Prism Program ( Big Brother gone too far?)

[BruceVC]

You mean the minority will ask themselves as the majority won't care much like what's happening today.

 

Also some of the majority support these measures, you've basically said it yourself. Your circle of friends don't care about security so rather leave it to people more qualified to make the right decisions for you

[pmp10]

Oh no.

Sooner or later the majority will notice that their ability to effect politics has dropped to near zero.

They will just have to find a convenient scapegoat before patting themselves on the back and carrying on.

[Hiro Protagonist]

 

 

Also some of the majority support these measures, you've basically said it yourself. Your circle of friends don't care about security so rather leave it to people more qualified to make the right decisions for you

 

 

No you misunderstand what I mean. My friends do care about security, they just don't care about what the NSA is doing.

[Guard Dog]

 

You mean the minority will ask themselves as the majority won't care much like what's happening today.

 

Also some of the majority support these measures, you've basically said it yourself. Your circle of friends don't care about security so rather leave it to people more qualified to make the right decisions for you

 

I totally reject the idea that these people are more qualified. They (the Obama administration & the NSA) do not give a damn about my security, safety, life, or health. The only thing they want is perpetual power and those are the means to get it. 

[Walsingham]

I agree with Hiro. This was precisely my point about going the 'upskirt' route of wikileaks.

 

Because this went outside the system, the system legitimately closed ranks. No-one could condone breaking the law when no laws had (correct me here) had been broken.

 

Handing this to the right senator and they'd have used it to tear the Executive a new bum hole, because they'd have looked good doing it. I think there may be one or two Congressmen who aren't keen on Obama.

 

Instead the Public got told, made a squawking noise, rose in a cloud, and have now settled again.

[BruceVC]

 

 

You mean the minority will ask themselves as the majority won't care much like what's happening today.

 

Also some of the majority support these measures, you've basically said it yourself. Your circle of friends don't care about security so rather leave it to people more qualified to make the right decisions for you

 

I totally reject the idea that these people are more qualified. They (the Obama administration & the NSA) do not give a damn about my security, safety, life, or health. The only thing they want is perpetual power and those are the means to get it. 

 

 

But GD what about the fact the NSA has helped prevent terrorist attacks? The measures they implement, like Prism, are for your own good. The Federal Government is your friend, the Federal Government is your friend  

[Guard Dog]

PMP is right. Everyday they wrap more and more chains around the American people until one day, soon I'm afraid, we will wake up in an authoritarian police state that would make Orwell cringe. Obama has railed on for five long years about fundamentally transforming the US. Now we are getting an idea what he means. He is transforming it from a relatively free nation where personal liberty is supreme and protected to a tightly controlled and monitored one where individual liberty does not exist. Why do you think he droned on so ponderously about "collective rights" during the 2008 election? He does not believe in individual rights. I truly believe he subscribes to the Maoist idea that the people are the property of the state rather than it's master. And so many Americans seem to be perfectly willing to sell their God-given liberty for reduced cost health care and "security".

 

The worst of it is they are not selling their own liberty, they are selling mine as well. Is it so inconceivable then that at some point some if us will stand up at some point and say enough is enough? Every time that man gives a speech, where he says one thing but the news that comes out is always the opposite, I feel the urge to go buy more guns and more ammunition because it just looks more an more inevitable that we'll be fighting each other again soon.

 

No hyperbole here, I'd rather see the country break apart than continue down this road it's on.

[Guard Dog]

Bruce, Barack Obama, Janet Napolitano and the HSA named me their enemy and a potential terrorist. I never thought I would live to see that happen. No, they really are not. The federal government no longer even pays lip service to the constitution. That is beyond scary.

[BruceVC]

Bruce, Barack Obama, Janet Napolitano and the HSA named me their enemy and a potential terrorist. I never thought I would live to see that happen. No, they really are not. The federal government no longer even pays lip service to the constitution. That is beyond scary.

 

What do you mean? You obviously don't mean you specifically but a group of people that you identify with?

[Guard Dog]

 

Bruce, Barack Obama, Janet Napolitano and the HSA named me their enemy and a potential terrorist. I never thought I would live to see that happen. No, they really are not. The federal government no longer even pays lip service to the constitution. That is beyond scary.

 

What do you mean? You obviously don't mean you specifically but a group of people that you identify with?

 

In 2009 Homeland Security sent a memo to local law enforcement everywhere asserting that they should pay special attention to Veterans, libertarians, tea party members, people opposed to abortion, etc as likely terrorists. It is the single most heinous document this government has produced since FDR ordered all Americans of Japanese descent rounded up and put in camps.

 

Apparently all you need to do to be considered a terrorist is not be a supporter of Obama.

Edited August 17, 2013 by Guard Dog

[Walsingham]

I'm not sure if this is a criticism of you or me, GD. But to my ears it sounds like you're freaking out simply because a trend is heading in one direction.

 

If I walk from London to Newcastle I'm walking North. But if you wait for me at the North Pole you'll be waiting a long time.

Edited August 17, 2013 by Walsingham

[Nepenthe]

PMP is right. Everyday they wrap more and more chains around the American people until one day, soon I'm afraid, we will wake up in an authoritarian police state that would make Orwell cringe. Obama has railed on for five long years about fundamentally transforming the US. Now we are getting an idea what he means. He is transforming it from a relatively free nation where personal liberty is supreme and protected to a tightly controlled and monitored one where individual liberty does not exist. Why do you think he droned on so ponderously about "collective rights" during the 2008 election? He does not believe in individual rights. I truly believe he subscribes to the Maoist idea that the people are the property of the state rather than it's master. And so many Americans seem to be perfectly willing to sell their God-given liberty for reduced cost health care and "security".

 

The worst of it is they are not selling their own liberty, they are selling mine as well. Is it so inconceivable then that at some point some if us will stand up at some point and say enough is enough? Every time that man gives a speech, where he says one thing but the news that comes out is always the opposite, I feel the urge to go buy more guns and more ammunition because it just looks more an more inevitable that we'll be fighting each other again soon.

 

No hyperbole here, I'd rather see the country break apart than continue down this road it's on.

In view of the discussion on the other page, my view is that they are just following the path started by the previous administration. Cowing the people into submission with the antiterror show. And that's where my disappointment with the guy stems from.

[Guard Dog]

You are dead on with that Nep. it really started with Woodrow Wilson after WWI and continued incrementally all the way up to the last year of Carter. Then it went in the other direction for twenty years. Then came 9-11, GWB and the Patriot Act and it has started going bad again. But where Bush took small steps, Obama is taking leaps.

[Hurlshort]

I'm not sure if I'd call the Patriot Act a small step.

 

If it makes you feel any better, I rail about the suspension of Habeus Corpus and it's importance to human rights every year with my 7th graders when we cover the Magna Carta.  

[Walsingham]

I'm not sure if I'd call the Patriot Act a small step.

 

If it makes you feel any better, I rail about the suspension of Habeus Corpus and it's importance to human rights every year with my 7th graders when we cover the Magna Carta.  

 

Yes. We have the same problem.

 

I really don't think naming bills stuff like The Patriot Act is helpful. The Human Rights Act is just as unhelpful. Repealing either one makes you sound like a total funthead. Yet they are both deeply flawed.

[Guard Dog]

I'm not sure if this is a criticism of you or me, GD. But to my ears it sounds like you're freaking out simply because a trend is heading in one direction.

 

If I walk from London to Newcastle I'm walking North. But if you wait for me at the North Pole you'll be waiting a long time.

No you are right. On the road to a destination is not the same as being there but it is better to turn back before you are too far along. Plus in this instance there is a point of no return (gun control) after which there is no turning back without bloodshed. Or even then.

[Wrath of Dagon]

I agree with Hiro. This was precisely my point about going the 'upskirt' route of wikileaks.

 

Because this went outside the system, the system legitimately closed ranks. No-one could condone breaking the law when no laws had (correct me here) had been broken.

 

Handing this to the right senator and they'd have used it to tear the Executive a new bum hole, because they'd have looked good doing it. I think there may be one or two Congressmen who aren't keen on Obama.

 

Instead the Public got told, made a squawking noise, rose in a cloud, and have now settled again.

Congress already knows about that, although it's not clear if they received all the info they were supposed to.

 

Senator Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat who leads the Senate intelligence committee, said in a statement that her panel has been notified of “significant FISA compliance issues” and “in all such cases, the incidents have been addressed by ending or adapting the activity.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-16/nsa-says-it-takes-privacy-violations-seriously-on-spying.html

[Calax]

 

I'm not sure if this is a criticism of you or me, GD. But to my ears it sounds like you're freaking out simply because a trend is heading in one direction.

 

If I walk from London to Newcastle I'm walking North. But if you wait for me at the North Pole you'll be waiting a long time.

No you are right. On the road to a destination is not the same as being there but it is better to turn back before you are too far along. Plus in this instance there is a point of no return (gun control) after which there is no turning back without bloodshed. Or even then.

 

 

 

Only Gun Control? Not gonna lie, your shotguns aren't going to do anything if a tank (or even an APC) rolls up to your front door. There is a reason you never see a drug cartel (you know, guys who break the laws to have MUCH higher powered weapons than are legal) going head to head with a Swat Team and winning.

 

You'd think that other amendments would be as sacred as that, but nobody gets in to much of a fuss if a law passes that makes it easier for a cop to stick his finger up my rear.

[Gfted1]

The point being, while one guy against a tank will always lose, an armed populous in open rebellion stands a much better chance.

[Walsingham]

 

I'm not sure if this is a criticism of you or me, GD. But to my ears it sounds like you're freaking out simply because a trend is heading in one direction.

 

If I walk from London to Newcastle I'm walking North. But if you wait for me at the North Pole you'll be waiting a long time.

No you are right. On the road to a destination is not the same as being there but it is better to turn back before you are too far along. Plus in this instance there is a point of no return (gun control) after which there is no turning back without bloodshed. Or even then.

 

 

Well, yeah, but ghastly as Newcastle is there's no reason not to go there for fear of ending up in the North Sea.

 

You and I agree that bureaucracies have a ratchet tendency to acquire powers and never give them up. Where you and I differ is in your notion that bureaucracies should never have ANY powers for fear of them one day getting too many. My view is that one simply needs to smack the ratchet mechanism with a spanner. A spanner made of democratic endeavour. And low carbon steel.

 

I don't know if you have already, but you might enjoy - as I currently am - histories of the Royal Navy and British Army. You'll find a lot of the same arguments we talk about here cropping up. And throughout Britain's history you can see the reasons for us having a permanent military force, the sincere fears it conjures up, and the bloody awful messes we've got into by virtue of trying to knacker it.

[Nepenthe]

You are dead on with that Nep. it really started with Woodrow Wilson after WWI and continued incrementally all the way up to the last year of Carter. Then it went in the other direction for twenty years. Then came 9-11, GWB and the Patriot Act and it has started going bad again. But where Bush took small steps, Obama is taking leaps.

We'll have to agree to disagree on the last sentence...

[Hurlshort]

I'm going to go out on a limb and say universal background checks for guns is a much smaller step than the Patriot Act.

[Guard Dog]

 

 

I'm not sure if this is a criticism of you or me, GD. But to my ears it sounds like you're freaking out simply because a trend is heading in one direction.

 

If I walk from London to Newcastle I'm walking North. But if you wait for me at the North Pole you'll be waiting a long time.

No you are right. On the road to a destination is not the same as being there but it is better to turn back before you are too far along. Plus in this instance there is a point of no return (gun control) after which there is no turning back without bloodshed. Or even then.

 

 

 

Only Gun Control? Not gonna lie, your shotguns aren't going to do anything if a tank (or even an APC) rolls up to your front door. There is a reason you never see a drug cartel (you know, guys who break the laws to have MUCH higher powered weapons than are legal) going head to head with a Swat Team and winning.

 

You'd think that other amendments would be as sacred as that, but nobody gets in to much of a fuss if a law passes that makes it easier for a cop to stick his finger up my rear.

 

Calax, you are missing my point. I do think every infringement is worth fighting over. But once they succeed in disarming everyone there is nothing, and I do mean NOTHING stopping a political cabal from infringing on any right if finds inconvenient to it's ends or just seizing total power all together. Why do you think the left wants gun control so badly? Do you really think they give a damn about crime or school shootings or yours or my safety? Gun control is not about any of those things. Politicians care about one thing; themselves. They want only what will enhance their influence, expand their power, advance their position. They are the lowest and basest of human beings. But you can never be the final arbiter over everything if someone else has the means to resist either through political power (votes) or hard power (armed rebellion).

 

 

As to the shotguns remark, if they start banning guns do you really think they will let you keep shotguns? It's domination by incrementalisim. You don't really need automatic weapons so let's ban those. You don't really need military style assault weapons, so we'll ban just those. Well, you don't really need handguns so we'll ban those. Nobody needs rifles for self defense so we'll ban those. Then it will be why do you need shotguns? The police will protect you so we'll ban those. They try to make each step sound so reasonable. Then they strip you of your freedom with a smile. 

[Guard Dog]

I'm going to go out on a limb and say universal background checks for guns is a much smaller step than the Patriot Act.

Hurlie two points:

 

1) If you have to ask the government for it's permission to enjoy a right is it really a right?

2) Despite that I'd still be in favor of universal background checks if, AND ONLY IF, no government state, local, or federal. would be involved in the process. You would not be dealing with an honest partner. 

 

I'd be in favor of background checks if it were really about keeping guns out of the hands of criminals. But, it's just not about that at all. See my previous comment.

[Zoraptor]

A right can still be a right if it's granted as a matter of course. Driving a car is a right, but you wouldn't want habitual drunk drivers, those who are sufficiently bad drivers to fail a test repeatedly or the blind to be able to drive- as others have the right to safely use the roads as well. It's all in the application of the law but so long as it doesn't end up with something ludicrous like "asians have a disproportionate number of crashes, don't issue them licences" or similar it works fine and pretty much everyone agrees it's a good idea.

 

Whether owner licencing/ background checks would work well in the US where there are more guns and a lot more illegal guns is questionable though, as it would rely on most gun owners being responsible and reasonable and a lack of illegal alternatives.

Edited August 18, 2013 by Zoraptor