Back When I Was Stationed Outside Selma

For John, BLUF:  Nothing to see here; just move along.

Here is a little tidbit from history:

Bull Connor was a member of the Democratic National Committee

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

A Progressive Reporter on NSA Spying

For John, BLUF:  I CAN handle the truth.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

Back when I lived in the Greater DC area and read The Washington Post faithfully, Mr Eugene Robinson was part of what I took to be the Modern Liberal Establishment in DC.  A long and respected columnist for the Wash Post, he provided a sense of what was going on.  On the 4th of July this year he wrote a column titled "We can handle the truth on NSA spying".  Here is the heart of his story:

I accept that the administration officials, Justice Department lawyers, federal judges, FBI agents and NSA analysts involved in the phone surveillance and other programs are acting in good faith.  The same is true of members of the House and Senate intelligence committees, who are supposed to be providing oversight.  But honorable intentions are not enough — especially when we know that much of what these honorable officials have told us is false.

The biggest lie of all? That the American people don’t even deserve to be told what their laws mean, much less how those laws are being used.

I see myself as being a patriot, but part of being a patriot is knowing when to say to my Government that it is wrong.  As that great American, Carl Schurz said:

My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right.

Thank you, Mr Robinson, for a great Independence Day Opinion Piece.

Regards  —  Cliff

"Print the Legend"

For John, BLUF:  Sometimes it is hard, but we have to keep digging for the facts.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

This blog doesn't generate much interest, in that it is not focused on local politics and personalities.  Again on City Life this AM the discussion was about Left in Lowell and Gerry Nutter's Lowell.  Dick Howe and I were left out.  Actually, that isn't all bad.  What is it Bill Taupier says, "Blogging is the most important thing unimportant people do."?  And, he is correct.  And that is why the freedom to blog is so important.  It represents a conversation amongst the unimportant people, the ones who collectively elect people to office and sustain them in office by their tacit support.♠  But, that isn't the focus of this blog post.

The focus of this blog post is the question of non-partisan opinion.  At a blog of the Federation of American Scientists is an article on the Congressional Research Service and the question of non-partisan research and support to the US Congress.  The title is "Behind the Scenes at the Congressional Research Service".  Already it doesn't sound good.

The article discusses a former CRS Director, Daniel Mulhollan, and two of his employees, retired AF Col. Morris Davis♥ and retired long term CRS analyst Richard F. Grimmett.  Both show that non-partisan does not mean finding some wimpy middle of the road position.  On the other hand, I believe it means learning how to disagree without being disagreeable.  There is a difference between believing someone is wrong on an issue and believing they are stupid, evil, corrupt or otherwise a person of no consequence.

Sergeant Joe Friday says it the best—"Just the facts, ma'am".♦

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Tacit support is what Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi lost on the streets of Cairo and other places, resulting in his being replaced by the Mamluks, the tradition Egyptian arbiters of Government.
♥  Like City Life's own George Anthes, Colonel Moe Davis was an Air Force lawyer, a JAG.  I believe Colonel Davis now teaches at Howard University.
♦  Well, it seems he never actually said that, but that is what millions of people think he said.  "This is the West, sir. When the legend becomes fact, print the legend".

Dressing Appropriately

For John, BLUF:  Dress for success.

Dressing appropriately seems to have become somewhat of a lost art.

Dapper District has this line...

... dressing respectfully for the occasion is more a matter of communicating that you have amply prepared for it ...

If you show up for a meeting with some government body or government bureaucrat, paying taxes or traffic tickets aside, or you are going to a bank (or credit union) and you have a nice shirt and a tie, you suggest that you are taking this seriously and you would appreciate it if others understood this, and reciprocated.  It works.  It doesn't mean that you have knuckled under to The Man.  It does suggest that you see yourself as a serious person and wish to be treated as such.

Regards  —  Cliff

The Revolution and Sabotage

For John, BLUF:  We did take the Revolution to the Motherland, back in 1776.

Thanks to a pointer by a friend, I went to the Blog Standing Well Back, which is about "IED and EOD Evolutions".♠  The most recent post was "An American terrorist in England".  This is an appropriate post for the 4th of July, in that it is about a saboteur for the American Colonies, in England, or as we might say today, a "terrorist".

One of the problems with the term terrorist is that one man's terrorist might be another man's patriot.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Improvised Explosive Device and Explosive Ordnance Disposal.

Everybody Does It Defense

For John, BLUF:  .  Nothing to see here; just move along.

Quoting from an article in The International Herald Tribune, which references an article in the major French daily, La Monde♠:

PARIS — Days after President François Hollande sternly told the United States to stop spying on its allies, Le Monde newspaper disclosed on Thursday that France has its own program of massive data collection, which sweeps up nearly all the data transmissions, including telephone calls, e-mails and social media activity, that come in and out of France.

Then this, about legality and control:

The system is run with “complete discretion, at the margins of legality and outside all serious control,” the newspaper said, describing it as “a-legal.”

That sounds like the situation with NSA, and given it is France, maybe worse.  This does play into President Obama's argument that everybody does it.  He made that point while in Dar es Salaam, earlier in the week.

When Governments begin to think they are the center, then they do strange things.  They sometimes even think they are doing it for the People.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  "Left-leaning Le Monde, self-proclaimed “newspaper of reference”, is the planet’s main French-language daily, with 35,000 copies distributed abroad."

In Snowden's Wake

For John, BLUF:  The President should fire the Director of National Intelligence.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

Lowell Blogger Kad Barma, in an Independence Day pronouncement, telling us about "The Spirit of '76" also talks about the US Director of National Intelligence.♠  The DNI, retired Air Force Lieutenant General James R Clapper is in a position created in the wake of 9/11, a position designed to ensure that in the future there would be no "intelligence failures" due to lack of cross-communication.♥  Creating the position was a mistake, in my humble opinion.  And, it is another waste of money in an ever-growing Federal Bureaucracy.

Kad, in his post, is pretty hard over on Mr Edward Snowden, infamous NSA leaker.  I am not sure that Mr Snowden so much revealed new secrets as forced those already known "secrets" to the front of our minds.

Where I agree with Kad is that Mr Clapper lied to the US Congress, and thus to us.  As Kad notes, Mr Clapper had the question ahead of time.  He could have designed a truthful answer or headed it off.  He did neither and instead tried to work around it, ending up lying to us.  This is no small matter.

Article I of the US Constitution is the Legislature.  The Executive is Article II.  Within Article I are the implied oversight powers of the US Congress.  One shouldn't lie to Congress, especially if the lie will be outed.  If that happens there will be bureaucratic consequences.

It would seem to me that one way the President can deal with this problem with (1) Mr Snowden, (2) Mr Clapper and (3) the gross violation of our Fourth Amendment Rights by the NSA (and the US Post Office), would be to accept Mr Clapper's resignation.  (One believes it is somewhere in a filing cabinet in the White House, or maybe in one of the drawers of the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office.  (Remember the movie National Treasure:  Book of Secrets?))

Kad sort of sums it up:

we suffer an administration unwilling to accept that it is a travesty of its stated goal of transparency, and a congress who seems, to a member, to be unable to stand and demand for us what is right.  our supreme court, able only to adjudicate cases that are brought to it, instead satisfies itself by insulting each other and pretending that private relationships between citizens are more important for their attention than our government's wholesale abnegation of its founding principles and documents against all obvious points to our law.

I think Kad is wrong in his blank condemnation of the US Congress, but probably generally correct.  There are brief glimpses of courage, a Denis Kucinich, a Ron Paul, and a few other mavericks.

Yes, it is time for the US Congress to stand up for our "Rights of Englishmen", no matter your ethnicity or nationality.  That is why were was a Revolution.  The British Crown was depriving us of our Rights as Englishmen.  Magna Carta and all that.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  This person is supposed to coordinate CIA, DIA, NSA, and 13 other members of the Intelligence Community (IC).
♥  You know, like thwarting the Boston Marathon Bombing earlier in the year.