The end of America...

[Neil Young]

...at the hands of its own President.

Sorry, I don't how to post youtube vids so you click on the image so here's the link instead. It's sobering viewing. If you're a Bush supporter or apologist I'd be really interested to know how this legislation can be seen as anything other than an all-out assault on the founding principles of the USA - it's both unamerican and anti-American as well as being indefensible in anything calling itself a democracy subject to the rule of law.

CLICK (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igycXBseoAg&eurl=)

[Hollowman]

Not a fantastic situation. Although, doesn't the DTA provide all enemy combatants leave to appeal against the determination that they are enemy combatants? Which is basically the great writ by any other name.

[Snigger]

I would question the founding principles of the USA as well - the right to bear arms for one.

Anyone who doesn't think George W Bush is a fruitloop is as mad dubbya himself, and any nation voting a moron in twice is fucked anyway - so that the US and UK in the shit.

[Neil Young]

I don't know - are they allowed to see the "evidence" on which the classification is based? To whom do they appeal?

To be honest I really think it's a terrifying development. The leader of the world's only superpower (for the time being) is able to assume dictatorial powers - imprisonment without trial, secret arrests, guilt by association, the use of torture...

It's not just ironic it's all being done in the name of freedom and peace. It's stomach-curdling.

[Tom]

They're not allowed to see the evidence against them. Basically you can distort or fabricate anything you like in order to make a case. What this really does is bring US judicial process in line with it's foreign policy where any-old made up evidence is used as justification for invasion.

[Neil Young]

Let's not forget that some of these things happen here. Just last week it was discovered only by chance that the intelligence services were giving contradictory evidence in two separate cases. It only came to light because the defence lawyer happened to be acting for both defendants.

Also, where government actions have been found illegal by the courts it's often been down to European law. In other words our historic freedoms are protected not by British courts but by European ones.

[PeachSalsa]

Bush's popularity here is low, finally. He has nearly ruined America. I'm amazed that someone hasn't tried to kill him. Not that I think that is the right thing to do, or the answer. It's just expected.

His main objective was to become a dictator and so far is achieving his goal. He has broken every single law we have and nothing has been done. Not so much as a slap on the wrist. He just keeps on going.

I have no answer for it. I didn't vote for either Bush, and I do vote. I do have friends that voted for him and now regret it and hate him. The man said he spoke to God and was doing God's work. To vote someone like that into office is just asinine. And there are a lot of stupid people in America.

Every day I read about some new offense he has committed. I hear people complain, but nothing is being done. I cannot fathom it. The apathy of the American people is astounding. It makes me sick. I am outraged at nearly everything he says and does. I keep expecting him to revoke our right to free speech. Which will be pretty close if he passes into law that ISP's keep a record of where you have been on the internet.

I have no answers. I have no excuses. I still love my country and continue to think it's the best place to live. However, I despise our President, always have and always will. I can only hope we elect someone with some degree of humanity about them. Because Bush doesn't have any.

[Neil Young]

:handshake:

[Rich]

When reading this thread, I seem to have that Razorlight song playing in my head.

A combination of public apathy and greed for power is allowing civil freedoms to be taken away, at an alarming rate.

[Snigger]

I'd like to see a US president elected who puts his own country and the environment ahead of fucked up foreign policy. There are parts of the US that are nothing short of third world and yet nothing is done about whilst billions $'s are spunked on killing people in countries most Americans had probably never heard of.

[The Wolfman]

I'd like to see a US president elected who puts his own country and the environment ahead of fucked up foreign policy. There are parts of the US that are nothing short of third world and yet nothing is done about whilst billions $'s are spunked on killing people in countries most Americans had probably never heard of.

er...sounds a little bit like here too mate.

[Snigger]

Yes, his Toneyness is just as bad - but Britain doesn't have anything like the poverty the US neither is it fucking up the environment in anything like the scale the US is and with oil baron Bush at the helm nothing will be done about it.

[The Wolfman]

i tell you the worst thing though, if or when labour lose the next general election.......the tories will be in!!!:(

Have you fucking seen his shadow cabinet - absolute slimy little *****, make mandelson look normal.

And you just know we will go back to being a boom, bust economy too.

I think its better just to keep labour in and hope that the liberals come closer to knocking the tories into third.

[Red_hot]

I agree Jules.

[Red_Polo]

It's times like this I miss ctlovesred and snuffletrog

The snuffletrog may have been annoying but it was interesting to see just how the mind of a deluded person works

[The Wolfman]

It's times like this I miss ctlovesred and snuffletrog

The snuffletrog may have been annoying but it was interesting to see just how the mind of a deluded person works


looks like Paul S can replace him then.... :D

[The Wolfman]

I agree Jules.

I see it in the same way kylie would "better the devil you know" :handshake: :D

[Neil Young]

It's times like this I miss ctlovesred and snuffletrog

The snuffletrog may have been annoying but it was interesting to see just how the mind of a deluded person works
"Buddy boy...Saddam...world's fucked up...no sense of humour some people...hippie dreamer...they attacked us...7th Cavalry...lighten up bud...good ole boys...yee haw...where's my banjo...squeal like a pig..."

:rolleyes:

[Snigger]

i tell you the worst thing though, if or when labour lose the next general election.......the tories will be in!!!:(

Have you fucking seen his shadow cabinet - absolute slimy little *****, make mandelson look normal.

And you just know we will go back to being a boom, bust economy too.

I think its better just to keep labour in and hope that the liberals come closer to knocking the tories into third.

All politicians are the same - even the parties are the same now so I don't really care who gets in as long as it's not Labour. New Labour are more conservative than the conservatives in any case and the thought of Brown as PM makes me shudder.

[The Wolfman]

yeah i dont like brown either but the thought of anyone who is a tory makes me shudder.

[Snigger]

yeah i dont like brown either


Ket will have yo ass.

[Red_Polo]

"Buddy boy...Saddam...world's fucked up...no sense of humour some people...hippie dreamer...they attacked us...7th Cavalry...lighten up bud...good ole boys...yee haw...where's my banjo...squeal like a pig..."

:rolleyes:

:haha:

Right I've had my dose, don't do any more of that for another month or I'll get internad rabies :D

[CharlieMansonsSquint]

I seem to have that Razorlight song playing in my head.


Yeah, I like that song.

[Neil Young]

:haha:

Right I've had my dose, don't do any more of that for another month or I'll get internad rabies :D
He has spoken on the subject in "the other place", would you like to hear his, er, opinions?

[CharlieMansonsSquint]

...at the hands of its own President.

Sorry, I don't how to post youtube vids so you click on the image so here's the link instead. It's sobering viewing. If you're a Bush supporter or apologist I'd be really interested to know how this legislation can be seen as anything other than an all-out assault on the founding principles of the USA - it's both unamerican and anti-American as well as being indefensible in anything calling itself a democracy subject to the rule of law.

CLICK (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igycXBseoAg&eurl=)

Just watched this, absolutely shocking. The fact that laws like this can be passed without opposition makes a mockery of what Bush is trying to achieve; worldwide democracy. Being a stupid American no doubt he'd fail to see the irony that the legacy of 9/11 wasn't the globalization of terrorism in the mass public consciousness, but the beginning of the end for democracy in the home of the free. Now they are anything but.

[Abdul Alhazred]

American presidents have always acted as sovereigns when it suits them, but none of them have ben shitheels of the same ordure as Dubya.

The thread title is interesting - coming on the same day as;

- Bush announcing that America is pushing ahead with the militarization of space
- reports projecting that unlike Western Europe, the American population (and therefore its economic influence) will continue to grow.

I'd say America as a nation is anything but finished.

America as any kind of paragon of an enlightened nation is a different matter; you could point to various acts from 1913 onwards as nails in its coffin.

[Neil Young]

American presidents have always acted as sovereigns when it suits them, but none of them have ben shitheels of the same ordure as Dubya.

The thread title is interesting - coming on the same day as;

- Bush announcing that America is pushing ahead with the militarization of space
- reports projecting that unlike Western Europe, the American population (and therefore its economic influence) will continue to grow.

I'd say America as a nation is anything but finished.

America as any kind of paragon of an enlightened nation is a different matter; you could point to various acts from 1913 onwards as nails in its coffin.
I do believe there's a difference in kind now but I'm no expert on American history. I'd certainly say McCarthyism was "unamerican" in the way I'd use the term but there was opposition then and it wasn't led by the executive and it didn't suspend the rule of law. Now while maybe America as a nation isn't finished, America as an ideal, which is how it likes to see itself, is for as long as it behaves this way. It is no longer the land of the free let alone a beacon for the world.

Al Qaeda brought down the Twin Towers of Mammon; Bush has felled the Statue of Liberty.

[PeachSalsa]

I do believe there's a difference in kind now but I'm no expert on American history. I'd certainly say McCarthyism was "unamerican" in the way I'd use the term but there was opposition then and it wasn't led by the executive and it didn't suspend the rule of law. Now while maybe America as a nation isn't finished, America as an ideal, which is how it likes to see itself, is for as long as it behaves this way. It is no longer the land of the free let alone a beacon for the world.

Al Qaeda brought down the Twin Towers of Mammon; Bush has felled the Statue of Liberty.

:handshake:

[Hollowman]

As far as America as an ideal is concerned, the founding fathers reneged on the Declaration five minutes after the war was over. America as an ideal is just that. An ideal.

[johnp]

:rolleyes:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irOFAjsnSg0

[Abdul Alhazred]

As far as America as an ideal is concerned, the founding fathers reneged on the Declaration five minutes after the war was over. America as an ideal is just that. An ideal.

You could argue it was dead before that. As I've pointed out elsewhere, the declaration opens with the noble assertion that all men are created equal, and then a few paragraphs later refers to the Indians as 'merciless savages'.

[PeachSalsa]

The founding fathers did not consider Native Americans as humans. They considered them animals. And my founding fathers were British were they not? So don't blame that on Americans.

[Abdul Alhazred]

I do believe there's a difference in kind now but I'm no expert on American history. I'd certainly say McCarthyism was "unamerican" in the way I'd use the term but there was opposition then and it wasn't led by the executive and it didn't suspend the rule of law.

Only because the rule of law was already suspended at the time.

http://www.barefootsworld.net/war_ep1.html

Foreword to Senate Report 93-549, 1973

Since March 9, 1933, the United States has been in a state of declared national emergency. In fact, there are now in effect four presidentially-proclaimed states of national emergency: In addition to the national emergency declared by President Roosevelt in 1933, there are also the national emergency proclaimed by President Truman on December 16, 1950, during the Korean conflict, and the states of national emergency declared by President Nixon on March 23, 1970, and August 15, 1971.

These proclamations give force to 470 provisions of Federal law. These hundreds of statutes delegate to the President extraordinary powers, ordinarily exercised by the Congress, which affect the lives of American citizens in a host of all-encompassing manners. This vast range of powers, taken together, confer enough authority to rule the country without reference to normal Constitutional processes.

Under the powers delegated by these statutes, the President may:
seize property; organize and control the means of production; seize commodities; assign military forces abroad; institute martial law; seize and control all transportation and communication; regulate the operation of private enterprise; restrict travel; and, in a plethora of particular ways, control the lives of all American citizens.


There was an act in the mid-70's that ended this, and set limits on the duration of a state of emergency, but i don't have time to do a proper search on wiki at the moment :D

[Abdul Alhazred]

The founding fathers did not consider Native Americans as humans. They considered them animals.





That was my point - some ideal.

And my founding fathers were British were they not? So don't blame that on Americans.

FLMAO - so it's us (the colonial oppressors) who should be celebrating the 4th July?

[Red_Polo]

And my founding fathers were British were they not? So don't blame that on Americans.


LOL :blameshiftingshakey:

[PeachSalsa]

The Declaration of Independence was written/signed in July 1776. The Peace of Paris was not signed until September 3, 1783, then making the former colonies The United States of America. Until then, the people of the colonies were considered British subjects.

I am not trying to shift blame to anyone or anywhere. No country has an exemplary history. Not the US and not the UK. But the beginning of our history has it's roots in British history.

But if people want to blame America for the world's ills then there is nothing I can do about it. Hate America and Americans all you want. It will not change anything.

[Abdul Alhazred]

The Declaration of Independence was written/signed in July 1776. The Peace of Paris was not signed until September 3, 1783, then making the former colonies The United States of America. Until then, the people of the colonies were considered British subjects.

I am not trying to shift blame to anyone or anywhere. No country has an exemplary history. Not the US and not the UK. But the beginning of our history has it's roots in British history.

But if people want to blame America for the world's ills then there is nothing I can do about it. Hate America and Americans all you want. It will not change anything.

:confused: I wasn't blaming America for anything. I just pointed out that the Declaration of Independence wasn't perfect. And no matter whether it was penned by British Subjects or not, it is quintessentially American.

If I was still on KT I would discuss the matter with smphotog & ctlovesred, I'm sure that they would be delighted to be told that The Declaration of Independence was a British triumph.

:haha:

[PeachSalsa]

Sorry. I just get so tired of all the anti-American bullshit I have to endure on footy forums. It's everywhere. I made the mistake of going by KT to see what was going on, and of course the same shit is posted there by the same people.

I guess I could just stay off the forums all together. I only go here now and YNWA some to lurk. As a rule I do enjoy what I read, but every few months someone just has to attack my country. How often could I post that England is a shit hole before someone got tired of it?

[Abdul Alhazred]

How often could I post that England is a shit hole before someone got tired of it?

:handshake:

I already did - that's why I moved to NZ :D

please don't do a G_Man, i have my reputation to think of
;)

[PeachSalsa]

And here I am thinking of selling my house and moving to England just so I can watch Liverpool play. Guess I'll stay right here. But in truth, I have to admit that America is going down the toilet and Bush is the doing the flushing. At least he is hated here as much as everywhere else.

[Red_Polo]

The Declaration of Independence was written/signed in July 1776. The Peace of Paris was not signed until September 3, 1783, then making the former colonies The United States of America. Until then, the people of the colonies were considered British subjects.

I am not trying to shift blame to anyone or anywhere. No country has an exemplary history. Not the US and not the UK. But the beginning of our history has it's roots in British history.

But if people want to blame America for the world's ills then there is nothing I can do about it. Hate America and Americans all you want. It will not change anything.

ROFL easy tiger! :D

Take it easy mate! I'm not trying to attack your country any more than you are trying to attack mine. You can talk the technicalities all you like but the fact is that they were American patriots, American revolutionaries even. Or do you also consider Michael Collins British? Identities have more substance than to be shaped by just what piece of paper was signed when.

That last para is seriously paranoid mate. All I said was 'LOL :blameshiftingshakey:' in reference to one specific thing and suddenly you feel the need to give a ticking off to all the wretched people who you think 'hate American and Americans'? :o

Just chillax a bit bud we're all friends here! :cool:

[Red_Polo]

Sorry. I just get so tired of all the anti-American bullshit I have to endure on footy forums. It's everywhere. I made the mistake of going by KT to see what was going on, and of course the same shit is posted there by the same people.

I guess I could just stay off the forums all together. I only go here now and YNWA some to lurk. As a rule I do enjoy what I read, but every few months someone just has to attack my country. How often could I post that England is a shit hole before someone got tired of it?


Sorry only just read this. People rarely post with the intention of attacking America as a whole even on here, although I can completely understand how you can construe it that way at times. Whilst I abhor the Bush administration, I don't buy into any of the hackneyed stereotypes of Americans, and like many people in this country, I appreciate many aspects of American culture. Take my avatar for starters ;)

[JRG]

I wonder if the American people really know what's happened here?
I have always had faith in the general common sense of the American people, howver I now think they are a numbed as the British People by a diet of reality TV and con men religious fundamentalists all wrapped in in a ludicroulsy simplistic tabloid paper.

This could effectively end political opposition in the US if the citizens of the US aren't careful.

[Snigger]

Sorry. I just get so tired of all the anti-American bullshit I have to endure on footy forums. It's everywhere. I made the mistake of going by KT to see what was going on, and of course the same shit is posted there by the same people.

I guess I could just stay off the forums all together. I only go here now and YNWA some to lurk. As a rule I do enjoy what I read, but every few months someone just has to attack my country. How often could I post that England is a shit hole before someone got tired of it?

I don't think people hate America as a geographical landscape, or the majority of the citizens of America - although the jingoistic whooping and wailing gets little tiresome. The problem is the way America conducts itself in the world, it's big brother bully tactics and it's fuckwit of a leader - unfortunately everyone gets a splash of the tar brush.

[PeachSalsa]

All I can do is vote and try to keep asshole idiots like Bush out of office. But people are so ignorant of the world and too involved in their own tiny universe to care about the rest. It's sad, frustrating and makes me rage. Even at my friends that are so complacent they don't care that the rights of their children are being taken away. Next month, next year, the next generation, they don't care about. It's only now that has their attention and who is going to win American Idol or marry the bachelor.

[Tom]

I wonder if the American people really know what's happened here?
I have always had faith in the general common sense of the American people, howver I now think they are a numbed as the British People by a diet of reality TV and con men religious fundamentalists all wrapped in in a ludicroulsy simplistic tabloid paper.

This could effectively end political opposition in the US if the citizens of the US aren't careful.


As Jonathan Turley points out:

"People have no idea how significant this is. Really a time of shame this is for the American system.—The strange thing is that we have become sort of constitutional couch potatoes. The Congress just gave the President despotic powers and you could hear the yawn across the country as people turned to Dancing With the Stars. It's otherworldly..People clearly don't realize what a fundamental change it is about who we are as a country. What happened today changed us. And I'm not too sure we're gonna change back anytime soon."

[Tom]

I don't think people hate America as a geographical landscape, or the majority of the citizens of America - although the jingoistic whooping and wailing gets little tiresome. The problem is the way America conducts itself in the world, it's big brother bully tactics and it's fuckwit of a leader - unfortunately everyone gets a splash of the tar brush.

I don't hate americans. Indeed I have US relatives in NYC and maryland and love going over there.

I do however hate american foreign policy, the patriot act, the blatent disregard for environmental issues to protect big business self-interest etc.

[Tom]

It's real, it's happening here and now:

http://static.flickr.com/41/85519166_23c3359137.jpg


Plot Summary for
They Live (1988)

Nada, a down-on-his-luck construction worker, discovers a pair of special sunglasses. Wearing them, he is able to see the world as it really is: people being bombarded by media and government with messages like "Stay Asleep", "No Imagination", "Submit to Authority". Even scarier is that he is able to see that some usually normal-looking people are in fact ugly aliens in charge of the massive campaign to keep humans subdued.

Summary written by Melissa Portell {mportell@s-cwis.unomaha.edu}

John Nada is a man without job who walks around a big American city trying to find something to do. He finally finds a job as a worker and a place to spend the nights, but one day something terrible happens to him. John discovers a pair of sun-glasses through which he can see the true face of people. Many persons in this city are in fact aliens (from the Andromeda) and most of them are important members of our society. They keep humans in ignorance and they rule our world as they like. Nada must find the rest of the men that know what's happening (those who made the strange sun-glasses) and join them in the fight against the aliens...

[Abdul Alhazred]

we've got one that can SEE

[Tom]

:handshake: ...............I think Dunk's one of them

[Slim]

I have come here to chew gum and kick ass. And I'm all out of gum.

[glynner]

You know what's funny, Neil ? There really hasn't been all that much fuss about the habeas corpus law being changed in America at all. It's kind of flabbergasting; I just feel that people here have seen so many waves of political ineptitiude that this recent development is kind of viewed as one more wave. And they have become numbed to it. I honestly think the phonetapping scandal got far more press.

[Neil Young]

It is amazing. I wonder if the rightwing shock jocks mentioned it. :rolleyes:

There is a conspiracy of silence among the media, you really have to question why.