OT Ignornance

[RandyJ]

Yeah, we've got it real bad here in the U.S. Everybody can plainly see that we live in a repressive, fascist, police dictatorship. It's hard to fathom why trying to govern 270 million people in a way that gives them more individual freedoms than pretty much any other nation on the planet is such a hard thing to do and requires any laws or police powers. It's about time we rose up and overthrew our government. I'm confident that whoever emerges from that civil war and establishes a new government will do a much better job of it than has been done so far...

Right on. Virtual high five Fish.

-Matt

Fish, please use the sarcasm font for these rantings, 'cuz sometimes I might be too dense to sort out whether it is or not. And can we get a whisper font added, like for when I'm posting from work???

Lively, stimulating interchange, gents.

[Fish]

Fish, please use the sarcasm font for these rantings, 'cuz sometimes I might be too dense to sort out whether it is or not. And can we get a whisper font added, like for when I'm posting from work???

Lively, stimulating interchange, gents.

Sorry, forgot to use the <sarcasm> </sarcasm> tags. Won't happen again sir.

- Fish

[Victor Caballeros]

Now I have been pulled over with hand guns in my car and bullets in the glove box. Now the cop asked do you have any drugs, weapons etc.. in the car and I told him two guns in the trunk and bullets in the glove box. so he took me out of the car and put me in his car and asked for the keys to the trunk. he opened it and looked at them and closed the trunk and gave me a warning for speeding. The End! I never smarted off to him and I think that is the way it works with police. Plus l look like a thug back then too. Now in Mexico it's a differnt story you have to pay $$ for them to leave you alone

[v rainwater]

This is getting fun, thank you all for your two cents.

Fish, with 5% of the worlds people and 25% of the worlds prisoners, I imagine there's a large number of our oppressed minorities that would debate your "personal freedom" comment. Most are there for petty victimless crimes. Our broken justice system creates violence just like our foriegn policy makes "I-hate-the-US-istans" faster that we can kill them.
Take an inner city kid busted for drugs, lock him up, expose him to real violenence. If he's not ready to murder, he'll be someones bi**h, locked in solitary, be killed or kill. (research Nixon's little war, Williams Bratton changing the way policing is done, Regan's war on drugs, and Clinton's Zero tolerance)

While I'm not advocating "overthrowing the government". We must stop electioning career politicians and start electing real representives of the people for the people. Those who will reclaim our rights, instead of fearmongering to take them away. And fire all the traitors that voted in legistlation like the 500 page Patriot Act without even reading it.

[v rainwater]

As far as our "foriegn policy' goes, the following link (decorated Marine Gen. Smedley Butler circa 1935) is informative. I'm not buying that "they hate us because of our liberty or freedom" crap. Smedley says it very well.

http://www.lexrex.com/enlightened/artic ... racket.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Matt, as far as the vast conspiracy goes, your probably right. However, consider the warnings of the secret few elite string pullers which several
have warned of (Gen. Cornwallis, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin,JFK, Regan, Bill Moyers). And a much larger problem than too much not neccessarily true info in the hands of the "uneducated" is the constant barrage of disinfo and propaganda that the sheeple get through the mainstream. It seems to me we've become too "specialized" as individuals and not well rounded, so to speak. Some of the most close minded individuals I know are also the most educated.

[waterhog]

Im sure if you got money and live in a low crime area your views are a lot differ than someone who doesn't those laws seem like there geared to protect the police department and not the citizin that policeman has a gun and i dont know him from adom just because he went to some police academy doesnt mean hes not a psycho or could turn psycho at any minute hes just human like me and you he could be dirty as the bottom of your shoe and all these rights seem to protect them and cover ther butts

if theres anty mitpelled wards deal with it editars

[FarPastGone]

As far as our "foriegn policy' goes, the following link (decorated Marine Gen. Smedley Butler circa 1935) is informative. I'm not buying that "they hate us because of our liberty or freedom" crap. Smedley says it very well.

I am sure that was sarcasm on Fish’s part. The foreign policy of America is complicated twisted and in some regards grotesque. I will read the link you supplied next week once I am done studying for a test, but American foreign policy is far to complicated to justly cover here. Foreign policy in regards to the Middle East is so conflicted that you could probably spend a good portion of your life studying it. It is a story of constant undermining, proliferation of people and resources, ideologies that have no bearing in a society and hundreds of other actions that have brought us to where we are right now. There are people that hate us, there is far more to it than us not conforming to their ideological guidelines, and in large our Cold War dealings were largely responsible for arming a number of these non-state vigilantes. I like how Samir Kassir, a Lebanese intellectual assassinated by agents of the Syrian military, analyzes the situation in the Middle East in a book I read (called “Being Arab”);

“For whether if is or is no longer a foreign agent, Islamism still reinforces the Other. In justifying, or enacting, the clash of civilizations, it gives supporters of the crusade their rationale and enables the West to use all the means afforded it by its technological capabilities to maintain its supremacy over the Arabs, and thereby to perpetuate Arab powerlessness.”

Matt, as far as the vast conspiracy goes, your probably right. However, consider the warnings of the secret few elite string pullers which several have warned of (Gen. Cornwallis, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin,JFK, Regan, Bill Moyers). And a much larger problem than too much not neccessarily true info in the hands of the "uneducated" is the constant barrage of disinfo and propaganda that the sheeple get through the mainstream. It seems to me we've become too "specialized" as individuals and not well rounded, so to speak. Some of the most close minded individuals I know are also the most educated.

This is all more sensible than what you posted originally, I know this conversation has diverged, and maybe you were trolling for responses with your OP. None of this changes my original view though.

I agree that there is a "barrage" of disinformation, a large portion of what we hear is what the mainstream media wants us to hear and all that good stuff, but I think the propaganda rings just as true on the opposite side of mainstream thinking. "Free thinkers", anarchist, non-conformists, patriots and/or whatever these people like to consider themselves are just as susceptible to be fed manipulative highly-hypothetical lies as well. The people that think for them selves are those that can read between the lines without any impartiality taking that information in to account and applying it rationally. Two current examples of this;

a. This story you originally posted. Is there really some atrocious violation of constitutional rights going on here? No. Are there people that want you to believe otherwise? Yes.

b. The suicide avenger down in Austin. Are there people trying to promote his ideas as valid or even worse an expanding consensus in the population? Yes. Do they even realize how contradictory his whole diatribe is? No.

As for becoming too specialized I really don’t have an opinion on this. I do know academically speaking your field of study becomes increasingly specialized the further you pursue higher levels of education. If anything an increasingly globalized world and greater ease of access to information would point toward a wider wealth of knowledge for everyone. So maybe I don’t agree with that statement.

Either way everyone is entitled to think what they want, how they want, and the fact alone that we can publicly agree or disagree with the government in a public forum is what is great about America.

We have diverged past the point of return, and I have side-tracked myself from studying way too far.

-Matt

[Fish]

And prisoners in this country don't have a better standard of living than 50% of the world's population? Want to see some truly serious oppression, you might want to try sub-saharan Africa, North Korea, or Burma. I'm not saying we don't have people who are oppressed in this country. I'm just saying that our government might make it in the mini-pee-wee church league when it comes to oppression, while nations in those places are dominating the big leagues.

The U.S. is clearly one of the most libertarian nations in the world. Not everyone gets rich, not everyone gets a fair deal, but on your worst day you're more free than you'd be on your best day in a hell of a lot of other places. If you're in jail here for some stupid charge that amounts to "getting high using a substance that doesn't have a good political lobby", you knew you were committing a crime (it's not like you were protesting the government and they trumped up a charge to jail you) and you still got to vote, petition, demonstrate, etc. to try to change the law before you broke it and got arrested. (In case you can't tell, I think drug prohibitions are probably the worst idea government ever had.) But the kid in jail for smoking pot sure has a lot more to be pissed off about than the guy in the youtube video you posted who (gasp!) had an officer take his gun away and then give it back to him and not even ticket him! (And who publicized a private phone conversation he had with the mayor, who I'd bet was never informed he was even being recorded.) To call that oppression is an insult to oppressed people!

So, V, we apparently agree that drug prohibitions are bad and that the Patriot Act was a knee jerk reaction that goes too far and that politicians passed to show they're doing something. We apparently don't agree on the definition of oppression and on the fact that we're pretty freakin lucky to be able to even have this conversation and criticize the government and police in a public forum without fearing imprisonment or worse. And we may differ on what does or does not constitute sarcasm...

- Fish

[jermdog]

While I'm not advocating "overthrowing the government". We must stop electioning career politicians and start electing real representives of the people for the people. Those who will reclaim our rights, instead of fearmongering to take them away. And fire all the traitors that voted in legistlation like the 500 page Patriot Act without even reading it.

Right on. That is a well written statement and 100% true in my book. It is hard to see both sides of the coin since I'm a white 32 year old that lives in the middle of Fayetteville.
But I do know that last year Fay police shot a little black kid with a stick, and I'm talking like 11, not to mention they are kind of trigger happy in general around here lately. In my personal opinion if the police were required to have a college degree, pass more than just a few tests at the academy, and get paid better the problems would mos def decline. Then we would need fewer police to do the same job, and people wouldn't get beat up or shot by the dirty/racist/angry cops running around now.
On the other hand, we've got it better that most countries.
Although I wonder if this discussion has been flagged by the CIA or whoever for the voicing of our opinions about the govt. and more importantly patriot act.

[Prairie Tater]

"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free."
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

We are all slaves to a certain degree. The American people are enslaved to the Federal Reserve and its board of greedy and power-hungry bankers. It is "they" who really run this country. It does not matter which political party is in power. All politicians are tainted with lobbiest money coming directly from the big corporations which are controlled by these "puppeteers" as I call them. They are the ones pulling the strings. And in case you didn't know, their ultimate goal is a global government which they will also control.

I'm convinced that the only way for this country to live up to its full potential and really be free again is to rid itself of the Federal Reserve. We do not need a private bank printing our currency and charging us interest on it. From the research that I've done, every penny of our income taxes goes directly to pay the interest on these loans.

Here's a brief history lesson of this country's entanglements with the central banking system: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USGSOViaulc" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

And jermdog, you are right on target about the government watching our keystrokes. Just as I'm sure that "they" know every website that I've visited while doing my "research".

BTW, the video of the students protesting at Pitt reminds me of the good ol' days in the '60s and early '70s when we were protesting the (Vietnam) war.

T.Prater

[FarPastGone]

But I do know that last year Fay police shot a little black kid with a stick, and I'm talking like 11, not to mention they are kind of trigger happy in general around here lately. In my personal opinion if the police were required to have a college degree, pass more than just a few tests at the academy, and get paid better the problems would mos def decline. Then we would need fewer police to do the same job, and people wouldn't get beat up or shot by the dirty/racist/angry cops running around now.

We talked about this once and I completely agree we should be more selective in who is hired. Especially in Fayetteville, there have been two other incidences of cops killing people that they did not need to in the last six months or so.

This again is another instance in which everyone is entitled to their own opinions but there is far more to the issue than most know or understand, especially myself. Police are partly responsible for their public image, but with advances in technology and the modernizations of our cities I think by and large police have failed to adequately grow and advance at the same rate while being stretched thinner over larger areas. Before urban sprawl and suburban neighborhoods became the predominant communities in America (starting in the 1950s but really not exacting its revenge against Americans till the 1960s) police were tasked with maintaining order as opposed to law enforcement. Now police officers order-maintenance functions are restricted by procedures and protocols, the watchful eye of the media, and rules on how to treat suspected criminals. Not to mention the relationship between citizens and police officers has been strained by the barrier of metal and glass that separates patrolmen from the public. There are a lot of ideas and opinions in this field, most of which I haven’t read, but those I have read all seem to agree that the current model of law enforcement we have right now is a product of the way our society has shaped it.

Prairie Tater the NWO theory is so over-hyped and impossible from a geopolitical point of view it is laughable. America likes to maintain its hegemony and unequivocal role as the only current super power so I doubt this very very very much. The NWO people think globalization and economic integration are the ends to state sovereignty but don’t take into account the evolving nature of the concept of state sovereignty since the ideas inception with the formations of the nation state model after the Peace of Westphalia, to Bodin and Hobbes’ ideas on sovereignty, to post WWI, WWII, and Cold War territorial demarcations, to more modern theorists, and on to the threat of the multilateral transnational alliances and corporations (if you read it “multilateral transnational alliances and corporations” in a frightened voice there is some sarcasm in that, and there are a lot more microcosms in the history of sovereignty). No we are not about to pinnacle some peak of dark and evil control of America or the globe, we are simply in a period where we refine and redefine the scope of state authority on a much more regular basis.

- Matt

[v rainwater]

My bad, looks like I may have fallen prey to my OP 1st link spin by omition.Had video probs during that 1st post, damn Hughes Net. I now admit Robert's civil rights we not grossly violated. And perhaps the Nazi reference was a little harsh, Lozi (local socialist) would have been more accurate. However, my labeling is'nt based solely on this incident.
I apologize if I rubbed anyone the wrong way. My motovation isn't based on personal discontention in any way, but rather altruistic in nature. I feel extremely fortunate and blessed. It's just the revolutionary fire within wants to rip up the opressive forces of cruelty and find the original human goodness beneath the brutalities of our modern world (just kidding Big Brother) I guess you could say I have issues. At least several that compell my action. Don't worry, I may rant and rave, but never do anything as whacked as fly a plane into a building. Could do something like this though.lol http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_2HTKodv10" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Let me connect a few dots leading up to my knee jerking.
Wandering why we don't see many movies being made here, word travels fast in Tinsel Town.
http://defamer.gawker.com/5060581/crusa ... -next-role" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
I'm sure several of you say this on the national news, cost the public 400K
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7KM1ukwBGv4" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Then two recent grand jury decisions not to indict cops in probable murders. One mentally ill man shot 5 times, granted he was scoffling with an officer when shot by backup, but 5 times? The other was an ill 73 yr old, police said he was armed, 20 witnesses dispute that.The naive majority seems to think that cops are infallable and cops are thinking they're above the law. Maybe there is some truth to the assertion that the police's primary purpose is to protect the government, then corporations and the wealthy, then the masses gets whats left.
As far as Matt's assertion that police haven't developed and grown, the facts beg to differ. Do the research they's got a tremendous quiver of new gadgets. Your taxes have equiped the po po very well, not to mention over half of your taxes being spent blowing people to bits all over the world (in the name of spreading democracy and nationbuilding). What the hell is wrong with nationbuilding beginning at home?
P. Tater, you raise excellent points about the fed. It now looks like the Austrian economists were correct in their warning about Feds monitary policy

[v rainwater]

Must have run out room. P. Tater, equally disturbing is our food situation. See codex alamentarius & these http://www.correntewire.com/category/co ... omega_labs" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xXumzqeyAg" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Peace love and liberty. SYOTR

[v rainwater]

PS. Since the topic of the NWO was brought up, just wanted to add my two cents. Seems to me we're breaking too many eggs to make this New World Omlet;-)

[FarPastGone]

As far as Matt's assertion that police haven't developed and grown, the facts beg to differ. Do the research they's got a tremendous quiver of new gadgets. Your taxes have equiped the po po very well

You misunderstood the point of what I was saying. First I was speaking in generalizations of growing and advancing in regards to how society and lifestyles in America have evolved. Why would I talk about gadgets than diverge straight into concepts of sprawl and suburbia, and the resulting shift from order maintenance to law enforcement? Yeah more money and gadgets may be going to law enforcement, po pos, but think about the nature of their duties in regards to the traditional city. More people spread out over larger areas and shortages in police officers, I would hope money is going towards advancing their technologies. No, growing and advancing their role in the expanding sprawl of America is what I was referring to.

Wow! V rainwater thanks for saving my life and educating me on the errors of the FDA by allowing stevia in America as a sweetener. Another video made of 10-30 second sound bites completely manipulating what people are saying or the context they are saying it in for the creators own self-serving purpose (maybe to prove his theory right?). If you are really concerned about this, then I would recommend looking through academic databases (no that does not include Alex Jones’ site) to see if there are any actual publications from some of the millions of scientists around the world on this topic. Maybe if something turns up you can go through the appropriate networks to bring it to the attention of someone with the FDA. Beyond that you alone are responsible for what goes into your body, not the government, and there are lots of things that in some form or fashion at some dosage or intake of can kill you.

Who cares? I guess it is the “revolutionary fire” within you that makes you watch completely useless videos on YouTube, and philosophize on completely illogical concepts and theories. For real you want to make a difference? Stop supporting this crap.

- Matt