Author: kmilyun

Fight for the Social and Political Consciousness of America

From the mpeachinator on Smell Test states:

If this administration gets away with warrantless spying then we’ve given up the freedom and liberty we say we are trying to spread throughout the world. We’ve already lost the war on terror if we give up these ideals.

  1. warrantless spying
  2. spreading our ideals around the world
  3. war on terror

If you have read some of my blog I am sure you know that I am against standing by while the government nibbles away at the rights of American citizens. First I have to ask myself, when is it OK for my government to spy on anyone.

“Congress gave me the authority to use necessary force to protect the American people, but it didn’t prescribe the tactics,” Bush said, adding that the government needs to know why people linked to al Qaida are calling into the U.S. “One of the ways to protect the American people is to understand the intentions of the enemy.”

Yes, the government has the responsibility of protecting its citizens. They do not need to bypass the normal procedure of getting a warrant. Even if a warrant is received after the fact, we at least know the government values and holds true to our system of checks and balances. By going around the normal procedures we are all at risk of being spied on and put on some watch list.

Bush’s rhetoric is very selective and insincere. A superpower must be perceived as truly granting liberty and freedom to be trusted as a transmitter of them. Even the vote in Iraq did not convince the world that the United States supports the principles of freedom and liberty rather over that of neo-imperialism. Spreading democracy requires allies, particularly among the targets of one’s consideration.

How is terrorism defined and can a country war against it? If terrorism is defined as actions outside the bounds of conventional warfare can it be fought against using conventional tactics. If the term is defined to mean that the violence of an enemy is random, immoral, wanton, and unjustified and to justify violent reprisals we have scenerio where violence begets violence. What changes a National social consciousness from racism to racial equality, approving Bush’s tax programs to disapproving them, or from favoring war in Iraq to being against it. We need an answer. The future of the human race may depend on a radical change in political and social consciousness. Social conscious must force the American political conscience to uphold the fundamental concepts set forth in this countrys CONSTITUTION and BILL OF RIGHTS. The Separation of Powers were written in for a reason!

A story with a moral:

A guy has a dog that only barks, a lot. So he got tired of hearing it bark and decided to take it to the vet. After the doctor checked the dog, he told the owner: listen, this dog is deaf, blind and can’t smell! The dog owner asked: then why is it barking all the time? The Doctor answered: because it is the only way remaining to persevere his identity! from Sabbah’s blog.

Too Many Troubles on This Globe

There are too many troubles on the globe we call Earth. I can not keep track of them all. If you take the time to read blogs from other Countries than your own it becomes obvious that we all have somethings in common. Some authors write about freedom of speech, others about oppression. From Palestine, Israel, Africa, China, America, France, Germany, Denmark, we all blog.
Take a blog trip around the globe.

Now to the confusion. Some news from about:

AUSTRALIAN AND US TROOPS SET TO JOIN UN FORCES IN DARFUR
The Australian
PAKISTAN WILL NOT, CANNOT INTERFERE WITH US/ISRAEL NUKE ATTACK ON IRAN
Daily Times Pakistan

FRIDAY MEETING FOR PEACE AGAINST U.S. AND WAR HELD
The Korean News Agency

Olympic Ice Skating Scoring – it’s all in the Math

While watching the skating this evening we were discussing the unfairness of the random choice of the nine judges. DrumsNWhistles Thank you for posting the link to John Emerson’s article about the mathematical flaw in the ice skating scoring system.

“Does the new scoring system increase fairness? On some level it does, but the system has introduced the unsettling possibility of dumb luck influencing the medal standings. In a close competition with skaters separated by only a few points, the outcome will likely be determined by the random choices of panels of nine judges. This is neither desirable nor fair, and the system can be improved easily. The outcome should be determined solely by the skaters and the judges, using the scores of all twelve judges.”

read the rest of this article here

I thought Zhang Dan and Zhang Hao of China showed us a true Olympic moment. The courage and spirit to continue after landing hard on both knees and sliding – awesome!

I guess I am getting old. The announcers over use of “for sure” and “fur sure” during the snowboard events drove me nuts. Do not ask me why – it just did – really – fur sure.

Enjoy the Olympics.

This Just Resonated with Me.

From Mahablog

sent in by femfacal

A Stalinist Line of Discipline.

Filed under: Bush Administration — maha @ 10:44 pm

Don’t miss this speech by Jim Marcinkowski posted at No Quarter. This is just a bit of it.

We fought the Soviets and I fought the Soviets because they had a fatally flawed, intolerable system of government where (and think about this):

The government was always right and never apologized;

Any dissent was suppressed, ridiculed, banned or worse;

Secret prisons were denied and never acknowledged or spoken about;

The torture of captives (in Lubyanka) was condoned;

State incarceration was not subject to the checks and balances of a legal system;

Economic plans, like for oil, were established/determined in closed sessions between politicos, commissars and production managers, far outside public view, and where government claimed privilege in so doing;

Wages were set at the lowest common denominator, no matter what Bloc country you were in;

Government agents had access to your medical records, your library records, your telephone, and your e-mail.

A place where judicial power and judicial review were proclaimed concepts, but simply ignored in application;

Where criminal records of young adults were closed to all but the military;

Where a Constitution was a mere facade and ignored by state actors.

Any dissent, debate and protest were deemed unpatriotic;

The public media was bought, paid for, and provided by the state;

The military clandestinely and shamelessly influenced the national media and public opinion;

A place where wrong was declared right;

Where tapping a phone was like tapping a pencil;

Where lying was considered a patriotic skill;

The extraction of natural resources was paramount to any concern for the environment and the impact on the health of its people;

Where the use of “state secrets,” (those things embarrassing to the government) were confused with legitimate issues of “national security”;

A place where “secrecy” and “national security” were used to control debate;

Where legitimate secrecy, was subject to political use and abuse;

Where “legislators” were mere mouthpieces for and rubberstamps of whoever was in power;

Where you lived and died with the permission of the government;

A place where foreign policy was more important than domestic concerns;

Where fear was used as a political weapon and an acceptable means of control;

Where the best medical care was reserved for the influential;

Where wealth was concentrated in the top 5%;

A place where there was no middle class – just a small economic and political elite, and the working poor. …

… Since 1995 the Republican Party and its friends in the American corporate structures that so vigorously contribute to and support them have—in the space of a decade—created in this country more than the beginnings of a system that this country spent 50 years trying to dismantle.