Friday, June 7, 2013

A sober reminder



I am grateful to the American heroes who stormed ashore at Normandy and made NSA monitoring of this tweet possible. 

 —Iowa Hawk



99 comments:

Joe said...

That is heavy on so many levels!

(BTW: I am a great fan of Iowa Hawk.)

Unknown said...

The government is giving the American people what it wanted; temporary safety from a non-existent threat. So now we are the enemy of this totalitarian government. So America, do you want French Fries with that Police State?

Constitutional Insurgent said...

Robert Sinclair ^+1

We continue to see ever more invasive technological intrusion into our lives...and we keep getting told by successive Administrations, that this is benign.

We keep getting ridiculed for employing a "slippery slope" argument.....while the intrusions get more invasive at each juncture.

Welcome to the security state...it's not just in the movies anymore.

Z said...

Mustang, this is an excellent post. .thank you.
I admire those who do historical posts on D Day and all, very much, but I think it is important to consider what our great Americans died for; and it surely isn't THIS.

I'm going to have to check out Iowa Hawk.

Robert..except there is a threat. Not from US, as touted by the WH, but...

Joe, isn't it? Perfect.

Anonymous said...

I've never been that scared of gov my whole life. Drones, NSA, recording of every phone calls, Facebook post, etc...

The gov is now against its citizens. That's what it means.

We must fight hard to keep our guns. This is even more important now.

Ducky's here said...

"They can be granted intellectual liberty because they have no intellect"

--- George Orwell

Z said...

FrogBurger, it is getting scary. Scary enough that leftwing night time talk shows and even the NY Times are finally getting it. When the NY allows a writer to say Obama's "lost all credibility"...
Well, it's not exactly an enthusiastic endorsement of a Republican, but it's BIG.

Ducky...I strongly believe that's what this administration feels; and that includes you, too. Congratulations for your vote.

Anonymous said...

Z, it sounds maybe borderline conspiracy theory but I think our presidents are just puppets for other people. It makes no sense to me that Obama and the likes were against the Patriot Act in the first place, yet employ the same tools and scale them even more once they have power.

I think we're losing our democracy and republic to some kind of elite that finances our parties. They make us believe they're different but they really are not that different. The difference is only when they talk and manipulate us.

Z said...

FrogBurger, I think you could be right and I've voiced that opinion several times, as you know. (Bilderburg, Soros, Trilateral Commission, etc)

BUT, I also think that a president is savvy to information others don't have and, when faced with the reality of threats they get every morning in briefings, suddenly, maybe, the Patriot Act has some merit they hadn't considered.?

Anonymous said...

You may be right but then they should shut the hell up in the first place. IF you can make that conclusion, so can they. Yet they put us against each other constantly and divide us as Americans, when most of us can really work things together.

They divide to conquer. To maintain their power and benefit financially (and sexually for some) from this power.

It's disgusting.

Anonymous said...

Think about all your personal information gathered by the NSA. Your posts on this blog, the comments. Add to it your phone calls, the books you buy on Amazon or borrow at the library. An entire profile based on you that tells to the government how you stand.

Now you have nationalized healthcare. For some reason, a bit like the IRS, they can get to that information. You need a very important surgery and it needs to be approved. But they don't like what they see in your profile. You're not a valuable citizen anymore.

And we're afraid of terrorists? This scares me more.

Always On Watch said...

Orwell's book 1984 was published 64 years ago yesterday, the day that the phone data collecting broke.

Quite a coincidence, huh?

Louis H. said...

I watched the news today and the Senator Sensenbrenner from Wisconsin was bragging about authoring the patriot act. I wondered why he would brag about something like that. He thinks that 300 million people are in danger from Moslem extremists, but I think the government is more dangerous.

Pris said...

Even Al Gore has spoken out against the insidious spying upon American citizens. What a surprise that is!

Z, how long have we spoken out about the goals of the far left, and now it's coming out piece by piece. I call it the death of a thousand cuts.

However, it has been a matter of time before it rose to the surface. It is more obvious now, even to liberals, journalists, and hopefully more and more citizens.

FB is exactly correct. Divide and conquer is the plan. Perhaps now, many of us can come together and agree about what our govt. is up to.

Waylon said...

I agree that is one hell of a quote that reveals much when looked at from that point in history in WW II until the present. With the present resembling more and more the tyranny that was thought to be embodied completely with National Socialism and Socialism in the European Theatre, now evidently showing its ugly tyrannical face in America, the one and only country founded on the principles of individual rights and constitutionally limited government.

One wouldn't even be considered off-the-wall to ask if this was part of a longer term scheme since America entered both WW I and WW II belatedly, and against the wishes of the people, until certain extraneous "incidents" occurred to swing the thinking of the public to support the disingenuous war mongers wanting America in the war i.e. Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Delano Roosevelt).

Dave Miller said...

President Obama said this AM that the policies in place have been approved of and vetted by successive congresses dating back to the past Admin.

He stated that both parties have known about, and approved of the data collection we are now seeing.

The simple fact that both parties, and presidents, both Democrat and Republican have stood in support of the Patriot Act and legal interpretations that allow this spying does not mean it is not wrong.

Obama is as wrong on this as Sensenbrenner was when he wrote it and as wrong as our elected officials were who approved it.

A pox on all their houses...

Waylon said...

Scary enough that leftwing night time talk shows and even the NY Times are finally getting it. When the NY allows a writer to say Obama's "lost all credibility"...

----

Z, I'm thinking that something smell rotten in the state of America when the likes of the New York Times and left wing mouthpieces are crying "foul ball". After all they've pushed the agenda to being the country and the world to the state it's in today for the better part of the last century, and maybe even longer.

Pris, I'd put Al Gore in the same boat as the NYT, a rotten fish head, pointing to something scandalous that he's benefited from his whole life and now pretending to be scandalized ... it just ain't adding up.

Pris said...

Louis, the Patriot Act was devised to fight the war on terror. Originally it was used to track foreign calls and contacts between terror suspects abroad and those who may have been here.

The problem with it is, it depends on who our leaders are, and the lengths to which it can be used and abused!

Mustang said...

Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. —Benjamin Franklin.

Dave Miller said...

No Pris... on the Patriot Act, you are wrong...

It was an overreach to begin with and both the Bush Admin and the Obama Admin have used it to spy on average Americans without warrants.

If the problem is with just the leaders, can you cite what characteristics a leader who will not use and abuse that Act would have, given what we have learned over the last 12 years?

Dave Miller said...

Z... I hope your dinner was a smashing success last night!

Always On Watch said...

Possibly of interest in this discussion:

Jim Sensenbrenner: NSA violated law.

Pris said...

Waylon,
I know, and believe me Gore's no favorite of mine!!! However, what does he have to gain from making this statement?

Always On Watch said...

Also, Michelle Malkin has posted "History lesson: The crucial differences between Bush and Obama’s NSA phone surveillance programs."

Always On Watch said...

In her essay, Malkin wrote the following:

...Here is another key difference between the Bush and Obama administration programs.

Bush was fully engaged and committed to the war on terror when the NSA programs were first exposed in 2005, four short years after the bloody 9/11 attacks.

Obama, by contrast, immediately rejected the war on terror for “workplace violence”/”overseas contingency operations” euphemisms and officially declared last week that America’s war on terror is over.

Which makes you wonder:

What exactly prompted the Obama FBI to seek the sweeping FISA order on April 25? And why does it extend through July 19?

If it was related to the April 15 Boston terror bombing, how could Obama then stand up at National Defense University on May 23 and so publicly throw in the towel on combating Islamic jihad?

And if the catalyst for the FISA court order wasn’t the Boston bombing, then why so sweeping and so secretive? If not for the Guardian-published leak, which I must note I find as troubling now as I did during the Bush years, the document would not have been declassified until April 12, 2038.

Another fundamental difference between then and now: While Bush-bashers raised the specter of political spying abuses when the post-9/11 NSA program was exposed, there was never a shred of evidence that such abuses ever took place....


Truth -- or not?

Anonymous said...

Pris, the Patriot Act was written very broadly I remember. I was personally against some of it when Bush did it. We knew the possible consequences of what got passed during an emotional time.

I don't think it's to be put on OBama obviously.

What it shows with the IRS story is a pattern of gov being out of control and overall against the citizenry.

They don't work for us anymore, they seem to assume that their job is to control us.

Always On Watch said...

FrogBurger,
They don't work for us anymore, they seem to assume that their job is to control us.

EXACTLY!!!

Waylon said...

what does he have to gain from making this statement?

----

Pris, just a guess but I believe disinformation and misdirection are part of the game plan. And coming from Al Gore only makes it more questionable, IMO.

Z said...

FrogBurger, it is a frightening scenario. Started gradually by Bush and rushed into a FAR WORSE scenario by a president who believes only in BIG GOVERNMENT.. apparently, big BROTHER government.

Waylon, in the day, would you have hoped we'd stay out of WWII?
And what about today, in hindsight, you think we should have stayed out?
And, by "smells rotten", do you mean those hosts are in cahoots, or???


EVERYONE: I think there were some good reasons for some of the Patriot Act...always have thought that.

I wonder if there will ever be a situation Obama won't have to remind people that "Bush did it, too" before he just takes responsibility. Like how about "It was wrong then, and ......."

Dave, THANKS , it was just wonderful! I am considering posting a couple of pictures but they never quite capture the depth of the scene, you know? Thanks.

And can you respond to Always's quote from Malkin? I'd like to know your thoughts on it. Thanks again,

Unknown said...

Z … I would like to hear your opinion about “some good reasons” of the Patriot Act. Was any of it worth giving up our rights for?

Mustang said...

Romney just said that the safety of the country comes before the rights of the people.

Pris said...

Dave,
Mr. Pris's job for forty years, was as an Intelligence Analyst. I stick behind my comment about leaders!

I trusted Bush, and he announced what the method of those calls were and why they were necessary. Foreign calls to the United States. Now, since journalists went after Bush constantly, do you think if the crap that's going on now, was being done then, they wouldn't have found out about it?

To suggest that Obama is like Bush, in this regard, is wishful thinking on your part! There is no comparison.

I think we all have to be reminded that 3000 people were killed on 9-11. It wasn't a small operation, it was war!

Obama on the other hand has implied since Bin Laden was killed, and drones are used, Al Qaida is not the threat it was.

Really? Then why are our phone records being data mined by the millions, and why is the IRS going after the Tea Party?

Anonymous said...

Romney just said that the safety of the country comes before the rights of the people.

Not surprising. They're all more or less statist. I'm so done with those people.

Ducky's here said...

I remember the days during the Chucklenuts administration when the NYT printed that Verizon et. al. had surrendered millions of phone records and the reaction here was indignation that the liberal media was helping the terrorists.

But with a new guy in the WH attitudes change.

Mustang said...

There is NO America without our inalienable rights.

Anonymous said...

I remember the days during the Chucklenuts administration when the NYT printed that Verizon et. al. had surrendered millions of phone records and the reaction here was indignation that the liberal media was helping the terrorists.

Don't put everybody in the same bag. My logic then was the same as today's.

This is not a political party issue. Dennis Prager is not shocked by it for example and I totally disagree with him. But that's why I'm more of a libertarian than a conservative.

Constitutional Insurgent said...

"Dennis Prager is not shocked by it...."

I heard Pragers show yesterday, and where he stated that. This isn't a political issues, it's a civil liberties issue, which absolutely 'should' transcend parties.

Z said...

FrogBurger, I'm leaning a little toward Prager's arguments; felt that way before I heard how he felt, too.

I do believe that there's a very fine line between our safety and our rights. If rights come before safety, we have no rights because we have nothing, including ourselves and our belongings.

I know that will make some angry and I'm okay with that; it's how I've always felt and why I thought some surveillance wasn't wrong.

The phone records situation sounds like some of you think Obama or his henchmen are listening to every conversation you're having. It's very different than that if you look into it.

Do I like it? NO. Could watching patterns of people calling questionable places create a pattern which, when observed, could keep us safe? Obviously.

GO ahead; fire away.


Ducky, one more smug chucklenuts comment and you're deleted by me or the others who have the keys to geeeeZ. I'm sick of it and it's stupid anyway.

And it's not our fault this president is so severely untrusted by half of this country; that number mounting by the minute, by the way.

Z said...

CI, that's right, it shouldn't be political. Our safety should not be political.

How do you feel about his opinion on this?

Anonymous said...

If rights come before safety, we have no rights because we have nothing, including ourselves and our belongings.

That means your rights are not inalienable according to that logic.

We have a right to life, not to safety.

Anonymous said...

Z, we may as well write off the Constitution then. And ask gov when it's safe to have our rights. To which it'll respond: never.

Mustang said...

OBAMA: Denying your civil liberties helps us to defeat terrorist threats which no longer exist.

Z said...

Actually, one of the very few things the Constitution says gov't should do is protect...

Mustang, that's so convoluted yet is so true it's scary.

Mustang said...

OBAMA: We are denying your civil liberties in order to protect your civil liberties.

Anonymous said...

Actually, one of the very few things the Constitution says gov't should do is protect...

That says what the gov does. But it does not say it supersedes your individual rights.

And with this statement, I can build a democratic socialist state that will protect me from starving and being unemployed.

Waylon said...

Waylon, in the day, would you have hoped we'd stay out of WWII?
And what about today, in hindsight, you think we should have stayed out?
And, by "smells rotten", do you mean those hosts are in cahoots, or???

---

Z, since I wasn't around in the day I don't know if I'd have hoped that. But the majority of Americans didn't want to get involved in either WW I or WWII until the Lusitania was sunk and the mood changed, again in WW II the majority of Americans didn't want to get involved until Pearl Harbour.

I wonder why the main thrust of American involvement was in Europe when it was Japan that attacked Pearl Harbour. General MacArthur was operating on a shoe string trying to hold things together in the war in the Pacific.

The involvement of America into WW I definitely turned the tide and saved France and Britain. Also WW II would have turned out differently without American involvement. We know that in hind sight.

I mean that the media specifically the New York Times has taken the side of sympathy with tyranny—the progressives, socialists, national socialists and communists. The statists that advocate for more government involvement in every sphere of individual choice and life.

Al Gore is just one individual beneficiary of the corruptness that has eaten the country alive from the inside out.

Unknown said...

Rand Paul said on Thursday, "I’m not opposed to them going to a judge and getting an order for an individual who you have probable cause to believe that they’ve been involved with a crime. It’s not that I don’t want to go after terrorists – or rapists or murderers or any kind of terrible criminal. It’s that I want to go after them, not the rest of the law-abiding citizens that are out there."

Apparently, we have a government that doesn’t understand something as pig simple as this.

Z said...

FrogBurger..my point is "then who does watch for terrorists? you and I? Who does keep our airports safe (or tries..who knows how effective we've been, and who knows if the stories of having thwarted many terror attacks is true?) Do WE take turns listening to phone calls to prevent another Boston bombing? etc etc?
Bush and Rice were scoffed by the idiotic left who thought "They should have known about airports" ...sure, they should have known and they had knowledge terror could happen on a plane; what, short of shutting down all airports, could they have done? (the left doesn't think things thru when they're in an anti-Conservative feeding frenzy)

EVERYBODY:

Have we become to be a country to populated for democracy?...By that, I mean do we have too many opinions and not enough willingness to be on OUR SIDE anymore? And can we even trust OUR SIDE? Are we too big to depend on ourselves for our safety?

just throwing out questions for conversation and I hope people chime in..please!?.......


IN the meantime, I'm at my office desk watching some of our teachers leave to attend graduation today and I decided not to go because of my foot (and that awful Obama's here in LA again and the traffic will be nightmarish..the creepy thing is the streets involved are all around my house as if I'm having him there!>..!)
I'd cry too hard at the graduation, anyway; I literally LOVE many of those kids.

Z said...

Jack, I heard that, too, and thought "Why can't everybody understand this?"

And yes, that DOES help better understand and swallow that 'thin line between safety and snooping on Americans'..

I am not sure it's quite that simple, but he usually makes sense and he did in that comment. Thanks for that reminder

Unknown said...

Z … the question is moot. We don’t live in a democracy. We live in a Republic. Even so, we are citizens of states, which are sovereign. We should wonder, living under a federalist system as ours, what right does the FEDERAL government have to spy on the citizens of SOVEREIGN STATES? We have too much government, folks.

Louis H. said...

If Obama is protecting us from terrorists, who is protecting us from this government?

Waylon said...

Have we become to be a country to populated for democracy?...By that, I mean do we have too many opinions and not enough willingness to be on OUR SIDE anymore? And can we even trust OUR SIDE? Are we too big to depend on ourselves for our safety?

----

Z, I don't subscribe to the theory that because of a larger or growing population that individual rights and limited government get tossed out in favor of a more management oriented state. I think it's observable that the bigger the state apparatus becomes the less individual choice that remains, the more the beast of government expansion is fed, the bigger it grows and the more power it craves and demands. I don't think your country became the most successful country ever created by following and embracing the ideas of tyranny, but by explicitly rejecting those ideas.

That is what you could call the big rotting fish in the room, I guess. I don't know how people can move from freedom to embracing slavish dependence on the state, but that is obviously what's happened, IMO.

I think the Founding Fathers explicitly understood the evils of "democracy" and clearly spoke of a "republic, if you can keep it." What makes a country strong is the foundation that puts in the hands of the individual to make the most of life in the country, without the state looking through your garbage, snooping around and peeping into the windows and lives of the citizens.

My question would be: How did we get to this point? Why do some people reflexively apologize and offer excuses for the over reaching power grab of the state?

And I do think the original statement in your post on this blog should arouse querulous wonder. By getting involved in the largest conflagrations of the last century, defending the ideals of the country's founding, as they were told, how did we arrive at the point where the country has almost descended to the point of statism that would have been characteristic of the enemy of the day—the state uber alles?

Anonymous said...

Z, the role of the gov is to provide safety. When it does that it works for us.

But that doesn't mean it can build big data on every single citizen.

They may as well knock on every door, look inside your house without a warrant. There's no difference to me.

My right, as someone who doesn't break the law, supersedes the rights of the government.

If you don't agree with that, then the whole premise of inalienable rights fails. And so we can justify tyranny.

Anonymous said...

You need to listen to Mark Levin's show from yesterday. Just listening right now and like I said, he says there's no reason to build big data on citizens.

Mustang said...

Washington doesn’t need more Republicans; it needs less Washington. —Iowa Hawk

Anonymous said...

According to Mark Levin, DHS can copy your computer hard drive based on a 'hunch.' I feel really safe.

I'm sure they could copy and put data at the same time and frame you. How do you prove you did nothing wrong?

You want safety? you'll get safety via technology.

A scary state.

Pris said...

Well FB,
If we consider the military draft years ago, wasn't that against our inalienable rights? Or how about rationing of certain foods or materials needed for WWII, being a govt. command?

Yet I'm sure Europe was grateful we joined in the war to beat Hitler who would have assuredly taken over France and England, not to mention the millions of Jews who were murdered by the Nazis.

So, Z is right. It is a fine line between our inalienable rights and security. We did the right thing then, and if not for Japan bombing Pearl Harbor, who knows how things may have turned out. Finally FDR had no choice but to join the war on both fronts.

In those days Americans were isolationists until Pearl Harbor was attacked, and FDR was dragged into the war because at that point he had no choice.

However today, it's a whole different ball game. We have socialized medicine coming to the fore, a nationalizing of education instead of local schools, making enemies of citizens who are Tea Party members and Christians, intolerance of differing opinions, pitting group against group, political correctness gone amok, multiculturalism instead of a melting pot, and on and on.

There is no comparison between yesteryear, and today.

Constitutional Insurgent said...

Z - "How do you feel about his opinion on this?"

I think that he and others sufficiently fear a terrorist threat, that they are willing to further enable the State to engage in this sort of activity, fully knowing however, that once gained.....is never scaled back.

If citizens truly knew what intrusive apparatus was able to be used.....many would have a far more pessimistic assessment. I see it used only against foreign threats, due to the nature of my job and the agency that employs me....but it's no stretch to envision the full weight of our capabilities to be brought to bear against our own.

It's arguable to question whether or not the terrorist threat is oversold/overblown...but the ability to play that card is dangerously easy, and politically tempting...by any/either party.

I'm at a loss as to where the State derives some enumerated right to arbitrarily seize a medium, that is the property of a consumer and a company If this sort of activity is indeed benign and utterly relevant to our safety, why then don't we merely abrogate any facade of privacy?

Instead of incrementalizing the security-state...we might as well cut to the chase.

Z said...

Robert, Sometimes I think some of you think the individual states are too much government, too.

I wish I could imagine rugged individualists thriving in this country today but I don't. Not many, that's for sure. And if you are, you're considered a kook.

Pris...I agree with you. Thanks for that comment.


CI..I agree, but how CAN we 'scale back' when Al Qaeda is supposedly growing, along with other splinter groups, members are coming in through our borders, threats are reported every day and sometimes they win, like in Boston?
How do you 'scale down' when the threat's bigger than ever to our own homeland?


Constitutional Insurgent said...

Z - Because there's no silver bullet. Carrying out a terrorist attack in this nation is ridiculously easy. So much so, that there are several scenarios that I'm surprised haven't been carried out [yet].

No threat to the homeland is bigger than the eventual end state of government intrusion.

Constitutional Insurgent said...

Z - I should amend my last. Terrorist groups must be eliminated where they take sprout. We failed spectacularly in 2001/02...and are left with the consequence of our decisions.

Anonymous said...

If we consider the military draft years ago, wasn't that against our inalienable rights? Or how about rationing of certain foods or materials needed for WWII, being a govt. command

Yes it was. Very much like putting Japanese and Germans in camps was. But then you're assuming it was necessary to win the war and play a guilt trip on me. I don't think it makes your point stronger.

Kid said...

Pris. Poetry.

Anonymous said...

You guys can't really say it's ok for gov to gather data for your physical safety on you then rant about Obamacare doing the same. It's totally illogical.

Z said...

EVERYBODY:

This past couple of years, I've been around high school students a LOT.

Black, White, Asian, Hispanic...almost evenly divided.

Some of ALL of those groups are hard working kids who just "shoulder to the grindstone"...studying their brains out, sitting at lunch studying, getting taken to lunch by our teachers and having amazing talks on philosophy, or their class work, or life in general, and I know some of these kids pretty well.
These kids do Socratic seminars, understand things we never knew when we were their age.

Other kids of all those groups just want to learn enough to get a good grade in the class. Very little effort put forth, the only one-on-ones they want with the teachers are when they're complaining about their grades...begging for leniency.

Some of our Hispanic kids are STARS in the class.....one is giving a graduation speech this afternoon. I sincerely love that boy...and he gave me THE biggest hug last night,,,,
this child who stays to himself and shows no emotion; this boy whose uncle and aunt were murdered in their home in front of their 3 small children a year ago by a gang member. The uncle was NOT a member of a gang. Imagine the grief? But he's THRIVED in school. He's worked HARD. He will always do well.

Some of our Black kids are stars; mostly the girls, by the way. Also, it's only the girls who hint of racism the minute they feel not enough was done for Black History month, for example. ONLY the girls. interesting.
Our Head of School addressed that at Chapel one day, VERY expertly, disarming everyone in the room first with the fact that his Minor at UCLA was BLACK HISTORY.....25 years ago. Boy, did some of the steam go out of THEIR grievances! (there IS no racism there).

Anyway...I say this in regard to the RUGGED INDIVIDUALIST subject I opened above. SOme people have it; they work hard, they only want what THEY DESERVE, and others want what they don't deserve and expect it.

make sense? It's kind of a microcosm of America...the world, I guess.

Anonymous said...

I'm glad Mark Levin is with me. The rest of "Conservative" talkshow hosts are mostly pragmatists and socially conservative. But they are not for small government. They are lying what they say so.

Z said...

CI..good comments: What do you think should have been done in 2001/2?
I'm very eager to hear.


FrogBurger, nobody thinks it's totally okay! None of us likes the gov't getting into our business.

You tell ME how you expect to live in a country this big and this threatened for its (supposed) faith
and have no gov't helping out in that endeavor. I'd like to hear...really.

Anonymous said...

I've got a chopper 300 yards above my house hanging b/c of Obama being in town. Freaking pain in my ear.

Or the NSA was informed of my comments and the police is coming :)

Anonymous said...

FrogBurger, nobody thinks it's totally okay! None of us likes the gov't getting into our business.

It's ok. You all make me want to join the Libertarian Party again.

Constitutional Insurgent said...

Z - In a nutshell, we should [and could] have pursued and annihilated al Qaeda core. We relegated the group to a second tier priority when we embarked on nation building....then invaded Iraq...and embarked on nation building again.

Constitutional Insurgent said...

FB - Come on in! There's room for you.

Anonymous said...

I used to donate CI. I think I'll do it again.

Unknown said...

Pris, you have a completely uninformed understanding of American history. Roosevelt made several campaign promises to avoid involvement in Europe. He realized that the only way he could become involved in the war was to somehow get the Japanese to attack us. He believed they would do that, in the Philippines. He did not think it would be Hawaii. Was he so uninformed that he could not recall what Japan did in China, 1894, to Russia in 1904, during the Siberian intervention, Manchuria in 1928-1931, or Shanghai 1932 and 1937? Was he, as a sitting president, completely inept? No, he was not inept. He did everything he could to get America into the war and by golly, he did it when Japan finally attacked us in 1941.

IMO, Roosevelt was one of our worst presidents, on a number of fronts. What did he do to our citizens of Japanese decent? It was completely unjustified and an abdominal violation of citizen’s rights. In 1943, he provided fissionable uranium to the Soviet Union, funneled secretly to Russia out of a northern Montana Air Base. Why would an American president deliver these top-secret materials to the Soviet Union? It led us to the Cold War, during which so many Americans died. Is this the president Roosevelt you’re so proud of? So I disagree: there are comparisons to be made. If we fail to connect these dots, then we deserve whatever happens to us by administrations that abuse their power.

Kid said...

FrogBurger. Yep, accepting of having ones liberties trampled on is Entirely Unacceptable. For Any Reason. People die all the time, and since no one lives forever under any circumstance, the tragedy here is trashing the American way of life over the prospect that some number of people get killed.

For perspective from my POV
- No nation has ever been wiped out by violence in semi-modern to modern history. England thumbed their nose at Germany. Germany is still here. Japan, the Jewish people..
Violence is never a total solution for an aggressor. The real threat is to turn the people both weak AND against themselves.

That is what is happening here. DHS/TSA should be rejected with extreme prejudice. Ditto multi-culturalism. I hear saying anything bad about muslims is now to be considered hate speech and against the law. We should, every one of us drive with a F the muslims bumper sticker until the jails overflow and the cops can't possibly stem the tide.

Like England cheerily told hitler to FO, we should tell this nanny state to go set up shop somewhere else.

They know they're going to push us beyond the limits with all this crap. It is why they bough and deployed 3000 Mine Resistant vehicles. It is why they purchased 1.6 billion rounds of ammo, much of it hollow point depending on who you believe, but they're buying the regular stuff too since it's so hard to get.

We will all be fighting the fight against America that the African Americans fought. That MLK realized could only be won on peaceful grounds.

The only way violent revolution would have a chance is if it was led by military command and a coup.

Otherwise if it gets hairy, we may as well be throwing spear at airplanes. WE'RE not even as armed as Iraq was and look how much of a cakewalk that was for the military.

Peacefully Overwhelm is what keeps coming up in my thoughts.

Kid said...

Robert Sinclair, I basically agree with you. Didn't see that as one of Pris's real points in her message...

But, Why do you think FDR wanted us int he war? In my mind it is one or both of two concepts.
1) not able to escape the depression using stupid libtard strategies (overtax, tariffs on imports mainly) he figured the war would both cull the population, reducing the unemployed, and kick starting manufacturing. And putting women to work(commie subversion)
2) to serve stalin. He agreed to a final attack over the beaches in denial to Churchill's plan to attack through the soft underbelly of Eastern Europe (now the 'Stans) that stalin wanted for himself that would have been very hard to accomplish if the place was littered with Americans and Allies exercising martial law all over the place.

FDR was a pure communist for sure and threw many lives away on D-Day.
Plus he was a dumbass regards economics, or was working to destroy America economically as part of the communist plan. That part goes back further than FDR in fact.

Unknown said...

@ Kid …

I wasn’t attacking Pris, just disagreeing with her statement, “… FDR was dragged into the war because at that point, he had no choice.” My point was that FDR did everything he could possibly do to get us involved in that war, even in violating US law with respect to provisioning Russia and England.

Let me also add that it was nothing shy of American greed that set the Great Depression into motion … and it evolved into a worldwide phenomenon. As you pointed out, nothing FDR did to ease the Great Depression actually worked. Nothing—until he place the United States on a wartime footing in December 1941; until the government seized industries and forced industrialists to work for him for $1.00 a year. Then you draft all the men into military service, force women to work in the factories, toss the Japanese into concentration camps, suspend habeas corpus, and do fireside chats so that the dumbass American citizens thought of you as a father figure. My gosh … we sure did deserve him, didn’t we? And by the way, we’re still paying for the Tennessee Valley Authority. Joe Stalin must have been eating his own heart out.

Kid said...

Mr Sinclair. Agreed.

Z said...

Tell us how it was 'greed' that got us in to the depression.


FrogBurger...you sound like you're threatening us that you're joining Libertarians. I don't think any of us doesn't have a lot of Libertarian in us.


And I'm still waiting to hear how we avoid terrorism without any federal gov't help.

Unknown said...

At the end of WWI, Germany was in shambles. France wasn’t far behind. The value of industries was next to nothing. It was a perfect situation for investment. American industrialists and investors went nuts buying stocks to recapitalize German industry. The return was phenomenal. And it went on for ten years. The more investment, the higher the price for stocks, but the return was just too good to pass up. The return was so good, in fact, that people began to borrow money in order to invest it in stocks and bonds. Thus, greed pushed domestic and foreign stocks to the point of collapse. And now consider what happened to the German monetary system after 1930. By 1933, the German citizens were paying as much as 35,000 Deutschmarks for a loaf of bread.

No one said we could avoid terrorism without federal help. But rather than spending tens of billions on data mining innocent Americans, without a warrant, which means illegally, focus instead on those who are causing the problem: Muslims. Profiling is NOT against the law. Data mining without a search warrant is against the law.

Waylon said...

The Federal Reserve is a central bank, but it is neither federal or a "reserve" as the name implies, a department of the federal government. Instead it's a privately owned banking cartel with the power to print money out of nothing but thin air.

It's a subtle means of gaining control of a country. It is hardly unexpected that it would be created and imposed on the largest free economy of the world at the time it was created in 1913. You'll never find a controlled state in which the tyrants wield absolute power that doesn't have a central bank. It's a progressive/socialist/communist tool that is used to gain absolute power. Lenin knew this very well.

Oddly part of the ruse used to pretend that freedom was at risk during both world wars, and that the free market was at work, even though it was the central bank that was in control, determining interest rates, printing a predetermined amount of paper currency, "managing" the economy. Management of the economy would not exist where a free market existed, where the market determined prices of goods and services the old fashioned way, supply and demand.

Discussion of the FED actions occupy the bulk of the "financial news". What would really be news would be if one of those trained media seals would break the news that the FED isn't doing anything different than the economy czars of the Soviets or the National Socialists of Hitler's Germany. The power resides within the hands of a few people only, who control and decide when to torch the structure, as the final act.

Kid said...

Waylon..........
Yes, the Fed is an entity which the US government has not the slightest control over. Hence eh Congress doesn't tell gentle ben bernanke (or any of the other past fed chairmen) what to do, they meekly ask it questions and accept the most obtuse answers !!! 'the fed' is controlled by entities outside of the US. LOL. Not funny though outside of maybe 1 in 10 million people know this.

'the fed' has printed up 44 TRILLION dollars of YOUR Money to GIVE to the banks when the housing bubble burst and all the monoply mortgage paper went worthless. Well, hell, THEY're Not going to lose right ?
Specifically, the fed exchanged perfectly good Treasuries for totally worthless mortgage paper that will Never be worth anything. Watch in about 10 or 20 years how the fed just writes that off their balance sheet. 44 trillion AND Counting.

It seems we're lucky to have a majority in this country that understand that the government works for US, that obama and the female obama are not king and queen. In fact, I question
whether this is the case.

Briefly, I'll add with obama FOR the middle class, that gas prices have doubled, and food has doubled in the last 4-5 years. Who does that hurt? middle class perhaps?
Hows come da prices goes up? Tax the rich perhaps? The Rich Don't Pay Tax ! They pass it on to the middle class/consumer. It's is simply a cost of materials to them. Just like if they make clothes and the price of cotton goes up. YOU get to pay more for a shirt.

Man, I'm not genius. Imagine how Einstein felt living in this world.

Kid said...

PS - The Schmart people say that the Great Depression starting in 1929 caused the stock market crash - not the other way around as most people think of it.

In modern times, the bursting of the housing bubble caused the stock market crash, the market crash did not cause the housing bubble to burst. The burst came first.

Waylon said...

Kid, as bleak as it looks, I still look for glimmers of light.

I think it's good to keep our eyes open and when things don't add up we need to look deeper. Slowly but surely more people are becoming aware of this giant scam.

For all the years Greenspan was Chairman of the Federal Reserve, "managing" the economy, interest rates and controlling the printing presses for the money supply while talking up the "free market".

Then after he walks out the door, he comes to the supposed great enlightenment that "he was wrong, the free market doesn't work".

That was a WTF moment of importance for me.

Kid said...

Waylon, yea, the Maestro admits his own failure. That was pretty unexpected.

But it's true, he fought economic problems by building bubbles. First the tech bubble, then the housing bubble, which the democrats participated wildly in both cases imo.

Kid said...

PS - Please advise any glimmers. I don't see any. Each year has not brought 'better' only worse.

(((Thought Criminal))) said...

Romney just said that the safety of the country comes before the rights of the people.

Surely you can set aside your need for constitutionality and vote for Romney anyway.

Anonymous said...

@Pris:

"Then why are our phone records being data mined by the millions, and why is the IRS going after the Tea Party?"

I think Froggie touched on it briefly...I believe that they want to work on one front at a time...and would have us believe that it's not Al Queda...but now it's their own citizens who must be their new front on "terror"...from the IRS on up. And that they fear us more than they do a couple misfit muslims in Boston...there are far more of us on the right that they want to subdue.

Kid said...

...there are far more of us on the right that they want to subdue.

There ya go Imp. You got it. Plus, THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT Boston Victims.
They couldn't care less.

They don't care about any victims. We are all expendable. We are only here to be sheared. And if we're a liability (senior on SS) rather than an asset (some schmuck paying taxes) then we have less than zero value.
obamacare's death squads will take care of that problem.

So, did you hear about that F Fascist bitch sebillius trying to deny the 10 year old girl a lung transplant ?

Remember that the triple orgasmic affordable health care bill was to provide health care for EVERYONE right?
Hell no. This is the amount of respect they have for the average American intellect.

Put this shit on ESPN, and maybe things would be different.

Kid said...

Beam, romney is history, you need to get over it. You're sounding like a libtard for God's sake.

Anonymous said...

@Kid:

"This is the amount of respect they have for the average American intellect.

Put this shit on ESPN, and maybe things would be different."


They do in a way...they rely on Colbert and Jon Stewart for their..."news". And don't forget SNL.

In one way I wish we hadn't entered the war in Europe...there wouldn't be a muslim problem today. And they're just getting started here. They've already won in Europe...tell me I'm wrong.

Being an "islamophbe" might be illegal?

Let's say I have arachnophobia? I get a can Of Raid to keep them away from me...I'm 'afraid' of spidey....yea...I'm 'afraid" of muslim nuts too....there's plenty of solid reason and empirical evidence to base fear of them on. They're a disease and just as threatening to humanity and life as AIDS, Swine Flu, Mad Cow disease or Ebola.

What do I arm myself with against their threats and incursions into our way of life? The truth..which is what our government now wants to subdue, outlaw and stifle.

Even the Brits are finally waking up and they're taking it to the streets. I only hope the EDL gets bigger and bigger and bigger.

Anonymous said...

Here's where we're headed...and the mutts love it:

"The Freedom From Religion Foundation said the Pickens County School District is actually at fault for creating a pro-Christian atmosphere that encouraged proselytizing — and that tone indirectly prompted the 18-year-old graduate, Roy Costner IV, to recite the prayer during his podium address, Raw Story reported.

The valedictorian who so insensitively inflicted Christian prayer on a captive audience at a secular graduation ceremony is a product of a school district which itself has set an unconstitutional example by hosting school board prayer,” said Annie Laurie Gaylor, co-president of the FFRF, in Raw Story.

FFRF has been attuned to the Christian atmosphere at the school for some time, she said. Members have sent several letters to school administration officials, warning that the prayers spoken during board monthly meetings are unconstitutional and accusing of discriminatory job practices that favor Christians, Raw Story reported. In the face of looming lawsuits, the school cut prayers at graduation ceremonies."



So...it's clear...Christians are the threat....Let's see what would happen if they reported who the real threat to freedom of speech is...

I know...Christians rioting and killing in our streets.

Z said...

Kid, he'll never quit...like a broken record.

Imp; I heard that in Indonesia Miss World is getting rid of bikinis on all the contestants from all countries....what made me laugh out loud is that the English woman in England who runs the show thinks this is a lovely idea , that they're "designing beautiful sarongs instead and I like the idea."

Picture this: Some conservatives Christians in some country decide they'd rather just have contestants wear lovely one-piece swimsuits because they're more modest and (frankly) more becoming.
Think the English woman would be quite as excited about sarongs? :-)

Z said...

"inflicted Christian prayer!"...my GOD, how HORRIBLE!
I think they'd have found a muslim student reading from the Koran such a lovely, open-minded, multi-cultural thing, huh?

imagine the excitement..!?

Anonymous said...

@Z:

"thinks this is a lovely idea , that they're "designing beautiful sarongs instead and I like the idea."


Wonder what the dimwitted ass will say next year when full body burka's are required and they just judge the Mascara thru the eye slits??...one cut at a time Z...one cut at a time.

These people make me want to vomit.

Pris said...

Robert,
What did I say about FDR that makes you think I'm a fan of his? Since Americans at that time were isolationists he didn't respond to helping England until we were attacked by Japan at Pearl Harbor.
That seems pretty clear to me!

BTW, he tried to load the Supreme court with more justices so he could have more power.
It's also clear he was a progressive!


FB, of course it was necessary to win the war. Why is that a guilt trip on you?






Constitutional Insurgent said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Constitutional Insurgent said...

"Here's where we're headed...and the mutts love it"

Yep. Except this is where we are [Pickens County School District, the same district as mentioned above]:

[i]“Number one, our coach is a Christian,” Carter said. “To me, that's the most important quality, simply because the devil's after our children and the more quality people we can surround our children with, the better chance they have.”

Rev. Billy Graham has said that “the most influential person in America is a high school coach,” Carter said.[/i]

I don't know about you, but if I want my children indoctrinated to believe in God, Allah or the Flying Spaghetti Monster, I'll see to it myself as a parent, rather than at the hands of a public school employee.

Z said...

CI, I don't see where a coach being a good Christian has anything to do with indoctrination.
I know Christian coaches who never ever discuss their faith but they live it in very positive, inspiring ways every day; honesty, encouragement, listening to the kids more than others might, etc.

The kids are crazy about these coaches for their kindness and fun, not anything like indoctrination.

(((Thought Criminal))) said...

Beam, romney is history, you need to get over it. You're sounding like a libtard for God's sake.

Yeah, because libtards were all about telling people to set aside their misgivings about Romney's career leftist political record and voting for him anyway.

Sorry I wasn't there for you when you needed help driving conservatives out of the Republican Party, pal.