot of them are ex military. Their uniforms and gear have morphed from police officer into combat infantryman. With that has come a change in mindset and mission statement.

The mission statement of serve and protect is morphing into a mission statement of search and destroy. A number of them, especially the young ones long for a zombie apocalypse.

God help the poor bastard that flips the switch and puts them in assault mode. He will be shredded.

*This is not a joke. One of the young SROs showed me his how to kill zombie manual.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5354 ... ival_Guide

[The Practician]

I gotta say, having just watched an old VHS copy of Team America: World Police, The whole "we're dicks, not assholes" justification for American exceptional-ism is starting to wear a little thin.

[PrestonSturges]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cloud9', 'W')e have the same thing going on in my small county. Our local sheriff’s office has at least one Cadillac Gage APC. All have M-16 variants in their cruisers. I know a lot of the cops locally. Many of them I taught in school. A lot of them are ex military. Their uniforms and gear have morphed from police officer into combat infantryman. With that has come a change in mindset and mission statement.

The mission statement of serve and protect is morphing into a mission statement of search and destroy. A number of them, especially the young ones long for a zombie apocalypse.

God help the poor bastard that flips the switch and puts them in assault mode. He will be shredded.

*This is not a joke. One of the young SROs showed me his how to kill zombie manual.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5354 ... ival_Guide

[PrestonSturges]

From 9-11 the GOP has become the party of continuous crisis. Now we have the debt "crisis," the social security "crisis," the public school "crisis," the FAA "crisis," the Post Office "crisis," and at least another half dozen more they will conjure from thin air by the end of the year.

This is how the nazis softened up the german people to accept ever higher levels of oppression throughout the 1930s. 9-11 also gave the GOP the opportunity to adopt the themes of The Other, The Enemy Within, the oppression of the Aaryan people, the dangerous immigrant, the constant threat of conspiracy, the homosexual menace, saving Christianity, "spiritual" renewal, racial purity, ending bilingual anything, clamping down on contraception and fertility blah blah blah, all lifted directly from Mein Kampf. In addition, they have become virulently anti-intellectual and abandoned any sort of rational policy driven platform in favor of straight propaganda.

That is someone's cue to respond with a mindless propaganda talking point....Can they resist?....