Thursday, June 26, 2008

Change We Can't Believe In - RIP 4th Amendment

Today we learned that only 15 Senators give a damn about the Bill of Rights. I guess us Cleveland Liberal Drinkers can take some comfort our Senator, Sherrod Brown, voted with the good guys. But that's very small comfort when the candidate many liberals championed to become the Democratic POTUS nominee, Barack Obama, has taken a stance that Ben Franklin would scoff at and decided that trading liberty for security is just fine. Call me crazy but I don't see how his stance on this issue is one iota of 'change' from the current administration's.

Of course Senate Majority Leader Harry 'Microscopic Balls' Reid promises the Dems will try really really hard to strip immunity for the Telecoms out of the bill so the Bush Administration and Telecoms who violated the Constitution can be held accountable....but he's not promising anything because he knows they'll pass the bill with immunity included. Harry's afraid he might get another atomic-wedgie from Trent Lott if they don't.

Gee, I wonder why the Dems are so willing to cave? Could the reason be that 94 Democrats have taken an average of about $8,000 each in campaign donations from the Telecoms since 2005 and they want to continue suckling the generous bosom of Ole Ma Bell and her cousins? That's a big fat DUH! And the fattest pig at the teet is Hundred Millionaire Jay Rockefeller (D-Calling Him A Whore Would Be An Insult To Whores) who has been rewarded with $50,000 in campaign donations from Verizon and AT&T employees for his successful efforts to protect their interests over his constituents.

Does anyone in their right mind really think the government wants to enlist the Telecoms in blanket surveillance and collection of personal information on the American people just to keep us all safe from all of the terrorists our government creates by invading countries with oil? That their intention with this new FISA law is purely innocent and has our best interests in mind? If you believe that, then you haven't been paying attention to what's happening in that bastion of Free Market Capitalism, China. It appears that the free market and democracy don't necessarily go hand in hand.

We've already seen that our government can control elections with information it collects on it's citizens from private companies as it did so successfully in both 2000 and 2004. I know what most of you are thinking..but, but...that was Bush! The Democrats would never ever do such a thing. Yeah, right. It's a political party folks, they want to gain power. Let's not be so naive.

Two weeks ago Obama was Mr. Progressive but this week is open to letting the T-coms off for illegally spying on you, reverses himself on NAFTA, and agrees with Scalia on both guns and the death penalty. WTF? In his defense; Hillary Clinton is no stranger to lobbyist money, helped promote NAFTA and pandered to the hardworking white male gun-owners in Pennsyltucky with tales of skeet shooting at her childhood cottage. I'm thinking she'd be no different.

Obviously most of us would never vote for McCain or any Republican for that matter, but that doesn't mean we cannot pressure the Democrats now to do what is right. Big Business, The Mediacracy, The Military Industrial Complex and the GOP all pressure the Democrats to do fall in line. If the Democratic Party is only getting pressure from the top and they aren't hearing from us at the bottom, then it's quite predictable who's voice they're going to heed.

Just hoping that once Obama is in the White House and the Dems have a larger majority in Congress everything will be OK is not realistic. I was drawn to Obama because his message asked the people to get involved in the change we all want for this country. Well, maybe it's time the people start communicating to the Obama campaign what we hope for and what change we believe in, instead of the other way around.

Obama is not taking PAC or 527 money and I just received an e-mail from Howard Dean saying the DNC is following suit. I don't know if they'll keep this policy up in the future but for now kids this is our opportunity to exert populist political pressure. Contact the Obama campaign and Dr. Dean at the DNC about the FISA cave or any other issue they are falling down on, tell them you're pissed off and you won't give any more of your 'change' until they do what's right.