The Proletariat Congress

Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both. ~ Benjamin Franklin

RealID (H.R. 418 and H.R. 1268) is being touted by the American federal government and the Department of Homeland Security (herein referred to as DHS) as a programme that will help Americans live more secure lives in their nation by having a single piece of federally approved ID that consolidates all their information, including biometric data into a single use entity. But that is not the reality as we know it. The reality is that this is one more step by the American government toward a police state, in which people pay for their “security” with their freedom, a cost too dear.

With each piece of information that each citizen provides to their government, that is one more piece of information the government can use against you. Each revelation hands your private life into the hands of those who can easily destroy it. With the surrendering of valuable information into a single mega-database, the likelihood of identity theft occurring is increased tenfold. That sensitive information is easily available to those who don’t need to know certain things.

Without this piece of federally sanctioned ID, Americans would be denied entry into federal buildings. For this, RealID is dangerous, for it limits the freedom that would have other wise be guaranteed for Americans through the constitution. The restrictions include and are not limited to:

• Driving your car
• Boarding a plane, train, or bus
• Entering any federal building
• Opening a bank account
• Holding a job

Scary. To think. A simple piece of ID would limit one’s mobility rights. It would effectively violate the right to travel (mobility rights). In Saenz v. Roe, it was ruled that the right to travel is protected by the Fourteenth Amendment. This would override a constitutional right that would have otherwise been a natural right for all American citizens.

Imagine, not being able to board a city bus without proof of ID.  The right to go about your business without being tracked would be compromised.  We as humans have the right to do stupid shit.  We also have the right to travel within our own nation without worrying about being stopped just because someone in a position of authority is on a power trip.

Or trying to open a bank account.  You wouldn’t even have a safe place to put your money.  If it was bad enough to think the government could access your library borrow records, imagine if they could find out your financial information?  While some might say that it’ll lower rates of tax fraud, it would also limit a person’s right to object to paying federal income tax, as this frequently clashes with state law, in that if you’ve paid your state taxes, you don’t pay federal.

This wouldn’t do anything to deter terrorism. It is another step to limit democracy, and remove control from the people. These documents may be able to tell the government who you are and what your blood type is and when you last took a shit and where but not what matters, your intent. It will not be able to stop terrorism because these papers will not contain anything on intent.

This data will not only land in the hands of the government but also private organizations who would be able to hold onto that data and then in turn sell it. A whole lot is at stake with this system and yet there was no way to effective way to combat terrorism. The cost is too great to justify something that will not curb terrorism.

The initial cost of programme implementation is estimated at 23-billion US dollars. There is no guarantee of federal coverage, placing the burden on the state, a good number of which could easily be considered “poor” and “cash-strapped”. What’s more important, enforcing a national ID system or repairing ageing, crumbling infrastructure? Fixing those levies or making sure that everyone has their papers?

Someone might tell you that you ought to accept it because it’s for the good of national security. That this is part of the war on terrorism. But, no one has to accept this kind of abuse, this loss and invasion of privacy. There are ways to fight back even if you feel powerless. There are ways to do it without taking too much time. It is as simple as supporting and donating to groups that are oppose to RealID and are taking the fight all the way to the top.

There are states that are opposed to it, much to the dismay of the DHS. There are 17 states to date that have decided that this system is detrimental to the well being of their citizens. The states currently opposing RealID are: Arkansas, Colorado, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah and Washington…

There are a handful of other states where anti-RealID legislations are pending. They include and are not limited to Alaska, Kentucky, Ohio, Wisconsin. There are others that have similar pending pieces of legislation that still needs to be voted upon. These are many states that are defying the federal government in the name of what is good for the people.

Of course, not all states are opposed. The DHS has praised the following states as being ‘progressive’: California, Alabama and North Dakota. Michigan is also showing signs that it favours the oppressive move.

Four out of fifty isn’t enough to make a difference.

It is odd isn’t it? Two of those favouring the measure are traditionally blue states, and two are red states. Odd that a blue state would welcome such an oppressive measure. Or that anyone would be in favour of such measures.

Bush is indeed a uniter. He has united the nation against him, and against his administration.

Traditional groups that have been labelled as ‘liberal’ like the Sierra Club and the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) are on the same page as many religious organizations in their opposition to the RealID act. A common cause is what these different factions have in common. An enemy greater than their ideologies.

For this measure to fail, Americans have to reject it. Even a small, token rejection goes a long way. If the government meets a resistance force greater than the enforcement force it will be forced to look into the jaws of failure because the people have spoken.

1930s Germany had a national ID system. The people thought it was for their own good. But in this era, we have a great amount of information available to us. Fight tyranny before it can take root in your own backyard.

No2RealID
Real Nightmare

The spineless, cowardly Canadian Conservatives have blindly caved into American pressure once again. The ever weak-kneed Tories have decided roll over on Bush’s command and remove the US and Israel from its torture watch list because the two allege that they would never be involved in such inhumane activities nor should they be associated with rogue states like Iran and Syria. Those states engaged in torture. The US simply engages tactics to up the extraction of information using provisory amenity readjustment; it’s not really torture if the Americans do it…

Nor is it torture when the Israelis kill bystanders in their fight against Hamas or when they leave eight hundred thousand or so people in the Gaza strip without power. It’s not torture when they do it because they’re “protecting” Israelis from those poor Palestinians civilians… err, I mean, evil Islamic terrorists who just want to live in their homeland. Never mind that this affects everything including hospitals, medical clinics, water works, houses et cetera. Of course, that doesn’t matter to Israelis because the Palestinians aren’t “God’s Chosen”.

Gaza City plunged into darkness

Rather than worrying about the people who are suffering, I mean, “enjoying” their provisory amenity readjustment, the resolutely obtuse Harper administration has elected to willfully ignore the plight of those in these two nations in favour of international relations. Never mind that Canadians would rather keep rogue nations on the torture watch list, even if they are our “allies”. Of course, if they were truly worried about international relations, they would be in contact with our NATO allies who have qualms about engaging in such inhumane activities, with a flagrant disregard for human rights.

Like the good Harper ass-sucking Tory he is, Maxime Bernier, the Foreign Affairs Minister has come out (sorry, it’s not a closet; Harper won’;t give up the key for it), assuring America and Israel that it was simply an error and that it was never meant to be. He attempted to make it crystal clear that they, the Tories would never see to displease their extraterritorial overlords ever again. This pleased Israel’s Ambassador to Canada, Alan Baker, who had been most displeased upon seeing the document naming Israel along with the rogue state of Iran. He was most insulted but was placated upon receiving reassurances from Bernier that it would never happen again.

The US Ambassador to Canada, David Wilkins has uttered his displeasure with the government by terming it “offensive” that his country was considered on par with such insolent nations like China, Iran, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Afghanistan and Syria. He had a wee tantrum has he told a well-controlled press conference about the gross error in judgement made by the puppet government in Ottawa, saying it was, “Quite frankly it’s absurd. For us to be on a list like that is just ridiculous.”

How can it be ‘ridiculous’ when the two nations are known to engage in such activities that are contrary to the well being of others in the world? How is it not torture? Is it only torture when your enemy does it? Or because you’ve made the claim that you’re not actually torturing people because you’re simply trying to protect the world from terrorists? Sorry, playtime’s over children, let the adults take over and you can go sit in the corner and think about the crimes you’ve committed as you wear that lovely orange state-issued jump suit that you’ve given to the detainees at Gitmo.

Canada to rewrite Manual US criticized

Israeli envoy slams torture claim

Ottawa reverses torture stance

Canadian FM regrets ‘torture list‘

John F. Kennedy was the first Catholic to have been elected to the oval office in the USA. When he ran for the presidency in the 60s, he asked that voters judge him as an America and not a Catholic, and that is exactly what the voters did, before Lee Harvey Oswald decided otherwise in Dallas in 1963, when he assassinated JFK. Now, in the 21st century, we have another candidate pushing the same envelope, except now it’s for Mormonism, and not Catholicism. Mitt Romney, a member of the Church of Jesus Christ and Latter Day Saints (LDS; Mormons) is borrowing a page from JFK’s campaign book and asking the same thing of American voters.

Too bad for Romney this isn’t the idealistic 60s and he isn’t Kennedy because he managed to blow a perfectly good line by adding in a plethora of ignorance that is designed to make the secularists, humanists, deists, atheists and agnostics feel left out in the cold because we are ‘heathens’, those who are not Christian nor Jew; lacking faith.

I do not define my candidacy by my religion. A person should not be elected because of his faith, nor should he be rejected because of his faith.

This seems innocent at first glance, and it’s easy to take this at face value, until one takes a closer look at the next parts of his speech, in which he proceeds to alienate part of the voting population.

We should acknowledge the creator as did the founders in ceremony and word. He should remain in our currency, in our pledge, in the teachings of history and in the holiday season, nativity scenes and menorahs should be welcome in our public places.

The majority Founding Fathers of the United States of America only acknowledged a creator as far as Deism is concerned, with some clocking in as agnostics, atheists and only one or two as practising Christians. In Deism, a god-like figure or entity is rather superior entity is absent in all aspects of life after sparking the initial bust of energy that started life. Deism doesn’t concern itself with ritualistic prayer nor reliance on God for guidance in life.

Too bad Romney flunked American history or he would have known this little fact. The Founding Fathers wouldn’t have wanted ‘God’ to be in the public the way modern evangelical Christians do. They would have opted for a true separation of church and state, and not merely the symbolic one that some Republicans and Christians are opting for in the modern sphere of public life in America.

The pledge; the oath, it never had any mention of God in it before the emergence of the Soviet Union following the end of WWII in an attempt to set Americans apart from the seemingly godless commies who controlled the USSR. Religion wasn’t outlawed as a result of state atheism in the USSR, but rather as a result of the authoritarian nature of Stalinism, the ruling ideology of the nation at the time.

As for the display of religious symbols, sure Judaic ones aren’t forbidden in any of the Judaic scripture, but in Matthew 6:5-6, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus ordered his followers to be humble and to not pray in public, for God could hear prayer even in private; that public expressions of faith lessened the significance.

And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.

But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.

If your God is really omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent, why does he need to be on the currency, in the pledge and forced down the throats of everyone? If God is everywhere at once, why does he need some little sheep to remind everyone…?

But I digress, moving onward.

Romney has taken a low blow at those who would remove any acknowledgement of God from the public light.  What’s the matter, don’t have the guts to represent the people who opt to have no faith?  It becomes apparent here that he will not defend all faiths.  This is painfully obvious to those of us who opt to be free from any faith.

We are a nation under God, and in God we do indeed trust.

America is not one nation under God just because a gaggle of self-righteous Christians have decided that this is the way things ought to be. America is a nation of many people who hold many faiths that do not embrace a singular god, nor any gods. The polytheistic faiths embrace gods that the monotheistic faiths reject. Christians, Jews and Muslims are one God away from full blown Atheism.

‘I will serve no one religion’ U.S. presidential candidate vows

Romney vows to defend all faiths

Or at least that’s what Mike Huckabee, a Republican candidate, running for the presidential nomination would have you think. If he had his way, he’d have everyone thinking that civilization would somehow keel over if gay marriage existed, never mind that it does and that there are a few nations in the world where it actually does exist and surprisingly, chaos and anarchy hasn’t broken out here. Society hasn’t fallen to shambles.

I don’t think the issue’s about being against gay marriage. It’s about being for traditional marriage and articulating the reason that’s important. You have to have a basic family structure. There’s never been a civilization that has rewritten what marriage and family means and survived. So there is a sense in which, you know, it’s one thing to say if people want to live a different way, that’s their business. But when you want to redefine what family means or what marriage means, then that’s an issue that should require some serious and significant debate in the public square.

You mean, kind of like forcing people from different cultures to accept your definition of ‘family’, sort of like that? This is one case where the attempt to hide the contempt for the rights for a group is obvious. Huckabee is pandering to the religious right and their irrational fear that homosexuals will some how destroy society and the sanctity of marriage by getting married themselves.

If anything has supposedly upset the sanctity of marriage, it would have been the introduction of ‘divorce’ during the reign of King Henry VIII when the Vatican refused to annul his marriage. Of course, it wasn’t such a big deal then because people had greater things to worry about, such as just… surviving.

The 20th century saw the surge in the rate of divorce. This is tied closely to women’s suffrage and the feminist movement, that gave them equal rights, as well as the right to be equal to men. This was a good thing, but it did open up the way for people to get divorced because the woman wasn’t forced to rely on the man who could determine if she was able to leave. She was no longer forced into subservience.

Homosexuals have not done anything to ‘violate’ the sanctity of marriage. Heterosexuals are very capable of doing it on their own and are very professional about it. In fact, they can be so good at it, that they may marry and divorce multiple times, (ie: Rudy Guiliani, another Republican candidate). Heterosexuals have proven they are very able in their destruction of the sacred institution known in some circles as “Holy Matrimony”. Even more, sans divorce, heterosexuals are more than able on their own to destroy it by engaging in extra-marital affairs with others, regardless of gender.

Of course, any good conservative Christian will ignore this because well, it doesn’t count because it’s not homosexuals trying to invade the realm of marriage and pollute the minds of young children, letting them know that homosexuality is not some fearsome boogeyman that will leap out from under your bed at night and consume you whole.

For the same group, the title of ‘civil union’ is not acceptable either…

Because it really is a precursor toward marriage. Once the government says this relationship is in essence similar to or equal to a marriage—we’re not going to call it that, but that’s what it is—and you grant it the same basic rights as marriage, then you’ve effectively done it.

Maybe because it is the same thing. If it smells like dung, it looks like dung then it’s probably, dung. You can call it whatever you want and it’ll still be the same in the end. But is that really a reason why it can’t be granted? In fact, can’t ‘civil union’ be applied to heterosexual couples? Especially to those who loath the idea of marriage in front of the clergy? Or for those who just don’t believe in all that meaningless ritualistic hocus-pocus?

Along the same vein, but moving on, I can think of at least one nation where there is homosexual marriage and society hasn’t fallen apart, in fact, there were two notable marriages that occurred under the new law and were publicised when they did happen. I speak of course of Canada. Same sex marriage is legal here and two notable public figures who have on two different occasions tied the same sex knot are Scott Brison and Greg Smitherman.

Other nations that have legalised gay marriage, only to see society tick along as if nothing happened were: Belgium, Netherlands, South Africa and the strongly Catholic nation of Spain. Plenty more have legalised civil unions, the first step toward legalising marriage for homosexuals. These nations include: Andorra, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Slovenia, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, and Uruguay.

It should be noted that of the nations listed where civil unions are legal, there are a few that are paving the way for same sex marriage, but the issue is being debated at the moment. France, UK, Portugal, Finland and New Zealand are paving the way for the final phase in their nations, yet it has not rained fire and brimstone on those nations for their decision to make that leap forward.

Yet there are still candidates in the US that seem to think that being gay is some how a bad thing; that gay marriage will cause civilization to implode on itself, that we will incur “God’s” wrath for engaging in such sin; as though Genesis, Leviticus, Deuteronomy and other “holy” books are actually true despite being riddled with falsehoods and being nothing more than shallow folklore that has no moral bearing on the modern world. That if we did violate the “word” of “God” that we would burn in hell for all eternity…

Here’s my closing thought for this post: anyone else find it amusing that when politicians are outed for being gay in the US, it’s never the Democrats, it’s always the Republicans? And if there are gay Democrats, they don’t bother to hide it in the first place. Some act like Americans would not accept a gay politician. Yet according to a 1999 Gallup poll:

• 95% would vote for a woman
• 94% would vote for a Catholic
• 92% would vote for a Jew
• 92% would vote for a black
• 79% would vote for a Mormon
• 79% would vote for a homosexual
• 49% would vote for an Atheist