In short, over the past decade we have seen a new type of warfare evolve.
Under president bush Iraq, Afghanistan and the al-Qaeda network have been taken down.
Under obama, we have seen people killed before they can become a threat. The US government has even killed US citizens on foreign soil with no due process.
This brings up several ethics questions.
Is it right to kill someone before they commit a crime? Isn't the whole justice system built around bringing people to justice "after" they have broken the law? So what happens if the government starts arresting and or killing people just because those people were talking about breaking the law?
There is a difference between talking and doing. Can the justice system sentence someone to death without a trial, and without a crime? If there was no other crime besides talking, can the person be deemed a threat?
Where does society draw the line? Do we arrest, convict and imprison the husband who talked about hitting his wife? If so, how long should the person be held in prison?
Would it correct for society to imprison everyone who talked about breaking a law, but never actually committed a crime?
Perhaps it will be deemed semantic hair-splitting, but historically, the pre-eminent civilizations / societies (Rome and Great Britain, for example) have always had 2 sets of rules: one for their own citizens, and another for everyone else. The idea was that the citizenry shared the societal and cultural norms, so could be and were expected to behave in certain ways.
Since the same could not be said for everyone else, they did not share the rights and privileges as the citizenry.
All this is preamble to the main point: it is a mistake to conflate criminal justice with war. Just as it doesn't work well to have soldiers try to be policemen, it doesn't work well trying to treat enemies like society's criminals. The rules of the justice system are not the same as the rules of war, nor should they be.
We have a long-standing prohibition on assassinating hostile foreign leaders. The leaders of a terrorist organization (state-sponsored though they may be), do not qualify: they have openly declared war on us, and are actively engaged in same. They can (and should), therefore, be killed at the earliest opportunity. The history of radical Islam v. the West has always been thus.
As to whether this will become a slippery slope and bleed over into domestic law enforcement: of course it will tend to do that, unless checked by the people (us). To eschew everything that might be used for evil means being completely paralyzed. Our guns would be a good example.
That sort of dictatorial thing really only works well when either one sociopolitical group has overwhelming control (e.g., Sharia Law), or there is a single indentifiable group that everyone can hate (e.g., German Jews during the Third Reich). Given our society of widely divergent worldviews, playing the anticipatory game will prompt an overwhelming backlash from both sides.
Indeed we are in a new age of warfare. It was said that America refused to learn the lessons of Viet Nam, and the failure of western style large scale warfare in small nation counter insurgency supression. Thus the Army adapted FM 3-24 (known to the Marine Corps as Publication 3-33-5) the Counterinsurgency Field Manual which is nothing more than a blueprint for a Global Police Force.
In it is expressed the requirement for the needs of the Host Nation people above the occupying forces. Indeed the occupying forces are expendable and have their hands tied behind their backs to win the hearts and minds of the Host Nation people. Nothing is more important than the security of the populous and the upholding of their laws; all other considerations are secondary compared to these, including the lives of our American Sevice People.
You wonder why things are going as they are in the sand box? Read the Counter Insurgency Field Manual as released by the University of Chicago Press with forwards by Generals Petraeus, Amos, and Nagle, as well as an introduction by Sarah Sewall and it will answer all of those questions that have been bothering you about why we are doing what we are doing.
Our actions still will not make sense... but at least you will know why they don't! Liberal Warfare Strategy at it's best!
Instead of trying to predict the future like in the Minority Report, the government relies on intelligence agencies like the CIA.
But what is the real difference between the cia trying to predict crimes like in the Minority Report, and using physics like in the movies?
There is old question that if someone could go back and kill hitler before he came into power, should we? But on the other hand, what if we are wrong about the predictions, and an innocent person was murdered.
Is it acceptable for society to err on the side of caution? If so, where do we drawn the line?
Will it be acceptable for police officers to shoot and kill someone due to repeated calls for family violence?
Will it be acceptable for police officers to kill people who had a little bit too much to drink? After all, its better to put the person to death before they can harm anyone else. So if someone tries to get in their car after downing a few drinks at a bar, the police should just shoot and kill that person?
Lets say a wife likes to cheat. So law enforcement should lock her in prison? That way her husband does not catch her cheating and shoot her and her boyfriend? Or is better to lock the husband up so the wife can run around as much as she wants?
If the government is given free reign to kill people before they commit a crime, who is at greater fault? The person for talking about how they want to commit a crime, or the government that acts on those words?
After all, where does society draw the line in protecting others?
This is the exact reason our government MUST GET BACK TO THE CONSTITUTION! It should be required that all polititians pass a constitution test given by the Heritage Foundation. LOL Then we wouldn't see all this crap!
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All that is needed for evil to triumph, is for good men to do nothing.
The laws are already in place to arrest, and hold people indefinitely without trial. All you have to do is be labeled a domestic combatant and all of your rights disappear. What exactly is a domestic combatant? It is a very vague term and could be used to do exactly what you are talking about. And all of these laws have been passed to strengthen national security, but when does it become a police state? The big surprise to me is they haven't taken away our second amendment rights yet. Although we know there are many who are trying at this very moment. That is the next step in transforming our country into a land of slaves.
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My theory on the general public is that they're like mushrooms, they thrive when you feed em $hit and keep em in the dark.
"What the hell is going on out there!?" -Vince Lombardi
Now that the National Defense Authorization Act has been signed into law, anyone accused of being a terrorist can be detained by the military.
If the government wanted to, this opens up a whole new range of abuses. We just thought what happened to Randy Weaver and his family was bad. Randy Weavers wife was shot and killed by a sniper, and nobody went to prison over it.
With the new law, I doubt there would even be congressional hearings on the murder of US citizens.
Who in the government has the right to detain or murder US citizens at will? Is this "really" a law that should have ever been presented before congress? What would the founding father have to say about a law that allows the government to detain people without due process?
In most states the accused person has to be brought before a judge within 24 hours of being arrested. But now, just declare the person is a suspected terrorist and the persons rights are waived.
Freesw: You may be happy in your cage. The cage may give you all the things you need. You may be safe in the cage. But it is still a cage. Freedom is not safe, or control. If you are being control. You are a slave. Kings, the top 1%, control the money. Money right now, controls the voters. Money controls the Portals of free speech. Do you not see the bars of the cage.
We are already a land of slaves... most folks just don't know it yet.
He is absolutely right. You owe enough money and you become the equivalent of an indentured servant. I know that going into debt is one's choice, but nowadays it is necessary to get a good education or to buy a home for your family. This is the reason that all men are indeed not created equal. The more money in your family the better chance you have to succeed, and it is less likely you will need to borrow money to get ahead. It's funny too because rampant money lending has become the fulcrum of our economy and is a big part of the reason it is struggling. Even our country can't pay the bills without borrowing, and has been operating in the red for almost a decade.
There is no doubt that the system is set up to make the average american a slave. All of the money we earn is taxed four times over before we even spend it, and we are hit with interest, late fees, contracts, and penalties in all facets of our financial lives. It is almost impossible to live off the grid and owe nothing to some major corporation or some branch of government.
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My theory on the general public is that they're like mushrooms, they thrive when you feed em $hit and keep em in the dark.
"What the hell is going on out there!?" -Vince Lombardi
Indeed. If you owe money then you cannot be free, and that was one facet of the many levels of slavery I was talking about. You owe the man then you are working for the man! If 47% do not pay taxes then 53% of us work for the government at least a portion of the year. We work for the bankers another portion of the year. Now that Obama has put us so deeply into debt the number of days a year we get to work for ourselves has dwindled to near zero.
Indentured servitude is still servitude, and slavery beit voluntary or not.
"The cage may give you all the things you need. You may be safe in the cage. But it is still a cage. Freedom is not safe, "
No one's physically forcing anyone here to do specific tasks day in and day out, and beating or maiming you if you refuse to do them, or don't do them to the taskmaster's liking. No one here is locked in shackles to keep you from escaping to another town, or county, or country. Of course our economic system is unjust, our political system only a little less so, corrupted by the power of concentrated capital as it is. But it is not a slave system.
Words have meanings and when a word is completely misused, as Parnelli did, it loses its meaning. The word "slave" has a meaning. And, it is not the same as indentured servitude at all, as everyone in the 18th century well understood. To claim that we are "slaves" insults the memory of those who really were subjected to slavery during the first ninety years of this country's history, and severely distorts any attempt to describe our present reality. In both senses such an abuse of the term clouds our ability to accurately evaluate the real predicament we do find ourselves in.
I think more here than among the American population as a whole are concerned about and oppose the ratcheted up encroachment of the government on our civil rights. The public backlash after Ruby Ridge and Waco seemed to slow the process down for a time, but 9/11 gave authoritarians the leverage they needed to start the process up again, and they've exploited it for all they can since. We do have a few here who in actual practice do support this creeping authoritarianism in its specifics, even while they claim to be constitutionalists. I am not among them, and I don't need to resort to crass hyperbole to describe how things in our country are going awry. Given our nation's history, it's reprehensible to refer to the present day US as "a land of slaves." That it diminishes the horrors of real slavery is part of the unspoken agenda of watering the definition down, and using it so casually. If we are all in "a land of slaves," then the real history of slavery loses its significance in the modern mind which becomes used to the new terminology. That's one motive. The other is of course to chip away at the legitimacy of the federal government. The goal of the far right isn't to fix government, it is to do away with it and remake it in their image. Well, I'm on the record as favoring the repeal of much of the Patriot Act type legislation, not trying to use the fact of its passage as an excuse to accuse the government as a whole of illegitimacy, as we do see quite a bit of here.
I'm amazed that anyone who's given it much thought would agree with Parnelli's statement in any way.
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A republic, if you can keep it.
Plutocracy and permanent military entanglements are characteristic of decadent empire, not a republic.
My grandmother was a slave. She and my grandfather had my oldest uncle, out of wedlock, and it was not until they were having their second kid, that my great grandmother consented to allow them to marry.
How did my grandmother end up a slave? Well, story goes that she was the daughter of a forbidden Indian love. The offspring was shunned, abandoned by nearly all, and taken in as an indentured servant when she was just a baby.
And those that say indentured servants were not, or are not slaves, are full of ****. Slavery is alive and well today, and people are sold into slavery all over the world, but it's most common in North Africa and the Middle East.
I also have to point out, as a DIRECT descendent of slavery in America, that it's not a white or black thing either, as most would have everyone think.
The more I research the topic, the more stunning it is to find out that millions of Americans got here via slavery. Most worked their indentured contract off, and then created lives that have produced this great nation in the wake of that sacrifice on their part.
What the Liberals and those that survive on the lies told by the Left do not want to talk about is how slavery is gender and color blind. It was very common for former slaves to become slave owners themselves, as they started farms, companies and needed workers to tend the fields, and work for them.
Can you imagine the look on say Rev. Wright's face, when presented wtih the facts that many Black slave owners had White slaves they owned, bred and sold for profit?
Or the response of Femminists when they are presented with the realtiy that women could vote in the late 1700's, owned slaves, and were very powerful many years before the "sufferage" movement was supposed to have established those rights?
Why the changes?
Oh, well, do your own research, but it's clear that Liberals in our nation have used, created and carefully tended class/gender/race warfare to create voting blocks, and build power for themselves.
It was not until the eary 1800's that race became a factor, and that gender was used to seperate a citizen's rights. (Women tended to be quite conservative! Imagine that! But it's not hard to see why, the women with power in the late 1700's and early 1800's worked to get where they were. There was no welfare. No social programs, and the same held true for all who built themselves wealth and sucess, they earned it.)
Founding fathers, mothers and folks of all races were treated as equals until our Liberal buddies came along and created division, where none was needed. (But that devide was a powerful political motivation, and inside of 100 years, even nearly managed to re-write history to hide the changes.)
So, in closing, consider the following: The man we have elected as the idiot boy President, is a descendent of North African Arabs, the very same Islamic Slave traders who then, and now have taken and sold millions of people into slavery.
Obama himself has zero connection to anyone that came here as indentured slaves, or that were captured, and sold into slavery, other than perhaps his former realitives have a good chance of being the slave traders themselves. (Keep in mind, Obama's Grandfather was in thick with England, and as such, the slave trade as overseen by the English back when O's grandpa was just a child himself, and surely as his great grandparents were also in cahoots with England to trade goods and yes, even potientally, slaves.)
Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.
The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted.
Getting back on topic. I think we as a nation, have gotten bored,with the slow pace of our justice system. The political wisdom at this time is to do something, Now. And not trust our justice system to do its job. Offshore imprisonment, torture, are just two examples. Win-94 is right to show that there are already laws in place. (Though the wood on that lever action needs to be refinished). Imprisoning someone before a crime is committed. Is a lost of trust. Or maybe Cowardliness. Bypassing, Due Process, is kicking out one of the pillars of our nation. The question is, do you want a nation of laws.
Getting back on topic. I think we as a nation, have gotten bored,with the slow pace of our justice system. The political wisdom at this time is to do something, Now. And not trust our justice system to do its job. Offshore imprisonment, torture, are just two examples. Win-94 is right to show that there are already laws in place. (Though the wood on that lever action needs to be refinished). Imprisoning someone before a crime is committed. Is a lost of trust. Or maybe Cowardliness. Bypassing, Due Process, is kicking out one of the pillars of our nation. The question is, do you want a nation of laws.
I couldn't agree with you more Urban! Our judicial system is beyond broken... it is a political tool to be used against dissenters and those that fail to comply with the will of the government; to strike fear into their hearts and force them into submission. Our Law WAS based upon the presumption of innocence, but now you are punished before being found guilty by a jury of your peers in many cases. The confiscation of personal property is accomplished by the signature of a "judge" and not due process any more.
Kevin
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