Poll: Most Americans would trim liberties to be saferMeanwhile:
After a recent attempted terrorist attack set off a debate about full-body X-rays at airports, a new McClatchy-Ipsos poll finds that Americans lean more toward giving up some of their liberty in exchange for more safety.
The survey found 51 percent of Americans agreeing that "it is necessary to give up some civil liberties in order to make the country safe from terrorism."
At the same time, 36 percent agreed that "some of the government's proposals will go too far in restricting the public's civil liberties."
The rest were undecided or said their opinions would depend on circumstances.
The path down the road to perdition continues, especially in the USA where now some 54% of Americans believe torture is "often" or "sometimes" justified (an actual increment of 10% from June 2008).Security - Hallowed Be Thy Name.
So, my American friends ...In an older post on this same matter, I made the following conclusion:
Maybe you remain unfazed by all of this, your smug reasoning reassuring you that nothing like that could ever happen to you, that it is inconceivable that some "tracker" has been listening (or may yet still) to your most private conversations on the phone, or parsing through your emails, or credit card/bank statements, and so on.
Or maybe you remain approving of indiscriminate domestic spying, confident that such setting aside of constitutional rights serves the ultimate purpose of catching them evul ter'rists (which, as it turns out, is a false premise), while also being of the mind that such "accidental" abuses happen to others - never to you. In other words, you are one who would gladly proclaim "Security - Hallowed Be Thy Name" with much gratitude, patriotic fervor and conviction.
But regardless, how would you know whether or not you have been caught in the "wide-net" approach to electronic surveillance already adopted by Police and Security Agencies?
How would you possibly become aware that some faceless "tracker" is sharing all that was caught of your most private, intimate conversations - all the while sharing laughs with colleagues in so doing? That complete strangers have become quite familiar with your private life?
That faceless, shadowy men and women have been endowed with the power to act as nothing more than peeping toms, all-too-eager to watch and listen into every and all facets of your privacy, of your intimacy?
And how would you know whether or not you will be branded a security threat just because you went on strike, or because someone "out there" has decided that some of the books/newspapers/magazines that you read may be suspicious, or simply because you were overheard complaining about the government?
That is the question, isn't it?
(...)
All of the above once again demonstrate the harsh, ugly reality in this post-9/11 world driven by fear and the willingness to accept the ludicrous fallacy that we need to surrender "some" of our basic constitutional rights in order to improve security against terrorist attacks.
Yet always forgetting that abuse of security measures is as inevitable as the sun rising and setting - especially without any significant oversight, or even refusal of such.
Better wake up fast on your own and now, instead of being awaken by the thundering sound of jackboots just outside your home ... mere moments before your door is crashed open and you get picked up in a "pre-emptive security sweep".
Do you get it now?
Hence, it still remains to be established indeed whether we will stand up for our constitution, our democracy-based society, or let fear and paranoia sweep them away in lieu of authoritarianism - as we keep allowing our elected representatives to grant vast powers to security agencies.Well then - considering that the ever incremental costs in money and civil liberties is meant apparently to keep us safe from nefarious, evil terrorists like this s.o.b. ... I suppose it is safe to say that the results are now in - and it looks like it is indeed too late for us all.
More than ever, we better wake up before it is too little, too late ...
If it isn't already.
REPORT: Challenges To Constitutionality Of Health Reform Funded By Health Industry MoneySame old, same old.
Since Democrats secured 60 votes to pass health care reform legislation — and passage became inevitable — prominent conservatives relaunched an under-the-radar campaign to invalidate reform through the legal system. On the eve of the final health care vote in the Senate, Sens. Jim DeMint (R-SC) and John Ensign (R-NV) invoked a “constitutional point of order” to allow the Senate to rule by majority vote on whether the “Democrat health care takeover bill” is unconstitutional. Legislatures in approximately 14 states — organized by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a “business-friendly conservative group that coordinates activity among statehouses — have also introduced initiatives to ratify constitutional amendments that would repeal all or parts of the pending health care reform legislation, and Attorney Generals in at least 13 states are challenging a deal secured by Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) to fund Nebraska’s Medicaid expansion for perpetuity.In a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), the attorneys generals from South Carolina, Washington, Michigan, Texas, Colorado, Alabama, North Dakota, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Utah, Florida, Idaho and South Dakota “wrote that they consider the [Nebraska] provision ‘constitutionally flawed’ and demanded that it be stricken from the final bill.”
Yesterday, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) penned an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal explaining “Why the Health-Care Bills Are Unconstitutional.” “The policy issues may be coming to an end, but the legal issues are certain to continue because key provisions of this dangerous legislation are unconstitutional,” he wrote, and went on to challenge the constitutionality of the individual mandate, the so-called sweet heart deal for Nebraska, and the requirements for states to establish health insurance exchanges and insurance regulations.
The effort may prove a strong political organizing tool for conservative activists, but the legal reasoning has little support beyond the right fringe of the Republican party and the health care industry. Several weeks ago, the New York Times reported, “The states where the [constitutional] amendment has been introduced are also places where the health care industry has spent heavily on political contributions.” The industry has also contributed heavily to the campaigns of at least 7 of the 13 attorney generals threatening to sue the federal government over the Nebraska provision. (Campaign finance data was not readily accessible for the other 6 attorneys generals.)
An analysis conducted by the Wonk Room of available campaign finance disclosures for AGs from South Carolina, Washington, Michigan, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, Utah and Idaho reveals that the health industry contributed heavily to their campaigns. For instance, Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett (who is also running for Governor) accepted some $24,300 from the health care industry for his campaigns, including $10,300 from Pfizer PAC, $3,500 from Aetna Inc. PAC, and $2,500 from United Health Group Inc. Read the full analysis here.
Or this other one?During the Senate Finance Committee’s mark-up session of the health care reform bill today, Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) — who has had a hard time staying awake during these meetings — offered an amendment that would have delayed “a committee vote for two weeks.”
Bunning requested that the Committee put-off a vote on the health care bill until the final legislative language of the bill is made available on the Committee’s website for at least 72 hours. The amendment failed, with all of the Democrats except Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) voting against it. But had the amendment passed, it could potentially have halted the health care debate for weeks.
Before the vote took place, Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS) offered a defense of Bunning’s amendment by arguing that the 72-hour provision was critical because it provides time for senators to consult with health insurance lobbyists:
To be clear, Roberts is referring to health insurance lobbyists when he references the “people that the providers have hired to keep up with all of the legislation.”All the Senator from Kentucky is asking is for 72 hours to determine the cost. Senator Snowe has spoken eloquently about sunshine, and the openness, and the fact that the American people would support this 90 percent, 95 percent. But the thing that I’m trying to point out is we would have at least 72 hours for the people that the providers have hired to keep up with all of the legislation that we pass around here, and the regulations that we pass around here, to say “hey, wait a minute. Have you considered this?” And that’s all I’m asking for — is not only cost, but also the content of a bill. And that 72 hours, I think, is highly, highly important.
Back there, Transport Minister John Baird (yes - this same John Baird) was caught privately encouraging Canada's big airlines to step up their lobby campaign in order to kill a proposed "passenger bill of right" while his predecessor, then-Transport Minister Lawrence Cannon, publicly supported such legislation - in the name of the Harper government, of course.And the same applies with going to war (or not - and by the way: there are oil interests in Yemen, dontcha know), the use of military contractors (euphemism for mercenaries), stiffer crime and punishment (especially since many prisons are run by private corporations now), new transportation "rules" (of goods, of people - see above), outright slavery and so on and so forth.
(...) And here is the evidence to that effect (emphasis added):Transport Minister John Baird says he didn't pander to airlines with passenger bill"Working constructively with the airlines"? To kill the bill, yes indeed.
Transport Minister John Baird on Wednesday denied any collusion with the major airlines to stymie a passenger bill of rights, saying the government has simply "been working constructively" with the industry.
Internal government documents obtained by Canwest News Service show the transport minister's office privately pleaded with Canada's major airlines to step up their lobby campaign "to stop this motion in its tracks" even as the minister at the time, Lawrence Cannon, publicly supported it.
The motion passed unanimously in the House of Commons in June 2008 with the support of Cannon and Baird, who failed to bring forward legislation when he succeeded Cannon as transport minister in October 2008.
(...) Baird said there's nothing nefarious about the relationship, adding "we're been working constructively with the airlines."
Here is tangible proof again:
Let us pay closer attention to the very first sentence of the first highlighted paragraph in this email of Baird to airline VIPs:You're going to have to do some lobbying to stop this motion in its tracks.Now, let us look at this other sentence in the same email:If you don't lobby the grits and the Block, we're going to find ourselves in a position where we are outvoted by the Opposition Parties.So what do we have here?
A) a minister (Baird ) is telling airline VIPs what to do in order to kill a motion regarding a "passenger bill of rights";
B) said same minister (Baird), is explaining to those same airline VIPs why the minority government of which he is part can't by itself kill the motion, and thus explains why this requires airline lobbying of MPs from Opposition Parties in order to ensure that a majority of MPs would end up turning down the motion - all the while keeping the minority Harper government "in the clear". In other words: "help us help you".
Put A and B together, and what you have here is a bona fides "behind-the-door" (i.e. secret) agreement between two parties for a deceitful purpose.
A connivance.
And in the reality-based world we live in, folks, that is the very definition of collusion!
Period.
If for whatever reason you remain unconvinced of this, then here's the clincher (emphasis added):The (Harper minority) Conservative government launched Flight Rights Canada last September to inform air travellers of their rights, but only after airline executives reviewed several drafts, provided input, approved the final product, and signed off on the minister's speech to launch the program — a process that raised the ire of a top bureaucrat involved, the documents show.Once again, what we have here is "a secret agreement between two or more parties for a deceitful purpose".
(...) In the House of Commons, Baird confirmed Wednesday he doesn't support the bill, but defended the Tory record on the file, saying the government has "put forward new public policy" (Flight Rights) in the area of passenger rights.
A connivance.
A collusion.
I am all for a free market-based economy. Indeed, competition drives initiative and creativity, leading to better (or new) products as well as to better (or new) services, and henceforth to a better and greater choice for consummers. This in turn will usually translate well into job creation or maintenance, along with better salaries. And this in turn will usually translate into better individual spending powers and higher standards of living.What has happened throughout these past decades - and keeps happening - constitutes the first and foremost argument for the need to have companies and corporations to obey laws, just like every citizens. As I said above, call said laws "regulations" if you will - nevertheless, laws on due process of contract awarding through an appropriately regulated submission process, as well as rigorous boundaries imposed for the fulfillment of contracts, in addition to codified acceptable behavior by companies and corporations (as in our case) and corporate responsibility, are a matter of necessity for the continuity of our democratic societies founded upon the Rule of Law.
However, trusting in corporations to "do the right thing" with regards to the welfare of society, citizens, employees, et al., is pure nonsense. The reality is that companies and corporations live by one thing and one thing only: the bottom line. Hence, companies and corporations will do anything, regardless of whether they initially had good intentions or not, to keep profits not only high but also to increase them as well. In other words, companies and corporations will cheat, lie or steal, even go as far as to use spying, sabbotage and violence, as means to protect and increase their profit margins. This is simply the nature of the beast.
Therefore, just like societies need laws to place clear definitions of what is acceptable, non-criminal conduct for their citizens, so must there also be laws to place clear definitions of what is acceptable, non-criminal conduct for companies.
Some call these "regulations". I call these necessities, just like criminal laws for the citizenry. After all, laws serve to maintain the welfare, peace and prosperity of society overall.
Under the banner of this domestic unity and international legitimacy — and only after the Taliban refused to turn over Osama bin Laden — we sent our troops into Afghanistan.Oh, really?
Let us now take another look at the justifications put forth by the Bush administration for the Afghanistan war, as laid out by President Bush's address on October 7, 2001 (emphasis mine):Hope for change?"On my orders, the United States military has begun strikes against Al Qaeda terrorist training camps and military installations of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.Hence why the war in Afghanistan is deemed to this day a "just" war, meant to capture/destroy al Qaeda (especially their leader Osama bin Laden), the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks.
These carefully targeted actions are designed to disrupt the use of Afghanistan as a terrorist base of operations and to attack the military capability of the Taliban regime (...).
I gave Taliban leaders a series of clear and specific demands: Close terrorist training camps. Hand over leaders of the Al Qaeda network, and return all foreign nationals, including American citizens unjustly detained in our country.
None of these demands were met. And now, the Taliban will pay a price."
Putting aside the fact that the Taliban was never a terrorist organization to begin with, here are some interesting, seldom known, truths concerning the Taliban's "refusal" to hand over bin Laden:a) From September 28 to October 4, 2001, the Taliban negotiated and agreed to extradite bin Laden to Pakistan in order to place him before an international tribunal, with the court free to decide whether to try him on the spot or hand him over to America - but Pakistan President Musharraf killed the deal in the end;Ergo: in its (incompetent) desire to rush into war, the White House effectively lied about the Taliban's refusal to hand over bin Laden in order to cover up ... their desire to rush into war.
b) In the morning of October 7, 2001 (a few hours before Bush's address and the beginning of the war), the Taliban offered to try bin Laden themselves - but the White House rejected the offer;
c) On October 14, 2001, the Taliban offered to hand bin Laden over to the U.S., provided that proof was shown that he was responsible for 9/11 - but this offer was likewise flatly rejected by the White House.
Rumsfeld decision let Bin Laden escape: Senate reportGee ... really? Here's a little something from yours truly, back in October 2007 (emphasis added):
Osama bin Laden was "within the grasp" of US forces in late 2001 but escaped because then-defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld rejected calls for reinforcements, a hard-hitting US Senate report says.
The report, set for release Monday, is intended to help learn the lessons of the past as President Barack Obama prepares to announce a major escalation of the conflict, now in its ninth year, with up to 35,000 more US troops.
It points the finger directly at Rumsfeld for turning down requests for reinforcements as Bin Laden was trapped in December 2001 in caves and tunnels in a mountainous area of eastern Afghanistan known as Tora Bora.
"The vast array of American military power, from sniper teams to the most mobile divisions of the marine corps and the army, was kept on the sidelines," the report says.
"Instead, the US command chose to rely on airstrikes and untrained Afghan militias to attack Bin Laden and on Pakistan's loosely organized Frontier Corps to seal his escape routes."
Entitled "Tora Bora revisited: how we failed to get Bin Laden and why it matters today," the report -- commissioned by Senator John Kerry, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee -- says Bin Laden expected to die and had even written a will.
"But the Al-Qaeda leader would live to fight another day. Fewer than 100 American commandos were on the scene with their Afghan allies and calls for reinforcements to launch an assault were rejected.
"Requests were also turned down for US troops to block the mountain paths leading to sanctuary a few miles away in Pakistan.
"The decision not to deploy American forces to go after Bin Laden or block his escape was made by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and his top commander, General Tommy Franks," the report says.
"On or around December 16, two days after writing his will, Bin Laden and an entourage of bodyguards walked unmolested out of Tora Bora and disappeared into Pakistan's unregulated tribal area. Most analysts say he is still there today."
Rumsfeld's argument at the time, the report says, was that deploying too many American troops could jeopardize the mission by creating an anti-US backlash among the local populace.
The report dismisses arguments at the time from Franks, Vice President Dick Cheney and others defending the decision and arguing that the intelligence was inconclusive about Bin Laden's location.
"The review of existing literature, unclassified government records and interviews with central participants underlying this report removes any lingering doubts and makes it clear that Osama bin Laden was within our grasp at Tora Bora."
(...) We all know how this has been turning out so far:To put it more succintly, as yours truly did back in April of last year (emphasis added):(...) faced with the reality of this war and seeking to salvage the most out of it humanitarian-wise, the United Nations Security Council authorized an International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) for Afghanistan on 12/20/2001, which not only included N.A.T.O. forces but was also to be lead by N.A.T.O. itself. The ISAF's original peacekeeping mandate was for a duration of six months - however, partly because of the Taliban insurgency and partly because the U.S. has been "too busy" with its Iraq War since it began in 03/2003, the ISAF's mandate was thereafter extended in 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, and then extended anew until 03/2008 ... with talks already in the works for a further twelve month-extension beyond this date. In between, N.A.T.O. expanded its Afghanistan mission by increasing its forces in 2005 and in 2006 (including Canadian ones) - because its peacekeeping mission had transformed into a counter-insurgency one.In other words: due to the incompetence of Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld-Wolfowitz et al. (especially by their demonstrated incapacity to keep focused on the Afghan mission at hand and complete it soundly before moving on), N.A.T.O. had to change its peacekeeping/reconstruction mandate to full combat operations - because the Taliban and al-Qaeda were back in force (after being essentially allowed to flee to Pakistan in order to regroup), and enough to enact a significant insurgence at that. So in effect, N.A.T.O. ends up trying to finish the job the Bush administration should have completed to begin with, but instead botched - i.e. N.A.T.O. is trying to make up for the ludicrous mistakes of the demonstrated incompetence of Bush and Co..
(...)
Although having been successfully pushed out of power, the Taliban insurgency rages on in spite of the wishful thinking that it is weakening.
(...)
Osama bin Laden got away and is still in hiding, along with most of the al-Qaeda leadership - even if he and his organization were the prime justification for going into Afghanistan in the first place.
How so? The Powell Doctrine was already established and demonstrated after Desert Storm. But then the resident incompetents in the White House (Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz et al.) tossed it aside when they went into Afghanistan - especially because, as it has been revealed, they already had their sights on Iraq. So, they went in Afghanistan without massive deployments, made those stupid deals with the Afghan Warlords and their militias, contented themselves with routing the Taliban and al-Qaeda away from Khabul (and for the life of me, I never understood why no one figured out that the remnants of al-Qaeda and the Taliban would run into Pakistan and, consequently, take strategic steps to block off the border in order to prevent this - then again, they never had enough boots on the grounds to enact such a basic strategy to begin with - but I digress), and then they asked for U.N./N.A.T.O. help because they had begun occupying themselves with Iraq.
Conclusion: the Taliban and al-Qaeda have been back in force after being essentially allowed to flee to Pakistan and regroup, thanks to the mind-boggling incompetence of the Bush administration.Incompetence: always resulting into utter, neverending, FUBARs.
Or, in other words: this has been a policy of retreat from bin Laden and Afghanistan.
Oceans rising faster than expected as climate change exceeds grimmest modelsNo surprise there.
Since the 1997 international accord to fight global warming, climate change has worsened and accelerated — beyond some of the grimmest of warnings made back then.
As the world has talked for a dozen years about what to do next, new ship passages opened through the once frozen summer sea ice of the Arctic. In Greenland and Antarctica, ice sheets have lost trillions of tons of ice. Mountain glaciers in Europe, South America, Asia and Africa are shrinking faster than before.
And it's not just the frozen parts of the world that have felt the heat in the dozen years leading up to next month's climate summit in Copenhagen:
The world's oceans have risen by about an inch and a half.
Welcome to your Corporatocracy.
Hope you enjoy it ...
(Cross-posted from APOV)