TEOTWAWKIAIFF

It’s a sad day for freedom. Our (so-called) representative government has decided that American citizens are no longer derserving of the rights that our Constitution enumerates. Today, our representatives desecrated the memories of every man and woman who lost thier lives for the now- illusion of freedom in the United States. The Defense Authorization Bill has a provision in it to allow the government to indefinitely detain and execute, without trial, an American citizen – even here in America.

“Barack Obama has abandoned a commitment to veto a new security law that allows the military to indefinitely detain without trial American terrorism suspects arrested on US soil who could then be shipped to Guantánamo Bay.” – The Guardian

“While the bill never expanded the authority to detain American citizens indefinitely without charges, proponents said the legislation would codify court decisions finding the President does have the authority to declare “enemy combatants,” as commander-in-chief and under the post-9/11 Authorization for Use of Military Force against al Qaeda and its allies.” – CBS news

“Obama said that he would veto the defense bill that contained a horrific provision for the indefinite detention of American citizens. While many predicted it, Obama has now again betrayed the civil liberties community and lifted the threat of the veto.”  -  Jonathan Turley

I understand that this law doesn’t mean we will have gestapo thugs running black bag operations on average Jane and John Q. Public. The way I see it, Liberty is not to be trifled with, the slope to a totalitarian police state is very slippery, and I have zero confidence that anyone in the federal government is able to restrain themselves from taking more and more power from us.

This is why the bar must be set so high. I don’t always agree with the ACLU, but over time I see they set the bar so high for free speech because they know the politicians are constantly trying to push the bar down. We banded together as tribes and clans in pre-homo sapiens history because a community is stronger than the individual. Eventually these clans and tribes needed some direction and focus for the group and government was born. Some rallied against the chief and the shaman because they wanted to call their own shots. They felt that the chief/shaman/headman was trying to broker to much control, and they were not going to have any of it.

Fast-forward several hundred thousand years and we have the same struggle, but on a much larger scale with vastly more important stakes. Our government can affect every other person on the planet, directly or indirectly, with the policies set in Washington D.C. Doubt me? If they revoke all the environmental laws wouldn’t it rain acid in Africa? We need to make a stand. We need to set the bar high for our personal freedoms, not to protect some scumbag terrorist, but to protect ourselves.

There have been many, many stories on how the Department of Homeland security has been broadening the definition of “Domestic Terrorist” so the very word could soon be a synonym for “American Citizen.” The DHS will (or already is) printing a list of characteristics that mark a person as a domestic terrorist. Perhaps only if you meet all fifty points you will be questioned or possibly black-bagged to GITMO. After a while, the DHS will change the rules so you make the black ops list if you meet forty of these points. Then thirty. This is the slippery slide that the black and white nature of “us and them” thinking leads to. The thinking that the federal government deriving its athority from itself, instead of the Government deriving it’s authority from the consent of the people.

At what point does the higher ups determine that the quiet guy who goes to church every Sunday with his family, has a year’s worth of food, lives off the grid with a garden and some livestock, and possess (gasp!) firearms, meets this list and is whisked off to GITMO for water-boarding? Thanks to this bill, he won’t have a lawyer. He won’t ever see a courtroom. He won’t plead his case to a judge. Hell, he won’t even get to stand in front of a military tribunal. He will never see his family again, even when they pump the drugs into his veins to stop his heart.

Will it happen to us? Probably not. It can happen, though. Unless we, the citizens of these United States, make ourselves heard, then this will quietly go into affect. Then, like the Patriot Act, it will be quietly used to abuse the rights of everyday citizens. Write or call your congressman NOW, and maybe we can get it changed.

I fear there is a zeitgeist occurring, where the following trends crystallize into a new paradigm – the American Police State. I hope it does not happen, but the trend is evident.

• Militarization of police – military-grade weapons, including tanks, and training pushing the idea that everyone is a criminal. (Even if you peacefully assemble)
• The police-ification of our military – our military is getting a lot of training and practice in urban pacification of a semi-hostile indigenous population.
• The decay of American’s faith in Congress, and how Congress could care less. They are continually marching on the same path, daring the citizens to vote them out.
• The Department of Homeland Security’s “busy work” to make it seem like there are more and more terrorists here among us, and we need to “see something, say something” Just like it was 1949 in the USSR.
• Degrading economic conditions where more and more people are dependent on the state, and will vote anyone in who will keep the ponzi scheme going.

No matter how this bill is used, the fact that it exists – in direct opposition to the 5th, 6th and 7th amendments – is an eye-opening realization on how the Federal government views its citizens.