by Schmuto » Tue 20 Jan 2009, 16:57:26
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Pops', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', ' ')If there's any blame to go around, it's us voting citizens who put some of these guys in power, not our military, who should receive the blame.
It is funny to me those people actively attempt to undermine the very process which allows them their freedom and prosperity instead of sitting back and just mooching.
I consider it distant from the truth that voting "allows me" my "freedom and prosperity".
I have my freedom and prosperity despite the charade of voting in America.
To be clear, just because we are less enslaved than most people does not mean that we are free.
I have little doubt that the Founding Fathers would guffaw at the notion that what we have today is "freedom."
We are cordoned off into wire mesh cages for our "protests."
The FBI and CIA can wiretap us without warrants.
Our library loans and bookstore purchases can be monitored without our consent.
This is not to mention the economic enslavement, which includes a private bank controlling the money supply, private bankers controlling government and receiving taxpayer money directly for payment of bad bank dept and bonuses, and corporate interests owning politicians.
I say it again, for all to hear - whatever "freedom" we now enjoy is based purely on the momentum of the last 200 years.
A couple of planes and 2,000 or so deaths resulted in us allowing our executive to seize previously-shocking controls that they had not possessed before.
And the situation continues to deteriorate.
Your civil rights are waning, and they will be gone soon. I encourage each of you to enjoy them while you have them.
Toilet paper, hot water on demand, taco Bell at 2 am. These things are lovely, perhaps, but you will not miss them nearly as much as you'll miss your "freedom."
When the conversation we have had here, regardless of whether you agree with me, will be
illegal.
It'll be here very soon now. Couple more scare tactics - a terrorist bomb goes off here. A Chicago mob comprising thousands of unemployed are put down at gunpoint. A couple bombs go off there. The next great lie - that of "home grown" terrorists - becomes everyday language.
And it's all gone. And you have as many rights as a Russian citizen circa 1971.
And then you had better keep your mouth shut - all of you. Because the people who post here are, by nature, officious blabbers. You know who you are.
The time will be here soon. You've prepped physically. You've got your butter guns and beans.
How about your mind?
Are you ready for a world where the Feds can kick in your door anytime they want for any reason and . . .
there's nothing you can do about it other than to try to grovel the proper amount?
That day will be here soon.
Pops is a good man. But he's a remnant. He's probably 60 something, maybe pushing 70. He comes from a generation that was fed more patriotic beat-the-commis bull-sh-t than any have since.
I can forgive him for refusing to come to terms with where the country is at, and, more importantly, where it is headed.
You don't have any liberty. You don't have any freedom.
What you have is a momentary respite from the omnipresent weight of the oppression of the monied interests. That respite was provided by cheap oil.
I hope you are well rested, because the mass will soon be reaffixed to you back.
To conclude - the fatal flaw in Pops' 1950s-style patriotism is that Pops actually believes that our military keeps us free.
Think about that. Pops believes that if we immediately shrunk the military by 95% our "freedom" would be at risk.
But a moment's consideration should lead anybody who is young and unindoctrinated to the quite obvious conclusion that there is no tangible risk from any foreign power to American sovereignty nor could there be any time in the near future, that terrorism is, at worst, a bee stinging an elephant and never will be more than that, notwithstanding guys in the desert somewhere training on jungle gyms, and that the ultimate threat to our "freedom" is standing right next to you.
While you scrutinize the horizon so carefully for the enemy of liberty, your massive armies, which cost more than all the world's other armies combined, with your depleted uranium tank shells and your tactical nuclear bombs, you've missed the devil at your heels.
You have had your vision fixed so long on imagined threats from abroad that you have not considered that our house is not in order.
We are the threat, not them.