Another Step Backwards in America

[Gyotsha]

Re: Another Step Backwards in America

Sure, it may not be a pleasant idea, but this isn't going to change your lives. Most of you will go your whole lives without even being considered to be looked up by the FBI.

[TheGrandMom]

Re: Another Step Backwards in America

Sure, it may not be a pleasant idea, but this isn't going to change your lives. Most of you will go your whole lives without even being considered to be looked up by the FBI.

So untrue in so many ways. I'm a biker, have been for 28 years now. The FBI has a file on me. If you knew me, you'd know how stupendously stupid that was. Why do they? Because I've attended biker events that the Hell's Angels, the Outlaws, and other notorious gangs have been at. Seriously....is this shit necessary??

[Gyotsha]

Re: Another Step Backwards in America

Yes, I agree that that isn't really necessary. I was thinking about more in terms of them looking up people for terrorist activities, since that seems to be the focus of their actions.

[Kitalrez]

Re: Another Step Backwards in America

Yeah, they have a file on me, too. Apparently, being in the Marines and the Postal Service bring you to their attention. Dear god, this man can deliver mail and shoot, we'd better watch him! It does, however, considerably speed up my background checks. Everything is always up to date by about 6 months ago or so.

I'm always slightly curious as to why people think the Patriot act was when we started losing ground. Weren't there other signs we should've paid attention to? Like, why didn't anyone complain when airport security suddenly got tighter? We went from a somewhat effective system that saw very rare problems, to a system that sees virtually no problems, is bloated, degrading, and ridiculously inefficient. Was it worth it? Israel spent a lot less to secure their airports, they use character profiling to identify suspicious people they might want to talk to... "Gee, this guy seems to be nervous about something, we'd better talk to him further." Costs a lot less than a bomb sniffing machine, and is about as effective. Plus, you're not doing cavity searches on old ladies so that muslim travelers can't complain about racial profiling and sue. Yeah, if you're 90, and there's a man with his gloved hand up your rectum right now? It's up your butt to cover his... that's pretty much it.

We spent 40 years opposite people we knew had nuclear weapons, weapons that were aimed at us, and we knew they were prepared to use on us. Despite this, our security for an airline was something you could get through in about 10 minutes or less. Planes got hijacked once in awhile, we accepted that. Somehow, having to watch a hijacked plane being flown into other people on the news changed our view of that. It really shouldn't have.

Also, didn't "All the President's Men" sort of establish that you can't really trust the executive branch with any sort of power in this area? We had a perfectly workable correction going, why reverse it? Somehow, we've collectively decided that the world is a great deal scarier than it actually is. We show this on the news, on the radio, and on the internet. If we stopped buying into this, we probably wouldn't be facing destruction any more than we are now.

[Tsrwedge]

Re: Another Step Backwards in America

Rule number 1: Government will *always* abuse any power you give them.

Rule number 2: Because of Rule No. 1, NEVER give your government more power than it absolutely needs.

Prediction: Political enemies of the President (among others) will find themselves under undue and unjust scrutiny.

Vote the Republicreeps and Democraps out of office folks. This sort of utter bullshit will continue as long as they're in office. Vote Libertarian or a third party that does give a flying flip about privacy and your rights.

[Ameroth]

Re: Another Step Backwards in America

Sure, it may not be a pleasant idea, but this isn't going to change your lives. Most of you will go your whole lives without even being considered to be looked up by the FBI.

You're right. Just because I personally don't contract AIDS, I shouldn't give a shit about it all.

Yes, I agree that that isn't really necessary. I was thinking about more in terms of them looking up people for terrorist activities, since that seems to be the focus of their actions.

This is/was the focus of the Patriot Act. For those who are unfamiliar, that's the act that literally tramples your civil rights as an American citizen to "prevent" terrorism. This new legislation is aimed at giving the FBI essentially the same powers, but without the terrorism clause.

Rule number 2: Because of Rule No. 1, NEVER give your government more power than it absolutely needs.

The founding fathers established our government by checking every branch, and assuring no one part had too much power. What the fore-fathers setup may not have been perfect, but it was a hell of a lot closer to a truly free democracy. What we have today is a little mixture of dictatorship, socialism, and some democracy thrown in.

Shit, we still only get to vote between two different political parties: Republican liars and Democratic liars. Where's the option to vote for a real candidate?

[Grizzlebeard]

Re: Another Step Backwards in America

I'll quote a man I share a surname with, Thomas Jefferson:

When the government fears the people, there is liberty: when the people fear the government, there is tyranny.

[Akashimo]

Re: Another Step Backwards in America

And i think we're at the point where we fear the gov't but helpless to really do anything about it.

[Wise Donkey]

Re: Another Step Backwards in America

The two quotes I have in mind have already been posted, so I'll just

[KingOfZeal]

Re: Another Step Backwards in America

I think I want to add one more quote that fits this mess; it's more about the motive of this bill than what it does:

"If you want total security, go to prison. There you're fed, clothed, given medical care and so on. The only thing lacking... is freedom." ~Dwight Eisenhower

[MrMageo]

Re: Another Step Backwards in America

Last couple posts have really brought out what is going especially the T.J. quote.

Essentially it comes down to this.

Fear Tactics.

It is used widely in military confrontations, diplomacy and even government.

What has gone on and what is really the bush legacy has been the use of fear tactics on the american people to keep them in a constant state of hyper-tension. How many times over the last 7 years have you heard these words, terror, terrorist, al qaeda, bin laden. All of these are instantly manipulated by our sub-conscious and transfered into a picture. That picture, the fateful new york sky line on a september morning. This rekindles our fear of being attacked. It may also spark other pictures such as the 7/7 attacks in britain, or the incident in spain. But it all comes back to it being a fear tactic.

The Bush Administration, has done a great job at keeping the people afraid, and when people are afraid they don't look past what they feel will help them right now.

I mean I am a canadian, I have lots of american friends, my uncle and aunt were in New York on 9/11, my uncle was supposed to service the telecoms in the tower that day but thankfully got stuck in traffic. I was afraid, afraid for myself afraid for my country, and afraid for my american neighbors to the south. Not so much in fear of another attack, but afraid for the aftermath.

Lots of what 9/11 had written all over was a false-flag attack. Essentially that means a government covertly attacks them-selves and disguises it as an unprovoked attack. Hitler used it (Burning of the reistag) and many others have as well through the years. It is a wonderful tactic that garners fear, and ultimately support to your government. They are still finding evidence of this today. From the crater in PEN, that had no aircraft, to the whole in the wall of the pentagon that also had no aircraft, right up to the cut support beams in the basement of the WTC.

Now when ever you listen to the news, or the presidents adress, you hear terror, terrorist, Al Qaeda, Osama Bin Laden almost on a nightly basis. This is to keep everyone in a perpetual state of fear, causing a hyper-tension amongst the people who may jump at every shadow. So they willingly extend more power to elected officials to help save them from the evil bogey-man, that might not even care anymore.

Now if this was even a terror attack (which I and many others like me are highly skeptical of). Then the terrorists have already won. The government who is supposed to be protecting from the terrorists, stirs the pot daily, as does the media. When a government has to much power, they start to use that power to retain power. The patriot Act was the first consolidation of power, and this is just another in a line of power grab laws that really steals the power from the people. Until the hyper-tension boils down the American people will still be willing to hand over more rights and freedoms for "security", and since the fear-tactic works so well, it will be a long time before anyone stops using it. Hell I even heard HRC drop the T bomb a few times when it was apparent her campaign was over, and McCain used it to beat out Mitt, and Mike. So once the american people themselves realize they have been duped for 5-7 years (7 if it was a false flag) then the government will be forced to hand power back to the people, until then people in the media will stoke the fire, with special reports on terror, etc etc etc.