Count the lucky stars.

Remember why we were born.

Write 'I remain affectionately yours' after each NSA snooped-e-mail?

Wish everybody ya's greet a brighter and happy season

Wish for a meaningful Life?

Sign language with your emotional wee-little, well-Being

Have heart health, and

O, Joy and wellbeing, and

emotions of good old wishes?

O, and a Happy Valentines day!

So the question becomes has this activity of surveillance been going on long before the Bush administration?

Yes ralph, all this has gone on before Bush. In fact, FISA restrictions have only been around since the 70's. In WW1 every telegraph message out of the country was intercepted. The Bush programs for that matter are just expansions of Clinton programs. But as the man said, fiber optics forced a solution not envisioned previously, and I'm sure the next round of tech advances will render this problem obsolete and demand new ways to garner intelligence.

With Cheney learning much from the missteps of the Nixon Cartel and the obvious drive Rove had for a permanent Rethug majority, one might wonder why the supposed role of oversight by Congress is a thing of the past. If this criminal spying has even been going on since pre 911 it's now outside of the realm of reality that the first task for these thugs marching lockstep with W was to build nice thick portfolios on our beloved senators and representatives. It's obvious as to why these whores are beholden to corporate interests since one needs to only follow the money. It is far more troubling to understand why so many will so willingly turn their backs on the Constitution. I'm not a fan of conspiracy usually but it just belies logic that so many in congress could care so little for the principles this nation once had.

This doesn't mean there is a complete erosion of freedom equal to all of those societies. Free speech still basically thrives; we elect our leaders; and individuals retain a fair amount of autonomy in their personal choices.

Except that if you can be arrested at any time, for any reason, held forever without charge or trial, tortured for years until you confess to something, before being unceremoniously dumped onto the street without so much as a word of apology, then you don't really have those rights. Under that state, you are already a criminal, you just haven't been arrested yet. Under that state, you don't actually have the right to criticize the President, he has simply chosen not to disappear you for your words.

That he hasn't _yet_, is absolutely worthless as protection, and cannot with any credulity be called a 'right'.

At this point, it's not enough to simply repeal and condemn the neocon practices. They have to be shown to be fundamentally worthless, dangerous, and self-defeating. And the only way I can see to do that will be for the next president to take all those shiny new Darth Vader powers and use them all, without restraint, on the very body that deliberated, argued, voted, and in the end opted to let them be used on all of us. Be kinda funny if transcripts of Feinstein's and Rockefeller's phone conversations got sent to the newspapers, obtained without warrants. Be kinda appropriate if the congresscritters who supported the MCA started vanishing in the night. Want to get Congress to end the war? Start forcibly drafting the biggest warmonger's kids into the army.

I recall a SCOTUS nominee that didn't give a rat's ass about privacy... until one day a newspaper obtained his rental records from a video store. Suddenly the hoi-poloi were all in an uproar about how important privacy was and how there was a need to guarantee it. Apparently, the only way Congress will see the need to keep the country from degenerating into a bankrupt 3rd world shithole is if they see their own skins are on the line as well.

The really funny part is the demand for Government to furnish healthcare to everyone, which requires REALLY intimate knowledge be circulated around hither and yon.

You'll have REALLY intimate knowledge squirted hither and you around the globe already.

Lord, what a bunch of sissy-marys. Here's something you can do. Encrypt. If you're that paranoid, encrypt everything. A judge just ruled the key can't be forced out of someone.....
http://www.news.com/8301-13578_3-9834495-38.html

completely betrayed by the stupidity, arrogance, and pigheadedness of both the right and the left this past seven years.

It is obvious now, this nation is composed primarily of arrogant imbeciles.

So it is no surprise to me any longer that somehow I still feel too few see Ron Paul as the answer.

THE ONLY ANSWER.

Never mind he is working against the system, yet is raising as much money as any of the marionettes.

Never mind that he has more people searching on his name on the internet than ANY of the marionettes.

Never mind that he is the only one making any sense at the podium, explaining to all of us exactly what needs to be done to fix this nation.

Maybe Hillary will fix all this, huh? After her hubby had set up the very playing field during his presidency that led to this catastrophe.

Maybe Obama will wave his magic wand, a wand purchased for him by Halliburton or Exxon.

That's it in a nutshell.. The sheeple must look heavenward else all is lost.

The wolf is always at the door.

I really hate it when life turns out like a bad B movie.

You will obey me while I lead you

And eat the garbage that I feed you

Until the day that we dont need you

Dont got for help...no one will heed you

Your mind is totally controlled

It has been stuffed into my mold

And you will do as you are told

Until the rights to you are sold -Frank Zappa

How should I go about telling my Senator that she has been complicit or directly involved in breaking Federal laws? This is the woman whose constituencies include a large portion of employees at Ft.Mead. Is this one of those this is Republic, not a democracy moment? I can hear the reassurances from the VP right now that all of the great information that we have garnered surely outweighs a few innocent citizens civil liberties, doesn't it? Isn't this wholesale blackmail of our Congress?