The Secret Sandy Hook Secrecy Bill.

If it walks like a duck. Nuff Said.

———————————-  ~ Steve ~ ———————————–

http://lastresistance.com    posted on May 24, 2013 byMark Horne

Been wondering what has happened with the Sandy Hook case? Want many of the weird questions settled? The legislature of Connecticut has been bypassing normal open procedures to craft a bill behind closed doors that would, if passed, keep basic evidence of the crime forever behind closed doors

From the Hartford Courant, “Bill Drafted In Secret Would Block Release Of Some Newtown Massacre Records”:

Adam Lanza

“The staffs of the state’s top prosecutor and the governor’s office have been working in secret with General Assembly leaders on legislation to withhold records related to the police investigation into the Dec. 14 Newtown elementary school massacre — including victims’ photos, tapes of 911 calls, and possibly more. The behind-the-scenes legislative effort came to light Tuesday when The Courant obtained a copy of an email by a top assistant to Chief State’s Attorney Kevin Kane, Timothy J. Sugrue. Sugrue, an assistant state’s attorney, discussed options considered so far, including blocking release of statements ‘made by a minor.’”

You have got to be kidding.

The bereaved Sandy Hook parents are going through hell, I’m sure, and will be doing so for years to come. But they are no more special than the bereaved parents of children who were murdered in Columbine High School. As I wrote back when Michael Moore said he wanted the pictures released,

“If you use Google image search for words like crime scene columbine or Cleboldand Harris, you will find some pretty gruesome pictures. Why is Sandy Hook being treated so differently?”

This entire investigation has been shrouded in secrecy, as evidenced by repeated protests by local editorials (here and here). All this secrecy has been kept simply by the raw will of the police and whoever is overseeing them. What will happen if this becomes enshrined in law? Will it only be the bodies that are kept from view, or will we never get to see any more pictures of the bullet-ridden cars in the parking lot? Or will we be forbidden from seeing photographs of Adam Lanza’s Honda Civic with all four doors open and black sweatshirts strewn on the pavement around it? What about spent shells and the bullet holes in the interior walls? The official story makes Adam Lanza a lone gunman who managed to shoot 155 bullets in under five minutes and hit multiple targets multiple times.

Other than some professional local Connecticut Journalists, the major media has investigated nothing at all related to Sandy Hook, but rather considered it an opportunity to play Oprah Winfrey and to lobby for gun control. Many (Most? All?) of the Sandy Hook parents whose delicate privacy the Connecticut legislators are so concerned about have been aggressively lobbying in the news and in legislatures using their pain as a license to attack the second amendment. Showing the damage would further their cause, just likeMichael Moore said.

I’ve never in my life heard of the side of law and order wanting to suppress evidence. It is always the defense who wants the pictures concealed because of the fear that the jury will become enflamed with a sense of justice against the perpetrator.

What the Connecticut legislature is trying to do just seems backwards. The fact that they have tried to hide what they are doing makes it seem even more sinister.

FOTM has many investigative pieces on this incident. For the links to those posts, please go to our “Sandy Hook Massacre” page. Click here!

Liberal Tyranny: Praying for homosexuals is “hate”

Remember my post of May 22, on an internal document of President Lucifer’s Department of Justice (DOJ) titled “LGBT Inclusion at Work: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Managers”?

The document puts managers on notice that if they react with silence to an employee coming out as LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transsexual), their “silence will be interpreted as disapproval.” In other words, the only acceptable behavior toward LGBTs is no longer just tolerance or acceptance, nothing less than our vocal OUTSPOKEN APPROVAL will do.

Here’s more evidence of the new liberal tyranny.

Please watch this short video:

Homosexuals are calling Amber Dee Parker’s God Made Dad & Mom, the children’s picture book described in the video, as “teaching kids to hate LGBT families” and an attack on “LGBT equality.”

In an article for the gay publication Advocate, titled “New Antigay Children’s Book Teaches Kids to Hate LGBT Families,” Jase Pepples writes:

A new picture book by Amber Dee Parker and Hannah Sequra attempts to battle messages of LGBT equality with a warm and fuzzy brand of hatred, reports Good as You.

Endorsed by the American Family Association, God Made Dad & Mom tells the story of a young boy named Michael who prays for his classmate Jimmy and his two dads to learn “the truth” about how God made them after a trip to the zoo where he’s told all animal families “consist of a male, a female, and their offspring.”

Yup. To the enraged Left, praying for our neighbors is now a form of hate.

But selling Baby Jesus butt-plugs and religious dildos isn’t hate.

A scene from a San Francisco street fair

An attribute of pathological narcissists is that they “require excessive admiration” (American Psychological Association’s DSM IV). That is why narcissists overreact with rage to any perceived criticism. Nothing less than 100% approval will do.

In his seminal essay, “On Narcissism,” Sigmund Freud observed that all human beings, when they are children, go through a period of “primary narcissism”: The child is the most important object and the center of his/her universe. Most of us grow out of that early narcissism to a healthy adulthood. In some cases, however, their psychological development is disrupted and stunted, and so they remain stuck in primary narcissism — now a pathological form of excessive self-regard and self-absorption. Freud understood homosexuality as being an example of pathological narcissism in adulthood.

Cardinal Giacomo Biffi had warned that “The attacks on freedom of thought start with language. Those who do not resign themselves to accept ‘homophilia’ … are charged with ‘homophobia’.” Freudianism is no longer the flavor-of-the-month in psychology. But the DOJ’s Orwellian document and the LGBT reaction to a little children’s picture book would suggest that Freud was right.

H/t FOTM’s Sunny.

~Eowyn

John McCain is a POS

RINO Sen. John McCain was one of the sponsors of the National Defense Authorization Act that gives “authority” to the president and military to arrest and indefinitely detain U.S. citizens without charge or trial.

So it really shouldn’t surprise us that he favors capitulation on raising our national debt ceiling — yet again — and is bawling about conservatives Republicans “pushing too far.”

The Associated Press reports, May 23, 2013:

A long-simmering feud between establishment Republicans and Tea Partyers broke into full view Thursday, with Sen. John McCain accusing younger colleagues of overplaying their hands and tempting Democrats to change Senate rules that protect the minority party.

Tactics for dealing with the government’s budget and debt became the latest quarrel In a string of them between McCain —sometimes joined by other traditionalist Republicans —and Tea Party champions such as Ted Cruz of Texas, Rand Paul of Kentucky, Mike Lee of Utah and Marco Rubio of Florida.

Those four won Senate seats by defying the party establishment, and are shaking up the tradition-bound Senate with no-compromise, no-apology stands on key issues like debt and deficits, government spending and the use of drones in the war on terrorism.

McCain himself has defied Republican orthodoxy at times. But he was the party’s 2008 presidential nominee, and he now is among those who say a minority party will accomplish little in the Senate if it can’t find ways to cut deals with the majority.

Cruz, who like Paul is weighing a 2016 presidential bid, renewed his taunts of the party establishment in a speech Thursday on the Senate floor. The more accommodating Republicans, he said, are in cahoots with Democrats to raise the government’s borrowing limit by disabling the GOP’s ability to mount a filibuster threat that could be used to extract spending cuts from Democrats and the White House

[...] Earlier in the day, Lee angered McCain with similar remarks. Lee said Republicans should block a House-Senate conference designed to resolve budget differences because it might ease the Democrats’ effort to raise the government’s borrowing limit. That rankled the sometimes cantankerous McCain, of Arizona. He said the Tea Partyers’ tactics could embolden Democrats who are threatening to change Senate rules that now allow the minority party — or even just one senator— to block various actions.

“That would be the most disastrous outcome that I could ever imagine,” McCain said.

For months, Democrats have complained about Republicans blocking or delaying confirmation of top White House nominees, including some federal judges. Democrats say the impasse over a budget conference is further evidence of a small group of senators in the minority abusing their powers to block actions that in the past would have gone forward after a few speeches.

Supporters of the Tea Party-backed lawmakers say the ongoing IRS and Benghazi controversies have vindicated their sharply partisan, uncompromising views. Republicans cite the controversies as examples of Democratic overreach and obfuscation.

This week’s budget quarrel follows a high-profile split between Tea Partyers and champions of a big defense program over drone attacks, and an intra-GOP disagreement over gun control tactics. It involves an obscure procedural battle and arcane rules governing the congressional budget process. Democrats want to set up an official House-Senate negotiating committee to iron out the gaping differences between the budget plans passed by the Democratic-controlled Senate and the Republican-controlled House.

Cruz, Lee and others say they fear House and Senate leaders will use the budget measure to engineer a scenario in which an increase in the government’s borrowing cap could pass the 100-member Senate by a simple majority instead of the 60 votes typically need to overpower the minority on an issue.

McCain and others, like Budget Committee Chairman Patty Murray, D-Wash., note that House Republicans can block any move by Democratic negotiators to engineer a filibuster-free debt limit increase.

“Isn’t it a little bizarre,” McCain said Wednesday. “Basically what we are saying here on this (Republican) side of the aisle is that we don’t trust our colleagues on the other side of the Capitol who are in the majority, Republicans.”

“Let me be clear. I don’t trust the Republicans,” Cruz responded. “And I don’t trust the Democrats. I think a whole lot of Americans likewise don’t trust the Republicans and the Democrats, because it is leadership in both parties that has gotten us in this mess.”

At a Tea Party rally last month in Texas, Cruz taunted fellow Republicans after the Senate rejected a call for background checks on virtually all prospective gun buyers.

Cruz and other Tea Partyers had threatened to filibuster the gun legislation and keep it from coming to the Senate floor for votes. Other Republicans said the smarter political move — which eventually prevailed — was to let the votes take place, and have a few Democrats join Republicans in rejecting the wider background checks. Cruz suggested that Republicans who favored proceeding with the votes were “a bunch of squishes.”

That earned Cruz a rebuke from the conservative Wall Street Journal editorial page — gleefully retweeted by McCain. “Would it have been right for us to not even debate in light of the Newtown massacre?” McCain said.

[...] Democrats say the debt ceiling must be raised to pay for expenses already incurred by Congress. Failing to raise the ceiling, they say, would trigger a catastrophic default on U.S. obligations.

McCain scuffled with the tea party senators in March after Paul launched a filibuster to warn of the threat of unmanned drone attacks against U.S. citizens on American soil. McCain referred to newcomers like Paul and Cruz as “wacko birds” and said their fears of drone strikes against Americans were “ridiculous.”

“It has been suggested that we are ‘wacko birds,’” Cruz said Thursday. “I will suggest to my friend from Arizona there may be more wacko birds in the Senate than is suspected.”

The split between McCain, 76, and next-generation, 40-something potential 2016 candidates like Paul, Cruz and Rubio also illustrates the broader GOP drift toward the right. McCain has spent decades in the Senate, mixing a penchant for confrontation with a capacity for bipartisan relationships and legislation; the new generation is feistier and more wary of compromise.

H/t FOTM’s tina!

~Eowyn

Sarah Palin on Obama’s IRS-gate

Exclusive — PALIN: Going Rogue in the Wrong Direction

by Sarah Palin 22 May 2013 

As more information about the IRS scandal trickles out daily, the White House’s involvement is becoming clearer. Those of us who’ve been warning about the demise of freedom with Barack Obama’s efforts to “fundamentally transform” our great nation are about to witness some sad vindication. Will awakened Americans finally join us in saying “enough is enough”?

The president would like us to believe that he only learned about the IRS corruption from watching the news. But we recently learned that the White House was actively working with the IRS on how to roll out the story of this scandal. So, Mr. President, how can you have your staff work on the roll out of the biggest controversy since Watergate, and yet claim that you only heard about it by watching the news with the rest of us?

For the president to deny any knowledge of what was brewing and to claim to know nothing about the Benghazi cover-up or anything about anything White House-related lately, he’s either a liar or a hugely incompetent CEO. You decide.

Yesterday, we also learned that the top IRS official involved in the targeting scandal is planning on pleading the Fifth during her Congressional hearings. That’s keen – she’ll be able to enjoy her Fifth Amendment rights in a hearing about how her intimidating organization denied Americans the ability to fully exercise their First Amendment rights.

Keep in mind that the IRS considers you guilty until proven innocent when they audit you.  The Fifth Amendment doesn’t apply.

This scandal is not just about the IRS targeting Americans to deny them tax-exempt status or subjecting them to harassing retaliatory audits. The IRS also leaked to left-wing reporters the confidential application information submitted by conservative groups.

The IRS claims that their leaking of information was “inadvertent and unintentional disclosures by the employees involved.” They at first blamed the entire IRS scandal on a couple of employees who “went rogue,” but we soon found out that this was just more malarkey coming from the president’s spokesman. But even if these were “inadvertent and unintentional disclosures,” is that supposed to make us feel better? With the IRS running Obamacare, what are the chances that our confidential information and medical records will “inadvertently” and “unintentionally” be disclosed? Please remember that some of us warned America about the dangers of having the IRS play such a big role with the administration of Obamacare. We were laughed at and mocked relentlessly back then. It sure doesn’t seem funny now, does it?

This IRS scandal is especially terrible because Americans live in fear of the IRS like no other entity because this monstrous bureaucracy has the power to take your hard-earned money. Your wages are the sum of your labors; hence, the IRS has the power to steal the fruits of your labors. Average Americans live in fear of making an error on their tax returns that could cost them massive amounts of money, plus their reputation and good name.  If a small business makes a mistake, the IRS can shut them down and send them to jail.

The IRS has always been the face of intimidating and controlling big government. Now it’s the face of corrupt big government that actively attacks the people it is supposed to serve. This isn’t the change America was hoping for, Mr. President, but it certainly is transformative.

Average everyday Americans like my dad and his non-political buddies are outraged by this IRS scandal, perhaps more so than all the other White House fiascos that are making the radical Left’s intentions crystal clear. It’s because this IRS cluster hits close to home for everyone. It’s tangible proof of how a corrupt government can intimidate and target a person’s record, reputation, and life, and make them feel helpless.

These Obama administration scandals are a sad and stark reminder that only limited government can ensure liberty. At our core, we Americans just want to be left alone to live freely, peacefully, and productively.

Last year the Obama campaign told us that government is something we all “belong” to. I guess they’re right because when the government is powerful enough to target, intimidate, and harass us, we do “belong” to them. The real question is: Will we stand for this?

These atrocious government actions are bigger, uglier, and much more dangerous than “a few rogue employees.” It’s time for all Americans to stand together and join in the growing outraged chorus that looks at our out-of-control government and says, “Enough is enough!”

†

See also:

• “Groups & individuals targeted by Obama’s IRS witchhunt,” May 15, 2013.
• “Tax-exempt charity of Obama’s half-brother is a fraud,” May 21, 2013.

~Eowyn

Leader of July 4 armed march on D.C. arrested

Two weeks ago, I did a post on radio host and Iraq war veteran Adam Kokesh’s plan to lead an armed march on Washington, D.C., this July 4, Independence Day, to put government on notice that we won’t be intimidated.

In a Ron Paul rally on September 2, 2008, Kokesh had made evident his political views when he declared that “While it is our responsibility now to resist tyranny civilly, while we still can, there may come a time when we will say to the powers that be, be it with your blood or ours we have come to water the tree of liberty … who will stand with me?”

True to his words, on May 5, 2013, Kokesh launched the planned armed march as a group on Facebook, the “Open Carry March on Washington.” He hoped to get 1,000 supporters to march into the nation’s capital with loaded rifles.

TPTB are seeing to it that the march will not happen.

As reported by Natural News, three days ago, on May 19, 2013, police dragged Adam Kokesh from a “Smoke Down Prohibition” protest in Philadelphia and charged him with “resisting arrest,” which Kokesh denies. This YouTube video of the arrest shows Adam Kokesh clearly NOT resisting, holding his hands up in a surrender posture and trying to maintain his balance while a gang of police drag him away from the event.

The next day, Kokesh was charged with felony assault of a federal officer and is held without bail. (Source)

Kokesh can’t organize the planned armed march from jail. No doubt, the authorities will hold Kokesh until July 4 is past and gone.

Welcome to the Soft Tyranny of Obama’s America.

~Eowyn

Obama’s DOJ demands outspoken approval of homosexuality

“The attacks on freedom of thought start with language. Those who do not resign themselves to accept ‘homophilia’ … are charged with ‘homophobia’.” –Cardinal Giacomo Biffi

Writing for Townhall.com, May 20, 2013, Matt Barber brings to our attention an internal document of the Department of Justice (DOJ), which reeks of the thought tyranny of George Orwell’s prescient Nineteen Eighty Four.

Barber is a constitutional law attorney, the Vice President of Liberty Counsel Action, and the Associate Dean and Adjunct Assistant Professor of Law at Liberty University School of law.

The DOJ document, titled “LGBT Inclusion at Work: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Managers,” was created by DOJ Pride, the Association of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Employees of the U.S. Department of Justice and Their Allies.

The document, emailed to DOJ managers in advance of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) Pride Month, was leaked to the Liberty Counsel by whistleblowers within the DOJ.

As Barber notes, “The document is chilling. It’s riddled with directives that grossly violate – prima facie –employees’ First Amendment [right of freedom of speech] liberties.”

The document “LGBT Inclusion at Work” provides a litany of Do’s and Don’ts to DOJ managers, such as the following relatively benign instructions:

• Do use inclusive words like “partner,” “significant other” or “spouse” rather than gender-specific terms like “husband” and “wife.”
• Do speak up against derogatory jokes or comments when you hear them.
• Do use a transgender person’s chosen name and the pronoun that is consistent with the person’s self-identified gender.
• Don’t assume all employees are (or a particular employee is) heterosexual.
• Don’t use words and phrases like “gay lifestyle,” “sexual preference,” or “tranny” that are considered by many as offensive.

In all, there are 19 Do’s and 5 Don’ts, among them are some that are far from benign but are downright sinister, reeking of Thought Police. They include:

• Do assume that LGBT employees and their allies are listening to what you’re saying (whether in a meeting or around the proverbial water cooler) and will read what you’re writing (whether in a casual email or in a formal document), and make sure the language you use is inclusive and respectful.
• Do “Attend LGBT events sponsored by DOJ Pride and/or the Department, and invite (but don’t require) others to join you.”
• Do “Display a symbol in your office (DOJ Pride sticker, copy of this brochure, etc.) indicating that it is a ‘safe space.’”
• Concerning how to respond if an employee comes out to you, the DOJ document states: “Don’t judge or remain silent. Silence will be interpreted as disapproval.”

In other words, the only acceptable behavior toward lesbians, gays, bisexuals, and transgenders is no longer just tolerance or acceptance, they now demand OUTSPOKEN (verbalized) APPROVAL.

As Barber, an attorney, observes:

That’s a threat. And not even a subtle one.

Got it? For Christians and other morals-minded federal employees, it’s no longer enough to just shut up and [...] live your life in silent recognition of biblical principles (which, by itself, is unlawful constraint). When it comes to mandatory celebration of homosexual and cross-dressing behaviors, “silence will be interpreted as disapproval.”

This lawless administration is now bullying federal employees – against their will – to affirm sexual behaviors that every major world religion, thousands of years of history and uncompromising human biology reject.

Somewhere, right now, George Orwell is smiling. [...]

Is this the DOJ or the KGB? “[A]ssume that LGBT employees are listening …”? And what are “LGBT allies”? If you disagree with the homosexual activist political agenda, does that make you the enemy?

Yes, in any workplace, language should remain professional, but who defines what’s “inclusive”? Who decides what’s “respectful”? If asked about “LGBT issues,” for instance, can a Christian employee answer honestly: “I believe the Bible. I believe that God designed sex to be shared between husband and wife within the bonds of marriage”? Or is that grounds for termination?

[...] Are you kidding? Does this administration really think it’s legal to induce managers to “attend LGBT events,” or to “display pride stickers” against their will? That’s compulsory expression. That’s viewpoint discrimination.

That’s unconstitutional.

[...] This “DOJ Pride” directive is but the latest example of the “progressive” climate of fear and intimidation this radical Obama regime has created for Christians, conservatives and other values-oriented folks, both within and without the workplace.

H/t FOTM’s christy

~Eowyn

Fla. Gov. Scott vetoes sheriff’s $1 million ‘snitch on your neighbor’ program

 DOESN’T this program kinda remind you of how the gestapo might have been started?

————————————————————————————–

Gov.Scott

http://www.bizpacreview.com       May 20, 2013 by Joe Saunders

Gov. Rick Scott on Monday vetoed almost $368 million in state spending before signing the budget for next year, including $1 million for a violence prevention and mental health initiative sought by the Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw.

Bradshaw’s program would have established a hotline for residents to call when they suspected an individual might be planning a violent act.

If a call were deemed cause for concern, that person might be visited by deputies trained to deal with mental health issues.

In interviews, he cited such incidents as the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut and a movie theater in Auroroa, Colo., as instances where a watchful eye and trained help might have prevented tragedy.

But the proposal drew fire from conservatives when a widespread quote from a Palm Beach Post  story fueled fears of government taking action against people because of how they think, not how they’ve acted.

“We want people to call us if the guy down the street says he hates the government, hates the mayor and he’s gonna shoot him,” Bradshaw said in the article.

“What does it hurt to have somebody knock on a door and ask, ‘Hey, is everything OK?’”

Scott also turned down a 3 percent tuition increase for state college and university students.

Rest HERE!!!!

US military gives itself authority to police America without permission

This is deeply disturbing.

About three months ago, quietly and without anyone noticing, the Obama regime’s Department of Defense (DoD) gave itself the authority to use U.S. military troops to police America without permission from the President of the United States (POTUS) or state or local government.

US Army tanks “training” in the streets of St. Louis, June 2012.

The U.S. military is prohibited from intervening in domestic affairs, a prohibition codified in two laws:

• The Insurrection Act of 1807 is the set of laws that govern the ability of POTUS to deploy troops within the United States to put down lawlessness, insurrection and rebellion. The laws are chiefly contained in 10 U.S.C. § 331 – 10 U.S.C. § 335. The general aim is to limit Presidential power as much as possible, relying on state and local governments for initial response in the event of insurrection.

• The Posse Comitatus Act (PCA), a U.S. federal law (18 U.S.C. § 1385) passed after the end of Reconstruction on June 18, 1878, and updated in 1981 to refer specifically to the U.S. Armed Forces, makes unauthorized deployment of federal troops a punishable offense, thereby giving teeth to the Insurrection Act. The PCA does not apply to the U.S. Coast Guard (because the Coast Guard operates under the authority of the Dept. of Homeland Security instead of the Pentagon), nor does the PCA apply to the National Guard (because the National Guard is under state authority and can act in a law enforcement capacity within its home state or in an adjacent state if invited by that state’s governor).

The only exception to the deployment of U.S. military troops within the United States is provided under Section 4 of Article IV of the U.S. Constitution, which says: “and [the United States] shall protect each of them [the States] against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.” In other words, Article IV requires the U.S. government to protect each state from invasion and, upon the application of the state legislature (or executive, if the legislature cannot be convened), from domestic violence.

Together, these laws limit executive authority over domestic military action.

About three months ago, however, as reported by Jed Morey for the Long Island Press, the Department of Defense (DoD) unilaterally made a few subtle changes to a regulation in the U.S. Code titled “Defense Support of Civilian Law Enforcement Agencies” and in so doing, granted itself the authority to police America’s streets without obtaining prior presidential, state, or local consent, thereby upending a precedent that has been in place for more than two centuries.

Pursuant to those changes, the DoD issued a 42-page Department of Defense Instruction (DODI), No. 3025.21, February 27, 2013. (Click here or here for the PDF version of DODI.)

DODI no. 3025.21′s subject is “Defense Support of Civilian Law Enforcement Agencies.” Its purpose, “In accordance with the authority in DoD Directive (DoDD) 5111.1 and Deputy Secretary of Defense Memorandum (References (a) and (b)), is to establish “DoD policy, assigns responsibilities, and provides procedures for DoD support to Federal, State, tribal, and local civilian law enforcement agencies, including responses to civil disturbances within the United States, including the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and any territory or possession of the United States or any other political subdivision thereof in accordance with DoDD 3025.18 (Reference (c)).

The most disturbing part of the DODI no. 3025.21 begins on page 15: “Enclosure 3: Participation of DoD Personnel in Civilian Law Enforcement Activities.”

On page 16, under Section 1b’s “Permissible Direct Assistance” is a subsection (3), which states:

When permitted under emergency authority in accordance with Reference (c), Federal military commanders have the authority, in extraordinary emergency circumstances where prior authorization by the President is impossible and duly constituted local authorities are unable to control the situation, to engage temporarily in activities that are necessary to quell large-scale, unexpected civil disturbances because:

(a) Such activities are necessary to prevent significant loss of life or wanton destruction of property and are necessary to restore governmental function and public order; or,

(b) When duly constituted Federal, State, or local authorities are unable or decline to provide adequate protection for Federal property or Federal governmental functions. Federal action, including the use of Federal military forces, is authorized when necessary to protect Federal property or functions.

Jed Morey of the Long Island Press cites Bruce Afran, a civil liberties attorney and constitutional law professor at Rutgers University, who calls the DODI rule, “a wanton power grab by the military,” which is “quite shocking actually because it violates the long-standing presumption that the military is under civilian control.”

Afran points out that Section 1b(3) of the DODI not only fails to define what circumstances would be so severe that the president’s authorization is “impossible,” it also grants full presidential authority to “Federal military commanders” who have the same power to authorize military force as the president when the latter’s authorization is “impossible” — whatever that means.

As Afran puts it, “These phrases don’t have any legal meaning. It’s no different than the emergency powers clause in the Weimar constitution [of the German Reich]. It’s a grant of emergency power to the military to rule over parts of the country at their own discretion.”

Afran also expresses apprehension over the government’s authority “to engage temporarily in activities necessary to quell large-scale disturbances.” “Governments never like to give up power when they get it,” says Afran. “They still think after twelve years they can get intelligence out of people in Guantanamo. Temporary is in the eye of the beholder. That’s why in statutes we have definitions. All of these statutes have one thing in common and that is that they have no definitions. How long is temporary? There’s none here. The definitions are absurdly broad.”

Afran reminds us that, unlike the military, “the police operate under civilian control. They are used to thinking in a civilian way so the comparison that they may have some assault weapons doesn’t change this in any way. And they can be removed from power. You can’t remove the military from power.” Afran is considering amending his NDAA complaint currently in front of the court to include this regulatory change.

Jed Morey concludes: “for the first time in our history the military has granted itself authority to quell a civil disturbance. Changing this rule now requires congressional or judicial intervention. [...] As we witnessed during the Boston bombing manhunt, it’s already difficult to discern between military and police. In the future it might be impossible, because there may be no difference.”

H/t Washington’s Blog

See also:

• “US Army targets Tea Party movement as extremists in 2016 civil war scenario,” Aug. 16, 2012.
• “Armored military vehicles to patrol in Wisconsin,” Aug. 14, 2012.
• “What about those U.S. Army tanks in the streets of St. Louis?,” June 25, 2012.
• “Army tanks on streets of St. Louis,” June 24, 2012.
• “Armed U.S. troops in residential streets of Crookston, MN,” May 1, 2012.
• “U.S. Citizens Still Subject to Detention w/out Trial in Final Version of Defense Bill,” Dec. 14, 2011.

~Eowyn

Just The Facts Ma’am, Just The Facts.

Subject: Why Carry a Gun?

Why Carry a Gun? 

My old grandpa said to me ‘Son, there comes a time in every man’s life when he stops bustin’ knuckles and starts bustin’ caps, and
usually it’s when he becomes too old to take a whoopin.’

I don’t carry a gun to kill people.
I carry a gun to keep from being killed.

I don’t carry a gun to scare people.
I carry a gun because sometimes this world can be a scary place.

I don’t carry a gun because I’m paranoid.
I carry a gun because there are real threats in the world.

I don’t carry a gun because I’m evil.
I carry a gun because I have lived long enough to see the evil in the world.

I don’t carry a gun because I hate the government.
I carry a gun because I understand the limitations of government.

I don’t carry a gun because I’m angry.
I carry a gun so that I don’t have to spend the rest of my life hating myself for failing to be prepared.

I don’t carry a gun because I want to shoot someone.
I carry a gun because I want to die at a ripe old age in my bed, and not on a sidewalk somewhere tomorrow afternoon.

I don’t carry a gun to make me feel like a man.
I carry a gun because men know how to take care of themselves and the ones they love.

I don’t carry a gun because I feel inadequate.
I carry a gun because unarmed and facing three armed thugs, I am inadequate.

I don’t carry a gun because I love it.
I carry a gun because I love life and the people who make it meaningful to me.

Police protection is an oxymoron.
Free citizens must protect themselves.
Police do not protect you from crime, they usually just investigate the crime after it happens and then call someone in to clean up the mess.
Personally, I carry a gun because I’m too young to die and too old to take a whoopin’…..author unknown (but obviously brilliant)

See Update on Switzerland!!

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A LITTLE GUN HISTORY

In 1929, the Soviet Union established gun control. From 1929 to 1953, about 20 million dissidents, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
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In 1911, Turkey established gun control. From 1915 to 1917, 1.5 million Armenians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
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Germany established gun control in 1938 and from 1939 to 1945, a total of 13 million Jews and others who were unable to defend themselves were rounded up and exterminated.
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China established gun control in 1935. From 1948 to 1952, 20 million political dissidents, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
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Guatemala established gun control in 1964. From 1964 to 1981, 100,000 Mayan Indians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
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Uganda established gun control in 1970. From 1971 to 1979, 300,000 Christians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
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Cambodia established gun control in 1956. From 1975 to 1977, one million educated people, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
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Defenseless people rounded up and exterminated in the 20th Century because of gun control: 56 million.
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You won’t see this data on the US evening news, or hear politicians disseminating this information.

Guns in the hands of honest citizens save lives and property and, yes, gun-control laws adversely affect only the law-abiding citizens.

Take note my fellow Americans, before it’s too late!

The next time someone talks in favor of gun control, please remind them of this history lesson.

With guns, we are ‘citizens’. Without them, we are ‘subjects’.

During WW II the Japanese decided not to invade America because they knew most Americans were ARMED!

If you value your freedom, please spread this anti gun -control message to all of your friends. 

The purpose of fighting is to win. 
There is no possible victory in defense. 
The sword is more important than the shield, and skill is more important than either. 
The final weapon is the brain.
All else is supplemental. 

SWITZERLAND ISSUES EVERY HOUSEHOLD A GUN! 
SWITZERLAND’S GOVERNMENT TRAINS EVERY ADULT TO WHOM THEY ISSUE A RIFLE. 

This was brought to my attention

One other point is particularly important here. The description of gun distribution in Switzerland omits important information.

The Swiss government doesn’t hand out a gun to every household. It requires nearly every able-bodied young male adult to serve in the citizen militia, where they are issued a military rifle. The guns are supposed to be for military use only, not for personal defense.

Those men are supposed to show up for 18 weeks of training, followed by seven re-training sessions (each lasting three weeks) over the next 10 years.

If you want to keep your weapon after your years of service, it is refitted to scale back its firepower and you need to provide a reason for keeping it.

IT’S A NO BRAINER! 
DON’T LET OUR GOVERNMENT WASTE MILLIONS OF OUR TAX DOLLARS IN AN EFFORT TO MAKE ALL LAW ABIDING CITIZENS AN EASY TARGET. 

I’m a firm believer in the 2nd Amendment! 
If you are too, please forward.
    

~ Steve ~                   H/T  FOTM’s OWN  Ken L.

Benghazi, I.R.S. And Now For Your Viewing Pleasure, Scandal # 3: The A.P.

well it seems our justice dept. run by none other THAN that rock star eric holder had decided to hijack about 20 phone lines belonging to ap. in April and may of 2012.      kind of funny now that ap has been the target the media is up in arms. For years while justice and the admin have abused the american public it seemed they could care less, Well anyway if this is what it takes to shine the light on the vermin so be it. Benghazi, i.r.s., a.p.               seems like 3 strikes YOU’RE out in the ole ball game.

Politicians versus press: Attorney General Eric Holder held a press conference on Tuesday to address the story that the Justice Department secretly obtained two months worth of journalists phone records

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Eric Holder points finger at his DEPUTY who secretly obtained journalist’s phone records as Obama is forced to say he has ‘confidence’ in the Attorney General

• Justice Department obtained records listing incoming and outgoing calls and duration of calls for more than 20 telephone lines used by journalists
• Lines included the main number used by reporters in the House of Reps press gallery and general AP numbers in Washington and New York
• Stems from AP article talking reporting a thwarted terror attack
• Attorney General Eric Holder said he had recused himself from the investigation into the leak to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest
• Said that his deputy made the decision to obtain the records

By ASSOCIATED PRESS and DAILY MAIL REPORTER

PUBLISHED: 13:40 EST, 14 May 2013 | UPDATED: 17:55 EST, 14 May 2013

Attorney General Eric Holder went on the defensive on Tuesday explaining why the Justice Department secretly obtained two months worth of reporters’ telephone records in an ‘unprecedented’ search for a confidential source.

‘This was a very serious leak and a very, very serious leak,’ Holder said at a press conference explaining the department’s actions which have been criticized for going against the constitutional right to a free press.

Holder said that he recused himself from the making the controversial decision to subpoena the phone records of Associated Press journalists, saying that it was made by Deputy Attorney General James Cole.

He said that he was ‘confident that the people involved in this … followed all applicable Department of Justice regulations’ even though he claimed not to actually know the details of the decision-making process as a result of his recusal.

President Obama was forced to follow Holder’s press conference with the release of a statement saying that the incident does not shake his faith in his close friend and the country’s top legal adviser.    (Whoopsie)

‘The president has confidence in the attorney general,’ press secretary Jay Carney said.

The controversy came when the Associated Press reported that two months worth of reporters’ telephone records without their knowledge, obtaining a wide breadth of records that had nothing to do with the leak of information that they were concerned about. 

The Justice Department has spoken in the past about how they were upset over the leak of information about a foiled al Qaeda plot where the terrorist group planned to detonate a bomb on a plane bound for the United States.

‘I’ve been a prosecutor since 1976 and I have to say that this is among, if not the most serious, it is within the top two or three most serious leaks I’ve ever seen,’ Holder said.

It put the American people at risk. That’s not hyperbole. It put the American people at risk.’

That isn’t enough to satisfy critics, as top Republicans are already calling for Holder’s resignation over the incident.

‘Because Attorney General Holder has so egregiously violated the public trust, the president should ask for his immediate resignation,’ Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus said. 

‘If President Obama does not, the message will be unmistakable: The President of the United States believes his administration is above the Constitution and does not respect the role of a free press.’

The records listed journalists’ incoming and outgoing calls, as well as the duration of each call, for the work and personal phone numbers of individual reporters, general AP office numbers in New York, Washington and Hartford, Connecticut, and the main number for AP reporters in the House of Representatives press gallery, according to attorneys for the AP.

In all, the government seized records for more than 20 separate telephone lines assigned to AP and its journalists in April and May of 2012.

News of the probe into one of the largest news organizations in the world immediately sparked outrage among Republicans on Capitol Hill.

‘The First Amendment is first for a reason,’ Michael Steel, spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner, told MailOnline. 

‘If the Obama Administration is going after reporters’ phone records, they better have a damned good explanation.’

A spokesman for Republican House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said the move is representative of a broader ‘pattern of intimidation.’

‘Whether it is secretly targeting patriotic Americans participating in the electoral progress or reporters exercising their First Amendment rights, these new revelations suggest a pattern of intimidation by the Obama Administration,’ Doug Heye said.

The American Civil Liberties Union was equally critical. 

( You Know you screwed up if even the ACLU is on your butt.)

‘Obtaining a broad range of telephone records in order to ferret out a government leaker is an unacceptable abuse of power,’ said Ben Wizner, director of the ACLU Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project. ‘Freedom of the press is a pillar of our democracy, and that freedom often depends on confidential communications between reporters and their sources.’

AP President and Chief Executive Officer Gary Pruitt said the government obtained information far beyond anything that could be justified by any specific investigation.

He demanded the return of the phone records and destruction of all copies.

‘There can be no possible justification for such an overbroad collection of the telephone communications of The Associated Press and its reporters,’ Pruitt wrote in a letter of protest to  Holder. 

‘These records potentially reveal communications with confidential sources across all of the newsgathering activities undertaken by the AP during a two-month period, provide a road map to AP’s news gathering operations, and disclose information about AP’s activities and operations that the government has no conceivable right to know.’

The exact number of journalists who used the phone lines during that period is unknown but more than 100 journalists work in the offices whose phone records were targeted on a wide array of stories about government and other matters.

U.S. officials have previously said in public testimony that the U.S. attorney in Washington is conducting a criminal investigation into who may have leaked information contained in a May 7, 2012, AP story about a foiled terror plot.

The story disclosed details of a CIA operation in Yemen that stopped an al Qaeda plot in the spring of 2012 to detonate a bomb on an airplane bound for the United States.

In testimony in February, CIA Director John Brennan noted that the FBI had questioned him about whether he was AP’s source, which he denied. 

He called the release of the information to the media about the terror plot an ‘unauthorized and dangerous disclosure of classified information.’

Prosecutors have sought phone records from reporters before, but the seizure of records from such a wide array of AP offices, including general AP switchboards numbers and an office-wide shared fax line, is unusual and largely unprecedented.

In the letter notifying the AP received Friday, the Justice Department offered no explanation for the seizure, according to Pruitt’s letter and attorneys for the AP.

The records were presumably obtained from phone companies earlier this year although the government letter did not explain that. None of the information provided by the government to the AP suggested the actual phone conversations were monitored.

~Steve~

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2324501/Attorney-General-Eric-Holder-defends-deputys-decision-secretly-obtain-journalists-phone-records-saying-searching-leak.html#ixzz2TMlgvGVJ