Ferguson – The Police State Exposed

Ferguson simply has exposed what has been happening for many years now in the wake of the Patriot Act, NDAA 2012, HR 347, which transformed our republic into a police state and stripped us of our Fourth Amendment rights. Thanks to the military-industrial complex, which makes billions off endless wars, we now have militarized police forces as well, armed to the teeth with weapons of war. See: https://www.aclu.org/war-comes-home-excessive-militarization-american-policing

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/08/19/1322763/-Using-the-ballot-box-to-lawfully-disarm-the-American-militarized-police-state-Police-execution-video

Protesters nationwide hope to transform their anger into change and secure the guarantees of the U.S. Constitution & Bill of Rights. See Ferguson Protesters Hope To Transform Anger Into Change, and a quick look at social media offers insight into what people are thinking. Check out Twitter hashtags #sandydarity, #justicefor mike #protestpoliceviolence, #FergusonSyllabus, and Twitter handles @civilright.org and @ryjareilly. For more information, see the Atlantic Magazine, 8-25-14 article by Marcia Chatelan “Ferguson is on the Syllabus:” http://colorlines.com/archives/2014/08/following_ferugson_teaching_the_crisis_in_the_classroom.html

As far as the justice system response goes, Prosecutor McCullough may likely be using the grand jury as a “delaying tactic” to absolve a guilty police officer of shooting Mike Brown on the street of Ferguson, Mo near where he lived with his parents. Officer Darren Wilson will tell his tale to the grand jury and no doubt there will be no trained opposing force who will challenge his story.

According to Bill Simpich, an Oakland attorney and the 2003 Public Justice Trial Lawyer of the year, the 5th Amendment mandates the federal government to use the grand jury in capital cases, but he states that “it has fallen into disfavor over time and become an essential element of the New Jim Crow”. Simpich believes that “only a new civil rights movement can end this abuse of power.” This is part of a systemic problem that only can be corrected by putting the People back in charge of our government instead of a corrupt police state run by warmongering mega-corporations who care only about profits, not the human rights of an unarmed teenager.

Habeas Corpus is Like Car Insurance

Habeas Corpus is like car insurance—you don’t worry about it much until you have an accident; or, in the case of habeas corpus, until you get arrested for peaceful protest and hauled before a military tribunal.  Sound preposterous?  Isn’t this the United States, the land of the free?  Well, no, actually.  Not anymore.  Not since the Patriot Act, the NDAA 2012 (and 2013) Act, and the Trespass Bills (HR 347, S 1794), AKA the “anti-Occupy bills”.

Now, in the United States of America, U. S. citizens can be indefinitely detained, without charge or trial, for a “belligerent act”.  What is that?  Well, no one quite knows for sure.  Want to stage a protest at the Democratic convention, or question your representative on where your tax dollars are going?  Be careful, you could be guilty of “knowing” you are entering a government building or within proximate space of someone guarded by the Secret Service (if they aren’t in their hotel rooms with prostitutes), and therefore in violation of a federal crime that could land you in prison for ten years, in which case I guess at least you wouldn’t have to be paying taxes!

Add to this the attacks on our privacy and free speech by the SOPA, PIPA, and now (again!) CISPA legislation, which if passed, would eviscerate our ability to voice our outrage and connect with one another on the Internet, and a frightening picture of a world dominated by Big Brother watching and controlling our every move begins to take shape.

These laws make a mockery of our Bill of Rights by violating our First, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Ninth, Tenth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights, and whether you are a Tea Partier or an Occupier, your civil liberties are under assault.  We the people need to demand that these unconstitutional laws be rescinded before we find ourselves in Nazi Germany, or worse, living out an Orwellian nightmare.

Like car insurance, it’s a good idea not to let your constitutional rights like habeas corpus “lapse” because you never know when you might need them. 

Help us fight this unconstitutional attack on our civil liberties!  Write and call Congress and demand that these unconstitutional laws be reversed!

Habeas Corpus is Like Car Insurance

Habeas Corpus is like car insurance—you don’t worry about it much until you have an accident; or, in the case of habeas corpus, until you get arrested for peaceful protest and hauled before a military tribunal.  Sound preposterous?  Isn’t this the United States, the land of the free?  Well, no, actually.  Not anymore.  Not since the Patriot Act, the NDAA 2012 Act, and the Trespass Bills (HR 347, S 1794), AKA the “anti-Occupy bills”.

Now, in the United States of America, U. S. citizens can be indefinitely detained, without charge or trial, for a “belligerent act”.  What is that?  Well, no one quite knows for sure.  Want to stage a protest at the Democratic convention, or question your representative on where your tax dollars are going?  Be careful, you could be guilty of “knowing” you are entering a government building or within proximate space of someone guarded by the Secret Service (if they aren’t in their hotel rooms with prostitutes), and therefore in violation of a federal crime that could land you in prison for ten years, in which case I guess at least you wouldn’t be paying taxes!

Add to this the attacks on our privacy and free speech by the SOPA, PIPA, and now CISPA legislation, which if passed, would eviscerate our ability to voice our outrage and connect with one another on the Internet, and a frightening picture of a world dominated by Big Brother watching and controlling our every move begins to take shape.

These laws make a mockery of our Bill of Rights by violating our First, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Ninth, Tenth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights, and whether you are a Tea Partier or an Occupier, your civil liberties are under assault.  We the people need to demand that these unconstitutional laws be rescinded before we find ourselves in Nazi Germany, or worse, living out an Orwellian nightmare.

Occupy Wall Street

I am so happy to see people beginning to stand up and reclaim their government!  I was online for several hours on Sunday with the people chatting on the Occupy Los Angeles livestreaming chat and sharing ideas regarding the protests and demands that are being formulated.  My own thinking on this is in view of the urgency with regard to the exercising of our civil rights, that repealing the Patriot Act should be at the top of the list along with preserving our ability to communicate with one another via the Internet.  There is currently a “resolution of disapproval” that has been ramrodded through the House of Representatives by big Telecom that undermines the Net Neutrality regulations that currently exist as well as banning the FCC from enacting future protections.  Texas Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison  is pushing for a vote in the Senate and we must stop this and any other such legislation from passing the Senate as it is a serious assault on our civil liberties and the level playing field to which we are all accustomed on the Internet.  So, because our right to assemble peaceably and to communicate freely are vital to the pursuit of any other goals, my two top recommendations for OWS demands are to repeal the Patriot Act and to save the Internet.

There are many other demands that we need to make in order to reclaim our democracy, and I think the one I would place third would be the reason behind occupying Wall Street, to end corporate greed by holding Wall Street and the Banks accountable by prosecuting them for wrongdoing and demanding they pay their fair share of taxes.

Another demand I think is essential is the revocation of corporate personhood, as this is a cancer that has metastasized throughout our system until the corporation runs our government while it pays few of the taxes, pays no royalties on mining and oil on public lands, pollutes our environment, and receives huge amounts of government money in subsidies and contracts.

Ending war would save lives as well as money and help us invest in rebuilding our country and democracy both at home and around the world.

These are the demands with which I would start that double as good slogans for the movement to reclaim our democracy:

  1. REPEAL THE SO-CALLED PATRIOT ACT! RESTORE THE BILL OF RIGHTS!
  2. A FREE AND OPEN INTERNET! SAVE NET NEUTRALITY!
  3. MAKE THE BANKS & WALL STREET PAY THEIR FAIR SHARE!
  4. PROSECUTE WALL STREET! PROSECUTE THE BANKS!
  5. END CORPORATE WELFARE! STOP SUBSIDIZING GREED!
  6. CLEAN UP THE ENVIRONMENT! MAKE POLLUTERS PAY!
  7. TAX THE RICHEST 1%! SUPPORT THE BUFFETT RULE!
  8. END ALL THE WARS! BRING THE TROOPS AND MONEY HOME!
  9. REVOKE CORPORATE PERSONHOOD! PEOPLE HAVE THE RIGHTS!

WE are the change we can believe in!!

The People Need to Reclaim the Republic

It is telling that despite campaign promises to the contrary, the Obama administration hasn’t held the previous administration accountable for their abuses of power, has not rescinded the Orwellian practices of detention without trial, has sent even more troops to the Middle East, renewed the “Patriot Act”, went along with a bailout bill for greedy, irresponsible bankers over the strenuous objections of the voters and members of Congress, and kept all the Wall Street profiteers in key advisory positions. It appears that the same power brokers are pulling the strings, regardless of who is the governmental figurehead.

I would suggest that both the right and left wing are correct in their assessment that big government and big business are the problem as they are in league with each other and may even, as some fear, become an indistinguishable monolithic power. The ultra-rich 2% can afford to hire lobbyists but can we?  With the rapid disappearance of the middle class and our civil rights, we are becoming an impoverished slave class.

The alarming levels of corruption of government by corporate influence and the banking industry must be addressed if we are to reclaim our democracy.  We can start by rescinding the recent disastrous Supreme Court Citizens United decision that allows corporations to buy elections, pass the Fair Elections Now Act that imposes campaign spending limits, and pass legislation to end the revolving door between government regulatory agencies and corporate lobbying, among many other reforms, in order to reclaim government by and for the people.