05/11/2007
Oh Dear
By Gabe Rottman, Washington Legislative Office at 1:47pm
I've been slammed with school wrapping up and I missed this yesterday. My goodness, is all I have to say.
Watch the James Spader thing after.
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One important law in that regard is the prohibition on politically partisan activity. Given our nonprofit status, we may not endorse or oppose candidates for elective office. That means we cannot host comments on our site that show a preference for one candidate or party. Although we in no way wish to discourage you from that activity elsewhere, we ask that you not engage in that activity on our website (or include links to other websites that do so). Additionally, given that we are subject to very specific rules concerning the collection of personally identifying information through our website (names, email addresses, home address, financial information, etc.), we ask that you not use the comments portion of this blog to solicit this information from users of our website. We also ask that you not use the comments portion for advertising or requests for legal assistance, and do not add to your comment links to other websites, as we cannot be responsible for the content on other websites.
We are not able to respond to unsolicited inquiries, complaints or requests for assistance sent to this blog. Please direct your complaint or request for assistance to the ACLU affiliate in your state. Requests for legal assistance left in the blog comments will not receive a response or be published.
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May 14th, 2007 at 10:07am
There's a new ad for the Jeep "Patriot" that implies if you are the owner of a "Patriot" you can literally take a long arm and move or remove anyone you see as being "in your way".I wonder if the advertiser and car manufacturer created this ad concept with the "Patriot" Act in mind, a piece of legislation which allows our government to move or remove anyone that they see as being "in their way", labeling them as an "enemy combatant". This is truly frightening. The course our country is taking is frightening. I often think of my situation as being something out of a George Orwell novel. Orwell wrote 1984 and Animal Farm. He based these novels on personal experiences he had in the Spanish Civil War fighting in a Trotskyist outfit at a time when Stalin was trying to purge all of the contributions Trotsky had made to the Russian Revolution. Because of these purges, Orwell witnessed the unjust executions, imprisonments, and "disappearances" of many friends, barely escaping Spain alive himself. Following WWII, he was able to get his works condemning Stalinist tactics and policies published. In fact, there were several other works published in the late 1940's, including Darkness at Noon and Brave New World, that expressed a deep conviction that the totalitarian state would develop such formidable powers in the future (in this country's case-technology)that humans would become helpless to preserve their identity. Little did these authors realize (or did they) that this formidable power would be the USA. Remember, that it was after WWII that the USA imported Nazi intelligentsia to fight the Cold War. The problem with this is we probably not only imported the technology intelligence but also the ideology,which wasn't going to have a good result in the end (I'm living proof to this). Our founding fathers would be appalled at what our government is doing-the slow destruction of the Constitution which they fought so hard to create. What is even more unbelievable is the absolute silence of Congress, the mainstream media, and individual politicians and journalists. I guess that is what we get from moving to a mainly two party system to a one party neoconservative monopoly. Just think what would have happened if this type of federal government had the power and technology from the very beginning of our country's origin. Think of what acts of "dissent" would have been prevented before they could have even progressed-the Abolition Movement, Women's Suffrage, the Civil Rights Movement, the Labor Movement of the early 20th century when factory conditions were so horrific, controlled by "Big" money interests. All of these movements could have and would have been halted with the technology we now have. At the time, they were harassed, sometimes violently, but thankfully unsuccessfully. The Labor Movement and the Civil Rights Movement in particular were harassed many times by organized crime. Unfortunately, that mentality of organized crime is now running our federal government-"You are either with us or you are against us; and if you are against us, we will destroy you." What is really unbelievable is the hypocrisy of people like Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity who talk about this country as being the greatest in the world because it was founded on the precepts of freedom-freedom of speech, freedom of the press, the right to privacy-and then they support an administration's policies which are slowly taking those freedoms away from the American people; and they are doing this all in the name of fighting terrorist groups who our own government's policies helped to embolden over the last twenty or more years.( Let alone the question as to whether they could have prevented 911). This administration speaks about spreading freedom across the globe;however, they don't tell you that it is their own personal freedom they are talking about-their freedom to do whatever they want to whomever they want at the expense of innocent people for their own personal power and finances. This should terrify honest people throughout the entire world!
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