Mission Accomplished

It is with great relish (and no mustard) that I am able to finally report and fully commit. The Heads will be joining the assault on Las Vegas poker tables and bars, to begin upon our arrival sometime during the evening of 12/7.

To be sure, it was a long fight against the HR Generalists, but one they could never hope to win in the end due to my inter-department shock and awe campaign, where vast swaths of cubicle farm were bathed in the holy fire of bombs filled with political capital. Our arrival in Vegas represents true victory for The People. BG is right, and does well in making the larger point, which is that we must fight HR departments everywhere, because they hate our freedoms.

I just hope I don’t get bogged down in a quagmire that sees me throwing hammers on video poker machines that will never submit.

Mission Accomplished. See you there.

Another scrap on the pile

Here is an article to give the scene below some context.

This is what now happens in America, land of the free, when you don't have ID, forget your ID, or simply decide that you shouldn't be compelled, at random, to produce your papers.

I first saw this clip on MSNBC before I left work this morning. The clip they showed had little/no sound and was only a couple of seconds long.

There is so much to say about this it is difficult to know where to begin, so I won't. I shouldn't need to go on at length--pictures are truly worth thousands of words. Here is the entire video, and indeed, witness freedom and our fucking Patriot Act at work.




6:40 PM--Much credit goes to Keith Olbermann for giving this issue the proper attention on Crossfire, a far cry from the regulat "news". It's nice to see the ratings trending away from the trash that is Bill-O toward something much closer to reality.

Testing our Limits

Originally attributed to Pastor Martin Niemoller because of the lack of action from German intellectuals during the Nazi rise to power:

When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.

When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.

When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.

When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.

(Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_they_came... )

There are many variations of this poem, but all have the same underlying theme. They all speak to the killing off of freedom by the state, by the government. They will tell you when it’s okay to play poker, they will tell you when it’s okay to travel, they will tell you how and why to fear—no need to decide for yourself.

Alas, I am going into familiar digression and will cut it short for now. The following is the “why” of today’s post.

The 2006 Military Commissions Act is now law. Let's try this baby out and see how it works.

Are you really going to accept that the concept of your individual liberty is nothing but a memory? It’s only immigrants, you say? Ignoring, for now, the general moral depravity of such a sentiment, I challenge anyone to read the actual text of the new law. American citizens, not just immigrants illegal or otherwise, can be declared enemy combatants, ask Jose Padilla.

Does it not prompt in you even the smallest sense of foreboding? If it does, please see the links below and start finding out why. If you have no sense of foreboding about this, see the links from posts below (ignore the ReviewMe) anyway, and stop taking so much from the state on faith.

See the truth, even if it is ugly and frightening, and begin to glimpse how being truly free can feel.

Kicked in the Junk, indeed.

Time and time again over the last couple of years I have gone on at great length and with great sarcasm about anything smacking of the sentiment Save the Children. It's no secret that I'm generally annoyed by children for all sorts of different reasons, some definitely more valid than others.

Today I realized something. I don't hate kids at all. The reason that I cannot stand the thought of having children is that I cannot stand the thought of something so essentially innocent not even having a chance.

Sit down, close the poker table, shut down the iPod, radio, TV, and listen to what is being ignored and has been woefully underreported.

John Yoo, one of the architects of U.S. legal policy on torture in a public forum debate with Doug Cassel, International Human Rights expert. Please make sure you are paying very close attention to the last 1/3 of the six minute clip.

Now look at your kids. What if anyone ever calls you a terrorist? It doesn’t matter whether or not it’s true, it just has to be “put out there”. Perception is the only reality now, substance doesn't even enter into the debate. It’s not like there needs to be a warrant, or charges, or evidence, or anything even close thanks to the (now signed into law) 2006 Military Commissions Act. Ask yourself, if Democrat leadership is so effective and decent as compared to the big bad neo-cons and Republicans that were just swept out, how come they have not uttered the word “repeal”?

Maybe there are bigger and better things to do, like shoving an Amnesty Plan through for people here illegally. Is this how problems are dealt with? Declare them non-existent? Is that something you get to do under a continually increasing tax/debt burden as you make less and your money becomes even more worthless? Do you teach your children to declare things non-existent? Also worth remembering *again* is that the Republicans rejected Amnesty—So now that those guys are out, has Bush really lost anything? Oh yeah, he’s losing the dead weight of Cheney and Rumsfeld. They’ve helped start the wars they needed to; he can take it to Iran without them.

Do you really think they’re trying to avoid war? You need do some real research. You better wake the fuck up. These are the people who can conceive of crushing your kid’s testicles if they decide you are terrorist enough. Don’t be afraid of the terrorists you can’t see, be afraid of the one’s that you can.

I hate the all of the Save the Children mantras out there just as much as I ever did. It’s because they are not saving anyone or anything. They are using your natural instincts and emotions to blind you, and they are perverting the entire concept of saving children, making many (including myself up to now) discount or hate it, when fundamentally it is good.

Start taking back the country and life that’s being stolen from you.

Join a real Save the Children campaign.

The State of My Union

“….of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people, commencing demagogues and ending tyrants.”
--Alexander Hamilton, No. 1 General Introduction, The Federalist Papers

The helicopters are buzzing around my house and neighborhood again this morning. It is now a more constant and common sound, one that I find I do not like and cannot get used to.

It sounds like the beginning of some paranoid Orwellian post-apocalyptic sci-fi inside look at possible paranoid schizophrenia while struggling against the tyranny that has always existed at various points throughout the course of human history --type of novel. (I'd like to buy some comma's please, Pat)

But it’s not from any novel or movie. It is an increasing and encroaching reality.

No, I do not think I’m being followed and yes, police and television helicoptors are nothing new. It is their constant droning for half an hour out of every two as they constantly gaze and sweep my area that weighs heavy on me, reminding me with increasing frequency that I could “legally” be surveilledghostedrenditioned, and for the most ambiguous and ill-founded of reasons. Reasons that have no accountability and that I am no longer allowed to be aware of. We The People, “officially” reduced to little more than bit players in an elitist ant-farm spectator sport.

I’m reasonably sure that anyone reading posts here within the last month has already picked up on the fact that my knowledge and acceptance of what is truth has been changing drastically, and I have been struggling in many ways to come to terms with it.

To look directly upon the approaching tyranny and force myself to see it for the insidious thing that it is, and to confront the innermost part of myself that doesn’t want to believe it has been extremely unpleasant. Devastating, if I may use the word, is the freezing water realization that if we seek to preserve our national soul then we as citizens cannot stand idly by while pretending the horrors committed in our name and in the name of our noblest concepts don’t exist or aren’t as awful as all that. The fix has truly been in for a while now. Devastating is the fact that the people of the world, who used to look at us in large part with admiration or envy, now pity our apathy, our laziness, and our general national stupidity. Most Of Our Children Are Going To Be Left Behind is our new unspoken and unacknowledged legislation. The fact that our broken government or complicit, spineless mainstream media does not show us the truth as it is, and the fact that we have collectively used this as an excuse to believe blatant lies in trade for our next quick shot of gratification rends me to my core every time I consider it.

**********
I did not accomplish anything heroic during my term of service in the U.S. Air Force. It’s a fact that always disappointed me just a bit when I thought about it, as I was always enamored to a certain extent by the likes of Audie Murphy, Sgt. York, and other military heroes. I came to accept the fact that, more than likely, I was never going to be thrust into any Medal of Honor situations save those brought to me by the programming sweatshop leaders at Electronic Arts, and that all-in-all this was a good thing, a blessing. In spite of essentially hating the monster bureaucracy that was government, there was great comfort in the fact that I was still a tangible part of something larger and nobler than myself. On my second deployment to Saudi Arabia, when Saddam decided to lob a few scuds in our direction, I could begin to relate (even if it was in the most miniscule way) to the ones who went before me, who suffered, died, and gave up what was most precious so that I could have it. Crouched in a bunker, in a ridiculously unweildy chemical warfare suit, enduring the miserable torture of a gas mask in 120 degree weather, waiting, you think on these things. Even though you know that scuds are notoriously inaccurate and will likely miss you by twenty miles, you wonder, and you think on these things. While extents and durations may differ in each case, I believe that you would have extreme difficulty finding many military members who haven’t done the same. For goddamn sure, every one of your children, our people, on the other side of the world have thought on these things.

I’m telling you so you will know where I come from.

***********

When I was in the sixth grade, Mrs. Campbell taught our Government/History class. There was a particular issue being discussed (I wish I could remember exactly what it was, but alas, I cannot), and many of us in the class began running away with said issue, shooting ideas around and beginning to explore possible solutions to an ongoing societal problem as only “almost teenagers” who are naively 11 years-old can. While everyone excitedly carried on, I stopped because I noticed that this was the point where my teacher would usually quiet everyone down and we would continue our ride on the education train down curriculum track. However this time she just sat there, with a wry smile on her face and her head shaking back and forth a bit. When things finally died down and she spoke it was in a smaller tone, and our class unintentionally became near-death quiet in our efforts to listen. (Perhaps if she had been a more reflective personality type, she would have realized that in her softer tone there was power to shut us up where other efforts had failed, but that is neither here nor there I suppose) She said, “The thing you guys are so excited about is called idealism. It’s great when you’re 11 or 12, but you’ll realize when you get older that none of these things will ever happen. None of these ideas will ever really work.” That is a direct quote that I will not forget it as long as I live. It ran contrary to everything I had been taught up to that point. I knew about Dr. King, I knew about Ghandi, I knew about our founders, all forward thinkers who gave much and achieved more in pursuit of man’s unalienable right to Life, Liberty, and The Pursuit of Happiness. The concepts we stand on are a noble product of honest and critical thought. During 17 years in the confines of (or protected by, depending on your viewpoint) my super-Baptist household, I doubted much and questioned even more throughout my formal and informal education. Basic truths that are common through all major religions were increasingly ignored in favor of the competing dogmas of the moment. But I never doubted the fundamental ideas or documents of our country on which we based all. I knew.

I’m telling you so you will know where I come from.

**********

Turn off your Consumer Training Device, if only for a little while. Read what our founders wrote. There is a great deal of wisdom and truth there, history validates it and makes every effort to remind us if we will only take the time to look. The telescreen talks very little about things which will truly benefit a person, taking us from shallow human interest spectacle to empty and staged political debacle and back again, all in a wonderfully convenient 5-7 minute formatted package before it’s time for the Product Hymns once again. .

Oh no! The issue is Black and White! Look we’ve added Mexicans! All new! It is not.

Oh no! The issue is Christian and Muslim! Wait, Christians and Extremists! It is not.

Oh no! The issue is Red and Blue, Asses and Pachyderms! It is not.

Oh no! The issue is Gay usurping Straight! Child Predators! Oops, that's us, never mind!

Jedipublican's wave their hands.....(these are not the Congressmen you're looking for...)

The issue is Liberty vs. Tyranny. Television only speaks of these things after they have been twisted; to prompt in us the hideous DoubleThink perversion that is now reality. The latter does not spread the former. Stay the course. We’re not staying the course, we’ve never been stay the course. We’re not leaving for a while. We only need 100 billion and one year to defeat all evil, I mean find WMDs, I mean spread democracy. Don’t they know we’re “liberating” them?. Hey, buddy can I get another couple of trillion? How dare you say it is over oil! If you don’t give us the money to stay, your gas prices could go up! By the way, it’s doubtful you’re going to get this back.

Thinking quietly and privately on these things, there is no doubt that fear reaches out to squeeze the heart and keep us fixated. We must face that fear if our soul as a nation is to expand and heal. Only when we summon the courage to look into that expanse will we pay attention to where we come from, where we would like to be, and how we will get there. American people must be able to honestly admit that we will never find that destination wielding, or capitulating to, a tyrannical gun. Papers, please.

Take the time to look. Take the time to consider

Free.Your. Mind.