Many
people have been in a frenzy over the controversy of a certain popular
reality show, but while this was going on, last Thursday, the US Senate
passed the NDAA, National Defense Authorization Act. The vote passed
84-15, with all of the nay votes coming from Republicans, with the
exception of Oregon Senator Ron Wyden, Democrat, and Vermont Senator
Bernie Sanders, Independent.
The NDAA retains it’s most controversial aspect, the notorious
section 1021, which allows the government to detain any American citizen
for an unlimited amount of time without due process. Senator Ted Cruz
explained this as his reasoning for the no vote.
“Today I voted against the National Defense Authorization Act. I am deeply concerned that Congress still has not prohibited President Obama’s ability to indefinitely detain U.S. citizens arrested on American soil without trial or due process. Not only ethically reprehensible, this is illegal: the bill of rights in the constitution does not allow President Obama, or any president, to apprehend American citizens, and detain these citizens indefinitely without trial…
When I ran for office, I promised the people of Texas I would oppose any National Defense Authorization Act that did not explicitly prohibit the indefinite detention of American citizens. Although this legislation does contain several positive provisions that I support, it does not ensure our most basic rights as American citizens are protected.” Cruz said
Another disturbing section of this NDAA, Section 1071, beefs up the
already high levels of spying by the NSA. Section 1071 outlines the
creation of the “Conflict Records Research Center”, where the
unconstitutionally obtained information that the NSA has collected is
compiled and shared with the Department of Defense. This information,
referred to as “captured records,” can be anything from your phone
records, emails, browsing history or posts on social media sites.
Two other noteworthy clauses that were initially expected to be in
the 2013 version of this bill were not included. The first clause would
have eased restrictions on the transferring of Gitmo detainees, which
would have given the president more flexibility in dealing with those
prisoners. The 2nd unincluded controversial amendment, proposed by
Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, would have taken the decisions about
prosecuting sexual assaults within the military away from the normal
military chain of command, although commanders can now no longer overturn sexual assault convictions.
As usual,
there is a lack of any general acknowledgment from the mainstream press
over the recent passage (again) of this gross civil liberties
violation. Regardless of the numerous scandals that the administration
has recently faced, and public backlash over its’ broad and sweeping
“domestic surveillance” program, the state has unsurprisingly chosen
again to pass the bill. Another critical piece of legislation, which
enables the state to further violate the liberty of the people, was
over-shadowed by a trivial controversy (Duck Dynasty fiasco) that was
hyped by the media.
The ever-changing definition of “terrorism” provided for to us by the
state, has now expanded to describe individuals who are reverent of
individual liberty, suspicious
of centralized authority, and identified potential “terrorist activity”
to include such trivialities as paying with cash. The state has
undeniably been plagued by a pattern of corruption, favoring the
financial elite rather than representing the wellbeing of its own
people.
Sen. Justin Amash, along with Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, and others, began an initiative several months ago to curb the expanding jurisdiction entrusted to the NSA. Their amendment bill, the USA Freedom Act, has promised to stop the unconstitutional spying. But like most federal endeavors, it comes up short in truly protecting the people and limiting the power of the state or economic interests. The creation of unclear crimes punisheable indefinite detention are a recipe for oppression, no matter how you want to spin it.
http://www.exposingthetruth.co/ndaa-passed-while-media-preoccupied/#ixzz2oeMsl5Am
Sen. Justin Amash, along with Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, and others, began an initiative several months ago to curb the expanding jurisdiction entrusted to the NSA. Their amendment bill, the USA Freedom Act, has promised to stop the unconstitutional spying. But like most federal endeavors, it comes up short in truly protecting the people and limiting the power of the state or economic interests. The creation of unclear crimes punisheable indefinite detention are a recipe for oppression, no matter how you want to spin it.
http://www.exposingthetruth.co/ndaa-passed-while-media-preoccupied/#ixzz2oeMsl5Am
