"After 9/11, President George W. Bush turned to Civil War precedents to create military tribunals for trying alleged 'terrorists.' But in applying those draconian rules to a worldwide battlefield, he created the nightmarish potential for a global totalitarianism, as retired U.S. Army JAG officer Todd E. Pierce explains." Continue reading →
"As an anti-virus software tycoon at the head of McAfee Security, he says his early clients ranged from the CIA to the American navy and air force. 'The first six years of McAfee, 90 per cent of our income came from the government. The First Gulf War I donated $40 million worth of software to the U.S. Army,' he says. McAfee said intelligence officials were worried that encryption technology would get out of the U.S. and into the wrong hands. McAfee also says the growth of electronic currencies like Bitcoin is unstoppable, despite efforts by governments to curb their use. 'It will be everywhere and the world will have to readjust. World governments will have to readjust.'" Continue reading →
"In the course of only a few decades, everything unraveled. The monopoly over communication that the government once maintained had been completely smashed. This situation has persisted for about 15 years — a near-anarchist paradise of human sharing and interaction through technological innovation. What’s going on today is really the reaction and response by the elites. They want their power and control back. They are trying to get it through the oldest form of government control surveillance and the blackmail that comes with it. It’s the tactic guards used to control prisoners. It’s the tactic government is using to fight its way back toward having control over our lives." Continue reading →
"For example, they might send info to the DEA about a likely drug deal, and the DEA would then tell its agents that they should come up with a pretense to stop a certain truck at a certain truck stop at a certain time. The agents would work with local police to concoct a reason to pull the truck over, and voila, drugs found. But, most importantly, at no point would the fact that such information was used to lead to the stop be revealed, and that's unconstitutional. If you're accused, you're supposed to have access to all of the evidence being used against you. Continue reading →
"At the top of the executive branch, President Obama and his team favor Orwellian euphemism, preferring wordblobs like 'disposition matrix' to the harsh Anglo-Saxon of 'kill list' -- mumbling 'kinetic military action' when what they really mean is 'war.' But further down the administrative ladder, the language sometimes gets admirably blunt. The National Security Agency has programs with names like 'TRAFFICTHIEF' and 'PANOPTICON.' And DHS has even expressed interest in 'Gorgon Stare,' a drone-mounted camera array under development by the Air Force that can watch whole cities at a time (and turn the inhabitants to stone?)." Continue reading →
"The Office of Naval Research is looking into the approach as a potential model for distributed decision-making teams charged with quick response. The RPD decision-making framework 'acts as an intelligent team partner that is able to share information without overloading people and enhances the quality of information by sharing relevant facts,' Yen said. In practical terms, that means being able to more quickly identify a terrorist leader, for example, by recognizing patterns of behavior or similar interactions or social connections among members of terrorist cells. 'This agent architecture can not only enhance the capabilities of anti-terrorist analysts in identifying terrorist threats, [...] '" Continue reading →
"Any time you give a state agency a goal with an extremely broad, malleable definition, the agency is going to tend to interpret its mission as broadly as possible. And when that goal is inherently incompatible with a free society, the agency’s powers will inevitably grow at the expense of individual liberties and the rule of law. We shouldn’t trust the IRS to take as much money as it wants; we shouldn’t trust the military to invade the countries it thinks need to be invaded; and we shouldn’t trust the state security apparatus to 'keep us safe from terrorism.' The best thing that can happen to an agency trusted with such a goal is that it will fail. The worst is that it will succeed." Continue reading →
"US officials declined to comment on whether the military action under consideration would go beyond the use of cruise missiles and require fighter aircraft to enter Syrian airspace. 'We’re exploring every option,' the official said. If the United States took no military action against Damascus, then it would send a dangerous signal to other regimes with chemical stockpiles, including North Korea, the official said. Citing North Korea, the official said 'what’s to say, as they (the North Koreans) watch this play out in Syria, they wouldn’t use weapons like this?' Obama’s aides were still working to define the precise objective of any potential intervention, a second administration official said." Continue reading →
"[..] Sixth, the military-industrial complex and its lobbies on the Hill thrive on the profits, the work of war, the advancements, and the demand for their services that instability brings. The DHS thrives on an atmopshere of war and fear. Members of Congress thrive on making speeches about promoting rights and democracy, even though they are promoting war, instability, refugees and death. The State Department appears to have abandoned diplomacy and become subservient to the neocon influences. Seventh, the U.S. has a ready-made pro-war interest group in many churches. [..]" Continue reading →
"General Keane responded that polls showing the strong and historically consistent non-interventionist beliefs of the American people should play no role in a U.S. president’s decision on an issue of national security. In essence, General Keane told Mr. Baier and all other Americans to be quiet, go home, eat a cookie, watch TV, and let the vaunted U.S. military and our interventionist, bipartisan governing elite do as they wish regarding war with Syria. These arrogant and self-proclaimed aristocrats always know what is best for a taxed-to-death riff-raff that is only needed every four years to elect someone running on a 'no war' platform that will be utterly and cynically discarded once the presidency is won." Continue reading →