“It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once.” … Philosopher David Hume

Thomas Sowell, one the great minds of our times, wrote a thought provoking article exploring some ways a society loses freedoms. Mr. Sowell noted, “The most politically effective totalitarian systems have gotten people to give up their own freedom in order to vent their resentment or hatred at other people– under Communism, the capitalists; under Nazis, the Jews.” A profound comment that critical thinkers will appreciate; and unfortunately, too many liberals will not understand.
http://townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2010/02/16/playing_freedom_cheap

For several decades our freedoms have been incrementally usurped by government. Not only have the people have allowed this to have happened, too many don’t realize it or care. Public education and academia controlled by entrenched liberals subscribing to the ideology of Marxism have indoctrinated and dumbed-down a significant segment of the population. They have created a mentally challenged citizen that flocks to the Democrat Party. During periods of power these anti-liberty zealots have incrementally taken away freedoms and continue to attack traditions that have made America great for over 200 years.

There are a plethora of examples that prove American traditions and freedom are under attack by Marxist Liberals, often with assistance of the courts because a majority of Americans rebuke the liberal agenda. Their attack on religion escalated with the Supreme Court decision in Murray vs. Curlett (1963), which banned organized school prayers. Since then liberals have been committed to eliminate Christmas symbols and other religious symbols in public places, or caroling in public schools, the words “under God” in our Pledge of Allegiance or the use of God in any government communication. The lie used to promote this agenda is the non-existent “Separation of Church and State” clause in the U.S. Constitution. It’s a liberal myth! A provision created by an overreaching liberal activist Supreme Court.

Take something as benign smoking tobacco. The freedom to choose to consume a legal product has been taken away incrementally. It started in the 1960’s with restrictions to smoking in sections of airplanes, then airports, restaurants, places of employment and parks. This was followed by confiscatory taxes on tobacco products and multibillion-dollar suits against tobacco companies, then prohibition of smoking in individual cars and homes. Other Constitutional freedoms and property rights are being taken away in the same manner.

The most egregious Liberal attack on liberty is the assault on freedom of speech and thought. Tyrants and politicians supporting totalitarian systems know that to control the population you must control speech and thought. To this end liberals have passed “Hate Crimes” legislation, one of the most egregious violations of the U.S. Constitution ever passed by Congress and upheld by a Supreme Court. What a person is thinking when committing a crime against another person is not of consequence. The act alone should be judged and punished.

Freedom of speech and thought, along with property rights, are of the most cherished freedoms of any free society. Once government controls freedom of speech and thought they can dictate “appropriate” language, which liberals have done with so called “Political Correctness”. By controlling the use of words such as retard, queer, nigger, spic, kike, etc., governments can control the people. The 1st Amendment was adopted to protect the most insensitive speech and with out it there is no freedom. Think of the absurdity of rewriting great literary works of bye gone eras, like those of Mark Twain, because of the use of “incentive” words as defined by liberal elitist.

Team Obama and Democrats are shinning examples of the Marxist Liberal agenda to control the people. They use lofty rhetoric like economic and social justice, which does not sow justice but only spreads misery and poverty. They are master midway carnival barkers and political magicians using slight of hand, out right lies, misinformation, and distortion of empirical data, rewritten history, hate and class warfare to advance the agenda. Liberals posting on this blog is proof positive. Liberal icons are able to convince indoctrinated minions lacking critical thinking skills to give up their freedoms with bumper sticker slogans and sound bites that allow liberal naval gazers to feel good about their lofty self perceptions while being led into tyranny like a flock of sheep.

George Torres

It does not surprise me when liberals respond to ideological challenges with simple name calling or combine a few liberal talking points to make a phrase or sentence complete with misspelled words and void of facts. So I offer another challenge to liberals to defend pathetic liberal comments.

After President Bush’s radio broadcast Saturday morning liberal democrats trotted out Senator Diane Feinstein and in true liberal form put Iraq on notice to get their house in order. The lofty, narcissistic liberal senator advised the people of America and Iraq that three years is much too long for this war to have lasted, that “we” are frustrated with the lack of improvement in Iraqi political process and they must quickly provide for equal representation for the Sunni, Kurds and Shiites and blah, blah, blah…

Once again a liberal sashays out in public and criticize non-liberals for not being an example of perfection, like them. Senator Feinstein, in perfect liberal form, is pathetically self-absorbent in her own importance in the liberal alternate universe. This universe has no history and no future. It exists in the moment. Her pronouncements have no factual bases, are intellectually dishonest, but meet the goal of making her feel good about herself.

Senator Feinstein says the Bush Administration is incompetent for not winning this war after three years and it has gone on too long. Does she mean like the four years spent fighting the Revolutionary War, the War of Secession (aka: Civil War) or World War II? Or does she think the U.S. Urban Riots 1968-1972 does not count as a long struggle? More history the liberals ignore! She criticized the Bush Administration for not having won the peace yet. Does she mean like the ten plus years of reconstruction after the “Civil War”, or the seven plus years of reconstruction of Germany and Japan after World War II?

Senator Feinstein reminded Americans it’s been three years and criticized the Iraqis for having not established a political process that provides equal representation to minority Sunni and Kurds. Does she mean like the 70 years it took the U.S. to free the slaves or the 180 years it took the American government to provide equal representation (Civil Rights) to the blacks?

Senator Feinstein condemns the Iraqis for the sectarian violence. Is the morally superior senator suggesting the Iraqi government should be more vigilant in protecting its citizens like the U.S. government? The fact is that Iraq has 18 provinces and the violence is occurring in 3 provinces, by the way where the U.S. media hangs out. General Casey reported that the other 15 provinces report six or less acts of violence a day and 12 of those provinces report two or less acts of violence a day. Now isn’t it interesting the senator ignores that her state, the Socialist Republic of California, is about the same size and population of Iraq and suffered more citizens murdered than Iraq had killed in sectarian violence or by terrorist. Or that the senator ignores that when she was the mayor of San Francisco it had one of the highest murder and crime rates in the state and nation.

Now imagine if the U.N. assessed the crime rate of cities like Detroit, New York, Miami, Chicago, San Francisco, Oakland, Los Angeles and found the number of citizens killed by murder far exceeded the number of Iraqis killed by sectarian violence and terrorist. Then they deemed the U.S. an unsafe nation. I wonder how the morally superior senator would respond to the U.N. if they put the U.S on notice that if the political process and violence is not stopped they would take action.

The point is that the war in Iraq is just a battlefield in the global war on terror. The Iraqis are struggling to establish a representative government against common criminals released from Saddam’s jails and terrorist who, like liberal democrats, want them to fail. The liberal media is not reporting that the Iraqis are slowly winning, but there is still much to be done. The perfect liberals need to accept the imperfection of the rest of us. Senator Feinstein and her liberal comrades need to stop lying about the war, need to support America and Iraq and not the terrorist. There are plenty of other issues they can righteously criticize the Bush Administration.

 George A. Torres

The 2nd Amendment to the US Constitution reads as follows, “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” I often wonder which part of that amendment the gun control crowd does not understand… ‘the right of the people’ or ‘shall not be infringed’.

Our Founding Fathers knew that in order to stay a free society the people needed to be able to defend themselves and their property from attack: attack from foreign enemies as well as from the common criminal. These wise men drew upon their knowledge of history and human nature when preparing the Bill of Rights. They knew that throughout history tyrannical monarchies and other despots had routinely stripped the rights of the people to own weapons. This practice helped them control the people and safeguard their positions of authority. So long as the government’s armies were well armed and the people were not- uprisings against their power could be quashed easily and quickly

In the aftermath of hurricane Katrina an order was made for forced evacuations and to disarm the populace in the New Orleans area. Door to door searches were made and firearms were confiscated, legally owned or not. Many of us saw the footage on television. Former New Orleans Police Commissioner, Edwin Compass III, was quoted as saying, “no one will be able to be armed. Guns will be taken. Only law enforcement will be allowed to have guns.” Armed law enforcement officers followed the order to confiscate the firearms even though it was an illegal and unconstitutional order. In so doing these authorities took away the only protection some of these people had from the criminal element taking advantage of the chaos and breakdown in emergency services. How was this helpful to the citizenry? How was this serving and protecting the people? Courts later ordered a halt to the practice and the return of the firearms- to date this order has not been fully complied with by the New Orleans authorities. Monday a motion to hold Mayor Nagin and the current police commissioner in contempt of court was filed for not complying with the order to return the firearms to their rightful owners.

Who benefits when law abiding citizens are unarmed? Who benefits from the publicity of crimes committed with guns? Who benefits when people must turn to government for protection? Who benefits when new restrictive gun control laws are passed? The only benefactors I see are politicians who get to appear ‘tough on crime’ and the criminals. Gun control laws or no, criminals will obtain guns by any means necessary for their own gain. They do not care about laws; this is why they are called criminals.

Michelle Glisan Blevins

I found it ironic that in a show of open-mindness, the Arab-catering Western governments sided with the thin-skinned Muslims over the caricature of Muhammad, when other gods are ridiculed every day and when Arabs want to annihilate Judaism!

A few Muslims in Europe are abusing the Democratic freedom and “hijacking” the freedom of speech they found, to violently condemn a speech they consider offensive, in another case of freedom of speech against law and order, and civil opposition. Just remember France and the headscarves!

What have happened to the many Muslims that have chosen to leave their dictatorships of Islam for the shores of our jobless Western Europe or America, and the generous benefits we provide their extended families? Now they want to shape the policies of these secular countries into a more Islamic-compatible system and want us to bear the whole weight of their integration. 

I wish there were more Muslim marching in our street to condemn the slaughter of Muslims by Muslim terrorists in Iraq!

I wish they had shown as much energy to reject the Talibans, denounce war-monging Saddam or Iran, show their disapproval of the beheadings of hostages, and condemn terrorism.

I wish there more Tony Blairs to condemn the violent demonstrations.

In the meantime, in all the hot spot of the world, rabid blood-thirsty crowds are burning flags, calling for Bin Laden to avenge them, and demanding death and destruction. It would be interesting to know who orchestrated these events.

After all, the “inflammatory cartoons” were published LAST SEPTEMBER and went unnoticed for almost four months. What happened? Who brought them out and who stirred the pot?

 
 Eric Chevreuil

To those with knowledge of history prior to this moment and have the ability to view events with critical thought, find liberals only provide comic relief. Liberal’s narcissistic beliefs and moral superiority causes them to make fools of themselves day in and day out. It would be funnier if it weren’t so scary. Think about it, these people could regain power. Adolf Hitler, the essence of evil, once said, “What good fortune for the government that the people do not think.”

Presidential hopeful, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton acclaimed by liberals to be the smartest woman in the world, hopes Hitler’s comment is relevant to the American electorate. Hill’s, as doting fans call her, has taken the liberal media lead to attempt to politicize the trivial Cheney accidental shooting as a major event. Clinton, ignoring her history, trots out into the public forum to attack Cheney and Bush’s management of the event, like she has room to talk.

On Tuesday, Feb 14, 2005, Hillary blasted the White House for failing to disclose details about Cheney’s hunting accident, complained that Bush administration officials were stonewalling on “legitimate requests for information” and found the refusal of the administration to level with the American people on matters large and small very disturbing. Astounding! This from the woman who during her co-presidency withheld subpoenaed documents from Whitewater investigators for two years, refused to surrender Rose Law Firm billing records until statutes of limitations expired, illegally possessed and delayed the surrender of 500 republican raw FBI files, refused to surrender a suicide note written by Vince Foster after he had killed himself and during various corruption hearings consistently testified that she “had no recall”. For this woman to accuse the Bush administration of a “propensity for secrecy” is an absolute joke.

And, Hillary has the audacity to accuse President Bush of incompetence in executing the War on Terror asking, “ how long can it take to find the tallest man in Afghanistan? Another example of stand up comedy! Remember it was her husband, Co-President Bill, which refused to accept custody of Bin Laden from the Sudanese because they didn’t have a legal basis for holding him. Excuse me!

Hillary and other mentally deficient liberal democratic leaders try to deflect their incompetence by parroting the liberal talking points that accuse the Bush Administration of being a “culture of corruption”. Absolutely laughable! Want an example of a “culture of corruption”? The Clinton Administration is the model. Think not? Consider this incomplete selection of corruption. Bill and/or Hillary committing rape, sexual assault, indecent exposure, perjury, bribery, accepting illegal campaign contributions, illegal financial transaction, obstruction of justice, contempt of court, tampering with evidence, abuse of power, which were revealed in Paulagate; Monicagate; Whitewatergate; Casagrandegate; travelgate; Chinagate (selling of missile technology); Charlie Trie-gate; Web Hubbell-gate; Pardongate; Teamstergate; Nannygate; Secretary of Agriculture Michael Espy-gate; Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt-gate; V.P. Al Gore-gate; Housing Secretary Henry Cisneros-gate, Craig Livingstone-gate; and Jim Guy Tucker-gate. Or how about liberal democrat corruption illustrated by Rep. Boxer (D-CA) NSF checks at House bank; Rep. Frank (D-MA) roommate Stephen Gobie operating a homosexual brothel in home; Sen. Biden (D-DE) plagiarized Neil Kinnock during a presidential primary; Sen. Kennedy (D-MA) murder of Mary Jo; Gov. Patton (D-KY) harassing mistress; Rep. Rostenkowski (D-IL) post office scandal; Walter Fauntroy (D-WaDC) guilty campaign fraud; Rep. Studds (D-MA) lewd conduct with House pages; Rep. Traficant (D-OH) resigned for theft related offenses. Sen. Torricelli (D-NJ) resigned for bribery; Rep. Edwards (D-LA) misuses US Military during Hurricane Katrina; Sen. Gary Hart unethical sexual conduct; Sen. Robb and cocaine parties and Tai Collins scandal; Mayor Berry, WaDC guilty of trafficking narcotics; Sen. Byrd (D-WV) leader in KKK and lost controversial ML King tape; Sen. Daschle (D-SD) gave contracts for faulty x-ray screens for airline industry for lobbyist wife; Rep Jefferson (D-LA) use of military helicopters for personal use in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina & bribery in promoting business deals in Africa, Atlanta Mayor Campbell managed City Hall as a criminal enterprise with 10 city officials guilty of corruption; Senator Reid (D-NV) giving government contracts to family construction business in Las Vegas. Remember this list is by no means complete. Now I would submit these samples of liberal moral superiority demonstrates their hypocrisy. I have given these samples to liberal friends and asked them to explain how a few instances of conservative corruption compares with the magnitude of a liberal culture of corruption. Typical of liberals, silence. I challenge any liberal with the courage of their convictions to convince any thinking person that they are fit to lead.

  George A. Torres, Jr

In one scenario laid out by The VonFrederick Group, terrorists could hide an atomic weapon inside a cargo container, load it on a pirated freighter, dock it at a pier in San Francisco, and detonate the weapon before anything could be done to prevent it. Such an explosion would instantly kill every living thing for miles and utterly destroy the entire city and surrounding areas. Nearly every building would be demolished. As for people, San Francisco has an estimated population of over 740,000- the death rate would be expected to be at or near 100%. Deaths attributed to the effects of radiation poisoning as well as those who would perish in the resulting structure and wild fires outside the blast’s immediate reach could number in the thousands. Should something like this occur, September 11th would seem insignificant in comparison.

The preceding scenario came to mind when I read an article in the February 17th, 2006 edition of The New York Times about the control of the ports in New York. According to the article, “P&O Ports operates the New York City Passenger Ship Terminal and owns a 50 percent interest in the Port Newark Container Terminal, which is the third-largest cargo terminal on the Port Authority’s property.” This British company, Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Company (P&O) also runs ports in New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami and Philadelphia.  Our government has approved the purchase of P&O by Dubai Ports World (DP World). DP World is owned by the government of Dubai which is part of the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Additionally, David Sanborn, a senior executive of DP World, has been nominated to head the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Maritime Administration.

Two of the September 11th high-jackers were UAE citizens and partial financial backing of the attacks were done through transfers within the UAE financial system. The UAE is also working on expanding trade with Iran and has already approved several Iranian companies to operate within the UAE’s RAK Free Trade Zone.

Could a DP World employee sympathetic to extremist-Muslim terrorists pass along information on the inner workings and security of our ports? What if terrorists infiltrated the DP World organization and smuggled in terrorist operators or allowed deadly cargo to enter our ports, such as in the San Francisco scenario described above?

With an executive of Dubai Ports World in charge of the Maritime Administration, the Dubai company having 50% ownership and control of the Port Newark Container Terminal in New York (as well as operations in the other ports mentioned) and the threat to our ports from Mid-Eastern terrorists, are we leaving the fox to guard the hen house? Are we making the terrorist’s job easier? Are we opening our ports to potential disaster or is that thought just an over-reaction? What are your thoughts?

 Michelle Glisan Blevins

In the December 2005 newsletter Eric Chevrevuil discussed the 1st Amendment and freedom of speech, as a freedom the U.S. Constitution was created to guarantee. The discussion indicates Eric, along with many Americans, doesn’t get it. The Constitution was created to place limits on government, not the citizenry. Take the 1st Amendment; “Congress shall make no law…; or abridging the freedom of speech…”  No confusion there. No allusion to kinds of speech, just speech. Yet, those like Eric, minority activist groups, and activist judges, revel in exactly that, lofty discussion about definitions, applications and interpretations of free speech.

Oliver Wendell Holms’s claim in 1919 that any speech is not free speech is in of itself contrary to the 1st Amendment. Of course, yelling “fire” in a crowded theater is an obvious rare example of unprotected speech due to the inherent danger caused by the immediate result of stampede. However, there are no inherent dangers in offensive speech and the questions posed by Eric make for nice debate but is irrelevant. The framers of the Constitution indulged in these debates and carefully chose the words in the Constitution to avoid confusion and multiple interpretations. What Eric and like minds seem not to realize is that offensive and unpopular speech is exactly what was being protected, in spite of the so called “French” saying, one’s freedom stops when it infringes on another’s.

Let’s be clear, the 1st Amendment protects the ignorant racist standing on the corner yelling “nigger” from government, not society. Society can take various lawful measures to punish unacceptable speech. Citizens can refuse to support businesses or interact with individuals that practice deplorable speech. Private business can abridge the freedom of speech and create policy defining acceptable and unacceptable speech. But government shall pass no laws that abridge the freedom of speech. The Constitution does not guarantee the right not to be offended. That right does not and should not exist.

However, since the Warren Burger court, the Supreme Court has been creating policy and legislating from the bench as a matter of routine. An excessive indulgence by an activist judiciary has created rights that do not exist, like the right to privacy, the right not to be offended, the separation of church and state, the right to entitlements by illegal aliens, etc.

The purpose of the Constitution and subsequent Amendments was to protect citizens from unreasonable and unjustified intrusion by government into their personal lives and commerce. Personal thought, political correctness and cultural engineering is neither reasonable nor justified! As noted by Justice Scalia in 2003, “The court has taken sides in the cultural war, departing from its role of assuring, as neutral observer, that the democratic rules of engagement are observed.”

Yet, Congress enabled by the court, passed “Hate Crime” laws that support political correctness but severely violate the 1st Amendment. Think about it. Government is regulating thought. That’s outrageous! We have laws that punish those who commit crimes against another, what they were thinking at the time should be of no importance. Allowing the government to prosecute people for violations against preferable thought creates a “slippery slope” that should scare the hell out of any American. Justice William Douglas attributed this comment to Justice Thurgood Marshall during the debate on affirmative action, “You guys have been practicing discrimination for years. Now it is our turn.” Excuse me! Is this the kind of juvenile reasoning we want in our highest court?

The U.S. Constitution was created to protect us from our government. This “century old text”, as Eric calls it, is very concise. It is not a living, breathing document that is open to interpretation. The founders created a process in which the Constitution could be adjusted to fit changes in society. That process is via amendments, not the whims of an activist judiciary. Unfortunately, the freedoms guaranteed to us by the Constitution are quietly being taken away by those who are tasked with the sole responsibility to protect them.

Do we want a judicial oligarchy of nine legislating from the bench and creating policy according to their personal whims or beliefs, or do we want a judiciary that only reviews lower court decisions and laws enacted by the legislature and signed into law by the executive branch to ensure the decisions and laws do not violate the constitution? 

 George A Torres, Jr