By Don Feder
What’s even more absurd and futile than going to war to spread democracy and advance human rights? Intervention to stop regimes from “killing their own people.”
This is the sole rationale offered for Obama’s Libya excursion (Operation Odyssey Dawn even sounds like a Carnival Cruise ship) – to keep a tyrant from killing his own people.
British Prime Minister David Cameron declares: “Colonel Gaddafi has made this happen. We can not allow the slaughter of civilians to continue.”
While criticizing the way the mission was undertaken (and telling the president he “must do a better job of communicating to the American people”), House Speaker John Boehner – de facto chairman of the Obama Reelection Campaign – nevertheless insists: “It’s unacceptable and outrageous for Gaddafi to attack his own people, and the violence must stop.” From this beastly behavior, you will desist at once!
On March 19, Barack Obama said he had authorized a limited military action “to protect Libyan civilians.”
In the four decades Col. Gaddafi has been in power, how many of his “own people” do you think he’s murdered? In the past, we bombed him exactly once, not for killing his people but for killing our people – after the 1986 Berlin nightclub bombing, where two U.S. servicemen died.
The killing-his-own-people standard is applied with excruciating selectivity. The odds that we’ll keep a particular people from being butchered by a particular tyrant are comparable to winning the grand prize in a multi-state lottery.
• In 2009, Ahmadinejad was killing demonstrators in the streets of Tehran. As many as 150 died. Unlike the Libyan regime, nuclear-armed Iran really does pose a clear and present danger. Far from authorizing air strikes, it took our president weeks to work up the courage to condemn the slaughter.
• Over the course of three months in 1994, 800,000 Rwandans died in a tribal bloodbath. Other than offering humanitarian support – and singing “Toot, Toot Tutsi Goodbye!” – the West did nothing.
• On the night of June 3-4, 1989, the People’s Liberation Army liberated from their earthly existence 3,000 pro-democracy protestors in Tiananmen Square. Over the past decade, the regime has tortured to death an additional 3,400 of its own people who were members of the Falun Gong meditation cult. The PRC is our second largest trading partner and President Hu Jintao is an honored guest at the White House.
• During the 1990s, Kim Jong-Il, the evil madman who holds North Korea hostage, killed between 900,000 and 3.5 million of his own people in a state-sponsored famine. Instead of Tomahawk missiles up the keester, Kim got bribes to keep him from developing and/or proliferating nuclear weapons.
And still the administration, its media lackeys, and European amnesiacs offer the moral imperative of protecting Libyan civilians as the casus belli for the second most senseless humanitarian intervention this nation has undertaken.
The first came under another leftwing Democratic president. In 1999, then-President William Hefner Clinton dove into bed with the Islamists of the Kosovo Liberation Army. (Maybe he missed Monica.) In the 78 days we shocked and awed Yugoslavia, 3,000 civilians died.
We were there, Clinton informed us, to stop the ethnic cleansing of Albanian Muslims by Serbian Christians. When NATO turned Kosovo over to the KLA, none of the alleged mass graves were found. The ethnic cleansing came later, when victorious Albanians drove 277,000 Serbs from their homes, two-thirds of the province’s pre-war population.
In December 2010, a report by the Council of Europe charged Kosovo Prime Minister Hashim (the Snake) Thaci with harvesting the organs of Serb prisoners murdered for that purpose.
Aren’t humanitarian interventions fun?
Which brings us to the first intervention the community organizer can truly call his own. Operation Charlie Sheen is run by Barrack, Hillary, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and their joint chiefs of staff – Larry, Moe and Curly.
According to a story in the March 22 Washington Times, “observers” believe it will be hard to reach an agreement among coalition partners “given the divergence of opinion” about what they want to happen. (Gaddafi goes. Gaddafi stays but stops killing his own people. Gaddafi becomes a contestant on Dancing With the Stars.) Our French coalition partners are confused. They don't know who to surrender to.
Obama got us into this mess armed with a resolution of the U.N. Security Council (10-0 vote, with China and Russia abstaining) and an “Allah-be-praised” from the Arab League, whose members are willing to sit back and see the infidels bloody the tyrant for the sake of the jihadists.
I didn’t know Article I Section 8 of the United States Constitution gives the U.N. Security Council and the Arab League the power to declare war. That must mean the European Union has the authority to levy taxes, the power to confirm judicial appointments is vested in the Organization of the Islamic Conference and the Grand Duchy of Fenwick enforces U.S. immigration law.
In some ways, Libya isn’t as bad as the Egyptian intervention, in others, much worse. (We didn’t bomb the Egyptian Army because then-President Hosni Mubarak was killing his own people.)
Mubarak was definitely our bastard.
Caroline Glick writes in a March 21 column in The Jerusalem Post: “Under Mubarak, Egypt advanced U.S. interests in two main ways. First by waging war against the Muslim Brotherhood and opposing the rise of Iranian power in the region, Mubarak weakened regional forces that most threatened U.S. interests. Second, by managing the Suez Canal in conformance with international maritime law, Egypt facilitated the smooth transport of petroleum products to global markets and prevented Iran from operating in the Mediterranean Sea.”
Thanks to our Special-Olympics intervention, the Muslim Brotherhood is now the most powerful political force in the nation, as the March 19 referendum on constitutional amendments demonstrated.
Egypt’s newly appointed foreign minister has called for opening the nation’s border with Hamas-infested Gaza, to facilitate the flow of arms. And Egypt’s ruling coalition is allowing Iranian ships – carrying weapons to Hamas – to traverse the Suez Canal without being inspected. Where do you think Palestinian terrorists (a redundancy, I know) got the long-range Iranian Grad-type rockets they recently fired into Be’er Sheva?
Isn’t intervention fun?
Unlike Mubarak, you can’t say the Colonel is our bastard. (Reagan called him a “mad dog.”) But for the past 15 years or so, he’s been a remarkably well-behaved bastard. After 9/11, he saw which way the wind was blowing over the sand dunes, gave up his WMD programs, renounced terrorism, paid billions in reparations to the families of the victims of the Lockerbie bombing and acted as a bulwark against al-Qaeda in his region (out of self-interest to be sure).
On the other side of the Libyan civil war, the rebels are supported by al-Qaeda. The U.S. Military Academy at West Point’s Combating Terrorism Center notes that most of the Libyans fighting our forces in Iraq come from rebel strongholds.
As of Tuesday, we had fired 161 Tomahawk cruise missiles at Gaddafi’s military installations, each costing $1.16 million. It will cost an estimated $400 million to $800 million just to establish the no-fly zone, and as much as $100 million a week to maintain it.
This is small change compared to the cost of Iraq and Afghanistan – denominated in dollars and blood.
March 20 marked the 8th anniversary of our long march into the Iraq morass. The net result: 4,500 dead Americans, 67,500 dead Iraqis and 50,000 troops still stationed in the country. The Congressional Budget Office estimates the cost of Operation Enduring Bankruptcy, projected through 2017 (the target date of our withdrawal), at $2.4 trillion – somewhere around 17% of the current National Debt.
We deep-sixed Saddam, killed a lot of terrorists and gave Iraq the semblance of democracy – which will last until the last U.S. soldier departs. The loveable Iraqis reciprocated by killing and terrorizing the nation’s Christian population.
Going into Iraq was probably the right thing to do. (I’m having doubts about that too.) Staying for 8 years seems a folly comparable to Napoleon’s invasion of Russia.
But why run just one war when you can do two simultaneously? Afghanistan has cost over 1,550 American lives and $101 billion so far. Obama increased our troop strength to 100,000. Last year, terrorist attacks increased 64% and 2,777 civilians died.
If Iraq is Mission Impossible, Afghanistan has become Mission The-Road-to-Hell-is-Paved-With-Good-Intensions. In the 19th century it was a British graveyard. In the 1970s and 80s, it was Moscow’s mausoleum.
Its denizens are the raw material for democracy the way Mel Gibson is in line for a brotherhood award.
The Roman Empire bled to death on hundreds of foreign battlefields. (Its politicians helped at home, with taxes and inflation. Sound familiar?) Is there a Latin term for mission creep?
Obama’s Libyan adventure will be worth the cost if it sparks an authentic, no-holds-barred, everything-on-the-table debate about military interventions.
Humanitarian intervention (stop-him-from-killing-his-own-people), intervention to spread democracy and uphold human rights (as Bush ’43 so cluelessly put it in his second inaugural address, “The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in our world”) make as much sense as Obama’s Shiite health care program.
There is one, and only one, reason to use the U.S. military overseas. It’s called Operation You-Better-Be-Damn-Sure-Our-National-Interests-Are-At-Stake.
Operation Odyssey Dawn will go down in history as one of the high points in a presidency that has brought us unemployment hovering around 10%, a 21.4% increase in federal spending, the only three trillion-plus budget deficits, the federal abandonment of traditional marriage, race-based justice and suing Arizona for trying to keep out criminal aliens.
Will Barack Obama do more damage domestically or with his defense/foreign policy? It will be close – very close.
Don Feder is a former Boston Herald writer who is now a political/communications consultant. He also maintains his own website, DonFeder.com
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Thursday, March 24, 2011
OBAMA WAGES WAR ON MIDDLE CLASS
Obama's War on the Middle Class
By Jeffrey Folks
Whenever he is in campaign mode, President Obama goes to great lengths to remind voters that he is "struggling to defend the middle class." As he did in January 2010, Obama speaks of the middle class as "under assault" (by whom he does not specify). In his Labor Day radio address of 2010, he spoke of his "commitment to the middle class." As evidence of this commitment, Obama established a "Middle Class Task Force" early in his presidency chaired by Vice-President Biden. With Biden in charge, why worry?
It should be obvious that Obama and the left wing of the Democratic Party are not struggling to defend the middle class. Most of the time they are struggling to disenfranchise it by ignoring the basic rights of human liberty and of property that are guaranteed under our Constitution.
The 18% real rate of unemployment during Obama's first two years in office has not done much for the middle class. At the same time, there has been an enormous transfer of wealth from the middle class to the underclass. ObamaCare, financial services reform, mortgage reform, education reform, tax reform: in all of these areas, the administration's efforts have been to create and expand services for the poor at the expense of the middle class.
Whether it is the free health care promised to tens of millions of new Medicaid recipients or mortgage principle reductions ("cramdowns") promoted at every turn by his Justice Department, Obama acts like a political general in the class war -- the war of the government services-dependent poor and unionized public sector against the middle class. Among the first acts of his administration were the expansion "making work pay" and child credit benefits: welfare of the sort that had been trimmed by the GOP Congresses of the 1990s.
Whether it is benefits for the underclass or more power for public sector unions, Obama is intent on cementing power based on the loyal support of the underclass and unionized labor. But to complete the task, he must deceive the middle classes for a bit longer by appearing to move to the center. The independent middle class voter, the very class of citizen that is most endangered by his presidency, is key to his reelection. In order to win reelection, he convince them he is safe.
But nothing Obama has done has benefited the middle class. That much should be clear just from what is happening with consumers' pocketbooks.
The recent Bureau of Labor Statistics report on consumer prices is a telling indication of the effects of Obama's policies on the middle class. During the past 12 months, gas prices are up nearly 20%. While global markets largely determine oil prices, Obama's assault on drilling and his weak-dollar policy have not helped things. Had the President pursued a pro-drilling policy and defended the dollar, gas prices would have been substantially lower. Even at this late date, if the administration were to signal support for expanded drilling, world energy markets would respond by lowering the price of oil, thus lowering the price the middle class pays at the pump.
Gas prices hit the middle class disproportionately hard. Bill Gates spends an infinitesimal portion of his earnings on energy bills, and the urban underclass pay little. But the middle class, most of whom commute some distance to work, are shelling out a great deal more each month. The same for food prices, which are up substantially above the "core rate" of inflation. The underclass benefit from increased food stamp subsidies; Gates has probably never shopped. It is the middle class that bears all the burdens under Obama.
The passage of ObamaCare was supposed to lower the cost of health care for practically all Americans. This, in fact, was one of the main rationales for its adoption. Again and again, Obama promised that his health care reform bill would lower the cost of health care -- by $100 billion (he likes big round numbers, for some reason), by $200 billion, by $500 billion over the next ten years.
But since ObamaCare was passed, health care costs for the middle class are way up. Over the past 12 months the cost of private medical insurance, where it can be purchased at all, is up by as much as 59%. Hospital costs are up 6%, nearly three times the rate of core inflation. The cost of the most widely prescribed drugs has increased well above the rate of inflation, driven up by the prospect of future government regulation. None of this has helped the middle class. It is, in fact, part and parcel of a calculated transfer of wealth from the middle class to the underclass.
It's not just energy and health care. Other prices that are influenced by government policy have gone up disproportionately to those in the less regulated market. Educational expenses are up 4%, twice the rate of core inflation. Again, it is the middle class that has been hit. College tuition, private school tuition, and child care -- these costs impact the middle class, not the Warren Buffets of the world, and not the underclass who receive full "need based" scholarships, magnet school preferences, and subsidized child care.
It does not help that, as announced Monday, sales of previously owned homes fell in February to their worst level in nine years. Middle-class homeowners who are now under water on their loans will have to wait a bit longer to break even. Boomers eyeing a place in the sun are going to have a hard time selling their current home before moving.
As Obama understands all too well, one of the hallmarks of all socialist countries is the absence of an independent middle class. From the Bolshevik experiment in Russia to socialist Venezuela today, it is necessary for communist leaders to eliminate that class of citizens who are not dependent on government for their welfare.
Political theorists from Aristotle to Locke understood that a truly independent and prosperous middle class was essential to the collective well-being of any society. The middle class has always, in every society, been characterized by qualities of social restraint and economic realism -- a shrewd and skeptical conservatism that serves to restrain the grandiose plans of utopian revolutionaries and embittered reactionaries alike.
Throughout its history American society in particular has been the beneficiary of an aspiring middle class whose efforts have created the world's greatest democracy. It is an ominous sign that the political left, with the loyal support of more than a third of our population, is intent on its destruction.
Jeffrey Folks is the author of many books and article on American culture.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By Jeffrey Folks
Whenever he is in campaign mode, President Obama goes to great lengths to remind voters that he is "struggling to defend the middle class." As he did in January 2010, Obama speaks of the middle class as "under assault" (by whom he does not specify). In his Labor Day radio address of 2010, he spoke of his "commitment to the middle class." As evidence of this commitment, Obama established a "Middle Class Task Force" early in his presidency chaired by Vice-President Biden. With Biden in charge, why worry?
It should be obvious that Obama and the left wing of the Democratic Party are not struggling to defend the middle class. Most of the time they are struggling to disenfranchise it by ignoring the basic rights of human liberty and of property that are guaranteed under our Constitution.
The 18% real rate of unemployment during Obama's first two years in office has not done much for the middle class. At the same time, there has been an enormous transfer of wealth from the middle class to the underclass. ObamaCare, financial services reform, mortgage reform, education reform, tax reform: in all of these areas, the administration's efforts have been to create and expand services for the poor at the expense of the middle class.
Whether it is the free health care promised to tens of millions of new Medicaid recipients or mortgage principle reductions ("cramdowns") promoted at every turn by his Justice Department, Obama acts like a political general in the class war -- the war of the government services-dependent poor and unionized public sector against the middle class. Among the first acts of his administration were the expansion "making work pay" and child credit benefits: welfare of the sort that had been trimmed by the GOP Congresses of the 1990s.
Whether it is benefits for the underclass or more power for public sector unions, Obama is intent on cementing power based on the loyal support of the underclass and unionized labor. But to complete the task, he must deceive the middle classes for a bit longer by appearing to move to the center. The independent middle class voter, the very class of citizen that is most endangered by his presidency, is key to his reelection. In order to win reelection, he convince them he is safe.
But nothing Obama has done has benefited the middle class. That much should be clear just from what is happening with consumers' pocketbooks.
The recent Bureau of Labor Statistics report on consumer prices is a telling indication of the effects of Obama's policies on the middle class. During the past 12 months, gas prices are up nearly 20%. While global markets largely determine oil prices, Obama's assault on drilling and his weak-dollar policy have not helped things. Had the President pursued a pro-drilling policy and defended the dollar, gas prices would have been substantially lower. Even at this late date, if the administration were to signal support for expanded drilling, world energy markets would respond by lowering the price of oil, thus lowering the price the middle class pays at the pump.
Gas prices hit the middle class disproportionately hard. Bill Gates spends an infinitesimal portion of his earnings on energy bills, and the urban underclass pay little. But the middle class, most of whom commute some distance to work, are shelling out a great deal more each month. The same for food prices, which are up substantially above the "core rate" of inflation. The underclass benefit from increased food stamp subsidies; Gates has probably never shopped. It is the middle class that bears all the burdens under Obama.
The passage of ObamaCare was supposed to lower the cost of health care for practically all Americans. This, in fact, was one of the main rationales for its adoption. Again and again, Obama promised that his health care reform bill would lower the cost of health care -- by $100 billion (he likes big round numbers, for some reason), by $200 billion, by $500 billion over the next ten years.
But since ObamaCare was passed, health care costs for the middle class are way up. Over the past 12 months the cost of private medical insurance, where it can be purchased at all, is up by as much as 59%. Hospital costs are up 6%, nearly three times the rate of core inflation. The cost of the most widely prescribed drugs has increased well above the rate of inflation, driven up by the prospect of future government regulation. None of this has helped the middle class. It is, in fact, part and parcel of a calculated transfer of wealth from the middle class to the underclass.
It's not just energy and health care. Other prices that are influenced by government policy have gone up disproportionately to those in the less regulated market. Educational expenses are up 4%, twice the rate of core inflation. Again, it is the middle class that has been hit. College tuition, private school tuition, and child care -- these costs impact the middle class, not the Warren Buffets of the world, and not the underclass who receive full "need based" scholarships, magnet school preferences, and subsidized child care.
It does not help that, as announced Monday, sales of previously owned homes fell in February to their worst level in nine years. Middle-class homeowners who are now under water on their loans will have to wait a bit longer to break even. Boomers eyeing a place in the sun are going to have a hard time selling their current home before moving.
As Obama understands all too well, one of the hallmarks of all socialist countries is the absence of an independent middle class. From the Bolshevik experiment in Russia to socialist Venezuela today, it is necessary for communist leaders to eliminate that class of citizens who are not dependent on government for their welfare.
Political theorists from Aristotle to Locke understood that a truly independent and prosperous middle class was essential to the collective well-being of any society. The middle class has always, in every society, been characterized by qualities of social restraint and economic realism -- a shrewd and skeptical conservatism that serves to restrain the grandiose plans of utopian revolutionaries and embittered reactionaries alike.
Throughout its history American society in particular has been the beneficiary of an aspiring middle class whose efforts have created the world's greatest democracy. It is an ominous sign that the political left, with the loyal support of more than a third of our population, is intent on its destruction.
Jeffrey Folks is the author of many books and article on American culture.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
TRUE HISTORY OF OBA-HUSSEIN'S (mythical) PALESTINIAN BUDDIES
Back in early days of AntiMullah in 2006, we wrote and posted an in-depth article on the Palestinians.
I am not Jewish so had no personal axe to grind and just wanted to bring out the truth - whatever it was.
This is now in the old Archives, which Google apparently strips of formatting to reduce storage space.
Makes reading it a bit more difficult as it is now one long paragraph but all the information, still all valid, is there.
http://noiri.blogspot.com/2006/08/u-p-d-t-e-d-palestinians-pure.html
For those interested in the progression of certain Middle East /Iran matters from pre-site 2004/05 posts transfered over and for most of 2006 before it became too burdensome to continue the special section, now click on the Archives link below to have a look at some interesting background articles:
http://view-archive-contents.blogspot.com/
I am not Jewish so had no personal axe to grind and just wanted to bring out the truth - whatever it was.
This is now in the old Archives, which Google apparently strips of formatting to reduce storage space.
Makes reading it a bit more difficult as it is now one long paragraph but all the information, still all valid, is there.
http://noiri.blogspot.com/2006/08/u-p-d-t-e-d-palestinians-pure.html
For those interested in the progression of certain Middle East /Iran matters from pre-site 2004/05 posts transfered over and for most of 2006 before it became too burdensome to continue the special section, now click on the Archives link below to have a look at some interesting background articles:
http://view-archive-contents.blogspot.com/
=================
The Fogel family murders and Palestinian rejoicing photos
Thursday, March 10, 2011
HISTORY OF MOHAMMAD & ISLAM
FULL ARTICLE: LONG & DETAILED
http://www.bibleprobe.com/muhammad.htm
Christians & Jewish martyrs say; "I will die for what I believe".
A Muslim martyr says; "you will die for what I believe"....
Muhammad led 27 military campaigns against innocent villages and caravans & planned 38 others
“I am the prophet that laughs when killing my enemies.” (Hadith)
We apologize to anyone who may be offended by the history of the founder of Islam (Muhammad) below. And we are aware of the sensitivities involved. However, infinitely more damage has been done to Islam's "believers" by Islam's history of withholding the truth about its founder to them -- - and the circumstances surrounding its inception -- than any "damage" this true history below can cause.
http://www.bibleprobe.com/muhammad.htm
Christians & Jewish martyrs say; "I will die for what I believe".
A Muslim martyr says; "you will die for what I believe"....
Muhammad led 27 military campaigns against innocent villages and caravans & planned 38 others
“I am the prophet that laughs when killing my enemies.” (Hadith)
We apologize to anyone who may be offended by the history of the founder of Islam (Muhammad) below. And we are aware of the sensitivities involved. However, infinitely more damage has been done to Islam's "believers" by Islam's history of withholding the truth about its founder to them -- - and the circumstances surrounding its inception -- than any "damage" this true history below can cause.
Saturday, March 5, 2011
REAL ID ACT
By Tom DeWeese
How the U.S. Government Forged a Surveillance Society
On September 12, 2001, President George W. Bush invited members of Congress and the media for a meeting in the cabinet room of the White House. The mood was understandably anxious, somber: The World Trade Center lay in rubble, the Pentagon had a hole gouged into it and shock and awe had settled over the United States. One of the most extraordinary periods of American history � what would come to be known as the "Post 9-11 Era" � was beginning.
The president gravely laid out the situation and the steps his administration would take to secure the homeland, but during the course of the meeting he also made this significant declaration: "We will not allow this enemy to win the war by changing our way of life or restricting our freedoms."
Those were heroic words of principle and patriotism in a traumatic time, but history would show that government's reaction to the terrorist threat was the exact opposite than the protection of freedoms. Instead, government rushed in with a massive plan to create a surveillance society, intending to watch and document every action by the American people as a means of ultimate security.
First, Congress passed the Patriot Act, giving law enforcement powers to circumvent many Constitutional guarantees to personal privacy and home security. Then Congress created the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The department immediately became an army of more than 170,000 employees by combining twenty two existing federal agencies, including the
Border Patrol, Coast Guard, Secret Service, FEMA, Immigration and Naturalization Service, Customs Service, Animal and Plant Health Inspection, Federal Protective Service, FBI's Computer Incident Response Center and several more lesser agencies of the same type. In the middle of this rush for security, Congress created the Transportation Security Agency (TSA). Also born in this Post 9/11 era were state fusion centers with the intention of combining federal, state and local law enforcement agencies into instant response teams, intending to eliminate bureaucratic overlap and red tape, in case of another terrorist attack or Hurricane Katrina-type disasters.
Finally, Congress passed the REAL ID Act, promoted as an attempt to standardize the process and format for creation of all state drivers' licenses to achieve increased security. Proponents argued that, under REAL ID, we will know that anyone carrying a drivers' license is legal in this country and therefore not a threat.
What most Americans do not know is that the blue print for REAL ID did not originate in the United States, but in the backrooms of a United Nations organization called the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). That organization is tasked with the goal of creating a once-size fits all international identification system using massive data banks that contain individual biometric information on nearly everyone in the world. Biometrics is defined as measurement of the body. One might correctly think of fingerprinting, iris scans and facial recognition as biometrics.
In compliance to this goal, REAL ID mandates a certain picture quality for all drivers' licenses. Those photos are to comply with the ICAO's Document 9303 biometric format. Your photo taken by a local DMV is run through special software which measures and analyzes the unique identifiable characteristics of your face. The process results in a unique numeric code which identifies a person according to facial measurements. In other words, under REAL ID, using the adopted standard of the ICAO, your face is reduced to a number code, a number which is read by a computer and be tracked by surveillance cameras worldwide.
Why would the United States agree to implement such a system? What happened to the promise that we would not let the terrorists change our way of life? How did the United States move from a free society, bent on preserving our freedoms in a dangerous terrorist-driven world to one of total surveillance over the actions of every citizen? What was the unseen hand that led to such decisions?
The international focus on drivers' licenses through REAL ID came as a result of plans for international biometric passports. Passports, of course, are a control device of travelers both coming and going through US borders. Discussion regarding the use of E-Passports started soon after 9/11. It was not until the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act of 2002 that our federal government put in place the framework for the issuance of E-Passports. E-Passports utilize both biometric technology and RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology.
Focusing on passports, however, was about to create an international problem for the US government that would force it to accelerate and expand its surveillance plans, leading to a global surveillance system beyond what most in Congress intended.
Using the excuse that the US government wanted to learn as much about Al- Qaeda as possible, the US began to dictate to foreign governments that they also needed to implement E-Passports. Without them, said the US, their citizens would not be able to enter the US. In addition, the US wanted those nations to provide all information they had on Al-Qaeda members.
Meanwhile, the United Nations set up a committee named simply "Al-Qaeda". Again, the stated goal was for all nations to cooperate in an Al-Qaeda clearing house of information. Each government was to provide the names of the members of Al-Qaeda that the respective governments were aware of.
What became obvious to many in our government was, if we expected information about citizens of other countries our government was also going to have to "ante up" and provide information about our citizens to the other nations. This is when things started to get out of control. Global information sharing was seen as a necessity. All "chips" were on the table. For the system to work the personal and sensitive information, including the biometrics of all citizens in all countries, had to be made available to intelligence and law enforcement people around the world.
Other nations resented the United States telling them that they must supply information about their citizens if the US wasn't willing to do the same. The US was forced to comply with its own dictates. And so the drive was on for the creation
of an international surveillance system. REAL ID, while not recommended by the 9/11 Commission, became the center piece for the drive to document each and every American and placed their biometric records in international data bases.
The Real ID Act of 2005 was signed into law in May, 2005. The rulemaking process took roughly 2 1⁄2 years to be completed. During that 2 1⁄2 years over six hundred groups and organizations came out against the law for a variety of reasons. These groups covered a broad political spectrum from the far right to the far left. Religious organizations representing all major religions spoke out against the Real ID Act.
Among the reasons for such overwhelming opposition is that Real ID is an unfunded federal mandate; the federal government intervening in the issuance of state driver's licenses; the unfettered power Real ID provides the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security; a variety of privacy concerns; First Amendment religious concerns of which many were by Christian evangelical ministries; the state driver's license would become a de facto national identification card; and the requirement that each driver's license applicant would provide biometric samples.
In order for a state to be in compliance with the law, each state has 18 "benchmarks" they must complete or satisfy the Department of Homeland Security that the state is working towards completing the individual benchmarks. Opposition has been strong as 25 states, either as a result of law or resolution, opposed the Real ID Act. Because of the opposition, the Real ID Act implementation date has been postponed twice. However, proponents are determined to force implementation anyway and DHS demands that states comply by May, 2011.
If enforced, Americans will find what the saying "under government's thumb" really means. Biometric documents will be required for nearly every action Americans take. A digital/electronic footprint will be the only way to access bank accounts; accessing transportation (at any level); purchase of goods and services; obtaining employment; and so forth. Every one of these actions will be stored in databanks and transferred to international databanks for storage.
Along with REAL ID, more legislation is pending in Congress to create even more control, all sold as just another way to keep us secure. One piece calls for a "National Worker's Identification Card" and Senator Lieberman wants a new biometric social security card. If these proposals are passed into law and Real ID or anything else similar is in place it will be "game over". Employers and retailers will have to have biometric readers and RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) scanners.
In addition, American law enforcement is being changed and with it, America's unique justice system is being changed too. Once law enforcements mission was to catch criminals after a crime was committed. And even those captured were protected as"innocent until proven guilty." That Constitutionally-protected rights made American justice unlike any other in the world. It has been one of the cornerstones of American freedom and security over freedoms and the less-certain future they offer.
We must remember that the stated goal for the total surveillance system has been that the world would be as one, carrying the same documents to assure everyone is equal, everyone is known, and everyone is legitimate. Under the system, say the proponents, security can be guaranteed.
So now the surveillance system is nearly fully in place. What are the results? Are we safer? The fact is, with all of the biometric data bases being established, RFID chips, Closed Circuit TVs, Automatic License Plate Readers, National Security Letters, State Fusion Centers, the Patriot Act, and the establishment of the behemoth Department of Homeland Security, we are not any safer than we were on the day before 9/11.
Why? First, while the government increases surveillance over every individual in he name of protection from terrorists, our borders remain wide open. Anyone wanting to do harm to the United States is able to simply walk into the country and be aided by an entire network providing shelter, money, weapons, and access to American programs for money, schools and jobs. They can illegally purchase counterfeit birth certificates and social security cards and obtain state drivers' licenses in any state. Only three states have the ability to authenticates birth certificates.
Programs like E-Verify, sold as a way to guarantee that only legal residents get jobs, actually aid those entering illegally. It makes the Social Security Number the most valuable commodity in the nation � a valuable prize. That makes it profitable for underground criminal networks to obtain and produce them. Terrorists networks have the means and the money to lead that effort. In addition, a study commissioned by DHS and performed by Westat reported that E-Verify is wrong more than it is right when dealing with a person in our country illegally is vetted out. In these situations E-Verify is wrong 54% of the time and right only 46% of the time.
And there is one more fact that renders the entire surveillance effort worthless in the fight against terrorism. Back to those E-Passports and the US demand for other nations to comply. The whole
Under REAL ID and the growing surveillance society, however, law enforcements mission is emerging to be one of "crime prevention" before it occurs. The only way such a policy could work is for government to be able to observe our every action, including monitoring phone calls, opening mail, monitor our financial transactions, monitor who we associate with and monitor our travel. The government has programs to achieve each and every one of these things. DHS and National Security Agency (NSA) have both engaged in domestic spying. The Defense Department had a program called "Total Information Awareness" (TIA) that was designed to combine and access all of the video cameras now in place in nearly every store, shopping mall and parking lot to monitor every move we make. Now on the back burner, TIA could be reactivated at any time. All that is missing is the final requirement that all Americans must carry in their pockets the document tying them into the system � the REAL ID drivers' license.
Once fully implemented, REAL ID means a "one-size fits all" policy, leading to the end of Constitutionally- protected First and Fourth Amendment rights. Proponents believe "safety" trumps "freedom" and any cost. With full implementation of REAL ID, government will finally have the laws, technologies and the ability governments throughout history have always sought to exercise total control over the people. Yet many Americans still refuse to be alarmed, seeking safety program depends on honest, reliable governments producing honest, reliable, secure documents on their own citizens. They don't.
Many Moslem countries in the Middle East consider the US to be their enemy.Pakistan's government, for one, while pretending to be our ally, is full of government workers who are either friends or members of Al- Qaeda. They have helped hide Al-Qaeda leaders since the inception of the war on terrorism. It is a known fact by US intelligence agents. Any effort made by the US to coordinate strategy with such governments fails because plans are immediately shared with the enemy by such government workers. The internal politics of these countries put the governments in an untenable position. If the leaders of these countries are perceived to be working with U.S. intelligence officials there is blowback against them for working with the "Infidels" of the United States. As a result, information from these nations, to this day, is at best questionable and unreliable.
To rely on such countries to provide honest documentation for citizens by way of passports or other identification is pure folly. It is easy for government employees to provide Al- Qaeda operatives all the "legitimate" documentation they need to travel freely inside the surveillance bubble that has been established to supposedly catch them.
Any honest observer or government leader dealing with the situation on a daily basis has to know the truth � that REAL ID and its fellow programs are not about protecting us in the war on terror. So what is the real purpose? What are we really doing?
The fact is Real ID is designed to enroll every citizen into a single global system of identification and financial control. Doubt that � then consider these words of Robert Mocny speaking for DHS when he said, "information sharing is appropriate around the world," and DHS plans to create a "Global Security Envelope of internationally shared biometric data that would permanently link individuals with biometric ID, personal information held by governments and corporations."
Meanwhile, Julian Ashborn speaking as the Chairman of the International Biometric Agency said, "What information do governments share? With whom is my data shared and why?" All of these questions need to be addressed by an agency with global powers"
These officials are telling openly telling us what they plan � global governance. Americans are just not listening. The truth is we are not safe. And such a system will never make us safe. But what we have done in the name of safety is to create an international surveillance system that destroys the unique American system of liberty and justice, "harmonizing" us into the same totalitarian system that controls so much of the rest of the world.
It can be stopped now- before it is fully implemented.
But once REAL ID is enforced in every state through compliant drivers' licenses, it will be too late. Every American who cherishes their Constitutionally- guaranteed rights have until May of this year to demand that their state governments stand strong and continue to oppose compliance with this international straight jacket. Our protests postponed it for several years. We must do it again.
Call now or understand that, once in place, there will be no way for this generation to pass freedom to the next. REAL ID is that great a threat.
Distributed by www.worldviewweekend.com
How the U.S. Government Forged a Surveillance Society
On September 12, 2001, President George W. Bush invited members of Congress and the media for a meeting in the cabinet room of the White House. The mood was understandably anxious, somber: The World Trade Center lay in rubble, the Pentagon had a hole gouged into it and shock and awe had settled over the United States. One of the most extraordinary periods of American history � what would come to be known as the "Post 9-11 Era" � was beginning.
The president gravely laid out the situation and the steps his administration would take to secure the homeland, but during the course of the meeting he also made this significant declaration: "We will not allow this enemy to win the war by changing our way of life or restricting our freedoms."
Those were heroic words of principle and patriotism in a traumatic time, but history would show that government's reaction to the terrorist threat was the exact opposite than the protection of freedoms. Instead, government rushed in with a massive plan to create a surveillance society, intending to watch and document every action by the American people as a means of ultimate security.
First, Congress passed the Patriot Act, giving law enforcement powers to circumvent many Constitutional guarantees to personal privacy and home security. Then Congress created the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The department immediately became an army of more than 170,000 employees by combining twenty two existing federal agencies, including the
Border Patrol, Coast Guard, Secret Service, FEMA, Immigration and Naturalization Service, Customs Service, Animal and Plant Health Inspection, Federal Protective Service, FBI's Computer Incident Response Center and several more lesser agencies of the same type. In the middle of this rush for security, Congress created the Transportation Security Agency (TSA). Also born in this Post 9/11 era were state fusion centers with the intention of combining federal, state and local law enforcement agencies into instant response teams, intending to eliminate bureaucratic overlap and red tape, in case of another terrorist attack or Hurricane Katrina-type disasters.
Finally, Congress passed the REAL ID Act, promoted as an attempt to standardize the process and format for creation of all state drivers' licenses to achieve increased security. Proponents argued that, under REAL ID, we will know that anyone carrying a drivers' license is legal in this country and therefore not a threat.
What most Americans do not know is that the blue print for REAL ID did not originate in the United States, but in the backrooms of a United Nations organization called the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). That organization is tasked with the goal of creating a once-size fits all international identification system using massive data banks that contain individual biometric information on nearly everyone in the world. Biometrics is defined as measurement of the body. One might correctly think of fingerprinting, iris scans and facial recognition as biometrics.
In compliance to this goal, REAL ID mandates a certain picture quality for all drivers' licenses. Those photos are to comply with the ICAO's Document 9303 biometric format. Your photo taken by a local DMV is run through special software which measures and analyzes the unique identifiable characteristics of your face. The process results in a unique numeric code which identifies a person according to facial measurements. In other words, under REAL ID, using the adopted standard of the ICAO, your face is reduced to a number code, a number which is read by a computer and be tracked by surveillance cameras worldwide.
Why would the United States agree to implement such a system? What happened to the promise that we would not let the terrorists change our way of life? How did the United States move from a free society, bent on preserving our freedoms in a dangerous terrorist-driven world to one of total surveillance over the actions of every citizen? What was the unseen hand that led to such decisions?
The international focus on drivers' licenses through REAL ID came as a result of plans for international biometric passports. Passports, of course, are a control device of travelers both coming and going through US borders. Discussion regarding the use of E-Passports started soon after 9/11. It was not until the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act of 2002 that our federal government put in place the framework for the issuance of E-Passports. E-Passports utilize both biometric technology and RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology.
Focusing on passports, however, was about to create an international problem for the US government that would force it to accelerate and expand its surveillance plans, leading to a global surveillance system beyond what most in Congress intended.
Using the excuse that the US government wanted to learn as much about Al- Qaeda as possible, the US began to dictate to foreign governments that they also needed to implement E-Passports. Without them, said the US, their citizens would not be able to enter the US. In addition, the US wanted those nations to provide all information they had on Al-Qaeda members.
Meanwhile, the United Nations set up a committee named simply "Al-Qaeda". Again, the stated goal was for all nations to cooperate in an Al-Qaeda clearing house of information. Each government was to provide the names of the members of Al-Qaeda that the respective governments were aware of.
What became obvious to many in our government was, if we expected information about citizens of other countries our government was also going to have to "ante up" and provide information about our citizens to the other nations. This is when things started to get out of control. Global information sharing was seen as a necessity. All "chips" were on the table. For the system to work the personal and sensitive information, including the biometrics of all citizens in all countries, had to be made available to intelligence and law enforcement people around the world.
Other nations resented the United States telling them that they must supply information about their citizens if the US wasn't willing to do the same. The US was forced to comply with its own dictates. And so the drive was on for the creation
of an international surveillance system. REAL ID, while not recommended by the 9/11 Commission, became the center piece for the drive to document each and every American and placed their biometric records in international data bases.
The Real ID Act of 2005 was signed into law in May, 2005. The rulemaking process took roughly 2 1⁄2 years to be completed. During that 2 1⁄2 years over six hundred groups and organizations came out against the law for a variety of reasons. These groups covered a broad political spectrum from the far right to the far left. Religious organizations representing all major religions spoke out against the Real ID Act.
Among the reasons for such overwhelming opposition is that Real ID is an unfunded federal mandate; the federal government intervening in the issuance of state driver's licenses; the unfettered power Real ID provides the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security; a variety of privacy concerns; First Amendment religious concerns of which many were by Christian evangelical ministries; the state driver's license would become a de facto national identification card; and the requirement that each driver's license applicant would provide biometric samples.
In order for a state to be in compliance with the law, each state has 18 "benchmarks" they must complete or satisfy the Department of Homeland Security that the state is working towards completing the individual benchmarks. Opposition has been strong as 25 states, either as a result of law or resolution, opposed the Real ID Act. Because of the opposition, the Real ID Act implementation date has been postponed twice. However, proponents are determined to force implementation anyway and DHS demands that states comply by May, 2011.
If enforced, Americans will find what the saying "under government's thumb" really means. Biometric documents will be required for nearly every action Americans take. A digital/electronic footprint will be the only way to access bank accounts; accessing transportation (at any level); purchase of goods and services; obtaining employment; and so forth. Every one of these actions will be stored in databanks and transferred to international databanks for storage.
Along with REAL ID, more legislation is pending in Congress to create even more control, all sold as just another way to keep us secure. One piece calls for a "National Worker's Identification Card" and Senator Lieberman wants a new biometric social security card. If these proposals are passed into law and Real ID or anything else similar is in place it will be "game over". Employers and retailers will have to have biometric readers and RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) scanners.
In addition, American law enforcement is being changed and with it, America's unique justice system is being changed too. Once law enforcements mission was to catch criminals after a crime was committed. And even those captured were protected as"innocent until proven guilty." That Constitutionally-protected rights made American justice unlike any other in the world. It has been one of the cornerstones of American freedom and security over freedoms and the less-certain future they offer.
We must remember that the stated goal for the total surveillance system has been that the world would be as one, carrying the same documents to assure everyone is equal, everyone is known, and everyone is legitimate. Under the system, say the proponents, security can be guaranteed.
So now the surveillance system is nearly fully in place. What are the results? Are we safer? The fact is, with all of the biometric data bases being established, RFID chips, Closed Circuit TVs, Automatic License Plate Readers, National Security Letters, State Fusion Centers, the Patriot Act, and the establishment of the behemoth Department of Homeland Security, we are not any safer than we were on the day before 9/11.
Why? First, while the government increases surveillance over every individual in he name of protection from terrorists, our borders remain wide open. Anyone wanting to do harm to the United States is able to simply walk into the country and be aided by an entire network providing shelter, money, weapons, and access to American programs for money, schools and jobs. They can illegally purchase counterfeit birth certificates and social security cards and obtain state drivers' licenses in any state. Only three states have the ability to authenticates birth certificates.
Programs like E-Verify, sold as a way to guarantee that only legal residents get jobs, actually aid those entering illegally. It makes the Social Security Number the most valuable commodity in the nation � a valuable prize. That makes it profitable for underground criminal networks to obtain and produce them. Terrorists networks have the means and the money to lead that effort. In addition, a study commissioned by DHS and performed by Westat reported that E-Verify is wrong more than it is right when dealing with a person in our country illegally is vetted out. In these situations E-Verify is wrong 54% of the time and right only 46% of the time.
And there is one more fact that renders the entire surveillance effort worthless in the fight against terrorism. Back to those E-Passports and the US demand for other nations to comply. The whole
Under REAL ID and the growing surveillance society, however, law enforcements mission is emerging to be one of "crime prevention" before it occurs. The only way such a policy could work is for government to be able to observe our every action, including monitoring phone calls, opening mail, monitor our financial transactions, monitor who we associate with and monitor our travel. The government has programs to achieve each and every one of these things. DHS and National Security Agency (NSA) have both engaged in domestic spying. The Defense Department had a program called "Total Information Awareness" (TIA) that was designed to combine and access all of the video cameras now in place in nearly every store, shopping mall and parking lot to monitor every move we make. Now on the back burner, TIA could be reactivated at any time. All that is missing is the final requirement that all Americans must carry in their pockets the document tying them into the system � the REAL ID drivers' license.
Once fully implemented, REAL ID means a "one-size fits all" policy, leading to the end of Constitutionally- protected First and Fourth Amendment rights. Proponents believe "safety" trumps "freedom" and any cost. With full implementation of REAL ID, government will finally have the laws, technologies and the ability governments throughout history have always sought to exercise total control over the people. Yet many Americans still refuse to be alarmed, seeking safety program depends on honest, reliable governments producing honest, reliable, secure documents on their own citizens. They don't.
Many Moslem countries in the Middle East consider the US to be their enemy.Pakistan's government, for one, while pretending to be our ally, is full of government workers who are either friends or members of Al- Qaeda. They have helped hide Al-Qaeda leaders since the inception of the war on terrorism. It is a known fact by US intelligence agents. Any effort made by the US to coordinate strategy with such governments fails because plans are immediately shared with the enemy by such government workers. The internal politics of these countries put the governments in an untenable position. If the leaders of these countries are perceived to be working with U.S. intelligence officials there is blowback against them for working with the "Infidels" of the United States. As a result, information from these nations, to this day, is at best questionable and unreliable.
To rely on such countries to provide honest documentation for citizens by way of passports or other identification is pure folly. It is easy for government employees to provide Al- Qaeda operatives all the "legitimate" documentation they need to travel freely inside the surveillance bubble that has been established to supposedly catch them.
Any honest observer or government leader dealing with the situation on a daily basis has to know the truth � that REAL ID and its fellow programs are not about protecting us in the war on terror. So what is the real purpose? What are we really doing?
The fact is Real ID is designed to enroll every citizen into a single global system of identification and financial control. Doubt that � then consider these words of Robert Mocny speaking for DHS when he said, "information sharing is appropriate around the world," and DHS plans to create a "Global Security Envelope of internationally shared biometric data that would permanently link individuals with biometric ID, personal information held by governments and corporations."
Meanwhile, Julian Ashborn speaking as the Chairman of the International Biometric Agency said, "What information do governments share? With whom is my data shared and why?" All of these questions need to be addressed by an agency with global powers"
These officials are telling openly telling us what they plan � global governance. Americans are just not listening. The truth is we are not safe. And such a system will never make us safe. But what we have done in the name of safety is to create an international surveillance system that destroys the unique American system of liberty and justice, "harmonizing" us into the same totalitarian system that controls so much of the rest of the world.
It can be stopped now- before it is fully implemented.
But once REAL ID is enforced in every state through compliant drivers' licenses, it will be too late. Every American who cherishes their Constitutionally- guaranteed rights have until May of this year to demand that their state governments stand strong and continue to oppose compliance with this international straight jacket. Our protests postponed it for several years. We must do it again.
Call now or understand that, once in place, there will be no way for this generation to pass freedom to the next. REAL ID is that great a threat.
Distributed by www.worldviewweekend.com
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