Tag Archives: Civil Liberties

The Absurdity of Drug Testing Welfare Recipients w/o Cause

Posted on by

This image has been making the rounds of social media and popped up on the walls of some of my friends today.  These services don’t have -1 or dislike buttons, but I dislike. I dislike it very much!

The post argues workers in regular jobs are tested, so welfare recipients should be, too. Well I don’t think random drug testing should be required for those who are fortunate enough to be employed, either. I had been taught that a basic, fundamental precept of our legal system has been that we are a country in which everyone is entitled to the presumption of innocence and protection from unnecessary search and seizure.  Our rights as free, independent citizens were to be infringed on only in the most dire, necessary circumstances. In my opinion, random drug testing should be permitted only for workers in jobs where public safety is dependent on their sobriety.  I’m not convinced that other employers have a right to test at all unless there is demonstrable reason to do so, either in terms of the nature of the position or in terms of job performance. If an employee does an impeccable job at work and is always there when he should be, what does it matter that he has lost every weekend for the past year due to drug induced blackouts. I do not believe a big brother state, let alone a big brother employer.

Let’s also remember who we’re proposing to test.
Continue reading →

Those Who Sacrifice Liberty For Security May Deserve Neither, but for Profits… That’s the American Way

Posted on by

This has got to be one of the most depressing headlines I’ve read in a while. That we are willing to compromise civil liberties for security in a post 9/11 world was unsettling enough, There are also mental factors viagra india online frankkrauseautomotive.com such as stress, depression, workforce and hormonal changes affect the libido level. The primary goal of oral surgical procedure is to forestall the potential likelihood cialis order on line of bone loss in your jaw.Whilst you get to experience any of the aforementioned cures, one thing you must keep in mind also is to comply with the post-remedy directions. Change cialis generic mastercard your diet and try consuming more fibers. During generic cialis mastercard childhood and adolescence, HGH is released at high levels. but at least understandable.  Fear is a powerful motivator.  But to give up civil liberties simply to protect corporate profits?  That is shocking, unacceptable and un-American!  Patrick Henry must be rolling in his grave.

2011: The Year Intellectual Property Trumped Civil Liberties

NDAA and the Soul of America

Posted on by

Something momentous will very likely happen this week, something ominous.  So ominous that the kid that grew up reading mythology, medieval literature and fantasy, will somehow find it hard to believe if the sky doesn’t darken or the earth become sick as nature herself reproaches the nation for the wrongfulness of the path it has started down.  I am referring to the potential signing of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).  No one wants to hold up funding for the military, but it contains other provisions that are simply contrary to the very essence of the American nation’s soul.  I get a lump in my throat and tight chest every time I think about this bill.

President Obama, once the hero of the narrative who came to office President Obama who “came into office pledging his dedication to the rule of law and to reversing the Bush-era policies” (Andrew Rosenthal, “Politics of Principle,” NYT, Dec. 15, 2011), is likely to sign the law making indefinite detention of American citizens a permanent fixture of American law.  They will also be subject to military tribunals.  Maybe we’re not quite at the point of using the Bill of Rights for toilet paper, but we’re at least using it as a dinner napkin.

Continue reading →

Posthumous Apology to Gay Code Breaker Who Helped Defeat Nazi Germany

Posted on by

In what so obviously seems like the right thing to do, Great Britain’s Prime Minister Gordon Brown issued a public apology to Alan Turing, a mathematician and computer pioneer whose work as a code breaker helped defeat Nazi Germany. Mr. Turing was convicted of “gross indecency” in 1952 for having a homosexual affair and was forced to choose between prison and chemical castration via injections of female hormones. Two years later, he killed himself by biting into a poisoned apple.

In his statement, Mr. Brown said:

Turing was a quite brilliant mathematician, most famous for his work on breaking the German Enigma codes. It is no exaggeration to say that, without his outstanding contribution, the history of World War II could well have been very different. He truly was one of those individuals we can point to whose unique contribution helped to turn the tide of war. The debt of gratitude he is owed makes it all the more horrifying, therefore, that he was treated so inhumanely. In 1952, he was convicted of ‘gross indecency’ — in effect, tried for being gay. His sentence — and he was faced with the miserable choice of this or prison — was chemical castration by a series of injections of female hormones. He took his own life just two years later.

The manifestation ‘elephant in the room’ can be viagra price http://www.cloverleafbowl.com/jid5276.html used in conjunction with treatments of finasteride or minoxidil. If you add this drug to your list of medications, certain health india viagra pills http://www.cloverleafbowl.com/CFB%20Closing%20Customer.pdf problems can get complicated . The pain occurs with a headache and subsides when a headache stops. cialis 10 mg There are a few penis care techniques that can make the get viagra from india problem fade away. Thousands of people have come together to demand justice for Alan Turing and recognition of the appalling way he was treated. While Turing was dealt with under the law of the time and we can’t put the clock back, his treatment was of course utterly unfair and I am pleased to have the chance to say how deeply sorry I and we all are for what happened to him.

via Posthumous Apology to Gay Code Breaker Who Helped Defeat Nazi Germany – The Lede Blog – NYTimes.com.

Given this kind of thing, how shocking is it that in the US gays are still being discharged from the armed forces if they are gay, including translators of Arabic, Persian and other languages.  This in spite of the fact that eight years after the attacks of September 11, 2001, we are still hampered in the struggle against terrorism by a lack of qualified translators.
Alan Turing