I’m reading The Making of America: The Substance and Meaning of the Constitution and came across a passage that defines Tyranny. I wanted to share this passage with you and see what governments come to mind when you read this list.

1. Government power is exercised by compulsion, force, conquest or legislative usurpation.
2. Therefore, all power is concentrated in the ruler.
3. The people are treated as “subjects” of the ruler.
4. The land is treated as the “realm” of the ruler.
5. The people have no unalienable rights.
6. Government is by the rule of men rather than the rule of law.
7. The people are structured into social and economic classes.
8. The thrust of government is always from the ruler down, not from the people upward.
9. Problems are always solved by issuing new edicts, creating more bureaus, appointing more administrators, and charging the people more taxes to pay for these “services.” Under this system, taxes and government regulations are always oppressive.
10. Freedom is not considered a solution to anything.
11. The transfer of power from one ruler to another is often by violence–the dagger, the poison cup, or fratricidal civil war.
12. The long history of Tyranny is one of blood and terror, both anciently and in modern times. Those in power revel in luxury while the lot of the common people is one of perpetual poverty, excessive taxation, stringent regulations, and a continuous existence of misery.

A friend just showed me this video and I wanted to share it with you. I knew that the Fifth Amendment was very powerful, but I never understood the full power of the the Right to Remain Silent until I watched this video.

Follow up can be found on FlexYourRights.org.

Does anyone know who these protestors are? I would like to thank them for supporting Israel. If you see them, please flash an Israeli flag in support.

I have someone that I read on Live Journal, jordan179. He had some great thoughts on Roman Polanski’s new-found freedom.

When the evil, puritanical United States of America tried to extradite Roman Polanski, Famous Director, for the grubby little “crime” of drugging and then forcibly raping a thirteen-year-old girl, who was not a Famous Director, Switzerland stood up and boldly refused to let this great man have his life ruined for such a trivial offense. But Switzerland, brave little Switzerland, stood up to the wicked American bullies who actually had the temerity to argue that a nobody had rights which had to be respected … (oh, it is to laugh at the absurdity of the American position) … and denied the extradition on technical grounds.

Swiss Justice Minister Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf said she had decided against extradition because of potential technical faults in the U.S. request and also because Polanski had for years come to Switzerland in good faith.

Darn tootin! And Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf is a Justice Minister! If anyone ever did anything to her -= or her daughter — she would get justice, as befits her high status. But she’s making sure that important men keep their inherent right to rape litle nobodies, as is the right and proper order of life.

He is a free man since 1130 today,” she told a news conference in Switzerland’s capital Berne. “He can go to France or to Poland, anywhere where he will not be arrested.

Of course not. After all, it’s not like he did anything for which one should be arrested. Why, the girl was obviously a trollop — she was alone with Polanski. What else was he supposed to do, aside from rape her?

Widmer-Schlumpf said Washington could appeal the decision internationally but she did not expect that to happen.

Why would our Lightworker, the Obamessiah-in-Chief, even want to appeal the decision internationally? I’m sure that he understands that European justice is far more enlightened than our own, and is properly submissive to its dictates.

Just as thirteen-year-old Nobodies should be properly submissive to Famous Directors. I mean, the girl actually physically resisted, and said “No.” How dare she have done that? Didn’t she realize the honor she was being offered? Why, the girl should have been prosecuted for her temerity!

And, now, some enlightened Europeans sounding in on their love of justice:

Switzerland has found the path to reason…What a beautiful lesson in democracy,” said Bernard Henri-Levy, philosopher and a close friend, who led calls for Polanski’s freedom.

As everyone should know but it takes an eductated philosopher to point out, a core component of the definition of “democracy” is the maintenance of distinct social classes with privilege at law, so that an Aristocrat of the Mind like Polanski (or Henri-Levy) can rape any number of unimportant little thirteen-year-old girls and not expect to be held responsible for it by some boring bourgeoisie lawyers. Thank you, Monsieur Henri-Levy, and we will all take this into account when evaluating your future moral pronouncements.

I am delighted with the decision,” French Foreign Affairs Minister Bernard Kouchner said. “The great Franco-Polish director will from now on be able to rejoin his friends and family and work fully on his artistic projects.

Because that’s what’s really important. Working fully on his artistic projects. No matter whether or not he commits some piddling little technical illegality such as forcible rape, right?

Originally published at http://jordan179.livejournal.com/177407.html

Congratulations to Clay Scofield for wining his race against Don Spurlin.

Congratulations to Paul Bussman for winning his race against Patricia McGriff.

Prediction: Ron Sparks will win Governorship of Alabama in November.

TwiceRight.com has ran a very interesting video of Anderson Cooper’s thinly-veiled attack on Obama. Their point was that Obama is making the oil disaster go away be criminalizing up-close reporting on the issue. Here’s the video:

A couple of points about this video:

• I originally heard about the distance ban on No Agenda over the Fourth of July weekend. No Agenda airs 11am – 1pm Central (1100-1300). If the line in this clip can be trusted that this footage was shot on the evening of the Independence Day, then that would mean that the information would not have been out before the No Agenda show aired in order for clips to be made of this Anderson Cooper clip.
• During the Independence Day broadcast of No Agenda, I believe the distance discussed was 10 feet and there wasn’t talk about felony charges. In this video the “compromise” (and remember with Liberals the compromise is always I win, you lose then you lose some more) was 65 feet, but the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT wanted the distance to be 300 feet.
• Anderson Cooper spent a lot of time talking about transparency and Admiral Thad Allen being opaque (non-transparent for those of you in Huntsville.) Cooper tries to frame Allen to take the fall for not being transparent. While Admiral Allen has his part to play in this quagmire, it should be pointed out that it was BARACK OBAMA who promised that he would have the most transparent administration.
• I think on the charge of non-transparency Admiral Allen should be held responsible for his evasiveness, but I think that Cooper fell short of laying the blame where it ought to be laid: at the foot of the President of the United States. As head of the Executive branch and especially as the Commander-in-Cheif (thus Admiral Allen’s boss) Obama has failed to be an effective leader in this situation. An effective leader would admit to his mistakes, remove barriers to solutions, take the advice of experts and not refuse help when offered.
• Billy Nungesser, President of Plaquemines Parish deserves a major kudos for standing up and telling the truth: the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT is exacerbating the problem. On-paper resources are not in the field, nor are they available to be put in the field. Nungesser even admits to telling Vice President Joe Biden that the disaster hasn’t reached critical mass yet and that it was possible to avert catastrophe if the government would provide fast, effective leadership. By looking at the actions of the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT it is obvious that Nungesser’s advice was shat upon.

Guntersville, AL – Today, Republican candidate for State Senate District 9, Clay Scofield, was endorsed by his two former primary opponents, Tony Cochran and John Wilson, for the July 13th Republican Runoff.

“I would like to thank Tony Cochran and John Wilson for their endorsements and for their love of District 9,” Scofield said. “I hope that the good people that voted for them in the primary will join them in casting their ballots for me in the runoff.”

Clay Scofield is a life long resident of District 9 and owns Alabama Stormwater Control, LLC. He is a graduate of Arab High School and Auburn University with a B.S. in Agricultural Business and Economics. Scofield is a 3rd generation farmer and grandson of Bob Scofield, long time Arab car dealer.

“I strongly encourage the voters of Southeast Huntsville and Madison County to join me and my family in voting for Clay Scofield as our next Alabama State Senator,” John Wilson commented. “As our Senator in Montgomery, I believe Clay will hold true to the conservative principles valued by me, you and our neighbors.”

“There is no doubt in my mind that Clay Scofield is the best conservative choice for the July 13th runoff. After spending 9 months with the other candidates at debates and rallies, you get a sense of who has the greatest leadership ability, operates at the highest level of integrity and brings their commitment to Christ with them every day,” Tony Cochran stated.

Cochran continued: “Clay Scofield has those qualities we desperately need in government today. I am proud to join John Wilson, the other candidate from the primary in endorsing Clay Scofield for Senate District 9. I humbly ask my supporters to join me in voting for Clay Scofield on July 13th.”

Clay Scofield is running for the State Senate District 9 seat, which is currently held by Democrat Hinton Mitchem.

I think I’m going to once again make some changes to where and how I blog.

I think I’m going to give technology and movie reviews at first run on The Watchful.

Politics will be the main stay on Xanga, but may also run on No Agenda Report unless it’s local to town or whatnot at which point hyper-local content will either run on News Platoon or Discovering Huntsville (if there are enough writers interested in that site).

I am, of course, putting all the interesting news stories I run across on tumblr. I’m also using tumblr to point traffic to my blogs as I author them. tumblr will also carry content like political images and youtube videos.

Twitter has been pretty much mirroring my tumblr account, thought I also use Twitter for crowdsourcing and having conversations with various friends, internet or otherwise.

Live Journal has become a personal and portfolio site. I know that I’ve been making a lot of protected posts on Xanga lately that, even to me, is counter-intuitive given that Live Journal is supposed to be reserved for that kind of stuff. There’s a reason for this: there are people on LJ that live in town. What I ha’ve been posting about lately I’m not ready to share with those folks. Sure, I could make yet another friend filter, (which I have considered doing) but the people that I want reading this content have two things in common: they have Xanga presences and they aren’t in town.

It is possible that I might still use Xanga as a catch-all but just not give Xanga first run on the majority of the content. All I can say is we’ll have to wait and see. As it stands, if you really, really want to consume all of my content, your best best is to subscribe to either my Twitter or to my tumblr (both have RSS feeds), but this is going to mix in stories from the day.

Thank you for your kind attention.

P.S. Xanga themes are retarded. I’m guessing that when I changed my background color that’s what broke the CSS. Or it could just be that that Xanga is fucked up entirely. Even so, my CSS only works on my private page (though the link formatting still works on the public side; odd.) If you feel like bitching to Xanga on my behalf, I’d be much obliged.

Cheers!