Wednesday, December 14, 2011

John Force's Christmas Car Show 2011

From Gates of Vienna and right on

VERBATIM

Earlier this evening (around 2pm our time) a documentary about the Transatlantic Counterjihad was aired by SVT, the Swedish state broadcaster. For an hour or so our blog experienced an enormous surge in traffic, caused almost entirely by searches conducted from .se domains — i.e. in Sweden.

Presumably any number of these curious arrivals from Scandinavia have never visited Gates of Vienna in the past. So we bid you welcome! All you newcomers are invited to take a look around and read for yourselves what we have to say.

My Scandinavian contacts tell me that the SVT program was a hit-piece aimed at sites like this one, and was obviously intended to discredit and damage the Sweden Democrats (Sverigedemokraterna), in particular Kent Ekeroth. I’m also told that it featured a number of screenshots of Gates of Vienna pages, which presumably sparked all those google.se searches.

With that in mind, I suggest that our new Swedish readers spend some time going through our archives and reading what we have to offer. Fjordman’s essays will be of particular interest, but posts by El Inglés, Paul Weston, and Takuan Seiyo are also worth a look. If you work your way back month by month, you’ll find numerous translations from the Scandinavian languages, plus original essays by Norwegians, Danes, Finns, and Swedes.

When you’ve read a suitable selection of these articles, here are seven review questions you may wish to consider:

1. Now that you have read the actual essays written by contributors to this site, does the description of Gates of Vienna presented by SVT seem to reflect accurately what you have found here?

2. Do our articles incite violence, as asserted by your state broadcaster?

3. Do we, the Islam-critics of the Transatlantic Counterjihad, seem more violent and dangerous than the hundreds of thousands of third-world immigrants that your government has invited into Sweden?

4. You have now acquired a concise working knowledge of Islamic scripture, theology, and jurisprudence. Do you agree with your taxpayer-funded television company that the Sweden Democrats pose a greater danger to Sweden than the Muslim immigrants who inhabit the no-go zones of Malmö, Gothenburg, and the suburbs of Stockholm?

5. Do you think your political leaders truly have your interests, the interests of the indigenous people of Sweden, at heart? Or are they instead serving the interests of supranational organizations, such as the European Union, the United Nations, and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation?

6. Be honest: are you comfortable with the idea of living with a majority — or even a substantial minority — of Muslim immigrants in the neighborhoods around you? With their children making up the bulk of the pupils at your local schools? With the Islamic men with their multiple wives and numerous children drawing extensive welfare payments? Or would you prefer that Sweden be mainly populated by “persons of Swedish background”?

7. If you have fair-haired blue-eyed children under the age of ten, what kind of life do you envision for them in, say, the year 2030? How about 2050?

When you have answered the above questions, you can send your answers to SVT, or to your member of Parliament, or to Prime Minister Reinfeldt. But you might just as well fold them up, stick them in a bottle, insert a cork, and throw the bottle into the Gulf of Bothnia, for all the good it will do you.

After reading extensively here at Gates of Vienna, you will have come to understand why the Swedish ruling class is so determined to keep you in the dark about what they have done to your country.

If they ever had to admit the truth — that they have imported thousands and thousands of unassimilable parasitic immigrants into the country, and deliberately destroyed traditional Swedish culture to be more “inclusive” of the newcomers — they would be in a bind. They would have to do something about the problem, or face political ruin.

Doing something about it at this late date would be expensive, difficult, and possibly spark civil violence. Your rulers see no percentage in that course of action, so they prefer to continue blindly down the road they have chosen for themselves, driving their country into ruin whilst they relax in wealthy enclaves, protected from the depravity and degradation they have forced upon everyone else.

The current generation of Swedish leaders will earn themselves a dubious place in history — assuming that there is any history of this period not written in Arabic or Chinese — as the rulers who betrayed their country, who destroyed their homeland, who deliberately obliterated more than a thousand years of proud Swedish history.

And all for what?

They didn’t sell their birthright for a mess of pottage. They gave it away for nothing.

This is what Sweden has come to. This is what all of the West will eventually come to, but Sweden got there first.

You can send this post to SVT, but don’t expect them to broadcast it. The truth is the last thing they want you to hear.

Happy Bill of Rights Day!

Celebrate Bill of Rights Day on December 15, 2011 and help guarantee our freedoms endure!

The amendments in the Bill of Rights do not “give” anyone anything. However, the Bill of Rights protections do stop the government from doing certain things. This kind of limited government is the essence of liberty: the freedom to act without unauthorized restraint.

The addition of the Bill of Rights to the Constitution was celebrated as a victory for the champions of individual liberty. But for the Bill of Rights to remain more than what Madison referred to as a “parchment barrier,” citizens must understand the content and meaning.

MORE



A Culturally Enriched Repeat Offender

Don't believe I could have held my temper.

The Gates of Vienna
Verbatim Posts

The video below is from Danish television, and features a traffic stop by the police. The suspect is a repeat offender — 48 previous citations for driving without a license. Yet he is absolutely certain that the police only stop him because they are “racists”. And he uses a few choice epithets against them, repeated frequently.

If you’re Danish, you can probably detect from this man’s accent that he is a culture enricher. You may even be able to identify his country of origin, but the report doesn’t specify it.

Many thanks to Steen for the translation, and to Vlad Tepes for the subtitling. WARNING: The culture enricher in this clip is prone to excessive use of vulgarity and obscenity, and Steen has translated his epithets faithfully for the subtitles:

LANGUAGE



As a matter of interest, this video went viral immediately after Vlad first uploaded it last night. Since then it has had about 20,000 views.

JONES COSPONSORS NO CONFIDENCE RESOLUTION ON ATTORNEY GENERAL HOLDER

My representative is on the ball as usual.

Washington, Dec 13 -

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Congressman Jones is cosponsoring H.Res. 490, a resolution of no confidence in U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder. The legislation was introduced yesterday by Arizona Republican Congressman Paul Goslar, and is cosponsored by 21 members including Congressman Jones. It has been referred to the House Judiciary Committee for further action.

H.Res. 490 states “that it is the sense of the House of Representatives that Congress has lost confidence in the Attorney General of the United States.” It goes on to lay out the case for why Attorney General Holder has lost the confidence of the Congress, focusing on his role in the controversial “Fast and Furious” gun-walking operation and subsequent apparent cover up. Through “Operation Fast and Furious”, the Holder Justice Department allowed thousands of firearms to be illegally sold and/or transferred to Mexican drug cartels and other foreigners. Evidence suggests some of those weapons were used in the 2010 murder of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry. Congressman Jones was the first member of the North Carolina congressional delegation to call for Holder’s resignation.

“The outrageous gun-running operation known as Fast and Furious is the latest in a string of poor judgments made by Attorney General Holder,” said Jones. “The American people deserve the truth and Mr. Holder has failed to provide it.”

Holder appears to have knowingly given false testimony under oath regarding his knowledge of Fast and Furious, though he was briefed on the operation in July 2010. During a recent hearing with the Senate Judiciary Committee, Holder even admitted that he initially misstated facts as to when he found out. In July of 2010, Attorney General Holder filed a lawsuit against the state of Arizona and Governor Jan Brewer over the state’s anti-illegal immigration policy. In February of this year, Holder and the Obama administration decided to no longer recognize the Defense of Marriage Act, which prohibits the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriage. Holder also dismissed a case against the New Black Panther Party in August of 2009 for one of the most blatant acts of voter intimidation in recent memory.

Print version of this document

Terry family marks one year anniversary of death of their son, Brian Terry, murdered border patrol agent

Vietnam Babylift, My Story



Saturday April 5, 1975 Stars and Stripes



Sunday April 6, 1975 The Saigon Post


Sunday April 6, 1975 Stars and Stripes

Basic information concerning the Babylift.


Vietnam Babylift Personal Stories

Brock Townsend

I was in Vietnam in one capacity or another from October 1967 until April 1975 except for the years 1971 and 1972. From 1973 until the end, I was the Funds Manager for the South Vietnamese Air Force at Bien Hoa. An interesting note is that Bien Hoa was the busiest airport in the world during the war and I believe TSN was second.

I was diagnosed with cancer of the vocal cords in the fall of 1974 and from the moment *Twila Donelson heard of this, she was the most caring and thoughtful person imaginable towards me. I truly believe it affected her more than it did me. She was deeply concerned, as she knew I loved the water, and she gave me the address of a friend of hers in Texas, who as a Colonel had undergone the same operation, but still boated. I can't say enough about her kindness.

In the early afternoon of the day of the C5A flight, Twila entered the doorway of my office at DAO (Defense Attache Office of the American Embassy) TSN and stated that she was leaving shortly to accompany the orphans and would not be back. She stated how sorry she was that I wouldn't be going. I don't recollect what I said, but she turned to go out the door, then paused, turned around, looked at me, but without saying anything more, left. I could see the sadness that had enveloped her face, and detected tears in her eyes. A few hours later, she was dead.

Another girl that was on the flight, but survived was Thelma Thompson. I visited her in the hospital in the Philippines. She told me she had been saved by a miracle, as she had originally been seated in the bottom of the airplane, but at the last minute had been asked to go and sit up in the tail section, as they were in need of more companions for the orphans there. Although the C5A was 65 feet high, Thelma only needed one short step to reach the ground when she exited at the conclusion of the crash. As I remember, there was nothing left of the bottom part of the plane. We can only hope that the end for most was instantaneous. I understand that Thelma incurred $40,000 in medical bills and the amount the government gave her was barely sufficient to cover this and she continues to suffer today.

I first met Sally Vinyard (The last American woman to leave Vietnam) in 1969 when we both worked for NAVY/OICC in Saigon. She moved back to Fallbrook, CA after the war and I was fortunate indeed in living in her town for a few years before I moved once again. We had many a delightful evening together. I would like to back up her contention that the Babylift was not political at all. Everyone in DAO knew long before that date that the end was near, as the shredders were going all the time. Even the ever optimistic Frank Toner, who had been in Vietnam since 1952, knew by April 1st that all hope was lost. It is a shame that people and organizations try to please their agendas by inferring such. Also, Sally didn't mention that she adopted a beautiful Vietnamese girl who has grown to maturity and is the apple of her eye. But, then again, Sally has always been a very modest and unassuming person.

Although this was the first C5A flight, other South Vietnamese orphans had been flown into Oakland on Wednesday night April 2, 1975. They may have come from Danang. (Reference Stars & Stripes Saturday, April 5, 1975.) The next day's edition headlines "178 Die On Babylift " with a heartbreaking picture of a Vietnamese and an American lady carrying two orphans after the crash.

Finally, I would like to post the following second paragraph from the "Unclassified - Immediate" message dated 05 May 75 from SECNAV Washington, DC to ALNAVSTA:

"As we relocate the Navy civilian employees of the Defense Attache Office, Saigon, I note with pride the service given under adverse and sometimes dangerous conditions by the few hundred on the rolls at the last, and the several thousands who served before them in Vietnam. Particularly noted with deep regret are the thirty-one civilian employees who lost their lives in a volunteer effort in the tragic plane crash on 4 April 1975."

Brock Townsend
brocktownsend@gmail.com
(I have five half-Vietnamese daughters, two of whom were born in Saigon.)
========
Operation Babylift

Operation Babylift was an effort to evacuate Vietnamese orphans, mainly of Vietnamese/ American heritage, and, as an afterthought, to reduce the American presence in Vietnam. A C-5A transport which had brought in war materiel for the RVNAF was chosen for the task. The tragedy was that a malfunction in the aft loading ramp caused it to open in flight, damaging the hydraulic/cable controls of the horizontal and vertical stabilizers on the tail. It was a miracle that anyone survived the crash at all. No doubt the skills of the aircrew were responsible for bringing the crippled aircraft so close to landing safely.

There were approximately 200 orphans on board. To tend to their needs, Defense Attache Office employees, mostly secretaries, were directed to quickly pack a bag and help the orphanage employees already working with the children. There is an effort to archive and provide information on not only the Defense Attache Office women who perished but all women who served in Vietnam. The following is a list of those who perished on 4 April 1975.

The Orphans (names unknown) 79

Orphanage Employees 8

Blanc, Birgit

Bui, David

Bui,Dolly

Bui, Michou

Bui, Tina

Makk, Lee

Moses, Margaret

Sister Ursula
--------

Defense Attache Office (DAO) Employees 35


Adams, Barbara

Bayot, Clara

Bertwell, Arlete

Blackburn, Helen

Bottorf, Ann

Brown, Celeste

Clark, Vivienne

Creel, Wanita

Crouch, Mary

Curtis, Dorothy

*Donelson, Twila


Drye, Helen

Eichen, Marilyn

Fuginio, Elizabeth

Gasper, Ruthanne

Herbert, Beverly

Hindman, Penelope

Hollibaugh, Vera

Howard, Dorothy

Kavulia, Barbara

Maier, Barbara

Martin, Rebecca

Martini, Sara

Middlebrook, Martha

Moore, Katherine

Polgrean, Marion

Poulton, June

Poulton, Orin

Pray, Joan

Randall, Sayonna

Reynolds, Anne

Snow, Marjorie

Stout, Barbara

Watkins, Doris

Wesley, Sharon

Civilian Dependents 5

Bell, Nora

Bell, Michael

Drye, Rohn

Moschin, Marta

Stark, Laura

USAF Military Personnel 11

Aquillon, TSGT Felizardo

Castro, MSGT Joe

Dionne, SSGT Donald

Johnson,TSGT Denning

Klinker, CPT Mary

Melton, CPT Edgar

Nance, SSGT Kenneth

Pager, SSGT Michael

Parker, TSGT William
Payne, MSGT Wendle

Willis, LTC William
========
Leave No Man Behind: Bill Bell And The Search For American POW/MIAs From The Vietnam War
Bell's wife and son were killed and a daughter critically injured in April 1975, when the families of U.S. officials assigned to the American Embassy in Saigon were evacuated in conjunction with the 'Operation Babylift' program.

Tom Cotton, Farmer, Scholar, Lawyer, Warrior: Dear NYT

Via Old Virginia Blog

Dear Messrs. Keller, Lichtblau & Risen:

Congratulations on disclosing our government’s highly classified anti-terrorist-financing program (June 23). I apologize for not writing sooner. But I am a lieutenant in the United States Army and I spent the last four days patrolling one of the more dangerous areas in Iraq. (Alas, operational security and common sense prevent me from even revealing this unclassified location in a private medium like email.)

Unfortunately, as I supervised my soldiers late one night, I heard a booming explosion several miles away. I learned a few hours later that a powerful roadside bomb killed one soldier and severely injured another from my 130-man company. I deeply hope that we can find and kill or capture the terrorists responsible for that bomb. But, of course, these terrorists do not spring from the soil like Plato’s guardians. No, they require financing to obtain mortars and artillery shells, priming explosives, wiring and circuitry, not to mention for training and payments to locals willing to emplace bombs in exchange for a few months’ salary. As your story states, the program was legal, briefed to Congress, supported in the government and financial industry, and very successful.

Not anymore. You may think you have done a public service, but you have gravely endangered the lives of my soldiers and all other soldiers and innocent Iraqis here. Next time I hear that familiar explosion — or next time I feel it — I will wonder whether we could have stopped that bomb had you not instructed terrorists how to evade our financial surveillance.

And, by the way, having graduated from Harvard Law and practiced with a federal appellate judge and two Washington law firms before becoming an infantry officer, I am well-versed in the espionage laws relevant to this story and others — laws you have plainly violated. I hope that my colleagues at the Department of Justice match the courage of my soldiers here and prosecute you and your newspaper to the fullest extent of the law. By the time we return home, maybe you will be in your rightful place: not at the Pulitzer announcements, but behind bars.

Very truly yours,

Tom Cotton

Baghdad, Iraq

Background

Survival Situation – Action Wins & Getting to know Selco

SHTF SCHOOL

Verbatim Post

Usually we take for granted what we see on TV, or other media. You can say “No i am always suspicious and do not believe all this” but most of us are forming our opinions unconsciously. So at the end, over the time we just have some opinions, and we are just sure about some situations and solutions, we believe some things just work like that because we saw it so often. Even if we are not experience that in real life, or even if we are not spending much time thinking about these things.

You see action movie and people just shoot each other no big deal.

As i say before, act of shooting is not so hard, actually it is pretty much easy, but decision to shoot someone is much harder, and great majority of people have problem with that decision in real life.

On one of the local meeting during our hard time people tried to organize some stuff like how to protect homes, set up some kind of neighborhood watch or something like that, most of the guys were armed with guns or any other kind of weapon, on the other side mostly all without previous experience with guns or weapon.

Guy who had a rifle was a taxi driver in normal times, he bought rifle few days before everything started, probably just gets know about basics with gun handling, but he was trying to look dangerous and relaxed in same time. In the middle of some kind of meeting and yelling he somehow gets in argue with another guy, who had a hunting knife on his belt.

Very soon argue was out of control and man took his knife out of the belt and start to approach guy with rifle. It was not something like jump or sudden attack, it was more like slow threatening walk with knife toward the man. Ex taxi driver had enough time to raise his rifle and simply shoot the guy with knife, but he did not, he got finished off, stabbed multiple times.

People just left the area and move on. Guy was left there, I guess relatives picked him up some time later. Body was gone the next day.

It was not about his speed or something like that, i guess he was just stuck with whole situation, he hesitated too much, he was not prepared for that threat, he was not ready, call it as you like. Now when you look in whole situation looks strange that guy did not just raise rifle and fired, but to do that you need first to cross over some things in your mind. That change takes time.

I have seen more situations like this one, sometimes just seconds counts, and your will to do things.

My ex coworker bleed to death because his wife freezed when heavy caliber bullets cut off his arm, even she had some kind of tourniquet and some bandages close to her, she did not use anything, she just screamed while blood was pouring all around him.

It is hard to get your mind in state when you not think too much, instead of just act accordingly, it is hard to do that especially in normal times. Hard times can learn people to act like that, but it is hard school and lot of people just failed. Great majority of us is same like that taxi driver, only few of us like guy with knife.

This is not about becoming killer, or toughest man. It is about acting. Hopefully your SHTF situation will not be as violent as mine. But remember human act or freeze and freezing can happen to all of us. Prepare people around you to not freeze but act by practicing drills.

Yes there is reason why you do “boring” airplane and ship rescue drills. It teaches you to act and this might make difference between life and death.

========

Getting to know Selco

Paper

Via Survival

"Anything that is on paper, anything that involves a promise or a commitment is no longer valid because as we said there isn’t a rule of law anymore. People can steal from you. Your money can be confiscated. And think how easy now it is to confiscate people’s wealth. Most of our wealth in this society exists as zeroes and ones on a computer server. It takes no effort whatsoever to steal zeros and ones on a computer server.

So what I have been telling people is you need to get into physical commodities. And the rule of thumb is if you can stand in front of it with an assault rifle and physically protect it, then it's real—it's a real commodity. That includes food, that includes water, that includes long guns and ammunition. That includes fuel. That includes precious metals—gold and silver coinage. Most especially silver coinage because silver is the metal of barter and transaction and currency."

-- Ann Barnhardt

Eric Holder Targets Voter ID Laws Just in Time for 2012 Election

Gaffe-prone Attorney General Eric Holder came under new Republican fire on Wednesday after calling for an end to state laws requiring voters to show identification at polling stations.

Sen. John Cornyn of Texas immediately slammed Holder, saying: "Voter identification laws are constitutional and necessary to prevent fraud at the ballot box.

"Facing an election challenge next year, this administration has chosen to target efforts by the states to protect the democratic process," Cornyn said.

The increased pressure on Holder came on the same day that 22 House Republicans proposed a vote of no confidence in him for his handling of the Fast and Furious gunrunning scheme.

The move was headed by Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona, who told Newsmax that Holder’s speech was further proof that “he is completely out of his depth as attorney general.”

“In the game of baseball it’s three strikes and you’re out,” Gosar said.

“First, with the Fast and Furious gunrunning operation, then with the laundering of U.S taxpayers' money to Mexican cartels, and finally now an attempt to circumvent the states’ rights to promote secure elections, Attorney General Holder has shown that he is completely out of touch with the American people.

“If we are to maintain the integrity of the democratic process, it is not unreasonable that voters should show appropriate identification when they turn up at polling stations and for him to suggest otherwise flies in the face of common sense,” Gosar added. “I have already called on Mr. Holder to resign over Fast and Furious. This latest speech should serve as his final strike.”

Action Alert: I strongly oppose Sections 1021 and 1022 in the National Defense Authorization Act (HR 1540).

The most importantest nomination ever!

Vox Popoli
Verbatim Post

Ross Douthat considers Ron Paul's surge in Iowa and is inspired to accomplish the rarely seen double-sellout on principle:
Even as the national party prepares to choose between the former speaker and the former Massachusetts governor, Iowa Republicans may end up choosing between Gingrich and Representative Ron Paul. In every post-Thanksgiving poll but one, Paul has been neck and neck for second place in Iowa. In most of them, he has lagged well behind the soaring speaker, coming in just below 20 percent while Gingrich hovers around 30. But a new Iowa survey, from Public Policy Polling, shows Gingrich leading Paul by just a single point, 22 percent to 21....

Iowa Tea Partiers face a choice. If the town hall crashers and Washington Mall marchers of 2009 settle on a Medicare Part D-supporting, Freddie Mac-advising, Nancy Pelosi-snuggling Washington insider as their not-Romney standard bearer in 2012, then every liberal who ever sneered at the Tea Party will get to say “I told you so.” If Paul wins the caucuses, on the other hand, the movement will keep its honor – but also deliver the Republican nomination gift-wrapped to Mitt Romney.
It's a stunning achievement. In order to prevent Barack Obama from winning a second term, Republicans must sacrifice principle to pragmatism and nominate the self-styled progressive Republican, Mitt Romney. But in order to prevent Mitt Romney from being nominated as the Republican candidate for president, Tea Party Republicans must sacrifice principle to pragmatism and vote for the Medicare Part D-supporting, Freddie Mac-advising, Nancy Pelosi-snuggling Washington insider, Newt Gingrich.

The problem is that too many Republicans listen to this sort of nonsensical analysis, all of which is intended to accomplish precisely one purpose: convince conservatives to vote against their own principles. Once they have done that, it doesn't matter who wins; the Bank Party has already won.

There are actually only two distinct candidates in the 2012 election. There is Ron Paul, who represents the U.S. Constitution, and there is Newt Romney O'Bama, who represents the Bank Party. The unprincipled pragmatists always like to claim, in defiance of both mathematics and logic, that a vote for Not-X is a vote for X, and yet, whereas the more salient and material fact of the matter is that a vote for X, Y, or Z is a vote for the set of {X,Y,Z}. There is no substantive difference between Romney, Gingrich, and Obama on any of the major issues presently facing the nation.

I don't believe Ron Paul can win the Republican nomination for president. But then, I didn't believe Tim Tebow could lead the Broncos to the top of the AFC West either. Roll Ron roll!

An Open Letter To Eric Holder From An ATF Agent in Mexico

Via Sipsey Street Irregulars

These words from ATF Attache in Mexico, Darren Gil to Sharyl Attkisson, in that explosive interview, last March have always stayed with me:

“At some point these guns are going to end up killing either a government of Mexico official, a police officer, or military folks, and then what are we going to do? There was complete silence on the other end of the phone…”

He (Gil) would ask (his superiors) repeatedly:

“When is this case going to shut down? The Mexicans are going to have a fit when they find out about it. You’re (speaking of himself, here) in Mexico… have limited diplomatic immunity…and the government is looking at you as potentially bringing weapons into their country (which in many cases is an act of war!), and they’re already very worried about their sovereignty down there, and the ATF agents let this happen. There are agents all across Mexico, and their safety should be the number one priority, and these folks are in that much more danger, now.”

One of those agents in Mexico watched Eric Holder’s testimony before Congress, last Thursday, and weighed in with this acerbic response at the whistle-blower forum Clean-up ATF :

Posted 09 December 2011 – 11:47 AM

An Open Letter to Attorney General Holder

Dear AG Holder:

From deep inside Mexico, thanks to streaming video, I was able to watch and listen to the entire House Judiciary Committee hearing. I’m a registered Independent – not Republican and not Democrat, so this is a non-partisan commentary. As I write this, my life, and the lives of my family members are more at risk becase of the reckless actions of you and your ATF buddies allowing, facilitating and even paying for firearms to be smuggled into Mexico for criminals.

Wow! You really made points with us when you refused to acknowledge you were under oath.

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You Like Ron Paul, Except on Foreign Policy

Via California Tree of Liberty


My Time at Walmart: Why We Need Serious Welfare Reform

Via The Feral Irishman

During the 2010 and 2011 summers, I was a cashier at Wal-Mart #1788 in Scarborough, Maine. I spent hours upon hours toiling away at a register, scanning, bagging, and dealing with questionable clientele. These were all expected parts of the job, and I was okay with it. What I didn’t expect to be part of my job at Wal-Mart was to witness massive amounts of welfare fraud and abuse.

I understand that sometimes, people are destitute. They need help, and they accept help from the state in order to feed their families. This is fine. It happens. I’m not against temporary aid helping those who truly need it. What I saw at Wal-Mart, however, was not temporary aid. I witnessed generations of families all relying on the state to buy food and other items. I literally witnessed small children asking their mothers if they could borrow their EBT cards. I once had a man show me his welfare card for an ID to buy alcohol. The man was from Massachusetts. Governor Michael Dukakis’ signature was on his welfare card. Dukakis’ last gubernatorial term ended in January of 1991. I was born in June of 1991. The man had been on welfare my entire life. That’s not how welfare was intended, but sadly, it is what it has become.

Other things witnessed while working as a cashier included:

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The House Votes Today 12-14-11 on Indefinite Detention of Americans

Daily Paul
Verbatim Post

Two weeks ago we warned you about indefinite detention provisions of the Senate's version National Defense Authorization Act.

We explain the bill...

* http://www.downsizedc.org/blog/urgent-indefinite-jailing-of-...
* http://www.downsizedc.org/blog/does-the-bill-really-do-what-...

We have BAD NEWS to report. In the final version of the bill coming from the House-Senate Conference Committee, essentially NOTHING HAS CHANGED except section numbers and a couple of words.

The House is voting on the bill TOMORROW, December 14.

Please CALL your Representative telling them to oppose the National Defense Authorization Act, especially sections 1021 and 1022. https://secure.downsizedc.org/etp/not-afraid/
Please write a letter as well. We have updated the hard-wired message to say:

I strongly oppose Sections 1021 and 1022 in the National Defense Authorization Act (HR 1540).

You may borrow from or copy the following personal comments...

These provisions REQUIRE military detention for aliens suspected of terrorism, and ALLOWS the President to subject American citizens to the same treatment. This includes the power to detain people INDEFINITELY, without charges.

This undermines the Posse Comitatus Act, which outlawed the deployment of the military for domestic policing. This actually makes us LESS secure because it diverts the military's mission from fighting wars to investigating and prosecuting suspected terrorists.

Even worse, this is a declaration of war on the American way of life.

* It violates the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment
* And abandons protections against arbitrary executive power that are as old as the Magna Carta

How can ANY of my rights and freedoms be secure if the President can, by whim, call me a "terrorist" and order troops to kidnap me?

If it is true that terrorists hate us for our freedom, then Sections 1021 and 1022 will make it official: The terrorists win.

Be a patriot. Be an American. Stand up for the Constitution. Strip Sections 1021 and 1022 from HR 1540 or oppose the bill altogether.

END LETTER
https://secure.downsizedc.org/etp/not-afraid/

Spread this message via email, blog, or social network -- whatever facilities you have. Tell your friends to join you in acting NOW. Rep. Justin Amash is organizing opposition, and he's making progress. But time is short. Your help is needed.

Thank you!

Jim Babka
President
DownsizeDC.org, Inc.

What I learned as a cop

I was a Chicago Police Officer for almost 30 years. I spent the first ten years of my career in one of the worst, most impoverished areas of Chicago, Lawndale. It was named as one of the ten most dangerous neighborhoods in America. Even people’s dreams weren’t safe.

Everyday I patrolled streets where there was no hope, no change, no future, and no way out. Self survival was paramount. People did whatever they could to live through one more day. Crime was just a day’s work.

The only thing that differentiated Lawndale from a fourth world country was indoor plumbing. The armies of rats and stray dogs ate better than the people. They were healthier too.

There was block after block of perfectly good commercial, manufacturing, and industrial property, all of it vacant, buildings and land. Urban renewal meant tearing things down, not redevelopment.

Day after day all we did was deal with people who were just trying to survive in any way they could. I developed a very healthy hatred. It wasn’t racism. I did not hate poor people. I hated a system of welfare, social engineering, and entitlement that did nothing to help poor people or alleviate poverty.

There was never a war on poverty. It was a war on poor people, a long term war designed to keep them in perpetual dependence and poverty. Our government created a system of slavery. They made people slaves to dependency, generation after generation.

I witnessed the big lies: wealth redistribution, social justice, social economic justice, and social engineering. Lies the progressives, liberals, and our president keep alive to this day.

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