Re: What has America lost?

Don Swayser allegedly said:

> steve wrote:
>> What has America lost?
>> 
>> - The US Constitution / Bill of Right (due to US Patriot ACT) The
>> president now has the power to order the arrest and indefinite detention,
>> secret trials, of anyone, with no evidence, public courts or legal
>> representation or habeas corpus. The President can order anyone's death
>> if it suits him - provided they aren't Americans. No evidence required.
>> 
> Oh really, where did you get that from?

Here's a real-life example:   

http://www.chargepadilla.org/links.html

>> - democracy (due to gerrymandering of district boundaries - 99% of House
>> congressional incumbents are re-elected - 80 out of 435 were un-opposed).
>> Mandatory cheat-able voting machines will finish the job in 2004. To be
>> fair, both major parties cheat in elections like there was no tomorrow.
>> 
> The only verified cases of cheating I've personally read about are those
> in Jimmy Walkers NYC, Richard Daley in Chicago and Huey Long in
> Louisianna. All of them were Democrats. The last attempt was in Florida
> with the hanging chad scam the democrats used as a smoke screen until
> they illegally demanded a recount in only two Florida Counties.

The cheating I'm talking about is pefectly legal. When the states define
their district boundaries (except for the 6 with only one district), they
typically draw the boundaries to set the staus quo in concrete. Like the
fuss in texas recently....where the majority Republicans are rigging things
their way after years of the former majority Democrats doing the same
thing. Cheaters all.  

They have been very successful. In all but ONE of the past *25* House
congressional elections (since 1954 incl), over 90% of incumbents have been
re-elected. Since 1998 (inclusive), the figure is over 98.5%...... 

I don't think there is another single-member plurality "democracy" on Earth
where 98%-99% of the sitting members are regularly re-elected.....thanks to
legal cheating.  It's so bad that in 80 of the 435 House seats, the other
major party didn't even bother to stand a candidate. 

It's shocking....yet few Americans seem to even know how degraded and
dysfunctional their electoral system is. 

Look at these stats: 

http://www.fairvote.org/dubdem/usreps.htm

 
>> - Trust - Bush leader has habitually lied to you about serious matters,
>> He has also lied to the world at large and they trust him far less than
>> Americans do.
>> 
> Oh? The greatest presidential liars in history were FD Roosevelt, Lyndon
> Johnson, Richard Nixon and William Clinton. Three of the four were/are
> democrats.

I see you're worried about parties. I'm not. They were all liars. 

But Bush today is worse than any of them......He lies about everything.  
 
>> - Allies - Most of their citizens and most of their governments think the
>> US at present is out of its friggin' mind. To the extent they work with
>> Bush, they are working to restrain his excesses.
>> 
> The countries which count are our traditional allies, the other English
> speaking nations. We have come victorious through two world wars. We
> must forgive Canada this last since it's really being controlled by a
> croaker. All the rest we can depend on to;
> 1. Be opposed in a war.
> 2. Surrender to the enemy.

Canadian's - English or French - are overwhelming opposed to the actions of
G W Bush in Iraq. Chretien may be French, but most of his Liberal party MPs
are not.  

New Zealand also did not back the US...and most Australians and Britons
don't either - as every opinion poll shows. 

I'm talking about lost trust on the level of the individual voter in all of
these countries. Tony Blair will pay dearly for what he has done next time
Britons go to the polls.  
 
>> - Safety - Bush's actions in invading Iraq have vastly increased the
>> dangers to America at home...and *certainly* abroad. Three to four years
>> ago, Americans could have visited almost anywhere in relative safety.
>> Today, roughly a 3rd of the world is off-limits to any sane American. The
>> *difference* has been Bush's response to 9/11.....he invaded Iraq...who
>> had nothing to do with it.
>> 
> It seems to me that the WTC was more expensive than all the rest of
> terrorist actions combined, and it happened in the US, and well before
> the Iraq thing.

Sure. 

> Only an absolute fool would assume the rest of the world
> wouldn't be an even more dangerous place if Hussein was still supporting
> the terrorists.

But he wasn't. I know Bush keeps saying it, but there is no proof.....and
the CIA and the DIA and others have repeatedly pointed out. 

> Your liberal rhetoric is boring and silly. Try thinking
> before posting stuff like this. It sounds like you're getting your
> material from "The Militant".

Your problem is you mistake the provable verifiable truthg for "rhetoric"
because of you own biases. 

If you verify the claims i have made...and fomd them valid....what will you
do? Acknowldge the truth? 

Or be like Bush and lie to yourself and others?  

-- 
Best Regards, 
Steve Withers
defenestrate: The act of throwing Windows out the window and replacing it on
your PC with some other operating system.