You remember this piece of repressive garbage. It sought to empower agencies of the US national security apparatus to make judgment calls about things like intent and preemption, then act on those calls to allegedly prevent the idea from sparking an undefined action or behavior pattern. This requires precognition or unlawful surveillance. One is unlikely and the other is illegal -- or used to be. And it's certainly immoral and against the spirit of the Constitution, also a quaint notion these days.
So I've been wondering what's up with the Senate version (
HR 1955 squeaked by in the House 404 - 6 last October). Then I got this email yesterday from the bill tracker for United for Peace and Justice and I honestly don't know what to make of it.
This piece of legislation was, imo, as important to the Bushies' domestic repression program as the patriot act, NSPD 51 and the military commissions act. It was a key tool in the Pentagon's initiative to treat the Internet as an "enemy weapons system."
That peculiar characterization is from the 2003 Pentagon document entitled the Information Operation Roadmap, which was released to the public after a Freedom of Information Request by the National Security Archive at George Washington University in 2006. You can download the report as a pdf file from a
link toward the beginning of this article. It's tough to mourn the passing of a bill that tells us "...the process of adopting or promoting an extremist belief system for the purpose of facilitating ideologically based violence..." is a criminal act. Broadly defined enough for you? I guess the new Directorate of Homeland Telepathy will be making those judgments, since we've now crossed the line between actions and thoughts and mind-readers are going to be a hot commodity.
Where does all this violent ideology come from? It's bubbling through the tubes of the Internets, where Islamofascists roam free as the antelope, where brutality and bloody violence are glorified and where thoughts and ideas pose serious threats to "homeland security" and must be suppressed. Actually, that sounds more like a Bruce Willis movie, but what the hell. At any rate, these two clauses are fairly unambiguous:
(2) The promotion of violent radicalization, homegrown terrorism, and ideologically based violence exists in the United States and poses a threat to homeland security.
(3) The Internet has aided in facilitating violent radicalization, ideologically based violence, and the homegrown terrorism process in the United States by providing access to broad and constant streams of terrorist-related propaganda to United States citizens.
Of course it has, you delusional parasites. The truth, and who has access to it, is always a problem for fascists. So now it's the damned Internets, where actual facts exist and where the entire alternate universe of the international press is just waiting to tell Americans what the Bushies have really been up to in the Middle East and elsewhere.
Where Iraqi teenagers tell tales of unbelievable brutality by the occupying forces. Where "embedded" US corporate media dilettantes are revealed as the suck-up non-entities they are, more concerned with access than truth, afraid to criticize anything the US does lest that access be denied, afraid of getting fired if their editors determine their stories aren't pro-Bushie enough, afraid of losing out on lucrative corporate PR gigs when their "journalism" days are over.
Yeah, if I were a fascist dictatorship masquerading as a legitimately elected government, I'd want that crap kept away from my subjects, too. Not that the Internet is anywhere near 100 percent reliable. Anything but. It just presents alternative world views from millions of people with completely different perspectives than that of the "normal" US TV news consumer.
It was the junta's latest, best shot at trying to diminish or eliminate the parallel universe of the Intertubes and force anyone who wanted "news" back to the TV and its fantasy land vision of corporate America. Where slime queens Brittany and Paris outrank all democrats; where the oratory of leftist preachers is an affront to the national interest while their right wing nut job counterparts get a complete pass; where brains and journalistic experience are unnecessary as long as the "on air talent" has good cheek bones and perfect teeth; where the health of the US economy is measured by the wealth of the Wall St. investor class and the middle class can go to hell; and where it's always a great day for another US air strike and the traditional mass slaughter of civilians. Oh, and torture isn't really torture at all; it's just enhanced interrogation and doesn't violate any Geneva conventions whatsoever.
The only disturbing bit of information in that email is the slithering presence of Senator Joementum (asshole - Tel Aviv). Anything Lieberman's up to is by definition a bad deal for civil liberties and human rights. Now that he's finally unleashed his inner wingnut he can openly support every Bushean initiative and play kissy face with McPain and Hagee, too.
Worse yet, he's still pivotal in keeping Senate committee chairmanships out of the hands of GOPpiggies, so Reid constantly sucks up to this vile turncoat megalomaniac when he should be treating him like some particularly ugly glob of street slime stuck to the sole of his left shoe.
But enough on the negative side. The death of the Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act is the hardest blow to the face the Bushies have taken so far. I don't know if it signals a trend or if it's a once-in-a-lifetime case of politicians acting in the best interests of their constituents.
If that's the case, somebody call Guinness. Even if it's not unique in the history of democratic republics, it deserves honorable mention.
wp
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