Tag Archives: Imperial Presidency

No Place to Hide: We’re All Suspects in Barack Obama’s America

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“Instead of crediting Snowden for forcing what the president concedes is a much-needed debate, Obama bizarrely cited the example of Paul Revere and the other early American rebels in the Sons of Liberty to denounce their modern equivalent. But the ‘secret surveillance committee’ Obama referenced that Revere and his fellow underground conspirators established was intended to subvert rather than celebrate the crimes of the British controlled government in power.  While modern town crier Snowden is judged guilty of a crime without trial, the folks in the NSA who have been spying on us are all depicted as honorable people to be presumed innocent, no matter evidence to the contrary.”

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/no_place_to_hide_were_all_suspects_in_barack_obamas_america_20140121

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Wendy McElroy: America’s Surveillance State

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“The domestic surveillance state is sometimes called the electronic police state. Those in political power use law enforcement to closely monitor the opinions and peaceful behavior of citizens in order to forestall and punish opposition. Typically the surveillance involves secret files, covert wiretapping, informants, the collection of personal data such as sexual preferences, and other tactics that are odious to a free society. The domestic surveillance state is often associated with the East German Stasi or the Soviet KGB. But its roots are deep in American soil, and it is reaching full growth with the ‘war on terror.'”

http://fff.org/explore-freedom/article/americas-surveillance-state/

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NSA mass collection of phone data is legal, federal judge rules

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“A legal battle over the scope of US government surveillance took a turn in favour of the National Security Agency on Friday with a court opinion declaring that bulk collection of telephone data does not violate the constitution.  The judgement, in a case brought before a district court in New York by the American Civil Liberties Union, directly contradicts the result of a similar challenge in a Washington court last week which ruled the NSA’s bulk collection program was likely to prove unconstitutional and was ‘almost Orwellian’ in scale.  Friday’s ruling makes it more likely that the issue will be settled by the US supreme court, although it may be overtaken by the decision of Barack Obama.”

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/27/judge-rules-nsa-phone-data-collection-legal

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Ron Paul: Congress Defers to President On NSA Reform

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“Congress’s decline from the Founders’ vision as ‘first among equals’ in government to an echo chamber of the unitary executive has been a slow but steady process. In the process we have seen a steady stream of unconstitutional wars and civil liberties abuses at home. Nowhere is this decline more evident than in the stark contrast between the congressional response to intelligence agencies’ abuses during the post-Watergate era and its response to the far more serious NSA abuses uncovered in recent years.  Congress is today acting as an advocate for the executive branch’s continuing abuses, and as an opponent to the civil liberties of US citizens.”

http://www.thedailybell.com/editorials/34922/Ron-Paul-Congress-Defers-to-President-On-NSA-Reform/

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MIT Students Show the Enormously Intrusive Nature of Metadata

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“While you’re watching, remember that while the NSA and FBI are collecting our phone records in bulk, and using advanced computer algorithms to make meaning from them, state and local government officials can often also get this information without a warrant.  When President Obama said that the phone surveillance program ‘isn’t about’ ‘listening to your telephone calls,’ he was deflecting attention from the terrifying fact that there’s nothing currently stopping the government from amassing and data-mining every scrap of metadata in the world about us. He made it sound like metadata spying isn’t a big deal, when it’s pretty much the golden ticket.”

https://www.aclu.org/blog/technology-and-liberty-national-security/graphs-mit-students-show-enormously-intrusive-nature

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Why I’m Leaving

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“My grandparents emigrated from Portugal to Mozambique during the 1940s and 50s in search of a better life. The massive and undeveloped colony seemed like the land of milk and honey for those willing to get their hands dirty. A few decades later my parents-to-be immigrated to South Africa as Mozambique headed towards what would become a 10-year war for independence. Then when I was just 4 years old they decided that a fascist state fully enveloped with the evils of apartheid was no place to raise a child. My mother was fortunate enough to get a work visa into the United States and that’s where we’ve been ever since.  Now the time has come for me to follow in my family’s footsteps.”

http://dollarvigilante.com/blog/2014/1/1/why-i’m-leaving.html

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Jim Bovard: The Sordid History of IRS Political Abuse

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“The IRS has a long history of trying to ruin the political careers of its critics. In 1925, Internal Revenue Commissioner David Blair personally delivered a demand for $10 million in back taxes to Michigan’s Republican Sen. James Couzens — who had launched an investigation of the Bureau of Internal Revenue — as he stepped out of the Senate chamber. Couzens fought the case, and eventually proved that he had actually overpaid his taxes by roughly $1 million. But the precedent of using threats to deflect oversight was firmly established.  President Franklin Roosevelt used the IRS to harass newspaper publishers, including William Randolph Hearst and Moses Annenberg.”

http://fff.org/explore-freedom/article/the-sordid-history-of/

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Obama’s Phony Free Trade Treaty That He Won’t Let Congress See

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“The Obama Administration is seeking to restore ‘fast-track approval’ powers on this, which would allow an up-or-down vote on the whole TPP without discussion of its individual components.  As a final point in this introductory post, let me say this: The problem with these ‘free trade’ agreements is that some critics rely on centuries-old protectionist fallacies; they are afraid of ‘cheap imports.’ Anyone familiar with Bastiat understands why such worries are misplaced. However, those of us who believe in genuine free trade shouldn’t trust government officials when they title something a ‘free trade’ agreement. It doesn’t take years of backroom negotiations to reduce tariff rates.”

http://consultingbyrpm.com/blog/2013/12/introduction-to-the-tpp.html

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White House Granted Itself ‘High Security Risk’ Healthcare.gov Waiver

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“A memo the Obama administration turned over to the House Oversight Committee revealed that the White House granted itself a waiver to launch the faulty HealthCare.gov website with ‘a level of uncertainty.’  The waiver was granted four days before the Oct. 1 launch of the Obamacare website, even though it was ‘deemed as a high (security) risk,’ according to CBS News.  CBS News reports tests to secure customer information privacy on the federal health exchange website fell behind schedule, with a required top-to-bottom security test before the launch of the site never getting done.”

http://washington.cbslocal.com/2013/11/05/cbs-news-white-house-granted-itself-waiver-to-launch-obamacare-website-deemed-as-high-security-risk/

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Santa Obama Gives Pay Raise to Federal Workers

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“Just in time for Christmas, President Obama signed an executive order on Monday giving a 1 percent pay raise for federal employees. The raise follows a four year hiatus from salary increases for federal workers, although most federal employees have apparently seen their pay increase via promotion or performance. The first increased paycheck will kick in on January 1. Obama’s decision to raise federal pay only widens the income inequality gap between federal workers and private sector employees; as of 2011, the average private sector employee made $59,804 in salary, and $28,000 in benefits, while the average federal workers made $74,436 in salary and $40,000 in benefits.”

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/12/25/Christmas-Obama-pay-raise

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