Divide and Conquer the Congress?

Published at OpedNews.

 

Joe Giambrone

Every time the word “bipartisan” makes it to print the world suffers.  When the two rival political syndicates line up in a row in favor of something, it’s because their masters feel so strongly about the issue that all other concerns are bulldozed away.  The American people are not those “masters,” not by any stretch of fantasy.

Bipartisan deals brought us the Iraq War resolution, the Patriot Act, the continuation of Guantanamo Gulag and infinite drone warfare, the naked aggression and support for terrorists in Afghanistan, Libya, Syria and elsewhere, as well as the permission to spy on, disappear and/or execute American citizens without due process.  Bipartisan handshakes erased the right to peaceably assemble and had the Occupy protests beaten, sprayed and hauled off into oblivion.  Bipartisan backroom conversations arranged untold trillions of dollars to banksters, all with the promise of future payments by America’s grandchildren and their grandchildren too.

In 2006 the House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D) told us that, “Impeachment is off the table.”  This low point in the modern history of that criminal protection racket known as the US Congress sent a clear message to the world: presidential crimes are okay in this new America 2.0.  It didn’t matter if the list of criminal charges from Representative Kucinich were true or not.  The Democratic leadership, in an obvious deal to ignore violations of the Constitution in violation of their own oaths of office, gave a free pass to the Bush regime to continue its policies unmolested, no matter how illegal or immoral they happened to be.

That was bipartisanship.

It was next arranged that the top Democratic contender for the presidency would share this view of presidential power, the protection of war criminals and the cover-up and classification of state crimes.  Enter Barack Obama, a bipartisan wet dream for four years.  Barack told us how he would “look forward” rather than back at the torture, unlawful surveillance and wars of aggression launched by his predecessor.  Barack’s Justice (sic) Department wasn’t so blinkered and narrowed in scope when it came to crucial whistleblowers, however.  For those leaking the evidence of state crimes, like John Kriakou (CIA), William Binney (NSA) and of course Private Bradley Manning (US ARMY), Mr. Obama has easily made exceptions to his “forward” looking posture.  Documentarian Robert Greenwald is currently exposing Obama’s War on Whistleblowers.

Mr. Obama’s forward-looking zealotry applies only when it suits his imperial expansion agenda.  And lo and behold, that imperial project has always been the ultimate US bipartisan endeavor.  Even in the era of Harry Truman (D), we have “policy planning” at the US State Department that is clear, unequivocal and patently immoral and at odds with the lofty rhetoric of politicians at podiums.

“[The US Government] should stop putting ourselves in the position of being our brothers’ keeper and refrain from offering moral and ideological advice. We should cease to talk about vague and—for the Far East—unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better.

We should recognize that our influence in the Far Eastern area in the coming period is going to be primarily military and economic. We should make a careful study to see what parts of the Pacific and Far Eastern world are absolutely vital to our security, and we should concentrate our policy on seeing to it that those areas remain in hands which we can control or rely on.”
–Memo PPS23, George Kennan, Head of the US State Department Policy Planning Staff. Written February 28, 1948, (emphasis added)

America is not a democratic republic, and is blatantly not a champion of democracy around the globe, as children are indoctrinated to believe.  America is a brutal, global military empire that has steadily expanded its reach and “action capabilities” since World War 2.  Many millions of casualties across Asia, the Middle East, Africa, South and Central America have piled up in the post WW2 period, thanks in large part to US taxpayers.  With the creation of the “National Security State” in 1948 the US set out on a path of securing its insatiable roster of “interests” in every corner of the globe.  Using its secretive covert capabilities, such as the CIA, Special Forces, SEAL teams and contracted mercenaries, this centuries-long project was, and remains, a clearly “bipartisan” affair.

So is Congressional Gridlock the Only Hope?

Imperial control strategy, which dates back to at least the Roman Empire, posits a divide and conquer method (“Divide et impera”).  Keeping the enemies fighting amongst themselves weakens them and allows the controlling interest to strengthen.  This idea may have some relevance to the current situation with the US Congress.

As complex as modern politics can be, the two sided beast can be set on itself, with resulting self-immolation.  This may be the only chance the population has in the short term, as it seeks to oust the corrupt from high offices, presuming enough of the population is actually interested in doing so.

I’ve smiled more than once these past few days, now that Obama no longer gets a free pass in the media.  After turning his unlawful powers on the Associated Press, he instantly alienated and struck fear into the hearts of the formerly cowed, compliant stenography corps that had ignored so much criminality for so long.  If the crimes of Barack are fair game, then the world gets a reprieve.  If impeachment moves forward, the spectacle will distract these Mafiosos for at least a year.

It seems the more damage these Congress Clowns can inflict on each other, the less they can harm the common people like you and I.  They can only accomplish so much at a time.  We may be spared the Trans Pacific Partnership, more internet censorship, more “free trade” job export deals, more bankster bailouts, more armored troop carriers in the streets and more wars of criminal aggression, at least for a little while.

If the tipping point is reached and lying becomes an impeachable offense again, as with William J. Clinton, then the gloves may come off.  Each side may seek to bloody the other in an ever escalating tit for tat that leads to a flood of resignations, criminal charges and perhaps even a glimpse of that mythical Unicorn called “justice.”

No, I’m not that naïve. But it is nice to dream.

Joe Giambrone publishes Politcal Film Blog (@polfilmblog), and here’s a Hell of a Deal.

Catalogued, Databased, Controlled

Biometric Database of All Adult Americans Hidden in Immigration Reform

 

Latest “Immigration Reform” bill creates biometric database of ALL AMERICANS controlled by high priests in the Department of Homeland Security (SS).

WIRED:

“Buried in the more than 800 pages of the bipartisan legislation (.pdf) is language mandating the creation of the innocuously-named “photo tool,” a massive federal database administered by the Department of Homeland Security and containing names, ages, Social Security numbers and photographs of everyone in the country with a driver’s license or other state-issued photo ID.

Employers would be obliged to look up every new hire in the database to verify that they match their photo.

…It starts to change the relationship between the citizen and state, you do have to get permission to do things,” said Chris Calabrese, a congressional lobbyist with the American Civil Liberties Union. “More fundamentally, it could be the start of keeping a record of all things.”

For now, the legislation allows the database to be used solely for employment purposes. But historically such limitations don’t last. The Social Security card, for example, was created to track your government retirement benefits. Now you need it to purchase health insurance.

Anti-Frack Activists Targeted

“Fracking Activists Could Face Felony Charges as “Ag-Gag” Laws Spread”

Full blown fascism coming down the tracks.  The joy of living in a criminal state and surrounded by ignorant buffoon flag wavers.

 

 

Congress Miffed Over Boston Bombing?

LA TIMES: “The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee says there was enough information about Boston Marathon bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev for the FBI to reopen an investigation into his activities.”

As does anyone with a few working brain cells.

What he doesn’t mention is the C.I.A., and their long history of interfering with security related to known Jihadi “assets” whom they would like to do their dirty work in targeted regions.  They also like them to recruit others, like their little brothers, to go fight for the empire against the official enemies.  This is what your tax dollars actually buy, yet Americans are largely ignorant about US foreign policies and covert operations.

A NEW THREAT WARNING HAS EMERGED

LA Times:  “Five days before two bombs tore through crowds at the Boston Marathon, an intelligence report identified the finish line of the race as an “area of increased vulnerability” and warned Boston police that extremists may use “small scale bombings” to attack spectators and runners at the event.“

The picture is beginning to focus on this travesty.

The threat was for small scale bombs, such as gunpowder bombs.

The warning related specifically to the “finish line.”  How could they know that anyway, before the fact?

The finish line was crawling with useless National Guard CST “weapon of mass destruction” detector guys (formerly thought to be “Craft International” operatives by some).

Where were the bomb sniffing dogs who could have actually detected the gunpowder bombs used?

CORRECTED: In the “morning,” bomb sniffing dogs allegedly engaged in a “training exercise.”   But where are they at the TIME of the bombing?  Can’t find them in pictures of the bombing event.  Can you?

Yes, that sounds a lot like a “theory.”

So disprove it. You know that’s how the scientific method works.

Public Awakening?

Congress is also less popular than ”cockroaches, lice, root canals, colonoscopies, traffic jams, used car salesman and Genghis Khan”

Washington Blog finds that the public’s overwhelming cowering and douche bagginess since 9/11 may be turning around:

Americans Are More Afraid of the US Government than of the Terrorists

 

Corruption at TED, Lawrence Lessig – #corruption

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mw2z9lV3W1g

Corruption, bribery, conflicts of interest, plutocracy, Lesterland, money in politics…

 

PS

I debated for this same solution in journalism class and was met with blank stares and knee jerk rejectionism.

They said: “We have to get money out of politics, not in!  That’s absurd.”

Me: “We have to get people’s influence INTO politics to offset the influence of what that money is buying.”

The solution is as easy as a one line box on the 1040 Income Tax form.  Give everyone a piece of political money to play in the game.  It doesn’t have to be a lot, just enough to empower the voices who represent common people.  This is the obvious solution to empower regular people to compete in the political arena while still being fair to the entrenched upper class.  Right now the elites monopolize the political funding system and control the candidates and high officials.  The only sensible response is to empower the rest of us, whom they are currently fucking over, so that our voices are heard too (as they are attached to campaign contributions).

 

 

Are you dogs?*

They are stealing your Social Security money this week, and what are you doing about it?

Bipartisan Rampage to Steal From Elderly & Disabled

 

You could very well BE that 85 year old getting screwed in this BIPARTISAN dealmaking.

It’s all about the money, who gets it and who doesn’t. Military contractors have no worries. Megabanks have no concerns. Monsanto is doing just fine. Then there’s you and your family.

“As the National Women’s Law Center revealed… benefit losses of $8,400 by age 86, and $9,770 by age 95″-Politico

In the fictional world of statistics and number rigging, the game the big institutions like to play, the Consumer Price Index is already rigged and not reflective of reality. The real cost of remaining alive in America is significantly higher than the government publishes in its reports. This new assault on Social Security cost of living adjustments will rob seniors of food and medicine.

Grand theft is now in progress, and it’s your retirement lifeline they’re stealing.  Wars and the “security state” will continue their unlimited funding and spending.  You, on the other hand…

ACT NOW:

Strengthen Social Security:

Tell Obama: No cuts to Social Security

Roots Action: (“If you vote to cut Social Security or Medicare benefits, I will oppose your re-election.”)

Tell Congress: Defend Social Security or Else

Bold Progress:

Tell Obama We Won’t Stand for Social Security benefit cuts

CREDO:

Tell President Obama: Don’t cut Social Security and Medicare benefits.

Campaign for America’s Future:

Tell Congress: Say No to Obama’s Social Security Cuts

 

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* If you survive long enough in Amerika, you may indeed be eating dog food.

Classic Short: Here Come the Billionaires

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3AJwTKXFnA

 

Nothing has changed under Obama.  Video is just as relevant right now, and in a bunch of other nations.

 

Carrey’s Cold Dead Hand

  

You guys want to go there?  I’m sure Kieran will weigh in positively on Jim Carrey’s satire.  The rest of you?

Is there anybody out there?  Talk to me.

I’ve seen Cold Dead Hand a couple of times, and I also watched the hysterical responses over at Fox News (sic).  The skit is a well done satire, but suffers from two problems: it’s simplistic, and Carrey himself is guilty of hypocrisy.  The reductionism of the anti-gun lobby is crass and relies on appeals to emotionalism.  Whenever you toss the ball to the other side, and they can respond with reason and logical argument, you’ve essentially shot yourself in the foot.

So, like Stephen King before him, Carrey is outed as hypocritical: he travels with armed bodyguards, something you and I don’t have the luxury of sharing.  One might easily say that armed bodyguards are better than having your own gun.  Now I’m sure Carrey needs this protection in a world of lunatics and star obsessed freaks.  But, aren’t you entitled to some level of protection too?  What makes the fart jokester’s life so fucking important compared to you and your family?

I pointed out previously how Stephen King’s rant exposed him for clinging onto 3 guns himself.  His argument then tried to shift onto large ammunition magazines, without a shred of introspection.  With 3 firearms, could not Stephen King commit a rampage worthy of the evening news?  Even with his limited magazine capacity?  That argument is hollow, particularly when he’s writing to deliberately offend other law abiding gun owners.

Now Jim Carrey has a right to his opinion, and at least he’s making a definitive statement about non-violence.  His band in the clip includes Gandhi, John Lennon and Abraham Lincoln – all murdered by firearms, and thus appropriate to elevate his message and make the point felt.  But narrowing his target to Charlton Heston and the NRA is a simplistic exercise in demonization.  Heston and NRA may be prominent faces, easily understood, but they are representative of many, many millions of Americans who share a similar perspective on self-defense and the right to bear arms (much like Carrey’s bodyguards).

Trying to paint self-defense and the causes of violence in black and white terms is doomed to failure.  That is what I’ve argued previously.  Even Barack H. Obama released a photograph of himself shooting a shotgun, which seems more reasonable than many of the other knee jerk responses floating around the national consciousness lately.

It’s also debatable whether Hollywood sells more guns than the NRA ever could.  Can anyone even recall a gun-free Hollywood film?  Guns are the national aphrodisiac, worshiped on television, in films, in video games, and children are encouraged from a young age to act out violent scenarios, pretending to use guns.  This is the culture we actually live in, a militaristic culture, but it’s so much worse.  The real America is a violent, brutal place of cold blooded competition at every level, where the poor are disposable and left to fight amongst themselves for the scraps of a glutinous, oblivious hyper-power.  The drug war policies have made drug trafficking one of the few real economic opportunities for millions and millions of the underclass.  Education has been gutted, and the manufacturing sector has been off-shored.  America swiftly descends into a third world plutocracy / dictatorship, where violence is the normal everyday reality.  These problems are quite a bit larger than Charlton Heston’s nearly forgotten legacy.

Of course, I haven’t proposed specific policy changes here, but then neither has Jim Carrey.  No one is happy with the status quo, but people keep electing completely corrupt individuals who would be more deserving of prison cells than the esteemed halls of power.  That’s a problem magnitudes greater than anything else we can discuss, because it affects all the other issues.  Nothing legitimate or moral can come from the United States congress when bribed, corrupt charlatans are the majority there.  The White House is more concerned with world domination and monkey-wrenching the Constitution in opposition to the rights of the people, and no one should trust them to do anything positive either.

How many are aware of the new 1.6 billion rounds of 40 caliber hollow point ammunition purchased by “Homeland Security” (sic)?  The 7.000 fully automatic machine guns and the nearly 3,000 Iraq tested, IED resistant armored personnel carriers, laughably painted with the word “Rescue?”  Or even the indefinite detention, drone assassination program, FBI provocateurs creating false terrorism plots all over the nation, the “Disposition Matrix” and total illegal government surveillance of their lives? I’m of the opinion that we have much bigger problems than the occasional maniac, but we can still attempt to address the maniacs.

So what is to be done?

• We can limit the size of magazines.  Perhaps 6 is safer than 10.  Then again the “West was won” with six shooters, that means the west was also lost by those on the receiving end.  Keep in mind that passing a law does not mean that criminal elements can’t acquire large magazines.  Even 3-D plastic printers have created gun magazines, a new technology that is impossible to contain.  But, let’s say this magazine limiting law passes; it could affect some small number of real world spree shooters.

• We can require psychological background screening.  This would entail a brand new national database of all psychological treatments.  At present, I don’t believe this exists, at least not in daylight.  A way of tracking prescription medications may exist, but of course these are supposed to be subject to confidentiality between doctors and patients.  What would the net effect be of enacting new tracking and surveillance of psychiatric care?  Would this not discourage people from seeking help in the first place?  How will the nuts and bolts of this surveillance work, and how can it be abused and used against the people?  I really do want to know.

• We could ban guns, and have the “Homeland Security” Gestapo attempt to confiscate the nation’s 300,000,000+ private firearms.  If you thought the violence epidemic was bad now … whew.  That could signal instant Civil War, and will not unfold in such a manner.  They prefer the boiling frog strategy.

• We could require locks on all firearms stored at home, with serious penalties for unsecured weapons.  This could reduce some incidents, however keys do end up in the wrong hands.  In the case of a disturbed young man who kills his own mother and uses her weapons to go on a killing spree, this locking up may arguably have done nothing to prevent the rampage.

• We could also form an emergency task force to examine the effects of anti-depressant drugs and their known links to violent rampages.  The FDA’s own warnings scream about violent episodes, suicidal thoughts and irrational behavior.  If we are serious about addressing the issue, the little matter of why people snap and go on murder episodes deserves more than a passing comment.

• We could end the drug war immediately and learn from places like Portugal and The Netherlands.  The RAND Corporation told us nearly 20 years ago that drug treatment is “23 times” more cost-effective than interdiction.  Drugs are primarily a health issue, not a criminal issue.  Their prohibition has failed with alcohol and it has failed with other drugs.  The prohibition fuels the violence and underground economy that tears apart the fabric of society.  Other strategies are called for, immediately.  If the money wasted on the anti-drug police state and prison system was put toward educating the next generation to rise above their poverty and hellish urban slums the problem would mostly disappear.

• We could end the plutocracy, and enact a system where the 1% super rich who defrauded America go unhappily off to jail, while their pillage is redistributed to rebuild our society, its infrastructure, its education system, its health system.  America could start giving a damn again about its majority, rather than the decrepit ghoul billionaires who corrupt everything they touch, beginning with the cesspool called Washington DC.

• We could end the empire, the system of dominating, threatening, invading, occupying, coercing and covertly overthrowing everyone the elites of America don’t like.  We could disempower the plutocrats and their militarism, downsize the war machine and put the military to work developing clean, renewable energy and efficient transportation.

As for the half-truths of the raging gun debates, spewing from both sides routinely (clichés really), I’m not impressed.  Say something plainly, real solutions, real impacts, taking into account the state of the world today.  Battling propaganda snips like Cold Dead Hand are more bluster than solution.  Both sides resort to poor argument and weak scattershot salvos.  Just try counting the number of times the Bill of Rights 2^nd Amendment is butchered.  The pro-gun lobby says only the part after the comma; the anti-gun lobby says only the part before the comma, then stops.  Every single time.

 

Action of the Day – Tell Congress

Tell Congress: Stop these cuts to our communities and our families, pull the pork from the Pentagon and make millionaires pay their fair share instead!

 

 

IMPEACH THEM ALL

“President Obama has utterly failed the first test of his second term, even before inauguration day,” American Civil Liberties Union Executive Director Anthony Romero said in a statement. “His signature means indefinite detention without charge or trial, as well as the illegal military commissions, will be extended.” Obama signs NDAA

The executive and legislative branches have declared war on the US Constitution.  The passage of “indefinite detention” without charge or trial should lead to immediate impeachment for violating their oaths of office to “defend the Constitution”.  Every clown who voted in violation of the Constitution for detaining American citizens without due process is now a criminal, under the US Constitution itself.  This is the end of America as we know it.

Need I remind anyone that the obligation to defend the Constitution is from all enemies, both foreign and domestic?

“In November, the ACLU and other organizations sent a letter to President Obama urging him to veto the 2013 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) if it impedes the closing of Guantánamo Bay prison by extending restrictions on transferring detainees from the facility. The current transfer restrictions are due to expire on March 27, 2013, but the pending NDAA bills in Congress would extend them until September 30, 2013. The letter tells the president that if the restrictions are extended, “the prospects for Guantánamo being closed during your presidency will be severely diminished, if not gone altogether.” You can read the full letter here.On December 31, 2011, President Obama signed the 2012 NDAA, codifying indefinite military detention without charge or trial into law for the first time in American history. The NDAA’s dangerous detention provisions would authorize the president — and all future presidents — to order the military to pick up and indefinitely imprison people captured anywhere in the world, far from any battlefield. The ACLU will fight worldwide detention authority wherever we can, be it in court, in Congress, or internationally.Under the Bush administration, similar claims of worldwide detention authority were used to hold even a U.S. citizen detained on U.S. soil in military custody, and many in Congress now assert that the NDAA should be used in the same way again. The ACLU believes that any military detention of American citizens or others within the United States is unconstitutional and illegal, including under the NDAA. In addition, the breadth of the NDAA’s detention authority violates international law because it is not limited to people captured in the context of an actual armed conflict as required by the laws of war.”

http://www.aclu.org/blog/tag/ndaa

“Never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was legal.”
—Martin Luther King, Jr.

Congress Betrays America (again)

Congress Disgracefully Approves the FISA Warrantless Spying Bill for Five More Years, Rejects All Privacy Amendments