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We Are All Prisoners Now
By Paul Craig Roberts
“They’re locking them up today
They’re throwing away the key
I
wonder who it’ll be tomorrow, you or me?”
The Red Telephone (LOVE, 1967)
12/26/07
"ICH" -- -
At
Christmas time it has been my habit to write a column in
remembrance of the many innocent people in prisons whose lives
have been stolen by the US criminal justice (sic) system that is
as inhumane as it is indifferent to justice. Usually I retell
the cases of William Strong and Christophe Gaynor, two men
framed in the state of Virginia by prosecutors and judges as
wicked and corrupt as any who served Hitler or Stalin.
This year is different. All Americans are now imprisoned in a
world of lies and deception created by the Bush Regime and the
two complicit parties of Congress, by federal judges too timid
or ignorant to recognize a rogue regime running roughshod over
the Constitution, by a bought and paid for media that serves as
propagandists for a regime of war criminals, and by a public who
have forsaken their Founding Fathers.
Americans are also imprisoned by fear, a false fear created by
the hoax of “terrorism.” It has turned out that headline
terrorist events since 9/11 have been orchestrated by the US
government. For example, the alleged terrorist plot to blow up
Chicago’s Sears Tower was the brainchild of a FBI agent who
searched out a few disaffected people to give lip service to the
plot devised by the FBI agent. He arrested his victims, whose
trial ended in acquittal and mistrial.
Many Europeans regard 9/11 itself as an orchestrated event.
Former cabinet members of the British, Canadian and German
governments and the Chief of Staff of the Russian Army have
publicly expressed their doubts about the official 9/11 story.
Recently, a former president of Italy, Francesco Cossiga, said
in an interview with the newspaper, Corriere della Sera
(November 30, 2007), that “democratic elements in America and
Europe, with the Italian center-left in the forefront, now know
that the 9/11 attack was planned and executed by the American
CIA and Mossad in order to blame the Arab countries, and to
persuade the Western powers to undertake military action both in
Iraq and Afghanistan.”
It is unclear whether Cossiga was being sarcastic about the
opinion of skeptics or merely reporting what people think. I
have written to him asking for clarification and will report any
reply that I receive. Apparently, the Italian media has not
offered a clarification.
Cossiga’s statement has not been reported by a US newspaper or
TV channel. Raising doubts among Americans about the government
is not a strong point of the corporate media. Americans live in
a world of propaganda designed to secure their acquiescence to
war crimes, torture, searches and police state measures,
military aggression, hegemony and oppression, while portraying
Americans (and Israelis) as the salt of the earth who are
threatened by Muslims who hate their “freedom and democracy.”
Americans cling to this “truth” while the Bush regime and a
complicit Congress destroy the Bill of Rights and engineer the
theft of elections.
Freedom and democracy in America have been reduced to no-fly
lists, spying without warrants, arrests without warrants or
evidence, permanent detention despite the constitutional
protection of habeas corpus, torture despite the prohibition
against self-incrimination--the list goes on and on.
http://www.truthnews.us/?p=1115]
In today’s fearful America, a US Senator, whose elder brothers
were (1) a military hero killed in action, (2) a President of
the United States assassinated in office, (3) an Attorney
General of the United States and likely president except he was
assassinated like his brother, can find himself on the no-fly
list. Present and former high government officials, with top
secret security clearances, cannot fly with a tube of toothpaste
or a bottle of water despite the absence of any evidence that
extreme measures imposed by “airport security” makes flying
safer.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071221/us_nm/security_airports_dc;_ylt=ApzEobAIQMfiX02LTvKbk1UXIr0F
Elderly American citizens with walkers and young mothers with
children are meticulously searched because US Homeland Security
cannot tell the difference between an American citizen and a
terrorist.
All Americans should note the ominous implications of the
inability of Homeland Security to distinguish an American
citizen from a terrorist.
When Airport Security cannot differentiate a US Marine General
recipient of the Medal of Honor from a terrorist, Americans have
all the information they need to know.
http://www.homeofheroes.com/news/archives/2002_0100_foss.html
Any and every American can be arrested by unaccountable
authority, held indefinitely without charges and tortured until
he or she can no longer stand the abuse and confesses.
This predicament, which can now befall any American, is our
reward for our stupidity, our indifference, our gullibility, and
our lack of compassion for anyone but ourselves.
Some Americans have begun to comprehend the tremendous financial
costs of the “war on terror.” But few understand the cost to
American liberty. Last October a Democrat-sponsored bill,
“Prevention of Violent Radicalism and Homegrown Terrorism,”
passed the House of Representatives 404 to 6.
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/12/20/5920/
Only six members of the House voted against tyrannical
legislation that would destroy freedom of speech and freedom of
assembly and that would mandate 18 months of congressional
hearings to discover Americans with “extreme” views who could be
preemptively arrested.
What better indication that the US Constitution has lost its
authority when elected representatives closest to the people
pass a bill that permits the Bill of Rights to be overturned by
the subjective opinion of members of an “Extremist Belief
Dr. Roberts was Assistant
Secretary of the US Treasury for Economic Policy in the Reagan
administration. He is credited with curing stagflation and
eliminating “Phillips curve” trade-offs between employment and
inflation, an achievement now on the verge of being lost by the
worst economic mismanagement in US history.
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