Black Helicopters
Mon Aug 06, 2007 at 01:28:06 PM PDT
Black helicopters are everywhere. There are at least a billion of them available across the United States right now if Gonzo decides to conduct illegal surveillance on any one of us. They don't look like black helicopters, but that's what they are.
I'm looking at a black helicopter right now. So are you. Mine was made by Dell and comes with a handy keyboard. It doesn't hover above my neighborhood, but it doesn't have to. It just sits here on my desk, ready and waiting to spy on me if Gonzo decides I'm not sufficiently loyal to the Commander Guy. There's another black helicopter right next to it. It's made by Panasonic. It rings several times a day, just like the black helicopters in my living room and bedroom.
Bush's criminal government doesn't even have to pay for these black helicopters, we buy them ourselves. We pay for them and we pay to use them. We pay again with our tax dollars, which are used to pay the salaries of the NSA spies who will spy on us with these black helicopters if Gonzo tells them to.
Welcome to Orwell Incorporated, formerly known as the United States of America.
Larisa Alexandrovna has lived in a police state, she knows what they look like and how they function:
Make NO mistake, we are in serious peril when an Attorney General who has subverted the Constitution per request of his boss, lied, obstructed justice, and defended torture, is now in full authority to declare who is going to be a target of warrant-less surveillance.
Six months from now, dozens of Democrats will cave again and vote to extend this FISA atrocity against the 4th Amendment. By then, the 2008 election will be less than a year away and their fear of being slandered as weak on terrorism will be even greater.
These same Democrats will vote for another surge this fall when General Petraeus confidently reports that another surge will enable us to "keep making progress" towards defeating the "terrorists". Their fear of being slandered for not supporting the troops will be even greater than it is now. And if another 9/11 happens, they will support whatever "emergency powers" the Commander Guy invests himself with in the aftermath, including martial law, internment camps, even suspending the 2008 elections.
Congress would never stand for that?
Guess what?
If there's another horrific attack on America and Bush suspends the 2008 elections, every incumbent senator and representative would stay in power.
Gosh. That would disappoint them, wouldn't it?
The mutual benefits to Bush and Congress of such a "regrettable" but "necessary" and of course "temporary" suspension of elections would require some rationalizing on the part of the beneficiaries, but rationalizing their endless bullshit is what politicians do best.
We'd hear rationalizations. We'd hear martial law being called Enhanced Security Conditions. We'd hear Internment camps being called Protective Custody Facilities. We'd see suspended elections being supported by incumbents in Congress "in a spirit of bipartisan unity during this national emergency" that would bring tears of patriotic pride to the eyes of every corporate media talking head from coast to coast.
Half the electorate never votes anyway, they wouldn't give a shit. And what would those of us who do give a shit do about it? Call our unlimited incumbency senators and representative who would no longer even have to pretend they care what we think?
Markos has expressed an opinion on suspended elections:
And no, Bush won't cancel the next round of elections to remain in power. That's about the most ridiculous conspiracy theory I've seen in a long time. Some people on our side can be just as "out there" as the "black helicopter" crowd.
I hope that Markos, whom I have the greatest respect for, never has to update that statement with a clarification.
Bush is the one who is "out there". The people wearing the tinfoil hats are the people running the federal government. Their "war on terror" is the conspiracy theory of all conspiracy theories. There is no war on terror. The only real war being waged right now is the war being waged by economic elites and their bought and paid for politicians against the middle class and the poor.
Another 9/11 is coming. It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. If there's another 9/11 while Bush is still in power, he will exploit the inevitable national trauma and fear even more ruthlessly than he did the first time.
If we let him.
If the past 7 years are any indication, we'll let him. We've been retreating and retreating and then retreating some more for longer than any of us care to remember. The wealthiest 1 percent of Americans owns 40 percent of the country, but that isn't enough for them. They want ALL of it. Too many working Americans don't even know they're being relentlessly attacked. The culture wars perpetrated by Republicans have blinded them to who their real enemy is.
In The Art of War, Sun Tzu advised:
If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.
We'd better start heeding this advice.
The economic elites are our enemy. Globalization, media consolidation, massive telecommunications spying, and Bush's unitary executive powers are their weapons.
But we have weapons too. Our greatest weapon is numbers. It's time to use that weapon. 500,000 progressives read Daily Kos regularly, but less then 1,500 of them have committed to taking a stand for American democracy on Iraq Moratorium Day.
Congress isn't standing up to Bush in any meaningful way, but neither are we. More Democrats will stand up for us in Congress if we stand up for ourselves in every town and city across this lied to, spied on, robbed blind, soldier burying, working two jobs and going broke anyway country.
Stand up to Bush on September 21, 2007! Use his black helicopters against him. Call your friends. Email them. Bring them to a Moratorium event with you. Bring your children. Bring your parents. Bring your neighbors. Bring a flag. Bring your hope. Bring your courage. Bring an end to this orgy of crimes against our Constitution, our country, and our world.
Give America a day it will never forget.
Then go home and watch O'Reilly have a meltdown and go ballistic at the same time.
Motivated yet?
SIGN THE PLEDGE
Thank you.
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