Whining impatience with a pesky Congress backed up by a threat to govern rule by newly assumed executive authority is not merely a character flaw, a childish tantrum, a legitimate difference of management technique, nor a misunderstanding of the nature of a republic.
It is an indication of a basic contempt for the very idea of a republic.
It is a clear overthrow of the fundamental architecture of the US Constitution.
It is a mortal danger to both the Constitution and the Republic.
It is an insult to the American people.
It is a betrayal of the American people.
~ vid ~
No. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
~ vid ~
You will be. You. will. be.
~ vid @3:07 ~
Stilton (17) reminded me that I forgot to make a point.
The Obama administration’s frustration with “the legislative process” clearly indicates that they do recognize that a Constitutional Republic based on the Separation of Powers into three Branches of Gov’t with a Bicameral Legislature operating under arcane rules and constrained by a difficult-to-amend Constitution is “no way to run a railroad.”
What Progressives fail to acknowledge is that it’s not the Federal Government’s friggin’ job to “run a railroad.” If you want the “trains to run on time,” there are other forms of gov’t (e.g. Mussolini’s Fascists) and private enterprises designed to do just that.
The FedGov’s job is not to run railroads but to protect our lives, liberties, way of life, property, overseas interests, etc., and rights.
The US Constitution establishes a fundamental governing process that is intended to make gov’t incapable of being run as easily, efficiently, and responsively as Progressivism (or any other statist -ism) wants/needs it to be. The Constitution is designed to be a pain in the @ss for a wannabe tyrant to deal with.
Yeah, presidentin’s hard; but the job wouldn’t impact Obama’s golf game nearly as much, if he’d stick to a president’s constitutionally authorized duties.
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26 Comments!
I see this, and I start thinking about the death of the Roman Republic and the birth of the Roman Empire, courtesy of Julius Caesar. I’ll bet most of those Roman Republicans thought it would never end, but it did.
There’s lots of things about Rome/USA that don’t track. But the consolidation of power seems much the same.
A little joke: Our Senate’s not like the Roman Senate; but, just in case, our Caesar might want to stay away from the Senate during the Ides of March. Some senators & congressmen might try taking a dagger to that joke of a budget he just published.
And here’s a thing about the consolidation of power: after Julius Caesar was gone, the republic did not revive — it was gone for good. So yes, I am afraid.
Do you folks recall a while back when there was a discussion here about the f e d s monitoring the interwebs and I had said that I had seen a tweet used as actionable in_tel, originally selected for a human look after the computers flagged it for a couple of key words. Now I am seeing it discussed on Fox as a proposed program. But like I said, seen it in practice already.
You may also recall that I had said that knowing that, that I was changing what/how I posted on the interwebs.
As such, there will be no post from me about where this gvt is heading.
And I remind all that already, they watch.
I don’t know why they are moving so slowly with this stuff. It’s not like the American people are going to look up from the brainwash-box and do something about it.
I wish they would come for me now. I have a lovely flu virus to share with them.
Smug, snippy b…witch. Her self assurance is frightening. Unsaid but implied;
Nice if the Congress (RINO’s) come along, but we’ll use the united Dems of the Senate, the courts, and executive orders to have our way. We have more lawyers and money than any private or even state group of naysayers, so we’ll have our way I’m sure. Besides, Holder controls the courts, so we can save the suit defense money for Obama’s re-election and Life Presidency. Oops, I wasn’t supposed to say that.
She is for damn sure one of the “we” in “We’re the ones we’ve been waiting for..”,
Peggy, sorry for you, happy for the feds, should they arrive.
Brad, I’ve thought about this. Maybe I’ll think a little more.
We’ll write you letters from camp, Brad!
“Send Chocolate!”
I’m not paranoid, and I’m not kidding. I try to avoid what I think might be flaggged key words.
Saw a tweet between two friends who were going on a trip by large flying vehicle get picked up out of the ether and result in co-ordinated action by three national agenceez/bureaus to inter cept them at the a-port.
Turns out to be a lot of nothin’ so far as either of the two being a danger at all. Another case of the stupid little joke. But the joke had been told between the two only- the sender thought. Action on the tweet was ramped up in less than three hrs. Got told that all the fuss was the result of that one message between the two friends. Saw both scrutinized equally, so the reciever hadn’t ratted out the sender.
It was real clear to me real fast that there was a monitoring program in place and it was being used to look for the bad guys, by watching us all.
Hey y’all – public service announcement here.
If you don’t already have plans for Saturday . . . and even if you do . . . Ken Salazar and Maria Cantwell will be at the Senior Center in Anacortes on Saturday to discuss “the future of the San Juan Islands” – as in the future under the “protection” of the federal govt.
Notification did not come until Thursday afternoon, and they made it very inconvenient for the people who live in the islands to make it to this event. Let’s show our solidarity for our friends and turn out to pack the place!
More info:
The original plan was to turn the San Juan’s into a Nat’l. Monument but they are instead now looking at a National Conservation Area (NCA)designation. NCA’s are administered by the Bureau of Land Management and special conservation rules apply to public lands within the NCA. However, this is a back door land grab as the surrounding properties are compelled to follow the same rules!
brad (2)
BS! Let ‘em come’n get me. Let ‘em come get a hundred million of us.
Point is: they can’t.
But … they can intimidate folks by implied threats of monitoring and repercussions.
They can intimidate folks even more by making a few examples.
And they can intimidate almost everybody by implying that their jobs or contracts are at risk.
They can’t actually do it, though.
We cannot stand idly by while seditious traitors slander constitutionalists by labeling us radicals, terrorists, and “enemy” or by hinting that we’re a threat to this country. It’s frikkin’ absurd and slanderous.
Preserve, protect, and defend … against all enemies, foreign and domestic.
If you wanna give up the Constitution without a fight, well piss on ya !
[Frankly, I almost hope they do invite me downtown for a chat. I'll even talk with 'em if that invitation is accompanied by a warrant or subpoena. I'd love to be able to shove my official-official records, extensive vetting, [redacted], &c. up their witch-hunting patoots. Then, I’d love to have a chat with a couple’a real journalists.]
[Any Feds reading this, make an appointment. I can save you from wasting overtime, agro, paperwork, and budget on me. If I find out there's a dossier on me for this, it will be without probable cause, and I'll be ... forced to deal with lawyers, again.]
As each of these news stories unfolds I become a little more convinced that anything short of an Obama re-election is the only thing that will snap the right leaning folks in this country out of whine mode. And that certainly includes what passes for our congress people.
Of course history is replete with stories of ‘Too little too Late’… why should anyone expect a different outcome?
“Well, Doctor, what have we got—a Republic or a Monarchy?”
“A Republic, if you can keep it.”
I think we can, although the likes of Boenher will only make it tougher if they don’t do their job and impeach some of the bastards.
Kafka: The Trial. Could happen to any one of us.
THEY— don’t care about US —- it’s the 18 year old new voters THEY are after— THEY are winning— ask a high school student what they think of this president–ask a college age student what they think of this president— and what they know about what is happening to this country. I dare you– if you do be prepared to BE AFRAID.
Doug, are those Constitutional Protections you are counting on?
Please, for the record, can you tell me a couple that they have not violated?
Yea, we have our rights, but no longer to the extent granted by God and enumerated by the Constitution. We have the rights permitted by our government.
Ask citizens post Katrina about the Second.
Ask al Awalaki (spelling?) about due process.
Ask the Catholic church about the First.
At least, so far, we are not asked to quarter troops.
All I was and am saying is, they are watching.
right now.
not maybe.
not sometime in the future.
and that we should keep it in mind.
Want to test this theory???
Between you and a trusted friend, shoot a few tweets back and forth reqarding evil intentions a half a day before showing up for checkin and then see what kind of reception you have upon arrival. Be sure to include special key words like air_plan e and b0m b.
If you happen to be a stupid young girl traveling with your swim team, you and your whole team can be met by serious reps of the fb of i, TS admin and local LEOs. And a cute sniffy pooch, almost forgot the GSD. Allow for extra time and you can just make your flig ht, but not before the coach cuts you from the team and vows to have you in the deans office come Monday.
You also earn the love of your teammates as the entire group is questioned and put through extra security screen. ing.
Sure, there may not have been legal repercussions, though the FA admin Regulatory had a rep there as well and a fine may be forthcoming, but for sure, there were consequences.
I don’t doubt that communications (and especially posts on public forums) are monitored and logged, with all sorts of skeezy algorithms looking for anti-Obama sentiments. But I’ll be double-dogged damned if I let that shut me up.
Returning to the original videoclip with this post, it’s amazing that the Obama Administration can simply label Republicans as a “roadblock” and then declare the end of even the pretense of bipartisanship.
Stilton (17)
Your second comment reminds me of a major point I forgot to make, so I’ll add it as an update.
brad (16)
I hear ya.
Look, I posted that around 4am, my time, so I wasn’t in a mood to think it through or polish my point. Frankly, I thought you were cautioning against using, let’s say, “inflammatory” language out of a concern for monitoring. If that’s not what you meant, I apologize; but my point is still valid, albeit clumsily, even if you didn’t really prompt it.
Clearly, I disagree with using cautious political language out of fear of monitoring (that’s different than making personal threats or advocating felonious acts). Let the King read the damn stuff! Frankly, I fear Missy’s retribution more (for you newbies, here, that’s my pet name for our hostess, SondraK, ma’am).
If you don’t want to be associated with my language, I fully understand. Not kidding. Seriously, I do. After all, I will kibosh any comments on my posts that use the N-word or are blatantly racist, and I will remove my own comments on any other threads that get that way. I do that for the same reason I took as yours: I do not wish to be associated with that crap. I don’t do that out of fear, though. I do it out of revulsion. There could be other things which might apply, but they haven’t come up. Folks’re pretty dang polite and reasoned, here.
As a result and in recognition of the possibility of having been wrong once before (danged if I can recall what it might have been, though), I have severely cautioned myself against any more 4am comments, ordered myself to perform 200-rounds of community range time, and fined myself Tq200 (Triskelion quatloo, not sure what that is in dog dollars).
It should be patiently obvious that joining a Tea Party and becoming active is fucking mandatory, for the year of our Lord, 2012 is for ALL.THE. MARBLES!
I’ll add a note of clarification myself, saying that I’m on the same page as DougM. I don’t worry about monitoring because I monitor myself (and my personal blog) – there’s no place for racism, threats of violence, or any other such nonsense. And this would be true whether or not any outside monitoring was going on.
Nope, I’m all about impassioned opinion which is (to the best of my ability) well-informed, pro-Constitution, and anti-socialist. And using the ballot box to solve our nation’s problems.
Stilton is obviously a terrorist. Someone should forward his name to whoever keeps The One’s enemy list.
brad (16)
Okay, re: your main question in (16):
“[A]re those Constitutional Protections you are counting on?”
No.
One cannot count on Constitutional protections. There are none, as such.
Constitutional protections are merely contractual prohibitions against gov’t abuse of power in that the gov’t recognizes these rights and agrees that individuals are born with these rights (things that cannot be taken without one’s individual consent).
Those prohibitions must be maintained jealously and forcefully … by The People™.
Yes, the gov’t is obligated to protect or rights, but we cannot depend on it.
We must insist on keeping our legitimate rights, by whatever means necessary.
As you say, the gov’t abuses it’s powers frequently, and it has done so habitually for over a hundred years. This is a symptom of a fundamental change in the governing class’ view of the citizen-gov’t relationship. They believe that gov’t controls society, not the other way around — you know, they govern only with the consent of the people, not because it’s in the general interest, or it’s for our own good, or to establish some kind of “social justice,” etc. They’re turning us into just another enlighted-despot-run Eurostatist kind of aristocracy-peasant relationship, something we threw the heck out in 1776.
If the gov’t erroneously violates the constitutional contract only occasionally, then those gov’t actions are illegitimate; and they become legal matters for redress by legislation, litigation, or election.
If the gov’t chooses to violate that contract as a matter of policy, then the gov’t, itself, becomes illegitimate; and it becomes a political matter of self-defense. If this illegitimate government cannot be brought to heel through elections, then the Declaration of Independence may be invoked to re-establish legitimate government.
You know, something like that.
i take a line from star wars, unfortunately very relevant
The Emperor: [to the Senate] In order to ensure our security and continuing stability, the Republic will be reorganized into the first Galactic Empire, for a safe and secure society which I assure you will last for ten thousand years.
[Senate fills with enormous applause]
Padmé: [to Bail Organa] So this is how liberty dies… with thunderous applause.
[From this space was deleted two paragraphs of hardcore libertarian Constitutionalist rhetoric, The sentence below summarizes the main point well.]You would have to expect that the government will fight back, no matter how wrong they might be.
As much as I like to run my mouth. I want to be around to do all I can to help reclaim our liberty.
^ Like what?
Sure, play it safe and tell yourself you’ll save the day in the nick of time, kiss the girl, and ride off as they roll credits.
Trouble is, it’ll be harder and more dangerous later, and at some point it’ll be too late.
All’s I have right now is a mouth/keyboard/vote.
DougM, thanks for your considerable time & thought,
especially (22). My biggest concern is an increasing
percentage of our population that is either ignorant
of the constitution or actively supportive of extra or
anti-constitutional actions by the administration.
Add in the educational & media active sabotage of our
constitutional form of government and we have a big
problem now & in our future. Your first video of that
WH official scared me good. She knows just how to
talk & make things sound reasonable & needed.