Kangaroo Congress in Contempt: Decider alone "shall" be "serious"

On December 1, 2005, John Yoo, an architect of U.S. legal policy on torture, publicly claimed that George Bush has the authority to order the torture of children. ... Does President George W. Bush agree? Are Yoo's remarks an expression of what is now offical policy and practice? ... During a debate in Chicago, John Yoo (Bush's former Department of Justice lawyer who created the justifications for the torture policies as being legal and the suspension of rights, and of absolute Presidential authority) said that presidential powers include the right to order the torture of suspects, including their children. John Yoo, a key architect for post 9/11 legal policy of the Bush Administration, has continued to advocate White House policies on torture, wiretapping and unlimited presidential powers.

John Yoo Argues Pres. George Bush Has Legal Power to Torture Children, Philip Watts

The president of the United States just (7/20/07) issued a public pronouncement declaring, as a matter of U.S. policy, that a single man has the authority to detain any person anyplace in the world and subject him or her to secret interrogation techniques that aren't torture but that nonetheless can't be revealed, as long as that person is thought to be a "supporter" of an organization "associated" in some unspecified way with the Taliban or Al Qaeda, and as long he thinks that person might know something that could "assist" us. ... but "supporter" isn't defined, nor is "associated organization." That leaves the definition broad enough to permit the secret detention of, say, a man who sympathizes ideologically with the Taliban and might have overheard something useful in a neighborhood cafe, or of a 10-year-old girl whose older brother once trained with Al Qaeda. ... This isn't just hypothetical. The U.S. has already detained people based on little more. According to media reports, the CIA has even held children, including the 7- and 9-year-old sons of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. In 2006, Mohammed was transferred from a secret CIA facility to Guantanamo, but the whereabouts of his children are unknown.

Dark powers, the sequel: The president's recent executive order allows the CIA to detain anyone the agency thinks is a terrorist -- or a terrorist's kid. by Rosa Brooks, Los Angles Times, July 27, 2007

If witnesses refuse to honor congressional subpoenas and are found in contempt, the matter is referred to the U.S. attorney from Washington, D.C., "whose duty it shall be to bring the matter before the grand jury for its action." The wording of that law doesn't give the U.S. attorney any leeway. It doesn't say that he or she "can" or "may" bring it before the grand jury. It says he or she "shall" bring the matter to the grand jury, so the courts can resolve the conflict between the other two branches of government .... And that would set the stage for a whole range of nightmares, up to and including impeachment.

Bush asserts a king's prerogative, by Jay Bookman, Atlanta Journal, July 25, 2007

With polls showing that a majority of the country now favors impeachment, and with Conyers, Pelosi, and the Democratic Congress sinking deeper and deeper into disfavor even as the president continues to add to his list of Constitutional crimes, something’s gotta give. After all, the Founders, in writing impeachment into the Constitution, did not say the test was whether Congress had the votes to impeach. They wrote that if the president abused his power, or committed other high crimes and misdemeanors, bribery or treasson, Congress “shall” impeach.

Office Arrests: The Shame of John Conyers, by Dave Lindorff, CommonDreams.org, July 24, 2007

       If Congress does not begin impeachment hearings soon, the President of the United States does not only have the right, but the duty to dissolve it, even without a pretext of a new war or a new terrorist attack or other unnamed and unnecessary nation emergency or crisis. They will have cemented themselves as one of the most corrupt and craven political institutions of all time, blind to any and all but the most heinous of crimes, all for political gains, ideological and political influence, willing to ignore the law and the Constitution every bit as much as the President himself may have, which they have concluded by every speech and every inaction, is beyond even investigation.

       There is a difference between being able to win elections and being fit to rule. Especially nowadays when it is technological technocrats, spin-doctors (liars), Madison Avenue admen, and blatant propagandists that have the most influence during political campaigns which have become so much about gaining and spending obscene amounts of money in a cycle of corruption that makes direct kickbacks to mobsters look circuitous and complex by comparison. Money is raised by making promises to corporations, often those most “influential” who control the media, for the purposes of their help which both parties fall over themselves to improve their stranglehold and monopolies on the airwaves which are given to them freely by the state, raise millions of dollars which they give back to these companies in purchasing advertising for campaigns. Then there is the political “technologists” who prune voter lists of legitimate voters for spurious reasons, disrupt the campaigns of rival candidates, put out fabrications to the medias they are purchasing ads with and allowed to make unsubstantiated or wholly fictitious claims out during campaigns which receive little scrutiny if they are “major” or “serious” candidates in the eyes of the press who judge relevance by the size of their campaign chests.

       Were it not bad enough for these people whose job it is to bend laws and break rules, being given free reign once every two or four years to do their duty and wreak havoc, trying to “purchase” and “control” the democratic system, blur the facts and tilt the scales of justice to get their man into office, but they now have put up their feet as the “managers” of government themselves. Since leaders are now constantly required to run for reelection almost on the day they take up office since the price of elections is so high, campaign managers and media advisers become chiefs of staff, presidential advisers, able to fire and marginalize career diplomats, government lawyers, FBI and other law enforcement agencies, all for political ends. Those who run the elections, most often by the most dubious legal means and methods possible, now run the government itself.

       And when this comes out as a “bad thing”, when this penchant for law breaking and public manipulation by constantly lying and leaning on those media corporations they have an insidious if not incestuous relationship with becomes public by those who know nothing about governing but everything about manipulation and deceit becomes let upon the light, when it is finally coming out how the courts and police have been corrupted by political apparachniks comes out, what does those who have any ability to rectify it do? They have party line votes with their own campaign managers advising them how to proceed based upon their own calculations of how much they can “spin” what is going on to provide them with votes or more influence or more campaign contributions for the next election cycle of course! What else would they do, conduct themselves according to their duties under the Constitution? No, they ask themselves what would Karl Rove do far more than what would a statesman do.

       If the diligent reporter Amy Goodman is correct, ("The Democratic leaders call the impeachment drive a distraction that would hinder chances at winning the 2008 elections") . that the Democratic leadership has gone on record as saying they would put off or ignore their oaths to protect and defend the Constitution because they think it would cost them votes in the next elections, they have broken their oaths and are a party to obstruction of justice as much as Alberto Gonzales, Dick Cheney, Harriet Miers, or anyone they hold in “contempt”. Impeachment is not a political tool, no matter what politicians think, it is a legal method for redressing criminal behavior and using it, or failing to use it and overlook crimes, makes either or both party leaderships in Congress as guilty of obstruction of Justice as Scooter Libby, if they hesitated for political reasons to launch preliminary hearings based upon political considerations. They would far more than the attorney scandal be using or failing to use the law, failing to put aside politics in the name of an open search for the truth, letting the public know what their government has been up to when the most serious of crimes is being not only alleged, but overwhelming evidence of criminal wrongdoing and abuse of power constantly leaked before a public increasingly awed and repulsed not only by the inactivity to address it, but that it all is and will be forevermore considered “normal” and that there is no depths to which the law and the courts are not willing to go or allow themselves to be “bent”.

       Congress has failed as an institution, not because the public has yet been completely turned off by its corruption, by allegations of tainted elections, by it unconcern for their voices and opinions if they are not wealthy or influential, but because they have been as willing as anyone they condemn to put political machinations and party loyalty above what is best for their nation, above their oaths to defend its Constitution, and their total disregard that they are now the only protection for rule of law or continued democracy. In light of the greatest crisis to this nation, they would consult their Karl Rove's, their Machiavelli's, instead of their consciences. They have proven themselves every bit as much unfit to rule as the President might have, and now with all the pieces in place for the President to disband it, I for one can no longer see the difference if he did.

       Impeachment you do not do because you know you have the votes in the Senate to convict. The Senate function is a trial, and you do not go to trial with a predetermined or preordained outcome in mind. That is a Stalinist Trial. That is a Kangaroo Court. That is what those who still care complain our country is moving toward. If that is what either party suggests should be the case, they should recuse themselves now.

       Impeachment is an indictment. It is done because there is enough evidence to warrant a trial, to suggest criminal wrongdoing. The greatest indictment to the political system is those who would suggest as “Senator” Obama has done, that there has yet been any evidence of serious criminal wrongdoing or subversion of the Constitution. In this, unlike the Senate whose outcome should not even be considered at this point, the amount of evidence is important. It can be overwhelming, enough to ensure a guilty verdict, or it can be enough to show complicity in criminal wrongdoing up to the level to be removed from office. If the evidence is not there or thought to be too weak, their ought to be no impeachment. But that evidence will not be brought forth, than investigatory hearing will not commence to try to gather that evidence, that points to the greatest failing yet to date of the political and justice system.

       I have pointed now for years the precipice we are upon. It has been the military which has leaked the greatest amount of information on the criminal wrongdoing by this administration. It is under grave situations like this that the military will ultimately decide whether impeachment will be “allowed” if Bush should declare that during a time of war, he is the sole “decider” and that his generals would have to decided, whether their oaths to uphold the Constitution were not just blowing hot air. And, as former CIA analyst Roy McGovern and others have pointed out, a President under indictment with the possibility of soon being removed from office would give the military reason to not uphold illegal orders to start provocative action or begin to escalate current conflicts or begin new conflicts to save one sorry leaders ass. Impeachment would be the legal cover they would need to stop what they know has been a political war of choice, and they might be able to prevent another one they have, against their better judgment, been told to prepare for in Iran.

       Many have open worried that the US is moving toward a military dictatorship model or that we have already become one. That would be true if Congress does not begin impeachment hearings, far less than if it did attempt to begin impeachment and they were stopped from doing so by the courts or the military from exercising their sole remaining potential to stop the madness before a new wider war begins or spreads at Bush's “discretion”. That is because if no veneer or illusion that democratic institutions remained after they have overwhelmingly now would have proven they have ceased to function, it would be far easier for Bush to removed via the military's own competency rules, should he indeed be then the sole “elected decider.” A dictatorship exposed as such is far easier to topple than one that hides behind a puppet legislature.

       Not only that, but Congress would be complicit in the deaths of all who might die due to a Gulf of Token type incident for failing to respond to that threat which has been pointed out relentless to them as of late as a real possibility. The US, democracy, liberty, and our military are now dying a slow death, and Congress seems content to due little else besides non-binding resolutions, meaningless censures and contempt charges that will be openly ignored by an administration that not only holds the President above the law, but anyone he that works for he or that he designates too is above the law, and that all rights under the Constitution given to anyone else, he can revoke at his discretion. If Congress cannot find “high crimes and misdemeanors” in that, they no longer have eyes to see, no longer a consciousness with which to think, and have already surrendered to the President any authority to decide anything they previously thought they might have had. In that case, I would agree with the President if he suspends Congress completely. They will have become a costly illusion of democracy and a waste of money.

       People have come forward against this administration's wrongdoing and it may as well have been to a firing squad. The press has been threatened when doing its job correctly, uncovering illegal programs, and other times has been rewarded for raking over the coals anyone who profoundly displeased the administration. Whistleblowers against Bush have been told to go to hell by the Supreme Court. And Congress, by not beginning hearings on impeachment has told them don't bother, no one will watch your back. Silence your conscience, it is ok, make your deal for a pardon, the Decider will have your back, and Congress is just one more entity that will throw you off the pier if you try to come forward. Their hesitation has made their immunity and protection worthless in the face of a 'unitary executive', and the President's favor is beyond measuring in cost, it is literally your life and the lives of your children at his discretion, and sole whim.

The Truth Is Never Off-the-table In Any Redeemable Society

       If he won’t quit, you can’t acquit. I have seen countless reasons why and how the police and courts have been used now to target people for investigations who have been deemed inconvenient to powerful people or interests, and once the police become used as a weapon, you no longer have any semblance of living in a fair and just society. (I see something you bought used may or may not have been stolen, You may or may not have known that email attachment / download link may have let to illegal software or other material (easiest way someone can be set up or to scare the shit out them just with spam because even trying to erase it can be a crime) (I was in Florida when a judge blew his brains out in his office when arrested for pornography legal in most of Florida except for his town, gotta love Florida’s sense of “justice” and “morality”), Voters on your list may have given false names / false addresses (especially those non-entities called homeless people who rank right up there with felons) and your candidate / employee / volunteer may or may not have known about it, Your article / post may or may not have incited or may or may not possibly incite someone to commit a crime if it was critical of the government / President / police / courts, XYZ Corporation, a millionaire billionaire, rich people in general, anyone powerful in general, etc. and been read by someone prior to committing a crime, and everyone’s favorite reason for a criminal investigation, You might have lied about cheating on your wife). Once investigations of ANYONE can be launched on spurious grounds because of questionable reasons, once selective enforcement of laws is used to political ends, or powerful or rich people are excluded because they are more able to fight back and have the dubious nature of why they were targeted exposed, or have connections which would make such charges or sentences go away later, you do not have a country or legal system which is not ultimately controlled by a gang of criminals.

        There were two things relevant to this which I learned from studying Russia and the Soviet Union recently in the FSU. One of which is how the Communists took control of Eastern Europe. Most Americans like to think it was violently, though force and the threat of force were obviously factors. Unlike Iraq or Afghanistan, the occupation forces in Eastern Europe were already on the ground and in their countries. A compromise was worked out with the newly reconstituted governments, through intimidation but “legal” that because a significant number of the people were legitimately Communists, and since the Soviets were there, that a power sharing arrangement would be worked out. “Just give us control of the police,” was basically what was requested. With that, obviously, they were able to steal everything else. A few questionable elections later, and low and behold, everything was safely in their hands.

        Another is how criminals now outsource their protection enforcement to the police. Why kill someone or try to destroy their lives if the cross / displease you when you have a corrupted legal system which will not only do it for you, but which includes its built-in insurance against police questioning? It is the ultimate criminal one-stop-shopping. When innocent people routinely die in jail awaiting trial on obviously set-up or bogus charges, or when merely the threat of being charged with a specific crime is so damaging to ones life or would devastate their families financially, and when asking the police for help is basically dealing with the same loose knit organization of cooperative actors, criminals and police and politicians are all on the same page and profit from the same convergence of interests.

        But that is Russia, you might say. Big Bad Scary Russia. That could never happen in the good ol’ US of A! People have a sense that the attorney scandal was the tip of a greater manipulation of the legal system. Some even suspect that it could be part of an overall strategy that includes illegal wiretaps and databases that log all phone and computer activity cross-referenced by things like race and voter affiliation.

       But say how these leaked blatantly illegal programs still ongoing might fit together and not be just a happenstance string of random “bad apples” and still yet, though far more probable that just being “accidental coincidences” and you will still be written off as a “conspiracy theorist”. There is a pattern to what is going on now in terms of illegal activity specifically directed at key people, and the US attorney scandal, the “Terrorist Surveillance Program,” and others which were leaked BY THE PEOPLE DOING THEM who were chosen for their LOYALTY TO BE TRUSTED WITH THE KNOWLEDGE OF THEM because it was inconceivable that they would leak such information because of political and psychological profiling, they are the least of which could be uncovered by any uncorrupted legal system. Unfortunately, we know we don’t have one.

       “Obstruction of an investigation” is no longer a crime if done by the right people. “Blackmail” is no longer a crime if done by the right people. Countless other crimes, can be, are, and will be excused if done in the name of covering up other crimes done by the Executive branch or any other actors they have contracted to do things on their behalf if contrary to the law and/or Constitution. The commuted sentence of “Scooter” Libby was a message just like a Mafia hit is meant to send a message. Cross us and there is no means to which we will not go to cover our tracks.

        I had mentioned in the previous post how the former Speaker of the House considered Alberto Gonzales’s actions amounting to blackmail or intimidation. People have recently alleged that the Vice-President’s office has been trying to blackmail or “pressure” not only members of Congress and their staffs, but members of the President’s staff as well. The level of criminality festering under the surface is incalculable while instead of creating the means for these crimes to be exposed, quite the opposite is occurring and new means are being devised everyday to retaliate and new threats of retaliation upon those who might wish to try to come forward. They not only would be abandoned by a President who would otherwise be their saving grace for crimes they did at his direction, but they risk being set up for things they did not do, or have to fight false allegations they know or fear, with overwhelming reason, would be thrown at them by the police or by the press, depending upon their level of importance and visibility.

        I said in RCP2 that things are changing, and they are. Ground has been given to letting out the truth, and if it were not for many brave people who have been willing to put their lives and careers on the line against the machinery of their own government and police being co-opted and used to illegal ends and to cover up illegal activities by the heads of their own agencies and of the Executive Branch, and I am certainly not one to say it has not been enough. You cannot ask people to do what you know will bring the wrath of illegal retaliation against them for speaking out and doing what is right, and that ultimately they are correct by almost every rational view for remaining silent. For me, I had a glimpse of where that road leads, of where remaining silent will take us. If others cannot see it, or pretend not to, that is ultimately their matters alone.

        For that reason, I will not say that the “Family Jewels” was not enough. It was something, and something is always better than nothing, which was what we had before, and reason to think would always in the near future be the case. But something far darker is on the horizon and I must now venture into the Iranian topic.

        During the Cold War, it was convenient that if the world was destroyed, no one would know who was to blame. It made it all so nice and simple. If anyone would be thought to be responsible for an Armageddon that could be trigger by simply a computer error or human error, most around the world would have assumed it was the Soviet Union, at least by the West, which to most in the West, IS the world.

        Now the tables have turned, and for good reason. Most the world outside of America knows the US has been launching wars of aggression which our own Nuremberg lawyers have said were no different than Germany or Russia’s illegal invasions, but Americans, those who bother care share the President’s same contempt for International Law. Why should we be “bound” by what may not be in “our nation’s” best interests?

        But far more damning to me as far as tracing back to now what may be what our own intelligence services have repeatedly warned the President and leaked, would be “uncontainable catastrophic consequences,” that being if we were to attack Iran on behalf of Israel, the Neocons, or whatever other group or person might think that to be a swell idea. That would be far worse than the killings of potentially hundreds of thousands of civilians in Iraq, or even that we do not allow or enable the counting of civilian losses there by our actions, because this one is being done in this more open time after more has been exposed of our criminality and what even one of our top generals described as a “government run like a Mafia,” with not only the blessing of Congress, not via disinformation doled out to the uncritical press spouting press releases as God’ to Moses divined truths, but the most heinous willful ignorance by both political parties.

        I am speaking of the condemnation by Congress of Iran for a statement by its President accusing him of inciting genocide against Israel based upon a translation known to be potentially, completely, mistranslated. This was just one of a PR campaign designed to soften the American public up to approving a bombing campaign or war with Iran, but by far a telling one. Both parties prevented a potentially more accurate translation which instead called for regime change in Israel, not exactly friendly either, but no less than what we have done repeated recently in regards to many countries around the world. Say one of them accused us erroneously as using that statement to say we were advocating genocide, and prevented, as our wonderful and just Congress did, from even allowing an expert translation approved by that countries most prestigious newspaper, from even being read into the record in its Congress or Parliament. NO EVIDENCE to the contrary to claims they could not have know to be possibly without merit on an accusation tantamount to a declaration of war, or to use as evidence to justify one!

       How much more close could any country be to saying the truth does not matter. That we will do the most grave and serious things, up to and including actions that will cause thousands of innocent deaths, based upon faulty and questionable “evidence” which we will not even allow to have contrary verifiable evidence be submitted into record by our legislators, even if it is accepted as potentially true by a press always sympathetic to misinformation the other way. For them, even that bending of reality was too much. For our Congress, it was just fine and completely unquestionable, regardless of its accuracy.

       They have learned much from the President, and we as a country have learned nothing yet from the last 6 years of how the truth has taken a backseat to police, press, politicians, and pundits who can be pressed and made to dance like marionettes to things everyone knows to be based upon lies and political manipulations, yet no one is allowed to complain about safely. Yet what or who is really safe in such an environment?

       I have been allowed to go further than I had anticipated, so nothing that happens now could come as a surprise or shock. I always took the best shot that was possible at the time where I saw the greatest hypocrisies and the best potentials for change. There is still time for a few more posts before rational debates again become impossible, before Congress goes nuts with what should have been done long ago, wins or goes home, and truth telling becomes treasonous again. So those posts are what I look forward to now, and also hoping others see the fork ahead and the potential destruction of everything they thought was good about America, its ideals, its honesty, and above all, its sense of honor, which will either be redeemed soon, or lost forever.

Constitution Cola Returns: Can the 'Real Thing' be far behind?

This was originally written a year ago for PolSci 9. It has been 'lost' for more than half that time. I cannot even begin to explain how much trouble I went through trying to get this article back, only have it unexpectedly 'back' now. I am leaving it intact though some parts are a bit dated, yet other parts show Americans were willing to put up with uncountably more and far worse revelations about the President, Vice-President, and Attorney General, have Congress change hands to an 'opposition' party, and still yet did a whole lot more of nothing but, 'Thank you sir, may I have another."

Has Constitution Cola Lost Its Fizz? Hot New Brands Topple Industry Leader's Market Dominance

        Like a lot of people, I just took it for granted it that it would always be there. I drank it while growing up like we all did. Who can't remember a lazy summer day, sharing a half-gallon bottle (no plastic 2-liters in those days) with your siblings, parents, and even grandparents, who would remind you how their grandparents drank it too.

        It was kind of like an institution, something handed down from generation to generation. It was there for us through the hard times of the Great Depression when this country was tested like never before, and as a symbol of America at home and abroad during both World Wars as much as American movies and cigarettes. For a lot of us, it was as unquestionably American as apple pie and giant gas-guzzling cars. Yet times change, and its market decline came faster than anyone could have dreamed.

        One could blame its lousy recent ad campaign for its decline, or the brilliant marketing campaigns for new rival brands aimed at its key demographic bases, or our tense modern times, but the fact is, once people became open to the idea that other brands are not un-American or unthinkable, its dominance was fated. The reality is, though we all drank it, though we all thought we liked it the same way, it basically was different things to different people.

         We all went through our youthful phases where we argued about how to improve its recipe. We may have put rum in it, some put it in cake and brownies, but it was usually there at every gathering, like a safety blanket keeping us safe in large groups, helping us feel comfortable with one another, breaking the ice, making the police respect our wild parties because they drank it too. Some of them may not have liked what we did with it, but it was a common part of all our lives and psyche.

         The biggest blow to it as being unquestionably a symbol of Americana was when even the President suggested it was stale. He even implied he might even prefer one of the newer brands from time to time at the White House. This set the stage for rival brands to suggest it was not necessarily synonymous or required at all American homes, functions, and gatherings.

         A lackluster ad campaign by its chief promoter, Alberto Gonzales, showed his heart was no longer with it. In trying to reinvent it for the future, he turned on its historical legacy and the traditional image people had of it, saying those who held it in their hearts above the current President were un-American, unpatriotic, and reported them to the police for investigations. The “This-Is-Not-Your-Father's-Cola” campaign was ill-conceived from the start, but the board consistently backed him up, even as sales began to plummet worldwide.

         The media, which had always been an unofficial cheerleader of brand, giving it free product placement in all of their news reporting, they were targeted too by Mr. Gonzales' campaign, threatened with investigations and monitoring of their reporters who might possibly infringe on its trademark instead of appreciating the free advertising they were constantly giving his brand. One could even begin to question which company he was really working for, his stewardship was so destructive to its stock.

         But nothing happens in a vacuum. Its gravely questionable and self-destructive marketing strategy came at a time when retro-fascions were in vogue, and to younger generations they were not retro or fascist or fashions at all, merely something hip, new, and different. After Constitution Cola abandoned its tired-but-true admittedly dull “Separation-Of-Powers” ad campaign, other brands recruited those who were let go to be used in their own marketing strategies.

        The Supremes, long the unsung supporting mostly off-camera backup players, became the new subtle stars in the campaign of an upstart, much more fashionable and chic micro-brewery label. The brilliantly named and marketed Dick Cider's Cider used them to great effect, coyly keeping them in the background in ads as well, but as an ever present presence in all of their commercials, a beautiful masterstroke of co-opting and undermining the idea of continuity and loyalty Constitution Cola enjoyed with consumers, and transferring that warm sense of nostalgia to the new brand, while still appealing to those who were looking for something new.

         But why now? Other brands have always been around making Constitution Cola refine it image over the years. Socialist Soda was never as popular here as in Europe, but its clever use of common people in its ad campaigns made Constitution Cola have to refine its image and marketing strategy to have to play better to its own populace base, and as a result reached even new heights in sales both at home and worldwide, becoming far more world-market competitive in the process in response to the competition.

         The answer to “Why now?” is simply because the “War on Terror” © TM made people more receptive to a stronger image. They also demanded drinks which catered to their own individual images of being unique and different than a one-size-fits-all grand umbrella which contained everyone underneath it and applied to everyone equally. Not every white-collar suburban ex-yuppie necessarily wants to be identified with liking the same drink which a homeless Black from New Orleans drinks. Its a mental image thing.

         Other new and revised brands have better catered to that sense of “individuality”which ironically was Constitution Cola's whole main selling point until it became ubiquitous. You cannot always be universal and regional at the same time.

         The “Dick Cider's Cider” brand comes in many different flavors. These are regionalized, marketed and packaged differently around the country in ways that Constitution Cola cannot be, forced by peoples mental images of it as being representative of everyone, which is unappealing to those who want to stand apart from the common crowd. The Dick's “De-cider” Hard Cider flavors are marketed in rural areas, and softer non-alcoholic flavors in cities, without contradictions in image in ways Constitution Cola's universal image cannot do. The former is what you want it think it is since its image is new and vague, and can mean whatever it wants to mean or whatever others want it to mean. Its new, its different, and being undefined in people's minds means it has no baggage as necessarily being liked by people whom you don't like.

         Some like me like to believe it is not over yet. After all, Constitution Cola still has, for the moment anyway, by far the best image and name recognition in the hearts and minds of consumers, the mute approving respect of the general public, even if that public image might have been hollowed recently, while its stock values are plummeting as corporate investors pull out seeking always those industries with the highest profit margins and growth potentials, while its own future prospects are undeniably only to be notable at all for a continued increasing decline and watering down, a fatal and unforgivable sin for investors.

         To China and to Third World authoritarian dictatorships is where most of our investor's dollars have gone, trillions of them, because there and other similar places, they really prefer these companies' structures which can operate without any of the historical restraints, labor or health codes, quality controls, quality of life, safety controls, and legacy considerations which Constitution Cola's board had to deal with until recently on a daily basis. The new fascion brands now taking the country by storm are much more in line with world-market trends, and are preferred by our own and major world investors.

         And because that lack of faith among investors is not daily front page news, most Americans are oblivious that one of their flagship brands is even in trouble, while they cluelessly continue to drink their hard cider, eat their brownies, play their video games, not realizing those parties they used to have without concern for safety or privacy are no longer safe nor secure, and not because of terrorists. You cannot give up supporting Constitution Cola yourself and expect everyone else to keep buying it too. It is a case of a crumbling giant whom no one will support anymore because everyone prefers to think it needs no support, while each is free to ignore what they prefer not to think about, that once it is gone, it is never coming back.

----

         The question is what will people not sell out on for money. From what I have seen of Congress, the Press, the Supreme Court, the answer is nothing. Wealth is the great consoler for a lack of conscience. Pay me enough and maybe I too might choose to believe we are not dishonoring the past and the truth and victims with endless bold-faced lies, sacrificing the public's future prosperity and control over their own government, and perverting the definitions of freedom and democracy to mean anything but what they used to mean. I don't know how high the price would be for me to roll over and play dead like the three above mentioned “estates” have and have thrown all the Constitution Cola they could get their hands on into the ocean like some Bostonians once did so famously with tea not all that long ago.

         What I choose to believe is that price would be far higher than what a Congressman makes, including all the bribes, legal and otherwise, all the PAC money, speaking fees, and guaranteed multi-million dollar book deals, guaranteed corporate jobs with million dollar salaries after leaving office, and their “token” $300,000 plus official salaries, all combined. It would take more money than that.

         It would take more power than the power trip the ideologues on the Supreme Court seem to be on, defiling the Constitution by backing up the most shameful decision the Court has ever taken (not allowing Florida to proceed with a court-mandated recount votes of an extremely questionable, extremely close election specifically mandated to need to occur by law by Florida's own and the country's own Constitutions) with going along silently and guiltily with an endless stream of shameful unconstitutional policies of what that one moment's turn away from history and democracy has wrought, a chain domino effect now an endless web of shame, all solely to hope to attempt to “spin” the future to their own personal views of how they think Americans in the future “ought” to think and behave. And to attempt to achieve an ideological goal, in the process they have abandoned all of their previous principles of avoiding judicial politicking and how government should stay out of people's daily lives and privacy, which they so much criticized others previous Supreme Courts for, but had at least occurred before within some semblance of legality and legal processes.

         It is a free-for-all world of Justice now, where the Attorney General of the “Justice” Department can threaten to imprison and investigate any whistle-blower (with a not-so-subtle thumbs up from the “Supremes” a few days ago) of any reporter who uncovers any more details or tries to investigate a blatantly illegal program he himself helped create, now safely using his office and control of law enforcement to quash any investigations of it, or himself, or his superiors who may have authorized it.

         Low level soldiers can be investigated, incarcerated, and even potentially executed for torture and murder and for violating the Geneva Conventions and Military Code of Conduct in committing War Crimes, while the head of the Defense Department and the President can openly state or imply that such bans on torture or international treaties rules and codes of conduct in war do not apply to themselves.

         No new independent consul investigations have been launched by Congress, nor foreseeably will be, to investigate recent new blatantly illegal and unconstitutional revelations implicating the President and/or the Attorney General to such abuses as:

1.Secret prisons and kidnappings of Americans, Europeans, and others shipped to other countries to be held without charges, without enough evidence to even arrest them, without acknowledgment that they are being held and reportedly with plenty of evidence showing these people may be and are being tortured, occasionally even tortured to death so long “catastrophic organ failure” is not the intent of the torturing but merely a regrettable “side-effect”

2.Wiretapping of Americans' overseas calls and now revealed potential wiretapping of local calls, all without warrants, all actions specifically spelled out as illegal under current law deflected only after being lied about until that was impossible by the Presidents own brazen admission that the law could not prohibit anything he might authorize in secret if he called it a “national security” measure, and

3.Illegal logging all calls made by all Americans into a database which includes cross referencing of age, race, and political party registration.

4.Nor has there been any attempts to constrain or question the revocation of Habeas Corpus (the right to trial) by the courts or Congress.

         Why should a reporter risk jail time for looking into crimes against the Constitution or lawbreaking by administration officials when Congress and the Courts have a make-no-waves policy towards literally any and absolutely whatever egregious violations of the law the White House may do, especially since they now know both they and their sources are being spied on while they try to do their work? Better to take the pay-off payments they acknowledge the government has been willing to pay them to write favorable stories about the President and administration since writing unfavorable ones could cost them their careers or worse, jail time.

         Will Congress demand the resignation of the Attorney General for decimating the capabilities of the Press to be able to do their jobs by threatening them with investigations if they pursue legitimate stories of circumventing the law or Constitution by the President, all to squash any independent checks of abuses of government power, and to prevent lies and disinformation as being exposed as such as is their mandate, right, and purpose under the First Amendment?

         Or will Congress instead continue to remain silent and knuckle under yet again to threats which now include the Speaker of the House specifically alleging a smear campaign against him by Gonzales and the Justice department in retaliation for his criticism of an unprecedented in 230 years of history raid of the Capital offices of a Congressman? Could that have been a fire across the bow of a Congress potentially beginning to become uncomfortable to being publicly repeatedly exposed as the completely ineffectual and powerless “tools” they have let themselves become?

         Will reporters too knuckle under and allow their owners to continue to sweep critical stories under the rug while their own hands are being tied and their voices silenced from publishing stories pointing to abuses far worse than Watergate, simply because their owners and editors prefer only to have good things written whenever possible about the President since they stand only to profit from such corruption, and conversely, would surely come under fire themselves if they became more openly critical even 1 inch more ahead of the rest of pack of other news organizations, and become a target of “Swift-boating” themselves?

         If even the 3rd highest official in Washington can allege such intimidation and potential blackmail by leaks and criminal investigations of himself for simply speaking out on one of those few and extremely rare occasions he might not be willing to march completely in lock-step with the President and Vice-President, one who is not even in the opposition party but one of “their own” sitting on a comfortable majority, all of whom are as loyal to whatever the President might ask of them as he is, imagine what they might do to intimidate him if he was a real obstacle in their way, the leader of a different Democratic Party of not so long ago, one that had a spine and a paper thin majority behind him?

         Then he might get a real indication of what intimidation by this Administration really means. But it would mean absolutely nothing to the public or to the law because of course, the trend is that the Press would never be allowed to cover it nor the police ever be allowed to investigate it. Think I am exaggerating? Watch how quickly this story above fades from sight like all other negative stories about what the Administration does. There are no “Teflon” Presidents, just ones who have the Press on a short enough leash to make all the bad stories about them fade quickly away from the headlines because the public is so easily convinced, when told, they don't wish to hear it, and corporations behind the news organizations who don't wish to say it because they stand only to lose from such negativity of a corporate friendly Administration that is loosening restrictions on their coverage and ownership laws, willing to do anything it can think of to make them richer, and they back up the President to the end.

         The Pentagon has begun to question its own paid propaganda stories to the Iraqi Press, but no one seems willing to call “off-limits” to spreading the propaganda money around the home front corporate media for favorable news stories about the President or his policies.

         The “Constitution Cola” being offered by the current heads of all branches of this current government and its Press is not the same sugary drink I grew up on, nor does it have merely saccharine substituted instead. Its main flavor ingredient is now arsenic, determined by design to destroy any sense of credibility or faith in our government, or in the validity of its elections, other than blind unquestioning and unquestionable patriotism-or-else, as defined for you by the President of course. In case you are unsure what “patriotism” means, they will be sure to define it for you and back that definition up with overwhelming force. Attempt to influence your government or even have it listen to you, attempt to protest or speak out publicly against it, and you do so at your own most certain peril, photographed, personal info logged, and phones tapped. Welcome to a 21st century “democracy,” American style. But drink enough hard cider and it will all go away or just seem alright.

May 30, 2006