Bush: One of the Worse Disasters to Hit the U.S.
"The first American Revolution wasn't fought with petitions. People actually had to take stands and put their lives on the line. They had to be rude. They had to disobey the nice officers.
"It worked. It can work again."
-- Shelley Thomson
From trt-ny:
# iPowerWeb, the new web hosting provider for The Claire Files Forums, went down yesterday during the Los Angeles power outage. When they came back up, around 10:30pm eastern time, our database was hosed, so I restored from backup, losing a day's worth of postings. Bummer, man.
# Mike Whitney at Information Clearing House - Jose Padilla and The Death of Liberty - I've seen a number of references to this story over the past few days, but hadn't thought about it enough to realize it's significance. Mr. Whitney did, though. [smith2004]
I had to sit down when I heard the Padilla case had been settled. I literally felt sick to my stomach, like I was gasping for air. The case of Jose Padilla is quite simply the most important case in the history of the American judicial system. Hanging in the balance are all the fundamental principles of American jurisprudence including habeas corpus, due process and "the presumption of innocence". All of those basic concepts were summarily revoked by the 3 judge panel of the 4th Circuit Court. The Court ruled in favor of the Bush administration which claimed that it had the right to indefinitely imprison an American citizen without charging him with a crime. The resulting verdict confers absolute authority on the President to incarcerate American citizens without charge and without any legal means for the accused to challenge the terms of his detention. It is the end of "inalienable rights", the end of The Bill of Rights, and the end of any meaningful notion of personal liberty.
...
The Padilla ruling is the blackest day in American history. The icons of American liberty; the Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial, the Statue of Liberty; are empty shrines if they are not underscored by the guarantee of freedom. The Vietnam Memorial, the Constitution, the Gettysburg Address, the 4th of July, the Federalist Papers, and the American flag; all gratuitous expressions of a principle that has vanished from the political landscape.
Every man and woman who ever wore an American uniform and died in the service of their country, died in vain. Their sacrifice has been rendered completely worthless by the action of the 4th Circuit Court.
George Bush has now extinguished every meaningful part of the American dream. The last vestige of the social contract has been defiled and desecrated by the administration and their court. Personal freedom is dead in America; it was impaled by the verdict against Jose Padilla. How many thousands or, perhaps, millions of Americans will die or endure incalculable suffering to regain what we have lost on this tragic day?
# Joe Plummer at Strike the Root - We Have the Advantage - we have been taken hostage by lying scoundrels, but the truth will set us free. [root]
There before me stood the ugly truth: Politics is Power over People, "Politician" is basically a synonym for "Conman," and at the top it's criminals that run the show. The "Political System," it turns out, is really nothing more than a way for the criminals to hide and legitimize their illegitimate behavior. Is it any wonder the worst among us rise to the heights of power? . . . Is it any wonder the most talented liars seize the greatest rewards?
# Mike Wasdin at Strike the Root - In Search of a Scapegoat - FEMA did a horrible job in New Orleans, but they've fixed the problem. They fired the one man responsible for the whole thing. Yeah. Right. Article drips with sarcasm. [{@wasdin}]
Please remember, only government can provide these services for you. Who else but government could stop private enterprise from coming to the aid of your fellow Amerikkkans and force err . . . I mean escort people from their homes in such an efficient manner? Who but government using this tragedy as a guise to confiscate weapons from its citizens, do it in such a way as to sell it as something that is actually for their own good?
# GeekWithA.45 - The Fog Of...Reality... - a summary of the gun confiscations in New Orleans. [geekwitha.45]
Oh, and government? You've expended your leeway on the Second Amendment for this generation.
Consider notice served.
# Physorg.com - EBay to buy Internet telephone firm Skype - for $1.3 billion in cash and $1.3 billion in stock, plus "as much as 1.5 billion in incentives based on performance of the unit." This is good financial news for Skype's employees, at least in the short run, but incredibly bad news for Skype itself. The Skype people seemed to care a lot about personal privacy. Ebay will give anything it knows about anyone to any gummint entity for the asking, no warrant required. Guess we're all going to have to switch to Phil Zimmerman's zFone. Click here for Skype's press release. [clairefiles]
Skype's founders, Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis, will remain with the company.
EM America - Effective Microorganisms - hopefully, this will be used instead of toxic chemicals, to clean up New Orleans. I won't hold my breath. This is Amerika. [liberty]
# Wolfgang Gruener at Tom's Hardware Samsung builds foundation for 32 GByte Flash cards - far out! Not commercial yet. [alisvoice]
