Security

Are We Really Free When Big Brother Is Systematically Turning America Into A Giant Prison?

July 4, 2013 by Michael

Every year on July 4th we celebrate our “independence”, but is America really free? How could we possibly be free when “Big Brother” is constantly intruding in our lives in hundreds of different ways? And I am not just talking about NSA snooping. Sadly, the truth is that the United States is beginning to fully embrace a “police state” culture. We have learned that the government monitors and keeps a record of all of our cell phone calls, emails, Internet searches, credit card transactions, and every piece of mail that we send. But most Americans don’t seem to care. We are “encouraged” to report the “suspicious activity” of our neighbors to the authorities, we are told that having security thugs touch the private areas of our women and children at our airports is necessary “for our security”, and 80,000 SWAT team raids are conducted each year in the United States. But the American people don’t seem to care. America was once a great country, but now it is being turned into a giant prison, and only a small minority of the citizens are raising their voices in objection.

When I was a child, I was taught that totalitarian societies such as North Korea, the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany were the bad guys.

So why in the world would we want to become more like them?

Do we actually believe that these ridiculous security measures are keeping us safer?

At this point, we have already given up so much privacy that we barely have any left.

For example, up until recently I actually believed that our mail was private. But now we have learned that the government is monitoring every piece of mail that the American people send. And according to the New York Times, the government has flagged the mail of thousands of problem citizens for special attention…

Leslie James Pickering noticed something odd in his mail last September: a handwritten card, apparently delivered by mistake, with instructions for postal workers to pay special attention to the letters and packages sent to his home.

“Show all mail to supv” — supervisor — “for copying prior to going out on the street,” read the card. It included Mr. Pickering’s name, address and the type of mail that needed to be monitored. The word “confidential” was highlighted in green.

But even if you are not on the list of those that get special attention, your mail is still photographed. In fact, 160 billion photographs of our mail were sent to the government last year…

Mr. Pickering was targeted by a longtime surveillance system called mail covers, a forerunner of a vastly more expansive effort, the Mail Isolation Control and Tracking program, in which Postal Service computers photograph the exterior of every piece of paper mail that is processed in the United States — about 160 billion pieces last year. It is not known how long the government saves the images.

Together, the two programs show that postal mail is subject to the same kind of scrutiny that the National Security Agency has given to telephone calls and e-mail.

The tyrants of the past never dreamed of having some of the technologies that we have today. Virtually everything that we do is watched, monitored, tracked or recorded in some way.

And as technology continues to advance, there will be very little that the authorities will not be capable of.

Some of the technologies that are coming out these days are absolutely frightening. For example, over in Europe one company is now running talking ads that seem like they are coming from inside our own heads…

Passengers leaning their head against the window will “hear” adverts “coming from inside the user’s head”, urging them to download the Sky Go app.

The proposal involves using bone conduction technology, which is used in hearing aids, headphones and Google’s Glass headset, to pass sound to the inner ear via vibrations through the skull.

A video for the Talking Window campaign released by Sky Deutschland and ad agency BBDO Germany states: “Tired commuters often rest their heads against windows. Suddenly a voice inside their head is talking to them. No one else can hear this message.”

How would you respond if a “voice inside your head” suddenly started talking to you?

In other instances, “Big Brother” can intrude in our lives in more old-fashioned ways.

For example, just check out the rules for July 4th that were posted at the entrance to one park in Lakewood, Ohio. This photo comes from a recent article by Paul Joseph Watson…

Why would anyone want to go spend the 4th of July at that park?

But this is what America is turning into. We are turning into a society that is absolutely obsessed with security and control, and this is manifesting in hundreds upon hundreds of different ways. If you doubt this, just check out the following articles…

-“21 Facts About NSA Snooping That Every American Should Know”

-“29 Signs That The Elite Are Transforming Society Into A Total Domination Control Grid”

-“America Is Being Systematically Transformed Into A Totalitarian Society”

-“America Is Embracing The Secret Police Culture Of The Nazis”

-“America’s Roads Have Been Turned Into A Revenue Generating Surveillance Grid”

Fortunately, the recent revelations about the NSA have spurred some Americans into action. For example, a new non-partisan organization known as “Restore The Fourth” is calling on the U.S. government to restore our Fourth Amendment rights. The following is from a press release that the organization recently issued…

*****

Restore the Fourth is a grassroots, non-partisan, non-violent movement that seeks to organize and assemble nationwide protests on July 4th, 2013. Protesters in over 100 cities across America will gather to demand that the government of the United States of America adhere to its constitutionally dictated limits and respect the Fourth Amendment. http://www.RestoretheFourth.net provides a detailed list of protest locations.

Restore the Fourth maintains that justification of the Fourth Amendment beyond the original text need not be given; the legitimacy of which is self-evident. “The right of the people to be secure in 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 persons or things to be seized.” The Fourth Amendment of the Bill of Rights clearly protects all citizens’ assets, both digital and physical, against searches and seizures without warrant; they aim to assert those rights. They insist that the proper channels of government work to ensure that all policy complies with the supreme laws of the United States of America in their entirety.

Restore the Fourth requests that American citizens’ right to privacy is respected and stands with the Electronic Frontier Foundation and StopWatching.us on their open letter to Congress. As informed members of the American electorate, they endorse and echo the letter’s demands.

1. Enact reform this Congress to Section 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act, the state secrets privilege, and the FISA Amendments Act to make clear that blanket surveillance of the Internet activity and phone records of any person residing in the U.S. is prohibited by law and that violations can be reviewed in adversarial proceedings before a public court;

2. Create a special committee to investigate, report, and reveal to the public the extent of this domestic spying. This committee should create specific recommendations for legal and regulatory reform to end unconstitutional surveillance;

3. Hold accountable those public officials who are found to be responsible for this unconstitutional surveillance.

The July 4th demonstrations seek to demand an end to the unconstitutional surveillance methods employed by the U.S. government and to ensure that all future government surveillance is constitutional, limited, and clearly defined.

Restore the Fourth aims to ensure that the will of the people is reflected in the government of the United States of America. This movement intends to bring an end to twelve years of Fourth Amendment abuses, and demonstrate the need for a return to the Constitution. All Americans should stand with them in this cause to protect the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution.

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I would encourage you to speak out about these issues however you can. For some people, that may mean participating in a street protest. For others, it may mean making a great YouTube video. Others spread the word on radio shows or by speaking with their friends. Personally, I have written about these issues extensively on my websites and in my new book. We all have ways that we can object to the fact that America is being systematically transformed into a giant prison.

So what do you think?

Do you believe that America is really free?

Please feel free to share your opinion by posting a comment below…

Mourn For America: Whenever A Tragedy Happens They Take Even More Freedom From Us

April 21, 2013 by Michael

What in the world is happening to America? Over the past couple of decades, the federal government has used just about every major national tragedy as an excuse to take even more liberty and freedom away from us. And without a doubt, the Boston Marathon bombing was a great national tragedy. I don’t think that any of us will forget the images that we have seen over the past week. All of those responsible for this attack should be exposed, hunted down, tried and punished. Unfortunately, what always seems to happen is that it is the American people that seem to get punished the most for these tragedies. Over the past couple of decades we have been told again and again that if we will just give up a little bit more freedom that the authorities will be able to keep us safe. But you know what? It is IMPOSSIBLE for them to keep us safe. There is no way in the world that the federal government can protect us from all of the bad guys in the world. We are a country that is absolutely teeming with “soft targets” – malls, churches, schools, concerts, sporting events, etc. No matter how much money we spend, there is no way that the federal government will ever be able to provide enough security for all of those soft targets. Even if our society morphed into something that resembled George Orwell’s “1984”, the government would still never be able to guarantee our safety. Unfortunately, in the aftermath of this attack there will inevitably be calls for “increased security” and “more anti-terror legislation”. The answer always seems to be to expand the emerging police state. But it is getting to the point where all of this “security” is becoming absolutely suffocating, and yet it doesn’t seem to be keeping us any safer. So where does all of this end? Are we going to completely throw out the entire U.S. Constitution in a desperate attempt to feel a little bit safer? Or are we going to choose to live our lives without fear no matter what others may try to do to us?

Benjamin Franklin once made the following statement…

“Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”

Sadly, the way that the American people have responded to national tragedies over the past couple of decades would have made our founding fathers greatly ashamed. The American people have been way too willing to give up liberty in exchange for the promise of safety.

We have been told that the terrorists hate us because of our liberties and freedoms. But we have also been told that in order to be “safe” from those terrorists we have got to give up those liberties and freedoms.

So who is really winning?

We seem to have forgotten some of the most basic lessons in life.

If you cower in fear when a bully comes after you, what is the bully going to do?

The bully is just going to keep coming after you because his actions are being rewarded.

Those that are trying to create fear love it when you become fearful. It is exactly what they want.

The appropriate response to a great national tragedy is to reject fear and to continue to boldly live our lives as if nobody could ever shake us.

But instead, the atmosphere of fear in America continues to grow.

And yes, there are common sense things that our government should be doing to keep bad guys away from us.

For example, the number one thing that the federal government should be doing is to secure the border. Every single day, thousands upon thousands of people that we don’t know anything about pour into this country. And yet the federal government has absolutely refused to secure our borders for decades.

Until the federal government secures our borders, they should not ask any of us to sacrifice a single ounce of liberty or freedom in the name of “national security”.

But even as the Obama administration treats our border security like a joke and continues to import huge numbers of people from radical areas of the Middle East, they continue to tell us that “domestic terror” is the next great threat that we are facing.

Many of our other politicians are buying into this philosophy as well. Senator Lindsey Graham says that the attack in Boston is a perfect example of “why the homeland is the battlefield“.

So if “the homeland is the battlefield”, then who is the enemy?

Well, a U.S. Army Reserve training presentation recently identified evangelical Christians as “religious extremists“, and since Barack Obama entered the White House there have been numerous government reports that have identified Christians, “constitutionalists”, patriots, anti-abortion activists, conspiracy theorists and gun owners as “potential terrorists”.

So where does all of this end?

Are the American people rapidly becoming the enemy?

Will we be constantly scared to death of one another?

Will the entire nation exist in a never ending environment of fear?

Will we eventually have the TSA and the Department of Homeland Security patrolling every mall, every church, every school, every concert and every sporting event?

Unfortunately, the bad guys will always be able to find a soft target, and there will be more terror attacks in the future no matter how much security we pour on. Once upon a time this nation was greatly blessed with peace and security, but now that hedge of protection is gone. The federal government could give the Department of Homeland Security trillions of dollars a year and it would not make much of a difference. We live in a world that is becoming increasingly unstable, and bad guys are going to do bad things.

Yes, there are some common sense things that we can do to make our nation more secure. At this point, the federal government is not doing most of those things.

But no matter how hard we try, bad things are going to happen. When those bad things happen, what we can control is how we respond to them.

That is why what just happened in Boston is so alarming. The entire city was put into a complete lockdown for nearly two days. It was a preview of what could happen nationwide if martial law was declared. It was an over the top display of force that clearly demonstrated to the rest of the world how incredibly frightened we are.

Some of the things we saw in Boston were absolutely disgraceful. For example, you can see video of an innocent Watertown family being ripped out of their home at gunpoint right here.

Do you know what this tells the rest of the world?

It tells them that terrorism works.

It tells them that one small incident is enough to send the entire nation into a full-blown panic attack.

You can see some more photos of martial law in Boston right here. Instead of making things better, this is just going to make the atmosphere of fear in this nation even worse.

And you know what? None of those heavily armed men even found the second suspect. He was actually found by a neighbor that had gone out to take a smoke.

Like most Americans, I absolutely hate terrorism in all the forms that it takes.

But we are not going to prevent future terrorism by treating the U.S. Constitution like a piece of trash. We have now shown the world that we are willing to throw out our most important constitutional rights the moment that a “threat” arises, and this is just going to encourage even more terrorism.

You see, those that engage in terrorism want attention and they want to create fear. When we give them attention and we allow them to create fear we give them exactly what they want.

Is there anyone out there that can defend what we just saw in Boston? I can’t imagine any American that still loves the Constitution being proud of what just happened. I think that Karl Denninger put it quite eloquently the other day…

By effectively occupying a part of the Boston metro area they made an utter mockery of the 4th Amendment. There was no “hot pursuit” and thus no argument available to them allowing searches of private property without consent or a warrant. Not only did they search without a warrant there were multiple reports through the day of seizure of firearms, among other things.

Sadly, most Americans seem to be more than willing to disregard the U.S. Constitution these days. Most of them are incredibly scared and they just want someone in a position of authority to assure them that they will be safe.

So I am sure that in the months ahead we will see “security” get even tighter in this country. With each subsequent tragedy, it will just get tighter and tighter until we can barely even breathe.

This is not the answer to any of our problems. In fact, it is just going to make many of the problems that we are facing as a nation far worse.

Why Is It Necessary For The Federal Government To Turn The United States Into A Prison Camp?

April 20, 2012April 20, 2012 by Michael

There has been no society in the history of the world that has ever been 100% safe. No matter how much money the federal government spends on “homeland security”, the truth is that bad things will still happen. Our world is a very dangerous place and it is becoming increasingly unstable. The federal government could turn the entire country into one giant prison camp, but that would still not keep us safe. It is inevitable that bad stuff will happen in life. But we have a choice. We can choose to live in fear or we can choose to live as free men and women. Our forefathers intended to establish a nation where liberty and freedom would be maximized. But today we are told that we have to give up our liberties and our freedoms and our privacy for increased security. But is such a trade really worth it? Just think of the various totalitarian societies that we have seen down throughout history. Have any of them ever really thrived? Have their people been happy? Unfortunately, the U.S. federal government has decided that the entire country needs to be put on lock down. Nearly everything that we do today is watched and tracked, and personal privacy is rapidly becoming a thing of the past. Many of the things that George Orwell wrote about in 1984 are becoming a reality, and that is a very frightening thing. The United States is supposed to be the land of the free and the home of the brave. Sadly, we are rapidly becoming the exact opposite of that.

I don’t know about you, but I never signed up to live in North Korea. When I was growing up I was taught that repressive regimes such as North Korea are “the bad guys” and that America is where “the good guys” live.

So why do we want to be just like North Korea?

When they put in the naked body scanners at U.S. airports and started having TSA agents conduct “enhanced pat-downs” of travelers, I decided that I was not going to fly anymore unless absolutely necessary.

Then I heard about how “random bag checks” were being conducted at Metro train stations in the Washington D.C. area, and I was glad that I was no longer taking the train into D.C. anymore.

But now the TSA is showing up everywhere. Down in Houston, undercover TSA agents and police officers will now “ride buses, perform random bag checks, and conduct K-9 sweeps, as well as place uniformed and plainclothes officers at Transit Centers and rail platforms to detect, prevent and address latent criminal activity or behavior.”

So now I have another thing to add to my list of things that I can’t do anymore.

No more riding buses for me.

But the truth is that you can’t escape this expanding security grid no matter how hard you try.

In fact, TSA “VIPR teams” conduct approximately 8,000 “unannounced security screenings” every year at bus terminals, train stations, ports and highway rest stops throughout the United States.

Look, every society needs some level of security. There are always bad guys out there that want to harm innocent people.

But in the United States we must demand that those in charge of our security do their jobs in a way that does not compromise our dignity, our liberties or our freedoms.

Does having TSA thugs touch the private parts of old women and young children before they get on their flights keep us any safer?

Of course not.

But it does move our country in a very dangerous direction.

The reality is that this “Big Brother control grid” that is being constructed all around us is expanding in a thousand different ways.

For example, a new bill before the U.S. Congress would require black box data recorders to be installed in all new vehicles starting in 2015. These black box data recorders will be able to constantly transmit data about everything that your car is doing to the government and to the insurance companies. The following is from a recent article by Eric Peters….

And naturally, they – the government, insurance companies – will be able to track your every move, noting (and recording) where you’ve been and when. This will create a surveillance net beyond anything that ever existed previously. Some will not sweat this: After all, if you’ve got nothing to hide, why worry? Except for the fact that, courtesy of almost everything we do being either “illegal” or at least “suspicious” we all have a great deal to hide. The naivety of the Don’t Worry, it’s No Big Deal crowd is breathtaking. Did the average Soviet citizen also “not have anything to hide,” and hence why worry?

But the last possibility is probably the creepiest possibility: EDRs tied into your car’s GPS will give them – the government and its corporate **** ******* (edited for language) – literal physical control over (hack) “your” vehicle. This is not conspiracy theorizing. It is technological fact. Current GM vehicles equipped with the same technology about to be mandated for every vehicle can be disabled remotely. Just turned off. All the OnStar operator has to do is send the appropriate command over the GPS to your car’s computer, which controls the engine. It is one of the features touted by OnStar – of course, as a “safety” feature.

In the future, it will be used to limit your driving – for the sake of “energy conservation” or perhaps, “the environment.” It will be the perfect, er, vehicle, for implementing U.N. Agenda 21 – the plan to herd all of us formerly free-range tax cattle into urban feedlots. So much easier to control us this way. No more bailing out to the country or living off the grid – unless you get there (and to your work) by walking.

Even when you are sitting at home you are still being watched and monitored in countless ways.

For example, every single call you make on your cell phone is intercepted and monitored by the government.

Your Internet activity is tracked and monitored by a whole host of government agencies as well. If you doubt this, just read this article.

Now CISPA would expand government surveillance of the Internet even further. The following description of CISPA comes from the Electronic Frontier Foundation website….

CISPA creates an exception to all privacy laws to permit companies to share our information with each other and with the government in the name of cybersecurity…. CISPA’s ‘information sharing’ regime allows the transfer of vast amounts of data, including sensitive information like internet use history or the content of emails, to any agency in the government including military and intelligence agencies like the National Security Agency or the Department of Defense Cyber Command. Once in government hands, this information can be used for any non-regulatory purpose so long as one significant purpose is for cybersecurity or to protect national security.

Frightening stuff, eh?

I want you to imagine a scenario for a moment. Imagine that the government assigned two “watchers” to you that followed you everywhere you went and stared directly into your face the entire time.

Would you feel comfortable?

Why not?

You don’t have anything to hide, do you?

Well, of course the truth is that none of us would like having our privacy constantly invaded. It is not pleasant to constantly feel like you are being watched.

That is why all of these new “security measures” are so alarming. A system is being set up where all of us are being constantly watched and monitored 24 hours a day.

And most Americans have no idea how fast the transition to full martial law could potentially be.

Barack Obama recently updated an old executive order that has been around for decades that would enable him to take charge of all food, all energy, all health resources and all transportation resources in the United States with the stroke of a pen. This new update would allow him to do it even in “non-emergency” situations.

The following is what U.S. Representative Kay Granger recently had to say about this executive order….

This means all of our water resources, construction services and materials (steel, concrete, etc.), our civil transportation system, food and health resources, our energy supplies including oil and natural gas – even farm equipment – can be taken over by the President and his cabinet secretaries. The Government can also draft U.S. citizens into the military and force U.S. citizens to fulfill “labor requirements” for the purposes of “national defense.” There is not even any Congressional oversight, only briefings are required.

Later on in her letter, Representative Granger even used the phrases “martial law” and “government takeover” to describe the power that Barack Obama potentially has under this executive order….

It is still unclear why this order was signed now, and what the consequences are for our nation – especially during times of peace. This type of Martial Law imposes a government takeover on U.S. citizens that is typically reserved for national emergencies, not in a time of relative peace.

Do you trust Barack Obama with that kind of power?

Unfortunately, considering the really bad decisions that all of our government officials regularly make, it is really hard to trust any of them to do the right thing at this point.

The American people need to let their voices be heard on these issues. If not, the federal government will continue to strip away our privacy, our liberties and our freedoms until everything is gone.

Do you want your children to grow up in a country that has been turned into a giant prison camp and that more closely resembles North Korea than it does the nation that our forefathers originally founded?

If not, please do what you can to speak out against these abuses.

The truth is that the federal government does not really even care about our national security anyway.

If they did, they would secure our borders. Just today I read that the National Guard is withdrawing 900 troops from the U.S.-Mexico border. Our border security is already a total joke and now it is going to be even worse.

Over the past several decades, tens of millions of people have crossed that border illegally. Every single day, terrorists, drug dealers, gang members, sexual predators and a whole host of other “bad guys” could be crossing that border and we would never even know about it because we aren’t doing anything to stop it.

For nearly 60 years, the U.S. government has successfully protected the border between South Korea and North Korea, but the U.S. government flatly refuses to protect our own borders.

Until the federal government decides to do what the U.S. Constitution requires them to do and start protecting our borders, then the federal government should not be asking any of us to make a single sacrifice in the name of “security”.

The truth is that we can have a reasonable level of security in this nation without giving up the liberties and the freedoms that millions of Americans have shed their blood to protect.

We do not need to turn the United States into a giant prison camp. America is supposed to be the land of the free, and we need to work hard to get that dream back.