Liberty Issues Vol. 1

The Patriot Act

Passed in a hasty post-911 session of Congress, with little debate, the USA Patriot Act was created to quickly bring any terror plotters to justice, and to insure the immediate security of the nation. It was given a ‘sunset’, or end-date, as a precaution against governmental abuse of these far-reaching powers. Instead of allowing the act to end, as it was intended, Congress has consistently voted to continue the Patriot Act, even though the expiration date has long-passed.

THE USA PATRIOT ACT:

Expands terrorism laws to include “domestic terrorism” and could subject political organizations to surveillance, wiretapping, harassment, and criminal action for political advocacy.

Expands the ability of law enforcement to conduct secret searches, gives them wide powers of phone and internet surveillance, and access to highly personal medical, financial, mental health, and student records with minimal judicial oversight.

Allows FBI agents to investigate American citizens for criminal matters without probable cause of crime, if they say it is for “intelligence purposes.”

Resurrects the illegal Nixon-like COINTELPRO-style programs that were used to attack and discredit political opponents engaged in legitimate political activities.

Has the potential for abuse far beyond the scope of anything before

Arguments have been made that if someone is not engaged in illegal activities, they shouldn’t worry about the Patriot Act. This is a falsehood. The Patriot Act can easily be abused to allow suppression of news, political ideas, and outright corruption. For this reason, it was given an expiration date. Allowing the Patriot Act to continue is very dangerous to the freedom of the American people.

Call or write your Congressman and demand that he act to repeal the invasive and Constitutionally illegal USA Patriot Act.


Communism VS Liberty
Most people haven't read the Communist Manifesto. And it's no wonder... The Communist Manifesto is a virulent book, filled with plans for violence and seething with anger. It attacks the ideals of freedom and the very concept of Liberty. It's hate-filled pages contain a list of 10 precepts that are present in a communist nation. The United States of America has implemented most, if not all of them, already.

Here are the 10 tenets, and how they are implemented in the USA:

1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes. Property taxes are a rent charged by government.

2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax. The Federal Income Tax does far more than Marx or Engels, the authors of the Communist Manifesto, could have ever imagined.

3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance. The government now controls all inheritance via legislation.

4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels. Eminent Domain laws can be used for this purpose.

5. Centralization of credit in the banks of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly. The privately owned 'Federal' Reserve bank overreaches any concept of Marx and Engels.

6. Centralization of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the state. The federal government controls all forms of transportation and communication in our country via the FAA, DOT, FCC, economic aid and regulations.

7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the state; the bringing into cultivation of waste lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan. The Bureau of Land Management controls the lands and federal regulations enforce the management of land and soil.

8. Equal obligation of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture. The federal government does not directly force labor, but through taxes requires an income to own property.

9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country. Corporations already control most of the country's agriculture.

10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children's factory labor in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, etc. Public education is a requirement in the USA. The end-goal of the educational system is to create contributing members to the workforce.

Why did America adopt Communist principles? These tenets were sold to us by well-meaning individuals in most cases, yet they go completely against the ideals of Liberty. The main goal of Communism is to eliminate private property. The main goal of Liberty is to protect private property. How did we allow this to happen?

Communism tends to hide behind the idea of democracy. The idea is that if a government is supposedly for the people, it is also democratic. Many communist nations claim to be 'democratic'. China, for instance, called it's leadership a 'democratic dictatorship' and claims to have a 'representative democracy'. In our own country, these ideas are being sold as 'progressive' or 'democratic' when they are anything but. What's being called democracy is actually a tyranny of the many over the few.

The reason many Americans see these communist principles as good is the same reason many people are willing to sacrifice Liberty for safety: They are unable to see the negative effects in the future due to the seemingly overwhelming good in the short term. This was the case in the early part of the 20th century when most of the communist legislation was passed. Depression and war blinded many people to the long-term ill-effects. The people were too desperate or too tired to fight it. To top it off, many of the programs were sold as democratic 'public works' projects. They never called it 'communism' or 'socialism'.

Liberty treats the individual as the most important element. The individual has the ability to govern and make decisions for himself. Communism treats the individual as a part of a whole. If a part of the whole has a different idea that doesn't conform to the whole, that part will be removed. Dissidence is not tolerated. This is never the case with Liberty.

Liberty will always conquer Communism, no matter what it calls itself. Communism hides behind many names but it's precepts are well-defined. A government that proclaims Liberty and follows the precepts of communism is communist. A government that claims to be a democracy, yet practices any of these precepts is a communist nation, and will fail. The people will not tolerate being enslaved indefinitely.


The REALID Debate
What is the REALID debate about? What is the REALID, anyway?

In 2005, Congress passed the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act for Defense, the Global War on Terror, and Tsunami Relief, 2005. Attached, as a rider, was the REALID Act. The REALID Act was originally introduced in Congress as 2005 HR 418 but was killed by inaction. It's proponents wouldn't see it die, and quickly added it as a rider to another piece of legislation they knew would pass. Upon the passage of the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act for Defense, the Global War on Terror, and Tsunami Relief, 2005, the REALID ACT became law.

The law requires the driver's licenses of every state to be 'mechanically readable'. This means that every driver's license issued in the USA will be easily read by some sort of hand-held device. In order to meet this requirement, states must place either an RFID (radio frequency ID) chip inside, a magnetic strip, or a barcode on the card. The State of Alabama is one of the most compliant with this legislation which was scheduled to take effect in April of 2008. It has now been pushed back to December of 2009.

So what's the problem? Why is this an issue? It's an issue because the subject goes far deeper than any ID card debate. It goes to the heart of Liberty and Freedom.

In our country, we are supposed to be free to travel, without any government controls, as Liberty dictates. If you want to go to the Courthouse, there should not be someone waiting along the side of the road asking to see your ID. No matter where you are going, there should be no one stopping you to check your ID without a good reason to suspect you've violated someone else's rights.

National ID cards have historically been used to subjugate a country's people. Once a government begins looking at citizens as tagged and numbered parts of a whole, it treats them as numbers. Nazi Germany and the USSR both required the use of a national ID system. Failure to produce your papers would result in harsh treatment and imprisonment.

This is already occurring in our country without a national ID being required. Every day someone is arrested for failing to produce ID, even when they have no ID on them to show. This is a violation of our Constitutional rights and our God-given Liberty. Our country isn't Nazi Germany... the American people are free to travel anywhere within our borders without producing any ID.

When the Reichstag was burned in the years before World War II, Hitler used the event as an excuse to take draconian measures that infringed on the rights of the German people. He claimed terrorists were infiltrating Germany and used this as an excuse to invade neighboring countries. To prove you were a German citizen, you had to produce your papers. Hitler would have swooned at the notion of the type national ID the REALID Act requires.

Defeating the REALID Act alone will not be enough to restore Liberty. Americans are already numbered, nationally, by the Social Security system. Try to get a job, open a bank account, or get a driver's license without one. You will find it very difficult, if even possible. When the SSN was introduced, it was met with heavy opposition. Nevertheless, proponents pushed it though Congress by painting it as part of a program that was good and promising that the social security number would never be a requirement. Needless to say, they lied.

There are many obstacles placed in the way of Liberty. All of them were started with benign intent, and all of them have become far-reaching institutions of government. Defeating the REALID is necessary if Liberty is to ever be restored. The goal of Liberty will never be acheived if we continue putting stumbling blocks in the road.

The 'Federal' Reserve
The Federal Reserve bank is a private institution that controls the money supply of the United States of America. Under no oversight from Congress, the 'Federal' Reserve, which is no more federal than Federal Express, is free to create money and place it into the American economy at will. It does this by creating credit in the form of loans to member banks, which in turn loan the money out to businesses and citizens.

By manipulating interest rates, the FED can increase or decrease the flow of money. The more credit created, the lower the value of the money. This is the reason the value of the dollar fluctuates and why inflation occurs. Prior to 1913, the year the FED was created, the value of the dollar fluctuated only a few cents per century.

Many people assert that the FED manipulates money to the advantage of the secretive owners of the Federal Reserve bank. When the economy falters, the bank's owners can buy up assets and foreclose on properties from defaulted mortgages. Artificially devaluing the dollar can cause a lack of trust in stocks and financial markets. This, in turn, makes people take their money out, or to not invest money that would normally be invested. The price of stocks drop, and the bank's owners can then buy large shares of companies for a fraction of the actual value of it's stock.

Andrew Jackson was probably the most outspoken opponent of a Federal banking system. During his term as President, he abolished an early attempt at a Federal bank, saying,

"Gentlemen, I have had men watching you for a long time and I am convinced that you have used the funds of the bank to speculate in the breadstuffs of the country. When you won, you divided the profits amongst you, and when you lost, you charged it to the bank. You tell me that if I take the deposits from the bank and annul its charter, I shall ruin ten thousand families. That may be true, gentlemen, but that is your sin! Should I let you go on, you will ruin fifty thousand families, and that would be my sin! You are a den of vipers and thieves. I intend to rout you out, and by the grace of the Eternal God, will rout you out."

Afterward, he warned future generations against allowing a private bank to control it's money saying,

"The bold effort the present bank had made to control the government ... are but premonitions of the fate that await the American people should they be deluded into a perpetuation of this institution or the establishment of another like it."

Jackson was right. He acted quickly and avoided the bottomless pit into which we've willingly jumped. The value of the dollar remained practically unchanged throughout our country's history until the Federal Reserve bank took control of it. Since then, the dollar has consistently dropped until it is now only worth pennies on the dollar. And it's value is still dropping.

Imagine if you created something that made the value of your house drop to pennies on the dollar. Wouldn't you do everything in your power to reverse that? Why, then, are you not doing everything in your power to restore the value of your dollar?
The FED infringes on Liberty by not giving the people control over their own currency. The dollar has no oversight by our elected representatives. This means we can't control it's value, a right originally guaranteed to us by our Constitution. If we are to have Liberty in our country again, the FED must be abolished.