In a post over at Protein Wisdom, entitled California Is Obama’s Tammany Hall, Darleen Click concluded that:
The foundation has been laid and Obama is not interested in the jobs or foreign policy or even being CinC. He is working to build a permanent one-party rule of the United States and enjoying the perks of being First Boss.
In the Comments section, I remarked:
-Before The Civil War: ‘The United States are….’
-After The Civil War: ‘The United States is….’
-In 2013 A.D.: ‘The United States was….’
Friend In The Ether McGehee responded:
-After The Civil War: ‘The United States is….’
I suspect the awkwardness of that construction is why the U.S. side in that war chose to call itself “the Union.” Even now you’re more likely to hear substitutes for a singular “United States,” as in “the U.S. is…” or “the USA is…”Even “America” serves to separate the concept of this country from the plurality implicit in its official name, even though it also evokes a more positive concept with highly patriotic associations, and is therefore one that I tend to favor…
Of course, those associations also create a connotation that transcends the government and diminishes it, at least in my mind, because it’s how Reagan used to refer to the people. And now, as Ken at Popehat has concluded, the government has declared the American people a hostile power.
My response [now expanded for this post]:
-I favor the original [‘The United States are….’] because it stresses that the Several States are, in a sense, the fourth branch of government, and we must return to that concept. The States act as, perhaps, the major restraints on the inevitable power grabbing actions of the national government — at least in the original order of things under The Constitution. In this Age Of Leftist Hegemony, the Several States have, for all intents or purposes, been reduced to being mere administrative departments of the national government. This has come about due to the Leftist belief that all power must be centralized and in the hands of their Elite — their Illuminated Ones.
However, the process of assimilation has not been completed as yet and so there is still reason to place one’s hope in the States. But the time is short and the Left, helped along by the Useful Idiots of the supposed Right and the Republican Party, will not give-up their quest to centralize all power in these United States.
Refugium inveniemus in provinciis [Find refuge in the provinces]
-I also, by the way, refuse to call the deliberately treasonous Party, the ‘Democrat’ Party. They are the ‘Democratic’ Party – believers in mob rule [aka: Democracy].
-Though he’s a Libertarian, Popehat is dead-on-balls-accurate in his observation of the Snowden charges.
From his post [emphasis mine]:
…Based on the plain language of the statute, it seems to require the government to prove that the defendant (1) knowingly and willfully [that
is, not accidentally] (2) communicated or made available to an unauthorized person, (3) in any manner prejudicial to the United States or for the benefit of any foreign government to the detriment of the United States, (4) classified information concerning communication intelligence activities of the U.S. or any foreign government. (Some might disagree that element (3) modifies all the possible ways to violate the statute.)Note that the second and third charges both require the feds to prove that Snowden’s release of information to the press was harmful to the United States. This puts our government in the position of attempting to prove that it is harmful to release accurate information about how it is spying on us, and how it is misleading us about spying on us.
Espionage charges usually describe someone with classified information leaking that information to powers hostile to the United States government.
We, the people, are those hostile powers.
Bravo to him for catching that [SIDENOTE: I agree with McGehee when he says: 'So, while I remain unconvinced that Snowden is a hero, that cannot possibly outweigh the villainous behavior of my country’s government'.]
As far as the national government is concerned, we are all Outlaws now.
As Chesty Puller said:
We’ve been looking for the enemy for some time now. We’ve finally found him. We’re surrounded. That simplifies things.
Let us act accordingly.
Resistentiam Tyrannis nunc.
Resistentiam Tyrannis saecula.
PROSCRIPTUS!
Resistance to Tyranny now.
Resistance to Tyranny forever.
OUTLAWS!
