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TERRY’S TIDBITS – NOT

“The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands…may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.”

James Madison, Federalist Papers

I’ve got some things to say and as lot of these things relate to Louisville, I can think of no better place to say them.

I am sickened by the way that Americans are treating Americans, here in Louisville and around the country.

This smoking debate is nothing more than government sponsored divide and conquer tactics aimed at making neighbors take sides against neighbors.  As long as we, the citizens, are fighting amongst ourselves, the government has a lot of leeway in making new rules to keep us down.  Only we can stop this assault on our freedoms, and we can’t do it as long as we are attacking each other.  Your neighbor is not your enemy.

Mr. and Mrs. Jones need to mind their own business.  Mr. and Mrs. Smith need to do the same.  The Antis and the smokers need to live and let live.  The Republicans and the Democrats need to get together and figure out where they are both going wrong.  The liberals and the conservatives need to hash out differences.  The Catholics and the Protestants worship as they see fit.

All over this country people are bickering, mostly from not minding their own business.  All over this country, government is filling in the cracks that used to be alive with diversity and freedom to choose.  I AM SICK OF IT.

Our constitution is being assaulted by our government.  As a matter of fact, our constitution is almost useless today.  Does anyone know what Homeland Security is capable of?  Does anyone know the extent of our loss of freedom right now?  Let me give you a few examples from the book, The War on the Bill of Rights, by Nat Hentoff.

Did you know that your phone can be tapped because of the company you keep?  Not only your phone but your neighbor’s phone, your family’s phone, and any pay phones in your area.  Anyone using those phones thereby becomes suspect, including the pay phones, because of the company you keep.

Did you know that the FBI can come into your home when you aren’t there and seize your belongings, and they don’t have to tell you that they’ve been there?  In J. Edgar Hoover’s day this was known as the “black bag job.”  While they are there, they can plant what is called the “Magic Lantern” on your computer, and that device records every keystroke that you make, whether online or not.  They come back later and download the information about you – to be used against you.

Just before the beginning of the Revolutionary War, the British ransacked homes, including chests, boxes, and trunks and took what they wanted.  In 1761, James Otis challenged these acts in the Massachusetts Superior Court saying, “A man’s house is his castle.”  The Declaration of Independence was a result.

Did you know that we have Americans in prison right now that have been detained indefinitely without legal representation and without charges filed against them?  One such citizen that the book points out has been in prison for over a year.  How many times have we heard about the SS of Nazi Germany picking up people and those people vanishing?

How about your library book selections and book store purchases open to scrutiny by the FBI?  A special “spy court” judge issues the order.  It gets worse.  The librarian or bookstore clerk cannot object and is bound to silence by a new Homeland Security law.  AMERICANS ARE NOT ALLOWED TO TALK?  In the history of the First Amendment there has never been such a sweeping suppression of speech by the government (John Ashcroft) as this one.  John Ashcroft and those like him are the reason that we have a Constitution; to protect us from them.  He’s taking care of that. 

These are only a few of the things that are happening to our Constitution and our Bill of Rights.  We can thank Homeland Security, John Ashcroft, and George W. Bush for tearing up the rules that protect us from our government.  But more importantly, we can blame ourselves.  We are letting this happen.

We are letting this happen while people bicker about smoking, fat content, VET testing, profanity on television, fair wage, fairness acts, and God knows what else.  None of this is going to matter unless we get off our butts, pull together, and fight for our rights as guaranteed by our constitution.

Steven King couldn’t make this any scarier.  Go buy the book, and, while you’re at it, buy some more books on the same subject, THE LOSS OF OUR CONSTITUTION.

Folks, we have big problems and they are getting bigger.

From – The War on the Bill of Rights:

          “History teaches that grave threats to liberty often come in times of urgency, when constitutional rights seem too extravagant to endure.  The World War II relocation cases, and the Red Scare and McCarthy-era internal subversion cases, are only the most extreme reminders that when we allow fundamental freedoms to be sacrificed in the name of real or perceived exigency, we invariably come to regret it.”

                                                      Thurgood Marshall

I’ve said enough.  You can sit on your butts and do what you are doing now or you can fight.  Wait long enough and there won’t be anything left to fight for and worse, even thinking about opposing this government will be treason.

Terry Gray

President - Forces Kentucky

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