Life under GWB

[BigV]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

--snip--As a threat to civil liberties, roving wiretaps just don't compete with people being taken off to war against their will. In these days, the civil liberties horror is that the protestors have to be in a certain special area. Back then, people were getting SHOT during protests.--snip--

I'm just gonna cherry pick here UT, cause I gotta jet, but...

Civil liberty erosion is considerably more dire that having the protestors confined far away, although I find that chickenshit at best. I'm talking about stuff like this. U.S. Can Confine Citizens Without Charges, Court Rules So now it's "legal" to just sweep you up. Maybe you'll stay in the United States, uncharged, incommunicado, or maybe you be subject to "extraordinary rendition". These are GWB spirited policies. Not just sticking his fingers in his ears when people protest. He can make you go away.

He's pressing hard for the expansion of the military's role in a domestic disaster. As if he didn't already have the ability to mobilize the federal forces for everything BUT law enforcement, now he wants that--the end of posse commitatus. That's not a filter, that's not chicken little. That's a real problem.

Originally Posted by Undertoad

The story of the rich getting richer and poor getting poorer is repeated all the time. In all the years I've had my head out of the sand, I've heard the doomsayers making that same statement. By this time the rich should be shitting on golden toilets and the poor should have the distended bellies we see in famine Africa. But we aren't, because the doomy gloomy vision is a bad filter.

I can't fairly allocate all the blame for the greatest disparity in wealth in our nation's history to GWB, but this dangerous situation has been accelerated by his policies and ideas. If you hollow out the middle, the tiny tip of the pyramid has nothing to support it. No, I don't have a calendar date to post, but I believe we're careening toward the train wreck described by Tonchi. GWB has greased those skids to his own short sighted benefit, and we'll all suffer later, like so many are suffering now. The ludicrous adventure in Iraq is just his trophy example of poor leadership. Poor stewardship of this country's trust and resources. A shameful waste of our blood and treasure.