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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on June 28, 2017 at 9:17 am
On December 13, 2014, the U.S. Senate passed a $1.1 trillion spending bill to fund almost the entire government through the September 30 end of the fiscal year.
But one Federal agency was pointedly exempted from full funding: The Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Its funding would expire on February 27.
With their newfound majorities in both houses of Congress, Republicans intended to hold the security of the United States as a hostage.
Their goal: To force President Barack Obama to rescind the changes he had made in American immigration policy.
With more than 240,000 employees, the DHS is the third largest Cabinet department, after the Departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs.
The Defense Department is charged with military actions abroad.
DHS is responsible for protecting the United States inside and outside its borders. Its goal is to prepare for, prevent and—if prevention fails—respond to man-made accidents, natural disasters and terrorism.
Among the agencies now operating under its mandate:
- U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services
- U.S. Customs and Border Protection
- U.S. Coast Guard
- Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
- Federal Law Enforcement Training Center
- U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)
- Transportation and Safety Administration (TSA)
- U.S. Secret Service
- Science and Technology Directorate
- Domestic Nuclear Detection Office
- Office of Intelligence and Analysis
- Office of Operations Coordination and Planning
Yet each of these agencies has a vital role to play in protecting the nation. A nation whose security Republicans were willing to threaten to get their way on a matter of domestic policy.
Right-wing Republicans argued that even if DHS’s funding were stopped, most of its employees would stay on the job. That’s because they perform work considered necessary to protect human life and property.
But while those employees were safeguarding the country, they wouldn’t be paid until the shutdown ended.
It’s hard to give your full attention to protecting the lives of others when you have to worry about paying a mortgage or feeding your family.
Of course, the Republicans responsible for this shutdown would have continued to receive their hefty paychecks.
Republicans chose to act as Mafia extortionists at a time when the United States appeared to be in the crosshairs of North Korean terrorism.
On November 14, 2014, Sony Pictures came under relentless attack by cyberterrorists, whom the FBI linked to North Korea.
The reason? Sony’s production of “The Interview,” a comedy depicting the assassination of North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un.
Calling themselves “Guardians of Peace,” or GOP, they shut down the company’s computer system and revealed employees’ personal information such as salaries, addresses, and Social Security numbers.
(Ironically, “Guardians of Peace” appropriated the same abbreviation–GOP–used by the Republicans for “Grand Old Party.”)
Warning issued by “Guardians of Peace” (GOP)
On December 17, 2014, Sony Pictures cancelled the Christmas Day premier of “The Interview” after the nation’s five largest movie chains refused to show the movie, following a terror threat posted online.
And then on February 5, 2015, Anthem Insurance announced that its database had been hacked–and sensitive medical information on up to 80 million customers and employees accessed.
According to an anonymous source, the hackers used malware that’s been used almost exclusively by Chinese cyberspies.
* * * * *
As the Third Reich came to its fiery end, Adolf Hitler sought to punish the German people for being “unworthy” of his “genius” and losing the war he had started.
His attitude was: “If I can’t rule Germany, then there won’t be a Germany.”
In his infamous “Nero Order,” he decreed the destruction of everything still remaining–industries, ships, harbors, communications, roads, mines, bridges, stores, utility plants, food stuffs.
Fortunately for Germany, one man—Albert Speer, the Minister of Armaments—finally broke ranks with his Fuhrer.
Albert Speer
Risking death, he refused to carry out Hitler’s “scorched earth” order. Even more important, he mounted a successful effort to block such destruction or persuade influential military and civilian leaders to disobey the order as well.
As a result, those targets slated for destruction were spared.
After the election of America’s first black President, Republicans waged a similar “scorched earth” campaign. Their avowed goal—as stated openly by Kentucky’s U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell—was “to make Barack Obama a one-term President.”
Literally during his first Inauguration, Republicans, in a secret meeting, agreed to block every effort he made to repair the economy.
Acting as extortionists, they repeatedly threatened to shut down the government if they didn’t get their way in legislative matters.
And just as repeatedly, they blocked legislation that would have helped the poor, unemployed, women, elderly, disabled or middle-class.
At the center of their fury lay the Affordable Care Act, providing medical care to all citizens.
Even after Congress passed it and the Supreme Court affirmed it, House Republicans shut down the government in October, 2013.
By doing so, they hoped to pressure Obama into killing his signature piece of legislation. The effort failed.
Like Adolf Hitler, their attitude has been: “If I can’t rule America, there won’t be an America.”
It remains to be seen whether a Republican Albert Speer will step forward to save America from the self-destructive excesses of this Nation’s own fanatics.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on June 27, 2017 at 9:25 am
Johnny Depp is an acclaimed actor. But his skills as a comic have sparked a backlash.
“When was the last time an actor assassinated the President?” he asked while speaking at the Glatonbury Festival on June 22.
Johnny Depp
The Glastonbury Festival is an annual, five-day celebration of contemporary performing arts that takes place near Pilton, Somerset (England).
Perhaps Depp sensed that he was making himself a target for the Secret Service, for he quickly added that he was not referring to himself: “I want to clarify, I am not an actor. I lie for a living. However, it has been a while and maybe it is time.”
Predictably, Donald Trump’s family did not find the joke funny.
The next day, Lara Trump, wife of the President’s son, Eric, called Depp’s comments “really, really sad—as a family member and as an American.”
Eric and Lara Trump
Max Goldberg from USA, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
Appearing on Right-wing Fox Network’s “Hannity,” she told its host, Sean Hannity: “It’s happening to Donald Trump because he is Donald Trump. Their candidate failed, because they have nothing else to say. They have no platform; they have no real leader; they have no message.
“So the only thing they can do is pile on the President. Unfortunately it is to the detriment of the country.
“It’s really sick, Sean. The Republican Party is becoming the only party of tolerance here in the United States.”
On Twitter, Donald Trump Jr. called for Disney to dump the star of the “Pirates of the Caribbean” franchise.
“President Trump has condemned violence in all forms, and it’s sad that others like Johnny Depp have not followed his lead,” said deputy White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
Apparently these Trump enthusiasts forgot Trump’s series of threats against his Republican and Democratic opponents throughout the 2016 campaign:
- On March 16, he warned Republicans that if he didn’t win the GOP nomination in July, his supporters would literally riot: “I think you’d have riots. I think you would see problems like you’ve never seen before. I think bad things would happen. I really do. I wouldn’t lead it, but I think bad things would happen.”
- That Republicans clearly saw this as a threat is undeniable. Paul Ryan, their Speaker of the House, said on March 17: “Nobody should say such things in my opinion because to even address or hint to violence is unacceptable.
- On August 9, Trump told a rally in Wilmington, North Carolina: “Hillary [Clinton] wants to abolish, essentially abolish, the Second Amendment. If she gets to pick her [Supreme Court] judges, nothing you can do folks. Although the Second Amendment people–maybe there is, I don’t know.”
Clinton’s camp instantly responded with fury.
“Don’t treat this as a political misstep,” Senator Christopher S. Murphy of Connecticut, who has called for stiffer gun laws, wrote on Twitter. “It’s an assassination threat, seriously upping the possibility of a national tragedy & crisis.”
“Well, let me say if someone else said that outside of the hall, he’d be in the back of a police wagon now, with the Secret Service questioning him,” said Michael Hayden, former head of the CIA and National Security Agency (NSA).
The Trump campaign issued a statement denying that he had meant any such thing.
Three days after Trump’s Hillary remarks, Operation Antrhopoid, a UK-French-Czech historical film, appeared in theaters. Its subject: The 1942 assassination of SS Obergruppenführer (General) Reinhard Heydrich.
A tall, blond-haired formal naval officer, he was both a champion fencer and talented violinist. Heydrich joined the Schutzstaffel, or Protective Squads, better known as the SS, in 1931, and quickly became head of its counterintelligence service.
Reinhard Heydrich
In September, 1941, Heydrich was appointed “Reich Protector” of Czechoslovakia, which had fallen prey to Germany in 1938 but whose citizens were growing restless under Nazi rule.
Heydrich immediately ordered a purge, executing 92 people within the first three days of his arrival in Prague. By February, 1942, 4,000-5,000 people had been arrested.
In January, 1942, Heydrich convened a meeting of high-ranking political and military leaders to streamline “the Final Solution to the Jewish Question.”
An estimated six million Jews were thus slaughtered.
Returning to Prague, Heydrich continued a policy of carrot-and-stick with the Czechs—improving the social security system and requisitioning luxury hotels for middle-class workers—alternating with arrests and executions.
The Czech government-in-exile, headquartered in London, feared that Heydrich’s incentives might lead the Czechs to passively accept domination. They decided to assassinate him.
Two British-trained Czech commandos—Jan Kubis and Joseph Gabcik—parachuted into Prague.
On May 27, 1942, the assassins waited at a hairpin turn in the road always taken by Heydrich. When Heydrich’s Mercedes slowed down, Kubis lobbed a hand grenade at the car. The explosion ruptured Heydrich’s diaphragm, spleen and lung.
On June 4, Heydrich died of his injuries.
For Donald Trump, movies and jokes about assassination carry supreme—if unnoticed—irony.
It is Trump who repeatedly raised the issue of using violence and assassination to attain political ends. The last thing he needs are reminders—like Depp and Anthropoid—that Right-wingers can also be targets for death.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Politics, Social commentary, Uncategorized on June 21, 2017 at 10:18 am
What a difference five years makes.
On June 20, Karen Handel became the next Republican to represent the suburban Atlanta 6th District of Georgia in the House of Representatives.
The seat became vacant in January, when its holder, Tom Price, became Secretary of Health and Human Services.
Handel won the election by more than 10,000 votes against her opponent, Democrat Jon Ossoff.
Both Republicans and Democrats saw the race as a referendum on the increasingly troubled Presidency of Donald J. Trump.
For Handel, the victory had to be sweet. She had sought–unsuccessfully–to represent Georgia as governor in 2010 and then as U.S. Senator in 2014.
But perhaps her most embarrassing moment came in 2012 as vice president of public affairs for Susan G. Komen for the Cure.
A fanatical anti-abortionist, she thought she had worked out a successful strategy for Komen to pull its grant monies from Planned Parenthood (PP).
Karen Handel
She didn’t care that this money went entirely for breast cancer screenings for poor women. What she did care about was that about 3% of all PP revenues went toward providing abortion services.
Since being hired by Komen as vice president of public affairs, in April, 2011, Handel had pushed to drop PP from grants.
And why not?
She had promised to de-fund PP during her failed 2010 campaign for governor of Georgia.
She believed that:
- She could strip PP of future grants from the Komen Foundation, and
- Make the decision look as if it resulted from a legitimate tightening of eligibility criteria.
The official version, as put out by Handel and the top brass of Komen, went: “We’ve halted grants to Planned Parenthood because it’s under investigation by Congress for misuse of funds.”
Unfortunately for Handel–and Komen–the public instantly saw through the lie.
Any crank in Congress can start an “investigation” into anything.
And PP was “under investigation” by a crank: Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.), chairman of the Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations.
Stearns claimed he wanted to determine whether PP had spent public money on abortions over the last decade.
But Stearns didn’t hesitate to slander the patriotism of thousands of 9/11 “first responders”—the police, firefighters, construction workers and others who risked their lives to save their fellow Americans.
Rep. Cliff Stearns
He did so by demanding that they submit their names, birthplaces, addresses, government ID numbers and other personal data to the FBI to prove they were not terrorists.
Only then could they receive federally-subsidized medical care for injuries caused by exposure to toxic dust and debris at the site.
Not one terrorist was discovered in the resulting investigations.
Public outrage at Komen was immediate and overwhelming:
- More than 50 members of Congress signed letters asking Komen to reverse course.
- New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg publicly rebuked Komen and pledged $250,000 to PP.
- Approximately 37,000 people from all over the country signed a petition demanding Handel’s resignation.
- PP raised nearly $3 million in contributions.
Reeling before this unexpected onslaught of criticism, Komen issued a statement: “We will continue to fund existing grants, including those of Planned Parenthood, and preserve their eligibility to apply for future grants.”
Having failed in their latest assault on women’s rights, the Right’s would-be predators now portrayed themselves as victims:
- “The last time I checked,” Handel told Right-wing Fox News, “private non-profit organizations have a right and a responsibility to be able to set the highest standards and criteria on their own without interference, let alone the level of vicious attacks and coercion that has occurred by Planned Parenthood. It’s simply outrageous.”
- “Planned Parenthood campaigns to destroy anyone who questions them,” charged Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the anti-abortion Susan B. Anthony List.“Their attitude is that of an immature teenager with an enormous sense of entitlement. This is just more proof that Planned Parenthood will pulverize anyone who dares to question them.”
- “What Planned Parenthood did to that venerable and honorable organization [Komen Foundation] is nothing less than a Mafia-style shakedown,” said Steven H. Aden, senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund. The Fund bitterly opposes abortion, gay marriage, birth control and the separation of church and state.
Many conservatives correctly defended Komen’s right, as a private charitable organization, to give–or withhold–its money as it saw fit.
But these same conservatives refused to grant PP’s outraged supporters the same right: To withhold their own monies from Komen.
National Review’s Daniel Foster called the backlash to Komen “disgusting,” attacking PP and “the Left” for their “gangsterism.
During the battle for Stalingrad, in 1942, a young German soldier named Wilhelm Hoffman was appalled that the Russians refused to surrender. In his diary he wrote:
German soldiers at Stalingrad
“September 26. Our regiment is involved in constant heavy fighting. After the elevator was taken the Russians continued to defend themselves just as stubbornly.
“You don’t see them at all, they have established themselves in houses and cellars and are firing on all sides, including our rear. Barbarians–they use gangster methods! Stalingrad is hell….”
What held true for German Fascists holds equally true for those in America: Oppose their efforts to enslave you–and you become a gangster.
And Georgians now have a would-be predator as their representative.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on June 20, 2017 at 12:05 am
While the Nazi Party ruled Germany from 1933 to 1945, its influence over all aspects of Germans’ lives was suffocating.
“The persuasive influence of the Nazi regime reached into every corner of everyday life in Germany,” reads the back cover of Richard Grunberger’s classic 1971 book, The 12-Year Reich.
“Censorship prevailed, education was undermined, family life was idealized, but children were encouraged to turn in disloyal parents.
“‘Volk’ festivals, party rallies, awards, uniforms, pageantry all played a part in the massive effort to shape the mind of a nation.”
And yet, after the Reich surrendered unconditionally to the Allies on May 8, 1945, a strange thing happened: Virtually no one in Germany admitted to having been a Nazi—or having even known one.
American and British soldiers couldn’t find any German veterans willing to admit they had ever fought against Western, democratic nations. All the once-proud legionaries of the Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS swore they had been fighting “the real enemy”—the Russians—on the Eastern front.
And then there were all the stories of Germans who, at great risk to themselves, had hidden Jews in their attics. Which left unanswered the question: If so many “good Germans” had saved so many Jews, how had six million Jews died horrifically before the Reich fell?
In short: Adolf Hitler had lost the war he started—making him a loser nobody wanted to be identified with.
In the decades since, the “loser” tag has continued to stick with those who once served the Third Reich. Mel Brooks has repeatedly turned German soldiers—once the pride of the battlefield—into idiotic comic foils.
Even the fearsome Gestapo was spoofed for laughs on the long-running TV comedy, “Hogan’s Heroes.”
“Hogan’s Heroes”
“Americans love a winner,” George C. Scott as George S. Patton says at the outset of the classic 1970 movie. “And will not tolerate a loser.”
And that is why Republicans have stuck so closely with President Donald J. Trump.
A typical example of this occurred on June 8 after former FBI director James Comey testified before the United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
Comey revealed that, on February 14, Trump had ordered everyone but Comey to leave a crowded meeting in the Oval Office.
“I want to talk about Mike Flynn,” said Trump.
Flynn had resigned the previous day from his position as National Security Adviser. The FBI was investigating him for his previously undisclosed ties to Russia.
“I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go,” said Trump. “He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go.”
This was clearly an attempt by Trump to obstruct the FBI’s investigation.
Yet Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan rushed to excuse his clearly illegal behavior: “He’s new at government, so therefore I think he’s learning as he goes.”
Paul Ryan
David Brooks, the conservative New York Times columnist, offered a more accurate explanation of Trump’s motives. Speaking on The PBS Newshour, Brooks said:
“We are a nation of laws. Donald Trump lives in an entirely different cultural universe. He is more clannist, believing in clan, believing in family, believing in loyalty, not recognizing objective law, not recognizing the procedures that is really how modern government operates….
“It’s not only that he doesn’t know the rules, but at all along and throughout his presidency, he has sort of trampled on the rules almost as a matter of policy, as a matter of character, because he doesn’t believe in that kind of relationships. It’s all personal loyalty, not about laws and norms and standards.”
Republicans don’t fear that Trump will trash the institutions that Americans have cherished for more than 200 years. Institutions like an independent judiciary, a free press, and an incorruptible Justice Department.
He has already attacked all of these—and Republicans have either said nothing or rushed to his defense.
What Republicans truly fear about Donald Trump is that he will finally cross one line too many—like firing Special Counsel Robert Meuller. And that the national outrage following this will force them to launch impeachment proceedings against him.
But it isn’t even Trump they fear will be destroyed.
What they most fear losing is their own hold on nearly absolute power in Congress and the White House.
If Trump is impeached and possibly indicted, he will become a man no one any longer fears. He will be a figure held up to ridicule and condemnation.
Like Adolf Hitler. Like Richard Nixon.
And his Congressional supporters will be branded as losers along with him.
Republicans vividly remember what happened after Nixon was forced to resign on August 9, 1974: Democrats, riding a wave of reform fever, swept Republicans out of the House and Senate—and Jimmy Carter into the White House.
What Ronald Reagan once said about the leadership of the Soviet Union now literally applies to that of the Republican Party:
“They…have openly and publicly declared that the only morality they recognize is what will further their cause, meaning they reserve unto themselves the right to commit any crime, to lie, to cheat, in order to attain that.”
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on June 19, 2017 at 1:08 am
On January 8, 2011, Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was shot in the head while meeting with constituents outside a Tucson, Arizona, grocery store.
After a miraculous recovery, she continues to struggle with language and has lost 50% of her vision in both eyes. Although she returned to her Congressional duties, her injuries forced her to resign in 2012.
The shooting claimed the lives of six people and left 13 others wounded.
One of those killed was Arizona’s chief U.S. District judge, John Roll, who had just stopped by to see his friend Giffords after celebrating Mass.
The youngest victim was nine-year-old Christiana-Taylor Green, whose desire to one day enter politics had led her to attend the scheduled meeting with her Congresswoman, Giffords. Her having been born on September 11, 2001, added a special poignancy to her tragic death.
Rep. Gabrielle Giffords
Although the actual shooter, Jared Lee Loughner, was immediately arrested, those who fanned the flames of political violence that consumed 19 people that day have remained unpunished.
Gabrille Giffords, then 40, was a moderate Democrat who narrowly won re-election in November, 2010, against a Republican Tea Party candidate.
Her support of President Barack Obama’s health care reform law made her a target for violent rhetoric–especially from former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.
In March, 2010, Palin released a map featuring 20 House Democrats that used cross-hairs images to show their districts. In case her supporters didn’t get the message, she later wrote on Twitter: “‘Don’t Retreat, Instead – RELOAD!’”
As the campaign continued, Giffords found her Tucson office vandalized after the House passed the healthcare overhaul on March 21, 2010.
Giffords sensed that she had become a target for assassination. In an interview after the vandalizing of her office, she cited the animosity against her by Right-wingers:
“For example, we’re on Sarah Palin’s targeted list, but the thing is, that the way that she has it depicted has the cross-hairs of a gun sight over our district. When people do that, they have to realize that there are consequences to that action,” Giffords tells MSNBC.
At one of her rallies, her aides called the police after an attendee dropped a gun.
In April, 2010, Giffords supported Rep. Raúl Grijalva after he had to close two offices when he and his staff received threats. He had called for a boycott of Arizona businesses in opposition to the state’s controversial immigration law.
“I am deeply troubled about reports that Congressman Grijalva and members of his staff have been subjected to death threats,” Giffords said.
“This is not how we, as Americans, express our political differences. Intimidation has no place in our representative democracy. Such acts only make it more difficult for us to resolve our differences.”
But intimidation–and worse–does have a place among the tactics used by influential Republicans in the pursuit of absolute power.
Increasingly, Republicans have repeatedly aimed violent–and violence-arousing–rhetoric at their Democratic opponents.
This is not a case of careless language that is simply misinterpreted, with tragic results.
Republicans like Sarah Palin fully understand the constituency they are trying to reach: Those masses of alienated, uneducated Americans who live only for their guns and hardline religious beliefs–and who can be easily manipulated by perceived threats to either.
If a “nutcases” assaults a Democratic politician and misses, then the Republican establishment claims to be shocked–shocked!–that such a thing could have happened.
And if the attempt proves successful–as the Giffords shooting did–then Republicans weep crocodile tears for public consumption.
Consider the following:
- Rep. Randy Neugebauer (R-Tex.) yelled “baby killer” at Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) on the House floor.
- Florida GOP Congressional candidate Allen West, referring to his Democratic opponent, Rep. Ron Klein, told Tea Party activists: You’ve got to make the fellow scared to come out of his house. That’s the only way that you’re going to win. That’s the only way you’re going to get these people’s attention.”
- Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) said Tea Partiers had “every right” to use racist and homophobic slurs against Democrats, justifying it via Democrats’ “totalitarian tactics.
- ”Rep. Michelle Bachmann (R-Minn.) said she wanted her constituents “armed and dangerous” against the Obama administration.
- Right-wing pundit Ann Coulter: “My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times building.”
- Senator Phil Gramm (R-Tex.) “We’re going to keep building the party until we’re hunting Democrats with dogs.”
- Rep. Louisa M. Slauter (D-NY) received a phone message threatening sniper attacks against lawmakers and their families.
For more than 50 years, Republicans have vilified government–except when they controlled it. They convinced millions of Americans that Democrats are potential traitors, if not actual ones.
They have routinely slandered Democrats as:
- Plotting to “take away your guns.”
- Wanting to turn America into a welfare-dependent society.
- Being “Godless” and intending to force atheism on believing Christians.
- Plotting to allow the United Nations to “take over” the United States.
Consciously or not, Republicans have taken their cue from Adolf Hitler, who advised in Mein Kampf: “All effective propaganda must be confined to a few bare essentials.
“Those must be expressed as far as possible in stereotypical formulas. These slogans should be persistently repeated until the very last individual has come to grasp the idea that has been put forward.”
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on June 16, 2017 at 12:04 am
On June 14, Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA) was among five people shot during a Republican baseball practice in Alexandria, Virginia.
Scalise, the U.S. House majority whip, was shot in the hip. Other victims included a member of Scalise’s security detail, U.S. Capitol Police officer Crystal Griner; Zack Barth, an aide to Rep. Roger Williams, R-TX; and lobbyist Matt Mika.
Steve Scalise
The suspected gunman, James Hodgkinson, was shot dead by Capitol police.
And now, some GOP lawmakers think they have the answer to foiling any future such attacks: They want to carry guns themselves.
“The ability to protect ourselves individually, rather than having to rely on someone else is something that I cherish,” Rep. Jack Bergman (R-Michigan) told CNN. “I would like the opportunity to be able to protect myself as a congressman.”
Rep. Chris Collins (R-New York) told CNN: “I’ve had a carry permit for 30 years, and I would say off and on in different instances where I have, you know, felt it was appropriate, I would carry the weapon on myself.
“Certainly in the short run I’m going to go a step beyond just having it in the glove box in my car and I will be carrying.”
On the evening of June 14, Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie wrote on Facebook: “What’s always evident in these situations is: The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.”
That, of course, is the standard mantra of the National Rifle Association (NRA).
But it it true?
On July 7, 2016, five Dallas police officers were shot and killed by a disgruntled ex-Army Reserve Afghan War veteran named Michah Xavier Johnson. Another seven officers and two civilians were wounded before the carnage ended.
The shootings erupted during a Black Lives Matter protest march in downtown Dallas.
Texas has long been an “open carry” state for those who want to brandish rifles without fear of arrest. And about 20 people wearing “ammo gear and protective equipment [had] rifles slung over their shoulder,” said Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings.
“When the shooting started, at different angles, [the armed protesters] started running,” Rawlings said, adding that open carry only brings confusion to a shooting scene. What I would do [if I were a police officer] is look for the people with guns,” he said.
“There were a number of armed demonstrators taking part,” said Max Geron, a Dallas police major. “There was confusion about the description of the suspects and whether or not one or more was in custody.”
A 2012 Mother Jones article on “More Guns, More Mass Shootings–Coincidence?” offered a striking finding. After analyzing 62 mass shootings over a 30-year period, the magazine determined: “In not a single case was the killing stopped by a civilian using a gun.”
So much for the ability of gun-toting, untrained amateurs to “stop a bad guy with a gun.”
But even highly-trained shooters–such as those assigned to the United States Secret Service–don’t always respond as expected.
On May 15, 1972, Alabama Governor George C. Wallace was campaigning for President in Laurel, Maryland. He gave a speech behind a bulletproof podium at the Laurel Shopping Center. Then he moved from it to mingle with the crowd.
Since the 1968 assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy, all those campaigning for President have been assigned Secret Service bodyguards. And Wallace was surrounded by them as he shook hands with his eager supporters.
Suddenly, Arthur Bremer, a fame-seeking failure in life and romance, pushed his way forward, aimed a .38 revolver at Wallace’s abdomen and opened fire. Before the Secret Service could subdue him, he hit Wallace four times, leaving him paralyzed for the rest of his life.
Arthur Bremer shoots George Wallace
Nor was he Bremer’s only victim. Three other people present were wounded unintentionally:
- Alabama State Trooper Captain E C Dothard, Wallace’s personal bodyguard, who was shot in the stomach;
- Dora Thompson, a campaign volunteer, who was shot in the leg; and
- Nick Zarvos, a Secret Service agent, who was shot in the neck, severely impairing his speech.
None of Wallace’s bodyguards got off a shot at Bremer–before or after he pulled the trigger.
On October 6, 1981, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat was reviewing a military parade in Cairo when a truck apparently broke down directly across from where he was seated.
Anwar Sadat, moments before his assassination
Suddenly, soldiers bolted from the rear of the vehicle, throwing hand grenades and firing assault rifles. They rushed straight at Sadat–who died instantly under a hail of bullets.
Meanwhile, Sadat’s bodyguards–who had been trained by the CIA–panicked and fled.
Sadat had been assassinated by army officers who believed he had betrayed Islam by making peace with Israel in 1977.
The ultimate test of the NRA’s mantra that “there should not be any gun-free zones…anywhere” will come only when one or more heavily-armed gunmen target an NRA convention.
It will then be interesting to see if the surviving NRA members are as quick to blame themselves for being victims as they are to blame the victims of other mass slaughters.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on June 13, 2017 at 12:20 am
Hear that sound?
It’s the sound of Niccolo Machiavelli laughing at President Donald J. Trump.
Machiavelli (1469 – 1527) was an Italian Renaissance historian, diplomat and writer. Two of his books continue to profoundly influence modern politics: The Prince and The Discourses on the First Ten Books of Titus Livy.
The Prince has often been damned as a dictator’s guide on how to gain and hold power. But The Discourses outlines how citizens in a republic can maintain their liberty.
Niccolo Machiavelli
In Chapter 26 of The Discourses, he advises:
I hold it to be a proof of great prudence for men to abstain from threats and insulting words towards any one, for neither the one nor the other in any way diminishes the strength of the enemy—but the one makes him more cautious, and the other increases his hatred of you, and makes him more persevering in his efforts to injure you.
If Trump has read Machiavelli, he’s utterly forgotten the Florentine statesman’s advice. Or he decided long ago that it simply didn’t apply to him.
Consider his treatment of James Comey, the former FBI director whom the President fired on May 9.
James B. Comey (By Federal Bureau of Investigation)
In a move that Joseph Stalin would have admired, Trump gave no warning of his intentions.
Instead, he sent Keith Schiller, his longtime bodyguard and henchman, to the FBI with a letter announcing Comey’s dismissal.
Trump had three reasons for firing Comey:
- Comey had refused to pledge his personal loyalty to Trump. Trump had made this “request” during a private dinner at the White House in January. After refusing to make that pledge, Comey told Trump that he would always be honest with him. But that didn’t satisfy Trump’s demand that the head of the FBI act as his personal secret police chief.
- Trump had tried to coerce him into dropping the FBI’s investigation into former National Security Adviser Mike Flynn, for his secret ties to Russia and Turkey. Comey had similarly resisted that demand.
- Comey had recently asked the Justice Department to fund an expanded FBI investigation into contacts between Trump’s 2016 Presidential campaign and Russian Intelligence agents.
On May 10–the day after firing Comey–Trump met in the Oval Office with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak.
Donald Trump
Kislyak is reportedly a top recruiter for Russia’s SVR foreign intelligence agency. He has been closely linked with Jeff Sessions, now Attorney General, and fired National Security Adviser Mike Flynn.
“I just fired the head of the FBI,” Trump told the two dignitaries. “He was crazy, a real nut job. I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.”
Two days later, on May 12, Trump tweeted a threat to the fired FBI director: “James Comey better hope that there are no ‘tapes’ of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press.”
It clearly didn’t occur to Trump that Comey might have created his own record of their exchanges. Or that he might choose to publicly release it.
But shortly afterward, that’s exactly what he did.
News stories surfaced that Comey had written memos to himself immediately after his private meetings with Trump. He had also told close aides that Trump was trying to pressure him into dropping the Russia investigation.
The news stories led to another result Trump had not anticipated: Acting Attorney General Rod Rosenstein yielded to demands from Democrats and appointed former FBI Director Robert Meuller III as a Special Prosecutor to investigate Trump’s Russian ties.
A Special Prosecutor (now euphemistically called an “Independent Counsel”) holds virtually unlimited power and discretion.
In 1993, Kenneth Starr was appointed Special Prosecutor to investigate Bill and Hillary Clinton’s involvement in “Whitewater.” This was a failed Arkansas land deal that had happened while Clinton was still governor there. It had nothing to do with his role as President.
Starr never turned up anything incriminating about Whitewater. But he discovered that Clinton had gotten oral sex in the Oval Office from a lust-hungry intern named Monica Lewinsky.
Clinton’s lying about these incidents before a Federal grand jury led to his impeachment by a Republican-dominated House of Representatives. But he avoided removal when the Senate refused to convict him by a vote of 55 to 45.
Finally, Trump’s implying that he had illegally taped his conversations with Comey was yet another dangerous mistake, with four possible outcomes:
- If Trump has such tapes, they can and will be subpoenaed by the Special Prosecutor and the House and Senate committees investigating Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election.
- If Trump has such tapes and refuses to turn them over, he can be charged with obstruction of justice–and impeached for that reason alone.
- If he has burned or erased such tapes, that, too, counts as obstruction of justice.
- If he doesn’t have such tapes, he will be revealed as a maker of empty threats.
This last outcome wouldn’t get him impeached. But it would make him a national laughingstock.
As Machiavelli also warns: Unwise princes cannot be wisely advised.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on June 12, 2017 at 12:01 am
If you visit San Francisco, forget what Julie Andrews told you in Mary Poppins: Don’t “Feed the Birds.”
Getting caught doing so can net you a fine from $25 to $1,000.
City officials launched the campaign in 2004, fining people who fed pigeons in the Tenderloin area.
Within a month, they extended the crackdown to Fisherman’s Wharf, Chinatown and the cable car turnaround in downtown.Feeding birds “damages property, and it’s not good for the bird population,” said Christine Falvey, a spokeswoman for the Public Works Department at the time of the ban.
“We have a whole education campaign letting people know it’s against the law,” said Falvey.
This includes posters erected by the Department of Public Works, which read:
“Please do not feed the pigeons. There are dozens of reasons why, but mainly: feeding pigeons harms our neighborhoods and also harms the birds.
“Large population of pigeons is a health hazard. Our huge feral pigeon population is a health hazard and creates many problems in the city.
“Pigeon droppings dirty public spaces, do costly damage to buildings, and can spread life-threatening diseases, especially to the elderly and immune-deficient. Their nesting materials block drains and harbor parasites like bird mites. Pigeon food makes a mess and attracts rats.
“Feeding pigeons promotes over-breeding. Pigeon feeding produces over-breeding.
“Pigeons normally breed two or three times a year, producing two eggs per brood. Overfed city pigeons can breed up to eight times a year.
“Pigeons are harmed when fed. When you feed pigeons, you are not doing them a favor. They lose their natural ability to scavenge and survive on their own.
“Pigeon over population leads to overcrowded, unsanitary conditions and produces sick and injured birds. A smaller flock is healthier and does less damage.
“It is illegal. It’s against the law to feed pigeons on the streets or sidewalks of San Francisco (Sec. 486. M.P.C). Violators may be cited and fined.
“You can help keep your neighborhood safe and clean and the pigeon population under control by not feeding pigeons. Keep edible garbage away from pigeons by discarding it in a securely covered garbage can.
“And don’t feed pets outside.You may report pigeon feeders to the San Francisco Police Department at 415-553-0123, or by calling 3-1-1.
“Please join in on the efforts to keep San Francisco clean and beautiful by NOT feeding the pigeons.”
* * * * *
At the same time that city officials are telling residents, “Please don’t feed the pigeons,” they aren’t telling them, “Please don’t feed the bums.”
Because of its mild climate and social programs that give cash payments to just-arrived vagrants, San Francisco is often considered the homelessness capital of the United States.
Former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown (1996–2004) actually proposed that the city create electronic cards for transients that residents could swipe with their credit cards, thus transferring money from their accounts to that of the recipient.
Brown dropped the idea when faced with the brutal truth that not many citizens–especially women–would be willing to whip out their credit card when confronted by a smelly, unshaved and possibly psychotic transient.
San Francisco spends $250 million annually on services for what are now euphemistically called “the homeless.”That’s because city officials don’t want to use words that accurately describe who makes up the overwhelming majority of this population:
- Druggies
- Drunks
- Mental cases
- Bums
Eight city departments oversee at least 400 contracts to 76 private organizations, most of them nonprofits, that are charged with eliminating this pestilence.
Estimates of this population range from 7,000-10,000 people, of which approximately 3,000-5,000 refuse shelter.
A similar public crackdown on “bum-feeders” could go like this:
“Please do not feed the bums. There are dozens of reasons why, but mainly: feeding bums harms our neighborhoods and also harms the bums.
“Our huge feral bum population is a health hazard and creates many problems in the city.Bum droppings dirty public spaces, do costly damage to buildings, and can spread life-threatening diseases, especially to the elderly and immune-deficient.
“Their stolen shopping carts and filthy possessions block sidewalks and harbor parasites like bedbugs and lice. Bum food makes a mess and attracts rats.
“Feeding bums promotes overbreeding. Bums normally travel alone, foraging for drugs and/or alcohol.Pampered city bums flock to liquor stores and drug dens where they can indulge their vices, thus taxing city medical services to the limit.
“When you feed bums, you are not doing them a favor. They lose their natural ability to find work and support themselves and their families.
“Bum over population leads to overcrowded, unsanitary conditions and produces sick and injured bums. A smaller horde is healthier and does less damage.
“It’s against the law to feed bums on the streets or sidewalks of San Francisco. Violators may be cited and fined.
“You can help keep your neighborhood safe and clean and the bum population under control by not feeding bums.
“Keep edible garbage away from bums by discarding it in a securely covered garbage can. And don’t feed bums outside.
“It is Illegal. You may report bum feeders to the San Francisco Police Department at 415-553-0123, or by calling 3-1-1.
“Please join in on the efforts to keep San Francisco clean and beautiful by NOT feeding the bums.”
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on June 9, 2017 at 1:51 am
Lori Tankel had a problem: A lot of angry people thought she was George Zimmerman.
She began getting death threats on her
Unfortunately for Tankel, her number was one digit away from the number Zimmerman used to make his call to police just before he fatally shot Martin.
The phone number had been shown throughout the trial. And, believing the number was Zimmerman’s, someone posted Tankel’s number online.
Just minutes after the verdict, Tankel began getting death threats.“We’re going to kill you. We’re going to get you. Watch your back,” threatened a typical call.
Tankel worked as a sales representative for several horse companies. She had grown used to relying on her phone to keep her business going.
But, almost as soon as the Zimmerman verdict came in, “My phone just started to blow up. Phone call after phone call, multiple phone
So she did what any ordinary citizen, faced with multiple death threats, would do: She called the police.
According to her, the Seminole County Sheriff’s Office told her the department itself receives around 400 death threats a minute on social media sites.
In short: Unless you’re wealthy, a politician or–best of all–a cop, don’t expect the police to protect you if your life is threatened.
If you doubt it, consider the lessons to be learned when, in February, 2013, Christopher Dorner declared war on his former fellow officers of the Los Angeles Police Department.
First, above everyone else, police look out for each other.
Robert Daley bluntly revealed this truth in his 1971 bestseller, Target Blue: An Insider’s View of the N.Y.P.D. A police reporter for the New York Times, he served for one year as a deputy police commissioner.
“A great many solvable crimes in the city were never solved, because not enough men were assigned to the case, or because those assigned were lazy or hardly cared or got sidetracked.
“But when a cop got killed, no other cop got sidetracked. Detectives worked on the case night and day….
“In effect, the citizen who murdered his wife’s lover was sought by a team of detectives, two men. But he who killed a cop was sought by 32,000.”
Second, don’t expect the police to do for you what they’ll do for one another.
The LAPD assigned security and surveillance details to at least 50 threatened officers and their families. A typical detail consists of two to five or more guards. And those guards must be changed every eight to 12 hours.
SWAT Team
By Oregon Department of Transportation (SWAT team preparedUploaded by Smallman12q) [CC BY 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons
Those details stayed in place long after Dorner was killed in a firefight on February 12, 2013.
But if your bullying neighbor threatens to kill you, don’t expect the police to send a guard detail over. They’ll claim: ”We can’t do anything until the guy does something. If he does, give us a call.”
Third, the more status and wealth you command, the more likely the police are to address your complaint or solve your case.
If you’re rich, your complaint will likely get top priority and the best service the agency can provide.
But if you’re poor or even middle-class without high-level political or police connections, you’ll be told: “We just don’t have the resources to protect everybody.”
Fourth, don’t expect your police department to operate with the vigor or efficiency of TV police agencies.
“I want this rock [Hawaii] sealed off,” Steve McGarrett (Jack Lord) routinely ordered when pursuing criminals on “Hawaii Five-O.”
Jack Lord as Steve McGarrett
Real-life police departments, on the other hand:
- Often lack state-of-the-art crime labs to analyze evidence.
- Often lose or accidentally destroy important files.
- Are–like all bureaucracies–staffed by those who are lazy, indifferent or incompetent.
- Are notoriously competitive, generally refusing to share information with other police departments-–thus making it easier for criminals to run amok.
Even when police ”solve” a crime, that simply means making an arrest. After that, there are at least three possible outcomes:
- The District Attorney may decide not to file charges.
- Or the perpetrator may plead to a lesser offense and serve only a token sentence-–or none at all.
- Or he might be found not guilty by a judge or jury.
Fifth, the result of all this can only be increased disrespect for law enforcement from a deservedly–and increasingly–cynical public.
It is the witnessing of blatant inequities and hypocrisies such as those displayed in the Christopher Dorner case that most damages public support for police at all levels.
When citizens believe police lack the ability-–or even the will-–to protect them or avenge their victimization, that is a deadly blow to law enforcement.
Police depend on citizens for more than crime tips.
They depend upon them to support hiring more cops and buying state-of-the-art police equipment.
When public support vanishes, so does much of that public funding.
The result can only be a return to the days of the lawless West, where citizens–as individuals or members of vigilante committees–look only to themselves for protection.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary, Uncategorized on June 7, 2017 at 12:15 am
Nikolai Sergeyvich Zhilayev (pronounced Zill-lay-ev) was a Russian musicologist and the teacher of several 20th-century Russian composers.
Among these: Dimitri Shostakovich.
Among his friends–to his ultimate misfortune–was Mikhail Tukhachevsky, the former military hero now falsely condemned and executed as a traitor by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin.
In 1938, Zhilayev, too, became a casualty of what has become known as The Great Terror.
In his posthumously-published memoirs, Testimony, Shostakovich, his pupil and friend, described how Zhilayev faced his end with a calmness that awed even the NKVD (the predecessor to the KGB) secret police sent to arrest him.
Dimitri Shostakovich
“He had a large picture of Tukhachevsky in his room, and after the announcement that Tukhachevsky had been shot as a traitor to the homeland, Zhilayev did not take the picture down.
“I don’t know if I can explain how heroic a deed that was….As soon as the next poor soul was declared an enemy of the people, everyone destroyed in a panic everything connected with that person.
“If the enemy of the people wrote books, they threw away his books. If they had letters from him, they burned the letters. The mind can’t grasp the number of letters and papers burned in that period…
“And naturally, photographs flew into the fire first, because if someone informed on you, reported that you had a picture of an enemy of the people, it meant certain death.
“Zhilayev wasn’t afraid. When they came for him, Tukhachevsky’s prominently hung portrait amazed even the executioners.”
“What, it’s still up?” one of the secret police asked.
“The time will come,” Zhilayev replied, “when they’ll erect a monument to him.”
As, in fact, has happened.
Mikhail Tukhachevsky appears on a 1963 Soviet Union postage stamp
Third hero–James Brien Comey (December 14, 1960)
Comey served as United States Attorney (federal prosecutor) for the Southern District of New York (2002-2003).
As United States Deputy Attorney General (2003-2005), he opposed the warrantless wiretapping program of the George W. Bush administration. He also argued against the use of water boarding as an interrogation method.
In 2005, he entered the private sector as General Counsel and Senior Vice President for Lockheed Martin, the biggest contractor for the Department of Defense.
On July 29, 2013, the United States Senate voted 93 -1 to confirm Comey as director of the FBI, the seventh in its history.
James B. Comey
He directed the FBI from his appointment in 2013 by President Barack Obama until his firing on May 9 by President Donald Trump.
In a move that Joseph Stalin would have admired, Trump gave no warning of his intentions. Instead, he sent Keith Schiller, his longtime bodyguard, to the FBI with a letter announcing Comey’s dismissal.
Trump had three reasons for firing Comey:
- Comey had refused to pledge his personal loyalty to Trump. Trump had made this “request” during a private dinner at the White House in January. After refusing to make that pledge, Comey told Trump that he would always be honest with him. But that didn’t satisfy Trump’s demand that the head of the FBI act as his personal secret police chief.
- Trump had tried to coerce him into dropping the FBI’s investigation into former National Security Adviser Mike Flynn, for his secret ties to Russia and Turkey. Comey had similarly resisted that demand.
- Comey had recently asked the Justice Department to fund an expanded FBI investigation into contacts between Trump’s 2016 Presidential campaign and Russian Intelligence agents.
As a Presidential candidate and President, Trump has:
- Steadfastly denied those revelations;
- Repeatedly attacked the “fake news” media reporting these revelations. Chief among his targets: CNN, The New York Times and The Washington Post; and
- Attacked the Intelligence agencies responsible for America’s security.
On May 10–the day after firing Comey–Trump met in the Oval Office with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak.
Kislyak is reportedly a top recruiter for Russia’s SVR foreign intelligence agency. He has been closely linked with Jeff Sessions, now Attorney General, and fired National Security Adviser Mike Flynn.
“I just fired the head of the F.B.I.,” Trump told the two dignitaries. “He was crazy, a real nut job. I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.”
During that meeting he gave the Russians sensitive Intelligence on ISIS that had been supplied by Israel.
Two days later, on May 12, Trump tweeted a threat to the fired FBI director: “James Comey better hope that there are no ‘tapes’ of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press.”
But shortly afterward, it appeared Trump was the one who should worry: Reports surfaced that Comey had written memos to himself immediately after his private meetings with Trump.
He had also told close aides that Trump was trying to pressure him into dropping the investigation into close ties between Russian Intelligence agents and Trump campaign staffers.
The firing led directly to a result Trump did not anticipate: Acting Attorney General Rod Rosenstein yielded to demands from Democrats and appointed former FBI Director Robert Meuller III as a special prosecutor to investigate those ties.
And, on June 8, James Comey was scheduled to give his much-anticipated version of events before the United States Senate Intelligence Committee.
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GOP: “GIVE US AMERICA–OR WE’LL DESTROY IT!”
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on June 28, 2017 at 9:17 amOn December 13, 2014, the U.S. Senate passed a $1.1 trillion spending bill to fund almost the entire government through the September 30 end of the fiscal year.
But one Federal agency was pointedly exempted from full funding: The Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Its funding would expire on February 27.
With their newfound majorities in both houses of Congress, Republicans intended to hold the security of the United States as a hostage.
Their goal: To force President Barack Obama to rescind the changes he had made in American immigration policy.
With more than 240,000 employees, the DHS is the third largest Cabinet department, after the Departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs.
The Defense Department is charged with military actions abroad.
DHS is responsible for protecting the United States inside and outside its borders. Its goal is to prepare for, prevent and—if prevention fails—respond to man-made accidents, natural disasters and terrorism.
Among the agencies now operating under its mandate:
Yet each of these agencies has a vital role to play in protecting the nation. A nation whose security Republicans were willing to threaten to get their way on a matter of domestic policy.
Right-wing Republicans argued that even if DHS’s funding were stopped, most of its employees would stay on the job. That’s because they perform work considered necessary to protect human life and property.
But while those employees were safeguarding the country, they wouldn’t be paid until the shutdown ended.
It’s hard to give your full attention to protecting the lives of others when you have to worry about paying a mortgage or feeding your family.
Of course, the Republicans responsible for this shutdown would have continued to receive their hefty paychecks.
Republicans chose to act as Mafia extortionists at a time when the United States appeared to be in the crosshairs of North Korean terrorism.
On November 14, 2014, Sony Pictures came under relentless attack by cyberterrorists, whom the FBI linked to North Korea.
The reason? Sony’s production of “The Interview,” a comedy depicting the assassination of North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un.
Calling themselves “Guardians of Peace,” or GOP, they shut down the company’s computer system and revealed employees’ personal information such as salaries, addresses, and Social Security numbers.
(Ironically, “Guardians of Peace” appropriated the same abbreviation–GOP–used by the Republicans for “Grand Old Party.”)
Warning issued by “Guardians of Peace” (GOP)
On December 17, 2014, Sony Pictures cancelled the Christmas Day premier of “The Interview” after the nation’s five largest movie chains refused to show the movie, following a terror threat posted online.
And then on February 5, 2015, Anthem Insurance announced that its database had been hacked–and sensitive medical information on up to 80 million customers and employees accessed.
According to an anonymous source, the hackers used malware that’s been used almost exclusively by Chinese cyberspies.
* * * * *
As the Third Reich came to its fiery end, Adolf Hitler sought to punish the German people for being “unworthy” of his “genius” and losing the war he had started.
His attitude was: “If I can’t rule Germany, then there won’t be a Germany.”
In his infamous “Nero Order,” he decreed the destruction of everything still remaining–industries, ships, harbors, communications, roads, mines, bridges, stores, utility plants, food stuffs.
Fortunately for Germany, one man—Albert Speer, the Minister of Armaments—finally broke ranks with his Fuhrer.
Albert Speer
Risking death, he refused to carry out Hitler’s “scorched earth” order. Even more important, he mounted a successful effort to block such destruction or persuade influential military and civilian leaders to disobey the order as well.
As a result, those targets slated for destruction were spared.
After the election of America’s first black President, Republicans waged a similar “scorched earth” campaign. Their avowed goal—as stated openly by Kentucky’s U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell—was “to make Barack Obama a one-term President.”
Literally during his first Inauguration, Republicans, in a secret meeting, agreed to block every effort he made to repair the economy.
Acting as extortionists, they repeatedly threatened to shut down the government if they didn’t get their way in legislative matters.
And just as repeatedly, they blocked legislation that would have helped the poor, unemployed, women, elderly, disabled or middle-class.
At the center of their fury lay the Affordable Care Act, providing medical care to all citizens.
Even after Congress passed it and the Supreme Court affirmed it, House Republicans shut down the government in October, 2013.
By doing so, they hoped to pressure Obama into killing his signature piece of legislation. The effort failed.
Like Adolf Hitler, their attitude has been: “If I can’t rule America, there won’t be an America.”
It remains to be seen whether a Republican Albert Speer will step forward to save America from the self-destructive excesses of this Nation’s own fanatics.
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