How to Spot a Bigot

As much as I love to rant about the dangers of extremist religion and religious bigotry as it affects our liberty and personal freedoms, the fact is that the vast majority of religious folks in America be they Christian, Muslim, Jew or otherwise, are not bigots.  Most of us genuinely respect the rights of all peaceful honest people to follow their hearts, choose their own culture and lifestyle.

My last post, “Bigot Dynasty,” called out Phil Robertson, head of the Duck Dynasty clan a bigot, not because he’s a self described Bible thumper and born again Christian who believes in the Bible teachings literally, but because he is unreasonably intolerant and outright disdainful of others who do not share his beliefs, most particularly his beliefs concerning human sexuality.

That’s the hallmark of a religious bigot. It’s how to spot them easily in a crowd. They seem to consciously possess and constantly express an abnormal fixation against mostly the biblical “sins” involving sex, especially homosexuality.

Reasonable people understand that there is a whole lot more involved in human heterosexuality than just sexual relations between a man and a woman. A successful marriage, for example, between heterosexuals is probably 75-80% personal compatibility factors and perhaps only 20% or less sexual.

Reasonable people today understand that it’s exactly the same with homosexuality. The sexual attraction is not only about sexual acts. Sexuality is a biological phenomenon and it is the biology – the chemistry -- which mostly determines personal attractions between human beings. At least 10% of the human population has been homosexual since long before the dawn of the human race. It’s not simply about a lifestyle choice. It’s a biological reality.

That’s the part of the human equation that religious bigots don’t seem to get and won’t ever accept about homosexuality. It’s Phil Robertson’s problem for instance. “It seems like, to me, a vagina — as a man — would be more desirable than a man’s anus. That’s just me. I’m just thinking: There’s more there! She’s got more to offer. I mean, come on, dudes! You know what I’m saying? But hey, sin: It’s not logical, my man. It’s just not logical… says Phil. “Start with homosexual behavior and just morph out from there; bestiality, sleeping around with this woman and that woman and that woman and those men … they won’t inherit the kingdom of God.”

The religious bigot always focuses the attention of his intolerance on sex. Sexual sins are far more important to them than all other categories of sin taken together. But lust is just one of the so-called biblical seven capital vices; the deadly, mortal or cardinal sins. Homosexuality is not even on the list.

You rarely find a religious bigot going on and on about gluttony, for example, and how all fat people who eat too much food will be going to Hell. Yet gluttony is a grave and deadly cardinal sin of which at least half the adult population in America is guilty in spades. The average religious bigot is likely to be one of them. But you never hear a religious bigot spouting off about anger, greed, sloth, pride, envy or gluttony – no; it’s always about lust, and more particularly homosexual lust.

Religious bigots like Rick Santorum, Phil Robertson, Sarah Palin, and her daughter Bristol, insist that gay activists are “hypocritical” to take offense at bigoted anti-gay comments. “I think it’s so hypocritical how the LGBT community expects every single flippen [sic] person to agree with their life style,” says Bristol.

“Free speech is an endangered species. Those ‘intolerants’ hatin’ and taking on the ‘Duck Dynasty’ patriarch for voicing his personal opinion are taking on all of us.” declares mother bigot Sarah.

Yet it is obvious to reasonable people that one need not agree with the homosexual lifestyle to be tolerant and accepting of the homosexual’s right to follow his or her own chemical biological sexual orientation reality.

As far as the religious bigot is concerned, however, it’s those who call out their bigotry who are the real bigots and haters. They think that we should all respect and tolerate their bigoted speech without complaint. Phil Robertson is their hero.

Listen to Phil: That’s how to spot a bigot. 

Bigot Dynasty

We have liberty to thank for the fact that as Americans all of us still enjoy the basic right to say and believe as we like, and that includes the absolute inalienable individual right to think, talk and act like a raging bigot.

Believe me, there are plenty of bigots out there, especially religious bigots, in the good old U.S.A. who take full advantage of that right.  

Consider the fascinating case of Phil Robertson, a 67 year old Charles Manson lookalike; patriarch of the Duck Dynasty clan, and star of the A&E TV network “reality” show series, Duck Dynasty, about the life and times of a Louisiana redneck family that made it big in the duck call manufacturing business.

Typical airhead Americans are eating it up. Over the last 5 years Duck Dynasty been the hottest cable network show on television.  

Robertson is a proud self described Louisiana redneck, having grown up where Cajun and Ozark redneck culture intersect; born to a manic-depressive mother and a roughneck father. He also unabashedly calls himself a born again Christian Bible-thumper, and he thumps it regularly on the show, especially at the end of every episode.

There are plenty more things he would like to say on the show, he admits; “controversial things” that don’t make it past the A&E producers cut.

While growing Up in Pre-Civil-Rights-Era Louisiana, Phil claims that: “I never, with my eyes, saw the mistreatment of any black person. Not once… They were godly; they were happy; no one was singing the blues.”

Yeah, right. Blacks weren’t mistreated in the old Jim Crow south as far as he’s concerned. He never saw it happen. Do you believe that? Would anyone in his right mind believe that?

This guy was a biker gang type back in the early '70's and that's apparently why he and the rest of the men in his family still look like biker gang types.  He used to spend his days "getting drunk, chasing tail, swallowing diet pills and black mollies." Once he drunkenly kicked his wife and three sons out of their house saying: "I'm sick of you." And he once had to flee the state of Arkansas after badly beating up a bar owner and his wife.

But later he was “born again” and turned his life over to Jesus Christ. He's gone from vicious biker gang bigot type to religious bigot Bible thumper type.

Phil is one of those who think that America was founded as a Christian nation. He laments the fact that the Ten Commandments can't be displayed outside every courthouse. He fancies the popularity of Duck Dynasty as a small corrective to all that’s been lost in America.

“We’re Bible-thumpers who just happened to end up on television,” he explains.

That’s why I confess that I have never watched a single episode of Duck Dynasty. Plenty of snippets and teasers from the show, however, convinced me that it’s basically just another contrived and scripted The Beverly Hillbillies type sit com, (another classic American TV hit show from the 1960’s), about the lives of a backwoods hillbilly family hitting the big-time after striking oil on their land.

I don’t see anything intellectually stimulating, amusing or socially redeeming about watching a bunch of ignoramuses, (albeit financially successful ones), looking like a group of homeless vagrants, complete with wildly unkempt hair and beards, going about their mundane lives. I’d much rather watch a reality show about the lives of insects or hippo’s; but to each his own.

Recently the controversy has been all over the news about A&E network having suspended Phil Robertson from the show after he expressed a torrent of religiously bigoted opinions against gays and other “sinners” in a candid GQ magazine interview.

He equated, for example, homosexuality to “bestiality, adulterers, idolaters, male prostitutes, the greedy, the drunkards, the slanderers, the swindlers—they won’t inherit the kingdom of God,” he opined. “Don’t deceive yourself,” preached Phil, “It’s not right.”

To his credit, he added: “We never, ever judge someone on who’s going to heaven, hell. That’s the Almighty’s job. We just love ’em; give ’em the good news about Jesus—whether they’re homosexuals, drunks, terrorists. We let God sort ’em out later; you see what I’m saying?”

Yeah, I see what he’s saying; homosexuals, drunks and terrorists; it’s all the same to Phil. He’s not judging them. He’s an equal opportunity bigot.

Right; he’s not judging gays; no way.

Now, I’m not trying to imply that Phil Robertson is a bad person. He’s probably a very good person, I don’t know. Hell, Archie Bunker was actually a good guy at heart in spite of all the bigot baggage he carried. From what little I know about him, Phil probably has lots of admirable qualities too.

Evangelical Christians like Sarah Palin and other committed Duck Dynasty fans -- (why is it no surprise to me that Sarah Palin would be a Duck Dynasty fan?) -- are outraged at what they deem as A&E’s “intolerance.”  Naturally, they think that religious bigots like Phil Robertson should be tolerated no matter what they say publicly and that any objection to their outrageous religious bigotry is “intolerance.”

“The reality is that the Robertson family are Bible-believing Christians who don’t cherry pick what the Bible teaches,” says Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council. “It is time for all Americans to take a stand against the cultural elites who want to destroy the livelihood of people and remove God and His truth from every aspect of public life.”

No, they don’t cherry pick, do they Tony? I suppose then that they must also think it’s perfectly proper to stone gays, witches, adulterers, and all those other undesirable sinners to death. After all, that’s what their Bible teaches too, right? Nah, they’re cherry pickin’ the biblical scriptures alright. Christian religious bigots do that all the time. Phil doesn’t want to stone anyone.

Palin and Perkins are, along with Phil Robertson, among that large majority of Christian Bible thumping evangelicals in America who want to reestablish daily Christian prayer and the teaching of biblical creationism in the public schools; display the Ten Commandments in every court house and government building; and establish a government promoted Christian theocracy throughout the United States.

That’s why folks like me criticize them for their bigotry. That’s why I call them out.

The Liberty Institute, a legal firm specializing in religious liberty cases, condemned A&E’s actions and urged them to reconsider. “In the spirit of American tolerance of religious diversity, A&E should reinstate Mr. Robertson and apologize for its religious bigotry,” they demand.

Right; Robertson is not a religious bigot -- A&E is the religious bigot.

Ok; in many ways I actually agree with Tony, Sarah and Phil. I say that if Duck Dynasty is what people want; Duck Dynasty is what they should get. And that includes all the religiously bigoted opinions spewed out by Phil Robertson.

I certainly don’t think A&E should suspend or punish him in any fashion for simply being a bigot, although they have a right to do so if they think it’s a good business decision. This is not about the First Amendment.

Unfortunately, this was probably a poor business decision that will cost A&E a lot of money. Duck Dynasty is a hit TV show because of its huge Christian evangelical audience and that audience doesn’t like what’s happened to their Phil.

What A&E should have done, in my opinion, is call Robertson out as the religious bigot he is. By all rights he should be ashamed for what he said. A&E should have strongly disclaimed his ignorant opinions as not those held by A&E; and then let the audience decide whether to keep watching the show or not.

That would have been the responsible thing to do. Suspending Robertson just makes the situation worse. It’s like swatting a hornets’ nest with a stick.

If enough people (like me) were to stop watching, Duck Dynasty would be cancelled and it would be Phil’s own fault. On the other hand, if the majority of American evangelical Christian airheads keep watching it, the Duck Dynasty clan and A&E can continue cashing in on the lucrative fad. Let the audience decide.

In short, I say don’t ever try to punish bigots, statists, other ignoramuses and the like. People have the right to be bigots in America. Just call ‘em out into the sunshine for what they are, and let them feel the searing heat of reason and logic on their backs. Shame on them!

That’s what I do – it’s my job with this blog -- whenever confronted with people like Phil Robertson and his Bible thumping cultural ideas in bigot dynasty.

Merry Christmas!

Strip Search Nation

The government and common people of India are pissed off plenty at federal authorities in the United States of America, and in my opinion rightfully so, over the treatment of one of their second tier diplomats charged in a criminal case.

The facts of the “crime” boil down to allegations that the diplomat paid her Indian maid less money per month than what she claimed to be paying her in a sworn application for a U.S. visa.

Let’s say that this consular official, Devyani Khobragade, lied on that visa application. Let’s concede for the purpose of argument that she was paying her maid the paltry sum of $3.31 per hour instead of the $9.75 per hour required under New York minimum wage laws. Let’s say she’s guilty of this “crime.”

Ok; maybe she’s a criminal; maybe not; but there’s been no trial yet and she’s entitled to due process of law. Right?

So how does the federal government of the United States of America in the State of New York treat people – diplomat or commoner alike; American citizen or non-citizen alike -- in this type of case?

Does it assume that the accused is innocent until it can prove otherwise in a court of law to an impartial jury? Does it refrain from punishing the accused unless and until a guilty verdict is rendered? Does it treat persons who are supposed to be presumed innocent until proven guilty with dignity and respect in the criminal justice system process?

No; of course not.

After all, this is the United Statists of America we’re talking about here. Our government treats all accused suspects as criminals. It assumes that they are guilty before their trial. It humiliates and punishes them before they are found guilty. It systematically denies each and every one of them the slightest scrap of dignity and respect as human beings.

In this case the U.S. Department of State's diplomatic security team arrested the diplomat without warning in front of the school building where she had just dropped off her daughter. They handcuffed her as though she were a dangerous threat to society. They always do that in America to humiliate suspects. Then they handed her over to U.S. marshals in New York.

The marshals dragged her to a detention facility where hardened and vicious convicted criminals are warehoused. They strip searched her. They performed full body cavity searches of her.

They threw her into a cell right along with convicts in the general population. And they wouldn’t let her out until she had posted $250,000 bail. They always do their damndest to punish people in the most humiliating ways possible before a lawyer bails them out and before they’ve been found guilty.

The U.S. Marshals Service confirmed that it strip-searched Khobragade and placed her in a cell with other female defendants. It described the measures as "standard arrestee intake procedures."

Indian officials are complaining that the treatment of their diplomat was heavy-handed touching off a full scale diplomatic clash with India which has escalated over the past several days. They have a good point. They have a perfect right to complain.

So Now the U.S. Secretary of State, John Kerry himself has told them that he “regrets” what happened. He knows damned well it was wrong.

But what about all the other hapless accused persons of non-violent crimes in America who are treated exactly the same way?

What does Mr. Kerry have to say about them? 

Nothing!

"This Office's sole motivation in this case, as in all cases, is to uphold the rule of law, protect victims, and hold accountable anyone who breaks the law -- no matter what their societal status and no matter how powerful, rich or connected they are," says the federal prosecutor in the case.

In short, that’s how we treat everyone here, violent or non-violent suspects alike; first time accused or multiple repeat offenders alike. You can get a parking ticket in New York City and find yourself locked up in a detention facility with violent convicts, strip searched and body cavity searched, and in all respects treated like a violent criminal before your trial.

That’s life in the United States of America: Strip search nation. 

The Vindication of Edward Snowden

NSA whistleblower and genuine American hero Edward Snowden has been vindicated.

I’ve been patiently waiting for this to happen and now it has. 

This week a Federal District Judge ruled that the National Security Agency's Orwellian style metadata surveillance program that collects millions of Americans' telephone records is probably unconstitutional because it violates the Fourth Amendment.

U.S. District Court Judge Richard Leon issued a preliminary injunction against the program but suspended the order to allow an appeal by the Justice Department. NSA’s spying tactics are unlawful, he found, but he’ll leave the ultimate decision on that point to the Appellate Courts.

"The court concludes that plaintiffs have standing to challenge the constitutionality of the government's bulk collection and querying of phone record metadata, that they have demonstrated a substantial likelihood of success on the merits of their Fourth Amendment claim (of unlawful search and seizure), and that they will suffer irreparable harm absent…relief,'' Leon wrote.

The government: "does not cite a single instance in which analysis of the NSA's bulk metadata collection actually stopped an imminent attack,'' he concluded.” Given the limited record before me at this point in the litigation — most notably the utter lack of evidence that a terrorist attack has ever been prevented because searching the NSA database was faster than other investigative tactics — I have serious doubts about the efficacy of the metadata collection program as a means of conducting time-sensitive investigations in cases involving imminent threats of terrorism.''

Of course, the powers that be in the government of the United Statists of America will certainly appeal this decision, and the case will likely find its way to the U.S. Supreme Court. But even if the decision is overturned, (which in my humble opinion is likely), Edward Snowden, far from being a traitor as portrayed by the Authority, has been vindicated and will go down in history as a hero and martyr for honorably serving his country.

Leon’s ruling is the first among many to be decided in the near future regarding the legality of several aspects of the NSA’s spying program on American citizens. "Today, a secret program authorized by a secret court was, when exposed to the light of day, found to violate Americans' rights. It is the first of many," said Snowden in a statement responding to the court decision.

National security considerations do not trump the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution. Snowden knew that when he blew the whistle on his NSA bosses in violation of his oath to keep its secrets because he was upholding a higher oath to the Constitution and the people of the United States. That’s why he is not a traitor and that’s why historians will not paint him as a traitor.

Now Snowden has written an "open letter to the people of Brazil" offering to help their government investigate allegations of U.S. spying on their nation. In return for this valuable service he wants only a grant of permanent political asylum in Brazil.

"I've expressed my willingness to assist where it's appropriate and legal, but, unfortunately, the U.S. government has been working hard to limit my ability to do so," says the letter. "Until a country grants me permanent political asylum, the U.S. government will continue to interfere with my ability to speak out… Six months ago, I revealed that the NSA wanted to listen to the whole world. Now, the whole world is listening back, and speaking out, too. And the NSA doesn't like what its hearing."

Edward Snowden has been vindicated and deserves to get his wish. 

U.S. Government: Dumb & Dumber

After the disastrous rollout of the ObamaCare Internet website that cost more than $600 million to create yet crashed before the first customer tried to log on, we know now that politicians, bureaucrats, agents and employees running the United States are totally clueless when it comes to spending taxpayer dollars wisely and using modern technology to manage the business of government.

That’s the primary reason why our nation is over $17 trillion in debt with no end to out of control spending in sight.

Private sector Internet tech experts say that the Obama administration, for example could have contracted a perfectly good website fully capable of handling millions of visitors at a time for a price somewhere in the neighborhood of $200,000. At the very least it could have been done right for less than $1million. Hell, Microsoft or Google might even have done it free just for the positive publicity.

So the U.S. government probably overpaid for its admittedly nonfunctional healthcare website by the astronomical sum of at least $600 million. And the taxpayers will have to shell out even more $millions just to fix all the problems.

That’s dumb.

Now we learn that the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) issued $4 billion in fraudulent tax refunds just last year alone to people using stolen identities. Lots of that money was shipped off without questions to addresses in Bulgaria, Lithuania and Ireland the U.S. Treasury Department admits. In fact, the IRS  sent a total of 655 tax refunds to a single address in Lithuania, and 343 refunds went to one address in Shanghai.

That’s really dumb.

"Identity theft continues to be a serious problem with devastating consequences for taxpayers and an enormous impact on tax administration," acknowledged J. Russell George, Treasury's inspector general for tax administration. The fraud "erodes taxpayer confidence in the federal tax system." 

As if the average taxpayer ever had any confidence in the federal tax system, or the entire federal government for that matter, to begin with.

Thieves often steal Social Security numbers from people who don't have to file tax returns, including the young, the old and people who have died, says his report. In other cases, thieves use stolen Social Security numbers to file fraudulent tax returns before the legitimate taxpayer files.

Doesn’t the IRS know or at least have the means to check the status of social security number holders? Don’t they know how old they are; where they live; where they work; how much has been withheld from their paychecks, etc.; or whether they are still alive? 

Apparently not; they either don’t know or don’t check all the information available to them in order to verify refund claims.

Instead the IRS, which wants to issue quick refunds, often processes and sends out refund checks before employers are required to file forms documenting wages. They pay the money without checking any of the facts.

That’s dumb.

Do you think a private business like Amazon.com or Wal-Mart could ever be scammed out of $4billion by identify thieves? Do you think that they would ever issue 655 refund checks to the exact same address in Lithuania? Not a chance. They’re not dumb.

Do you think any private business would ever in a million years blow shareholders cash to answer stupid questions like: “What is the meaning of life?” Of course that kind of spending would be considered unthinkable in the private sector where money must be managed properly or the firm goes out of business.

But that’s exactly the type of spending our federal government engages itself in all the time. It has actually shelled out a federal grant for the purpose of answering the question: “What is the meaning of life?” I’m not making this up.

Right now, Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions is trying to find out why $172,445 of taxpayer dollars are being spent by the National Endowment for the Humanities on research projects and grants to study questions like “What is the good life and how do I live it?" ($25,000) The grants are typically given to museums, libraries, and universities as well as individual scholars.

That’s even dumber.

Your government is interested in paying out hard earned taxpayer dollars in government grants to lucky benefactors for the purpose of studying several other ridiculous questions such as: "Why are we interested in the past?" ($24,803); "Why are bad people bad?" ($23,390; "What is belief?" ($24,526); "What is a monster?" ($24,999); and "Why do humans write?" ($24,774)

That’s your U.S. Government at work: Dumb and dumber. 

Trigger Happy in New York

Shoot first and find excuses later is the new motto for cowardly police officers in New York City who have no qualms about firing bullets into a crowd of innocent bystanders while attempting to gun down an unarmed man.

We have to wonder whether this is what the cops are taught to do in cadet school or whether they learn it on the job as the most expedient way to protect themselves from the slightest hint of potential danger posed by unruly suspects.

Shooting live rounds into a crowd of people, however, simply cannot be justified under any circumstances.

The latest instance involves 35-year-old Glenn Broadnax, of Brooklyn, an unarmed, emotionally unhinged man creating a disturbance at 42nd Street and Eighth Avenue near Times Square in New York City. Apparently, he was attempting to commit suicide by lurching himself into traffic and lunging toward oncoming cars.

Naturally, a crowd gathered to watch. Some tried to help the poor man. That’s when the police arrived with their guns. And when the suspect reached into his pocket for his wallet two frightened cops opened fire, missing him completely but wounding to female bystanders.

“Mr. Broadnax never imagined his behavior would ever cause the police to shoot at him,” explained his attorney. Never-the-less, the cops and the prosecutor are blaming him for the shooting. 

He “recklessly engaged in conduct which created a grave risk of death,” claims the prosecution in a nine-count grand jury felony indictment containing charges carrying a possible 25-year prison sentence.

So the situation that left two innocent bystanders with gunshot wounds at the hands of trigger happy police thugs was entirely the defendant’s fault say the authorities. That’s their excuse for shooting at an unarmed man on a crowded street and plugging two women in the crowd with lead.

“It’s an incredibly unfortunate use of prosecutorial discretion to be prosecuting a man who didn’t even injure my client,” said an attorney for one of the wounded women. “It’s the police who injured my client.”

Yes, it’s the police who shot first and found excuses later.

They’re trigger happy in New York. 

Spooked!

Thanks solely to our American whistleblower hero, Edward Snowden, we now know for certain that the United States of America’s National Security Agency (NSA) either does, or at the very least, has the technical capacity to know each and every one of us hapless citizens even better than our own mothers know us.  

The government spooks are running amok.

We’re spooked!

Today’s state of the art technological NSA government spooks make George Orwell’s 1949 prescient novel “1984,” accurately predicting the “big brother” surveillance state, seem like harmless snooping through someone’s garbage.

Snowden’s latest revelation is the fact that the NSA is constantly tracking and compiling data on the locations of 5 billion cell phones overseas, including those belonging to Americans abroad. Only now NSA admits that it “inadvertently” gathers the location records of "tens of millions of Americans who travel abroad" annually, along with the billions of other records it collects by tapping into worldwide mobile network cables.

NSA can listen in on the cell phone and land line phone conversations too. We know that from earlier Snowden revelations. He told us that while working for the NSA he had the wherewithal to tap into the President’s phone had he wanted to.

Would NSA have admitted it had our hero not revealed it first?

I think we all know the answer to that.

Can we believe the NSA when it says that this data is only “inadvertently” collected on Americans abroad? Can we rationally believe that they aren’t constantly spying on all of us right here in the United States?

I think we all know the answer to that as well.

To date, we know only a very small percentage of Snowden’s documented information about the NSA and those revelations have all been bombshells.

The bottom line is that the NSA has the capacity to track the movements of almost any cell phone and their unsuspecting users 24/7/365 around the world, including cell phones in America, and then use its state of the art number crunching software -- a powerful analytic computer program called CO-TRAVELER -- to make maps of the myriad patterns and relationships mined from the data.

In short, if you use a cell phone, the NSA has the technical capacity to know exactly where you are at all times, who you are meeting with and what you are talking about. It stores this unimaginable quantity of data, up to 27 terabytes, and the volumes of such data are presently "outpacing our ability to ingest, process and store" it according to NSA’s own admission.

If the NSA targets you for any reason, even if you are completely innocent of any wrongdoing and are not a potential terrorist, it has the capacity to track your every move.

The NSA has tapped in to the entire global computer and communications networks, including the World Wide Web, Internet and private Intranet networks, land line telephone and cell phone networks, radio traffic; every conceivable means of electronic communication between human beings.

It can read your emails. It knows the identity, date, time and duration of every Internet website you have visited, every page you viewed, and every scrap of information you’ve downloaded. I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised to learn that they have copied and are monitoring the hard drives of every computer that is connected to the Internet, including yours and mine.

If you have a webcam on your computer, I’m told it has the capacity to turn it on surreptitiously, even when the machine is turned off, enabling it to spy on you inside your home complete with sound and pictures.  

If you use credit or debit cards, the NSA has the capacity to know the intricate details of every transaction you enter; the groceries you buy; gasoline at service stations, and the items you purchase at Amazon or Wal-Mart; your utility bills; all of it.

If your doctor has stored your medical records electronically, chances are that the NSA already has the complete picture of your health situation, right down to that wart on your butt. If it doesn’t have them now it will get them sooner or later as a consequence of ObamaCare.

It has your tax records and returns, federal, state and local; your bank statements; your brokerage transaction history; elementary, secondary, college and graduate school transcripts; police records; voting records; library books borrowing records; dental records; everything, except perhaps your handwritten diary locked in your home safe, yet if necessary, it has the clandestine means to acquire that too.

Big Brother now has the capacity to know anything and everything it wants to know about you whether you like it or not. Like I said before: more even than your mother, your wife, your mistress and your best friend combined. Maybe someday soon it will find a way to tap in to your brain and thereby know your every thought. Thankfully, I’ll probably be dead by then.

Get used to it. It’s going to get a lot worse.

We’re spooked!

Statist French Sex Police

A deranged young Parisian nut case got angry recently and brutally murdered a French prostitute. He confessed to the cops that he simply had "felt the need to take his anger out on somebody" after recently being made redundant.

So what does the thoroughly statist socialist dominated French parliament do about it? They’re about to pass a law imposing hefty fines on the “crime” of paying for sex. Anyone caught paying for sex would face an initial fine of 1,500 Euros. The fine would be doubled for repeat offenders.

Johns would be made to undergo an "awareness" course on prostitution, similar to ones on the dangers of drunk driving given to traffic offenders. A perfectly innocent activity which has been permitted, legal, part of the culture and social fabric in France for millennia, will be banned by the government if the statists have their way.

Of course, prostitutes everywhere have been at risk for the possibility of becoming murder victims ever since the oldest profession was invented long before the dawn of civilization. Exactly the same possibilities have been true in the case of wives, girlfriends and all manner of significant others.

Sexual relationships are risky whether the payment is in cash or commitment.

Next then, assuming the logic of the statists is valid; the government should pass laws imposing hefty fines on anyone engaged in sexual relationships. After all, it’s not the payment of cash which makes a sexual relationship risky; it’s all of the myriad emotional factors involved.

In this case, the deranged murderer killed his victim because he was angry about his own worthless redundant life – not because he was obliged to pay his victim for the opportunity.

But statist logic is never valid. It only makes sense to statists. You know; all those morons out there who would pass laws banning wet dreams – or any other gratuitous form of pleasure – if given half a chance.

Here in the United Statist States of America, we’re way ahead of the French when it comes to punishing innocent people for wanting sex without commitment. There is something about the subject of gratuitous sex that sends statists into apoplectic fits of frenzy. That makes the matter of paying for it out of the question here except within a few isolated and remote pockets in the State of Nevada where prostitution is expensive and heavily regulated.

Prostitution in America is almost entirely conducted illegally and underground. And that will be the situation in France if the statists have their way. If they think that paying for sex causes violence just wait until they make it illegal. Just like all other victimless crimes, it’s the law banning the activity which results in all the violence, murder and mayhem; not the activity itself.

Maud Olivier, the Socialist MP who presented the bill in the French Parliament, attacked critics in her opening speech. “To say women have the right to sell themselves is to disguise the fact that men have the right to buy them” she croaked. "So is it enough for one prostitute to say she is free for the enslavement of others to be respectable and acceptable? Where is the glamour in the 10 to 15 penetrations a day undergone by women compelled to be prostitutes, evidently for economic reasons, with dramatic consequences for their health?"

An opponent of the proposed law said he feared that the penalties against paying for sex would actually harm prostitutes. "That won't change anything for prostitutes," he told reporters. "They will be forced to continue to hide themselves because even if they are not risking arrest, their clients are. And their survival depends on their clients."

One prostitute said she feared that clients might want to take prostitutes "to places that are more and more hidden, for example basements, car parks, forests... isolated places that we are afraid of because we won't be secure.”

However, a former prostitute who is now an activist argued that targeting clients was the only way to stop prostitution. "You need to tackle the root of the evil," she explained. "Prostitution is kept up by clients and the only way reduce it - because of course the mentalities need to evolve - the only way to stop it is to punish the client."

That’s right Madam Statist; put targets on the backs of innocent men who simply want a little sex without the commitment of a relationship and are willing to pay for it. It’s a win-win situation; no different than any other innocent business transaction; a win for provider and client alike.

But in France, one cannot successfully employ reason and logic to argue with the Statist French Sex Police.

Get Out!

Hamid Karzai, that thoroughly corrupt United States government installed puppet president in Afghanistan, is petulantly refusing to sign a new bilateral security agreement allowing American military troops to continue operations in his Middle East hellhole of a country. 

So the Obama administration has threatened to withdraw all U.S. troops from Afghanistan next year. “Ambassador (Susan) Rice reiterated that, without a prompt signature, the U.S. would have no choice but to initiate planning for a post-2014 future in which there would be no U.S. or NATO troop presence in Afghanistan,” declared a White House statement.

My advice for what it’s worth: Take this wonderful gift; thank the Afghan crook for doing us a huge favor; then get out! Now!

Afghanistan has been George W. Bush and Barack Obama’s 12 year ongoing money pit boondoggle. Americans have watched helplessly all those years while $billions of taxpayer dollars were wasted and thousands of American lives lost in a cause for which we have accomplished absolutely nothing of value.

Stop begging this ungrateful bastard for the privilege of setting him up in power, protecting his crooked ass from his enemies, giving him $billions of our hard earned cash to enjoy and share with his criminal cronies, including the Taliban, and wasting the lives of our troops for nothing.

The U.S. invaded Afghanistan for the purpose of routing the Taliban and the removing the safe haven it provided to the Al Qaeda terrorists that supposedly threaten our national interests.

So we routed the Taliban, chased the terrorists into Pakistan and elsewhere, installed the corrupt Hamid Karzai government, and have been there ever since, because we know full well that the moment we leave the Taliban and Al Qaeda terrorists will return in force resulting in our accomplishing nothing.

The U.S. has accomplished nothing with our occupation of Afghanistan, and we all know it will accomplish nothing if it stays. 

So I say: Get out! Withdraw all of our remaining 47,000 soldiers now.

Get out! And let the Taliban and Al Qaeda thugs dispose of the corrupt grasping criminal that is Hamid Karzai. It’s time to go and let his tottering puppet government implode upon him.

I’ll bet money that he’ll be screaming and begging for us to stay if he thought for one minute that we were really preparing to leave. His worthless hide depends entirely upon the life giving sustenance of the U.S.A.

Enough!

Get out!