Well…yeah, that title is a little misleading, but what I wanted to say would have been too long to be one…what I wanted to say was…why do we have to continue to reiterate the fourth amendment? Shouldn’t the fourth amendment itself be enough? I guess not, and some of the legislators in the US congress feel the same way with the revelations of the NSA spying on you me, and everyone in the country. In fact, Alan Grayson, a Florida congressman, has just introduced legislation basically saying again what the fourth amendment says…that you can’t gather info on anyone unless there is probable cause that a crime has been committed and the warrants are approved by a judge. No more of this “let’s just watch everybody” under the guise of protecting us…I, for one, don’t want to be protected if that means that the government watches everything that I do…every phone call, every internet search, every text, and even the location data from our phones…one of the things that always happens is that the government will find a use for this data and I have no faith this use will be limited to those uses that are constitutional so they must stop…geez…
All posts by James DeVol
June 12th
Well…it was kind of a long day yesterday with going out for a couple with G and then staying up late to see the US win it’s soccer match with Panama…so, I’m a little worn out today and running late…slept okay but no dreams again and that is starting to be the norm so I guess I won’t comment on it anymore…I did tear the bike down again yesterday since the squeak is back and I may have fixed it…but, who knows until I get out and ride but that may not happen today with it raining already and a huge storm coming in from the west…and, that may cancel Tommy Castro for tonight which would be somewhat of a disappointment…I may just go downtown anyway if it’s not raining too hard…not much to do today….almost out of food but I have enough for today so I don’t need to go for groceries until tomorrow…so, I guess I’ll get the workout in and then take a look at the radar….more later…
What’s wrong with transparency?
Well…I have been following this whole NSA/spying flap over the past couple of days and the question that pops into my head is: “What’s wrong with transparency?” Why is it so terrible that we, as citizens, know what the hell our government is up to…especially when it directly affects us? It’s not like they’ve foiled hundreds of terrorist plots gathering all of this data…in fact, the head of the NSA has said that there may have been one plot foiled…and don’t give me that crap that it is worth it if one plot is foiled…since we don’t even know what the definition of “plot” is…is a full scale terrorist attack that was foiled or was it a couple of wannabes talking back and forth on facebook? Even with all of this money being spent…and there are over 400,000 people that are working on gathering and analyzing the data…they didn’t catch the Boston bombers and they are the sort of people that the NSA is supposed to be protecting us from….all the while we spend billions upon billions of dollars on this nonsense while bridges collapse and thousands of people die from gun violence every year…and thousands more from preventable diseases that could be cured if they had health insurance. I think we are at the point where we really do need to bring some light to these programs so we, as a people, can actually have a say in how we want to be kept safe and how much liberty we are prepared to cede to do it…geez…
June 11th
Well…it was just another day yesterday and I didn’t get much done…I did fix my golf bag and got the paint to do the spare tire and the brackets for the battery but it was wet and raining yesterday and that is not good for paint so I think I’ll wait for a dry day to do that stuff…slept okay last night and I feel okay with it being a no cocktail night…dreamt of oil leaks in the Miata but they are not real so I’m not sure what that was about….I did take a drive just for the hell of it and to get out of here and that was fun…might be meeting up with T today to have a couple and that will be cool but that looks like my whole day…nothing much else to do and I am getting really, really bored…but I guess I’ll just have to live with it…more later…
What happened to the fourth amendment?
Well…for quite a while now, I have been concerned by the daily erosion of the protections of the fourth amendment both by the courts and by the legislature of the federal government. I don’t understand it, either…when there is so much outcry about any infringement of the 2nd amendment and the rabid howls from the right when even sensible laws controlling guns are proposed, and yet with the revelations that the NSA has been infringing on the 4th on a daily basis…only a few repubs have come forward to oppose this big brother dragnet. The most egregious justification for it is the general one of “safety” and that the government is “protecting” us from some amorphous threat that is out there but they won’t tell us what the threat is or what they are doing to protect us…this creates the next question which is why should we believe agencies that lie on a daily basis?”. This boils down to one quote that I use quite often that distills the balance between risk and freedom: “..those who give up essential liberty for temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety…” Ben Franklin…geez…
June 10th
Well…it was an okay night last night and I did get to watch the Griffins win the second game of the playoffs…but, that means that they are back in town for a wed game and that is going to make parking for Tommy Castro a real pain….but, I think I’ll still go…just need to park across town and do a little walking…slept okay last night but I’m still worn out today…allergies are still here but not getting worse so that is something….and, I was kind of good last night so that helps…not much to do today…I do need to go out and get some black paint to do some touch up on the battery hold downs in the trunk and the spare tire….but that is about it….more later…
The name of the group is Phelegathon…
Well…my brother and I were trying to figure out the name of a local group here around GR…it just came to me…it was Phlegathon…if you’re reading…I think that is the one….
No politcal one today…
Well…have been thinking about something political to write about today and have come up empty so I think I’ll just do an update and call it good…I did take a bike ride with my brother today and it was fun…but the damn squeak is back an more annoying than ever…so, I went out and got some wheel bearing grease and took the bike back apart to grease everything…again…and it sounds like it is fixed again but I am going to hold my breath again…after all, I did get a few quiet days out of the lithium stuff… not sure what I can do if it does it again….other than be annoyed…and, I made a little money this aft so that was cool, too…can buy groceries again this week! I am still pretty sore from hitting that bucket of balls Friday and my damn golf bag broke so I need to go find some zip ties to see if I can fix it….the duct tape didn’t work…oh, well…it looks like an easy fix and I will get on that tomorrow….
June 9th
Well…running a little late today but that is normal for Sunday…had an okay day yesterday and did get dome cleaning done so I feel okay about that…slept okay but no dreams again…crap….I am really sore this morning from hitting the golf balls Friday but that should go away after the ibuprofen and the bike ride…my brother is coming over to ride in a few minutes so this one is going to be short since I have to work on the bike before we go…the damn squeak is coming back again and I’m not sure where to look next…more later…
Heartless bastards….
Well…just a short one on a jaw-dropper that I read somewhere today…our buddy Eric Cantor, had a wonderful idea (yep, that’s snark) to eliminate government funding of elections that would do nothing but increase the influence of corporations and the rich, but he tried a little bit of misdirection to confuse people what the whole thing was about…including a clause that would take some of the money and put it towards funding medical care for sick kids…but the sick, heartless bastards of the hard right (yeah, you can read that tea partiers) came out in full howl that helping sick kids would create a “constituency” that would then have to be helped forever…just like people that get food stamps or unemployment insurance. I am at a loss how to respond to someone as heartless as this…of course you should help sick kids forever! Who is a government supposed to help forever? Oil companies? Oh…I forgot…that is exactly who these bastards want to help while kids die from lack of health care…geez…