End the War on Freedom

"... a pistol in the bedroom, a shotgun over the door, a .30-06 for reaching out--you don't need any more." -- Kurt Saxon

# Americus at The Claire Files Forum - These Colors Are Running... - some pessimistic but realistic commentary on Bushevik Amerika. Very well said. [clairefiles]

So World War III has begun, and I'm in the bad country. Our President is totally F'ing mad, he and his millennial dispensationalist raptureists backers are trying to fulfill an ancient religious prophecy about an all-destroying battle between good and evil, and the most powerful propaganda industry in history is strangely backing him up, pretending he's sane and reasonable, leading Americans on a cult of global-scale murder-suicide that may very well leave our country in ruins. How did we come to this?

# Scott Bieser - The Time Sink - Mr. Bieser's weblog has moved to www.bigheadpress.com/TheTimeSink. I updated my links page. [smith2004]

# Doug Ireland at LA Weekly - Trial by Bush: Constitution-shredding in the Jose Padilla case - why the recent 4th District Court decision denying Jose Padilla his normal sixth amendment rights is important. Mr. Ireland didn't mention that if the Supremes uphold this ruling, we'll see a lot more dead cops. Without the promise of a speedy trial (already a sham, but at least something), I for one will not allow myself to be taken alive. [root]

Why is the Padilla case so important? Because the right to freedom from arbitrary detention and to a jury trial is one of the fundamental rights for which the American Revolution was fought -- it is enshrined in our Bill of Rights. As Thomas Jefferson wrote to Tom Paine in 1789, "I consider trial by jury as the only anchor ever yet imagined by man, by which a government can be held to the principles of its constitution." Imprisonment without trial is one of the ways in which the U.S. (through its annual State Department reports on human rights around the world) measures a country's degree of despotism. Bush has asserted his power to keep Padilla in jail "until hostilities are ended" -- but since Bush has also proclaimed the struggle against al Qaeda as one without any end in sight, Padilla could rot in prison for 20 years or more.

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But in his astonishingly vigorous dissent when the Supreme Court first ruled against the Padilla appeal, Justice Stevens (with Justices Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer concurring) wrote: "Unconstrained Executive detention for the purpose of investigating and preventing subversive activity is the hallmark of the Star Chamber. Access to counsel for the purpose of protecting the citizen from official mistakes and mistreatment is the hallmark of due process. Executive detention of subversive citizens . . . may not be justified by the naked interest in using unlawful procedures to extract information. Incommunicado detention for months on end is such a procedure. Whether the information so procured is more or less reliable than that acquired by more extreme forms of torture is of no consequence. For if this Nation is to remain true to the ideals symbolized by its flag, it must not wield the tools of tyrants even to resist an assault by the forces of tyranny."

# Chris Floyd at The Moscow Times - Global Eye, 9/16/2005 - more on the Padilla ruling. [root]

Four years ago, the United States was hit by a terrorist attack. Three days later, the U.S. Congress signed away the people's freedom, writing a blank check for tyranny to a ludicrous little man installed in office after the most dubious election in American history. Last week, the poisonous after-effects of this abject surrender took yet another sinister turn, as Bush factotums in the courts once again upheld the Leader's arbitrary power over the life and liberty of his subjects.

The joint House-Senate resolution of Sept. 14, 2001 -- approved by a combined vote of 518-1 -- gave President George W. Bush the most sweeping powers ever granted an American leader. Bush was authorized to use "all necessary and appropriate force" against any organization or individual that he alone declared was somehow connected to the Sept. 11 attacks. His arbitrary will would be the sole deciding factor. This timorous resolution was, in effect, a repeal of the Magna Carta: the nobles of the land giving back hard-won rights to a harsh, incompetent despot.

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With Congress in headlong retreat from its responsibilities, the last bulwark against the floodtide of junta rule is the federal courts. But these, of course, are now packed with Bush Family retainers and Reaganite reactionaries, eager to serve the Leader. Last week, for the second time in three months, a Bush judicial minion under consideration for a Supreme Court post issued a key ruling upholding the president's dictatorial powers, The Washington Post reports.

First it was chief justice nominee John Roberts, who was already interviewing for a high court seat when he pleased his masters by ruling that Bush had the arbitrary power to create his own parallel justice system -- the "military tribunals" for his Terror War captives -- and run it as he sees fit. Now comes Judge J. Michael Luttig, appointed by Bush I and one of Bush II's leading candidates for the other open Supreme slot. Luttig has authored an appeals court decision that strikes even deeper at the dying hulk of American liberty, ruling that Bush can imprison U.S. citizens indefinitely without charge or trial. All the Leader need do is make a bald assertion of evildoing, which the defendant is not allowed to challenge or dispute; indeed, the captive is not even allowed to appear in court.

# Jacob G. Hornberger at Laredo News - Only one way to eliminate drug-war Violence - end the war on some drugs, of course. You knew that, but for some reason the drug warriors haven't figured it out yet. Maybe because their livelihoods depend on it, eh? This article will likely move here when the September issue is posted. [root]

From U.S. Congressman Henry Cuellar, to the DEA, to the FBI, to the Webb County sheriff's office, to the Laredo Police Department, to Laredo Mayor Betty Flores, everyone is expressing concern about drug-war violence in Nuevo Laredo .

Unfortunately, however, the remedy being proposed is the same old tired one that Laredoans have been hearing for some 30 years -- crack down even more fiercely in the war on drugs, especially on drug sellers.

What all these politicians and law-enforcement people fail to recognize is that the drug war itself is the cause of the violence they seek to eliminate and that "cracking down" will only exacerbate the problem.

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There's no other way to cure drug-related violence. Those who want to end the violence without ending the drug war are hoping for rain without clouds.

Ultimately, however, the drug war presents a moral issue, especially on the demand side: Why should government have the power to punish a person for ingesting a harmful substance, be it cocaine, marijuana, whiskey or tobacco? Indeed, I still remember the friends of mine in Laredo whose lives were damaged not so much by the drugs they were ingesting but by the federal conviction they received when they were caught.

# Claire Wolfe at Backwoods Home Magazine - The 2005 Hardyville Freedom Film Festival - 35 films in seven categories. Vote by October 20. I voted for Serenity, sight unseen, in the science fiction category. [root]

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