[BigTex]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('seahorse', 'Y')es Cloud9, you're thinking is way up on Cloud9, but, practically, the 2nd Amendment is still only a piece of paper. Unless you are willing to use that gun in your hand, that paper will not protect you. Thomas Jefferson had a good quote about that, which, I don't have time to find right now.

Its good that our founding fathers didn't wait for the courts to protect them. Believe me, I'm in the courts a lot, you won't find what you're looking for there.

[seahorse]

Don't get me wrong, I believe in the ideas expressed in the constitution, namely, limited government, but the problem is, words don't limit anything, only people do, people who believe in them, and believe enough to do something.

[BigTex]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('seahorse', 'D')on't get me wrong, I believe in the ideas expressed in the constitution, namely, limited government, but the problem is, words don't limit anything, only people do, people who believe in them, and believe enough to do something.

[seahorse2]

For those who still believe the NSA isn't illegally spying on your and other US citizens, read this:

SF News

[seahorse]

Believing in our Constitution is believing that our gov't is a limited gov't and ultimate power resides in the people. In theory, a good idea, but what is reality?

We all know the power of the purse. Whoever controls the money is in control. So, who controls the United States purse? Surprisingly, the CIA.

If you haven't read it, I started a thread on the CIA's "Black Budget." In short, under Federal law, the CIA is given the authority to appropriate any budget item and use it for its own operations, and this appropriations are kept secret, not even Congress is allowed to know. The implications of this are overwhelming.

Here's a link to the thread I started:

CIA Black Budget

So, one has to ask who works for who, does the CIA work for the elected gov't or does the elected gov't work for the CIA. Based on the statutory framework for funding the CIA, and heeding President Eisenhower's warning of the rise of the military industrial complex, I think I would have to side on the side that in this case, the tail is wagging the dog. This funding statute, though maybe well intended at the time, certainly has led to a perversion of our democratic belief that ultimate power is reserved to the people.

Its inherently undemocratic, and unconstitutional, to allow budget funds, intended for the people and to effectuate the policies of our representative gov't, to be secretly appropriated away to a secret organization for its own secret purposes that doesn't ever have to answer to the people.

To allow the CIA to operate secretly with access to the entire US budget effectively allows them to establish foreign policy, which is a right granted to the Presidet and other elected officials.

As Napoleon Bonaparte once said:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')nternational incidents must not be allowed to shape foreign policy, foreign policy must shape the incidents.

[seahorse]

Earlier, I posted an interesting article that asked, was the US on the verge of a revolution, and the article meant the violent type. That article is here:

Is US on verge of a revolution?

That article is fairly persuasive that real problems are developing an analysis those problems in relation to some previous studies on factors leading to a revolution.

In follow up to that article, look at some recent news:

Vermont Town votes to arrest Bush and Cheney:

Reuters

The thread here where Eco terrorist start burning nongreen homes:

PO Topic

Protestors go to Countrywide VP's home to protest the "loan sharks".

Yahoo Business

Lots of anger building out there.

[seahorse2]

The violation of 4th Amendment Rights continues with domestic spying by the FBI.



$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'B')y LARA JAKES JORDAN, Associated Press Writer 46 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - FBI Director Robert Mueller says an upcoming Justice Department report will show the bureau improperly used national security letters to obtain personal data on Americans during terror and spy investigations.

Mueller says the report focuses on national security letters issued only in 2006 — a year before the FBI enacted sweeping new reforms to prevent future lapses.

Mueller's comments Wednesday morning in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee came just days before the Justice Department's inspector general is scheduled to release the follow-up to a similar audit in 2007.

Last year's report found that over a three-year period, the FBI had demanded personal data on people from banks, telephone and Internet providers and credit bureaus without official authorization and in non-emergency circumstances.

[seahorse]

Revolutionary pressures continue to build - college students arrested for trying to do a "citizens arrest" of Karl Rove.

News

[seahorse]

I'm sure most are aware that the Federal Reserve Bank is now going to loan out $200 billion dollars to non banks to keep them going. They will be making loans to institutions like Goldman Sachs etc.

Market Watch

This is an affront and an attack on our capitalist democracy. For years I have watched and listen to these bankers on tv extol the virtues of free market capitalism, and bash and attack programs like free school lunches for needy children and health care for all as an affront to free market capitalism, yet now, when their own livelihoods are at stake, somehow they can justify billions in aid to themselves, which only means that the American taxpayer will be saddled with the burden of paying for all those bad mortgages they made. Yet, despite the fact that they made all these bad mortgages, the CEO of Goldman Sachs, for example, was paid $103 million dollars last year for all his bad decisions.

Are you guys not upset about this? Does anyone else besides me get utterly pissed that we taxpayers are paying for this mess? We are bailing them out, which allows them to make bad loans, pay exhorbitant salaries, and in so doing, make a mockery out of the idea of "capitalism"? This idea that America is the "land of opportunity" is like believing in Zeus. That idea that our Constitution or our capitalist system works is a ring in each of your noses.

Thomas Jefferson warned us about this, and it cannot be said any better than with his own words:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I') believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.
Thomas Jefferson, Letter to the Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin (1802)
3rd president of US (1743 - 1826)

[seahorse2]

Keep in mind that all banks are not the enemy, only the banks that argue they are "too big to fail" in a where they also tell us no man is above the law.

Bernanke has stated that there will be bank failures of regional, smaller banks, just not the big boys.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'H')e said the banks at risk were “small and in many cases de novo [new] banks that are heavily invested in real estate in localities where prices have fallen”.

[seahorse2]

Hmmmm, the Federal gov't has expanded its domestic spying program allowing the use of military spy satellites on US soild, and I thought the Constitution prohibited this kind of thing.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'C')oming on the back of legislation that upgraded the administration's ability to wiretap terrorist suspects without warrants, the development is likely to heat up debate about the balance between civil liberties and national security.

[seahorse]

Thanks! Also, good to hear another voice on this thread. Its become more of a diary of sorts.

[seahorse2]

If you haven't read the article saying the US is primed for a violent revolution, you should. There was a housing riot, which only goes to show that the economic downturn leads to economic upheaval, as evidenced by this riot.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')ednesday, March 12, 2008

BOCA RATON — A crowd of more than 500 people waiting for hours this morning for housing voucher applications were dispersed by police in riot gear at the Boca Raton Housing Authority when the applications ran out sooner than expected.

The action prompted complaints that officers used excessive tactics and housing authority officials were incompetent in their planning.

[careinke]

Whats really scary is your link no longer goes to the story. Looks like it has been taken down.

Cliff (Start a rEVOLution, grow a garden)

[seahorse2]

Thanks for letting me know the story has been taken down. I guess they dont want to sow panic.

[Ferretlover]

South Florida: Don't Move Here
… Today, in Palm Beach County, "hundreds, maybe thousands," near-rioted for subsidized housing. That's right, we just about had a "housing riot." Not as bad a sign as a food riot would have been, but still up there.
The wait nearly turned ugly when housing officials told hundreds still on line Wednesday morning that they only had enough applications left for those with disabilities. The crowd surged forward, almost crushing mothers with children and people in wheel chairs, said Judith Aigen, Boca Raton Housing Authority executive director.

"I think a riot was about to happen," she said.

It was then that police in riot gear stepped in, dispersing the angry crowd. Boca Raton Fire Rescue took nine people to area hospitals for medical conditions such as seizures, fainting or diabetic shock, said fire Chief Tom Wood. Police arrested two people and charged them with resisting arrest without violence, said police Chief Dan Alexander.

No one foresaw the response to an announcement by the housing agency that it planned to give out 600 applications for its Housing Choice Voucher program. Only 200 of them will be accepted. …
South Floridians not happy either

[threadbear]

Oh dear, Ferret Lover--I hate to put a gallows humour face on this, but this scene came right out of South Park, it seems.

"The wait nearly turned ugly when housing officials told hundreds still on line Wednesday morning that they only had enough applications left for those with disabilities. The crowd surged forward, almost crushing mothers with children and people in wheel chairs, said Judith Aigen, Boca Raton Housing Authority executive director."

If you have a warped sense of humour even global economic collapse has it's funny/sick moments.

[Ferretlover]

Gallows humor: The joke is on us! And, in a big-time way......

[seahorse2]

This video linked by Dukey analyzes language in a new bill just passed by the US house of Representatives. Let's hope it doesn't become law, because it definitely violates our 1st Amendment by criminalizing "terrorism" which includes the use of "force" - which is defined as something less than violence, specifically criminalizing "force" as intellectual and written arguments against the US gov't.

PO topic

[Ferretlover]

Shouldn't be too much of a problem as time goes by--so few people can actually Think, let alone criticize the government.