Behind closed doors, Senators John McCain (R-AZ) and Carl Levin (D-MI) drafted a bill without a single hearing, and the dreadful S. 1867 National Defense Authorization Act should come before the Senate for a vote early this week. In the words of Senator Lindsay Graham (R-SC), the bill will "basically say in law for the first time that the homeland is part of the battlefield." Even your hometown. Understand the effect of making everywhere in the U.S., the mall, the beach, the grocery store, your back yard, part of the battlefield. This greatly expands the powers of the Commander-in-Chief.
This bill will, by declaring America the battlefield, give the President and every future president the power to order the military to grab and whisk away into detention any American citizen anywhere in the world - even here at home. Citizens can be detained without charge, without a warrant, solely on the word of the President. There is no right to an attorney and detention may be indefinite, even for life. No trial, no judge, no jury, no lawyer, no charges, no rights whatsoever, just because one man or woman says so.
Surely our Democratic President Barack Obama opposes this bill. He has been said to, but he has not been active or vocal in fighting against this militarization of civilian life. Nor does he oppose the expansion of the military into the ranks of the local police. The militarization of the police has been showcased in the last few weeks as peaceful, unarmed, nonviolent demonstrators have been beaten, clubbed, arrested, and sprayed with military grade pepper spray, in some cases being held down and being sprayed down their throats as at the University of California at Davis. This situation goes against centuries of law and custom, keeping the military and the police separate, but once the whole country is the battlefield this issue will be moot.
At the first assault on the Occupy movement in Oakland, Scott Olsen, a veteran of two tours in Iraq, was wounded and awarded a cracked skull for his service when a military style police raid destroyed the Occupy encampment. His speech and language centers on the left side of his brain are still damaged. In Seattle, an 84-year-old Dorli Rainey was pepper sprayed when paramilitary police in riot gear stormed the Occupy site. Ms. Rainey is up and still fighting. A young pregnant woman was not so fortunate. After being pepper sprayed and kicked in the stomach by Seattle's Storm Troopers, she miscarried. And Right Wingers blamed her, saying that because she was pregnant she should have stayed away from the protest. But that's the point, isn't it? You should be safe at a peaceful, nonviolent protest. You have the right to assemble, to petition your government for redress of grievances. It's in the Bill of Rights, part of our Constitution.
And I must mention the idiots on Fox News calling military grade pepper spray a "food product," playing the tape with the screams muted and the sound down so that Bill-O could say that the spray didn't seem to bother the protesters so much. On other networks, you could hear screaming, wailing, sobbing.
Tonight at one minute after midnight there will be showdown between evicted Occupiers in Los Angeles and the police. We do not know yet how this will transpire. Petitions are circulating imploring the mayor to call off the eviction.
We are living among thousands of fraudulent foreclosures by banks that received bailout money from the tax payers to pay their top managers 12-figure bonuses. The Republicans who would rather shoot their grandmothers than raise taxes on the rich by letting the Bush tax cuts expire do no mind letting the middle and working classes get hit by not renewing the cut in the payroll tax. That's because our politicians are corporate property. And the Supreme Court has paved the way to complete the corporate takeover of the government with its absurd Citizens United Decision that says that corporations are persons before the law with all the rights that accrue thereto. I agree with the sign seen at an Occupy protest: I will believe corporations are people when Texas executes one. Which reminds me of the spontaneous applause the debate audience gave Governor Rick Perry when it was pointed out that he has presided over more executions, almost 250, than any other governor. Where is Orwell when we need him?
Oakland's mayor has admitted discussing the raid on the Occupy movement there with the mayors of up to 18 other cities, joined by the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security. What are they doing in local matters involving nonviolent protests? Well, you know, there are no divisions anymore between police and military, local and federal, civil and criminal, corporation and government. We have reached fascism, our newly minted police state still polishing its boots before kicking another pregnant woman in the stomach. But we are there. The line has been crossed. Our emails, phone calls, communications are monitored and mined without warrants. FISA is a joke now. GPS tracking can be secretly placed on a citizen's vehicle without a warrant. For God's sake, 4000 of the 5500 Zuccotti Park Library books, BOOKS, at Occupy Wall Street were destroyed.
At the same time the Christian Dominionists pursue their agenda, which is to establish the kingdom of God here on earth before the Second Coming. They want dominion over all levels and branches of government and to place the Bible above the Constitution. Not only abortion but also contraception will be illegal. Michele Bachmann has been endorsed by their own Dr. George Grant who can be seen in this video stating that what they want is "World Conquest."
There's so much more that I may be adding and revising this blog entry for days and days.
This great and beautiful country is seriously ill. The Enlightened wisdom of the Founders is being twisted from secular into religious and Jesus is being turned into Rambo. The Bill of Rights is in shreds. The government has merged with corporatism, Mussolini's definition of fascism. Police state tactics rule over idealistic young protestors who have hit the money button too close for comfort. Down is up and wrong is right. If you just consume and mind your own business, you might never even know it. But trying to be part of the solution has become very dangerous.
No comments:
Post a Comment