Where at least you know you’re free?

Tim Swanson, October 08, 2008

Email This | Print This | Share This | Comment

While everyone is distracted by the unwinding of various financial institutions, the battle over an open society and civil liberties is quietly fighting on.

Homeland Security’s space-based domestic spy program is now operational, despite lacking privacy safeguards.

A brigade from the 3rd Infantry is now the first official military unit to become permanently garrisoned in the US as part of the new Northern Command. What Posse Comitatus Act?

Despite any record of violent or criminal intent, Maryland officials have admitted that they had added antiwar activists to national databases of suspected terrorists. Good luck getting off that list, right?

And while I do not condone hacking email accounts, the alleged perpetrator in the Sarah Plain case was arrested and indicted — for the very same activities that the NSA, FBI and other federal agencies do on a daily basis.

It should also be noted while there was a justifiably large outcry over the $700 billion bailout two weeks ago, a mere three weeks ago — without a debate — Congress passed the new defense spending bill: a hefty sum of $612 billion.

At least no one is threatening martial law, right?

Email This | Print This | Share This | Send a letter to the editor | Letters

Comments to “Where at least you know you’re free?”

Sukrit
October 8th, 2008 at 9:55 pm

The only hope is hyperinflation and the total collapse of the dollar (just like the continental dollar collapsed back in American history). That is the only way the empire will end, the only way a new, sensible economic policy will be adopted. The people have to learn their lesson the hard way.

Chris Baker
October 8th, 2008 at 11:21 pm

If the people are going to learn, they have to turn on their brains. Will they make that choice?

swan
October 9th, 2008 at 1:12 am

I want to find out more about the Honorable Brad Sherman, who sure stood his grounds for us last week.

R. Nelson
October 9th, 2008 at 2:04 am

The local neocon gadfly, Zeke Hile, is furious at your list of what he calls “terrorist-lovin’, military-shovin’” pinko nonsense. He wants to know why you would object to constant surveillance of all Americans by satellite, phone, and email eavesdropping when America’s at war. Hell, Zeke says, there are hundreds, maybe thousands of Ay-rabs half a world away armed with the latest AK-47s (now sporting cruciform bayonets). What greater threat could there be than this?

He also wants to know what’s wrong with an official combat brigade stationed in America, like it was in Baghdad. Haven’t you seen how bad traffic jams can get, and how handy a few Abrams tanks and Blackhawk choppers would be in clearing the way? Zeke’s eyes get really big when he waxes on about how holed-up criminals could be turned into pink mist by a smart bomb, rather than burden local cops with laws, rights, negotiations, all those pinko distractions from getting the job done.

He laughs at “Wussy Comitatus” (I won’t repeat the vulgarity Zeke uses) and says, between pulls at his 64-ouncer, if you haven’t done anything wrong you don’t have anything to worry about.

Zeke’s rant ended with asking what would be so bad about being run by Marshall law. Didn’t Marshall Dillon deal justice out to his fellow citizens? Real Americans, he avers, want to help their government fight terror, not get in the way.

little guy
October 9th, 2008 at 4:38 am

I think that hyperinflation and the total collapse of the dollar is exactly what the elite want, Sukrit. In other words: I think this crisis was pre-planned. Mark my words: they will use this crisis – this controlled demolition of the US economy – to accelerate our integration into The North American Union and the Amero, or herd the sheeple into a totalitarian police-state.

Either way, I think martial law is in the offing.

B York
October 9th, 2008 at 5:49 am

I believe the overall objective is to bankrupt the government, destroy the dollar, and privatize everything in sight, giving the corporations everything they want, and for us a fascist police state.

Eugene Costa
October 9th, 2008 at 6:47 am

“And a few members were even told that there wold be martial law in America if we voted no.”

Congressman Brad Sherman

It is a remarkable statement, by a Congressman, and direct testimony that Congressmen were threatened with martial law.

It is curious this has not been blazoned all over the mainstream media.

It is not too late to impeach, which, from the beginning, has been the ultimate structural and Constitutional remedy.

If, according to Kucinich’s original and insightful scheme, Cheney is impeached first, someone like Colin Powell might be made vice president, then replace an impeached Bush.

Or simply replacing Cheney might be enough, with Powell serving the role of Haig under Nixon.

I am not a fan of Powell at all, by the way, but though a “politician” with a highly practiced blind eye, even as a military man, he is not the at the level of lunacy of those now running the executive branch.

For those familiar with Chicago politics, which are instructive in the way studying Renaissance Florence is instructive, the principle would be similar to that behind replacing the deceased Harold Washington with Eugene Sawyer, was it?

Steve Hogan
October 9th, 2008 at 7:41 am

B York,

I’ve never seen so much confused thinking packed into a single sentence. Bankrupt the government? Government has the authority to tax, both directly and indirectly. Its members decide what spending levels will be, whether to borrow and its extent, and whether to monetize debt through inflation. In other words, whether government remains solvent or runs enormous debt is completely within its control. No one can force governments to go bankrupt!

Destroy the dollar? Who has the constitutional authority to coin money? The Congress. So why did they cede this power to a private banking cartel? Congress could take back this power today if they wanted to and padlock the doors of the Federal Reserve. One can only conclude that they don’t want to, because doing so would end the gravy train. Without a separate institution creating money out of thin air and generating artificial booms and painful busts, the people – even intellectually lazy Americans – might figure out who is to blame. Can’t have that!

Privatize everything? In case you’ve been in a coma the last two weeks, the government decided against an angry public to transfer $850B from property owners to rent seekers. This isn’t privatization, it’s wealth redistribution. You might even say that its theft on a massive scale. Who are the thieves, Mr. York?

As for the fascist police state, who has the ability to create one? General Electric? WalMart? Uh, I don’t think so. Your friendly neighborhood congressman and his buddies voted to fund the awful Dept. of Homeland Security, the NSA, the silly drug war, and the rest. If you want to complain about the snooping and spying, try blaming those who are doing the snooping and spying.

richard vajs
October 9th, 2008 at 8:13 am

In a way, I wished that this country was under the control of some all-seeing, all-powerful cabal seeking to “enslave” us. That would mean that at least there would be some organization to the whole mess and, more importantly, some group that is going to care what happens to all of America if things deteriorate badly. But, I doubt that that is the case. What we probably will have is a Hobbesian future wherein everyone tries to get what they can, while they can, and let the rest go to Hell, if it will. The rich will never agree to higher taxes as a price to save our Government. The Zionists will never agree to a fairer foreign policy in order to get us out of this insane war against Islam. The corporations will never agree to less predatory trade and finance policies. America is now less than the sum of its parts. No one could possibly find a true interest in controlling all of it
This armed force is welcomed by the rich who have gotten what they could from America and want to keep it. The rich want their gated communities and want to be protected from the consequences of a looted society. If you want to see the future of a bungled America, watch Mad Max not 1984.

Eugene Costa
October 9th, 2008 at 8:32 am

Max Max is a first class flick.

A: It is all a conspiracy.

B: It’s actually much worse than that. A conspiracy would be relatively easy to deal with.

A: What is it then?

B: It’s not a conspiracy.

A: I don’t follow.

B: That’s because you are not in on it.

A: Oh.

[snippets from a conversation ca. 1968]

Eugene Costa
October 9th, 2008 at 8:54 am

corr: Mad Max

liberranter
October 9th, 2008 at 11:32 am

One would have to have a brain to turn on. That, from my observation, excludes a good 75-90 percent of the general population from said choice.

liberranter
October 9th, 2008 at 11:33 am

Are Zeke’s father and his mother also his sister and his brother? Just curious…

Lear k
October 9th, 2008 at 1:26 pm

The few will control everything and every one!These are the better of us as they believe!

Lear k
October 9th, 2008 at 1:30 pm

Colin Powell is part of the problem.Remember the speach he gave the UN.He is responsible for the unjust war against Iraq as any on else .

Lear k
October 9th, 2008 at 1:34 pm

Control the press.
control the money and wealth.
control the judicial system.
control the masses.

paw
October 9th, 2008 at 2:34 pm

We’re pressing Bob Schieffer to ask the candidates about record military spending in the final debate.

Here’s our question:
“The Iraq and Afghanistan wars, at a cost of $5,000 per second, fuel our growing debt and feed the economic crisis. Even subtracting war funding, Pentagon spending is breaking records. Will rebuilding the economy require a tough look at military spending? What would you change?”

Please add your voice to over 10,000 others.

Eugene Costa
October 9th, 2008 at 4:03 pm

Indeed. That’s not quite the point.

Lester Ness
October 9th, 2008 at 8:59 pm

People like Zeke used to man lynch mobs.

Lester Ness
Kunming
China

Lester Ness
October 9th, 2008 at 9:13 pm

I think you’re giving our pols too much credit. They are just as stupid and opportunistic as they seem. There is no intelligent puppet-master in control.

Lester Ness
Kunming
China

Lester Ness
October 9th, 2008 at 9:27 pm

You might be interested in Dimitry Orlov’s essays comparing the decline of the Soviet Union and that of the US. cluborlov.blogspot.com

Lester Ness
Kunming
China

Lester Ness
October 9th, 2008 at 9:58 pm

Bush and whoever comes next don’t need to formally declare martial law. They can just keep on doing what they’ve done the last 8 years. There’s already an alternate prison and court system, including kidnapping and torture. So far as I know, it has not swept up many pale-faced well-to-do Protestants YET, but there’s no reason it can’t in the future.

Augustus didn’t formally inaugurate a Roman Empire. The Republican assemblies kept meeting, people continued to compete to be elected aedile or consul. But the real decisions were made elsewhere, in private, by Augustus and friends.

“… then, dropping the title of triumvir, and giving out that he was a Consul, and was satisfied with a tribune’s authority for the protection of the people, Augustus won over the soldiers with gifts, the populace with cheap corn, and all men with the sweets of repose, and so grew greater by degrees, while he concentrated in himself the functions of the Senate, the magistrates, and the laws.” Tacitus, Annals, I.i

Lester Ness
Kunming
China

Brad Smith
October 10th, 2008 at 1:04 am

While I agree with Richard that there are many varied interests, this doesn’t mean that there are no conspiracies. We had a very clear and real conspiracy to start the war in Iraq. This was accoplished because the global elite had merging interests. Some where zionist, some oil men, globalist, defense contractors etc. They only came together to lie us into this war becuase they all got what they wanted at the same time. The same is true with the coming war with Iran if they can all get what they want it’s go time, if not they will sit around and lobby each other untill the time is right.

This also goes for what us conspiracy nuts call the Amero, Nafta SuperHighway etc. Some of the global elite are pushing for this right now and planning and waiting for thier day. And yes, some of this plotting and scheming takes place at the Bilderburg Group Meetings and the Bohemian Grove get togethers for the global elite. Honestly, do you really believe that the most powerfull people on Earth get together just to drink and watch sports? These people live breath, and die for power. They may only have their own best interests at heart, but that does not mean that their interests never converge. No, they don’t care about us, it’s all about power and who among them gets to be the first Trillionair. I’m sure these bloody handed monsters stab each other in the back often enough while they play thier games. But their playing board is the world and the pieces they play with are us and our families.

Furthermore, if you know anything about human nature, you know that people compete in three distict ways. It’s true for people everywhere on Earth. One group wishes for equity. They want everyone that competes to get the same amount of prize money at the end, this only seems fare to them. The second group just want’s to get the biggest chuck of the prize they can, regardless of whether or not someone else gets more. The third and actually the scariest group only want’s to WIN the game. They don’t care if they only end up with one dollar of the prize as long as everyone else gets less. That’s how they define “Winning”. You can observe this tendency in the people you meet everyday. You can also see this tendency in the global elite. To them it’s just one big competition on a global scale. Right now it seems the third and scariest group is headed for the finish line.

Ps. I think it time or past time to stock up. Food, water, ammo, seeds, gold, silver, etc.

Peace!

Eugene Costa
October 10th, 2008 at 1:54 am

As a matter of fact, Augustus (who was three official personae in sequence) had as his declared aim Res Publica Restituta. Unfortunately, neither Res publica nor Imperium means anything so simple as “Republic” or “Empire” respectively, though both English terms descend from the Roman.

The closest contemporary analogy to the thrust of Augustus’ polity may be that of the American Social Conservatives, so-called, who are less precisians about Constitutional and legal niceties than they are about what they call “traditional values”.

Ceasar’s nephew was a provincial with provincial social prejudices, and this was in manhy ways the essence of his “conservatism”.

In fact, he was signally the antithesis of his uncle–socially, politically, militarily, and constitutionally.

Augustus ruled mainly by auctoritas, and with some of the methods of the traditional Greek tyrants, like Pisistratus.

Unfortunately, “tyrant” in Greek does not mean what it means in English, though it descends from the Greek.

Not to belabor the matter, while maintaining the forms of the old constitution, Augustus worked outside and along side it, a bit like a parallel government. In effect he rigged the elections, for example, but did it legally.

Augustus’ tribunicia potestas was part of the show and also the source of important powers and privileges, including immunity and coercitio.

Augustus most importantly held an imperium that was gradually recognized as “majus”, that is greater than the imperium of any other military commander.

In the East, there was a move to deify him, which he resisted as untraditional. On the other hand, the son (as Octavianus) of Caesar, he was son of a man declared immortal, as he too would be declared after his death.

Of all Augustus’ many talents and attributes, he also had one which is absolutely necessary to the type having any real and posthumous success–longevity. This despite a sickly constitution that often put him at death’s door, from which he reemerged again again to outlive all his physicians.

Eugene Costa
October 10th, 2008 at 1:58 am

Corr: “again and again”. Pardon this and any other typos.

Eugene Costa
October 10th, 2008 at 11:05 am

Honestly, do you really believe that the most powerfull people on Earth get together just to drink and watch sports?

Actually, a good many of them are not even up to that level of intelligence. In the US, mostly they play golf.

Badly.

The Polynesians rather ingeniously solved the problem of their various royal personages, whom they viewed as storehouses in emergencies, especially at sea, by making them at once substantial, tasty, and eminently edible.

It really shows how backwards and naive Americans are by comparison.

The last thing to do at the moment is stock up on anything. You may be stocking up the rest of your very short life for a future that does not exist.

Eugene Costa
October 10th, 2008 at 11:48 am

After the Great Decider, “The only anxiety you have to be anxious about is the anxiety that feeds the anxiety you have to be anxious about.”

What, him worry?

The doublebind by the way is eminently Protestant and Evangelical.

Brad Smith
October 10th, 2008 at 4:18 pm

Eugene you say “The last thing to do at the moment is stock up on anything. You may be stocking up the rest of your very short life for a future that does not exist”.

Yes life can be short for anyone. However, not preparing for the worst is folly. I am not only preparing for myself but also my family. I am married with three children two still at home. I think it would be incredibly irresponsible knowing what I do about our economy and government to do otherwise. You know what? It also brings a good deal of comfort knowing that no matter how bad things get my family will be taken care of. Insurance is one thing and can be good too. but I wouldn’t count on it the way I would count on being prepared. I know that many of my friends who still live in the cities think I’m nuts. But I think they are nuts for living the lives they do, surrounded by crime, and an ever increasing police state, mountains of debt, etc.

So I’ll say it again, it’s time to stock up. Food, water, ammo, seeds, gold, silver, etc. It’s far better to be overprepared than foundering around clueless in any crisis.

Peace!

Eugene Costa
October 10th, 2008 at 5:09 pm

“Stocking up beyond” ordinary precautions, including for natural emergencies, and specifically in response to this collection of financial events is exactly what the people who caused it would like you to do–be passive and endure, wait it out.

If survivalism is the goal, there are better ways to go about it.

The reaction of “stocking up” to weather the storm strikes me very much like the nuclear fallout shelter craze in the ’50’s, when enormous numbers of otherwise rational people were running around building bomb shelters in which they expected to survive nuclear war.

The slightest rational thought suggests that had the same time and energy been put into collectively curbing the lunatics engineering the prospect of nuclear war in the first place much utterly worthless activity could have been avoided.

To an extant that is what broke out in the ’60’s among the young, and it was not strongly ideological, but mainly rational and reactive.

It is a myth that anti-war protesters were mostly leftist, or that hippies were draft-dodgers. After a certain point, many of the most active antiwar protesters were veterans.

What they had in common was, well, being antiwar.

But then most adherents of Paul are not very rational at all, are they, and many Libertarians of the more “conservative” bent seem lukewarm on real change.

Paul might have saved the whole lot of his followers a lot of trouble, including “stocking up”, by following his own principles and coming out strongly for impeachment.

Stocking up now, fallout shelters soon to follow.

If it comes to that, enjoy your hole. Don’t forget to stock up on good books. With no electricity or gasoline or diesel to generate it, and no nearby stream or water-driven generator, you’ll need a huge amount of lamp oil and firewood for those cozy winter nights.

How much gasoline or diesel can you bury–it is easy to do, but it could run into real money. Or are you smart enough to have livestock?

And oh, make sure you mark the solar panels on your roof with a huge sign, “Anti-Government Revolutionary”. Not that the forces of “Lawn Order” would not know where you are anyway, but making yourself easier to find may get you a better berth in the camp with “Arbeit Macht Frei” over the gate.

Anyone can die at any time. Indeed.

And, after Patton, it is always safer to run into the artillery rather than away from it.

It’s also much more fun.

Eugene Costa
October 10th, 2008 at 5:40 pm

Good luck, Brad, with a lot of intelligence and hard work, some luck and real endurance, in thirty years or so you may qualify as serfs and peasants.

Andy
October 10th, 2008 at 5:49 pm

Become informed and aware or watch American Idol? Sadly just too many Americans just don’t care enough. That’s why the powers that be can get away with what they do. Its like ancient Rome with its ‘bread and circus’ routine to distract the masses.

Andy
October 10th, 2008 at 5:53 pm

Being an “antiwar activist” gets you on a blacklist as a “suspected terrorist”? That’s really scary.

Lester Ness
October 10th, 2008 at 6:11 pm

“For those familiar with Chicago politics, which are instructive in the way studying Renaissance Florence is instructive….”

They may be yet more instructive if Obama, product of The Machine, wins.

Lester Ness
Kunming
China

Lester Ness
October 10th, 2008 at 6:24 pm

Invest in social capital, that is, make friends with your neighbors. If things really collapse to the point where you must raise your own food, you’ll need their help (and vice versa) anyway.

A month or two ago I observed wheat harvest, rice planting, here in Yunnan, and I didn’t see a whole lot of petroleum products being used. I don’t think a lot Yunnan people will be too badly effected by whatever happens. No. 1 son may move back from Kunming, and help with the field work again.

Lester Ness
Kunming
China

Timmy Ramone
October 10th, 2008 at 10:10 pm

It wasn’t that long ago that Zeke was ready to take gun in hand and fight the “evil gummint” to the death over Ruby Ridge and Waco. How times have changed.

Eugene Costa
October 10th, 2008 at 11:43 pm

Indeed, the Neo-Conservatives and Corporate Fascists and the rest, have been hitting college students hard with the old “if-you-get-arrested-in-an-antiwar-demonstration-you-will-never-get-a-good-job-in-corporate-America” song and dance.

Not that that accounts for much or even most of the apathy.

On the other hand, the way things are going, if you don’t get arrested in an antiwar demonstration, you will also not get a good job in corporate America.

One is tempted to include what will seem a complete non-sequitur about the Persians beating allied troops into battle against the Greeks.

Have you ever read the ingredients section on the label for Cool Whip?

That’s scary.

Eugene Costa
October 11th, 2008 at 12:07 am

As a general rule, never eat anything prepared by someone whose occupation is “food chemist.”

The mainland Chinese seem to be working on a new variation: never eat anything prepared by anybody.

Brad Smith
October 11th, 2008 at 1:14 am

Eugene, you amaze me. No matter how little you have to say you can’t shut up! If being self relient makes me a peasant so be it. If you think running into artillery is fun go for it.

As for Ron Paul all you need to do is look at how things have turned out. Should I say, I TOLD YOU SO! Good God man idialism is fine but at least temper it with a dose of reality.

For anyone else reading this, I’m not usually such an Ass, but oh well, when in Rome.

I’ll say it yet again, stock up, be prepared, do it for your family, your friends Hell even do it for Eugene when he comes knocking at your door. Sometimes it’s hard turning away the village idiot.

Peace!

Brad Smith
October 11th, 2008 at 2:15 am

Lester, isn’t that one of the problems they have been having? Number 1 Son being traded for field equipment that hasn’t shown up? I’m fairly ignorant on the subject, but curious.

As for making friends with your neighbors I coudn’t agree with you more. It’s one of the best things about living in a small tight knit community. We rely on each other and always have. I suppose it could also work for a large but also tight knit community. Around here we have always worked with each other, keeping taxes low by doing the work ourselves or voluteering in groups when it’s needed. We may be poor when it comes to per capita earnings ratio, but we all seem to own our own homes (not the bank) and stay well fed and clothed.

Living within your means seems to be a lost art in much of the US but we still seem to be on top of it. It may be that because Northern Michigan has missed out on the massive economic expansion that we will survive the coming depression. Helping each other is not exactly expected but is fairly routine. I help out in many ways in my community, it never seemes to be work, it’s just a part of life that I enjoy.

Having lived in a few large cities I was always amazed at the amount of vandalism: spray painting, broken windows etc. Why doesn’t this happen here? I think it’s fairly simple. What’s the point of spray painting something on Friday night if you know that Saturday morning you will need to get up early to help fix the problem?

I know that much of the US may seem like a lost cause. But trust me there are still many areas where you can still be proud to be an American. Northern Michigan is one of them!

Peace!

Eugene Costa
October 11th, 2008 at 5:00 am

“Living within your means seems to be a lost art”

Theocritean idyll aside, along with the implicit judgment that others are not so virtuous, the fact is that war, taxes, corrupt politicians and courts, financial thieves and confidence men, as well as blatant currency manipulation, have become systematic and make such a style of life catch as catch can at best.

Another group X, with all the same virtues and foresight, goes bust every day.

Small community banks with good paper, for example, became targets immediately after the collapse of subprime exactly because they had good paper.

I will not name names, but I recently talked to a former employee of one of the best small banks in the country–in fact a model of community service–whose clientele has all the virtues mentioned. It was sold recently and the buyer is now running it into the ground faster than you can say Jumping Jack Flash.

Eugene Costa
October 11th, 2008 at 5:21 am

That, Brad, is naive in the extreme.

If there is a further squeeze on agriculture, as is happening in some areas of the country, whatever the rural equivalent is, it will appear soon enough. Indeed, in many areas it is already there, though extremely well covered up.

Also, the idea that these same areas are not dependent on Federal largesse is covered nicely by the fact that the denizens, like Palin, are seldom honest enough to call what they cadge from the state “welfare”.

In fact, the names under which “welfare” travels in the countryside is a tale unto itself.

little guy
October 11th, 2008 at 5:24 am

You’re absolutely right, Brad, to prepare yourself and your family for coming collapse!

I’ve put together an “escape pod”…one-man tent, rucksack, sleeping bag, some food, and all the survival gear I’ll need to hoof-it over to the national forest preserve where I’ll begin my new life as a forest hermit! :D

Eugene Costa
October 11th, 2008 at 7:11 am

The legacy of the Anchorites might come in handy. I have always been struck by the similarity between Simeon Stylites and flagpole sitters.

There’s also dance marathons to be considered.

Eugene Costa
October 11th, 2008 at 9:10 am

Ah, Brad, you see, until this present enlightenment of what an ass you are, you thought peasant and serf were terms of abuse.

That’s a step forward.

Consider it aporetic.

Were there peasants in the US things should likely never have got this far.

Dano
October 11th, 2008 at 4:45 pm

@ Eugene Costa and Brad Smith,

I do truly believe that both of you, and all of us here, want the current US slide towards destruction to stop. Bickering about it will not solve anything.

Brad, you are right to prepare, but sadly no one is ever prepared for a disaster because no one knows what that disaster will look like. The concept of accumulating gold (which I hear alot nowadays) is very impractical. In a life-or-death situation, you won’t grab your bullion. You will grab your wife and kids, your firearm, and seek safety. You probably will only grab enough food that you can carry in one bag, so stockpiling is kind of useless. Secondly, you can’t own any gold nowadays without the government knowing exactly what you have. If you have alot, they will sieze it in a crisis before you know what happened. In fact, I think it only puts your family in more danger by bringing more attention to yourself. Just my opinion.

I am of Serbian background and I remember learning stories from my grandfather and his friends about their first encounters in WWII with evil. They lived in a village and periodically there were calls for day laborers in the surrounding towns. This happened all the time. On one particular day, however, my friend’s grandfather went to work on the railway line nearby and as he came up to the place where they normally registered he was passing by a railway cart and heard some odd noises. He hopped up and peered in the window and what he saw was something that cannot be prepared for. He saw a few dozen Serbian peasants, blindfolded, on their knees, with their hands behind their heads. There we several armed Croatian Ustase soldiers with sledgehammers one by one splitting the heads open of the kneeling Serbs. He tried to escape the area and was caught by some soldiers in Ustase uniform. A Croatian friend of his was also in this group. There was that indescribable moment of complete confusion and horror as he looked into his friend’s eyes, thinking he was going to be murdered next by someone who just a week ago shared a shot of brandy with him. Instead, his friend calmly assured the other soldiers that he was a Croatian assistant and asked him to go and get something for him from his house. My friend’s grandfather said ok and made his escape. The first thing he did was try and warn the other Serbs in the area. Nobody believed him. They said “That sort of stuff doesn’t happen anymore!” You can imagine what happend to them. The second thing he did was find a pitchfork and at night returned to the town, found the first Ustase soldier he recognized from the previous day and drove the pitchfork through his head. He took his German made rifle and handgun and it never left his side for the rest of the war. He used it to fight the Ustase fascists and the communist partisans for the remainder of the war. He was eventually driven from his homeland but most of his family survived. I won’t even go into what my actual grandfather witnessed.

The one thing he said to me was…”Don’t look for evil, but always be prepared to defend yourself, your family, and your community.”

Eugene, I believe that this is what Brad is doing and I don’t think he is wrong for doing it. The fact that he frequents this site, he is also aware of the current issues and is probably educating friends and family as well. He is doing his part. Ron Paul did, and is doing his part to the best of his abilities. I know you are pissed off about Ron Paul not pushing for impeachment, and frankly, so am I, but pondering on this will not do anything. He is raising of awareness on the internet, as with Raimondo and co., and his contribution has been invaluable. But don’t knock the idea of making basic preparations. It does make sense.

You don’t have to scare people into taking action, but sadly, it might take a sledgehammer for most people to realize just how bad it can get. Apparently, seeing what happened at Abu Ghraib is not enough for most Americans.

Peace to everyone posting here. May you never have to experience what my grandfather and his friends had to experience in their lifetime.

david monaghan
October 13th, 2008 at 9:08 am

reading some of the comments makes me feel a little sad that their EGOS have won the day

Eugene Costa
October 13th, 2008 at 9:47 am

Crocodile tears are the essence of ego.

For crocodiles especially.

Highlights

Breaking News