Top 10 Signs Of Impending U.S. Police State

D

Dave

Guest
Top Ten Signs of the Impending U.S. Police State

Hey America! Freedom is just around the corner…behind you

The Internet Clampdown

One saving grace of alternative media in this age of unfettered corporate conglomeration has been the internet. While the masses are spoon-fed predigested news on TV and in mainstream print publications, the truth-seeking individual still has access to a broad array of investigative reporting and political opinion via the world-wide web. Of course, it was only a matter of time before the government moved to patch up this crack in the sky. Attempts to regulate and filter internet content are intensifying lately, coming both from telecommunications corporations (who are gearing up to pass legislation transferring ownership and regulation of the internet to themselves), and the Pentagon (which issued an “Information Operations Roadmap” in 2003, signed by Donald Rumsfeld, which outlines tactics such as network attacks and acknowledges, without suggesting a remedy, that US propaganda planted in other countries has easily found its way to Americans via the internet). One obvious tactic clearing the way for stifling regulation of internet content is the growing media frenzy over child pornography and “internet predators,” which will surely lead to legislation that by far exceeds in its purview what is needed to fight such threats.

“The Long War”

This little piece of clumsy marketing died off quickly, but it gave away what many already suspected: the War on Terror will never end, nor is it meant to end. It is designed to be perpetual. As with the War on Drugs, it outlines a goal that can never be fully attained—as long as there are pissed off people and explosives. The Long War will eternally justify what are ostensibly temporary measures: suspension of civil liberties, military expansion, domestic spying, massive deficit spending and the like. This short-lived moniker told us all, “get used to it. Things aren’t going to change any time soon.”

The USA PATRIOT Act

Did anyone really think this was going to be temporary? Yes, this disgusting power grab gives the government the right to sneak into your house, look through all your stuff and not tell you about it for weeks on a rubber stamp warrant. Yes, they can look at your medical records and library selections. Yes, they can pass along any information they find without probable cause for purposes of prosecution. No, they’re not going to take it back, ever.

Prison camps

This last January the Army Corps of Engineers gave Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root nearly $400 million to build detention centers in the United States, for the purpose of unspecified “new programs.” Of course, the obvious first guess would be that these new programs might involve rounding up Muslims or political dissenters—I mean, obviously detention facilities are there to hold somebody. I wish I had more to tell you about this, but it’s, you know…secret.

Touchscreen Voting Machines

Despite clear, copious evidence that these nefarious contraptions are built to be tampered with, they continue to spread and dominate the voting landscape, thanks to Bush’s “Help America Vote Act,” the exploitation of corrupt elections officials, and the general public’s enduring cluelessness.

In Utah, Emery County Elections Director Bruce Funk witnessed security testing by an outside firm on Diebold voting machines which showed them to be a security risk. But his warnings fell on deaf ears. Instead Diebold attorneys were flown to Emery County on the governor's airplane to squelch the story. Funk was fired. In Florida, Leon County Supervisor of Elections Ion Sancho discovered an alarming security flaw in their Diebold system at the end of last year. Rather than fix the flaw, Diebold refused to fulfill its contract. Both of the other two touchscreen voting machine vendors, Sequoia and ES&S, now refuse to do business with Sancho, who is required by HAVA to implement a touchscreen system and will be sued by his own state if he doesn’t. Diebold is said to be pressuring for Sancho’s ouster before it will resume servicing the county.

Stories like these and much worse abound, and yet TV news outlets have done less coverage of the new era of elections fraud than even 9/11 conspiracy theories. This is possibly the most important story of this century, but nobody seems to give a damn. As long as this issue is ignored, real American democracy will remain an illusion. The midterm elections will be an interesting test of the public’s continuing gullibility about voting integrity, especially if the Democrats don’t win substantial gains, as they almost surely will if everything is kosher.

Bush just suggested that his brother Jeb would make a good president. We really need to fix this problem soon.

Signing Statements

Bush has famously never vetoed a bill. This is because he prefers to simply nullify laws he doesn’t like with “signing statements.” Bush has issued over 700 such statements, twice as many as all previous presidents combined. A few examples of recently passed laws and their corresponding dismissals, courtesy of the Boston Globe:

Dec. 30, 2005: US interrogators cannot torture prisoners or otherwise subject them to cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment.

Bush's signing statement: The president, as commander in chief, can waive the torture ban if he decides that harsh interrogation techniques will assist in preventing terrorist attacks.

Dec. 30: When requested, scientific information ''prepared by government researchers and scientists shall be transmitted [to Congress] uncensored and without delay."

Bush's signing statement: The president can tell researchers to withhold any information from Congress if he decides its disclosure could impair foreign relations, national security, or the workings of the executive branch.

Dec. 23, 2004: Forbids US troops in Colombia from participating in any combat against rebels, except in cases of self-defense. Caps the number of US troops allowed in Colombia at 800.

Bush's signing statement: Only the president, as commander in chief, can place restrictions on the use of US armed forces, so the executive branch will construe the law ''as advisory in nature."

Essentially, this administration is bypassing the judiciary and deciding for itself whether laws are constitutional or not. Somehow, I don’t see the new Supreme Court lineup having much of a problem with that, though. So no matter what laws congress passes, Bush will simply choose to ignore the ones he doesn’t care for. It’s much quieter than a veto, and can’t be overridden by a two-thirds majority. It’s also totally absurd.

Warrantless Wiretapping
:

Amazingly, the GOP sees this issue as a plus for them. How can this be? What are you, stupid? You find out the government is listening to the phone calls of US citizens, without even the weakest of judicial oversight and you think that’s okay? Come on—if you know anything about history, you know that no government can be trusted to handle something like this responsibly. One day they’re listening for Osama, and the next they’re listening in on Howard Dean.

Think about it: this administration hates unauthorized leaks. With no judicial oversight, why on earth wouldn’t they eavesdrop on, say, Seymour Hersh, to figure out who’s spilling the beans? It’s a no-brainer. Speaking of which, it bears repeating: terrorists already knew we would try to spy on them. They don’t care if we have a warrant or not. But you should.
 
“Free Speech Zones”

I know it’s old news, but…come on, are they f***ing serious?

High-ranking Whistleblowers:

Army Generals. Top-level CIA officials. NSA operatives. White House cabinet members. These are the kind of people that Republicans fantasize about being, and whose judgment they usually respect. But for some reason, when these people resign in protest and criticize the Bush administration en masse, they are cast as traitorous, anti-American publicity hounds. Ridiculous. The fact is, when people who kill, spy and deceive for a living tell you that the White House has gone too far, you had damn well better pay attention. We all know most of these people are staunch Republicans. If the entire military except for the two guys the Pentagon put in front of the press wants Rumsfeld out, why on earth wouldn’t you listen?

The CIA Shakeup

Was Porter Goss fired because he was resisting the efforts of Rumsfeld or Negroponte? No. These appointments all come from the same guys, and they wouldn’t be nominated if they weren’t on board all the way. Goss was probably canned so abruptly due to a scandal involving a crooked defense contractor, his hand-picked third-in-command, the Watergate hotel and some (no doubt spectacular) hookers.

If Bush’s nominee for CIA chief, Air Force General Michael Hayden, is confirmed, that will put every spy program in Washington under military control. Hayden, who oversaw the NSA warrantless wiretapping program and is clearly down with the program. That program? To weaken and dismantle or at least neuter the CIA. Despite its best efforts to blame the CIA for “intelligence errors” leading to the Iraq war, the picture has clearly emerged—through extensive CIA leaks—that the White House’s analysis of Saddam’s destructive capacity was not shared by the Agency. This has proved to be a real pain in the ass for Bush and the gang.

Who’d have thought that career spooks would have moral qualms about deceiving the American people? And what is a president to do about it? Simple: make the critical agents leave, and fill their slots with Bush/Cheney loyalists. Then again, why not simply replace the entire organization? That is essentially what both Rumsfeld at the DoD and newly minted Director of National Intelligence John are doing—they want to move intelligence analysis into the hands of people that they can control, so the next time they lie about an “imminent threat” nobody’s going to tell. And the press is applauding the move as a “necessary reform.”

Remember the good old days, when the CIA were the bad guys?
 
do you think that Papa Bush may have been reading 1984 to Junior at bedtime? :)

love

Grim

With a little Animal Farm thrown in for good measure.

"All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others."
 
Robert Anton Wilson writing on the results of the 2000 Presidential "Election"

I have never enjoyed an election more, or had my animal spirits raised higher by the results. I feel, in short, just like I did in Berlin the week before the Wall came down: a quantum jump seems about to happen.

My perennial candidate, Nobody, scored another stunning victory. The majority of citizens simply ignored the Gush/Bore/TSOG Control Machine, and "voted for Nobody," i.e. didn't vote at all. Unlike alienated artists of the past, I belong to the majority party -- the millions who looked over the candidates and decided they trusted Nobody.

According to the latest [wobbly] figures, since Gush and Bore each got the vote of [roughly] 25% of the eligible voters, and Nobody got the vote of [roughly] 50%, then Nobody won. Adding the "protest votes" for Nader, Browne etc., Nobody won even bigger, around 55%. since in this carefully rigged system, third party votes are, in effect, votes for Nobody. The people who voted for those "minority" candidates certainly didn't expect them to win; they just expressed their contempt for the 2 Lying Bastards more actively than those of us who just stayed home, got stoned and looked at Three Stooges videos.

I celebrate the majority with Whitmanesque rhapsody. The so-called Elite-- specifically, the 1/2 of 1% who own damn near everything, especially the politicians and the media -- spent THREE BILLION DOLLARS on this malign fiesta and still couldn't convince most of us that a choice between two over-rouged old whores like Gush and Bore matters a damn.

A few hours ago, I heard a pundit on CNN announce that whoever enters the White House on 20 January 2001 will know that "half the country" regards him as a fraud and usurper. As usual, the media got the facts wrong; they ignored the landslide 55% who chose Nobody. Whichever Lying Bastard enters the White House that day will seem a fraud and usurper to 80% of the country-- the 25% who prefer the other Lying Bastard + the 55% who prefer Nobody.

This seems wonderful to me. Liberty can survive only as long as most people distrust their government, and falls into decline and the "sickness unto death " whenever the people trust a government too damn much.

Besides, I think it's time to abolish politicians entirely and let everbody participate in self-government via Internet. We needed representatives in the 18th Century, because we couldn't all go to Washington. Meanwhile, times changed and our "representatives" have sold us out to the corporations, as we in the majority party all agree, whatever our differences in other matters. And we don't need "representatives" anymore; we have the Net technology to represent ourselves.

In that evolutionary sense, every vote for Nobody really represents a vote for Everybody.
 
The word FREEDOM is the worst enemy of the American people.
 
Top Ten Signs of the Impending U.S. Police State

Hey America! Freedom is just around the corner…behind you

The Internet Clampdown

One saving grace of alternative media in this age of unfettered corporate conglomeration has been the internet. While the masses are spoon-fed predigested news on TV and in mainstream print publications, the truth-seeking individual still has access to a broad array of investigative reporting and political opinion via the world-wide web. Of course, it was only a matter of time before the government moved to patch up this crack in the sky. Attempts to regulate and filter internet content are intensifying lately, coming both from telecommunications corporations (who are gearing up to pass legislation transferring ownership and regulation of the internet to themselves), and the Pentagon (which issued an “Information Operations Roadmap” in 2003, signed by Donald Rumsfeld, which outlines tactics such as network attacks and acknowledges, without suggesting a remedy, that US propaganda planted in other countries has easily found its way to Americans via the internet). One obvious tactic clearing the way for stifling regulation of internet content is the growing media frenzy over child pornography and “internet predators,” which will surely lead to legislation that by far exceeds in its purview what is needed to fight such threats.

“The Long War”

This little piece of clumsy marketing died off quickly, but it gave away what many already suspected: the War on Terror will never end, nor is it meant to end. It is designed to be perpetual. As with the War on Drugs, it outlines a goal that can never be fully attained—as long as there are pissed off people and explosives. The Long War will eternally justify what are ostensibly temporary measures: suspension of civil liberties, military expansion, domestic spying, massive deficit spending and the like. This short-lived moniker told us all, “get used to it. Things aren’t going to change any time soon.”

The USA PATRIOT Act

Did anyone really think this was going to be temporary? Yes, this disgusting power grab gives the government the right to sneak into your house, look through all your stuff and not tell you about it for weeks on a rubber stamp warrant. Yes, they can look at your medical records and library selections. Yes, they can pass along any information they find without probable cause for purposes of prosecution. No, they’re not going to take it back, ever.

Prison camps

This last January the Army Corps of Engineers gave Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root nearly $400 million to build detention centers in the United States, for the purpose of unspecified “new programs.” Of course, the obvious first guess would be that these new programs might involve rounding up Muslims or political dissenters—I mean, obviously detention facilities are there to hold somebody. I wish I had more to tell you about this, but it’s, you know…secret.

Touchscreen Voting Machines

Despite clear, copious evidence that these nefarious contraptions are built to be tampered with, they continue to spread and dominate the voting landscape, thanks to Bush’s “Help America Vote Act,” the exploitation of corrupt elections officials, and the general public’s enduring cluelessness.

In Utah, Emery County Elections Director Bruce Funk witnessed security testing by an outside firm on Diebold voting machines which showed them to be a security risk. But his warnings fell on deaf ears. Instead Diebold attorneys were flown to Emery County on the governor's airplane to squelch the story. Funk was fired. In Florida, Leon County Supervisor of Elections Ion Sancho discovered an alarming security flaw in their Diebold system at the end of last year. Rather than fix the flaw, Diebold refused to fulfill its contract. Both of the other two touchscreen voting machine vendors, Sequoia and ES&S, now refuse to do business with Sancho, who is required by HAVA to implement a touchscreen system and will be sued by his own state if he doesn’t. Diebold is said to be pressuring for Sancho’s ouster before it will resume servicing the county.

Stories like these and much worse abound, and yet TV news outlets have done less coverage of the new era of elections fraud than even 9/11 conspiracy theories. This is possibly the most important story of this century, but nobody seems to give a damn. As long as this issue is ignored, real American democracy will remain an illusion. The midterm elections will be an interesting test of the public’s continuing gullibility about voting integrity, especially if the Democrats don’t win substantial gains, as they almost surely will if everything is kosher.

Bush just suggested that his brother Jeb would make a good president. We really need to fix this problem soon.

Signing Statements

Bush has famously never vetoed a bill. This is because he prefers to simply nullify laws he doesn’t like with “signing statements.” Bush has issued over 700 such statements, twice as many as all previous presidents combined. A few examples of recently passed laws and their corresponding dismissals, courtesy of the Boston Globe:

Dec. 30, 2005: US interrogators cannot torture prisoners or otherwise subject them to cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment.

Bush's signing statement: The president, as commander in chief, can waive the torture ban if he decides that harsh interrogation techniques will assist in preventing terrorist attacks.

Dec. 30: When requested, scientific information ''prepared by government researchers and scientists shall be transmitted [to Congress] uncensored and without delay."

Bush's signing statement: The president can tell researchers to withhold any information from Congress if he decides its disclosure could impair foreign relations, national security, or the workings of the executive branch.

Dec. 23, 2004: Forbids US troops in Colombia from participating in any combat against rebels, except in cases of self-defense. Caps the number of US troops allowed in Colombia at 800.

Bush's signing statement: Only the president, as commander in chief, can place restrictions on the use of US armed forces, so the executive branch will construe the law ''as advisory in nature."

Essentially, this administration is bypassing the judiciary and deciding for itself whether laws are constitutional or not. Somehow, I don’t see the new Supreme Court lineup having much of a problem with that, though. So no matter what laws congress passes, Bush will simply choose to ignore the ones he doesn’t care for. It’s much quieter than a veto, and can’t be overridden by a two-thirds majority. It’s also totally absurd.

Warrantless Wiretapping
:

Amazingly, the GOP sees this issue as a plus for them. How can this be? What are you, stupid? You find out the government is listening to the phone calls of US citizens, without even the weakest of judicial oversight and you think that’s okay? Come on—if you know anything about history, you know that no government can be trusted to handle something like this responsibly. One day they’re listening for Osama, and the next they’re listening in on Howard Dean.

Think about it: this administration hates unauthorized leaks. With no judicial oversight, why on earth wouldn’t they eavesdrop on, say, Seymour Hersh, to figure out who’s spilling the beans? It’s a no-brainer. Speaking of which, it bears repeating: terrorists already knew we would try to spy on them. They don’t care if we have a warrant or not. But you should.

Dave, EVERYTHING you have written is sadly true. The one thing that especially scares the hell out of me is the whole Halliburton deal. They have these, "detention centers" which are empty, but I have heard they are guarded round the clock. Let's get real. They're not only for the *terrorists* they're for anyone who doesn't agree with their Draconian policies. Shades of "1984"? There's a book called, "The Handmaid's Tale" and it's becoming more real by the second. Pick up a book by Charlie Savage called, "Takeover". I think you'd enjoy it. Blackwater also scares the hell out of me. Soon we will have corporations ruling everything, instead of the *government*. This is why I am getting my ass to New Zealand. I want OUT of here before it gets any worse.
 
There are other reasons behind what is going on. I just got home and will start with the first one:

Top Ten Signs of the Impending U.S. Police State

Hey America! Freedom is just around the corner…behind you

The Internet Clampdown
There are two primary reasons for the impending federal regulation of the internet. That would be because of paypal. "What the f***?" you may say. No really- "paypal." Paypal represents the very thing the government is currently powerless to regulate and that is basically online banking. Paypal acts as a money agent outside of FDIC regulations that have been put in place since Roosevelt declared a "banking holiday" for 8 days back during the depression. This means that the government is aware of millions of dollars changing hands each year that are going unchecked and untaxed. You can debate an income tax and a sales tax all you want. Until they are legally declared unconstitutional you are obligated to follow the law and report any and all income and transactions. Did all of you know that while there is technically not a sales tax there is something called a "fair use tax?" This means that the video game system that you just bought on eBay is taxable to some extent.

Another problem with paypal is that it is used to funnel money illegally. Internet gambling is illegal in the United States, yet people are finding ways to transfer money around. One of those methods for some websites? Paypal.

Other policing of the internet was brought on and will continue to be brought on by what some of us are doing on this very board. Every time you are downloading a show or uploading or offering or pointing out the directions to find a show you are breaking the law. Realistically speaking, Dave Matthews, Phish, Jack Johnson and others have encouraged trading. Many artists including Morrissey have either not explicitly condoned it or have been silent on the issue. In either case, transfer of their intellectual property is illegal and it is coming to a head. The record companies are collectively losing almost into the billions as far as accumulated loss. You don't think they support an internet clamp down? People are trading and be honest here, stealing the intellectual property of others by trading and viewing music, books, magazines, software, movies and even comic books. It may not get a big notice when one of us posts an old Morrissey show but it collectively adds to a problem when multiplied by the population of internet users. My 63 year old father knows how to use limewire.

What is going on? Well the government has already allowed the Patriot Act to extend to paypal under the notion that illicit funds can easily be transferred into other accounts. Bascially, Ahmade Ahdoody can transfer anything he wants to his sleeper cell through paypal. The government noticed this and told paypal to police themselves because if not they can shot down the site as a potential threat to the security of the US. Paypal's response? You better have a reason for funds that are transferred or they are freezing your assets. An example back in 2005 showed how a gentleman had his Hurricane Katrina donation fund frozen by paypal as too many little unexplained (not related to ebay) payments were made into a single account creating a large sum.

Speaking of eBay. You want the wild west of untaxed commerce? Look no further than eBay.com. Legally you are supposed to include money made at a garage sale. How many people on eBay are reporting their full sales volumes and amounts to the governments. Unlike a garage sale there is a record of all transactions that the government can easily review in order to see who is paying what. So far eBay has demonstrated that your listing fees enable some of the best lawyers around so that list is not transferred into government hands.

The policing of the internet is something that we have brought on ourselves. It is not the odd email of random pornography. You know the mastercard priceless parodies, or the "tubgirls" or 2girls1cup nonsense that we all forward. It is the untapped taxation potential and the use of the internet in the act of theft that is steering us there.

I will address some of the others later.
 
Soon we will have corporations ruling everything, instead of the *government*..

I can't recall when it's ever been different, the sad thing is that the New Zealand govt is under the same pressure as every other govt & will kowtow to the ruling class. For such a small class their pressure is enormous, whilst our class is massive we are servile to the wishes of the few! The govts are the mouthpieces of the corporations!

Freedom is a one-way process, they (the ruling class) can move (their money) to anywhere in the world, whilst we are put under 'immigration controls' just to try & get the crumbs.

love

Comrade Grim
 
I can't recall when it's ever been different, the sad thing is that the New Zealand govt is under the same pressure as every other govt & will kowtow to the ruling class. For such a small class their pressure is enormous, whilst our class is massive we are servile to the wishes of the few! The govts are the mouthpieces of the corporations!

Freedom is a one-way process, they (the ruling class) can move (their money) to anywhere in the world, whilst we are put under 'immigration controls' just to try & get the crumbs.

love

Comrade Grim

You don't seem servile to me. Do you dress left, too??? My pressure is not enormous because I never eat carbs and I do stripperobics! Do you know that guy Buzzetta? I like your explanation but I like his better because he is for freedom.
 
What about all UK citizens having to be subjected to finger and eye scanning on arrival in the good ol' US of A?
I thought we were 'on your side'?:confused:

Jukebox Jury
 
What about all UK citizens having to be subjected to finger and eye scanning on arrival in the good ol' US of A?
I thought we were 'on your side'?:confused:

Jukebox Jury

Not all UK citizens. Didn't you know that Cat Stevens is daaaaangerous? Amy Winehouse is also a big threat to the US.

Oh, and I forgot to mention Morrissey.
 
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Cmon, now. It's not something that is just happening in the US. Britain has more than its share of closed curcuit tv cameras. In fact, isn't it illegal to speak or write advocationg the abolition of the royal family? It's Treason.

The Guardian's legal challenge to the 1848 Treason Felony Act, which makes it a criminal offence, punishable by life imprisonment, to advocate abolition of the monarchy in print, even by peaceful means, was today dismissed by the House of Lords.

Five law lords upheld an attempt by the attorney general, Lord Goldsmith, to halt the newspaper's attempt to declare section 3 of the 1848 act incompatible with the Human Rights Act 1998, on the grounds that the older legislation was an obstacle to freedom of speech.

The lords ruled the Guardian's case unnecessary, as the paper had published articles that espoused republican views, and had not been prosecuted.

*****************************************************
whereas in the US, we may be monitored if we begin to talk about controversial, "potentially dangerous" ideas, but it's not illegal to talk about it, unless you are involved in a conspiracy to remove someone from office by force.

This is the reason that out country allows racist and fascist organizations to have free speech, whereas in Britain, it seems that many people would rather not have open debate, if the debate is with a group that they find too offensive.

Not trying to have any heated argument with my friends in the UK, but from my perspective, I think my country is often unfairly maligned. I feel, from what I can gather, that there is still greater personal freedom in the US, than in any other place I know of.

They are trying to take out rights, and they are using fear tactics to do it, and they've gone further than they should ever have been allowed. But minus the apologists for their behavior that would try to blame the people for taking advantage of freedom, that would say "Some of you are criminals, and so we must proceed as if all of you are criminals", that would throw away the Bill Of Rights with the excuse that "It's your fault, you shouldn't have downloaded those songs", and that allowed the creation of this Paypal monster, that accepted huge donations from Meg,at ebay, to allow all sorts of potential abuse, yes, including the possibility of money laundering, and terror funding, and which should be brought under control and made to become a true regulated bank; besides these few people that will say, "Yes torture is fine, as long as it's our side doing the torturing", never stopping to think that this will inevitably lead to increased torture against out own citizens and a twisted justification for new blind and random attacks against humanity, in fact Many Americans do believe strongly in freedom and have access to more information from around the world, so that, even as they are cracking down on out freedom, awareness and resistance is growing.

Don't blame it on Americans. We are maybe a little too ready to believe in authority, and when the 9/11 attacks happened out administration acted swiftly to gain the most unchecked control, and to simultaneously strip all Americans of important Constitutional rights. If you weren't here then, you can't imagine what it did to this country to have those attacks on the World Trade Center. It still seems almost like a dream. It's hard to accept that it happened. We were stunned. They fed the fear on Fox News and all the others, and had us ready to seal ourselves inside plastic. Suddenly the implications of all of the bad decisions we'd made over the years, choosing to trade with dictators, setting up puppet governments, selling weapons of mass destruction, and the technology and training to make best use of, all this came back on us, and it was shocking and the world was different.

But now, it's a few years on, people are starting to realize what happened, the way the terrorist activities were used by our own government against the people, and I think we will continue to see resistance, both open, and in secret.
 
Cmon, now. It's not something that is just happening in the US. Britain has more than its share of closed curcuit tv cameras. In fact, isn't it illegal to speak or write advocationg the abolition of the royal family? It's Treason.

The Guardian's legal challenge to the 1848 Treason Felony Act, which makes it a criminal offence, punishable by life imprisonment, to advocate abolition of the monarchy in print, even by peaceful means, was today dismissed by the House of Lords.

Five law lords upheld an attempt by the attorney general, Lord Goldsmith, to halt the newspaper's attempt to declare section 3 of the 1848 act incompatible with the Human Rights Act 1998, on the grounds that the older legislation was an obstacle to freedom of speech.

The lords ruled the Guardian's case unnecessary, as the paper had published articles that espoused republican views, and had not been prosecuted.

*****************************************************
whereas in the US, we may be monitored if we begin to talk about controversial, "potentially dangerous" ideas, but it's not illegal to talk about it, unless you are involved in a conspiracy to remove someone from office by force.

This is the reason that out country allows racist and fascist organizations to have free speech, whereas in Britain, it seems that many people would rather not have open debate, if the debate is with a group that they find too offensive.

Not trying to have any heated argument with my friends in the UK, but from my perspective, I think my country is often unfairly maligned. I feel, from what I can gather, that there is still greater personal freedom in the US, than in any other place I know of.

They are trying to take out rights, and they are using fear tactics to do it, and they've gone further than they should ever have been allowed. But minus the apologists for their behavior that would try to blame the people for taking advantage of freedom, that would say "Some of you are criminals, and so we must proceed as if all of you are criminals", that would throw away the Bill Of Rights with the excuse that "It's your fault, you shouldn't have downloaded those songs", and that allowed the creation of this Paypal monster, that accepted huge donations from Meg,at ebay, to allow all sorts of potential abuse, yes, including the possibility of money laundering, and terror funding, and which should be brought under control and made to become a true regulated bank; besides these few people that will say, "Yes torture is fine, as long as it's our side doing the torturing", never stopping to think that this will inevitably lead to increased torture against out own citizens and a twisted justification for new blind and random attacks against humanity, in fact Many Americans do believe strongly in freedom and have access to more information from around the world, so that, even as they are cracking down on out freedom, awareness and resistance is growing.

Don't blame it on Americans. We are maybe a little too ready to believe in authority, and when the 9/11 attacks happened out administration acted swiftly to gain the most unchecked control, and to simultaneously strip all Americans of important Constitutional rights. If you weren't here then, you can't imagine what it did to this country to have those attacks on the World Trade Center. It still seems almost like a dream. It's hard to accept that it happened. We were stunned. They fed the fear on Fox News and all the others, and had us ready to seal ourselves inside plastic. Suddenly the implications of all of the bad decisions we'd made over the years, choosing to trade with dictators, setting up puppet governments, selling weapons of mass destruction, and the technology and training to make best use of, all this came back on us, and it was shocking and the world was different.

But now, it's a few years on, people are starting to realize what happened, the way the terrorist activities were used by our own government against the people, and I think we will continue to see resistance, both open, and in secret.

You totally missed the point of my post concerning the first part of the regulation of the internet. Is it coming? I believe so, but not because of what you perceive to be a suppression of rights. Do you honestly believe that the government cares what your or my opinion is in lieu of money that they feel is due to the government? We could declare, and say pretty much anything we want on any forum so long as it is not seditious to the degree that we are exposing national security or giving arms to the enemy. The government wants its piece of the pie. The regulation over the internet has been discussed for the past ten years. There was talk about regulation once the online billing agents stepped up.

Either way we agree that regulation will eventually arrive but you claim that it will be to suppress our rights I claim it will be for financial and taxation purposes.
 
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