Now everyone knows that it is not polite to intrude on people in their private moments. The problem is that big brother doesn’t seem to know that peeking into people’s private communication is wrong and it should be illegal. Unfortunately President Bush wants to continue to grant immunity to telecommunications companies in the name of the so called ‘war on terror’ which in actuality is a war on the American people and the telecommunications infrastructure is the front line in the gradual diminishment of civil rights that Congress has permitted in recent years.

We need representatives in Washington DC who support protecting Americans instead of distrusting us. As a candidate for federal office I support legislation to abolish the Department of Homeland Security, that Orwellian agency constructed in the days after 9-11, which has crafted the war on the American people and their rights since. I support the elimination of FISA loopholes and the closing of Guantanamo Bay and the return of all detainees to their countries of origin. I believe that the American people deserve full and open disclosure on all activities related to government spying conducted against her citizens. Finally, I support the elimination of discreet, undocumented funding of the Central Intelligence agency.

Our rights are not negotiable. Telecommunication companies have violated those rights and have broken the law in order to appease a corrupt and power hungry administration that is willing to throw out Habeus Corpus, the right to privacy and international law in a reckless drive down the road to never-never land. Corporations must be held accountable and the President and his cronies must be called to account for violating our basic constitutional rights. Unfortunately, Senator Obama has been a disappointment on this issue and has refused to honor his commitment to filibuster this legislation. As a result, we are once again adrift without a rudder, a captain, a ship or an engine, being dragged along by the tides of fear.

It is time to reject the efforts of George Bush and anyone else who wants to grant retroactive immunity to corporations that spy on Americans. Congress has proven itself to be too weak-kneed to stand up to the fear mongers, but there is a new line of candidates running for office who are not so willing to roll over and play dumb. Treason is not patriotic. We all know that the government spying on us is wrong, and that any agency or corporation that assists in breaking into our most intimate communications is not behaving in a democratic fashion. The new reality is that our privacy is being compromised until we roll back FISA protections and strip immunity for corporations that spy on Americans.

For more information on this issue please visit: http://www.usalone.com/no_following_orders.php

“Both the Islamists and Neoconservatives] were idealists who were born out of the failure of the liberal dream to build a better world. And both had a very similar explanation for what caused that failure. These two groups have changed the world, but not in the way that either intended. Together, they created today’s nightmare vision of a secret, organized evil that threatens the world. A fantasy that politicians then found restored their power and authority in a disillusioned age. And those with the darkest fears became the most powerful. “

What’s especially interesting about this film is the theory they propose that the hype about the islamic threat in the from of al-Qaeda, is in fact a myth perpetrated by politicians, particularly American neo-conservatives in an attempt to unite and inspire their people following the failure of earlier, more utopian ideologies.

Part 1: “Baby It’s Cold Outside”

The first part of the series explains the origins of Islamism and Neo-Conservatism. It shows Egyptian civil servant Sayyid Qutb, depicted as the founder of modern Islamist thought, visiting America to learn about our education system, but becoming disgusted with what he saw as a corruption of morals and virtues in western society through individualism. When he returns to Egypt, he is disturbed by westernization under President Nasser and becomes convinced that in order to save society it must be completely restructured along the lines of Islamic law while still using western technology. He also becomes convinced that this can only be accomplished through the use of an elite “vanguard” to lead a revolution against the established order. Qutb becomes a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood and, after being tortured in one of Nasser’s jails, comes to believe that western-influenced leaders can justly be killed for the sake of removing their corruption. Qutb is executed in 1966, but he inspires the future mentor of Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri, to start his own secret Islamist group. Inspired by the 1979 Iranian revolution, Zawahiri and his allies assassinate Egyptian president Anwar Al Sadat, in 1981, in hopes of starting their own revolution. The revolution does not materialise, and Zawahiri comes to believe that the majority of Muslims have been corrupted by their western-inspired leaders and thus may be legitimate targets of violence if they do not join him.

At the same time in the United States, a group of disillusioned liberals, including Irving Kristol and Paul Wolfowitz, look to the political thinking of Leo Strauss after the general failure of President Johnson’s “Great Society”. They come to the conclusion that the emphasis on individual liberty was the undoing of the plan. They envisioned restructuring America by uniting the American people against a common evil, and set about creating a mythical enemy. These factions, the Neo-Conservatives, came to power under the Reagan administration, with their allies Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, and work to unite the United States in fear of the Soviet Union. The Neo-Conservatives allege the Soviet Union is not following the terms of disarmament between the two countries, and, with the investigation of “Team B”, they accumulate a case to prove this with dubious evidence and methods. President Reagan is convinced nonetheless.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Part 2: “The Phantom Victory”

In the second episode, Islamist factions, rapidly falling under the more radical influence of Zawahiri and his rich Saudi acolyte Osama bin Laden, join the Neo-Conservative-influenced Reagan Administration to combat the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan. They are successful in repulsing the Soviet armies and, when the Eastern Bloc begins to collapse in the late 1980s, both groups believe they are the primary architects of the “Evil Empire’s” defeat. Curtis argues that the Soviets were on their last legs anyway, and were doomed to collapse without intervention.

However, the Islamists see it quite differently, and in their triumph believe that they had the power to create ‘pure’ Islamic states in Egypt and Algeria. However, attempts to create perpetual Islamic states are blocked by force. The Islamists then try to create revolutions in Egypt and Algeria by the use of terrorism to scare the people into rising up. However, the people are terrified by the violence and the government in Algeria use their fear as a way to maintain power. In the end, the Islamists declare the entire populations of the countries as inherently contaminated by western values, and finally in Algeria shoot each other, due to a perception that the terrorists themselves are not pure enough Moslems either.

In America, the Neo-Conservatives’ aspirations to use the United States Army’s power for further destruction of evil are thrown off track by the ascent of George H. W. Bush to the American Presidency, followed by the 1992 election of Bill Clinton leaving them out of power. The Neo-Conservatives, with their conservative Christian allies, attempted to demonise Clinton throughout his presidency with various real and fabricated stories of corruption and immorality. To their disappointment, however, the American people do not acknowledge him as an enemy as they intended and remain indifferent to Clinton’s alleged evils. The Islamist attempts at revolution end in massive bloodshed, leaving the Islamists without popular support. Zawahiri and bin Laden flee to the sufficiently safe Afghanistan and declare a new strategy; to fight Western-inspired moral decay they must deal a blow to its source: the United States.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Part 3: “The Shadows in the Cave”

The final episode addresses the actual rise of al-Qaeda. Curtis argues that, after their failed revolutions, bin Laden and Zawahiri had little or no popular support, let alone a serious complex organisation of terrorists, and were dependent upon independent operatives to carry out their new call for jihad. The film instead shows the United States government wanting to prosecute bin Laden in absentia for the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings, and needing to prove him to be the head of a criminal organisation to do so. They find a former associate of bin Laden, Jamal al-Fadl, and pay him to testify that bin Laden was the head of a massive terrorist organisation called “al-Qaeda”. With the September 11th attacks, Neo-Conservatives in the new Republican government of George W. Bush use this created concept of an organisation to justify another crusade against a new evil enemy, leading to the launch of the War on Terrorism.

After the American invasion of Afghanistan fails to uproot the alleged terrorist network, the Neo-Conservatives focus inwards, searching unsuccessfully for terrorist sleeper cells in America. They then extend the war on “terror” to a war against general perceived evils with the invasion of Iraq in 2003. The ideas and tactics also spread to the United Kingdom where Tony Blair uses the threat of terrorism to give him a new moral authority. The repercussions of the Neo-Conservative strategy are also explored with an investigation of indefinitely-detained terrorist suspects in Guantanamo Bay, many allegedly taken on the word of the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance without actual investigation on the part of the United States military, and other forms of “preemption” against non-existent and unlikely threats made simply on the grounds that the parties involved could later become a threat. Curtis also makes a specific attempt to defuse fears of a dirty bomb attack, and concludes by reassuring viewers that politicians will eventually have to concede that some threats are exaggerated and others altogether devoid of reality.

Click here to view the embedded video.

My conclusion

The tactics discussed in this film are still being used today. All you need to do is look at the rhetoric between the Clinton and Obama campaigns on who would you perfer answer the red phone at 3am.  Steve King’s (R-IA) warnings that terrorists will be dancing in the street if you elect a Democrat to the White House. President Bush’s attempts at justifying torture and demanding the Congress grant retroactive immunity to his administration and the telecommunication companies which have been his willing partners in warrantless domestic spying.  It is also being used to attack the GLBT community as seen recently in Oklahoma state Representative Sally Kern  (R-Oklahoma City) comments which were recorded then placed on Youtube…

Click here to view the embedded video.

It’s way past time for the world to grow up and finally say “Enough!” to the politics of fear.

* Information about the film and the majority of the text herein except my conclusion, provided by the english language Wikipedia.

Compared to some people, I was lucky: I wasn’t injured. I kept my job. I got home easily. But compared to the vast majority of Americans, I am a victim. I had glass in my hair. I lost a year’s work, and some irreplaceable items. My family went crazy for a while. My kid had nightmares. You explain to a five-year-old why (in his words) “They crashed into the building on purpose?” or reply to “I thought pilots were good people”.

But I am a victim another way.

I share part of this other victimhood with all Americans. I am a victim, not of terror, but of the so-called ‘war on terror’. I am a victim of a government that is out-of-control. I am a victim of crushing national debt. I am a victim because I live in a country that went from having the sympathy of the world to one that is a pariah, an outcast among nations, a rogue state. I am a victim because I now have to ‘watch what I say’. I am a victim because my rights are violated, not by some nebulous and inimical group of terrorists, but by my own government.

They do not speak for me.

But in another way, I do not share this other victimhood. My victimhood is being abused.

I have watched for years as my government – our government – has whittled away my rights, stolen my freedoms, and wrecked the constitution in the name of a false security. I have watched and watched and watched, as they have used my name – my victimhood – to make me a victim once again.

They do not speak for me

So, I will post this diary, and I will take action. I will volunteer. I will give money. I will make a difference. This is MY country, this is MY victimhood, and I will not have it abused. I am no martyr; I have no death wish; I hope that no terrorist ever strikes anywhere again. But the founders of this country knew what they were doing. They wanted freedom. They DEMANDED freedom. They put their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor on the line to win freedom. And now it is reduced to this.

But it is worse even than this; it would be one thing to pay too heavy a price to increase our safety. But we have paid the price for nothing. We have arrested thousands of people, and let them go. We have spied on our own citizens, and found out nothing. We have allied ourselves with torturers, and yet, we are not safe. Indeed, by making our enemies unite, we have made ourselves weaker, and our enemies stronger.

This victim demands an end to the ‘war on terror’ that is really a war on America. Impeach the president.

About Peter Flom

Peter Flom received his Ph.D. in Psychometrics in 1999 from Fordham University, where he was a Presidential fellow. He was a teaching assistant and later an adjunct professor while in graduate school, and also consulted with students who were writing their dissertations. Since graduating he has continued to consult with Ph.D. candidates in the social sciences, and has assisted in writing grant applications in the fields of drug abuse and HIV prevention. He is first author on four papers, and co-author on numerous others. He was in the World Trade Center in 2001 when the planes impacted.

Originally printed in DailyKos.

It makes a mockery of every American soldier that has given their life so that we may be free.

Did you know that the Bush administration is now claiming a new right to spy on your financial transactions. They decided that once again, contrary to the law, they are not required to get a search warrant.

Data from the Brussels-based banking consortium, formally known as the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, has allowed officials from the C.I.A., the Federal Bureau of Investigation and other agencies to examine “tens of thousands” of financial transactions, Mr. Levey said. Swift routes more than 11 million transactions each day, most of them across borders.

While many of those transactions have occurred entirely on foreign soil, officials have also been keenly interested in international transfers of money by individuals, businesses, charities and other groups under suspicion inside the United States, officials said. A small fraction of Swift’s records involve transactions entirely within this country, but Treasury officials said they were uncertain whether any had been examined.

Bill Clinton had nothing on this administration, when it comes to redefining the meanings of words or laws.

In response to a Supreme court ruling that Americans had no constitutional right to privacy for records which are held by banks or other financial institutions Congress passed the Right to Financial Privacy Act, which restricted governmental access to our banking records.

In considering the Swift program, some government lawyers were particularly concerned about whether the law prohibited officials from gaining access to records without a warrant or subpoena based on some level of suspicion about each target.

So how did they do it? They redefined the clear intent of the law.

After an initial debate, Treasury Department lawyers, consulting with the Justice Department, concluded that the privacy laws applied to banks, not to a banking cooperative like Swift. They also said the law protected individual customers and small companies, not the major institutions that route money through Swift on behalf of their customers.

Using this twisted rational as justification, the F.B.I. has turned to national security letters (NSL), to demand such records.

Before the Patriot Act, the FBI could use NSLs to obtain records concerning suspected terrorists and spies. The Patriot Act amended the law to allow the use of NSLs to obtain information about anyone at all.

I have personal experience with this but due to the never ending gag order, that these letters place on you, I can not discuss it even today, years later.

We have seen the list of groups under suspicion in the United States the military talon database listed many civil liberty, peace groups, and any group which opposed military recruitment on college campuses.

A sample of about 1,500 “suspicious incidents” out of 13,000 listed in the database included four dozen anti-war meetings or protests, some aimed at military recruiting.

The fact that the TALON database included information on American citizens engaged in peaceful protest activities was first disclosed several months ago by NBC News and researcher Bill Arkin.

Why is this important? Because they admit that anyone in this database is a terrorist suspect, and would be subject to the full weight of American military and justice system.

The TALON system “should be used only to report information regarding international terrorist activity,” said Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England in a March 30 memo

The government can turn their many powers intended for use against terrorists, against any citizen, who dares to speak out against the government’s aims. Even when such opposition is perfectly legal and protected by their constitutional rights.

When the government wants to target a group or individual they can. Due to the complexity of our legal system, you have intentionally or not, violated a myriad of local, state, and federal laws. Any of these can be used to target you, if the government so desires. Remember they got Al Capone for income tax evasion, and not his many criminal misdeeds.

I will end this with a simple quote attributed by some to one of our founding fathers.

They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security.

Something we should all heed.