A Bad Week for Liberty

I thought this article from Glenn Greenwald at salon.com was worth sharing.

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/07/29/change/index.html

It's titled "this week in change" summarizing a few news items from the week which provide yet more evidence that nothing has really changed. In brief:

1. Congress passes legislation to provide billions of dollars in new War funding

2. The treatment of the Wikileaks story by the MSM basically ignores the horrific revelations of the Afghanistan war, and instead focuses the discussion on how evil and unpatriotic it is to publish such information.

3. President Obama pushes for expanded government power to use the so-called "National Security Letters"(NSLs) to enable warrantless access to citizens' Internet records.

Unfortunately, Mr. Greenwald's article only touches on the bad news of the week for those of us who love our civil liberties. To add to the pile:

Another U.S. citizen, "Imam Awlaki" is added to the Administration's assassination list ... with no criminal conviction or even charges being filed. Just another un-proven accusation "you're a terrorist" that brings a death sentence on a U.S. citizen, due process be damned.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128831726

More unearthed land mines in the 2000+ page so-called "Financial Reform" bill. A provision which:

" . . . exempts the SEC from disclosing records or information derived from surveillance, risk assessments, or other regulatory and oversight activities." ( i.e. from FOIA requests).

I love the part about "other regulatory and oversight activities". Terms so vague that the entire agency and all of its activities might as well be exempt from any public scrutiny.

http://market-ticker.org/archives/2533-Oh,-They-DO-Intend-To-Steal-From-You.html

From 'antiwar.com': Our Congress debates "H.Res 1553" basically declaring that we give our full support to Israel should they decide to use military force to “eliminate nuclear threats” from Iran.

http://www.antiwar.com/blog/2010/07/24/stop-congress-from-green-lighting-attack-on-iran/

AND, as every C4L member has no doubt heard, the U.S. Senate is holding debates and cloture votes on the DISCLOSE Act.

The vast majority of "We, The People" work hard to support ourselves and our families, pay taxes, and possibly engage in some part-time political activism. Meanwhile, our tax dollars fund a gangster-government that's working FULL TIME to erode our freedom and further involve us in imperialistic military crusades.