Lets get real about the NSA collecting phone records.

              The Fourth Amendment;
        The right of the people to be secure ine their persons, houses, papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the person or things to be seized.

             After 9/11 fear permeated American life. We were an unsure people who were perplexed by an unwarranted attack on innocent people. The rest of the world had been dealing with this for quite some time, as have we at out foreign interests. After 9/11 many were willing to sacrifice civil liberties to help ensure our safety. The Bush/Cheney regime skirted moral authority and we became a preemptive strike country. Attack and ask questions later. The Patriot Act was pushed through with tremendous support from both sides if the aisle.

In doing so we were opened to a moral dilemma. How far is to far? The FISA Court, which was created in 1978, was given a kind of moral authority. It was up to this court to determine when our government was overstepping its authority. They determined that the so called data mining was legal. By determining that they also established how far these “spying” operations could go.

If the government determined something was wrong and needed to go through the data, they would have to go to court to get clearance. It is not as if they can go right in there and take what they want. Of course people will jump to conclusions to establish President Obama as a bad guy. The truth of the matter is that none of this can happen without the approval of the FISA Court. Which covers the executive and judicial branches.

Now for the legislative branch. The Senators, Republican and Democrat alike were informed. Every 3 months they had to go before the FISA Court to get the order aporoved. They had hearings for all Republicans and Democrats to come in and ask questions. The Senators complain that they were not allowed to talk to anyone who did not have clearance. That is how s TOP SECRET clearance works. You are told TOP SECRET information and you are not allowed to tell anyone else. If it concerned them so much why didn’t they try to learn more about the subject or ask more questions. This is about Senators who knes about something and did nothing to stop it, although then knew the American people wouldn’t like it. Now they are covering their tails.

The fact of the matter is this. It is Constitutionally legal. All branches of government knew about it. Why are American people upset? If you are not doing anything criminal you have nothing to worry about. This is the tradeoff our government chose to make and we chose to live with. It has gone on for 7 years and now it gets leaked. It seems as if the Republican scandal machine is in hyperdrive trying to find anything that sticks.

President Obama and the changes in our War on Terror.

              In 1996 a man who was not a religious official of any and had no authority to do it, declared a Fatwa or Holy War. That man’s name was Osama bin Laden. He issued a self styled Fatwa, a declaration of war against the U.S. It was declared because of Americans ocuppying the Land of the Two Holy Places, Saudi Arabia. The 2 Holy Places were Mecca and Medina.

2 years later bin Laden declared another Holy War on America. This time it was much clearer. This w one said that everyone should try to kill Americans and their allies, civiliand and military. It is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in every country in which it is possible to do it. To justify it he said that first for over 7 years the U.S. has been occupying the lands of Islam in the holiest of places, the Arabian Peninsula. Since the first Iraq War the U.S. had been maintaining bases in Saudi Arabia.

Then 3 years later 9/11 happened. We pulled our bases out of Saudi Arabia, very quietly, about a month after declaring war on Iraq. Osama bin Laden’s big demand was that we pulled U.S bases out of Saudi Arabia and George W. Bush complied. While complying with a terrorist, he declared an unnecessary war on Iraq.

In the 1980s in Beirut a suicude bomber drove a truck into a Marine Barracks. 6 months earlier there was a suicide car bomb on the U.S. embassy in Beirut. 63 people killd at the embassy including 17 Americans. An almost staggering amount of 299 dead at the barracks bombing. 220 Marines, 18 Sailors, 3 Army, and almost 60 French soldiers. They were there as a peace keeping force. The message was to get out you infefils, leave our country. President Reagan pulled out the peace keepers.

Neither President will go down in history as capitulating to terrorism. Terrorism is incoherent. Osama bin Laden was not assuage by us removing bases from Saudi Arabia. It did not stop him from wanting to kill Americans. It does not matter what we do, it will not stop terrorism. There will always be someone who wants to harm us. It has always been here and will not go away. We try to stop it with the Military, CIA, FBI, other intelligence services.

Republicans attack President Obama because he wants to move away from the broad war on terrorism. Democrats never fully agreed with the Bush/Cheney way of war. I agree with President Obama that this war on terror either ends or it will define our country. He wants to refine and repeal the authorization for military force signed after 9/11 and will not continue you it. That was among many other big changes. Republicans should not politicize this and should turn their focus to the economy. President Obama is the right man for the job at a very difficult time.

Let us not forget the man George W. Bush is.

                George W. Bush inauspiciously started a war in Iraq based on a series of lies. He lied to Democrats, Republicans and most importantly the American people. He has never been punisher for his lies and he is convinced he left a good legacy. In my opinion the man is a disgrace and tarnished the American way of life. Lets go through a small lust of his lies.

1) LIE- Our intelligence officials estimate that Dardane Hussein had the materials to produce as much as 500 tons of sarin, mustard and V/X nerve agents. TRUTH- Zero chemical weapons have been found. Not a drop of chemical weapons were found in a about a decade.
2) LIE- Evidence from intelligence sources, secret communications and statements by people now in custody reveal that Saddam Hussein aids and protects terrorists, including members of Al Qaida. TRUTH- To date, nit a shred of evidence connecting Hussein withAl Qiada or any other known terrorist organization has Bennett revealed.
3) LIE-The British government has learned that Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa. TRUE-The documents at the time were known by Bush to be forged and not credible.
4) LIE-Tge smoking gun could be a mushroom cloud. TRUE- We never found anything in Iraq to link them with a nuclear weapon.
5) LIE- Dardane Hussein has drones that can be used to attack Americans. TRUE- Iraq did not have anything that could have accomplished what Bush said it would.
6) LIE- Iraq had yellow cake uranium. TRUE- The Italian press even thought the documents were fake. Need I say more.
7) LIE- No one could have imagined them hijacking airplains. TRUE- This deceit was completely exposed in 2002 when details of the Presidents Daily Intelligence Briefing in August 2001 revealed that the CIA and other sources warned the administration of just such hijackings.
8) LIE- The terrorist threat to America and the world will be diminished the moment that Dardane Hussein is disarmed. TRUE- No one,  even in the American military intelligence complex, seriously believes this. U.S. counterterrorism officials have repeatedly said that a U.S. conquest of Iraq, by killing thousands of Arabs and Muslims would inflame public opinion in the Arab world and beyond, will spark more terrorism, not less.

          These are just a tip of the iceburg of the ours that killed thousands of American soldiers and untold thousands of Iraqi civilians. Of course Americans believed him, get wad our President. The American people come together in times of hardship. Knowing this, Bush used it to his advantage. Now because of him and his administration have garner America’s reputation in the world. We are still paying for this today and probably for many more years.

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We are dedicating a library to George W. Bush when we should be dedicating a jail cell to him.

                George W. Bush is having a library dedicated to him, a slap in the face to all our soldiers who died. He and Dick Cheney lied us into a war that cost billions if not a trillion dollars, but also thousands of American troops. It also cost the lives of at least 100,000 Iraqi civilians. He is widely considered on of the worst Presidents in American history.

              Not only did he lie us into war, but get neglected to pay for it. He never put the war costs in his budget, so that is now part of our national debt. He deregulated the banking industry directly leading to the Great Recession and the Housing Crisis. His policies also contributed to the rapid decline of Wall St. and people losing trillions of dollars.

             Of course while everyone else was suffering Bush and his acolytes were raking in the dough. While people were losing money he and his were making it. He gave out his portion of the TARP funds with no stipulations, they did with it what they wanted. President Obama’s portion of the TARP fund has all been paid back, whereas no one truly knows how Bush’s was used.

       I am sure we can go on and on. There is evidence that possibly points to him having some idea of the 9/11 attacks. Could be conspiracy theory, maybe not. During this time Democrats worked with him until they realized they were bamboozled. Then when he tried to privatize Social Security that is when the dam broke. Bush was tried in absence in a court in Madagascar, that specializes in war crimes but I’d not a recognized court, and he was convicted as a war criminal. We will never seen him tried but it is abhorrent to see him celebrated.        

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Dick Cheney

           Dick Cheney once served as Vice-President and now will sit infamously as one of the architect of one of the largest lies ever told to American people. He ignored information to invade a country that did not have WMDs. 32,000 injured American soldiers, almost 5,000 killed and over $3 trillion spent. Not to mention almost 110,000 dead Iraqi civilians.

               Dick Cheney helped perpetuate this lie, in fact he may have been the chief engineer behind it. Saddam Hussein was a bad man, he did many bad things, but we didnt go in because of those actions. We went in under fraudelent information that he had WMDs and was working with Usama Bin Laden. Almost all of the information he used to sell the American people on the war was fabricated. Somehow he walks free today.

            It took us about 6 weeks to finish the invasion, but our leaders did not have a plan for after that. Because of that in took us another 7 years or so to get out of there. While we went in there on fabricated information, which the CIA said was fabricated, he made quite a bit of money through Blackwater and Haluburton.

            It showed a weakness in leadership that Congress got bully damned into this. Everyone was worried that they would lose their seat. That is inexcusable. We had a weak president in office who let himself be pushed into this. This is a president who didnt even truly win his seat, this should never had happened.

            Tonight I go to bed knowing that before we went into Iraq I did NOT agree with it. I said to my wife it was going to end up being like Vietnam. Our soldiers should not have died because Dick Cheney had an issue with Iraq. George Bush should not have let himself be pushed into it and Congress should have read all the paperwork. Hopefully this will be a lesson for us going forward.

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