The Noah Diaries (24): "We outnumber them in this country, and we have the guns" (Andrew Breitbart)

Bye-bye to habeas corpus, can't feed family on $4K/wk?, Bill-O's threat, workplace of the future, Georgia bloodlust, and more


He can't say this stuff, can he? (See 9/20 below.)

by Noah

9/14/11 -- Then and now: The demise of habeas corpus


The Magna Carta gave us habeas corpus -- the right to go before a judge to require legal justification for detention. Lords and royals could no longer simply go out and capture and imprison and people. It was the idea that no person is above the law, that people cannot be falsely imprisoned or detained without sufficient evidence.

Although it was really a deal between the king and the barons of the time, not every ordinary citizen, such a right essentially created the middle class by giving birth to an idea. George W. Bush and his pliable minions in Congress used 9/11 to take away that right in their Patriot Act. That right was a key part of our Constitution. Now it's gone. Any of us can be swept up and disappeared at the whim of those in power. If that sounds like Pinochet's Chile, there's a good reason. That Pinochet enjoyed a warm and supportive relationship with the Bush Crime Family is also no coincidence.

The strategy of removing habeas corpus while putting more money in the hands of far fewer people through tax cuts for the wealthy and such means as union-busting to set the wage bar ever lower and remove worker rights and benefits is all part of the greater war on the middle class. When the middle class is gone, we will be masses of serfs, in thrall to the kings, given nothing in return and denied even the chance to earn a better place in society.

Will we be forced to enter an era of robbing the rich and giving to the poor in order to survive -- i.e., Robin Hood redux? More likely, current policies forced on us by right-wingers will lead to far worse, for us and, eventually, for them. Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat Bastille Day and its aftereffects.

This country was built from the ground up. People were empowered. Unjust taxation, like big breaks for the very rich but not the rest of us, was prevented, most of the time. A day in court was assured.

No freeman shall be taken, or imprisoned, or outlawed, or exiled, or in any way harmed . . . except by the legal judgement of his peers or by the law of the land.

-- the Magna Carta, Clause 39

All of this created the conditions that created the middle class. Before this, people were owned. Things didn't change overnight, but the concepts of freedom and equality were given life. Continued tax cuts for the wealthy and taking habeas corpus away will eventually reverse that process. This is a conscious undertaking on the part of the rich and powerful. It is the essence of Republican policy as exemplified by Teabag governors in Wisconsin, Maine, Michigan, Ohio, etc. It is part of what lies behind the propaganda of FOX, its cousin CNN, Politico, and the vast majority of the media at large. We are in the process of being owned again.

9/14/11 -- Well, isn't this odd, Rick Perry?

The Texas governor talks a lot about the insurance purchase mandate in what he calls Obamacare. He says it's unconstitutional or something. Interestingly, Perry issued a vaccination mandate for Merck's HPV vaccine, and in fact did it when his chief of staff was a lobbyist for Merck. Gee, I thought the governor was against health-related mandates.

It's also interesting that Merck gave $500,000 to the Republican Governors Association, a group Perry was twice chairman of. They also gave $5000 to Perry's campaign for governor. Yeah, it looks like Perry can be bought for a mere $5000.


9/20/11 -- FOX on-air personality Andrew Breitbart, at a teabagger rally in Massachusetts:

We outnumber them in this country, and we have the guns. I'm not kidding. They talk a mean game, but they will not cross that line because they know what they're dealing with. And I have people who come up to me in the military, major named people, who come up to me and grab me and they go, "Thank you for what you're doing. We've got your back."

Obviously, this is incitement, in the same way that fellow FOX personality Bill O'Reilly used to chant "Tiller the Baby Killer" until someone went and shot Dr. George Tiller dead. It's clear what kind of country Rupert Murdoch, Roger Ailes and their ilk want.

More from Breitbart:

Bring it on. I'm sick of it. I'm sick of this Trumka guy. I'm sick of this John Sweeney guy. I'm sick of the SEIU. I'm sick of them going to people's homes, executive's homes, and showing up.

How is this different from what O'Reilly did? When you have a microphone, you have a responsibility. The Republican sense of responsibility is perverse. They're calling for mayhem and death. It's who they are.


9/20/11 -- The Tax Debate: (1) Guy can't feed his family on $4K a week?

Repug congresscretin and multi-multimillionaire John Fleming of Louisiana whines about the prospect of only having $200,000 left to feed his family if taxes for the wealthy get raised and he starts having to pay as much of a percentage as working folks. Man, $4000 a week? He must have the fattest family in the state.

Fleming owns several Subway franchises in his state. I don't know about you, but when I go to Louisiana, I can find nice hole-in-the-wall eateries with fantastic food and they're cheaper than Subway, so maybe what people should do there is just boycott the congresscretin's stores.


9/20/11 -- The Tax Debate: (2) Quote of the Year nominee -- Mark Cuban, owner of the NBA Dallas Mavericks

Be patriotic. Go out there and get rich. Get so obnoxiously rich that when that tax bill comes, your first thought will be to choke on how big a check you have to write. Your second thought will be, "What a great problem to have," and your third should be a recognition that in paying your taxes you are helping to support millions of Americans that are not as fortunate as you.

9/21/11 -- The Tax Debate: (3) Thought for the day -- Please don't stop the show, Bill!

If Bill-O can afford to pay millions to Andrea Makris (when she filed a sexual harassment suit against him), he can afford to pay his fair share of taxes. But Bill O'Liely says he may have to stop doing his show if "Obama raises taxes" on the upper class.

Yes, Bill-O is so twisted that he thinks stopping his show is a threat to us all! Oh, please don't stop the show, Bill. What would we do? Besides, it might be better to know where you are every night.

Keep the camera on this guy. Someday medical science will appreciate having a filmed record of him.


9/21/11 -- Workplace of the future: Amazon.com's 110-degree warehouse

When you have no union and it's all but impossible to get another job, the corporation you work for has all the power. They know you'll put up with all the corporate sadism they dish out. Worker rights, working conditions, and safety be damned. This is the corporatist dream, and the end result of neo-fascist state governors and their Republican legislatures busting unions and stripping rights from workers. They're just replaceable parts.


9/22/11 -- A show called bloodlust: Georgia murders Troy Davis

Bloodlust. The state delayed the scheduled 7:00pm execution and executed Davis shortly after 11:00 tonight. You got it, they turned it into a prime-time TV show while the country waited on a decision from our so-called Supreme Court, which predictably decided not to grant a stay. It was "stay tuned" and "breking news" all night. You knew they were gonna kill the guy. Tonight's delays were just theater. Showtime! Live from Crackerland!

It reminded me of that old Star Trek episode where Kirk and crew end up on a Roman-style planet that broadcasts its gladiator fights and executions on nightly prime-time TV. I guarantee you that right now more than one weasel in Hollywood has pitched a similar but more graphic TV show and has one "in development," as they like to say out there in the land of phony.

What price justice? A cop was murdered, but now there will always be doubt about who actually did it. All the Georgia authorities had to do was keep Davis in prison with a life sentence while the investigation went on, but no, it was a case of "we got a guy, he was there, he fills the bill, let's execute him." Small minds confuse revenge with justice. They denied Davis a lie-detector test, for 22 years! I guess they were afraid of results that might not fit the agenda of their death culture. Davis may have been innocent, and too many innocent people have been executed only to be proven innocent as time went on. That's worse than "Let God sort them out" justice.

Davis may indeed have been the guilty guy, but seven of nine witnesses recanted. The former warden of the prison said wait. The former head of the FBI said wait. Even the "ex-Nazi" pope said wait. What does it say when an "ex-nazi" doesn't want you to kill a black dude? The state of Georgia, however, couldn't wait. It acted like any other psycopath. I guess they've never heard of that "reasonable doubt" thing in Georgia but it's hard to be reasonable when you can't reason. Why do ya think they call them crackers?

If you're from Georgia and don't like what I have to say, too bad. You had your say already. I have two words for you, and they aren't "nice job."


9/23/11 -- Thought for the day: Why blackbirds fall from the sky



Cindy Jacobs, founder of the religious-nut group Generals International and backer of Rick Perry, knows why. It seems that in Arkansas, blackbirds fell from the sky because of gays in the military. How does she explain the fires and drought and the hottest summer, with every day topping 100 degrees? Must be witchcraft. Or is it Muslims in the White House?

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History in the making:
Selections from THE NOAH DIARIES 2011

Yesterday: (23) Blowhard George Will outblows Hurricane Irene. Plus: "Quitter" Sarah throws a hissy fit, CEOs make out like bandits, FOX "deconstructs" a speech, Teabag gov loves Paris, and more (9/1-12/11)
Tomorrow: (25) "Current emissions are not causing air-quality or public-health problems anywhere in America" (Steve Milloy of FOX "News"). Plus: Secede already, Texas!, Solyndra -- all Obama's fault, Repugs on science, megachurchie calls Mormons a cult, and more (10/3-18/11)

FOR A COMPLETE LISTING OF THE SERIES, CLICK HERE

And don't forget 2010's Year in Review series and 2009's "12 Days of Christmas Scorn"!

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