Zharkov in the U.S.A. writes:

@ Eric in NM, you are too comfortable with a government which can secretly designate "suspected" enemies of the state to make them disappear.

Every day the U.S. is becoming more like North Korea.

Let me explain so that even a 5 year old could understand:

Barry cannot throw little Newt in prison for the rest of his life just for fun, but Barry CAN imprison Newt forever if Barry falsely accuses him of being a "suspected" terrorist, if it makes Barry happy. Got it?

Reliance on a presidential "terrorist designation" to protect citizens is naive and dangerous. After all, the federal government has a record of accusing innocent Americans of terrorism.

Documents released by the Department of Justice in Obama's first year in office listed practically everyone - from returning veterans to pro-life activists to 2nd Amendment advocates - as possible "domestic terrorists." The only possible reason the government takes GPS readings for your home is for targetting. Homeland Security says that people who pay in cash may be terrorists.

The Patriot Act was also sold to us as intended only for "designated terrorists" but according to a Justice Department report, the majority of crimes in which it is used are NOT related to terrorism. The Patriot Act was abused from the beginning on all kinds of crimes.

Regardless of your view, the Bill of Rights remains protected by our federal constitution. That's our law.

Moreover, according to Secretary Clinton, it is a violation of human rights to imprison citizens indefinitely without charge, without trial, and without legal counsel. She has said so many times, in many different forums. She is correct, and an educated American citizen would agree with her.

Designating ordinary citizens as "terrorist" does not allow a court hearing. That label is attached to a citizen in secret - a clear violation of the due process clause of the 5th Amendment and the right to counsel in the 6th Amendment.

Indefinite detention without trial and verdict of guilt is cruel and unusual punishment under the 9th Amendment and a violation of the UN treaty on human rights.

In America, the Bill of Rights cannot suspended by statute or federal regulation because those rights are fundamental rights that supersede such legislation. Congress has no power to enact an unconstitutional law. The President has no authority to enforce an unconstitutional law and nobody has any duty to obey it.

The Constitution cannot be amended except by its own terms, so the provision in the NDAA regarding indefinite detention of US citizens is void as an illegal attempt to overturn our Bill of Rights.

You should not want this country to ignore fundamental human rights as a matter of official policy, Eric. That would be un-American. Perhaps you have forgotten who we are.

Senator Diane Feinstein said "I strongly believe that constitutional due process requires that United States citizens apprehended in the United States should never be held in indefinite detention."

Representative Jerry Nadler (NY) said, "We are in danger of losing our most precious heritage not because a band of thugs threatens our freedom, but because we are at risk of forgetting who we are and what makes the United States a truly great nation."

Human Rights Watch said, "It establishes precisely the kind of system that the United States has consistently urged other countries not to adopt."

There is barely a difference between the powers granted to Obama by the NDAA and what the military junta in Burma claims the right to do to its citizens. In Burma, people fighting for liberty were called terrorists, much the same as Homeland Security called our military veterans in the MIAC Report and its followup to the MIAC Report.

Secretary Clinton just spent time and money going to Burma to argue against indefinite detention that our government now wants to do in America. Obviously, she needs to spend more time in the Oval Office to present the same argument to her president who thinks liberty is a threat to national security.

Posted on Sat Dec 17, 2011

Eric in New Mexico writes:

@ Maureen,

Some years back an Afghan friend of mine was despondent and wanted to test a theory, so he dialed 911 and said, "I'm al quaida in SantaFe, come get me!"

They came, they saw, they detained, and took him to the hospital because he was drunk and possibly a danger to himself in his state of mind.

No charges broght, just a psyc evaluation and breakfast in the morning before being discharged from the hospital.

Funny thing resulted in that he'd spent a number of years after 9/11 living in paranoia and occasionally harrased by citizens in who's ignorance they associated his homeland with those who attacked us, and he's a US citizen.

After this little episode with SFPD, he never again lived in fear of being mistaken for a terrorist.

Oddly enough it actually restored a bit of his faith in America.

Now I don't think Z will be testing his beliefs in like manner as my friend, but if he does, I'll give you even odds he'll live through it if he's drunk enough and unarmed.

Hope this true story helps folks put the war on terror in perspective.

EJ

Posted on Sat Dec 17, 2011

Maureen in Massachusetts writes:

@ Eric in New Mexico

Umm, ouch.

Posted on Fri Dec 16, 2011

John in Canada writes:

@ eric define terrorism – how cute.

How about the banking sector that requires only to hold 5 or 6% of your debt in cash.

Look at it this way a 200K home – you give a 20K down payment – you have just provided the capital to the bank for the loan value on your home and another home and guess what all that debt you just agreed to – the bank have put up nothing – you provided the full capitalization for your own home and for the privilege of capitalizing your own home (not to mention the other home you provided capitalization for) you get to pay the bank twice the value of your home in interest over the mortgage period (and they can finance another idiot)– and the bank makes a whole lot of cash for absolutely nothing.

Now imagine that same bank after entering into an agreement with you – takes your money and offers nothing to you but debt – that bank now decides to raise the value of your loan by raising interest rates beyond which is affordable – you lose your home -they (the banks)cry bankrupt – the tax payers bail the banks out – the banks take back the home you paid them for (perhaps for years)– now your on the street broke and the banker is sipping champagne -planning their next heist. Oh yeh and the tax payer will pay for years for this also.

Eric if I gave you 5 dollars and you could instantly convert this into 100 dollars – would you – could you ever go broke? I hope not but guess what – the financial institutions manged to do just that.

Meanwhile the average joe is expected never to default on debt – if the banks cant manage with such a sweet deal – what makes anyone in their right mind think they can get out of debt or even a nation? A sucker or fool is born every day.

How many folks have killed themselves over debt? How many have lost their retirement? How many have lost their livelihoods? How many people have lost their future? I call that terrorism. I also call it deliberate.

The notion that what has happened is immoral but not illegal – is flat out false.

Again I ask you eric if I gave you 5 dollars and you could make it into 100 dollars – could you ever go broke ?

if you could get people to finance their own debt at no cost to you and make huge profits off of compound interest – could you ever go broke?

You would be a flat out liar if you say you could – the only way you could go broke is if you did it on purpose. Now thats terrorism and it is illegal.

Side note -I read how starbucks has spent millions in lobbying to prevent labeling issues on their products – they should be forced to label their products– my wife became deathly sick after consuming a starbucks coffee – they should label their goods -but labeling or not – I wont buy another starbucks coffee again – trust once its broken – is not easy to fix. Perhaps my family should sue them for their tainted coffee. But then again the courts are no place for justice. If they were we would see OBL in front of one and along side him some bankers. Seems Mr. Obama has the same faith I have in the courts at dispensing justice - hence no bankers or OBL in front of a court. Although I am waiting for the 4am raid and the bullet to head/heart on the financial terrorists.

Any how - terrorism - I would say the financial mess more than qualifies as a terrorist act – there is no conceivable way that what has happened was an accident – if I forced my neighbor into poverty, created conditions that made my neighbors kill themselves, destroy entire nations - so I could have more money (most of which does not even exist)– think its not illegal – think again.

But then again Japanese after WW2 had been executed for water boarding westerners– water boarding being torture- but that some how was redefined as not torture or is it now again torture?

So I guess you can make anything that terrorizes a person, family or nation into terrorism so long as its convenient to do so – I bet a whole lot of people out there are feeling financially terrorized at the moment.

But hey its not illegal – just immoral. I would laugh but its no laughing matter.

Posted on Thu Dec 15, 2011

Zharkov in the U.S.A. writes:

Congress has no power to nullify the Bill of Rights. No president ever had the power of imprisonment without trial. The Bill of Rights removed that power. The US Supreme Court already held that imprisoning American citizens of Japanese ancestry during WWII was unconstitutional.

Your president-alleged was supposedly a law professor and knew before he signed that the provision he requested to imprison Americans was illegal and prima facie unconstitutional.

The President-alleged has approved a law which the State Department has spent years and millions of dollars trying to abolish similar laws in foreign countries as a human rights violation.

Posted on Thu Dec 15, 2011

Zharkov in the U.S.A. writes:

"Terrorist" has proven to be an infinitely flexible term, with some democrats calling republicans terrorists; Homeland Security calling military veterans, Ron Paul supporters, constitutionalists, survivalists and anyone buying guns and storable food, "potential terrorists" - so yes, any US citizen can now be "a terrorist" if the President decides he doesn't like them.

And Eric, if you were a real, patriotic, liberty-loving American, you would not be an apologist for one guy having much power over his countrymen. You can only hope that the President does not abuse his discretion in ordering arrests inside America. Hope is not a check or balance.

Posted on Thu Dec 15, 2011

Eric in New Mexico writes:

@ Z,

You neglect to add that one must meet the definition of a terrorist in order to qualify for unlimited room and board for as long as folks think detention appropriate.

And the President has a lot of leway in his decision making with regards to individual cases.

It's not like the gov is going to round up all the homeless just because someone in gov might consider them to be a security risk in some hairbrained Orwellian fixation upon what's permitted in societical norm, and that the less fortunate represent a danger to the status quo of political/corporate fat cats and dictators everywhere.

Unless you are a terrorist and there's good probable cause for you to meet that definition, I don't believe you have anything to worry nor complain about.

EJ

Posted on Thu Dec 15, 2011

Zharkov in the U.S.A. writes:

President Obama promised to VETO the National Defense Authorization Act, which permits imprisonment without trial for American citizens in violation of our Bill of Rights - and then he immediately broke his promise and signed the treasonous Bill.

Where is the honor in that lie to America and then discarding over 200 years of constitutional law?

If the President can't keep a promise made to his own country, what hope do foreign leaders have of him keeping promises to them?

Posted on Thu Dec 15, 2011

Perez Iyiola O. in Nigeria writes:

Barack Obama has lived up to his promise of 2008, to America and the World, to withdraw American Troops totally out of Iraq...This action is greatly appreciated by the whole World, and it has won Obama and his Administrative Team many great, unannounced medals of honours, integrity and celebration from the hearts of Global Watchers and Lovers of Democracy and Liberty for Human Rights from Tyranny, and haters of Terrorism around the globe...GOD has proven Obama as HIS Gift to AMERICA. If this man and his Administrative Teams and with their innovations, inspite of the contradictions of the Economic Depression which he inherited from his predecessor and the additional stifling environment visible to all the Earth created by his the opposition Party; I say, inspite of all, could still achieve that much in Conquests against Terrorism on the borders of AMERICA and such Tremendous Victories over Tyranny and Despotism around the World, in tune and resonance with The Passion of The AMERICA's FOUNDING FATHERS, of which we can never forget such names as Washington, Abraham Lincoln and few others but more relevantly in this regard, Franklin D Roosevelt(US) and Winston Churchill(Great Britain), the duo destroyers of the Terror of Adolf Hitler, a threat to the quantum leap of massive extermination of Peace from the Earth; So therefore in the same spirit of the America's Founding Fathers of sorting out despots and possible spreads of Terror to the rest of the World, and rooting them off before it's too late, Obama and his Administrative Teams and with their Enviable Innovations have achieved that much as we have all seen around the World in this regard in a short while of his first term, despite the Economic odds around them which they inherited, I foresee a great stunt this man and highly innovative, amiable and enviable Team of People of Integrity could pull on the AMERICA'S ECONOMY in his second term now that the WAR ON TERROR has gotten tremendous supports around the World much now than before,(courtesy of their Innovations by GOD'S ENDOWED GRACE), and his Administration is now withdrawing Armies(MASSIVE TROOPS) back home...The implications now are that, costs of war minimised, huge money saved to be pumped into AMERICA's ECONOMY, in creating more jobs in years ahead speedily now, more innovations of socio-economic developments to be embacked upon speedily in time of lesser wars in years ahead now...I am not a politician and never will be, but as an oracle(voice) of GOD, I hereby speak...I foresee a great future speedily for AMERICA and her People...I see a priceless, unbeatable winning ticket with OBAMA/CLINTON...Honestly I raise my voice above the rooftop, I am only speaking what I am seing in the spirit realm, which is truthful and faithful...So sorry I am not a politician, if I have offended anyone, forgive me...The future of AMERICA is more than a man...All here said is for the Explosion and Bloom of AMERICA to her Place securely in GOD on the Earth. I cannot but speak what GOD has revealed and shown unto me as HE gives me The Grace to do...I wish all AMERICANS and her Lovers, Merry Chrismas and Happy New year in advance...(for details of these my posts, you may check "BBC News" and "Washington Post" on their facebook posts on: end of war in Iraq also. There are other details there I put). Thank you all, for your obedience...It is well.

Posted on Thu Dec 15, 2011

Ashim C. in India writes:

He said this..he is doing this...he can and USA can

Posted on Thu Dec 15, 2011