Tomgram, salvation is destruction

The headline to the Tomgram article says it all,  We Have to Destroy Our Constitution to Save It.  It's one of those great lies such as Bush the younger's abandoning free market principles to save it.  It has no basis in truth, but is accepted by a segment of the population.

No one to the Neutralist's knowledge actually said that about the constitution other than Tom, but it is the general tone of partisans of the security state. 

Bush did make his remark.  Unlike a lot of people who were born with a hatred for him, his family and party, The Neutralist doesn't think he was stupid.  Neither do we believe him a genius.  He possessed the cunning of the political class.  There is a very limited free market in this country.  In real terms, Bush did nothing to save it, nor did he have any intention of doing so.  He was bailing out the banker class.  His remark of saving it was him being cute as was, oh like say, Bill Clinton when he announced the end of the big government era.

The security state partisans do claim to be preserving our freedoms, but they talk more on the order of keeping us safe.  They say we have not heard about the events they prevented.  We sure know about the guys they set up for a fall.  If they're so effective, then there should have been no Boston Marathon bombing.  After all, they were tipped off by the Russkies.

So if the record of catching the bad guys is, as they say in Scotland, not proven, what is the rationale for scooping up all our phone records?

In truth, we do not have an answer, only guesses.  The people who are doing this are bureaucrats even if they wear general's stars.  We would not want to say they are born rotters and that is what they do.  They may have signed on believing in the goodness of the mision.  No matter the state of their souls, they believe in the mission.  If they don't, at least they serve it.  Governments and bureaucracies do not always trust the citzenry.  It is not far from that to a for your own good attitude.

It is even shorter to a we are trashing the Bill of Rights to save it.  Are they mad.  Sure, but the real crazies don't go to asylums.  If you can write a plausible paper, appear cogent on C span, you should have no worries about keeping a post no matter how many files you want Leviathan to scoop up.

The Tomgram applauds the activity of the people who exposed COINTELPRO and the paper that exposed the operation.  What has changed?  More to the point, who has changed?  There is a tiny burst of surprise that the Clintons have an enemies list.  Not a big topic in the media.  When Nixon had them it was proof of complete evil, as was just about anything he did.  Equally hated and reviled was J. Edgar Hoover and his FBI. 

To go after them was truth to power.  Was it really?  After all, the media applauded the actions of the operatives.  We don't know, but no matter, the security state at that time was a fraction of what it is now, but it was not good.

Now, the great and good are not rising up in opposition as they did even under Bush.  Not too many have much to say against this administration.  Why?  Is it a cult of personality for someone who really does not have much of a personality?

Tom and Glenn have to be commended.  It has to be a bit lonely, but that is heroism.

Chris Hedges sues Obama over indefinite detention-Has nice words for Santorum

Below is a video of Chris Hedges.  It is an interview by Amy Goodman of Democracy Now
.  I am not a man of the left, nor am I a small d democrat.  As a constitutionalist, surely there are many things Amy, Chris and moi disagree on.  There is, however, not much in this video I can gainsay.  I do think a better choice of words would have been corporativist elite than corporate elites.  It may be a quibble, but many big corporations do not have the standing that say Goldman or GE or Morgan do in influencing or controlling policy.

Yet in light of the fact that the security establishment did not want the indefinite detention aspects of the bill, his deduction that elite fear is the driver is not something to be dismissed.  In truth it scares the Neutralist all the more.  In the long run, it cannot succeed and points up how brittle the system is that it perceives this as necessary.  For a time, it will cause much suffering.  People this desperate have crossed a Rubicon.

Of course this might be a declaration that we have lost overseas.  After all, were "we not fighting them over there so we did not have to fight them over there?"  Maybe that should have been all along, "We are fighting them over there so we don't have to fight ourselves over here."

Other small observations: has Mitt Romney ever read the bill of rights?  I thought Rick Santorum a mindless chickenhawk opportunist, but give the lad his due.  He explained our rights under the constitution as well as Chris might have.

Do you see anything? Moi, nothing. David Pakman and Peter Ingemi do not confront the elephants in the room

The last day of the year and I am driving on Route 9 here in the People's Republic of Massachusetts from Wormtown to the Holy City of Noho.  This is truly a privilege as I get to listen to the radio and go from the loony right to the vapid left in one drive.

First up is Mr. Peter Ingemi, DaTechGuy on WCRN.  He did not talk tech, but politics as is his wont.  He sounds like what he is, a tea partier who was downsized and moved on.  He does not like Ronnie Paul because he won't save us from the muzzies or something.

As Worcester receded, and I got closer to Happy Valley.  Mr. David Pakman's voice got clearer on WHMP.  He is a bit more focused in his weltanschaung.  Ronnie had misgivings about evolution and ergo is not fit to be president.  Your man has a point.  Washington, Adams and Jefferson never heard of Darwin and they sucked as presidents and human beings.

Saturday is a talk radio ghetto.  I may have been one of the pairs only listeners.  Guys in working class Worcester are out doing something.  The cool people out west are listening to Bob and Ray, I mean Tom and Ray and Car Talk from the Ministry of Information.

It has been a hard few years for our country.  The average person's net worth is way down.  Still, no matter how hard it is, there is no one in this country so poor that they cannot afford an elephant in their living room to ignore.  The president has signed the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012.  If you agree with Glenn Greenwald, this is about as big a deal as it gets constitutionally.

El Presidente signs it today and nada from either Mutt or Jeff.  Now, I suspect the techie likes it because, gosh, we gotta be secure and he is always tired of hiding under the bed.  The bad news is who signed it.

Pakman, it is a little tougher.  You had George Bush and all his wars and now you have the demi-god and the wars have not changed (other than some cosmetic withdrawls).  An honest man would have to say Obama was a fraud.  Well, an honest man would say that.

As we head into the 12th year of the Bush/Obama administration maybe Rodney King couldn't get us to all get along, but there is at least some consensus in the Ingemi/Pakman Axis.

I believe in evolution, but opposing the NDAA and not believing evo is okay with me.  Being for NDAA and believing in NDAA is evidence of personal devolution.

David Pakman does his best to be the smarmiest guy on WHMP.  The competition is fierce.   Learn more about him here.

You can learn more about Mr. Ingemi here.

In truth, I may have not heard it because I was listening in the car.  If I am mistaken and they took the issue on, they have my apology.  If Mr. Pakman called Obama on it, I'll need a pacemaker.

National Defense Authorization Act of 2012-finally and admission that fighting them over there was a sham

The National Defense Authorization Act of 2012 has passed and the president is to sign it.  So we used to say we were fighting them over there so we would not have to fight them over here.  Well the Neutralist never said it.  We believe the whole posture of our so called War on Terror is a scam.  When semi chicken hawk (is a legal guy in the army, medal for paper cuts maybe), Lindsay Graham said the bill would "basically say in law for the first time that the homeland is part of the battlefield" he admitted as much.  If we are at this point, the terrorists have won.
Gene Healy's column, If America is the battleground, nobody has any rights at the Washington Times is worth reading.

Has any congress member, aside from those who voted no, ever read the Constitution?

The can has been kicked

Some defense spending cuts supposedly, but our guess is cosmetic. The faux conservatives say we need to control spending other than being able to drone-bomb and invade everywhere. That, of course means they are not truly serious.

Another episode of debt theater coming soon enough.

It's official, the Constitution is a joke

When the president violates the law of the land and two senators lead the charge in legislation that essentially says, "you go guy" the constitution has ceased to exist. It is now moribund in any meaningful sense.

Ed Shultz, Chickenhawk

So your man, Ed Shultz, who was against any war W wanted has had an epiphany. Libya is a holy crusade according to the big guy. I think we can parse this. Bush devil, Obama god. I looked up himself on wikpedia and can find no evidence that he was ever in the military. Ed Shultz, the Rush Limbaugh chickenhawk of the left with a smaller audience.

Libya is no different from the other wars except this president is consulting congress even less. Shultz gets the Al Smith, no matter how you slice it, it's still baloney award.



Jeremy Scahill takes him to the cleaners.

The King's, er the President's Speech

As the Neutralist, I suppose it is necessary to go on record concerning POTUS' speech explaining his actions as regards Libya for my readers, or maybe reader, or whatever. There is not too much to opine about. Your man said, “When our interests and our values are at stake, we have a responsibility to act.” Of course I didn't come away with any real idea how our values or interests were at stake, but so what.

Now that I know "we have a responsibility to act," Iam ready. After I post this, I shall climb into my jet fighter and fly over to Libya to strafe those MG loyalist bastards. Oh, I don't have a jet and am not really going to strafe anyone. Oh, I get it, the corporate "We." So even though I'm not participating, it is being done in my name.

I am aghast. Just remember the words of a US Senator intoned in 2007, "The President does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation." I wonder who that solon was?

So who the heck is Bonnie Kristian and why is she making sense? Most succinct reasoning about Libya yet

Surfing a few sites this morning I came upon an article at Antiwar.com. It is a piece the Neutralist wishes he wrote. 10 Reasons the US Should Leave Libya NOW is a well ordered repository of the reasons not to be in Libya. If you know somebody who is on the fence or drinking the kool aid on the issue, urge them to read it. You don't change many minds in this life, but if someone is not invincibly ignorant, this should make an impact.

To show my gratitude to the author, I am going to steal part of her article. Specifically, Reason 9:

9. This goes against our founders’ vision for American foreign policy. Let me simply provide a few telling quotes:

“Peace, commerce and honest friendship with all nations; entangling alliances with none.” — Thomas Jefferson

“America does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.” — John Quincy Adams

“No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.” — James Madison

“The constitution vests the power of declaring war in Congress; therefore no offensive expedition of importance can be undertaken until after they shall have deliberated upon the subject and authorized such a measure.” — George Washington

“All wars are follies, very expensive and very mischievous ones.” — Benjamin Franklin

So called conservatives think a conservative foreign policy is "supporting the troops" (of course for them, that does not often mean being one) no matter what silly intervention is proposed. A real conservative war policy is to not get into wars as evinced by the quotes above.

Poor Bonnie Kristian, we have closed the competition. There will be no more entries. Bonnie Kristian is the Neutralist Rookie of the Year. Granted, it is not a much coveted award, and brings neither money or great applause. No matter, it's still less of a joke than the Nobel.

If Bonnie wants an 11th reason the Neutralist can supply one. The only successful exit strategy the US has executed was Viet Nam.

David Corn and a Good War

On the sixth day of Hate Week, after the processions, the speeches, the shouting, the singing, the banners, the posters, the films, the waxworks, the rolling of drums and squealing of trumpets, the tramp of marching feet, the grinding of the caterpillars of tanks, the roar of massed planes, the booming of guns -- after six days of this, when the great orgasm was quivering to its climax and the general hatred of Eurasia had boiled up into such delirium that if the crowd could have got their hands on the 2,000 Eurasian war-criminals who were to be publicly hanged on the last day of the proceedings, they would unquestionably have torn them to pieces -- at just this moment it had been announced that Oceania was not after all at war with Eurasia. Oceania was at war with Eastasia. Eurasia was an ally.

There was, of course, no admission that any change had taken place. Merely it became known, with extreme suddenness and everywhere at once, that Eastasia and not Eurasia was the enemy. Winston was taking part in a demonstration in one of the central London squares at the moment when it happened. It was night, and the white faces and the scarlet banners were luridly floodlit. The square was packed with several thousand people, including a block of about a thousand schoolchildren in the uniform of the Spies. On a scarlet-draped platform an orator of the Inner Party, a small lean man with disproportionately long arms and a large bald skull over which a few lank locks straggled, was haranguing the crowd. A little Rumpelstiltskin figure, contorted with hatred, he gripped the neck of the microphone with one hand while the other, enormous at the end of a bony arm, clawed the air menacingly above his head. His voice, made metallic by the amplifiers, boomed forth an endless catalogue of atrocities, massacres, deportations, lootings, rapings, torture of prisoners, bombing of civilians, lying propaganda, unjust aggressions, broken treaties. It was almost impossible to listen to him without being first convinced and then maddened. At every few moments the fury of the crowd boiled over and the voice of the speaker was drowned by a wild beast-like roaring that rose uncontrollably from thousands of throats. The most savage yells of all came from the schoolchildren. The speech had been proceeding for perhaps twenty minutes when a messenger hurried on to the platform and a scrap of paper was slipped into the speaker's hand. He unrolled and read it without pausing in his speech. Nothing altered in his voice or manner, or in the content of what he was saying, but suddenly the names were different. Without words said, a wave of understanding rippled through the crowd. Oceania was at war with Eastasia! The next moment there was a tremendous commotion. The banners and posters with which the square was decorated were all wrong! Quite half of them had the wrong faces on them. It was sabotage! The agents of Goldstein had been at work! There was a riotous interlude while posters were ripped from the walls, banners torn to shreds and trampled underfoot. The Spies performed prodigies of activity in clambering over the rooftops and cutting the streamers that fluttered from the chimneys. But within two or three minutes it was all over. The orator, still gripping the neck of the microphone, his shoulders hunched forward, his free hand clawing at the air, had gone straight on with his speech. One minute more, and the feral roars of rage were again bursting from the crowd. The Hate continued exactly as before, except that the target had been changed.


From 1984 by George Orwell, Part 2 Chapter 9.

The analogy is not perfect, but it is close enough. David Corn tried to make the case that the Obama war is holy and Bush interventions, not so much. There is no real qualitative difference in the policy of the incumbent and his predecessor. Was Mr. Corn ever in show biz. He is quite a song and dance man.

Welcome year 11 of the Bush Obama administration.

Michael Graham would not know what conservatism was if it bit him on the nose

As I drift towards Boston while driving, I can pick up its radio stations. There is a breed of mostly men who are paid to rant on the airwaves. On of them Michael Graham purports to be a conservative. Loving all those, you know, reactionary things like the rule of law, due process, the Constitution. Yup, he loves those quaint traditions, except when he doesn't.

Today, he called for the extra judicial killing of Julian Assange because "our defense department and diplomacy have been blown up completely. Well, if being shown up to be incompetent in your reports, yes he is right. Mr. Assange released true stuff. He offered to redact anything really dangerous. Like the Pentagon Papers, all of this was going to come out sooner or later anyway.

What it shows up is our Hilary and her Department of State as the kids who are still doing student government. It shows us with a military that really isn't doing much but chasing its tail.

The brave Mr. Graham, who "supports" the troops by not ever being one is a chickenhawk calling on others to kill someone withoug any due process. Oh, America is doomed if there is not enough mayhem.

Mr. Graham, a conservative war and foreign policy is that the only things worth defending are hearth and home. Saving the world is bound to fail. Get the right wikileaks message.

Well, what do you expect. Of course you'd want a president to be a führer if your name was Donald the German

Donnie Deutsch and Pat Buchannan the constitution out the window to protect our soldiers over there. Arrest the Koran burner to protect the troops.

May I point out the supreme irony. A military is supposedly* deployed to protect us. We are not supposed to protect the troops. Anyway, you can watch Mr. Deutsch having the vapors here.

Hat tip to the Daily Burkeman. The link on Burkeman is "this speaks for itself. If a foreign policy gets to the point where we have to arrest our own people, no matter how goofy, because our armed troops, who are pretending to be building a free country overseas might be shot at, then res ipsa loquitur. I agree with Chris Dowd. Donnie and Pat are scarier than Terry.



*our military is not deployed overseas to protect us.

The McChrystal Affair-It's only the first time, we're just feeling our way here

So McChrystal has been relieved. Obama let him go and talk radio is on the president's case. The Neutralist believes the best point in the discussion was made by a retired intel officer, Col. Patrick Lang. The colonel is hardly some fanatic leftie Obamista,

The principle has always been in this country that the federal military is an instrument of state policy. Our tradition is designed to prevent the emergence of "Caesarism" as a method of picking leaders or determining basic national policy. To maintain that principle Macarthur was fired on the advice of George Marshall. What McChrystal has done is to challenge President Obama.

That the talkmeisters did not get this and just jerked their knees is understandable. Most are just party Republicans who will do anything to get a teammate in the White House even if it's only Mitt Romney's hair and they have to forget that constitution they claim fealty to.

The Neutralist believes there is a bigger story here. This is the first time since MacArthur we have had an incident and this one is different. The general did not just disagree, he called his boss a stiff when you boiled it down.

So the CinC dismisses him. Everyone is happy.

Pas Moi.

If we have eternal war, why would we not have more of these incidents? How long until the tide of "let the generals run the war, they're the professionals" becomes overwhelming.

Disengagement leading to Neutralism is essential, because we run chance for many evils, including "Caesarism"