Friday, September 26, 2014

Dear Veterans who "Fought for my Freedom"...

I have had a few discussions with people who insisted that I had to shut up about various political issues, because they were veterans, and they fought for my freedom, and that I couldn't possibly understand what it means because I'm not a veteran. A quick chat with friends and family who are veterans, themselves, gave me great perspective on this -- the consensus was "Those guys are idiots, and they give veterans a bad name... (not my own words)."

When you think of the wars that America has been involved in over the years, it's hard to pinpoint any period where America's freedom was actually threatened by anyone outside of America. Even World War 2 is a difficult subject to delve into to get any kind of instance where "America almost lost it's freedom". Sure, there was a lot of sacrifice. But arguably, the landings at Normandy had more to do with French freedom than our own. We really sacrificed a lot of our blood, guts, sweat, and tears for our French, Belgian, English, Italian, and other people enslaved by Fascism. But I think it's fair to say that America was never in any position to be invaded, not by Nazi Germany, nor by Japan. In fact, within months of the Infamy of Pearl Harbor, the Japanese were up against the wall, and in no position to take away any civilian freedom from the USA. Germany was completely unable to break down Britain's defenses, and had to keep putting off their planned invasion, because the British fought them with cunning and technology. RADAR was what kept the Brits on top of Luftwaffe raids (well, that, and lots of sleepless nights for RAF pilots), while the first computers and an army of mathematicians broke the Nazi Enigma codes. By the time D-Day occurred, the Germans were already losing the war -- mostly because of a disastrous decision to go to war against the Soviets.

So with that out of the way, I have to honestly say, Dear Veterans, that you did not fight for my freedom. I owe none of my freedom to any American Vets who served in the 20th or 21st centuries. I can say this with utter confidence, because I actually have history and knowledge on my side, as opposed to the venom, vitriol, and self-aggrandizing emotionalism of the Vets who literally tell me that I had better shut up, because they fought for my freedom to speak. Don't misunderstand, dear veterans. I am not expressing contempt for you or your valiant efforts fighting under the banner of Old Glory and in the name of America. I am only disparaging the political notion that any of your efforts had anything to do with preserving my freedom, or expanding the freedom of unfairly disenfranchised citizens. Most of the great advocates and champions of Freedom in America are actually civilians, many of whom have no veteran status, and many of whom you all learned about in school. In fact, not only are America's greatest champions of freedom and liberty not military heroes, the U.S. Military has done far more against the cause of freedom and liberty than is has done to protect it. I will first list some notable American freedom fighters, then I shall list events in history where the Military fought against those who championed freedom, fairness, and the rule of constitutional law.

Here are America's true champions of liberty, and the actual defenders of freedom:

Since I've often noticed on more than one occasion that many conservatives have an axe to grind when it comes to African Americans, I thought I'd start this lesson in freedom and liberty off with Famous African Americans who fought for our freedom.
  • Frederick Douglass -- After escaping from slavery, he became a leader of the abolitionist movement, gaining note for his dazzling oratory and incisive antislavery writing. He stood as a living counter-example to slaveholders' arguments that slaves lacked the intellectual capacity to function as independent American citizens. Many Northerners also found it hard to believe that such a great orator had been a slave.
  • Harriet Tubman -- Born into slavery, Tubman escaped and subsequently made about thirteen missions to rescue approximately seventy enslaved family and friends, using the network of antislavery activists and safe houses known as the Underground Railroad. She later helped John Brown recruit men for his raid on Harpers Ferry, and in the post-war era struggled for women's suffrage.
  • Paul Robeson -- He became politically involved in response to the Spanish Civil War, fascism, and social injustices. His advocacy of anti-imperialism, affiliation with communism, and criticism of the United States government caused him to be blacklisted during the McCarthy era. Ill health forced him into retirement from his career. He remained until his death an advocate of the political stances he took.
  • Martin Luther King, Jr. -- A Baptist minister, King became a civil rights activist early in his career. He led the 1955 Montgomery Bus Boycott and helped found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) in 1957, serving as its first president. With the SCLC, King led an unsuccessful struggle against segregation in Albany, Georgia, in 1962, and organized nonviolent protests in Birmingham, Alabama, that attracted national attention following television news coverage of the brutal police response. King also helped to organize the 1963 March on Washington, where he delivered his famous "I Have a Dream" speech. There, he established his reputation as one of the greatest orators in American history. J. Edgar Hoover considered him a radical and made him an object of the Federal Bureau of Investigation's COINTELPRO for the rest of his life.
  • Malcolm X -- This will incite many conservatives, not just because he's a African-American, but because he's a Muslim, as well. Feel your conservative blood boiling now? Malcolm X was an African-American Muslim minister and a human rights activist. To his admirers he was a courageous advocate for the rights of blacks, a man who indicted white America in the harshest terms for its crimes against black Americans; detractors accused him of preaching racism and violence. He has been called one of the greatest and most influential African Americans in history.
What could possibly piss off Tea Party activists and other conservatives more than African American Freedom Fighters? How about a Mexican-American freedom fighter!
  • Cesar Chavez -- A Mexican American, Chavez became the best known Latino American civil rights activist, and was strongly promoted by the American labor movement, which was eager to enroll Hispanic members. His public-relations approach to unionism and aggressive but nonviolent tactics made the farm workers' struggle a moral cause with nationwide support. By the late 1970s, his tactics had forced growers to recognize the UFW as the bargaining agent for 50,000 field workers in California and Florida.
  • Elizabeth Cady Stanton -- Stanton was an American social activist, abolitionist, and leading figure of the early women's rights movement. Her Declaration of Sentiments, presented at the Seneca Falls Convention held in 1848 in Seneca Falls, New York, is often credited with initiating the first organized women's rights and women's suffrage movements in the United States. Before Stanton narrowed her political focus almost exclusively to women's rights, she was an active abolitionist with her husband, Henry Brewster Stanton and cousin, Gerrit Smith. Unlike many of those involved in the women's rights movement, Stanton addressed various issues pertaining to women beyond voting rights. Her concerns included women's parental and custody rights, property rights, employment and income rights, divorce, the economic health of the family, and birth control. She was also an outspoken supporter of the 19th-century temperance movement.
  • Susan B. Anthony -- In 1851, she met Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who became her lifelong co-worker in social reform activities, primarily in the field of women's rights. In 1852, they founded the New York Women's State Temperance Society after Anthony was prevented from speaking at a temperance conference because she was a woman. In 1863, they founded the Women's Loyal National League, which conducted the largest petition drive in the nation's history up to that time, collecting nearly 400,000 signatures in support of the abolition of slavery.

    In 1866, they initiated the American Equal Rights Association, which campaigned for equal rights for both women and African Americans. In 1868, they began publishing a women's rights newspaper called The Revolution. In 1869, they founded the National Woman Suffrage Association as part of a split in the women's movement. In 1890 the split was formally healed when their organization merged with the rival American Woman Suffrage Association to form the National American Woman Suffrage Association, with Anthony as its key force. In 1876, Anthony and Stanton began working with Matilda Joslyn Gage on what eventually grew into the six-volume History of Woman Suffrage. The interests of Anthony and Stanton diverged somewhat in later years, but the two remained close friends.

    In 1872, Anthony was arrested for voting in her hometown of Rochester, New York, and convicted in a widely publicized trial. She refused to pay the fine, but the authorities declined to take further action. In 1878, Anthony and Stanton arranged for Congress to be presented with an amendment giving women the right to vote. Popularly known as the Anthony Amendment, it became the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1920.

  • Roger Nash Baldwin -- Roger Nash Baldwin was one of the founders of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). He served as executive director of the ACLU until 1950. Many of the ACLU's original landmark cases took place under his direction, including the Scopes Trial, the Sacco and Vanzetti murder trial, and its challenge to the ban on James Joyce's Ulysses. Baldwin was a well known pacifist and author.
  • Lenny Bruce -- Leonard Alfred Schneider (October 13, 1925 – August 3, 1966), better known by his stage name Lenny Bruce, was an American stand-up comedian, social critic and satirist. He was renowned for his open, free-style and critical form of comedy which integrated satire, politics, religion, sex, and vulgarity. His private life was marked by struggles with personal demons and efforts to prevent his wife from working as a stripper. His 1964 conviction in an obscenity trial was followed by a posthumous pardon, the first in New York State history, by then-Governor George Pataki in 2003. He paved the way for future outspoken counterculture-era comedians, and his trial for obscenity, in which – after being forced into bankruptcy – he was eventually pardoned, is seen as a landmark trial for freedom of speech in the US.
  • Larry Flynt -- Larry Claxton Flynt, Jr. (born November 1, 1942) is an American publisher and the president of Larry Flynt Publications (LFP). In 2003, Arena magazine listed him as #1 on the "50 Powerful People in Porn" list.

    LFP mainly produces sexually graphic videos and magazines, most notably Hustler. Flynt has fought several prominent legal battles involving the First Amendment, and has unsuccessfully run for public office. He is paralyzed from the waist down due to injuries sustained in a 1978 assassination attempt by Joseph Paul Franklin.

    Flynt's triumphs include several landmark legal cases involving satire printed in his magazines, as well as the freedom to publish pornography in general. Though some may find that advocacy for the right to publish and read pornographic material is no great honor, it is significant in that prior to Flynt taking this to court, the government arbitrarily chose targets to censor due to its pornographic nature. Flynt's 1988 battle with Jerry Falwell over a satire liquor ad, depicting Falwell as an alcoholic who had sex with his mother, is significant, because it defended the right to satirize public figures.

So there are literally hundreds more people I can go on about, including gay rights activists, like Harvey Milk, Native American rights activists, and so on. By this point in my lesson, you should get the point. Freedom and liberty in America is rarely something that has been fought over in foreign lands. The Civil War was possibly the last time in American History, when Freedom for millions of Americans was a goal that was fought for by the military. In the 20th century, we have never really seen our soldiers fight for the cause of freedom. Quite the opposite is the truth, I'm afraid. Whenever the U.S. Military has been called to take part in a struggle between advocates of freedom, and advocates of the status quo, the military has nearly always been on the side of those who fight against freedom. In the world of finance and monopolies, in the 20th century, the American military has often found its services paid for by super-rich, fighting to keep their oppression of lesser-monied people going just a little bit longer.

For Example:

  • The Banana Wars -- General Smedley Darlington Butler, one of America's most highly decorated, respected, and important military figures from the 19th and 20th centuries, wrote about a series of conflicts that included U.S. Military action in the Philippines, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Mexico, and other central and South American countries. These wars were sold to the American public as uprisings of Communists who threatened American businesses in the region. The reality, as Butler wrote in his memoirs, is that they were fought mainly to protect the profits of the American-owned fruit companies, who were usually only facing having to actually pay for extracting fruit from democratic nations that didn't profit from the American companies being there. Butler saw these action as using the U.S. Marine Corps as hired thugs to protect monopolies.

    In these police actions, Butler details how US forces were often asked to shoot at women, children, and Catholic clergy, including nuns, who were usually aiding the peasants fighting against the Corporations. He wrote a book called "War Is A Racket", which details all of his experiences, and advocated for more wise and prudent use of America's armed forces. In case after case, American troops tended to dismantle democratically elected governments, and place dictators in charge of them, who were often puppets of the Fruit Companies. U.S. Troops destroying democracy, to establish a dictatorship? Yes. It's all true.

    Incidentally, Butler founded The Bonus Army after World War 1, which fought to get pensions and federal assistance for Veterans returning from the War. Prior to the Bonus Army, American Soldiers returning from war often returned home with nothing more than their battle-scars. The Bonus army was instrumental in getting benefits for veterans, as a reward for being wounded for and dying for their country, and paved the way for the G.I Bill that came in 1944. But it did not happen without a fight.

    In 1932, Veterans of World War 1 marched on Washington to urge the government to pass the Wright-Patman Bonus Bill, which would have paid vets for their service during the war. Many vets came home to find no jobs, and became homeless. Soon, a shanty-town formed just outside of the capital, called "Hooverville", where veterans lived during weeks of protest. It was very much like the "occupy" movement of it's day. On March 28, 1932, the bill was defeated in the senate, and as veterans marched to the capitol in protest, the army was called in to deal with them. General Douglas MacArthur led a U.S. Army infantry division, complete with tanks, on Hooverville, where they clashed with veteran-protesters and their families who were camped there. Major George S. Patton, who led the tank division, was cheered by the protesting vets as a hero, until he ordered his men to fix their bayonets and charge them. Though only a few veterans were killed, both MacArthur and Patton regarded the incident as the most distasteful orders they were ever given.

  • The Ludlow Massacre -- The Ludlow Massacre was an attack by the Colorado National Guard and Colorado Fuel & Iron Company camp guards on a tent colony of 1,200 striking coal miners and their families at Ludlow, Colorado, on April 20, 1914. Some two dozen people, including women and children, were killed. The chief owner of the mine, John D. Rockefeller, Jr., was widely criticized for the incident.

    The massacre, the culmination of a bloody widespread strike against Colorado coal mines, resulted in the violent deaths of between 19 and 26 people; reported death tolls vary but include two women and eleven children, asphyxiated and burned to death under a single tent. The deaths occurred after a daylong fight between militia and camp guards against striking workers. Ludlow was the deadliest single incident in the southern Colorado Coal Strike, lasting from September 1913 through December 1914. The strike was organized by the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) against coal mining companies in Colorado. The three largest companies involved were the Rockefeller family-owned Colorado Fuel & Iron Company (CF&I), the Rocky Mountain Fuel Company (RMF), and the Victor-American Fuel Company (VAF).

    In retaliation for Ludlow, the miners armed themselves and attacked dozens of mines over the next ten days, destroying property and engaging in several skirmishes with the Colorado National Guard along a 40-mile front from Trinidad to Walsenburg. The entire strike would cost between 69 and 199 lives. Thomas G. Andrews described it as the "deadliest strike in the history of the United States."

  • The Tulsa Race Riot -- The Tulsa race riot was a large-scale, racially motivated conflict on May 31 and June 1, 1921, in which a group of whites attacked the black community of Tulsa, Oklahoma. It resulted in the Greenwood District, also known as 'the Black Wall Street' and the wealthiest black community in the United States, being burned to the ground.

    During the 16 hours of the assault, more than 800 blacks were admitted to local white hospitals with injuries (the black hospital was burned down), and police arrested and detained more than 6,000 black Greenwood residents at three local facilities, in part for their protection. An estimated 10,000 blacks were left homeless, and 35 city blocks composed of 1,256 residences were destroyed by fire. The official count of the dead by the Oklahoma Department of Vital Statistics was 39, but other estimates of black fatalities varied from 55 to about 300.

    Numerous eyewitness accounts described airplanes carrying white assailants, who fired rifles and dropped firebombs on buildings, homes, and fleeing families. The planes, six biplane two-seater trainers left over from World War I, were dispatched from the nearby Curtiss-Southwest Field (now defunct) outside Tulsa. White law enforcement officials later stated the planes were to provide reconnaissance and protect whites against a "Negro uprising". Eyewitness accounts and testimony from the survivors maintained that on the morning of June 1, the planes dropped incendiary bombs and fired rifles at black residents on the ground.

  • The Kent State Shootings -- The Kent State shootings (also known as the May 4 massacre or the Kent State massacre) occurred at Kent State University in the US city of Kent, Ohio, and involved the shooting of unarmed college students by the Ohio National Guard on Monday, May 4, 1970. The guardsmen fired 67 rounds over a period of 13 seconds, killing four students and wounding nine others, one of whom suffered permanent paralysis.

    Some of the students who were shot had been protesting the Cambodian Campaign, which President Richard Nixon announced during a television address on April 30. Other students who were shot had been walking nearby or observing the protest from a distance.

    There was a significant national response to the shootings: hundreds of universities, colleges, and high schools closed throughout the United States due to a student strike of four million students,[9] and the event further affected public opinion—at an already socially contentious time—over the role of the United States in the Vietnam War.

  • The U.S. invasion of Hawaii -- When a group of missionaries dead set on talking the King Kalākau of Hawaii into giving them all of his land, got thwarted by his daughter, Liliuokalani as she ascended to the throne, and threatened to establish a democracy where native Hawaiians and colonists from America would be treated as equals, they called on the U.S. Government for help. Apparently, many of America's senators and congressmen were as appalled as the white settlers at the thought of being "equals" to people whom they mocked as nothing more than monkeys (newspaper articles and cartoons pretty much established that fact), so they sent in the Marines, of course.

    In spite of the fact that Queen Liliuokalani's native citizens had no weapons (The American colonists took them away), no land (Sanford Dole, leader of the missionaries, forced King Kalākau to sign a bill that forbid Native Hawaiians from owning land), and were being threatened by the white settlers, who had all the land, all the guns, and looked down upon the natives, the Marines came and stood at the side of the colonists. The rest is history.

As we can see, the US military has been used to destroy democracy, disrupt freedom of speech, and kill innocent peaceful protesters, all throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. I haven't even mentioned how the US Army, following the Civil war, was used to massacre native Americans and force them off of land, once gold was discovered on it. Time and time again, liberty, democracy, and freedom were disrupted by U.S. Military actions, all for the sake of monopolies. So it's difficult for me, or anyone familiar with actual uncensored U.S. History, to believe that any vets fought for my freedom. As I said, I certainly appreciate your efforts and initiative in serving our country, but I do not have any obligation to worship at your feet, for protecting me from anything. I will salute you for doing what your country asked you to do, and putting up with all the suck that went along with the job, but I'm not going to accept what I know is a lie -- that you fought to defend my freedom.

Wednesday, June 18, 2014


Why Conservatives are the problem

The biggest division in American society, which has been developing since the late 1970's, has been the divide between conservatives and liberals. Conservatives often speak of liberalism in extreme terms -- they like to claim that liberals are all tree-hugging, irreligious, drug-using, lazy, unproductive, communists, socialists, and ultimately un-American. Liberal ideas and people in the news are frequently portrayed by conservative pundits as evil, having hidden agendas, or worse.

Conservatives often speak as though being religious automatically makes a person morally superior. Tell that to the victims of all the abortion clinic bombers and doctor-assassins, who thought they were doing God's work. You may want to tell that to the Catholic church, too, which forced women in Ireland into slavery for getting pregnant out of wedlock, and who buried hundreds of dead kids without so much as an epitaph or explanation of how they died.

The Conservatives clearly are projecting their own shortcomings onto liberals, because most of them, particularly the most vocal commentators, are actually worse than what they accuse liberals of. When you see another conservative, religious televangelist or congressman involved in an extramarital affair, or involved in a financial scandal or patronage scandal, it's sometimes too traumatic for even other conservatives to take, and many of them actually accuse their criminal colleagues of being liberal democrats!

The problem is that liberals often do not respond to the conservative message, and let their claims go unchallenged. This is a big mistake, because the real problem with America is, and always has been, conservatives. I can say this with relative confidence, too. We can go into this for weeks, but there is a real meaty part of this issue that I'd rather discuss here, which concerns the very essence of America, and why conservatives who claim to support it, by their words and actions, actually stand against it.

Do you agree that the bill of rights, as outlined in the United States Constitution, is an important part of the makeup of America's culture? Do you value free speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion? Do you believe that the power of government originates from the consent of the governed? Do you believe that the purpose of government is to "to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity"?

If you do not agree, then you are obviously against the US Constitution, and really should just be honest about it, instead of trying to give the U.S. Constitution lip service, while really trying to undermine it. If you really want to overturn the Constitution, just admit it.

However, if you believe these things, the very foundation of the United States Constitution, and you believe they are beyond reproach, and should not be altered, then you cannot possibly align yourself with the current conservative movement, without risking being dishonest, or ignorant of what you really believe.

Conservatives do not respect Freedom Of Religion

Conservatives stand in stark contrast to the values outlined in the US Constitution. This is an easily established fact. Just look at what they say about Freedom Of Religion, for example. Many in the Republican party, on Conservative talk shows, and in writing, have expressed their belief that America was "founded as a Christian Nation." They promote the idea that the constitution provides for freedom of religion, but only within the confines of the Judeo-Christian faiths. Of course, this is not supported by the US Constitution, but they will claim it is, anyway. They usually point out the superficial "in the year of Our Lord..." as the proof, though this is rather specious. The US Supreme court has always established that there is no limitation to which religions are free to be practiced in the USA.

Some conservatives go even further. David Barton, and many other Conservative Christian Fundamentalists, which includes plenty of movers and shakers in the Republican party, has gone so far as to suggest that the Constitution is based entirely on Biblical principles, which is a ridiculous notion, because the founding fathers actually wrote about what inspired them to write the Constitution, and it was not the writings of Jesus they cited at all, but people like Rousseau, Montesquieu, John Locke, Voltaire, Hume, and Diderot. Most of these men were not particularly religious, and are not know to have quoted the Bible as justification of their beliefs.

And still they go further. Many conservatives even suggest that we should ban, or restrict the non-Christian religious people among us; that we say, ban Muslims and atheists from running for public office, and that there be a religious test as a per-requisite for running for public office (Which, by the way, is in direct violation of the first Amendment, as well as article 6 section 3, of the US Constitution, which specifies "no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States").

Conservatives do not respect Freedom Of Speech or of the press.

We often hear conservatives refer to people whose opinions they don't like as "traitors", and suggest that we punish them as traitors (always being carefult to not mention that this may include the death penalty). They were quite vociferous about this during the protests that sprung up in the lead-up to President George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq. If you're old enough to remember, you will note that people who protested President Nixon and Reagan's war policies, also were condemned as traitors by conservative commentators. They cited an unwritten rule that "you can't criticize the president during a time of war." as their reason. Of course, there is no actual law or constitutional principle that this is based on. They claim that since the definition of "traitor" is "one who gives aid and comfort to the enemy", that criticism of a president during a war gives comfort and aid to the enemy." Unfortunately for them, nobody has ever successfully proven this. The First Amendment doesn't have any exceptions in it -- it doesn't say "freedom of speech and of the press, EXCEPT when you criticize a president during a war."

But conservatives go further. Some have gone on record as suggsting that we need to modify the First Amendment; that freedom of speech should have limitations or exceptions. They have crafted legislation in several states, for example, which would ban teachers from teaching scientific, medical, and historical facts in Public schools. Specifically, they have constantly tried to ban teaching Evolution, sex education, and some historical facts which clash with some of their southern beliefs. The bans usually follow the logic, that teachers should not be allowed to teach things that are harmful to children -- yes, it's always about protecting the children, of course. They then label evolution, sensible, common sense, hygienic knowledge of sex, and certain things about the civil war as harmful. Teachers are then faced with not being able to educate properly.

Conservatives do not respect your right to vote

Republicans in several states, notably Texas, have crafted legislation that is blatant in it's usurpation of the Constitution. They have literally brought up legislation that would appoint senators, rather than let the public vote on their representatives. They even tried to make it harder to register to vote, making it necessary for voters to get ID documentation that most people don't have to show for employment or to a police officer. All of the voter-ID laws that were proposed by conservatives were cleverly written to overlook the reality that those most affected by them would be people living near or below the poverty line, and in most Southern Conservative-held states, that would be African Americans. The laws were designed to combat voter fraud - which has never been a problem, and which has never been substantiated. The only electoral frauds that police and federal investigators have ever substantiated were those committed by Republicans appointed to run elections in various districts. Most of the offenses of "voter fraud" that the Republicans got caught doing involved trashing ballots from districts that tended to vote for democrats.

Conservatives are against your protection from illegal search & Seizure, as well as your Miranda rights. Oh, and they don't even like your right to a fair and speedy trial...

Conservatives Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Bill O'Reilly, and others have all suggested that the 5th Amendment is a terrible hinderence on law enforcement. They all responded to the forthcoming trial of Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev by suggesting that we suspend his Miranda Rights because he was a terrorist, and may know about other bombings to come. They even suggested that a trial should not even be neccesary -- that we should be just holding him in indefinite detention, constantly interrogating him until he tells us everything he knows.

In almost the same breath, many suggested that we wiretap all of the mosques and other Islamic associations in the country, looking for evidence of potential crimes. This is interesting, because these people would be the first to complain if someone suggested that we wire-tap the churches of abortion clinic bombers, all of whom, so far, have been Christian. They even dared to suggest that we disallow muslims from becoming school teachers, and Anne Coulter even quiped that the wife of the deceased Bomber, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, be arrested merely for wearing a hijjab. Within a single 30-minute discussion on Fox News, all but one of the bill of rights was found to be a problem for conservatives seeking expediency over fairness.

As John Stewart of the popular Comedy show "The Daily Show" pointed out in a montage of conservative pundits discussing the Boston Marathon bombing, only the Second Amendment was spared, held up as too sacred to alter!

Conservatives are against domestic tranquility

Nothing can be more disgusting than to see people cheering for a bully, or lauding a person for breaking the law. Cliven Bundy showed us that conservatives love bullies, especially when those bullies arm themselves and face-off against police. What conservatives didn't say about Bundy was that he refused to pay the fees for using public lands which all the other farmers in his area have paid. He refused to pay the fees, and when the government came to serve him with a court order, he called up a bunch of gun-nuts to help him stand up to the law. Bundy didn't actually abuse his neighbors or fellow citizens, but he has been allowed to skirt federal law, and conservatives are on his side, even though the obvious fact that he is breaking the law is never even discussed.

When Americans are abused by their fellow citizens, or discriminated against, conservatives are the first ones to come to the aid of the abusers. Time and time again, when legislation to end discrimination against non-white Americans, against religious minorities, against gay people, or against women, is proposed, the ones who always oppose it are conservatives. They openly question whether or not rape should be a crime. They demand that willingly discriminating against African Americans is a freedom of speech and freedom of association issue, not a civil rights issue.

When conservatives defend rapists, defend racists, and defend bullies, they are in favor of a society where domestic conflict is the norm, and abuse of fellow citizens is encouraged. This is essentially opposition to domestic tranquility.

Conservatives do not think that a government's power is derived from the consent of the governed

When you hear conservatives, especially those with Evangelical Christian Fundamentalist beliefs, try to explain where the government's power, and our rights come from, they will claim that your rights came from God, and so don't the powers of governments. They will even go as far as to claim that this is what the constitution says, but they're wrong, of course. The founding fathers wrote into the Declaration of Independence, that the power of government is derived from the consent of the governed. If they believed it came from God, they should have written that, but they didn't. What conservatives fail to realize, when they try to proclaim that God personally appoints governments and leaders, and that the Bible is clear about this, is that if we were to go to the Bible for advice on governing, or for human rights, we run into serious problems. The bible doesn't support anything similar to the Bill Of Rights. The Bible clearly sets up a monarchy as the preferred system of government, that women are property, with little more value than farm animals, and it even goes as far as to promote slavery.

The implications are clear if you side with the Biblical notion of governing and society. Voting is antithetical to Christianity -- God appoints leaders to be absolute and unquestioned representatives of his law on earth. Citizens have no rights, except what the King says. Faith in the religion of the King is the ultimate arbiter of one's value in society, and if you are wealthy, it's because God wants it, or because you pleased God. This is exactly what King George The Third believed when we sent him the Declaration of Independence. In other words, Conservatives are against the very principles that the founding fathers fought for! You can't get any clearer than that.

With all of these things put together, it is impossible for anyone to say, with a straight face, that conservatives really care about preserving the constitution, or just have a slightly different interpretation, which they claim is closer to the intent of the founding fathers. If the founding fathers could see what conservatives are saying today, they would not just roll over in their graves, but they would rise from them and vomit in disgust. Vomit and disgust are not strong enough reactions to the vast and monstrous hypocrisy that the right wing shows. They literally have spoken out against nearly every part of the constitution, save the Second Amendment, of course, just within the last couple of years. In my opinion, speaking out against any part of the constitution, or suggesting that the bill of rights might be outdated, is not just UN-American, it's sociopathy, inhumane, and just plain evil.

Wednesday, February 26, 2014

What a Liberal Son Of a Bitch wants

I don't know about the rest of you liberal sons of bitches, but I actually WANT:
  • Universal healthcare
  • The Bush-era Tax Cuts rescinded
  • More money to go into the Public School system,
  • Free college tuition for all.
  • An END to workfare.
  • Welfare and unemployment assistance to be universal, based on the needs of the individual.
  • The Military shrank, in terms of personnel, equipment, and budget.
  • A universal ban on gifts given to elected officials.
  • A universal ban on corporate lobbying.
  • Women to be considered equal to men in all aspects of public, private, and work life.
  • Civil rights to include protection for LGTB.
  • A minimum wage that rises with the cost of living.
  • Stiff fines and prison sentences for lobbyists who bribe elected officials
  • And end to private prisons, and other contracting of government services.
  • End all monopolies.
  • End Religious tax exemptions.
  • Laws fining and punishing news organizations and public relations media for promoting untrue, invented, or otherwise demonstrably false information as fact.
Now I know this may piss off some of you conservatives out there, so I want you to tell me why any of these things are not good ideas.

Republicans Vs. Democrats: Your choice is really simple!

It's really simple, folks. The choice between voting for democrats and Republicans really is like this:

Vote for Republicans/Tea party/Libertarians if you believe:

  • Women should not be equal to men in terms of Employment, should not have access to abortion, and should not make the same wages for the same job that a man does, even if they outperform men.
  • White people of Anglo-Saxon descent should get preferential treatment over racial minorities.
  • Gay people have no place in society.
  • One group's "religious liberty" includes the right to discriminate, and deprive gays or other groups of employment, housing, access to government services.
  • The taxes collected from you should not go to help anyone else that you don't know, don't care about, or hate.
  • That America needs to be restored to a Christian nation, and that all aspects of society need to be run by biblical laws.
  • That as many aspects of the government must be privatized for profit.
  • That Profit is the only valid way to measure any person or program's success, and the only valid motivation for doing anything.
  • That public school is a total failure, because teachers are all lazy and concerned only with their giant salaries, and our kids are all too stupid.
Vote for Democrats if you believe:

  • That government and society should be all-inclusive; that no person can be denied a job, house, or government access on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexuality, handicapped status
  • That women should be considered equal to men in terms of employment, government access, healthcare, and have access to abortion if that is their desire.
  • That all persons in the USA are treated equally under the law, reguardless of age, sex, ethnic background, sexuality, handicapped status, veteran status, etc.
  • No person or group has the liberty to deny the same access to jobs, housing, government access, for any reason.
  • All citizens should get equal access to public education, and that the system should be fixed (because conservatives deliberately ruined it for selfish profit motives) to educate everyone to world-class standards.
  • America is not an exclusively Christian nation, and we should allow people of all faiths to have equal access to employment, housing, and access to government.
  • Profit is a poor motivator and a poor way of measuring success. Some things are worth more than their ability generate a profit, and sometimes, government needs to do things that are commercially unprofitable because the results benefit the people. Government is not a business, and should not be run for profit.
Now I'm pretty sure that everything I've said about the Democratic/liberal point of view on here is correct, since I am a God-damn liberal son-of-a-bitch, myself, but how well did I do describing the Republican point of view here? I'd like to know. I don't want to be accused of misrepresenting the opposition.