Rand Paul and Ron Widen managed to stop the renewal of the so called “Patriot Act” yesterday blocking it’s renewal and kicking Obama in the nuts. Not optimistic it will stay that way or that any data collection will actually stop. I think Obama will keep doing it regardless. After all – it was already illegal before the law expired. But Rand is moving up my list of possibilities as the only Republican I might have to give serious consideration to.
Kind of interesting for those who remember when the shredded the constitution after 9-11 that there were these anthrax letters targeting key senators and the press that helped get the Patriot Act passed in the first place. Did any of you find it interesting that anthrax was back in the news (pentagon ships live anthrax by Fedex) right before another key vote?
I remember at the time writing letters to the editor that if the government ever got these powers they would never let go of them. And I was right.
RP might have moved up on your list but not mine. I’m more of a conservative Libertarian and he doesn’t do it for me except when it comes to things like this. I would much rather see Walker (#1) and then Rubio (#2) and then Carson (#3).
But nothing pisses me off more than the NSA spying on everyone.
Walker is nub who happened to be at the right place at the right time. Any time the media asks him a complicated question, he doesn’t know what to say and melts down.
So it’ll be Rubio.
I just watched Walker in an interview with Maria Bartiromo and for the first time in a long time I finally saw someone answer all the questions without stumbling and looking like a total idiot.
Even Carson hasn’t done that. Rubio, maybe.
RP has moved up on my list, even-though this is more likely not about standing up for constitutional rights and more about his calculated effort at popular appeal and his presidential run.
For me I am looking for someone who is demonstrated to be smart, clever and level headed and who is intellectually committed to truly advancing the population core, the voters, the 99%ers over the 1%ers. However, Elizabeth Warren is not running.
Whatever dude, you’ll vote for whoever your party nominates and that’s that!
We need not indulge your primate cavemen thoughts further.
Enough said.
“Enough said”, yep Walker has pwn’d you!
Pimping for Walker now?
You’ve said nothing but pointless nonsense, yet it certainly is enough!
NSA’s current legal understanding of SPYing has ended, but has the SPYing ended?
Really, how do we know if the NSA still continuing as before, really???
The only way we knew what the NSA was doing in the first place was Edward Snowden “illegal” but patriotic revelations. Pre-Snowden, the Govt ‘lied’ to the American public about NSA spying!!
NSA never reveals its activities, it’s classified. Not everyone in congress is briefed and those that are, have clearances and can’t discuss what they have been told!! For congress to keep their clearances, they can’t publicly air their concerns or discuss anything in public as these things are classified.
Our democracy is anything but transparent!! If you think, believe that NSA would never do anything illegal; you don’t understand CIA/NSA/DoD/Pentagon black ops history!!!!
It’s completely awesome that RP successfully did an imitation of “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington”; but, how do we know NSA stopped anything???????????????????????????
Do we know that the NSA isn’t just giving us their best dog and pony show?????
Given the regularly demonstrated willingness of our Government to con and lie to Americans (Think GWB lies/lied about IRAQ weapons of mass destruction, LBJ lies about the Tet Offensive …) to get what it wants and with Snowden in Russia, who could and/or would tell us?????
Imitating Vladimir Putin, our government viciously prosecutes those that publically oppose Washington lies with truth!!!!!
Conspiracy HEY::: This question, HOW DO WE KNOW or CAN WE BELIEVE THE NSA STOPPED can be a DU post in of itself!!!!!!
Dude, as a douchebag you are challenged to answer your own [stupid] questions.
Surprisingly, I think you’ll figure out government agencies need funding for their activities and then there is the meddlesome court system we have which actually does still work despite what talk radio tells you.
Hey Dufus Hmeyers, rhetorical questions to hard for you?
Talk radio, what a hoot and figures drooling eejits like you listening to it. So pwn’d!
An unchained NSA… Concerning.
Kicking Obama in the Nuts… Well deserved.
Being able to kick Hillary in the Nuts… Priceless!
Fire Eye…
Rand Paul would have meant no war with Libya and no Al Qaeda at the shores of Italy, trying to reclaim land lost centuries ago.
No war with Syria, giving Assad a free hand to fight ISIS.
Going back further it would have meant no Iraq war as well, meaning no ISIS, and no Iranian influence in Iraq.
It also would mean no Kurdistan, which hasn’t yet happened but I think is just a matter of time as ISIS is close to taking Baghdad.
So you are the master of what would happened with pretend history?
Awesome!
Except people like Marc Perkel probably have their own pretend revisionist history too!
The problem with pretend revisionist history is that everyone has theirs!
Khadafy was doing fine until we intervened at the behest of the French.
It’s no question to the intelligent that this Obama administration is a complete disaster on foreign relations.
Set us back decades.
No better domestically either.
I fail to understand why the Democrats aren’t running someone hauling around less dung than Hillary. Just the mismanagement/corruption at the Clinton charity ought be enough to cause anyone wanting better government to run the other way. Yes I do understand nobody has proven they broke the law but their tax returns prove they collect donations to help the poor and then keep nearly all of it.
Rand has climbed on my acceptability list. He isn’t my personal favorite but any of the Republican candidates comes out ahead of Hillary.
Hillary will do awesome in the polls.
Until it is time for people to vote — which is a long, long, long time away.
When Democrats go to the polls, they will want an actual Democrat.
Which is why she needs to be “inevitable”.
And it worked out great last time too!
I can’t imagine any American patriot voting for a party that that ecstatically swoons over a couple Dicks and GWB, is beholden to rich Republican donors hell bent on sending America’s middle class on an unapologetic Globally Competitive Spiraling Race to the Bottom with their uncritical belief of Neoliberalism (a doctrine that market exchange is an ethic in itself that is a guise for plutocratic dictatorship)!
…”Neoliberalism (a doctrine that market exchange is an ethic in itself that is a guise for plutocratic dictatorship)”…
Whose definition is that?
Obviously the term ‘Neoncon’ and ‘Neolib’ are totally made up terms that are pejoratives of a nature known only to those who use them.
There is this great tool, called google which can do worldwide document searches from your desk, have you heard of it?
Neoliberalism is a religious belief system of Reaganomics trickle-down economists and believers like Milton Friedman, George Stigler, Ronald Coase and Gary Becker.
“I remember at the time writing letters to the editor that if the government ever got these powers they would never let go of them. And I was right.”
Seems to me that every damned wicked weirdo Republican has agreed with that very same assessment at one time or another too — once government gets hold of something, they never let it go. Though I’m sure you will be quick to disagree since you can never be wrong about your favorite RELIGION!
However, consider this: TAXES! More specifically, INCOME TAXES that you can thank your beloved asses for since it was a majority of DEMOCRATS and a DEMOCRAT President (Woodrow Wilson) who decided that U.S. citizens weren’t giving enough to the government. They even decided to institute a new Gestapo too — the IRS and that Federal Reserve. And it’s not like the asses didn’t start taxing Social Security either with your hero Al Gore casting the deciding vote to take even more from that measly little pile of pennies they already taxed when you were working. But don’t worry. More regulation and certainly MORE POWER are always the answer — if you’re an ASS! (And it’s not like the Republican’s exactly help themselves drive those points home either. So I do understand why you are so confused and think veiled communism is the answer.)
Though, I too applaud Rand Paul. Nice to see we agree on SOMETHING!
Wow, what’s it like to be pwn’d and have your head jammed so far up some plutocrat’s ass, you’ve become their apologetic bitch?
Why are republicans always pushing corporate life robing WARfare (Wall Street or Pentagon), with their lobbyist pushing corporate welfare schemes, taking the little middle class wealth that’s left and making the rich ever richer? Cheney with his Halliburton handouts, … HOW EVIL, self-deceptive and UNPATRIOTIC can you be?
You must really like this race to the bottom, Rove Repukes are pushing!
Wow, Woodrow Wilson even, did we have highways then?
You can thank Dwight Eisenhower Highways and his Federal Aid Highway Act for federal fuel and tire taxes to pay for construction and maintenance costs of Interstate Highways!
Maybe you want all roads and bridges privatized with ever higher tolls collected for private Companies who then press states to assume the financial risk of traffic not meeting expectations (because people avoid tolls). Maybe you wish Repuke Chris Christie would arbitrary close more bridge roads?
Quit sniffing each other’s butts.
They both stink equally.
Wilson did a lot worse than that.
Sedition Act forbade Americans from criticizing their own government in a time of war. Citizens could not “utter, print, write or publish any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language” about the government or the military. The Postmaster General was given the authority to revoke the mailing privileges of those who disobeyed. About 75 periodicals were were shut down by the government in this way and many others were given warnings.
Department of Justice arrested tens of thousands without just cause. One was not safe even within the walls of one’s own home to criticize the Wilson administration. A letter to federal attorneys and marshals said that citizens had nothing to fear as long as they “Obey the law; keep your mouth shut.” In fact, the Justice Department created the precursor to the Gestapo called the American Protective League. Its job was to spy on fellow citizens and turn in “seditious” persons or draft dodgers. In September of 1918 in NYC, the APL rounded up about 50,000 people.
The Palmer raids were later.
In 1915, in his address to Congress, Wilson declared, “The gravest threats against our national peace and safety have been uttered within our own borders.
About 175,000 Americans were arrested for failing to be patriotic.
NFS, is Wilson running?
What’s your point; you like history so much, instead going back 97 years to 1918, why not go back 120 more years to the 1798 Alien and Sedition Acts signed into law by President John Adams??
Here’s more on the failures of American presidents. Very embarrassing and not taught in our education system.
http://civilliberty.about.com/od/historyprofiles/tp/Worst-Presidents-Ever.htm
I applaud Rand Paul for fighting for what’s right. Not one terrorist or “lone wolf” was thwarted by the NSA’s collection of meta data. Huge waste of taxpayers money.
I’m not the one who brought him up.
What did Ron Widen(sic) do other than ask questions to people in charge that he knew they had to lie about in public?
“All great ideas are dangerous.” Oscar Wilde
They’re trying to make everything less dangerous and have no great ideas.
Perkel blogs, and they reauthorize the program.
thanks for sharing
See if you can connect the dots…
Now that the Patriot Act has essentially ended (expired it’s financing), watch how many news stories you see about “terrorists” and the increased threat we are all at. Either that or the complete lack of any other news — particularly any news coming from Washington.
WATCH!
Who is Ron Widen?