As you may have heard, last week actor Sean Penn visited his buddy Hugo Chavez in Venezuela once again. Associated Press reported his comments on the 2012 presidential election as

“It’s never predictable what can happen in an American election, but we certainly believe at this point that it’s becoming increasingly clear to the American people that the policies of the far right are the policies of the rich, and that they are to the exclusion of the middle class and the poor, and that no society has a future on that basis.”

This is far from the most outrageous comments attributed to Sean Penn during visits to the socialist police state that is Venezuela. Furthermore, these are exactly the kind of statements conservatives and libertarians should expect to hear from Hollywood liberals during President Obama’s reelection campaign. Being unable to run on a record of great success, the president will have no choice but to turn to this divisive rhetoric to get reelected. Unless his opponent is Rick Santorum, whose rigid social conservatism will hurt him greatly in swing states like Ohio and Florida, and whose record on big spending is most outstanding when compared to his three competitors–an ex-Governor who balanced budgets, a former house speaker who oversaw a government shutdown shortly followed by nearly-balanced budgets (national debt went up during the Clinton “surpluses”), and a Texas Congressman who has never voted for an unbalanced budget or a tax increase–the President will have to actually debate the merits of his economic policy. And it is a debate he will likely lose.

Organizing for America, the Democratic National Committee under the offensive demagogue of a new chairwoman, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, and various mainstream media personalities have been attempting to capitalize on the greed and anger of the Occutards and have been running on a “Republicans are the party of the rich!” message–in spite of President Obama’s backing of and expansion of the bailout and stimulus policies of his predecessor George W. Bush.

No doubt at the front of Mr. Obama’s campaign will be the entertainment industry that helped him get elected in the 2008 primary and general election against seemingly impossible odds. This will include Sean Penn.

It baffles me how Sean Penn and his ilk have any credibility with the American people. I’ll admit that I even find a personal degree of disappointment in myself when I share articles on Facebook about celebrities endorsing my choice for 2012–Ron Paul. I do it because sadly enough, Americans care more about what these people think than say, what the veterans and members of the military think, or what the people out of work think, or what the successful small-to-medium sized business owners think. I don’t like the idea about taking advice from celebrities on anything. Most of them have zero understanding of individual liberty, economics or how the business sector operates, a minimal understanding of international affairs, and a hypocritical view on the fair share the 1% which they are a part of is allegedly not paying. Sean Penn is one such actor.

What I am also baffled by is that those of us on the other side of the political spectrum rarely fight back against these celebutards. We often take a “who cares what Hollywood thinks mentality”, failing to understand the power they have over influencing everything the average American says and does. Middle America doesn’t understand the lack of credibility these people have and we fail miserably to expose them for their hypocrisy. Reason is on our side, and we need to prove it, and we can do show by exposing the words of these people for their inaccuracies and logical inconsistencies. Will everyone listen? Of course not. But we don’t need every American to listen to us, we just need to get a few people at a time to wake up. Eventually, enough will do so that Hollyweird loses is significance in election cycles.

In 2010 I was working on a satirical book, entitled Mass Media Mindnumb, on what I had perceived to be the denigration of American pop culture. I have since lost interest in the subject and focused on more important things in my professional and personal life, but I kept the unfinished manuscript and sometimes reference it if I need some ammunition to fight back against Hollywood hypocrisy. My generation has proven to be the strongest victim of the cult of celebrity. I fear greatly what subsequent generations will look like as they come of age. America today faces a dichotomy. We will go down one of two roads. A road of European style socialism all the way to bankruptcy, or a restoration of the long forgotten free-market principles that made America great in the first place. There will be a generational shift that will soon show up in the political spectrum. My generation will either choose this European socialism, or adopt a libertarian-leaning conservatism. The dominionist [religious] right stands in the way of them adopting the latter, while the entertainment industry beckons them to the former.

I’ve spent enough time recently demagoguing the dominionists, so I’m gonna go after Hollywood, and I’ll start with Sean Penn.

In Mass Media Mindnumb I had written a scathing rant about Sean Penn’s hypocrisy. I’m going to release the contents of that rant in this article, while making some minor editorial revisions to reflect current events. Here is what I had written:

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I Am Sean

Sean Penn is one of several celebrities who has made enough an ass of himself that he gets his own subsection in this chapter. You probably think he’s a good actor. Really I can’t remember him outside of any movies other than Fast Times at Ridgemont High—where he played a disruptive stoner and I Am Sam—where he played the mentally challenged title character. Both decent movies; the actor is a different story.

Deceitful, left-wing, but most importantly the ultimate hypocrite—Sean Penn routinely criticized George W. Bush for taking away civil liberties during the beginning of the war on terror, but recently came out suggesting that people lose their right to free speech!

Let me break it down for you.

In 2002, he placed a $56,000 ad in The Washington Post out of concern for the upcoming war in Iraq and the PATRIOT Act. This letter was surprisingly eloquent, making some interesting analogies. He particularly wanted Bush to reconsider invading Iraq and the expansion of his federal power, to not “[diminish U.S. citizens] through loss of civil liberties [or] dangerously heightened presidential autonomy through acts of Congress.” His criticism of Bush would soon turn into anger, going so far as to call for Bush’s impeachment.

The criticisms—well, the early ones at least–were not entirely unfair, but what completely destroys Penn’s credibility as a political voice (pay attention here) is his ultimate hypocrisy. Some time in spring 2010, Sean Penn appeared on Bill Maher’s show Real Time. On the show, Penn made comments that completely destroyed his credibility for all his criticisms of George W. Bush’s infringements on our civil liberties.

I mentioned briefly the socialist leader of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, a man who has partially usurped control of the media in his country, all but guaranteeing political insuperability. Well, Penn is chummy with this guy and doesn’t exactly like people who bash him. The mainstream media, according to Penn, constantly lies about Hugo Chavez.

In reality, the mainstream media tells a lot of lies and skews many of their stories. But portrayal of Hugo Chavez as a socialist dictator isn’t one of their misleading notions—its cold hard fact. Penn’s allegations of this as a lie aren’t what make him a hypocrite. What makes him a hypocrite is the fact that he suggested a law which would outright violate the First Amendment—both violating freedom of the press and of speech.

“Every day, this elected leader [Chavez] is called a dictator here, and we just accept it, and accept it. And this is mainstream media. There should be a bar by which one goes to prison for these kinds of lies.” — Sean Penn in 2010 on Real Time with Bill Maher

Excuse me? You want a bar that would send people to prison for speaking their mind? Even if they were lying about Chavez’s oppression and socialist policies, and they certainly are not, the media has a constitutionally protected freedom to say whatever they want and it is the responsibility of ‘we the people’ to do our homework and find out the truth. As a matter of fact, two of the earliest media outlets in this country were created for campaigning purposes when John Adams and Thomas Jefferson battled each other for the presidency. They each had their own outlet to demagogue each other, and it was up to the citizens to separate fact from fallacy.

If anyone is going to be locked up for false allegations by this bar that Penn wants to create, consider this scenario where the law becomes international and then subsequently be used to lock up Chavez.

According to a Feb 2006 piece from Reuters, Chavez was quoted as saying the following of then-President Bush:

“The imperialist, genocidal, fascist attitude of the U.S. president has no limits. I think Hitler would be like a suckling baby next to George W. Bush.”

Hugo Chavez compared a man who removed an oppressive dictator and kept his country safe, despite wasting lots of money and using questionable policing tactics in the process, to a man who systematically murdered 6 million Jews and invaded multiple countries not with the goal of liberating them but with the goal of ethnically cleansing and then occupying them. Under Penn’s proposed law, Chavez would be behind bars.

See what I did there, Seanny? Apparently free speech is okay for Sean Penn only if you agree with him. When George W. Bush tapped phone and email communications in an attempt to secure our country—albeit with potential to violate our 4th amendment rights—it’s oppressive and fascist; but a man who controls his country’s media to consolidate his own power is a democratically elected and transparent leader, and anyone who disagrees with that should be locked up!?

Pot-calling-the-kettle-black much? You can’t yell about someone infringing on the First Amendment, then subsequently suggest people lose their First Amendment rights because they disagree with you, and expect to have any credibility left can you? I would hope not. And I would hope you the reader make note of this and don’t take political advice from this guy. Ironic enough that his own proposed law of course would probably ensure his buddies Chavez and Ahmedinejad be locked up for their lies—Ahmedinejad especially for calling the Holocaust a myth. But what’s even more ironic is that Sean Penn wants to make laws that oppress people who disagree with him politically, when his own father suffered the same oppression.

Sean must have forgotten that his father, the late actor Leo Penn, was an actor during the Red Scare. He was a communist sympathizer, a supporter of Hollywood trade unions and refused to accuse his communist friends to the House Un-American Activities Committee and as a result was blacklisted—i.e. nobody would hire him because of his political leanings! But in Sean Penn’s hypocrisy, he suggests people should be jailed for their opinions (or FACTS) that Hugo Chavez is a power hungry socialist tyrant.

Sean Penn is a true celebutard; a politically inept hypocrite who should just stick to acting and stay out of politics! But as much as I detest him, I would never suggest he be locked up for his lies. I would most likely never suggest he be blacklisted. But I will suggest a boycott of him. I don’t think I’ll be watching his upcoming films.

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My views on Sean Penn’s hypocrisy remain the same to this day. I hope the readers of this article take these facts to heart and share them with others, particularly the ones regarding Leo Penn. The Hollywood left is losing its credibility but I can only hope it will lose it in time stop my generation from accepting this entitlement mentality present among Occupy Wall Street. The last thing I want is to wake up in 10 years to a repeat of the recent London riots: a bunch of spoiled 14 year olds throwing rocks and molotov cocktails at shops because mommy and daddy didn’t buy them that iPad they are “entitled” to. And if you believe for one second this hypothetical will never happen, I’ll refer you to the even more recent riots in malls all across the country over the new Nike Air Jordans. I don’t think you get a more accurate example than that of combining the “entitlement” mentality with the peer-pressure driven cult of celebrity, not to mention the general wussification of the American male when a bunch of guys in their teens and early-to-mid twenties are fighting over shoes as if they were the Sex and the City girls.

Its not too late to stop this from happening. Just as we managed to do with the temporary stoppage of the so-called Stop Online Piracy Act, libertarians and libertarian-leaning conservatives will have to take up arms against Big Hollyweird once again; this time over their lies, distortions, and political influence. Don’t be afraid to spend a little extra time attacking their hypocrisy and their logical fallicies and eventually they’ll lose credibility with some of the electorate.

As for Sean Penn, the characters of Spicoli—the dumb stoner, and Sam—the mentally challenged man—may actually be smarter than their portrayer, Sean Penn. Sean PWNED!

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Aaron Alghawi is finishing his B.S. in Economics at Texas A&M University; he is a board member and Director of Student Outreach for the Republican Liberty Caucus.

Following the pattern of other provocative statements about potential domestic terrorist threats from the Obama Justice Department, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has issued a statement exposing the threat of “hundreds of thousands” of “sovereign citizens” who can turn violent “at the drop of a hat” during encounters with the police.

Citing three specific cases in three years and a trend of an increase in arrests of believers in individual sovereignty from 10 to 18 cases per year, mostly for non-violent crimes, the FBI declared law enforcement to be “inundated” with threats.

This may be the most exaggerated and offensive example of specious fearmongering to come out of an administration which has been promoting irrational fear of generally harmless groups of citizens for three years. The FBI is taking aim at a huge body of citizens who are increasingly angry about government abuse of power and irresponsibility and attempting to turn them into a movement of dangerous potential terrorists.

These dangerous “extremists” hold such horrific views as “outrage at tax collection,” defying environmental regulations and believing that “the United States went bankrupt by going off the gold standard.” The FBI is identifying them as “sovereign citizens” and is defining them as a members of a movement, though they provide no evidence of organized or coordinated activity beyond just being angry with the government, a characteristic shared by about half the nation’s population.

I would say that the concerns over this threat were excessive, but that’s giving the FBI too much credit. Ridiculous is a more appropriate description. Statistically a three year increase from 10 to 18 cases of mostly non violent crimes associated with anti-government activists isn’t a crimewave. It’s not even large enough to qualify as a validly quantifiable trend. Given the hundreds of thousands of crimes committed yearly it’s far below the margin of error for crime statistics.

The FBI claims that they are “being inundated right now with requests for training from state and local law enforcement on sovereign-related matters.” This supposed demand for a response to a nonexistent threat probably would not be there at all had the FBI not been promoting the idea that average citizens are potential domestic terrorists for years. The FBI is creating bogeymen to justify their own actions and to distract from the government’s increasingly callous disregard for the rights of citizens.

The kinds of concerns which the FBI is using to identify these potentially dangerous citizens are not the hallmarks of dangerous extremism. They are mostly reasonable concerns over the current state of our government held by tens of millions of fairly ordinary citizens who have legitimate reasons to be dissatisfied with government. They are also the same kinds of extreme views which were held by our founding fathers. They are targeting Americans for the crime of being American and for holding to values of independence and self-reliance on which our nation was built.

The one genuine, unifying characteristic of all of these “extremists” is that they are not happy with a government which is spending beyond its means, taxing beyond our ability to pay and which encroaches more and more on our constitutionally guaranteed rights every day. In their statement the FBI is not actually identifying a real threat to public safety or to citizens, they are putting us on notice that public expression of justifiable anger at the government can get you labelled a dangerous criminal or even a terrorist.

This is a tactic intended purely and simply to intimidate and silence the public. They are sending the message that protest is a crime and speaking out against government will not be tolerated. The implications of this statement from the FBI are particularly ominous in the wake of efforts in the National Defense Appropriation Act, the PATRIOT Act and the pending Enemy Expatriation Act to empower the government to take away the most fundamental rights of citizens. As they did under Hoover, the FBI is categorizing people and making lists and if you don’t watch your step they’ll put you in a database and take away your rights.

The goal may be to intimidate critics of government, but they are also showing us why we so desperately need to take our government back before these threats of abuse of power turn into full-fledged tyranny.

A version of this article appeared previously on Blogcritics Magazine

As you all know, I’ve come out pretty strongly against these from the get go.  I have always been against “anti-file sharing” legislation. I blasted Kimba Wood for shutting down Limewire. And I’ve been warning about SOPA for months and PIPA for weeks. Now, the American people are finally waking up. And all it took was 24 hours without Wikipedia. First, let’s discuss exactly what this bill is. Corporatist [quasi-socialist] Hollywood executives, the California Teamsters Union, and greedy entertainers got together with their lobbyist friends and said “hey, get congress to write a bill that lets us make money every time someone so much as looks at us or listens to us, we deserve it!”. Intellectual property laws in this country predate the world wide web by decades, and the lobbyists knew it would be easy to manipulate them for maximum control.

Government also liked the idea. Those in congress that wrote and supported the bill up to this point saw it as an opportunity for unprecedented government power over an area–both an economy and a society in and of itself–that has remained extremely free: the internet. These statists had the ultimate opportunity now to monitor us, influence us, control us, and further consolidate their power as time goes on. That is what awaits us if these bills pass. Unprecedented power for the political class. All it takes is a few greedy people to abuse their power. Let’s go back to the entertainment industry and how they’ve abused IP laws over the years to make a dime every which way they can:

You can clearly tell the effect of Big Hollyweird lobbyists on the net worth of entertainers. Elvis was once at the top of the world. At his death, his net worth was $7 million (1977 dollars) which is anywhere from 18-25 million in 2010 dollars. (see inflation calculator: http://www.westegg.com/inflation/)

Now compare that to Katy Perry. She’s a top artist of today, but she’s not as popular today as Elvis was in his time. Her current net worth after about 5 years being mainstream (and the entire time during a recession) is $55 million.

Someone like Snoop Dogg with 20 years of fame may be a better comparison. His net worth is $150 million.

I’m not trying to single out Snoop as greedy or anything, he’s had a lot of time to invest. And of course there are exogenous factors like a more globalized economy. Powerful emerging economies of like Russia, Brazil, South Korea and Taiwan wouldn’t have been able to access American entertainment with such ease and in such high quotas prior to the fall of the Soviet empire and the advent of internet music. But that can’t possibly be the only cause of so much more wealth among musicians (not to mention actors, directors, crew, writers, etc) today. I’m trying to point out that Hollywood corporatism has amassed what is a disproportionate and most-likely unfair amount of money for entertainers. Why do you think they have lobbied so hard for SOPA and PIPA? They are trying to milk us for every dime they can.

In a true free market, they wouldn’t make half the money they do. File sharing like Limewire would still exist without limits on their content. Youtube would stream content. Nobody could do anything about it unless the person sharing or streaming was making money off of the “stolen” content (like those bootleg DVDs from China). You wouldn’t be put in prison for playing a pop music song in a home movie uploaded to Youtube…a song that pretty much everyone has heard because we live in the internet age. File sharing of songs obviously occurred because the market did not demand the music enough to pay large amounts of money for it. iTunes came along with a la carte music purchasing and over time, people would switch to one of the two as opposed to buying CDs. Did this really make entertainers poorer? NO! They got richer! And so did the film industry! In 2010, in a weak economy, Hollywood execs raked in more money than they did in 2007 when the economy was strong; right before the recession began its onslaught on our jobs and investments.

It’s also been very interesting to watch America’s unity against SOPA. This is going hard! Liberals, conservatives, moderates, libertarians; all coming out against Big Hollyweird. I love it! Al Gore and Ron Paul agreeing on something? I don’t think America has ever been more united on something in my lifetime other than killing Osama bin Laden. (Now, try to imagine the blowback of a hypothetical Santorum Administration shutting down the porn industry )

As for Nancy Pelosi and even some of my fellow Republicans that have come out against this in recent hours….I mean days….it’s clearly to save their own skin. Let’s take a good hard look at the people who wrote the bill and pushed it for so long. Make sure to be unforgiving at the polls (Lamar Smith, look out!)

I do want to say one more thing. It’s amazing what 24 hours without Wikipedia can do. They and the folks at Reddit shut down to get people’s attention. It WORKED! This is an example of what will happen if we continue this move toward socialism and continue to raise taxes and regulations on the entrepreneurial class. One day, they will say “enough!” and quit investing and creating jobs. When that happens, this recession we recently had will look like a boom by comparison. Wikipedia can just go back online tomorrow. Economies….not so much. I am confident that the House will strike down SOPA. Call your senators, and make sure that their equivalent–the Protect IP Act–is killed as well!

In Liberty,

Aaron Alghawi ’12

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Aaron Alghawi is a senior economics major at Texas A&M University, as well as an alternate board member and Director of Student Outreach for the Republican Liberty Caucus.

Once president Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) it appears that word went out to all of the Senators and Representatives who voted for it that the bill was fixed and they should write their constituents reassuring them that it the bill no longer authorized the indefinite detention of US citizens inside our borders by the military on presidential order and without due process of law.

So the reassuring emails were sent to all the constituents who had lobbied against the passage of the bill with the military detention provisions included, and a lot of them were pacified by these earnest statements from legislators who likely either did not read or did not understand the totality of the NDAA as it was finally passed. They were convinced that the addition of the statements “Nothing in this section shall be construed to affect existing law or authorities relating to the detention of United States citizens” (1021.e) and “The requirement to detain a person in military custody under this section does not extend to citizens of the United States” (1022.b.1) actually fixed the problems with the bill.

What they failed to understand is that the first statement is meaningless because the authors of the bill and the president believe that they already had the power to detain civilians in military custody without due process even before this bill was passed, and that the second statement still uses the term “requirement” which means that while military detention of US citizens is not required in all cases as it is with foreign citizens, it is still an option if ordered by the president. The new wording may be less egregious, but the fundamental problem of military detention remains an issue.

All they had to do to actually fix this bill was change the phrase “not required” in the original language to “prohibited” when referring to the military detention of US citizens and all of the complaints would have been satisfied. That they did not do this when every expert had told them it was the simple and obvious solution and that they instead engaged in misdirection and false assurances, demonstrates a cynical attitude towards the intelligence of the outraged public which had been loudly lobbying against this aspect of the NDAA.

While reassuring letters from Congressmen may have won over some former opponents, they are not fooling civil liberties lawyers who have actually read the bill and looked at the final wording in context. You don’t have to take my word for the persistence of military detention in the legislation because plenty of legal experts are speaking out against it. Sadly they don’t have the platform or authority of a letter from your trustworthy hometown Congressman.

On Justia.com Professor Joanne Mariner, director of the Hunter College Human Rights Program and formerly with Human Rights Watch, writes of the NDAA:

“Notably, section 1022(b)(1) does not exempt American citizens from the more important provisions in section 1021, which allow the military detention of broad categories of terrorist suspects. It does not, therefore, improve on the status quo by extending any new protections to Americans.

“Moreover, the specific exemption for American citizens in section 1022 could be understood as suggesting, by negative implication, that American citizens are covered by section 1021. Potentially reinforcing this view is the fact that an effort to amend section 1021 to exempt citizens failed in the Senate. If, in the future, judges decide to refer to the statute’s legislative history to help ascertain its scope, the lack of such an exemption may be determinative.”

And she dismisses the supposed promise of protection for US citizens from changes in the law, writing:

“the provision’s reference to “existing law” begs far too many questions. It is precisely the scope of existing law that is subject to vociferous debate and continuing litigation. Under the Bush administration, the law was interpreted to allow the indefinite detention of both citizens and non-citizens arrested anywhere in the world, including the United States.”

Benjamin Wittes, who is a senior fellow in Governance Studies at The Brookings Institution and co-director of the Harvard Law School-Brookings Project on Law and Security, writes in his FAQ explaining the NDAA that our rights were already essentially gone in practice and that the NDAA just formalizes this situation:

“The NDAA is really a codification in statute of the existing authority the administration claims. It puts Congress’s stamp of approval behind that claim for the first time, and that’s no small thing. But it does not–notwithstanding the widespread belief to the contrary–expand it. Nobody who is not subject to detention today will become so when the NDAA goes into effect.”

Although he does write off most of the concerns with the NDAA as being based on its ambiguities and ultimately left up to determinations by the courts, he also raises the additional concern that “the NDAA could theoretically be said to expand detention authority involves people held on the basis not of membership in an enemy group but mere support for one,” validating the concern that the applicability of military detention could be expanded to include people with no direct involvement in any terrorist activity.

In its press release on the signing of the bill, the ACLU is much more definitive about its concerns, quoting ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero:

““The statute is particularly dangerous because it has no temporal or geographic limitations, and can be used by this and future presidents to militarily detain people captured far from any battlefield.”

And stating that:

“Under the Bush administration, similar claims of worldwide detention authority were used to hold even a U.S. citizen detained on U.S. soil in military custody, and many in Congress now assert that the NDAA should be used in the same way again.”

What is clear from reading all of this analysis of the bill is that although the final revision successfully muddied the waters, it did not fix the basic concerns with military detention of US citizens. That the government believed they already had the power before the passage of the NDAA does not excuse the authors of the bill from responsibility for formally codifying this practice. What is also quite clear is that the reassuring letters from Congressmen are widely off-base, as nothing in the NDAA does anything to protect the rights of citizens.

It does to some degree reframe the debate, however. The argument is now much more basic, between those who believe that the NDAA should have been used as an opportunity to prohibit military detention and protect the rights of citizens, and those – like most members of Congress – who seem perfectly comfortable with giving the president the power to suspend foundational legal principles like Posse Comitatus and Habeas Corpus when even a hint of association with terrorism is involved.

This article appeared in slightly different form on Blogcritics Magazine.

Senate has Final Chance to Vote Down NDAA and Block Military DetentionThe final version of the National Defense Authorization Act has passed the House and will be voted on in the Senate on Thursday. Despite tens of thousands of emails and calls the wording in the bill which would allow indefinite military detention of US citizens has not been changed substantially.  The offending sections have been renumbered to cause confusion. They are now sections 1021 and 1022  (You can read the conference report in this PDF), and although there are slight changes in the language it still allows for military detention of civilians at the discretion of the President.

The only remaining way to block this unprecedented attack on our civil liberties and to preserve our Constitutionally guaranteed rights is to vote down the entire bill on the Senate floor and send it back to committee for revision.

Representative Justin Amash (RLC-MI) was surprisingly successful marshalling Republican opposition in the House but there just weren’t enough votes.  He wrote of our efforts:

“For those of you who don’t believe that your calls and e-mails to Members of Congress work, let me assure you that they do. Members “freak out” when they receive more than half a dozen calls on any issue.”

“Thanks to our efforts, several Members of Congress are reconsidering their support for the NDAA provisions that permit the indefinite detention of Americans without charge or trial. They have approached me on the House floor to let me know. Please keep up your efforts.”

Law enforcement, national security agencies and the military itself all oppose this aspect of the NDAA. Like most Americans we believe in a strong and effective national defense and the unqualified support of our troops, but that does not mean we should sacrifice our most basic legal protections under the Constitution in our pursuit of the War on Terror. We certainly shouldn’t make our own troops the enemies of our people in the service of a government which has forgotten the principles on which our nation was founded. If we give up everything which makes America a great nation in pursuit of a tiny bit of additional safety then the terrorists have won.

Please help support our work to bring our government under control and restore our liberties by donating using the PayPal link below. You can also join the RLCto become part of our network of member-activists.

You may think that this sort of insane legislation which totally undermines our Constitutionally protected rights can’t be real. You may find it hard to believe that most Republicans are supporting it. You may not think this could happen in your America. Yet this outrage is entirely real and our only hope is to demand that our elected representatives listen to our concerns and stand up for liberty by voting down the NDAA and resubmitting it without these provisions.

It is very unlikely that President Obama will veto this bill and we cannot rely on his judgement on this important issue. Even if you previously wrote in during our efforts to stop the bill in the Senate and during Reconciliation, please take this opportunity to write your Senators using the form below to ask them to vote down the final version of the NDAA and get to work fixing it and protecting our liberty. We encourage you to customize the text to express your personal concern and outrage.

If you prefer to call your Senators on Monday, use our tool to get their phone numbers.

Liberty Republicans Stand Against Military Detention

National media outlets join legislators in ignoring the pleas

of a people crying out for the preservation of their rights

 

This letter was sent over the weekend by New Hampshire State Representative (and state RLC Secretary) Andrew Manuse to his representatives in Congress. It sums up very effectively what many in the Republican party feel about the failure of our elected leaders on the issue of indefinite military detention in the National Defense Authorization Act. We can hope that even if they don’t listen to the thousands of grassroots Republicans who are calling and writing them they might listen to our compatriots like Rep. Manuse, Rep. Justin Amash and many others who hold elective office.

Dear Sens. Ayotte and Shaheen and Rep. Guinta:

I understand how form e-mails to representatives and senators are not taken seriously, because they indicate a lack of effort on the part of a constituent to even read into an issue and think about it on his or her own. I typically give such e-mails less attention when I receive them, so I wanted to make sure to type an original message to you before the form letter text, which is below my first signature. This letter is being sent to Sens. Ayotte and Shaheen as well as Rep. Guinta, as a grievance against the federal government and the Congress, as written by a state representative for his constituents.

I’m sure you know by now that I am disappointed with the direction of our Congress, particularly the House (I expect the wrong direction from a Senate controlled by Sen. Reid). To be clear, I am opposed to what all three of you are doing in Washington for the most part, with a few minor exceptions. I am also certain that the American people and the people of New Hampshire share my views. We expected more from you. I understand your job is to use your own judgment and not bend to the whim of a handful of constituents, like me; however, I would hope that you would at least take my grievance against you into deep consideration.

Specifically, I would expect each of you as my representative and senators from New Hampshire, a state that treasures the Live Free or Die attitude of our founders, to make a lot more noise against the usurpation of authority in the several bills that have come before you this session, particularly sections 1031 and 1032 of the National Defense Authorization Act of 2011. Your leadership has been quite unsatisfactory, to say the least, on this matter.

Besides the Patriot Act reauthorization bill, no bill would be more damaging to our way of life and liberties as Americans than sections 1031 and 1032 of the National Defense Authorization Act as adopted in the Senate. If this bill passes and the federal government acts to indefinitely detain a U.S. citizen without allowing that citizen to face his or her accusers and without allowing that citizen to be judged by a jury of his or her peers–inalienable rights under our Constitution–this government will be in breech of contract and I fear it will no longer have the consent of the governed, if it hasn’t lost that consent already. I do not want to think about what might come next, but I can tell you definitively that I very much want to avoid it. I have a wife and children, currently, and we just want to live at peace, without the government interfering in our lives. I know many of my constituents share this view.

To avoid the end to the path we’re currently on, I am pleading with you to fight against these two provisions, sections 1031 and 1032 of the National Defense Authorization Act as adopted in the Senate, with every ounce of energy that you have. This may just be the last shot we have at restoring a sense of honor to the Congress and our federal government.

The U.S. government was created to protect the life, liberty and property of all citizens, equally under the law. Yet, with laws like the Patriot Act and the provisions within the National Defense Authorization Act, we now have a government that is making war with the very citizens it was formed to protect. We have a government that is making it impossible for citizens to be lawful, and thus, they will become increasingly lawless and I fear even greater conflict between the government and the citizens, who are the rulers of themselves, will result. Such anarchy was what our government was created to prevent. But when the government passes laws that are unconscionable, let alone unenforceable under the Constitution, it leaves the citizens with no other avenue than anarchy. This would be an anarchy created by the government, and it is an anarchy that I do not want to live under, let alone subject my family to live under. What else would be the result than a government crackdown against its own citizens, even more horrific than the one perpetrated in these provisions. What kind of nation would we be?

I am asking you, no pleading with you, to heed my words and please, respect the rule of law and the constitution. Please do everything within your power to remove sections 1031 and 1032 of the National Defense Authorization Act (Senate version) during the reconciliation process. Our Republic is standing on such tenuous ground right now. We cannot afford anything else like these provisions that will weaken the Republic further, and put the very spirit of lawlessness, within our law.

Sincerely,
Rep. Andrew J. Manuse, R-Derry

Efforts to Stop Unconstitutional Elements of Defense Bill Now Focus on Reconcilliation Process

Last week we were part of an epic struggle led by Senator Rand Paul (RLC-KY) to block the inclusion of language in the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) which would make it legal for US Military forces to operate inside the US in violation of Posse Comitatus and arrest US civilians and hold them in military detention without charges for an indefinite period of time in violation of the right of Habeas Corpus, a fundamental legal protection under the Bill of Rights. Granting these extraordinary powers to the military is obviously unconstitutional and is opposed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and other law enforcement agencies.

Efforts to remove indefinite military detention from the NDAA were blocked by establishment leaders from both parties in the Senate, though Senator Paul did lead a last minute effort to successfully defeat an unexpected additional amendment which would have given the government even more extensive powers to arrest and hold citizens without charges.

The original offending sections (1031 and 1032) are still in the bill and contrary to the claims of supporters of the bill, the wording of section 1032 does not, in fact, provide protection for US citizens. The use of the phrase “not required” instead of “prohibited” leaves the decision to allow the military to detain citizens entirely in the hands of federal authorities.

The only remaining opportunity to have these sections removed from the bill will be during the coming week in the reconcilliation process where members of both houses negotiate a final version of the bill. During this process all members of Congress can make recommendations for changes or adjustments in the language and if there is enough outcry it’s possible that the joint committee will do the right thing.

This will be our last chance to fix the bill and protect our liberties short of hoping for an increasingly unlikely veto from President Obama. Even if you previously wrote in during our effort to stop the bill in the Senate, please take this opportunity to write both your Represenative and Senators using the form below to ask them to speak up against the inclusion of indefinite military detention in the bill. We encourage you to customize the text to express your personal concern and outrage.

UPDATE: Unamended Bill Headed for Reconciliation
12/1/11 – As you may have seen in the news the Udall Amendment was defeated yesterday, mostly along partisan lines, though there was some commentary from the opposition about the unusual level of constituent email supporting the amendment. They noticed, but unsurprisingly they did not listen to the people. The Feinstein Amendment which was a last ditch effort to fix the language in the bill also failed today. The fight isn’t over. It’s still worth contacting both your Congressman and Senators to encourage them to support the removal of sections 1031 and 1032 in the reconciliation process. This is our last chance to fix the bill and protect our liberties short of hoping for a veto from President Obama. The letter-writing tool below has been modified to reflect the current situation. Even if you sent an email before it’s worth sending another now.

UPDATE: Another Chance to Prevent Indefinite Military Detention

12/1/11 – Although the Paul and Udall Amendments failed yesterday, we have another chance to get indefinite military detention out of the UDAA. Two Amendments from Senator Diane Feinstein (D-CA) are still pending and will be voted on at 5pm today. They will edit the language of sections 1031 and 1032 to remove the possibility of indefinite military detention. They are a reasonable alternative to the Paul and Udall Amendments and Senators Paul, Udall and Mike Lee will be supporting them along with a growing coalition of other Senators. They are only a handful of votes short of passing these amendments, so if we could win over a few more Republican votes that might make all the difference. At the end of this article is an expanded list of Senators who you could call today before 2pm EST and encourage to vote for the Feinstein Amendments. Please take a few minutes to make the calls. It’s also still useful to email your Senators, especially if they are on the target list.

Here is video from Tuesday’s Senate debate where Sen. Ran Paul asks Sen. John McCain directly about the detention issue and gets a non-answer, with a craven appeal to public opinion, which amounts to an admission that McCain intended the bill to provide for military detention of civilians

UPDATE: Delay of Senate Debate on Defense Bill Offers More Time for Action

11/29/11 – Although this bill was scheduled for a vote on Monday, deliberations were put off until today, so you still have time to contact your Senators. Additional info for calling key Senators is included bwlow. In addition, Senator Paul will be speaking about the bill at 10:55 EST on the floor of the Senate. You can watch the speech on CSPAN2 if their schedule is correct. It can also be watched online.

If the new Defense Authorization bill passes then the military will be able to arrest US Citizens within the United States and hold them indefinitely without charge or trial in military prisons or try them before military tribunals without the protections guaranteed in the Bill of Rights.

Take Action to Stop Indefinite Military Detention of US Citizens

With very little notice and a vote which may come as early as TODAY (Monday) the U.S. Senate will vote on the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012 (NDAA) which was written and passed through committee in secret. It includes two sections which would change laws on military detention to authorize the military to imprison almost anyone without due process of law or any respect for their civil liberties, including Americans in foreign countries and those living in the United States. Those detained by the military under this law could be held indefinitely without charge or trial and they could end up in military courts instead of civilian courts.

The NDAA is almost certain to pass with strong bipartisan support. We don’t have the votes to stop it, though some RLC endorsees like Sen. Rand Paul oppose many sections of the bill.  It is likely that it will hit the Senate floor in the next few days with the backing of powerful Republicans like John McCain, who authored this unconstitutional expansion of military authority, who will be pushing to pass it without revision.

You may think that this sort of insane legislation which totally undermines our Constitutionally protected rights can’t be real. You may find it hard to believe that most Republicans are supporting it. You may not think this could happen in your America. Yet this outrage is entirely real.

I urge you to read the contents of S.1867 (PDF), particularly sections 1031 and 1032, and see for yourself

While the RLC also objects to other aspects of this bill, we probably can’t stop the bill from passing, but there is at least a way to oppose these particularly horrendous provisions and get them removed from the bill. Senator Rand Paul has offered an amendment (#1067) to strike the two sections from the bill and Senator Mark Udall has put out a similar amendment (#1107). The Senate needs to pass one of these amendments and protect our rights.

Please urge your Senators to protect our rights and the Constitution and oppose sections 1031 and 1032 of the Defense Authorization bill by voting for the Udall Amendment. Act now. The vote may come as early as Monday.

You can do this by using the form below to send them an email today.  We encourage you to customize the text to express your personal concern and outrage.

In addition, there are several Senators who we believe ought to be targeted for direct phonecalls from voters nationwide because they are likely swing votes. Please take time to call them at the numbers below. Just say that you’d like them to oppose military detention in sections 1031 and 1032 of the defense bill.

Pat Toomey (RLC-PA) – (202) 224-4254
Jim DeMint (RLC-SC) – (202) 224-6121
Ron Johnson (R-WI) – (202) 224-5323
Marco Rubio (R-FL) – (202) 224-3041
Olympia Snowe (R-ME) – (202) 224-5344
Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) – (202) 224-6665
Dean Heller (R-NV) – (202) 224-6244
Dick Lugar (R-IN) – (202) 224-4814

The views expressed here are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect official positions of the RLC.

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