Slaughter of Innocents in Iraq

Credit:  http://allenbwest.com/

If this picture does not tear you apart inside, then you are made of stone.  The events in Iraq are beyond my comprehension.  I feel that we should all be in constant prayer and mortification about the unspeakable evils that are occurring not only in Iraq, but in many other parts of the world.  I also hang my head in shame as an American, knowing that this is happening as a direct result of our invasion into Iraq.  Saddam Hussein was an evil man, but the evil that has erupted since we invaded and "liberated" that country makes Saddam look like a boy scout.  

I took the picture of this child from former Rep. Allen West's website.  In his article, which you can read HERE, Allen West unfortunately uses this horror to make a political statement, as can be seen in his title, "ISIS Is Beheading Children, and Obama Drops Two Bombs."  Yes, I agree Obama is a total incompetent who is in so far over his head that he can't see straight.  

But that is besides the point.  We could bomb Iraq into oblivion, but that is not going to stop the evil.  Is it just a coincidence that everywhere America goes, Christians are persecuted?  Our beloved land has become an evil country as we have turned our back on our Creator.  We no longer allow Him into "polite society."  We kill our own children in "legal abortions" at the rate of almost 1 million every year.  We want religion to be, at best, a private action, not interfering with our lives.  This is far more than politics.  This is a crisis of the spirit.

The answer to the evil that is happening in Iraq and around the world will not be found in politics. There is no human being who can make things right. The only answer is to go on our knees before Our Creator and beg His mercy and forgiveness for our sins.

Back in 2003, I remember St. John Paul II pleading with President George Bush not to go into Iraq. There is an interesting account of this written by Gerard O'Connell on a website called Kaldaya.net.  

On March 5, 2003 [interestingly, this was Ash Wednesday], Pope John Paul II sent the Italian Cardinal, Pio Laghi, to intervene with President George W. Bush and ask him not to invade Iraq and overthrow Saddam Hussein, but the US leader rejected the appeal claiming he was “convinced it was God’s will”.

A source close to the situation at that time, but who does not wish to be named because of the position he holds, has given me an account of what happened then based on what the cardinal told him in private.

He recalled how the Polish pope had already referred to this planned military intervention as an “adventure” and had warned that war would have serious consequences for both nations and the world. He said the pope chose Laghi for this delicate mission, because he was a friend of the Bush family and might have stood a better chance of being listened to.

The day before the scheduled meeting with the President, the cardinal was asked to meet with officials from the US State Department, as the President wanted to know the agenda of the meeting in advance. Cardinal Laghi was “interrogated” by the National Security Advisor, Condoleeza Rice, the source said; they spoke “with great clarity and great frankness”.

Condoleeza Rice was also present at the meeting next day when the cardinal met the President. So too were two other members of the National Security Council, as well as General Peter Pace, Vice-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Jim Nicholson, the US Ambassador to the Holy See, and Archbishop Gabriel Montalvo, the papal nuncio.

When the Cardinal arrived, the source said, he handed Pope John Paul II’s letter to the President, “who immediately put it on a side table without opening or reading it.”

The President then launched into an argument for war, the source added. He told the cardinal that he, the president, “was convinced it was God’s will”, and sought to convince the papal envoy that it was the right thing to do.

“After a few minutes of what the Cardinal termed ‘a sermon’ ”, the source said Laghi interrupted President Bush and said, “Mr. President, I came here in order to speak to you and to give you a message from the Holy Father and I would like you to listen to me.”

Cardinal Laghi told Bush that three things would happen if the United States went to war, the source recalled. First, it would cause many deaths and injuries on both sides. Secondly, it would result in civil war. And, thirdly, the United States might know how to get into a war, but it would have great difficulty getting out of one.

He told the president that with peace nothing is lost, but with war great turmoil would be created, especially in the Arab world.

He also told President Bush that “the most important issue” in the Middle East is the conflict between the Palestinians and the Israelis. That has to be dealt with if there is to be peace, the source stated.

As the forty-minute meeting came to a conclusion the President told Laghi, “We are not in agreement on Iraq but we are in agreement on other positions important to the Catholic Church and the Holy Father.”

According to the source, the Cardinal responded, “Yes, the values of promoting life and the family are very important, as they are based on the principles of natural law, human rights and the Gospel. But, Mr. President, I came here to ask you not to go to war, which is another value based on these same principles.”

Cardinal Laghi realized from this exchange that the President had already made up his mind, the source said. This was confirmed shortly afterwards by General Pace, as he accompanied the Cardinal to his car. He shook hands with the Cardinal and told him, “Your Eminence, don’t be afraid. We’ll do it quickly and we will do it in the best way.”

“Laghi knew his mission had failed, but he also realized that the Bush administration was very naïve about the consequences of war “, the source said

He recalled how the press corps was waiting outside the White House after the meeting to interview the cardinal, but administration officials did not allow him to speak to them at the White House. Arrangements to talk to the media had to be hastily made elsewhere.

The next day, March 4, when it was reported that the administration had blocked the Cardinal from speaking to the media at the White house, a person from the State Department called Laghi at the Nunciature in Washington and asked him to clarify with the media that he was not prohibited from giving an interview at the White House. Cardinal Laghi replied, “It is for you to make the clarification as you made the decision.”

Looking at this in hindsight, we can see the great wisdom of St. John Paul II. He had lived through the horror of World War II. He knew that war is never an answer. But President Bush refused to listen to him, and now evil has been unleashed upon the innocents. At the beginning of the Iraq war in 2003, there were 1.5 million Christians in Iraq. In 2013, that number had dropped to 450,000, the drop coming from those who fled the country and those who had been killed. And now the remaining Christians are faced with genocide while the world watches.

We live in the most serious of times. But there is a verse in the Bible that gives me hope: Romans 5:20 - "But where sin increased, grace increased all the more." As the world descends more and more into darkness, we who have been given the grace of forgiveness from Jesus Christ are obligated to rise up in prayerful intervention. We must throw ourselves into prayer as we never have before. The evil we see is going to get worse, and it will eventually come to our land, just as we saw on September 11, 2001. We must be willing to join with the Cross of Jesus Christ as we see exemplified by those in Iraq, Africa and other places of the world giving their lives for their faith.

Revelation 6:9-11:

When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained. They called out in a loud voice, “How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?” Then each of them was given a white robe, and they were told to wait a little longer, until the full number of their fellow servants, their brothers and sisters, were killed just as they had been.

Credit:  bishoysblog.com

The United States Government Declares Legal Right to Kill American Citizens

Credit:  afghancentral.blogspot.com

There was a very disturbing story in the news yesterday.  This is from nbcnews.com, written by Michael Isikoff:

A confidential Justice Department memo concludes that the U.S. government can order the killing of American citizens if they are believed to be “senior operational leaders” of al-Qaida or “an associated force” -- even if there is no intelligence indicating they are engaged in an active plot to attack the U.S.

This means that if the government decides you are a threat to the United States, then they can kill you even though they have no evidence and you have never been charged with any kind of crime.   And no, there will be no reading of your Miranda rights before they put a bullet in your head.

Mr. Isikoff quotes from the government memo:

“The condition that an operational leader present an ‘imminent’ threat of violent attack against the United States does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons and interests will take place in the immediate future,” the memo states.

Instead, it says, an “informed, high-level” official of the U.S. government may determine that the targeted American has been “recently” involved in “activities” posing a threat of a violent attack and “there is no evidence suggesting that he has renounced or abandoned such activities.” The memo does not define “recently” or “activities.”

“This is a chilling document,” said Jameel Jaffer, deputy legal director of the ACLU, which is suing to obtain administration memos about the targeted killing of Americans. “Basically, it argues that the government has the right to carry out the extrajudicial killing of an American citizen. … It recognizes some limits on the authority it sets out, but the limits are elastic and vaguely defined, and it’s easy to see how they could be manipulated.”

In particular, Jaffer said, the memo “redefines the word imminence in a way that deprives the word of its ordinary meaning.”

The 16-page memo, a copy of which was obtained by NBC News, provides new details about the legal reasoning behind one of the Obama administration’s most secretive and controversial polices: its dramatically increased use of drone strikes against al-Qaida suspects abroad, including those aimed at American citizens, such as the September 2011 strike in Yemen that killed alleged al-Qaida operatives Anwar al-Awlaki and Samir Khan. Both were U.S. citizens who had never been indicted by the U.S. government nor charged with any crimes.

Credit:  dancingczars.wordpress.com

This is not hypothetical. It has already occurred.  You may or may not remember when Anwar al-Awlaki, an American born citizen, was killed.  He had been declared a terrorist by the government and the media, but had not been officially charged, and there most certainly was no trial.

Yet, most people thought the government's murder of this American citizen was great news, including leading pundits like Bill O'Reilly, whose logo is "Looking Out For the Folks".  This is what O'Reilly wrote on September 30, 2011, which is very representative of what many Americans felt:

Anwar al-Awlaki has left the building. The 40-year-old American-born [my emphasis] Al Qaeda propaganda chief was killed in Yemen by a hellfire missile shot from a predator drone. . . . He was a vicious terrorist who got exactly what he deserved. . . . Today America rightfully celebrates another victory over vile terrorists who kill innocent human beings.

Huh? If this is "looking out for the folks" then, please, Bill, do me a favor and forget about looking out for me.  We don't give this kind of treatment to vicious killers like Charles Manson or Ted Bundy, and in fact, to do so would have violate their constitutional rights.  So why is it okay for the government to murder Anwar al-Awlaki, an American citizen?  And this is murder.  It cannot be referred to as capital punishment because there was no justice involved.  It was a simple act of the government wanting this man dead and following through with it.

And don't think that this will be confined to "Al Qaeda" terrorists.  If you are involved in anything that the government feels is against their policies, you could very well be targeted.  And this includes the pro life movement.  From Lifesitenews.com:

A study published by West Point's anti-terrorism center claims the “pro-life paradigm” is a motivating factor in domestic terrorism.

Dr. Arie Perliger, director of terrorism studies at West Point’s Combating Terrorism Center (CTC), makes the allegation in his report, “Challengers from the Sidelines: Understanding America’s Violent Far-Right.” The document – which references abortion 76 times in 146 pages – was issued in November but only reported last month.

Perliger writes that the “ideological principles of pro-life violence” include the beliefs that “the abortion industry” engages in “the systematic killing of innocent and pure human beings”; that “since every human being is created in the image of God, it is by definition a sin to end their lives”; and that “any violent acts to end their lives [of 'fetuses'] are immoral and should be prevented.”

The Lifesitenews article tells us that this is a continuing narrative of the Obama administration:

Such conflation of conservatives with racist terrorists has become a staple of Obama administration anti-terrorism reports.

An April 2009 DHS report entitled “Rightwing [sic.] Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment,” identified “groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration” and opposition to same-sex “marriage,” as “the most dangerous domestic terrorism threat in the United States.” The DHS later pulled the report.

Which group is the most consistent in dedication to single issues? No group has been or will continue to be more consistent than the Catholic Church.  There are individuals in the Church who deviate from  Church teaching, but the Church herself will always stand strong on the issues of life and on the defense of marriage.  We have to be blind not to see the handwriting on the wall.  The persecution has already begun with the HHS Mandate, and it will get much worse.

From the Lifesitenews article:

Constitutional expert John Whitehead of The Rutherford Institute has voiced concerns that the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) “would allow the military to show up at your door if you’re [deemed] a ‘potential terrorist,’ and put you in military detention” indefinitely, without charges.

Kids playing cops and robbers is
now a chargeable offense

As an example of how extreme and intolerant the government has become, we are seeing small children being arrested for bringing toy guns to school, and some just for pretending to shoot with their fingers:

10-Year-Old Boy Arrested, Charged For Bringing Toy Gun To School

Cops Called on 6-Year-Old With Toy Gun

Cops Charge 7-Year-Old for Bringing Toy Gun to Class

Boy, 6, suspended from Silver Spring school for pointing finger like a gun

Parents Furious After Boys Suspended For Using Fingers As Guns

If government officials have no problems with arresting small children for playing as children have always played, will they have any tolerance for Catholics who stand by their church's teachings in defiance of the government?  The National Defense Authorization Act, for those who don't know, allows the president to order the military to arrest and detain any American who is suspected of any kind of terrorism.  The Government can hold these American citizens indefinitely in an undisclosed location and never charge them or give them a trial.

If you are a pro life, pro family Christian, it is very possible that the United States Government could label you a terrorist and arrest and/or kill you with no accountability to anyone.  And you may very well have people like Bill O'Reilly cheering them on and turning the rest of America against you and "your type."

Our current government is led by a President who disdains everything that is Christian and supports all that is condemned by our Creator.  Barack Obama does not just support abortion, he loves abortion.  He is a great champion of embryonic stem cell research.  He is in full support of same sex marriage.  And he feels that anyone who does not agree with him is an intolerant bigot.

In the words of Our Lord:  "Remember the words I spoke to you: 'No servant is greater than his master.' If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also."  (John 15:20) .  But Our Savior also told us this:  "Don't be afraid of those who want to kill your body; they cannot touch your soul. Fear only God, who can destroy both soul and body in hell."  (Matt. 10:28).

We are headed for dark and evil days, and we must be prepared for them.

Credit:  sandrawangg.wordpress.com

American Freedom - Down The Toilet

During the past 10+ years, since the attacks of 9/11, we have seen our constitutional rights increasingly eroded.  First there was the Patriot Act, which took away our 4th Amendment right because the Act allows surveillance without probable cause.  We have warrantless surveillance, extended by Obama.  We have the TSA either groping or radiating us at the airports.  Here in New York City, we are told that we can have our bags searched at any time in the subway and there is nothing we can do about it.  We have cameras watching our every move. 

All of this is completely unconstitutional, and too many Americans, sadly, are accepting it because they are told it is the only way to be safe.  On December 31, 2011, Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act into law, which gives him and any future president the power to order the military to take any American into indefinite custody without a charge, trial or conviction. 

Now we have a new Executive Order signed by the President on March 16, 2012, which gives the government the ability to take anything and everything away from us. 

Let's face it, folks, we live in a de facto dictatorship, and it's only going to get worse. 

Here is an article describing the newest attack on our freedom.

New Obama Executive Order Seizes U.S. Infrastructure and Citizens for Military Preparedness

Brandon Turbeville

Activist Post

In a stunning move, on March 16, 2012, Barack Obama signed an Executive Order stating that the President and his specifically designated Secretaries now have the authority to commandeer all domestic U.S. resources including food and water. The EO also states that the President and his Secretaries have the authority to seize all transportation, energy, and infrastructure inside the United States as well as forcibly induct/draft American citizens into the military. The EO also contains a vague reference in regards to harnessing American citizens to fulfill “labor requirements” for the purposes of national defense.

Not only that, but the authority claimed inside the EO does not only apply to National Emergencies and times of war. It also applies in peacetime.

The National Defense Resources Preparedness Executive Order exploits the “authority” granted to the President in the Defense Production Act of 1950 in order to assert that virtually every means of human survival is now available for confiscation and control by the President via his and his Secretaries’ whim.

The unconstitutionality of the overwhelming majority of Executive Orders is well established, as well as the illegality of denying citizens their basic Constitutional and human rights, even in the event of a legitimate national emergency. Likewise, it should also be pointed out that, like Obama’s recent Libyan adventure and the foregone conclusion of a Syrian intervention, there is no mention of Congress beyond a minor role of keeping the allegedly co-equal branch of government informed on contextually meaningless developments.

As was mentioned above, the scope of the EO is virtually all-encompassing. For instance, in “Section 201 – Priorities and Allocations Authorities,” the EO explains that the authority for the actions described in the opening paragraph rests with the President but is now delegated to the various Secretaries of the U.S. Federal Government. The list of delegations and the responsibility of the Secretaries as provided in this section are as follows:

(1) the Secretary of Agriculture with respect to food resources, food resource facilities, livestock resources, veterinary resources, plant health resources, and the domestic distribution of farm equipment and commercial fertilizer;

(2) the Secretary of Energy with respect to all forms of energy;

(3) the Secretary of Health and Human Services with respect to health resources;

(4) the Secretary of Transportation with respect to all forms of civil transportation;

(5) the Secretary of Defense with respect to water resources; and

(6) the Secretary of Commerce with respect to all other materials, services, and facilities, including construction materials.

One need only to read the “Definitions” section of the EO in order to clearly see that terms such as “food resources” is an umbrella that includes literally every form of food and food-related product that could in any way be beneficial to human survival.

That being said, “Section 601 – Secretary of Labor” delegates special responsibilities to the Secretary of Labor as it involves not just materials citizens will need for survival, but the actual citizens themselves.

Obviously, the ability of the U.S. government to induct and draft citizens into the military against their will is, although a clear violation of their rights, not an issue considered shocking by its nature of having been invoked so many times in the past. Logically, this “authority” is provided for in this section.

However, what may be shocking is the fact that Section 601 also provides for the mobilization of “labor” for purposes of the national defense. Although some subsections read that evaluations are to be made regarding the “effect and demand of labor utilization,” the implication is that “labor” (meaning American workers) will be considered yet one more resource to be seized for the purposes of “national defense.” The EO reads,

Sec. 601. Secretary of Labor. (a) The Secretary of Labor, in coordination with the Secretary of Defense and the heads of other agencies, as deemed appropriate by the Secretary of Labor, shall:

(1) collect and maintain data necessary to make a continuing appraisal of the Nation's workforce needs for purposes of national defense;

(2) upon request by the Director of Selective Service, and in coordination with the Secretary of Defense, assist the Director of Selective Service in development of policies regulating the induction and deferment of persons for duty in the armed services;

Notice that the language of the EO does not state “in the event of a national emergency.” Instead, we are given the term “purposes of national defense.” This is because the “authorities” assumed by the President have been assumed not just for arbitrary declarations of “national emergency” but for peacetime as well. Indeed, the EO states this much directly when it says,

The head of each agency engaged in procurement for the national defense is delegated the authority of the President under section 107(b)(1) of the Act, 50 U.S.C. App. 2077(b)(1), to take appropriate action to ensure that critical components, critical technology items, essential materials, and industrial resources are available from reliable sources when needed to meet defense requirements during peacetime, graduated mobilization, and national emergency.

Presidential Executive Orders have long been used illegally by Presidents of every political shade and have often been used destroy the rights of American citizens. Although history has often come to judge these orders as both immoral and unconstitutional, the fact is that the victims of the orders suffered no less because of the retroactive judgment of their progeny. It is for this reason that we must immediately condemn and resist such obvious usurpation as is currently being attempted by the U.S. government.

Nevertheless, some have no doubt begun to wonder why the President has signed such an order. Not only that, but why did he sign the order now? Is it because of the looming war with Iran or the Third World War that will likely result from such a conflict? Is it because of the ticking time bomb called the economy that is only one jittery move or trade deal away from total disintegration? Is it because of a growing sense of hatred of their government amongst the general public? Is there a coming natural disaster of which we are unaware? Are there plans for martial law?

Whatever the reason for the recent announcement of Obama’s new Executive Order, there is one thing we do know for sure - “It wouldn’t happen here” has been the swan song of almost every victim of democide in modern human history.

I actually lay all the blame for the disintegration of the United States and all of the other horrors that are happening in the world at the feet of the Catholic Church.  Why?  Because we have not done our duty as the ark of salvation.  We have been given the Keys to the Kingdom, and instead of sharing it with the world, we've just tried to blend in with everyone else and hide what we are - the one true Church founded by Jesus Christ.

And certainly the most obvious act of disobedience of the Church is not to consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in 1960 when she asked us to do so.  Everything that has happened in the church and the world since then is a direct consequence of that disobedient act.  And leaders in the Catholic Church must answer for all of the horror and evil that has ensued and is still to come.

Where America Goes, Persecution Follows (For Christians)

I have previously posted about the fate of Christians whenever Americans invade or "help liberate" a country.  Almost without fail, Christians are persecuted, driven out and/or killed.  Is it a coincidence?  It seems almost impossible for this to be true given the number of times it has happened in recent history. 

Just this past weekend, the New York Times had an article dealing with the fate of Christians in Iraq.  This was probably the oldest existing community of Christians anywhere in the world, dating back to the time of the Apostles.  They even still speak Aramaic, the same language spoken by Jesus and the Apostles.  These Christians survived thousands of years under many different conditions, and thrived even under Saddam Hussein, whom we were told was the most evil man in the world. 

But then the Americans invaded and "liberated" Iraq, and now the Iraqi Christians are being systematically destroyed. 

Exodus From North Signals Iraqi Christians’ Slow Decline

TENNA, Iraq — Iraq’s dwindling Christians, driven from their homes by attacks and intimidation [which did not happen until the Americans invaded], are beginning to abandon the havens they had found in the country’s north, discouraged by unemployment and a creeping fear that the violence they had fled was catching up to them.

Their quiet exodus to Turkey, Jordan, Europe and the United States is the latest chapter of a seemingly inexorable decline that many religious leaders say tolls the twilight of Christianity in a land where city skylines have long been marked by both minarets and church steeples. Recent assessments say that Iraq’s Christian population has now fallen by more than half since the 2003 American invasion, and with the military’s departure, some Christians say they lost a protector of last resort.

Their flight is felt in places like the wind-scoured village of Tenna, which has sheltered dozens of Christian migrants over the past nine years. The families fleeing Baghdad’s death squads and bombings found safety here beneath the hulking mountains, but little else besides poverty, boredom and cold. Villagers estimate that half of the 50 or so Christian homes are now empty, their families abroad. Walid Shamoon, 42, wants to be the next to leave. He said he left Iraq’s capital in January 2011 after a confrontation with Shiite militia members set off a nightmare of escalating death threats and an attempt on his life. A brother had already been killed in a mortar attack six years earlier, so he said he quit his contract job with the Australian Embassy, giving up a $1,500 monthly salary, and came here.

These days, all he can think about is his application to emigrate to Arizona.

“This is not a life,” he said one recent afternoon, as a blizzard raced down from the mountains. “There is no improvement. There is no work.”

Many of the people now struggling in Iraq’s Kurdish north came in the wake of a suicide attack in Baghdad at Our Lady of Salvation Church in October 2010. It was the single worst assault on Iraq’s Christians since the war began, one that left 50 worshipers and 2 priests dead and that turned the church into a charnel house of scorched pews and shattered stained glass.

Christian families in Baghdad grabbed clothing, cash and a few other provisions and headed north for the Christian communities along the Nineveh plain and Kurdistan’s three provinces. They joined tens of thousands of other Christians from the capital, Mosul and other cities who traced similar arcs after earlier attacks and assassination campaigns.

“They traded everything for security,” said the Rev. Gabriel Tooma, who leads the Monastery of the Virgin Mary in the Christian town of Qosh, which took in dozens of families.

The Christians in northern Iraq make up a tiny fraction of Iraq’s legions of displaced people. In all, there are 1.3 million of them across the country, according to the most recent United Nations estimates. Many live in garbage dumps, shanty towns and squalor far worse than anything facing the Christian families in Kurdistan.

Still, Christians and other minorities were singled out in the years of sectarian cleansing that bifurcated a once-diverse Baghdad into pockets of Sunnis and Shiites. Estimates by the United States and international organizations say that Iraq’s prewar Christian population of 800,000 to 1.4 million now stands at less than 500,000.

“The consequence of this flight may be the end of Christianity in Iraq,” the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom wrote in its most recent annual report, summarizing the concerns of church leaders.

In January, the International Organization for Migration found that 850 of 1,350 displaced Christian families it was tracking in northern Iraq had left in the past year. Many cited fears about security as well as the strains of finding work, housing and schools in an unfamiliar place where they had few connections and spoke only Arabic, and not Kurdish.

“No one has done anything for us,” said Salim Yono Auffee, a member of the Chaldean/Assyrian Popular Council, a Christian group in northern Iraq. “These people are trying to figure out how to build their futures, to find homes, to get married. And they are leaving Iraq.” [The "no one" mentioned here includes the United States, which has done nothing to help the persecuted Christians.]

Even in the relative safety of Kurdistan, some Christians say they still live in apprehension. A kidnapping of a Christian businessman in Erbil, the Kurdish capital, and a recent outbreak of riots and arson attacks against Christian-owned liquor stores in Dohuk Province — the northernmost in Iraq, along the Turkish border — have deeply unsettled Christian migrants to the area.

Seven years ago, after retrieving his son from kidnappers, Salam Meti Abdul Karim moved his family from Mosul to the small Christian community of Shioz, a half-hour’s drive from the center of Dohuk Province. The years passed quietly, until one night in December, when a pickup truck full of men pulled up at the edge of town and set fire to a liquor warehouse.

“I felt like history was repeating itself,” Mr. Abdul Karim said. “We worry the situation is just going to devolve into violence. I was thinking to just take my family and go up to the mountains.”

The village hired armed guards after the attack, Mr. Abdul Karim said.

No Christians were killed in the riots against Christian store owners. Local officials say they were not specifically targeted because of their religion, but because the mobs who burned their stores — and the conservative clerics who had incited them — viewed the alcohol sales as un-Islamic.

Still, Kurdish officials, who have welcomed Christians to the region, rushed to defuse fears conjured by the clash. Massoud Barzani, the Kurdish president, visited Christians in Zakho, the city where the riots were centered, and a parade of government officials and religious leaders emphasized Kurdistan’s historical tolerance, and its deep ties to Assyrians, Chaldeans and other branches of Christianity.

“They are part of us,” said Fadil Omar, the head of the provincial council in Dohuk.

The Kurdish government has offered land, free fuel and other assistance to Christians as they have arrived from Baghdad, and it has opened its universities to students from Mosul, officials say. And Christians do not lack a political voice. They sit on local and provincial councils throughout the north, and hold seats in Parliament in Kurdistan and Baghdad.

Despite the help, many families say they are straining to stay afloat. Those close to cities have found jobs, but those in villages are largely unemployed, and they subsist on government pensions or relief payments of about $200 per month. They skip meals and share heating fuel. They are often miles from schools that teach in Arabic, and some parents say their children have dropped out.

The mountain village of Dawudiyah is a study in trade-offs, a place whose residents share similar stories of fear and flight from their homes in Baghdad. One man was threatened with death if he did not hand over his daughter to militants. A couple’s son was killed on his way home from work. Another family’s son was gunned down with three friends. They gave little thought to the consequences of leaving. They just had to get out.

“It was unbearable,” said Berkho Odeesho, the village’s mayor. “We found safety in Kurdistan, but things are getting unstable. We don’t know where to go.”

But like others here, Mr. Odeesho has a plan. He has applied for an immigration visa, and he is now busy preparing for his consular interview. Uprooting his family from Iraq may be difficult, he said, but it would be in service of a new future, away from Iraq, in a distant place called Illinois [where the Obama Administration is working hard to destroy the Church].

Tucker Carlson: Iran Deserves To Be Annihilated

The headlines in the news almost every day is about how evil Iran is, how they wish to "wipe Israel off the map", that they they are building a nuclear weapon, which we have been told for years could be launched at any moment.  The media and the government are telling us that Iran is the most evil regime in the world. 

Now conservative pundit Tucker Carlson tell us that Iran "deserves to be annihilated."  Wait a second!  Aren't we the ones condemning Iran because they want to destroy Israel, but yet we have the right to say Iran should be destroyed? 





Ah, but we just misunderstood poor Tucker.  As he explains in the video below, he actually misrepresented his own views.   He was actually urging caution because annihilating Iran might damage our economy.  It might cause oil to rise in price if we start bombing them.  He was mostly against the Iraq war, you know.  So give this poor guy a break, as he says here.  He is all for war under certain circumstances, but we're not very good at foreseeing the consequences.  He says he is hardly a peacenik, but he is not necessarily for indiscriminately bombing people. 



Tucker Carlson is a respected pundit for the conservative movement in this country.  But if his evil statements don't outrage everyone who hears them, then we are in even more trouble than I thought.  My fear is that there are many people in this country who agree with Carlson.  We are not at all concerned about the impact of war on innocent people but about the effect it will have on our economy and the price of oil. 

My beloved United States, the land of my birth, has become an evil country.  There is just no other way of putting it.  We are threatening the whole world if they don't agree with us.  We have merely to accuse them of only potentially being against us, and that gives us the right to turn our war machine on them.  We have become a despotic nation, imposing our beliefs on the rest of the world.  God help any nation who dares to disagree with the United States.  And the Republican and Democratic parties are in total conformity with this. 

We have sown the seeds for our own destruction.

America, Land of the Free - Not So Much

Why is Ron Paul the only GOP presidential candidate who is speaking about this issue?  Are the others totally unaware of the National Defense Authorizaton Act, which allows the US Military to indefinitely detain anyone without a trial or even being officially charged, including American citizens, that the Government considers a threat?  Well, Ron Paul is speaking out about it, and we all need to hear what he has to say. 

 

 

Rep. Paul says defense bill assures ‘descent into totalitarianism’

By Jonathan Easley - 12/26/11 09:25 AM ET

GOP presidential candidate Ron Paul warned that the National Defense Authorization Act, which was passed by Congress this month, will accelerate the country’s “slip into tyranny” and virtually assures “our descent into totalitarianism.”  [Is anyone listening?]

“The founders wanted to set a high bar for the government to overcome in order to deprive an individual of life or liberty,” Paul, the libertarian congressman, said Monday in a weekly phone message to supporters. “To lower that bar is to endanger everyone. When the bar is low enough to include political enemies, our descent into totalitarianism is virtually assured. The Patriot Act, as bad as its violations against the Fourth Amendment was, was just one step down the slippery slope. The recently passed National Defense Authorization Act continues that slip into tyranny, and in fact, accelerates it significantly.”

The NDAA is the nearly $670 billion defense spending bill that covers the military budget and funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

One controversial provision mandates the detention of terror suspects and reaffirms the administration’s authority to detain those suspected of having ties to terrorist organizations.

“The Fifth Amendment is about much more than the right to remain silent in the face of government questioning,” Paul continued. “It contains very basic and very critical stipulations about the due process of law. The government cannot imprison a person for no reason and with no evidence presented and without access to legal council. The danger of the NDAA is its alarmingly vague, undefined criteria for who can be indefinitely detained by the U.S. government without trial.”

“It is no longer limited to members of Al Qaeda or the Taliban, but anyone accused of substantially supporting such groups or associated forces,” Paul continued. “How closely associated, and what constitutes substantial support? What if it was discovered that someone who committed a terrorist act was once involved with a charity? Or suppose a political candidate? Are all donors of that candidate or supporters of that candidate now suspects and subject to indefinite detainment? Is that charity now an associated force?”

The White House initially threatened to veto the NDAA because of the detainee language, saying it would tie the hands of law enforcement officials. But the administration dropped the veto threat before the bill passed the House, as the bill’s supporters argued that there were sufficient waivers.

“The president’s widely expanded view of his own authority to detain Americans indefinitely even on American soil is for the first time in this legislation codified in law,” Paul said. “That should chill all of us to our cores.”  [Sorry, Congressman Paul, but people are much more interested in American Idol than the fact that their freedoms are being taken away]

“The Bill of Rights has no exceptions for really bad people or terrorists or even non-citizens. It is a key check on government power against any person. That [the Bill of Rights] is not a weakness in our legal system, it is the very strength of our legal system. The NDAA attempts to justify abridging the Bill of Rights on the theory that rights are suspended in a time of war, and the entire United States is a battlefield in the war on terror. This is a very dangerous development, indeed. Beware.”

Military given go-ahead to detain US terrorist suspects without trial

This bill is finally starting to hit the mainstream media.  The article below is from The Guardian in Britain.  US media are claiming that the bill does not include Americans, but at least we are getting the truth from other countries.  Read it and weep.

Barack Obama has abandoned a commitment to veto a new security law that allows the military to indefinitely detain without trial American terrorism suspects arrested on US soil who could then be shipped to Guantánamo Bay.

Human rights groups accused the president of deserting his principles [what principles were those?]  and disregarding the long-established principle that the military is not used in domestic policing. The legislation has also been strongly criticised by libertarians on the right angered at the stripping of individual rights for the duration of "a war that appears to have no end".  [The War on Terrorism (or is that War of Terrorism) was never meant to have an end.  We don't even have a defined enemy, making all of us potential enemies]

The law, contained in the defence authorisation bill that funds the US military, effectively extends the battlefield in the "war on terror" to the US and applies the established principle that combatants in any war are subject to military detention.  [The United States has now become the battle ground, and we are all potential enemy combatants]

The legislation's supporters in Congress say it simply codifies existing practice, such as the indefinite detention of alleged terrorists at Guantánamo Bay. But the law's critics describe it as a draconian piece of legislation that extends the reach of detention without trial to include US citizens arrested in their own country.

National Defense Authorization Act - War of Terror Against the Citizens of the United States By the US Government

If you get your news mainly from the Mainstream Media, you probably did not hear one word about the National Defense Authorization Act, which was passed by the United States Senate on December 7, 2011 by a vote of 93-7.  The only senators who did not vote for this bill were Harkin, Thomas [D] of Iowa, Paul, Rand [R] of Kentucky, Coburn, Thomas [R] of Oklahoma, Merkley, Jeff [D] and Wyden, Ron [D], both of Oregon (maybe we should all move there), Lee, Mike [R] of Utah and Sanders, Bernard [I] of Vermont.  All of the other 93 senators have betrayed every one of their constituents. 

What is this bill about, you ask?  From The Hill's Congress Blog:

Last week, the Senate voted to pass a bill that would codify indefinite detention without trial in the United States, mandate military detention for terrorist suspects, and stop the transfer of even innocent detainees out of the Guantanamo Bay and Bagram military prisons.


If that sounds bad enough, just wait:  As we head into the holidays, the bill could get even worse. This week, the National Defense Authorization Act, or NDAA, goes to conference, where the House and the Senate will try to reconcile a bad bill with a worse one.  Expect an even harsher, broader-reaching and more nonsensical bill in time for Christmas.