This Is As Serious As It Gets, Boys And Girls...

Over these last few years, I've screamed long and loud and have written countless thousands of words about the threat that the Bush Administration poses to this country and to the very foundations it was built upon. I know that most people find politics to be tedious, boring and unimportant to their daily life. And I'm certainly not here to convince you that you should meticulously track every piece of legislation that rolls through Congress. Some of us are into that, some of us aren't.

But... If you pay attention to nothing else I write about politics, please, please, please pay attention to this. This might be a little lengthy, but please bear with me. I feel that this is that important.

This country was founded upon certain principles and beliefs. The right to free speech, the freedom to practice any religion we see fit, the right to assemble, to petition our government... Our government was structured in a manner that divided power, ensuring that all of the power does not rest with one person. Our government was structured precisely so that we were not forced to live beneath the thumb of a dictator, so that we are guaranteed the right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." Unless we step up, that's all about to change.

On May 9th, George Bush, without legislation or the consent of Congress signed NSPD-51/HSPD-20 It's called the "National Continuity Policy" yet what they're asserting is being "continued" by this directive, I know not. It certainly isn't our democracy, our system of government or the freedoms that we currently enjoy. And though the policy, as you can see it on the White House website has a lot of colorful language and legalistic gobbledygook, the long and the short of this directive is the establishment of a dictatorship. Let me say that again because it seems vaguely important. NSPD-51/HSPD-20 abolishes our current system of government and installs a dictatorship. I wish that I could say I was being hyperbolic or reactionary. I wish I could say that I was making it up. But it's all there in black and white.

The directive asserts that in the event of a "catastrophic emergency," all governmental power will be vested in one man, the President. The directive defines a "catastrophic emergency" as such:

"Catastrophic Emergency" means any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions

The deliberately vague language used leaves the door open for anything to be classified as a "catastrophic emergency." It could be a terrorist attack, a fire, an earthquake or even a hurricane. A national emergency can be declared anywhere and everywhere and once it has been declared, the only law in this country will be what the President declares it to be, regardless of our other allegedly co-equal branches of government.

From the directive:

Enduring Constitutional Government," or "ECG," means a cooperative effort among the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of the Federal Government, coordinated by the President...

A "cooperative effort coordinated by the President?" Would that be the same sort of cooperative effort the President has displayed with regard to say... the Iraq war? Regardless, this installs the President as the de facto head of our entire system of government with the other branches playing secondary roles. That is NOT how our Constitution lays out the functioning of our government. The Constitution provides for three Co-Equal branches of government with none placed higher than another.

This is incredibly dangerous territory, guys. This directive provides the basis for a dictatorship here in the United States. With all of the power of our government in hand, the president can declare martial law, he can cancel elections, he can do essentially whatever he wants to do, up to and including declining to leave office when his term is up. This isn't hyperbole, guys... that's the power that this directive gives him.

I find the following passage from the directive entirely laughable:

Ensuring the continued functioning of our form of government under the Constitution, including the functioning of the three separate branches of government.

So the claim is, they're protecting our Constitution by destroying our Constitution? This directive does not ensure the functioning of the three branches of government, it ensures that the Legislative and Judicial Branches are subservient and secondary to the Executive.

Guys, this truly is as serious as it gets. The very principles this country was founded upon and our entire system of government are threatened by this one directive. The directive itself is a end-run around the authority of Congress and that of the Judiciary as well. I don't care if you're a Democrat, a Republican, a Libertarian or a Green, we all enjoy the same rights and freedoms in this country and this directive is an all-out assault on them. This Administration has declared war on that made this country unique, that made this country great.

Let me put this the simplest way I know how... This directive renders our Constitution null and void, folks.

And yet, despite the significance of this directive and the absolute threat it poses to our Republic, we are not hearing about it. The media has not touched it and our legislators are not speaking out about it. I would venture to guess that more than 90% of this country has never even heard of this directive. So it now falls to us to do something about it.

I find it fitting that on this Memorial Day that we honor the sacrifice made by so many to defend this nation by defending it ourselves. Countless thousands have given of themselves, have shed their blood, sweat and tears to protect the rights and freedoms enshrined in our Constitution. It's time we repay that debt.

I urge everybody that is so moved to repost, or link to this and encourage others to continue reposting this. We need to get this into the national discourse. This needs to be talked about. We need to squeeze our elected officials until they squeal and do something about getting this directive repealed. And the only way to put the squeeze on them is to get everybody talking about this, writing their Senators and Representatives letters, calling their offices, demanding that they pay attention and do something about this abomination. We have the power and it's well past time that we exercise it.

Never forget the words of Bush himself back in 2000:

"If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator."

~Kevin S.

So Yeah, About That Surge...

Well, now that we're a couple of months into Bush's troop surge in Iraq, we've got to be seeing some results, right? All of those thousands of additional soldiers shipped over to secure Baghdad surely have to be having some effect by now, right? Yeah... as it turns out, the cumulative effect so far is that violence and death have gone up, up, up. The very day that this country was shocked by the shootings at Va Tech that claimed 32 lives, a string of bombings in Iraq killed more than 250 Iraqi civilians. Over 180 in the supposedly reinforced and more secure Baghdad alone. Not that our media covered that story or anything. April's death toll was over 100 and there doesn't seem to be any indication that the violence will be stopped or even slowed down anytime soon.

And so how does the Bush Administration respond to the news that things are indeed getting worse in Iraq rather than better? Why, with some creativity and good ol' fashioned American ingenuity of course! To deal with the increasing death tolls, the Bush Administration has decided to stop counting deaths that are a result of car bombs. Yes, you heard it right. Deaths resulting from car bombs will no longer be tallied in the official body counts. And using numbers that exclude those deaths, the Bush Administration has had the freaking audacity to claim that there has been a dramatic decrease in sectarian violence.

In explaining the justification for excluding these deaths, the Preznit said:

"If the standard of success is no car bombings or suicide bombings, we have just handed those who commit suicide bombings a huge victory."

Not to point out the obvious, but prior to our occupation, Baghdad experienced neither car bombings or suicide bombings. But hey, why let a little factoid like that get in the way of a perfectly good talking point, huh?

It is true that the number of bodies that had been turning up tortured and executed has declined. They're only finding 10-15 bullet-riddled, tortured and mutilated corpses per day instead of the 30-40 a day they were finding. So I guess by Bush standards, that's... progress. The decline has been attributed in part, to radical cleric Muqtada al Sadr ordering his Mahdi militia to stand down for the moment and the Shiite militias aligned with PM al-Maliki having been reigned in. Despite the decrease in the number of executions however, there has been a sharp increase in the number of bombings and also in the number of deaths due to those bombings. You know, the deaths that the Preznit claims don't count. Not officially anyway.

You know, using that Bushian sort of logic, if I took away all of the losses my Raiders suffered last season to teams with names that ended with an "S" then my Silver and Black actually went undefeated. You know, I might be able to get into this logic after all!

It comes as no surprise to any of us that Bush's "surge" has failed and it has failed miserably. Instead of providing the security and stability he promised, it's provided only more death and destruction. It's time to end this stupid charade and bring our troops home. Iraq is in a state of outright civil war with our brave men and women caught in the middle. 70% of this country wants us out of Iraq and still this "president" refuses to obey the overwhelming will of the people. Bush is the single most intransigent president in the history of this country. The time for Congress to act is now. No more "non-binding" resolutions and no more talk of "timetables" and "benchmarks." Bush is the most intransigent president in this history of this country and it's painfully obvious to anybody with half a brain that he is going to veto any spending bill with "timetables" attached to it. It's time for the Democratic majority to cut the funding for this war. Period. Not one dollar more. We put them in office in November to end this war and to bring our troops home. I can understand the diplomatic and legislative efforts they've tried to this point. But it's done no good. Nor will it ever, so long as Bush sits in the White House. He listens to nobody nor cares what the people want. It's time to cut the funding entirely. It's time to end this war. The Democrats had best pay attention to us, or we will find others in the coming elections that will.

~Kevin S.