In an interview at Antiwar.com author James Bamford, A Pretext for War, suggests that a war tax and a mandatory draft are a sure way to assure full public involvement in the war making process:
The key problem is massive public apathy and extremely poor press coverage. I think the only way to prevent such wars in the future would be to make every citizen an equal shareholder in the war
Well, it certainly isn’t freedom on the march if Wisconsin representative sensenbrenner has his way with HR1528. Scrutiny Hooligans nicely summarizes just one part of this heinous legislation this way:
To wit, if you see your neighbor smoking a joint on his back porch at 11pm while his kids are safely tucked into their beds 25 feet away, then you must contact law enforcement within 24 hours or be subject to criminal prosecution by the U.S. Government and be sentenced to at least 2 years in prison. Your neighbor will be sentenced to a minimum of 10 years in prison.
Go read more and weep.
If you are even the slightest bit comfortable that stuff like this even gets introduced as possible legislation then perhaps you should move yourself over to North Korea.
Via Skippy.
Mark Kleiman argues that it is not and that it is cheating.
Whatever else it may be this debate points out that too much is at stake. Why all the ranting and raving if there is not large treasure at the end of the battle? The treasure comes both in the form of wealth transfer and values imposition. Neither the blues or the reds are exempt from the temptation of both.
You should know who is the source of this treasure. If not, check out your mirror.
A much more interesting discussion would focus on how we can fix our social structures so as to assure that you and I can exchange goods and services free of interference and how you and I can live our lives, choose our activities, enter into relationships of our choice, etc., without interference by others.
Begins with reframing the context and withdrawing the troops:
Much that needs to be done to end the
Mark Morford tries a glass half full view of Real ID:
Ah, but maybe I’m wrong. Maybe this is just rampant paranoia talking and it’s just a silly piece of harmless legislation and Real ID is overall a genuinely good and useful idea that will ultimately make us safer and more secure. You think?
Because hasn’t BushCo proven to be reliable and honest and just reeking with integrity about privacy and security issues so far? Hasn’t the USA Patriot Act been just a wondrous boon to police and CIA and our sense that we are trusted and cared for by our government? Aren’t we all feeling just so much safer with this most secretive, least accountable administration at the helm?
After all, why not trust the government on this? Why not put our faith in the goodly Homeland Security Department? Maybe Real ID really is patriotic and constructive and it will be a smooth and secure and completely inviolable system, one that protects citizens while giving them a new sense of freedom to move about the country with carefree flag-waving ease, safe in the knowledge that their big, snarling gummint is watching over them like a protective mother bear — as opposed to, say, a female praying mantis, who greedily screws her lover, and then, of course, eats him alive.
Really, this raving bit of incompetence by congress and the president is adequate reason to toss them all out of office. This is really one party no one should attend and if it means boycotting the airlines until they scream in anguished pain to get this stuff stricken from what passes for law then so be it.