I heard on the radio that the major federal medical and financial legislation enacted in 2010 will put 70% of the United States economy under control of the executive branch. The commentator asked the question: “At what point should the U.S. be considered a dictatorship?”
The question I ask is how can things have gotten to the point that the federal government has been able to take overarching control over medical and financial matters in a country generally considered by its residents to be the freest in the world?
On the short list of answers to that question is that the overwhelming percentage of adults in the U.S. attended a public or privately operated school where a central theme of the history and social studies curriculum is government in the U.S. is based on consent of the governed, and that elected legislators represent the will of the people. Students in those schools are systematically conditioned from their earliest years to believe in the electoral process, and to have a psychological allegiance to the idea of “representative” government. Emblematic of this conditioning process is routine recitation of the mantra called “The Pledge of Allegiance” that inculcates the mindset in a person to love government in the U.S. as their protector and benefactor.
The brightest of students typically continue on after high school to attend institutions of higher education. The idea that the government represents the collective will of the people is reinforced by these advanced education institutions. To borrow a phrase from George Orwell’s 1984, students at all levels are systematically conditioned to love “love Big Brother,” and that benevolent attitude is intended to be so deeply imbedded in their psyche that it continues through their life. Government directed education can have the effect of deforming a child’s mind just as the 1,000 year practice of binding the feet of Chinese women had on permanently deforming their feet.
Whether after high school or college, students enter their adult life having been repeatedly exposed to the idea that the government is the people, and so they think they are “free” no matter what the government does. That is important because once a person has accepted that the government acts on behalf of the people as a whole there is no theoretical limit to the power they will accept the government exercising over the people.
The two year election cycle for U.S. congressional representatives and presidential elections every four years ensures there is a steady barrage of media commentary and editorializing that reinforces the attitude of people inculcated during their school years that elections are evidence the government at all levels represents the will of the people. The success of that indoctrination process is reflected in the typical cry of “throw the bums out” as a response by the public to concerns about high taxes and increasing government spending. Invariably the proposed solution is to replace the “bums” with “good” politicians who will look out for the public’s interests. What isn’t heard in the media are thoughtful challenges or questions about the system of electing so-called representatives of the people – from a small-town mayor to the president – to ostensibly control the reins of government.
There is one group of young people who are not captives of the effort by government controlled schools to induce a love of Big Brother in students. Those are homeschooled students. They have the opportunity to learn the truth, unlike public and most privately schooled children, that George Washington sabotaged the will of the people by orchestrating replacement of the Articles of Confederation with the Constitution of the United States, the adoption of which was opposed by a large majority of the people in the thirteen colonies. The Constitution not only created out of thin air an entirely new country called the United States of America, but it included the framework for administration of that new country by a powerful centralized federal government. Homeschooled kids also have the opportunity to learn that Abraham Lincoln was not a paragon of race equality, that the war between the Northern and Southern states was a consequence of the United States’ tax policy that discriminated against the South, and that by today’s standards Lincoln was a war criminal who committed crimes against humanity for deliberately waging war on the civilian population of the South. Homeschooled kids also have the opportunity to learn that Woodrow Wilson was a scoundrel who dramatically expanded the federal government’s sphere of control and tricked the voting public to re-elect him so he could enmesh the U.S. into World War One that the majority of Americans wanted to stay out of. Homeschooled kids also have the opportunity to learn Franklin Roosevelt worsened and prolonged the Depression with his New Deal economic policies, and that he actively worked to maneuver the U.S. into a war with Japan. On, and on, and on homeschoolers can learn that these and other Presidents and elected officials were not the heroic figures students are taught to revere as Demigods by a government approved curriculum in a public or private school.
That homeschooling can be an antidote to the false idolization of well-known politicians, is indicative of how well educated a homeschooled person can be in any number of areas – language, math, science, history, and so forth. It is not surprising that homeschoolers consistently shine at competitions such as the National Spelling Bee and the National Geography Bee.
Homeschooling A Hope For America is a new book that contributes to understanding that homeschooling is an invaluable alternative to the glorification of the State as the representative of the people’s will that students are subjected to in a school with a government approved curriculum. Compiled by Carl Watner, editor for more than a quarter of a century of the The Voluntaryist newsletter, Homeschooling is an anthology of articles published in The Voluntaryist that deal with different aspects of homeschooling. A general theme of Homeschooling’s fifty chapters that are divided into five general sections, is that the direct education of children by their parents provides a hope for keeping the spirit of individual independence alive in America.
Homeschooling’s positive theme is very timely because the reach of the federal government and its local and state counterparts into the daily lives of people in the U.S. has reached a point that only differs by degree from government in the Soviet Union before its break-up – and in some ways exceeds it.
One of Homeschooling’s chapters is a review of the book Discovering America As It Is by anti-Soviet dissident Valdas Anelauskas. After he was expelled from the Soviet Union in 1988 Anelauskas settled in the U.S. He writes that he was “shocked” to discover there is more “ideological indoctrination and political propagandizing” of school children in the U.S. than there was in the Soviet Union.
Some parents may think Homeschooling’s most controversial Section is “Family – When Parenting Matters.” The underlying theme of that Section’s chapters can be interpreted that relying on government controlled schooling is an abrogation of a parent’s responsibility to provide for their children’s welfare.
Whether a person is familiar with homeschooling or wants to understand why its proponents are so passionate, the breadth of information in Homeschooling about the historical roots and practical and theoretical reasons to home school children provides something of value for any interested person.
Ordering information:
Homeschooling can be ordered by sending a check, money order or cash with complete mailing information to:
The Voluntaryist PO Box 275 Gramling, SC 29348
Or click here to order Homeschooling A Hope For America from Amazon.com with a credit card.
TOWARD A POLICE REFORM MOVEMENT An Excerpt from the forthcoming book _Where We Stand_ By L. Neil Smith THE PROBLEM
When you see three police cars pulled over at the side of a city street to deal with a single miscreant bicycle rider, you realize that there are too many cops. When all the heroes on television carry badges and a government franchise, you know we're in real trouble as a culture.
Every day we hear of some act of brutality -- people beaten and kicked when they're unconscious, or "Tased" until they die -- carried out by federal, state, or local "law enforcement" (which is a terrible misnomer, since most of the laws enforced today are unconstitutional, and therefore unlawful in and of themselves) against individuals or groups whose only crime was exercising their unalienable individual, civil, Constitutional, and human rights. "Policemen" at every level of government have become, more than any mere military organization, the "standing army" that was hated and feared by America's Founding Fathers.
There are reasons for this, foremost among them a shocking failure on the part of those same Founding Fathers to provide for any kind of proper enforcement of the first ten amendments to the Constitution, commonly known as the Bill of Rights. The warning signs were already plain, many years before this century's "Reichstag Fire" -- the attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001 -- which gave the government all the excuse it needed to turn the entire country into a prison.
Today's freedom movement (Libertarians, Constitutionalists, "Tea Partiers", and a growing number of "progressives") is attempting to identify the causes of America's ills. As long as they are being addressed, there's no harm in ameliorating symptoms, as well. You may get a CAT-scan to see why you suffer migraines, but you also take an aspirin.
Accordingly, we suggest the following steps -- many of which libertarians have thought about for decades -- to begin dealing with the signs by which we understand that we're all living in a police state. Any one of these measures (or even all of them together), may be pursued by concerned individuals and organizations who find them interesting and worthwhile -- without regard to their political ideology -- as conventional legislation, constitutional or charter amendments, initiated referenda, or as a part of settlements in lawsuits.
Short term, what's important is to create as much discussion of these matters as possible, so the "authorities" among us will understand that, if they don't change their ways, their ways will be changed for them.
SOME ANSWERS
First, there being no provision whatever in the Constitution for a national police force of any kind -- and in compliance with the 9th and 10th Amendments, as well as with Article 1, Section 8 -- all federal "law enforcement" and investigative agencies must be abolished and their present and former employees subjected to legal scrutiny of their current and past activities for possible criminal behavior and crimes against the Constitution. As "interim" measures, these agencies and their employees will be forbidden to use or carry weapons of any kind (except off duty as ordinary individual citizens), and will be permitted to operate at all only under close supervision by local police.
All military-style weapons, military vehicles, and military aircraft presently in use by any of these agencies -- or by local police -- will be surrendered for distribution to those who paid for them.
Independent civilian review boards, perhaps one in each of America's 3088 counties -- will be established to insure that federal conduct remains fully consistent with the Bill of Rights. No pleas of secrecy or "national security" will be permitted to impede access to government documents (including routine police reports) or their investigations in general. Willful misunderstanding, for political or any other purposes, of any article of the Bill of Rights on the part of any elected or appointed official will be considered _prima facie_ evidence of an intention to commit a crime or crimes against the Constitution.
LOCAL POLICE
All police officers at state, county, and local levels will be required to wear traditional police uniforms on duty and be forbidden to act in a professional capacity when off duty, or wearing civilian clothing. All uniforms must bear individual name patches and badge numbers easily legible from a distance of fifty yards, and it will be unlawful to cover or obscure them in any way. It will also be unlawful for police officers to conceal their facial features with any sort of helmet or mask, or to wear camouflaged or military-style helmets or battledress.
All vehicles employed by local police must be clearly marked and readily identifiable, with highly-visible registration numbers. With the exception of emergency medical and rescue services, agencies at every level of government will be forbidden the use of helicopters, fixed-wing aircraft, or unmanned drones which, in recent years, have more and more become instruments of state terrorism and statist oppression.
It is long past time to demilitarize the police and reintegrate them as individuals into the society they're supposed to protect. To reestablish a proper relationship between them and the people they're supposed to serve, police officers may not possess, carry, or use any weapon prohibited to civilians within their jurisdiction, nor carry a weapon of any kind off duty, concealed or otherwise, until all laws forbidding civilians to do so in exactly the same manner have been repealed.
In general, so they will be dependent once again on the good will of armed civilians, police officers must be limited to the traditional six-shot revolver and four-shot slide or pump shotgun. They must be forbidden to use or carry rifles, Tasers, stunguns, or fully automatic eapons of any kind. Likewise, bullet resistant clothing and equipment - which appear to have engendered an increasingly contemptuous disregard for the lives, property, and rights of civilians -- will be forbidden.
Handcuffs or other restraints will not be used gratuitously on nyone arrested for nonviolent crimes -- especially for the purpose of a humiliating public display. Arresting officials will be held fully and individually responsible under civil and criminal law for any loss of repute suffered by arrestees treated this way who are later proven innocent.
In "seige" situations (which may not be initiated merely because an individual expresses a wish to be left alone, locks himself in his house, or is known to possess weapons) authorities will be prohibited from interrupting telephone service or other utilities, or restricting free access by the media to the subjects of their operations. No incendiary devices, purposely built or otherwise, may be employed by police.
To avoid conflict of interest and prevent over-zealous enforcement of statues and ordinances, all fines and other traffic revenues will be divided equally between the American Civil Liberties Union and Amnesty International, provided, of course, that these groups adopt a view of the Bill of Rights which is consistent from article to article.
All illegal activity on the part of individual police officers or groups of officers should be treated as felonies and punished accordingly.
A NEWER COVENANT
Individual members of the military and police must be required to prove themselves at regular intervals by publicly taking an oath to uphold, defend, and enforce -- without reservation -- each and every separate article of the Bill of Rights, as written and intended by the Founders.
Any individual member of the military or police who refuses to obey an order which he or she considers unconstitutional or unlawful, in good faith, will receive executive clemency and, should the order prove to have been unconstitutional or unlawful, an appropriate reward, promotion, and reinstatement, if necessary, to full pay and benefits.
PRIVACY AND CIVIL LIBERTIES
Like many other such events in history, the attacks of September 11, 2001 have been exploited as an excuse to destroy every value that once made America a unique civilization. If the Bush Administration was correct in saying that "they hate us for our freedom", then the terrorists have won, because the government has destroyed that freedom.
Americans will have their privacy again, whether government and government-chartered corporations want them to or not. In general, owing to a long-established pattern of abuse by police agencies and individual officers, all eavesdropping, wiretapping, Internet surveillance, infrared photography, and other invasions of individual privacy -- or any procedure, including taxation, that requires disclosure of private financial information -- will be absolutely forbidden.
It was a grave mistake to extend such powers and privileges to government and its surrogates in the first place and now they must be revoked. For the foreseeable future, in order to restore the balance, the Fourth Amendment must be read as if the word "unreasonable" did not appear in it, since it is essentially meaningless. Given the unmistakable injunction of the Second Amendment, possession or use of any device for the detection of personal weapons -- by government at any level or by corporations -- will be illegal and severely punishable.
It is inappropriate for sovereign individuals to be labelled, sorted, and tracked as if they were livestock. Naturally, there is no provision for these activities to be found in the Constitution. Fingerprint records and other identification systems presently maintained by government or its surrogate corporations must be destroyed. Voiceprinting, retinal photography, and the "preventive" collection of DNA samples must be forbidden. Electronic tracking systems must be banned, and government forbidden to use Global Positioning Systems, especially in telephones, to track or find individuals.
A PERSONAL MESSAGE
To individual members of the police and military, we say the time for denial is over. If these proposed measures anger you, remember that Bill Clinton did it to you. Janet Reno did it to you. Louis Freeh did it to you. Larry Potts did it to you. Lon Horiuchi did it to you. George W. Bush, Richard Cheney and their minions did it to you. And now, Barack Obama, Janet Napolitano, and Eric Holder are doing it to you.
You have let them do it.
Thanks to them, you are despised by the very populace that you're supposed to be protecting. You are feared -- and if you enjoy that, there's something deeply wrong with you -- and you have forgotten that frightened people are dangerous. Until you are willing to prove the contrary to those you have sworn to serve, you are no different from the politicians listed above. You're exactly the same as those who:
Firebombed a whole neighborhood out of existence when a group of residents was accused of nothing more serious than disturbing the peace;
Assassinated a harmless old man merely to steal his valuable real estate;
Shot a little boy and his dog to death and then blew his mother's head off with a scoped high-powered rifle as she held her baby in her arms;
Confined, terrorized, gassed, and machine gunned dozens of innocent men, women -- and 22 little children -- in the church that was their home;
Tortured, intimidated, and tried to dispose of political prisoners -- not foreigners overseas, but your fellow Americans -- by denying them necessary and lawfully prescribed medication and proper medical assistance;
Threatened and confiscated evidence from independent investigators when they questioned the cover-up of an airliner crash that killed hundreds;
Viciously stomped kittens to death underfoot trying to frighten the innocent victims of a narcotics raid carried out at the wrong address;
Kidnapped, illegally imprisoned, and even tortured individuals never proven in any court of law to represent any kind of threat to anybody;
Committed hundreds of thousands of similar brutal, illegal, and unconstitutional travesties that have inexorably transformed the once free and noble American civilization into a dark, horror-filled dictatorship.
TIME TO STAND DOWN
The Cold War is over. The immensely destructive "War on Drugs", which has done vastly more damage to American society than drugs themselves ever threatened to, was meant from the beginning to replace it, and to destroy the very Constitution you have sworn to uphold and defend. When the "War on Drugs" failed to produce the desired results, it was replaced with the equally fraudulent and destructive "War on Terror".
Don't allow a gang of socialist trash, elected by the mass media and a noisy minority, exploit you as a tool to force illegal, immoral, alien ideas on an unwilling populace. They have stolen your honor. Your one duty, your only goal must be to regain it by enforcing the highest law of the land, the first ten amendments to the Constitution, commonly known as the Bill of Rights. Indeed, that's the only possible justification for what you do, and for the existence of government itself.
Don't let desk bound, overpaid SINOs -- "Superiors In Name Only" -- tell you what the Bill of Rights means. It wasn't written to be obscure. It wasn't written for them to interpret away. Remember your oath. Don't let corrupt judges and lawyers -- who only stand to benefit from eliminating the Bill of Rights -- tell you what it means, either. Do what most Americans haven't tried to do for over half a century.
Think for yourself.
Ask yourself this question: if you were one of America's Founders and you'd just surprised the world (and yourself) by winning a war of secession against the most powerful, heavy-handed government on the planet, and the last thing you wanted for yourself, for your children, or for your grandchildren was to fall beneath the heels of its jackboots ever again, what would _you_ want the Bill of Rights to mean?
And if the first act, under martial law, of that powerful, heavy- handed government had been to try to take your guns away at Lexington and Concord (yes, that's what those battles were all about), would you have written a Second Amendment to guarantee _government's_ exclusive "right" to own and carry weapons? Would you have written a Second Amendment that was subject to whatever the whims of government claimed was a reasonable regulation? Or would you have written it strictly to forbid government from having anything to do with your guns, ever again?
Anything whatever.
We say once again, it's time to end the "War on Drugs". Think back: isn't it true that every dime ever spent on it has only made the problem worse, not better? Many decent individuals have come to believe that, from the outset, it was never meant as anything but a war against the people of the United States of America and their freedom. It's time to end it forever, and to abolish the DEA, the FBI, the BATFE, and every other federal agency not specifically mentioned in the Constitution, and which, for that reason alone, is a criminal enterprise.
Likewise, it's time to end the "War on Terror" and abolish those agencies -- each and every one illegal -- charged with waging it. All laws, regulations, decrees, and promulgations passed in connection with it must be repealed, nullified, or otherwise disposed of, immediately.
Terrorism, to the extent that it exists, is a diffuse threat unlike the military of an enemy nation. The only way to deal with it is by means of a diffuse defense, consisting of free and independent individuals, properly armed and equipped. Such a policy would have prevented the events of September 11, 2001.
All hiring for these illegal agencies must also cease immediately, and those individual officers who manage to survive legal scrutiny of their past activities should be encouraged to find employment in the private economy, or be transferred to the US Marshals Service, given a new assignment -- Bill of Rights enforcement -- and be turned loose on crooked politicians, bureaucrats, and judges, rather than the American people.
It should have been obvious long ago that the worldview of the typical "law enforcement officer" has become so contaminated and corrupt over the years, so pathologically contemptuous of everyone around him, that, for the sake of public safety, every one of them will have to be removed and replaced by newly-trained personnel with a proper respect for the rights of the individuals they serve. One possible exception may be made in the case of "Oathkeepers" who are trying to stem the tide of brutal authoritarianism in the police and military.
In the long run, provided that care is taken to avoid the election of unapologetic fascists like Maricopa County Arizona's Joe Arpaio, municipal police forces and their multiple layers of bureaucratic protection must be outlawed and abolished, in favor of local sheriffs who are directly accessible by and accountable to the people. Also, stringent limits must be set on the ratio of officers to the civlian population.
Above and beyond everything, the Founders' hideous, destructive omission must be corrected and the Bill of Rights equipped with a "penalty clause" for politicians, bureaucrats, or policemen who violate its precepts. The point must be made that no portion of the Constitution allows it to be set aside in the case of an "emergency". The _Posse Comitatus_ Act of 1876 must be reinstated in full, and the most Draconian punishments imaginable established for its slightest violation.
Creating and enacting such a penalty clause must become the highest priority for Libertarians, Constitutionalists, "Tea Partiers", and any others who interested in restoring freedom to this once great country.
Fort Wayne Journal Gazette reported on July 25 that “there are 72 fusion centers around the nation, analyzing and disseminating data and information of all kinds. That is one for every state and others for large urban cities.”
What is a fusion center?
The answer depends on your perspective. If you work for the Department of Homeland Security, it is a federal, state, local, or regional data-coordination units, designed to improve the sharing of anti-terrorism and anti-crime data in order to make America safer. If you are privacy or civil-rights advocate, it is part of a powerful new domestic surveillance infrastructure that combines data from both the public and private sectors to track innocent people and so makes Americans less safe from their own government. In that respect, the fusion center is reminiscent of the East German stasi, which used tens of thousands of state police and hundreds of thousands of informers to monitor an estimated one-third of the population.
The history of fusion centers provides insight into which answer is correct.
Fusion centers began in 2003 under the administration of George W. Bush as a joint project between the departments of Justice and Homeland Security. The purpose (pdf) is to coordinate federal and local law enforcement by using the “800,000 plus law enforcement officers across the country” whose intimate awareness of their own communities makes them “best placed to function as the ‘eyes and ears’ of an extended national security community.” The fusion centers are hubs for the coordination. By April 2008 there were 58.
The growth has continued under the Obama administration. Indeed, Obama has also continued Bush’s concealment of domestic intelligence activity by threatening to veto legislation that authorizes broader congressional oversight or review of intelligence agencies by the Government Accountability Office (GAO). As a result of that threat, the GAO provision was removed from the Intelligence Authorization Act.
Due to secrecy, it is difficult to describe a typical fusion center. But if the Indiana Intelligence Fusion Center is typical, this is what one looks like.
Indiana’s center has essentially become an arm of Indiana law enforcement…. It has 31 full-time staffers and two part-time employees. Some … are state employees. Others are assigned to the center from other agencies, such as the FBI, Transportation Security Administration, and Marion County Sheriff’s Department. They are joined by workers from the Department of Correction, the Indiana National Guard, the Indiana State Police, the Department of Natural Resources and local campus police…. There are also private sector analysts on contract. Previously those analysts were from EG&G Technical Services of California. The most recent contract with EG&G called for payment of $1.1 million….
Fusion centers invite reports from public employees such as firemen, ambulance drivers, and sanitation workers as well as from the private sector such as hospitals and neighborhood watch groups. They often operate tip hotlines; this means a “suspect’s” name could be submitted by a disgruntled employee, a hostile neighbor, or an ex-spouse who seeks child custody.
What or who is targeted by this sweeping coordination of data?
To get an idea, let’s look at the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) program, which the U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence said “should be a national model.” In June 2008 the departments of Justice and Homeland Security recommended expansion of the LAPD program to other cities.
In April 2008 the Wall Street Journal reported on a new LAPD policy that compelled officers to report “suspicious behaviors” to the local fusion center. LAPD Special Order #11, dated March 5, 2008, defined a list of 65 suspicious behaviors, including using binoculars, taking pictures or video footage “with no apparent esthetic value,” abandoning a vehicle, taking notes, and espousing extremist views. Local police were converted into domestic surveillance agents.
Voices of caution were present from the inception of fusion centers. Former U.S. Rep. Bob Barr stated
Using the resources of federal and state law enforcement to encourage the citizenry to submit to the government information on the political, social and even religious views of other people, is in itself outrageous. For the government to then data-base that information, disseminate it widely, and clearly imply that views with which it may disagree provides an appropriate basis on which to surveil citizens and collect information on them, is beyond the pale. It is also a poor and inefficient use of police resources.
Political Abuse
Violation of privacy rights, excessive secrecy, lack of congressional oversight, the inevitability of inaccurate and noncorrectable information, the lack of due process for the accused, the encouragement of racial/religious profiling, the creation of a “snitch” nation, the merging of the military with the private sector, the political abuse of dissidents – the objections scroll on. Specific abuses scroll on as well. They include:
Maryland: Fifty-three nonviolent political activists, including antiwar and anti-death penalty activists, were labeled as terrorists and actively surveilled for 14 months.
Minnesota: Eight anarchist protesters who planned to protest the Republican National Convention in Minneapolis were preemptively arrested and charged with terrorism. In Minnesota, a crime can become terrorism if it disrupts the conduct of government.
Texas: A leaked intelligence bulletin from the North Central Texas Fusion System asked police officers to report on Islamic and antiwar lobbying groups.
Missouri: Supporters of third party presidential candidates, pro-life activists, and conspiracy theorists were targeted as potential militia members.
Virginia (pdf): A terrorism threat assessment included certain universities as breeding grounds for terrorism, including historically black colleges.
Clearly, the elaborate infrastructure of fusion centers has spied on peaceful citizens. Those who believe the abuses are aberrations, rather than an inherent or intended function, may argue that increased transparency will bring accountability and solve the problem. But that belief is naive. At least four reasons indicate that a lack of transparency and accountability are built into the system — the absence of real congressional oversight being number one.
Second, the ACLU and others have filed numerous Freedom of Information Act requests. They have had to fight tooth-and-nail for any scrap of information.
Third, as the ACLU (pdf) notes, “[T]here appears to be an effort by the federal government to coerce states into exempting their fusion centers from state open government laws. For those living in Virginia, it’s already too late; the Virginia General Assembly passed a law in April 2008 exempting the state’s fusion center from the Freedom of Information Act. According to comments by the commander of the Virginia State Police Criminal Intelligence Division and the administrative head of the center, the federal government pressured Virginia into passing the law…. [T]here is a real danger fusion centers will become a ‘one-way mirror’ in which citizens are subject to ever-greater scrutiny by the authorities, even while the authorities are increasingly protected from scrutiny by the public.”
Fourth, much of the information used by fusion centers comes from private databases such as Accurate, Choice Point, Lexis-Nexus, Locate Plus, insurance claims, and credit reports. Moreover, the centers access millions of government files like the Federal Trade Commission ID theft reports and DMV records. Why is this important? The federal government has adopted various laws to prevent the maintenance of databases on average Americans, but if fusion centers access the other existing files, they would bypass those laws.
A massive database on peaceful citizens, a tip hotline that encourages turning in of neighbors, the casting of suspicion on daily activities, enlisting private workers as national surveillance agents — this is a police state in the making. And if its creation is invisible to most people, well, that is another characteristic of a police state. You are not a believer until it knocks on your door … in the middle of the night.
The leaked documents “raise serious questions about the reality of America’s policy toward Pakistan and Afghanistan,” said Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat. “Those policies are at a critical stage,” and the documents “make the calibrations needed to get the policy right more urgent.”
Oh, so that's the problem with the Afghanistan war. It's not calibrated properly. Tell me, Senator, how do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a miscalibration?
Yesterday I mentioned that we will no longer be quoting the Las Vegas Review-Journal, because of their abusive copyright enforcement. Indeed, we won't even link to them.
But it got me to thinking of Wendy's new problem. She spends hours each day reviewing news items for ifeminists.com. Sure, it's easy to remember not to quote one source, but what happens when the copyright trolls start suing for 70 different online newspapers? Post a list by her computer? The engineer in me says there has to be a better way.
And there is, because our browsers already have a way to block objectionable content: ad-blockers. Here's how to configure them to block the Review-Journal:
Opera 9.x: Click Tools > Advanced > Blocked Content. Click Add. Type "http://*.lvrj.com/*" in the box, press Enter, and click Close. Presto! The Review-Journal will not appear in your browser.
Firefox with AdBlock Plus: Click Tools > Adblock Plus Preferences. Click Add filter. Type "http://*.lvrj.com/*" in the box, press Enter, and click OK. Unfortunately this only filters the images and formatting from lvrj.com; the text remains in a plain HTML rendering. I'm still trying to find how to fix that (see update below), but at least it serves as a strong visual reminder.
Using the Hosts File: With a text editor, open the file /etc/hosts (Linux, Unix, OS X) or C:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts (Windows). Add the following lines at the end: 127.0.0.1 lvrj.com 127.0.0.1 www.lvrj.com This will redirect requests for the LVRJ back to your own computer, with varying results, depending on how your computer is set up. But the important thing is that you won't see the LVRJ. The problem with this approach is that you can't quickly override it if you need to.
I don't know how to set up ad blocking for Internet Explorer or Safari, but the hosts file should work on any system. As the copyright trolls start litigating additional newspapers, simply add them to your block list.
Now if only someone would write a TrollBlock plugin for Firefox... Update: someone has: the BlockSite add-on.
"Patent trolls" were bad enough. Now there are "copyright trolls," and one in particular is suing anyone who has quoted content from the Las Vegas Review-Journal. One gun-rights website has shut down as a result.
On July 21st, The Armed Citizen received an indirect and informal notice of a lawsuit against this website and its owners, David Burnett and Clayton Cramer.
The suit, reportedly filed in US District Court on July 20th, alleges that The Armed Citizen and its owners “willfully copied” and infringed on original source content from the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
According to news reports, Righthaven LLC has filed lawsuits against no less than 80 other political websites and individual blogs for “infringement.”
Borrowing a page from patent trolls, the CEO of fledgling Las Vegas-based Righthaven has begun buying out the copyrights to newspaper content for the sole purpose of suing blogs and websites that re-post those articles without permission. And he says he’s making money.
...Now he’s talking expansion. The Review-Journal’s publisher, Stephens Media in Las Vegas, runs over 70 other newspapers in nine states, and Gibson says he already has an agreement to expand his practice to cover those properties.
...Gibson says he’s just getting started. Righthaven has other media clients that he won’t name until the lawsuits start rolling out, he says.
They're not acknowledging "fair use" as a defense, so limiting your quotes to 75 words or less won't prevent you from being sued. (It might help you win the lawsuit, but who wants the expense?) Therefore, we have removed from this site the one small quotation from the LVRJ, and we've pulled all LVRJ news links from ifeminists.com. And we have adopted a policy to never use any LVRJ content henceforth. If more of these "submarine" clients are revealed, we'll pull their content, too.
If you run a website or blog, I strongly advise you to do likewise.
An update on the Thoreauvian experiment-in-living being conducted by a good friend who is fed up with society and wants to see how far he can take "life in the woods".... (For an earlier report, click here.) Busy Times at the Backwoods of Hell
I realize that I have been negligent in my updating of the goings on here at BwoH, in part, and yes this is where I make excuses. The delay has been because I have not been in BwoH, for part of the time.. I left for familial obligations (perceived) and business opportunities (desperately needed). Two months in the flatlands resulted in slightly better than breaking even monetarily but very good “karma” and personal satisfaction. A mother thrilled at her new living room and kitchen, a friend saved from the threat of many lawsuits (built a beautiful fence), and another friend saved from her own attempts at home improvement. Grandparents saved from boredom, unfortunately through needless replacement of siding, but still I am glad for the time for they have been fortunate enough to outlive the averages and so we have spent the sort of time together that songs like “Cats in the Cradle” remind us is quite precious.
Tried to rescue some unwanted strawberries and elderberry plants.. strawberries just up and croaked because they just did not value their contribution to the life I am building I am sure. Elderberries died off immediately upon temporary transplanting while I finishied up work in the flatlands, but were recovering by the time I left. Good hearty survivalists! So I dug them up again, took them several hours by truck south and east.. and they died off again.. maybe.. they are putting up what I believe are more shoots, and so I remain hopeful that these are one of the ultimate plant survivalists! At the same time, having positively identified elderberries, which BTW are great for diabetes and other issues, I've found more than a few clumps of them in the BwoH!.. Still, the more the merrier!
And speaking of foraging, since I've been back I have stumbled across some wonderful Sumac berries which were used by natives/ first nations peoples for a version of “lemonade!” Wonderful stuff.. Blackberries are ripe.. need I say more? I found two Sassafrass trees, which for those who do not know are essential in root beer (the roots are the reason for “root” beer) and gumbo (the leaves are powdered to make file...) I've enjoyed a bumper crop of pin cherries which are small wild (original) cherries), along side daylillies (pods are like a cross between asparagus and radish... delightful!)
The garden is producing well as well. Chinese long beans are the star at the moment. You can pick 5-15 beans (depending on your appetite) as either a part of a meal, or as so often the case for me, most or all of a meal. You'd have to pick 5 times as many green beans to even come close to the lower end of that number of long beans, and the long beans taste better! Malabar spinach is taking over, so gets pulled like a weed, but also eaten daily. Squash is having problems this year, but I fear that this is because of the gardening practices of Rancher Bob and his wife, whose garden I am using/caretaking this year in place of my own (my site is not yet ready).. I hope that by going away from row gardening, to intensive but more natural gardening, I will be able to overcome some of the problems we are having.
Tomatoes are delicious, contrary to those store bought things.. the corn, though often containing a worm at the top, is delightful, and a true reminder of the delights of summer.. The raspberries produce more than I would ever have guessed, and have found a special place in my heart (or is that stomach) in the form of a 'condiment' on a peanut butter and raspberry sandwich.. They are okay on their own, but shine nova bright on the sandwich.. If you can take a kids food, PB&J to gourmet level, this is the way to do it!
Finally, I am still working towards the construction. Unfortunately I have to just pester the backhoe operator to try to get him here before I leave again. Once this small (with equipment) work is done, I can take on the build with gusto.. but one lesson is learned.. all of the rumors of the difficulty in getting work done in rural areas, are true in spades.. and my deck has been stacked with spades..
Still, a good life, great eats, and much still to come..
Breitbart’s Big Hollywood published an exclusive look at production on the set of Atlas Shrugged, the classic Ayn Rand novel that has skyrocketed to the top of bestseller lists on the back of support from conservative leaders like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh. Editor-in-Chief John Nolte reports that the state of the film is much more positive than initial reports made it seem, and broke the news that the novel is set to be split into a trilogy, rather than cramming all 1,200 pages into a two-hour feature...
I just stumbled across my laugh of the day. Mish linked to a web article "Writing For Readers — 5 writing styles for maximum impact", about blog writing style. Sounds interesting, I thought, so I clicked the link. And this is what I saw in my Opera browser:
Yes, that's how it appeared. The left edge of the article was completely cut off. I'd say that someone didn't get his Cascading Style Sheet quite right. (I checked, and it does display ok in Firefox.)
It's a common mistake. Once upon a time, ifeminists.com articles didn't display correctly in Internet Explorer; that took me a devilishly long time to fix. (I try to check the appearance with several different browsers, but I don't use Windows, so for IE I rely on user reports.) I just thought it was amusing that someone giving advice on how to create a web site forgot the very first rule of "writing for readers": make sure the readers can see your text!
From Cop Block (23/07): "Cop who committed murder gets 60 days in jail." The item opens,
A cop killed a woman while racing his car and speeding. This cop also drove faster than 90 mph at least 90 times in the month before McKay’s death and reached 118 mph twice on Interstate 595 and 114 mph once on A1A, where the speed limit is 30 mph. He got less of a sentence than Lindsay Lohan’s 90 day jail sentence for showing up late to court.
In 1776, the Declaration of Independence made it plain that in America, “Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, - That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive..., it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it,...” The consent theory stated by the Declaration is standard fare in American politics. The Declaration, however, failed to address a very important question: How do individuals express their disapproval of a political regime and/or withdraw their consent from a government that they deem “destructive?”
There are several methods that Americans have used to demonstrate their lack of consent. One way is to renounce allegiance to an existing political order. The colonists in North America seceded from the British empire by successfully waging the Revolutionary War. On the other hand, the eleven Confederate states removed themselves from the federal union from 1861-1865, before being forcibly reintegrated back into the United States. 1
A second way someone can express a lack of consent is to move to a different country. This is what several commentators have called “the exit option.” 2 History teaches that the last resort of the individual against tyranny is to escape from its jurisdiction. The Jews left Egypt; the Separatists fled England. History is replete with examples of people who “voted with their feet.”
A third way people express a lack of consent is by not voting. Although political pundits might not call it a withdrawal of consent, the fact is that millions upon millions of Americans show their displeasure with their government by not registering for and/or casting a ballot in political elections. Non-voting represents an exit from political society. It is a silent form of “social power” that speaks volumes. Choosing not to vote may be a form of apathy, but it is simultaneously an expression of “what I perceive is best for me.”
In other words, millions of non-voters are implicitly stating that voting is a meaningless and unimportant activity, so far as it applies to them and their loved ones in their own lives. After all, government programs, and spending and tax policies will continue regardless of how anyone votes. Furthermore, for those thinking individuals who understand that the government must “get out the vote,” the choice not to vote is a form of personal empowerment and a psychologically life-affirming act. 3 Those men and women who consciously choose not to participate in politics expose the lie behind the myth of “government by consent.” They have not consented to anything. In other words, their decision not to vote is a form of personal secession - the form of secession that is most readily available to them. 4
This choice is exercised by many millions of Americans because they understand that elections are nothing more than tugs-of-war between tweedledum Democrats and tweedledee Republicans. Both parties seek the mantle of power to impose their agendas on society. Politicians of every political party want to continue the flow of tax money into the treasury and to pass laws allowing the government to increasingly invade the social spheres of daily life. As social commentator, one-time political candidate, and author Gore Vidal once noted: there is really only one political party in this country, and it has two incestuously related branches. 5
Whether based on intuition or practical understanding, non-voters realize they only have a subservient role in the political structure described by Vidal. Without money, position or connections, they are disenfranchised from having any meaningful say-so in the government’s impact on their lives. Yet, in spite of this handicap, choosing not to vote can have a dramatic and positive effect on society. This is because a government’s survival is dependent on having a sufficient number of people grant it the appearance of legitimacy to act and elicit obedience. 6
Whether it is an explicit intention or an implicit result, the decision not to vote is a way of decreasing governmental legitimacy. As Vladimir Bukovsky, the Russian dissident put it: “Power rests on nothing other than people’s consent to submit, and each person who refuses to submit to tyranny reduces it by one two-hundred-and-fifty-millionth, whereas each who compromises [with it] only increases it.” 7 Finally, there reaches a point at which a government no longer has enough consensus to act under any authority other than the exercise of raw, naked power. Once the mirage of legitimacy is gone, a government must become openly despotic to remain in power. This, in turn, tends to turn even more people away from supporting it, and can put its continued existence in doubt.
This isn’t armchair speculation. History records that variations of this scenario have occurred numerous times. 8 Who would have predicted that the Marco regime would fall from power in the Philippines? Who ever expected that the Communist government in Poland would be succeeded by Solidarity? Who ever thought that the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics would “splinter apart” in what seemed like the blink of an eye? However, it is usually a surprise to the “experts” when it happens, because it occurs quickly and at a time when a State appears, from the outside, to be at the height of its power.
This phenomenon of seemingly sudden social change is explained by physicist Per Bak’s theory of self-organizing criticality. 9 This theory, for example, explains how millions of grains of sand can methodically be added to a seemingly stable sand pile until a “point of criticality” is reached. At that point, adding only one more grain of sand will trigger an avalanche. Professor Bak’s theory has been used to help understand such diverse things as traffic flow and the trading of stocks. It is equally applicable to the delegitimizing impact any one non-voter can have on a political regime.
It is within the realm of possibility that some day the illegitimacy of the government of the United States might reach the point of criticality. What would happen if impassioned non-voters used the many methods of modern communications to express their ideas and dissatisfaction to others? At first thought it might seem preposterous to seriously consider that government in the United States could become delegitimized. It isn’t. As sociologist Sebastian Scheerer has observed: “[T]here has never been a major social transformation in the history of mankind that ha[s] not been looked upon as unrealistic, idiotic, or utopian by the large majority of experts even a few years before the unthinkable became reality.” 10
For a variety of reasons which the French author, Jacques Ellul, outlined in his book, The Political Illusion, non-voters choose to dispel the myth that the voters control the political process. 11 Instead of debasing themselves and dignifying the elections that have no positive impact on their lives, over a hundred million Americans regularly choose to distance themselves from the voting process and the political regime legitimized by it. They do so by selecting the option of not voting. The non-voters are right, and they are winning every election held in America.
Endnotes:
1 It should be noted that the Confederate States successfully seceded, and that each state had to reapply for admission to the United States. The States were occupied by federal troops in order to coerce them into complying with these conditions. If the use of coercion to obtain their “consent” was illegal and immoral (as it would be in obtaining a signature on an ordinary contract), then what does this say about the status of these states today?
2 See Albert O. Hirschman, Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations, and States, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1970.
3 See “Remarks on the Psychological Aspects of Totalitarianism,” in Bruno Bettelheim, Surviving and Other Essays, New York: Vintage Books, 1980, pp.317-332.
4 Carl Watner, editor of the anthology of non-voting, Dissenting Electorate, first suggested this concept to me.
5 See “Homage to Daniel Shays,” in Gore Vidal, Homage to Daniel Shays: Collected Essays 1952-1972, New York: Random House, 1972, pp.434-449.
6 See Herbert C. Kelman and V. Lee Hamilton, Crimes of Obedience: Toward a Social Psychology of Authority and Responsibility, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999, p.116.
7 Vladimir Bulovsky, To Build a Castle -- My Life as a Dissenter, New York: The Viking Press, 1977, p.240.
8 See Kenneth Boulding, “The Impact of the Draft on the Legitimacy of the National State,” in Sol Tax (ed.), The Draft, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967, pp.191-196. Also see Joseph A Tainter, The Collapse of Complex Societies, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997 (reprint edition).
9 Per Bak, How Nature Works: The Science of Self-Organized Criticality, New York: Springer-Verlag, 1996.
10 Sebastian Scheerer, “Towards Abolitionism,” in Contemporary Crises, Vol. 10, p.7; quoted in Thomas Mathiesen, Prison on Trial: A Critical Assessment, Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publications, 1990, p.156.
11 Jacques Ellul, translated by Konrad Kellen, The Political Illusion, New York: Alfred Knopf, 1967.
YouTube: WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH COPS! Police Push Disabled Woman To The Ground Then Walk Off! These are the people charged with maintaining public safety...
Will America’s Police Become Federales? by Wendy McElroy
Police unions across America are moving closer to being federalized. The Public Safety Employer-Employee Cooperation Act of 2009 was reintroduced in the Senate by Majority Leader Harry Reid on April 12, where it currently awaits debate. The act is part of a supplemental appropriations bill meant to fund military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. If passed, the act would place first responders (police, firemen, paramedics) under federal union regulations. Control would be removed from state and local authorities except in places with fewer than 5,000 people or with fewer than 25 full-time first responders.
In effect the act seeks to nullify important aspects of the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 which in turn reversed much of the pro-union Wagner Act of 1935. Taft-Hartley is currently the cornerstone of U.S. labor law and allows individual states to regulate their own public-sector worker relations.
Most of the attention paid to the act has focused on the disastrous budget consequences it would have for local authorities. Public-employee payments (wages, pensions, and health benefits) already consume a huge slice of the expenditures of cities and states; for many the burden is so heavy they are verging on bankruptcy. The San Francisco Chronicle (July 14) reported, “Oakland [Calif.] laid off 80 police officers Tuesday after negotiations between city officials and union leaders failed on one simple matter: job security. The police union demanded that the city guarantee that its officers would not be laid off for three years in exchange for giving up some pension benefits that would have eased the city’s budget problems. City leaders, however, said it would have been irresponsible of them to agree to protect police jobs for more than one year because the city’s budget problems are likely to worsen.”
The act would remove such flexibility from local authorities and instead impose the unfunded mandate of applying federal standards that would be determined by the Federal Labor Relations Authority. In disputes a labor relations czar would arbitrate the “hours, wages, and terms and conditions of employment.” Local governments would no longer be able to adjust pay scales and benefits according to their own budgets nor would local voters have any input.
Transparency and Accountability?
The act would also diminish police transparency and accountability because it would regulate disciplinary policies through which police and sheriff departments address alleged abuse and misconduct. The act would strengthen unions that have a long record of siding almost unconditionally with their members against such allegations. For example, in June a young black woman who had jaywalked was punched in the face by a Seattle policeman. The president of the local police union declared, “He [the Seattle officer] did nothing wrong. If anything, I think he maybe waited a little too long to engage in force.”
Equally, when local authorities attempt to correct police abuse, police unions are often the greatest barrier. The Syracuse Post Standard (July 6) reported, “Syracuse Mayor Stephanie Miner has taken courageous steps to rid the police department of misbehavior that sullies the image of every officer.” Nevertheless, she has come “under withering criticism from the police union for refusing to sign a commendation” for a detective whom a federal jury found guilty last year of using excessive force. On July 19 the Austin police union urged the city council not to accept a $750,000 settlement with the family of a man killed by an officer last year. In many cases, police unions also act to block public and media scrutiny of accused officers.
The act has already passed the House so its fate rests with the Senate. The D.C. watchdog periodical The Hill (July 19) reported, “Senate and House Democrats are headed for a clash this week over funding for U.S. troops….The Senate and House are squabbling over $22.8 billion House appropriators added to the supplemental bill…. Senate Democratic leaders doubt the House bill can pass their chamber with the extra spending ” Nevertheless, Harry Reid has made it clear he will push the legislation and is threatening to keep the Senate in session past in August 1 if necessary. Given how important the August recess is to upcoming election campaigns, a lot of legislation may well be rushed through.
The Public Safety Employer-Employee Cooperation Act moves in precisely the wrong direction. Local authorities should have more power to negotiate down the disastrous cost of public-employee unions; the police should become more accountable and transparent in cases of alleged abuse. Power should be decentralized not federalized.
RRND/FND 3rd quarter fundraiser
Update, 07/30/10: We’ve got ourselves a situation here, folks. Today is the second “zero dollar day” in a row, and the first time we’ve had two in a row during this fundraiser.
We’re stalled at $1,443.82 ($198 higher than the ChipIn meter shows due to contributions coming via other avenues), $639.18 short of our goal.
Do I [...]
