where's the DANGER at?

• warantless search and seizure of property and person
• incarceration of indefinite term without trial
• suspension of habeus corpus - the right to DEMAND the accused be presented, to ensure they are still alive, if for no other reason
• the use of force or other questionable means to coerce confessions
• denial of a public, jury trial in which to respond to accusations leveled by the state

Having failed in their first attempt at nation building by creating too weak a central government, the framers of the U.S. Constitution drafted a second attempt, devising a three-part solution that would accept as its fundamental design the tendency for any body of power to ultimately overreach its boundaries.

Despite the fact that what they came up with - the "Executive/Legislative/Judicial" troika that proved so optimally counterbalanced that it has served as the model for nations the world over, these abuses of power noted above so concerned some of them, that they inisted the first ten Constitutional ammendments, commonly referred to as the "Bill of Rights" be attached and considered part of the fundamental makeup of the newly born nation, or they would have no part.

Ironically, on this list are some of the very things our federal administration insists it must do: not to "terrorists", but to us - the American citizens they claim to be protecting - in order to protect us. So what - they have to burn down the village to make it safe?

How is it that:

• when America was a pissant little nation that had just played two superpowers against each other to pull off the greatest coup in European colonial history (ultimately, half the North American continent, some of the most fertile, mineral rich land ever) with good reasons to fear reprisals,
• when it had to have been confronting more stress and chaos than anything we face today, as a global superpower,
  
• when the most of nations that would be it peers were monarchies or dictatorships, built upon slavery and colonial expansion, and thus would not have looked twice were America to have become such a nation,
• when even the limited direct representation the Continental Congress had allowed was considered madness in many learned circles,

...that the fundamental rights of the citizen was nevertheless so central to the nation they were inventing, that to have denied it would have ended up in a civil war nearly a century before it finally happened? How is it that, when we look back at what was done to Japanese-Americans during World War II, that it must be admitted it was wrong, so wrong that reparations were paid -- and yet we are poised to do it again, only now with anyone that looks like an Arab?

What are we so scared of, folks? How much danger are you in, personally? Do you honestly fear that you will be blown up or killed by a terrorist -- or is it more likely that you might be killed by a drunk driver in your own neighborhood?

Why are so many of us willing to shred the bill of rights for protection against a threat that can't be named, identified, located or described -- because to do so would somehow aid the enemy and increase the likelihood of this supposed, unnamed, unknown, nondescript "threat"?

Why do you trust these madmen who have stolen our country from us, instead of your own senses? I mean, c'mon... ask yourselves just a few simple, common sense questions:

What is NORAD? The North American Aerospace Defense command. Their mission: to protect America from all airborne threats. What is the Pentagon? The seat of our nation's entire defense: supposedly the "most secure building in the world" The entire nation's capitol, in fact, is perhaps the most heavily defended airspace on earth - and with good reason.... So; why am I asked to believe that a single passenger airliner, hi-jacked by some guys with minimal training, hit this center of America's military -- and was not shot out of the sky???

What if that had been a missile? Or a nuke??? Is D.C. protected, or isn't it. FORGET 9/11, forget terrorism. Forget that you're scared mostly because the media and the government won't let up off telling you THAT you are.... answer the question. Why was ANYTHING, EVER allowed to hit the Pentagon??? Under any circumstances.

FUCK 9/11 -- that's headquarters for our entire nation's militiary, offices of the top commanders of all U.S. armed forces. They couldn't stop a plane from hitting it? But they can defend us from nukes? C'mon!?!?!?

How many of you out there know people who have been the victim of either drug abuse, drug related crimes, or the effects of drugs on a loved one? Anyone old enough to remember when cocaine was the drug of the rich? Remember how it suddenly became accessible as a street drug in the '80s... around the same time that the "war on drugs" kicked into full gear?

Ask yourself this simple question -- if it is indeed a "war" on drugs, then why haven't we simply taken out the problem at the source, and destroyed the damned coca fields? Is it a war, or is that just a bullshit metaphor to justify feeding bodies -- Amerian bodies, CITIZEN'S bodies -- to the prison-industrial complex?

If it's a war, then why isn't it being fought like one? We have the satellites; we know where all the coke is grown. We give a week's notice, we give longitude and latitude, and then it's "scorched earth" time. Anybody who's caught in the fields is a casualty of war -- and a warning to those at the next location to get the fuck out when we say we're gonna burn it....

So... what's the answer, folks? We can invade a nation that had nothing to do with the horror of September 11th, 2001 because we basically felt like it, making up excuse after excuse as we went along. But we can't eliminate a scourge on our society so supposedly destructive that it is the reason most of our citizens are even IN prisons: non-violent, drug-related offenses folks - look it up.

We talk war a lot, but it's only a metaphor. If you'll be honest about the "war on drugs" you'll have to admit that it's not a war against drugs, but a war against people, with drugs as the premise. We lock up more citizens, conduct more drug buying stings, put cops in schools and undercover in inner-city gangs, stiffen the penalties and limit the options available to offenders... everything accept attacking the problem at the source.

Because when America talks war, the noun preceding that verb is not the purpose, but the premise of that war. War on drugs uses drugs as its excuse, not its objective, else most of Central and South America would be parched and smoldering. It isn't that we don't have the means, or the method. It isn't even that we lack the resolve -- we have the finest military on the planet, and are quite good at doing war.

Think Iraq is about your safety? Then why is Bin Laden still alive... and why are we hearing about his audio taped threats, instead of being given a weblink to the site showing footage of the smart bomb that took him out??? Think it's because we can't?

America fights the wars it wants to. Consider that, the next time you think that war keeps you safe...

Illegals Sucking Up Food and Help Meant For Poor Citizens

Hey

I worked today. For those of you who don't know, I work in a crisis ministry in N.C. that helps people below the poverty limit with food and utility bills. Our main source of funding is our Thrift Store. We also get government funding, donations from private citizens and churches.

In the past 6 months I have seen a major increase in the amount of Mexican illegals coming to us for help, and as a result, the amount we can help "legal" poor people with has been drastically cut. This has become depressing as hell for me and the people we work with when we watch what is going on. And mind you, the only problem we have with Mexican illegals is just that - they are illegal and they pay no tax, get paid in cash, and do not respect ANY of the laws of the United States or North Carolina!

Race is unimportant to us. I use the term Mexicans because that is the nationality of illegals that we here in Western North Carolina are dealing with. Other areas probably deal with other Nationalities, but we deal 99.9% with MEXICAN illegals.

Today a group of 6 Mexican immigrants came in and 5 of them were new arrivals to the area. Two of the women bought shirts and had the nerve to complain that one cost $1.00 and the other $1.15, and THEN they bitched about the tax.

To top it off, we were giving away free produce, two of each kind of veggie to a person (4 varieties today). One of the women filled up two bags and ran out of the store, and the other was plopping her 10th Butternut Squash into the bag when I stopped her and told her only dos (2) of each, not 10! She got pissy and left the store without any produce.

Now, we deal with actual starving people in our store, old people who don't eat much and who have to chop wood for heat or else freeze. People who lost jobs in the textile mills and furniture factories here when they moved TO Mexico. Those people have families, too.

HALF of our food and utility assistance goes to illegal Mexicans. There are at least 6 other food distribution points in this county of 15,000 people (where the median income is $21,000).

Unemployment is high here but of course, the statistics only count the ones receiving unemployment and does NOT count illegals at all. Here is what the Mexicans do (and the folks at our fellow food pantry- that deals almost exclusively with Mexicans - agree):

NOTE: There are a few exceptions to what I cite below, but not very many.

1. They live in apartments with 10 other people. The men work, the women have babies that become US citizens - thus they qualify for food stamps and welfare.

2. The men work on the Xmas tree farms, etc. for cheap wages because they live 10 to an apartment - This overcrowding into housing is illegal, but obviously they don't care because just being here is illegal and they know that no one is gonna do anything to stop it.

3. The men work and send their wages to Mexico and they come to places like where I work to support them because they have no money left. They make the rounds of all the free food and utility assistance programs. Once they send enough money to Mexico, their extended family arrives and the cycle starts again. In effect, we are paying for more to come here.

4. They do not get driver's licenses (except in rare cases), drive junk cars that are hazardous and do not insure them. They don't know the rules of the road. This past summer such a person - a woman - slammed head-on into a car carrying four senior citizens and killed 2, injured the others, and guess what? She, the illegal, not only had no license, insurance, or proper registration (they find cars broken down on the side of the road and steal the license plates) BUT ALSO no one deported her, put her in jail, or anything else. She just disappeared, and the family of the dead people were forced to pay the funeral expenses, take the monatary losses and not only that, they lost two family members!

5. They STEAL. Shoplifting, the aformentioned theft of license plates, they even break into dumpsters to steal IDENTITIES so they can apply for - and get - credit cards! They break into OUR dumpster to steal clothing we have discarded - not to wear, but to sell at flea markets so they can suppliment their incomes and send more to Mexico. Part of my job now is to cut the clothing we discard so they can't do that. They have destroyed 3 dumpsters of ours, and they litter the parking lot with the trash they throw out of it. They break into cars and trucks in our tiny lot.

REMEMBER, we're talking a county with 15,000 citizens and an average income under $22,000! Our poverty level is skyrocketing.

Now, the place where I work is also supported by funding from FEMA's emergency food and shelter program and several local churches. Guess what? We are not allowed to ask these Mexicans if they have "green cards", YET we must ask other people for their social security cards.

Get the drift? This WASHINGTON D.C. administration WANTS this to go on. So do the churches. I forget how many hundred million Bush wants to put into a program to help illegal aliens FIND WORK and HOUSING (not the same as the Guest Worker program) but it is more than $200,000,000. Meanwhile he wants to keep the tax cuts for the wealthy and make them permanent while cutting Medicare, medicaid, and Social Security. Right now there are programs run by the government NOT OPEN to citizens that support immigrants and ILLEGAL immigrants. Funding for small business, housing grants, etc. YOU and I cannot get this money. Yet our taxes pay for it.

I secretly think Bush's plan is to get the Mexicans to force down wages so that ALL Americans will be forced to lower their living standards. Then the rich can get richer.

I THINK the plan is to eventually ANNEX MEXICO in a non-hostile overthrow. I think he wants Mexico to be part of the United States. And with the new eminent domain laws, maybe he will take YOUR house to put up public housing for illegals ("guest workers"). Far-fetched or not, the possiblilites exist.

So what is the answer to dealing with the illegal immigrant population? Who is the most at fault? The church or the government?

Don't hand me this "I don't blame them for coming here crap." They have a perfect right to apply for and get visas. There ARE Mexicans who DO come here legally. They pay the taxes, they buy car insurance, and they are valuable members of the American work force and population.

We've exported thousands of businesses to Mexico that employ hundreds of thousands of Mexican Nationals, and Bush wants to open our borders to allow Mexicans to come here to take many of the remaining jobs that he says "American Citizens don't want." Tell that to those out-of-work textile workers and furniture factory workers!

Right now the South is being overrun by illegals, and we need a solution FAST! In THIS small county, it has become a near-crisis! Some of these families have lived here for 6 generations and for the first time, there is no work.

Poverty is alive and growing South of the Mason-Dixon line, and much of the money alloted to helping out is going to the Illegal Alien. That SUCKS. I've become a hard-liner on this subject after 3 years of seeing the problem in action.

What about YOU? Comments, please.

Breaking the "I"s...

Okay... guess if falls upon me to kickstart this thang...

First, in the interest of "full disclosure" -- I'm the 'associate' that put the blogging bug up Suzi's... well, you get the point <>....

Yeah, yeah... I can hear y'all whining now:

"Blog? I hardly send email -- why do I have to blog??" Too much like a homework assignment, eh? Well lemme ask you this: how much is your freedom worth? The price of a six-pack? The time it takes to watch another bad TV show?

If you've been paying attention to the lunatics running the asylum in Tweedle-D.C., you'll realize that they not only don't give a damn about civil liberties, truth, freedom or honor, but actually hold these fundamental aspects of American freedom in contempt...

It has been said the you only have those rights you can enforce for yourself... this is no less true because of the technology and comfort modern society provides. In fact, as sovereign nations are violated in our name, the complacency of modern ameriKKKan's serves to guarantee that heinous acts like those of September 11th, 2001 will recur.

And then what? How many of you will be sheeple, cowed under by fear, herded like lambs to the slaughter? How many will be willing to stand up and fight for the freedom to live your lives unmolested, as long as you respect the rights of other sovereign human beings?

That's not a rhetorical question, folks: even now, the freaks who run the pResident are posturing towards Iran, ready to continue their mad crusade, destined to cast us hurtling toward WWIII. What, you say? That would be madness?

Your point? These folks know of the death and destruction that would bring... we've suffered nearly 2,500 fatalities in Iraq alone -- do they even blink? These chickenhawks have no problem sending generations of the "great unwashed" to their deaths... it gives them more land on which to build their estates...

Think I'm crazy? Well, perhaps... but I invite anyone out their to dispute my logic, or argue against my conclusions. Hell; I'll take an amen corner of "yay-sayers" -- anything, at this point, to indicate that it's more than a handful of throwbacks to the hippy era that still give a fuck.

We have a tremendous gift here, folks, in this l'il ol' blog of ours -- ad hoc democracy on demand. Free speech that they can't shut down unless they kick in our doors, and pull the switch on the entire Internet!!! So c'mon! it only takes a few minutes to throw down some thoughts on the screen and click "Publish Post"... this ain't a class -- this is your LIFE!!!

Live free or die, y'all: because life without freedom is death...

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If you're in the mood for some hardcore political rants, check out my blog at http://www.whatdafuck.org/

Welcome MBCBSers!

This is where our guest bloggers will be talking about all sorts of interesting things in the very near future. Please stay tuned.

Dictator For Life