Quote-crazy

"I would love to believe that when I die I will live again, that some thinking, feeling, remembering part of me will continue. But as much as I want to believe that, and despite the ancient and worldwide cultural traditions that assert an afterlife, I know of nothing to suggest that it is more than wishful thinking." - Carl Sagan

Oh, how I want to believe. How comforting it would be. Everyday it makes more and more sense. I'll never deny the possibility, no. For I am somewhat a non-practicing Muslim. The ambiguity in the origin of life permits this belief, and I'm content with that. The problem is, I can't seem to find it anywhere else.

What does happen when you die? It's elating to imagine you looking down at your feet, atop clouds beside pearly white gates. But what if it doesn't? Do you remember what your life was like before you were... two years old? No? Then why would it be odd to presume the same thing happens upon death? It does seem like an afterlife is nothing more than wishful thinking.

Sigh.

But what is our purpose? The multiverse hypothesis sounds so ridiculous. What's the point of all this? Space is too god damned big. Why is the universal speed limit the speed of light? What the hell is the point of all this...

It may be wishful thinking, but there are reasons to believe. Until discoveries come about that shatter contemporary thinking, I'm sticking to what makes me happy; there's not enough proof to tell me I'm full of shit.

Seems like there never will be.

Good night/morning.

Writing

My favorite paper from English this semester is the Moment in Life essay. Actually the paper on Constitution is probably my favorite, but that's not important now. This could either be fiction or non fiction. In reality, it's both. I kind of made up some quotes so it could pass for either. It's probably not even that great.

" I’ve been to plenty of weddings in my life. They’re all basically the same because our people are proud and traditional.

We’re from Plav, a small historical town, in the middle of everything. The town is literally at the borders of Montenegro, Kosova, and Albania. My ancestors have been living in that valley for the past 400 years. Life there is pretty laid back; laborers only work from Monday through Thursday, eat a lot of food, and joke around all the time. It’s like an American family’s utopia. The wedding ceremonies there are identical to the ones we have in America; it was created over there first, our people in America couldn’t give up their traditions, it helps many cope with homeland sickness.

At the wedding, my lips arch parabolically and my nose bellows air to avoid laughing as I sit and listen to drunken relatives converse about their past. I see my cousin, although, she likes it when I refer to her as a ‘sister.’ (We’re close since I went on vacation and met everyone the first time in 2000. Her father died that year, and I talked to her a lot; she began calling me a brother and it stuck.) Standing tall (especially because of her ornate wedding cake-like headdress which adds a foot but more about that in a moment.) behind a large table consisting of the bride, my ‘sister’, and recently married relatives by her side in extravagant outfits, covered with heavy silver and gold embroidery; clothes that Queen Elizabeth the First would wear but, only on official state occasions. I admit crying a little seeing my ‘sister’ standing tall like that, especially because of her past. But I toughed it out, you know, since I’m a beast.

“She’s so beautiful,” an aunt whispers, “So when are you getting married? Vee gonna find you a nice girl.”

That’s the crazy aunt. Always thinking about who and when others should tie the knot. It’s an obsession, and it’s hilarious. She’s dressed up in the same type of embroidered white garb with jingling gold ornaments on her head to complement the giant gold collar; indigenous to our people, and enigmatic to anyone else.

I shook my head, laughed, and didn’t bother answering the question--who could?

The method men Albanian use to get married is quite different from the American way. Albanian men who live in America go back to their home country and basically ‘pick out’ the girl they want to marry; the parents talk about it first, to see if she is from a good family. Then, the girl spends time with the man to see if she likes him. It’s nice since the girl isn’t forced to get married and the families bond as friends.

I could have been married this summer if I wanted to, which is frightening; but that’s the power of culture. Seeing my ‘sister’ standing there I try to see the world through her eyes, as a precocious nineteen year old. I feel like I’ve turned to stone looking at marriage eye to eye. This inner child in me, precarious and fearful, squeaks, “I don’t wanna.” But this fear is probably part of the process. What results from this bond is valuable, and most important: love, loyalty, respect, trust, and happiness.

Traditions and customs in the ceremony involve these elements. Throughout the night attendees from both sides of the family get up and dance in formed circles. They hold hands high and oscillate them as they maneuver and move in the circle, to show their approval and happiness for the to-be couple. As they spiral around each other they seem timeless, like a primitive ritual, going as far back as the days when a conch that plays the euphoric song of love when blown upon.

In the end, the husband and wife fill their cups with champagne, and entangle their arms as they drink. When the time came to cut the cake, my ‘sister’ took a slice and fed her husband, then vice versa.

Afterwards, the crowd forms a large circle and the lights dim; the two dance in the middle and whisper into each others ear. Perhaps they were dreaming about the future. More likely, they were savoring the moment. Like a first kiss, a dream was falling into place becoming reality. All of that fantasizing she did as a teenager I remember, about sincerity, honesty, and the importance of true love; how beautiful, how becoming, how real.

Before leaving, I filter my way through the crowd to reveal myself and my ‘sister’ spots me, “There you are! Ha ha, so what do you think? You’re next! Vee gonna find you a nice girl!” "

Influences

I'll be listing quotes which influence of have influenced me. First off we have a Q&A between Carl Sagan and an inquirer at the Gifford Lectures.

"Questioner: I'd like to ask you about why you think any omnipotent being would want to leave evidence for us.
CS: I think I entirely agree with what you say. There is no reason I should expect an omnipotent being to leave evidence of His existence, except that the Gifford Lectures are supposed to be about evidence. And I hope it is clear that the fact that I do not see evidence of such a God's existence does not mean that I then derive from that fact that I know that God does not exist.
That's quite a different remark. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. Neither is it evidence of presence. And this is again a situation where our tolerance for ambiguity is required."

If you want to be amazed, read those Q&A sections. Carl was a walking encyclopedia. I can't imagine how much studying Carl did. It's like he knows every damn subject in-depth and his ability to respond to questions I find hard to understand quickly is inspirational. I have this feeling in my gut like, damn, I want to be that. Or know all of that.

The first piece of evidence that made me switch, I'll always remember. In Daniel Dennett's Show me the Science he mentions my previously strongest held creationist argument: the eye. Now that I understand natural selection and everything, like I'm supposed to, I can't believe I 'fell for it'.

Here's the excerpt:

"A creationist pamphlet sent to me some years ago had an amusing page in it, purporting to be part of a simple questionaire:
Test Two
Do you know of any building that didn't have a builder? [Yes][No]
Do you know of any painting that didn't have a painter? [Yes][No]
Do you know of any car that didn't have a maker? [Yes][No]
If you answered YES for any of the above, give details:

Take that, you Darwinians! The presumed embarrassment of the test-taker when faced with this task perfectly expresses the incredulity many people feel when they confront Darwin's great idea. It seems obvious, doesn't it, that there couldn't be any designs without designers, any such creations without a creator.

Well, yes--until you look at what contemporary biology has demonstrated beyond all reasonable doubt: that natural selection--the process in which reproducing entities must compete for finite resources and thereby engage in a tournament of blind trial and error from which improvements automatically emerge--has the power to generate breathtakingly ingenious designs.

Take the development of the eye, which has been one of the favorite challenges of creationists. How on earth, they ask, could that engineering marvel be produced by a series of small, unplanned steps? Only an intelligent designer could have created such a brilliant arrangement of a shape-shifting lens, an aperture-adjusting iris, a light-sensitive image surface of exquisite sensitivity, all housed in a sphere that can shift its aim in a hundredth of a second and send megabytes of information to the visual cortex every second for years on end.

But as we learn more and more about the history of the genes involved, and how they work--all the way back to their predecessor genes in the sightless bacteria from which multi celled animals evolved more than a half-billion years ago--we can begin to tell the story of how photosensitive spots gradually turned into light-sensitive craters that could detect the rough direction from which light came, and then gradually acquired their lenses, improving their information-gathering capacities all the while.

We can't yet say what all the details of this process were, but real eyes representative of all the i intermediate stages can be found, dotted around the animal kingdom, and we have detailed computer models to demonstrate that the creative process works just as the theory says.
All it takes is a rare accident that gives one lucky animal a mutation that improves its vision over that of its siblings; if this helps it have more offspring than its rivals, this one gives evolution an opportunity to raise the bar and ratchet up the design of the eye by one mindless step. And since these lucky improvements accumulate--this was Darwin's insight--eyes can automatically get better and better and better, without any intelligent designer.
Brilliant as the design of the eye is, it betrays its origin with a tell-tale flaw: the retina is inside out. The nerve fibers that carry the signals from the eye's rods and cones(which sense light and color) lie on top of them, and have to plunge through a large hole in the retina to get to the brain, creating a blind spot. No intelligent designer would put such a clumsy arrangement in a camcorder, and this is just one of the hundreds of accidents frozen in evolutionary history that confirm the mindlessness of the historical process. If you still find Test Two compelling, a sort of cognitive illusion that you can feel even as you discount it, you are like just about everybody else in the world; the idea that natural selection has the power to generate such sophisticated designs is deeply counterintuitive.

The designs found in nature are nothing short of brilliant, but the process of design that generates them is utterly lacking in intelligence of its own.

Intelligent design advocates, however, exploit the ambiguity between process and product that is built into the word "design." For them, the presence of a finished product (a fully evolved eye, for instance) is evidence of an intelligent design process. But this tempting conclusion is just what evolutionary biology has shown to be mistaken.

Yes, eyes are for seeing, but these and all the other purposes in the natural world can be generated by processes that are themselves without purposes and without intelligence.

This is hard to understand, but so is the idea that colored objects in the world are composed of atoms that are not themselves colored, and that heat is not made of tiny hot things.

In just about every field there are challenges to one established theory or another. The legitimate way to stir up such a storm is to come up with an alternative theory that makes a prediction that turns out to be true, or that explains something that has been baffling defenders of the status quo, or that unifies two distant theories at the cost of some element of the currently accepted view.

To date, the proponents of intelligent design have not produced anything like that. No experiments with results that challenge any mainstream biological understanding. No observations from the fossil record or genomics or biogeography or comparative anatomy that undermine standard evolutionary thinking.

Instead, the proponents of intelligent design use a ploy that works something like this. First you misuse or misdescribe some scientist's work. Then you get an angry rebuttal. Then, instead of dealing forthrightly with the charges leveled, you cite the rebuttal as evidence that there is a "controversy" to teach."

Those words influenced me. I remember how I fought them until I thought about what my friend was trying to tell me all along. Do you think I said,"Eureka!"? No it was more like, "I'm an idiot!"? I don't like being so hard on myself, but that was necessary. I'm really nothing special. That's why I want to be somebody. I'm nothing special, but I'm also not normal. I love saying that. I'm not normal. It intrigues others, I can see their eyebrows raise in the corner of my eye. Moving on...

This next quote comes from Theodosius Dobzhansky's Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution:

"Seen in the light of evolution, biology is, perhaps, intellectually the most satisfying and inspiring science. Without that light it becomes a pile of sundry facts some of them interesting or curious but making no meaningful picture as a whole.

This is not to imply that we know everything that can and should be known about biology and about evolution. Any competent biologist is aware of a multitude of problems yet unresolved and of questions yet unanswered. After all, biologic research shows no sign of approaching completion; quite the opposite is true. Disagreements and clashes of opinion are rife among biologists, as they should be in a living and growing science. Antievolutionists mistake, or pretend to mistake, these disagreements as indications of dubiousness of the entire doctrine of evolution. Their favorite sport is stringing together quotations, carefully and sometimes expertly taken out of context, to show that nothing is really established or agreed upon among evolutionists. Some of my colleagues and myself have been amused and amazed to read ourselves quoted in a way showing that we are really antievolutionists under the skin.

Let me try to make crystal clear what is established beyond reasonable doubt, and what needs further study, about evolution. Evolution as a process that has always gone on in the history of the earth can be doubted only by those who are ignorant of the evidence or are resistant to evidence, owing to emotional blocks or to plain bigotry. By contrast, the mechanisms that bring evolution about certainly need study and clarification. There are no alternatives to evolution as history that can withstand critical examination. Yet we are constantly learning new and important facts about evolutionary mechanisms."

That's all folks.

Papers

All right, the semester is over and I'm free for a while. I suppose I'll share some essays written for my English class. It's a long ass paper about the Constitution. Have fun reading it, haha.

"Where is the world headed? Currently, our government is making a mockery of our Constitution. Sometime in the future, if we follow this path, the U.S. may become a police state. Consider these lyrics, “…Cops tape the scene up, gunner downs 9; they're chasin' away kids playin' hop-scotch in his chalk outline. Two F-16's screech an iridescent sky, look down we're not in Iraq we're in NY! Rats in the streets we move underground like earthworms two coasts couldn't abort Satan in his first term. The army in the subway walkin' with toolies(note: Uzi-gun). I'm on the train with the back of the dollar bill still talkin' to me. Drive with my left I know what's right my weapon hand, like the map of DC streets still shows a pentagram. License on the car window when I pass through you've seen the news, no joke, New York pig department will blast you. My Weatherman party is invite-only soldier cuz with one wave of King G Dub's scepter it's over. The right to assemble puts the bureau's team on you. Look into my file and nod to this while Jell-O screams on you."[17]

That’s America’s future: a police state; an abject form of government. We can prevent this. It is America’s future only if we succumb to the whims and lies of politicians. But if we want America to go in the right direction we have to know where we are and where we’re going to get there. There’s only one document that can show us this.

The United States Constitution: a timeless masterpiece that exudes liberty. It is the metaphorical chain that constrains an incessant leviathan of power. Today it seems that beast has broken free of his bonds. How so? A pertinent quote may well explain how, "I prefer a man who will burn the flag and wrap himself in the Constitution to a man who will burn the Constitution and wrap himself in the flag,"(Craig Washington).

Since 9/11, many political pundits claim there will never be peace in a post 9/11 world; we should all stay locked up in our homes, be terrified, and let the government take care of us. Some of us, however, have a problem with the measures the government utilizes in order to "keep us safe."

But, we must never let go. Vandals have tried to tear the fabric of the Constitution since its inception. Just because someone says a slave is three-fifths a person doesn't make it so, nor that they should be slaves in the first place. Just because someone says gays shouldn't marry because it's sinful doesn't mean gays shouldn't have the right to get married. These statements come from people who simply don't understand the Constitution or choose to ignore it for their own personal benefit. You can't claim to be defending every American's rights saying those kinds of things because that technically would make you a hypocrite and perhaps a liar. Unfortunately for many, this isn't a theocracy. If you enjoy that kind of life, there are numerous settings in the Middle East you may be more at home in.

This isn't a tirade on religion. I include that second example because religious ideas, like the flag image in the quote, can also be wrapped around a man. Furthermore, 9/11 is the “flag” politicians cover themselves with while burning the Constitution. We shouldn’t allow this event to act as a springboard for Constitutional annihilation.

Today we see many flag-drapers ‘burning the Constitution.’ I don't want to live in a "your papers, please" surveillance state because it's one of the signets of fascism, "In a free society, the government responds to citizens — laws and government adjust as people go about their lives, change their views, culture, ways and means. Government follows populace. In a fascist society, the citizen responds to the state, or loses primary rights and privileges. You are either within the State or outside the State. Populace follows government. The State becomes the focus, not the individual. [1]"

There is no reason to live in a state like that. We have to understand a few things, first of all, if we're going continue to fight whatever we're fighting. The first thing that we should do, which makes sense, is to figure out who exactly are our enemies. Now, our president has given us a vague ten letter word, 'terrorists,’ which can be interpreted in so many ways just like George Bush’s favorite text: the Bible.

We should remember the statement as the CATO Handbook on Policy points out, "the joint resolution approved by the Senate and the House of Representatives authorized the president,

'to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001,’[18]"[2]

The source quoted comments that the U.S. should, "...not to wage an amorphous war on terrorism or evil or to unnecessarily conflate the terrorist threat with rogue regimes that seek weapons of mass destruction...focus the war on terrorism only on the Al Qaeda terrorist network and not expand it to other groups or countries that have not attacked, or do not represent a direct threat to the U.S....recognize that much of the war on terrorism will not involve large-scale military action but will emphasize diplomatic, intelligence, and law enforcement cooperation with other counties...make domestic counter terrorism to find Al Qaeda operatives in the United States a top priority for the Federal Bureau of Investigation."

The writers also emphasize that we, "must not engage in actions or follow policies that create sympathy and recruits for Al Qaeda; that is, we must avoid needlessly giving Muslims reasons to hate America." We should also, "improve relations with foreign intelligence agencies in order to be able to share information about suspected Al Qaeda operatives. (Such cooperation should be limited to intelligence and law enforcement; the U.S. military should not become involved in fighting other nations' wars for them.)"[2] Note: the point of pointing this out is because it mentions who our enemies are. It can’t be any U.S. citizen picked out of a pile. The government needs to be careful and calculated with who the ‘terrorists’ are, and the difference between them and U.S. citizens.

Now that we understand who our enemy is, the U.S. can focus its efforts and waste less resources. The next thing policymakers should do is reduce the budget for national defense, "from the current sum of more than $400 billion to about $200 billion in increments over five years... and make it clear that the reduced budget must be accompanied by a more restrained national military posture that requires enough forces to fight a major war anywhere in the world."[3]

Advocates like Ben Cohen, the Ben in Ben and Jerry's, show us in simple terms, in Oreos, how much better it would be for America if it spent some money appropriated for defense into other domestic destinations like education, health care, world hunger, and other beneficial causes. We don't need to spend money on weapons and things in our geopolitical situation. Putting it into these other areas almost seems like it would guarantee a tremendous improvement which would be great news for the people of America. We're not going more in-depth because the focus here is on the Constitution, this is a basic wrong that accompanies our focused war on terrorism and the in-depth details aren't necessary.

The next measures seem counter-intuitive. Legislators should, "make it clear to the public that homeland security efforts cannot make the country absolutely safe against possible terrorist attacks...and ensure that civil liberties are not sacrificed for unneeded and ineffective homeland security measures."[4]

The writer, on behalf of CATO, explains the situation well in his piece's final paragraphs,

"Finally, all homeland security actions must take into account civil liberties implications. We must heed Benjamin Franklin's admonition that 'they that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.' Before the government infringes on civil liberties, it must pass a litmus test: the government must demonstrate that any proposed new powers are essential, that they would be effective, and that there is no less invasive way to accomplish the same security goal. Ultimately, we must remember that although terrorists may take advantage of our liberties to exploit vulnerabilities in our society, our liberties are not the problem in trying to defend against terrorism. In the final analysis, homeland security means securing the Constitution and Bill of Rights, not just the country itself."(Italics for emphasis)[5]

That's how it should work today, instead of how it is: rambling on about how unsafe we are and that our liberties may also be an enemy because of the way terrorists exploit them. CATO’s italicized final analysis is what I am adamantly advocating.

This of course leads us into which laws infringe on our liberties and what we should do about it. The most important is Habeas Corpus. It's basically the writ by, "which detainees can seek release from unlawful imprisonment."[6]

James Walsh's Liberty in Troubled Times expands with the title 'Why Holding You Without A Charge Is So Bad',

"Some argued during World War II-- just as some argued after 9/11-- that temporary violations of constitutional rights are not a big deal. And, they argue, this is especially true during wartime, when the whole American system that recognizes and supports constitutional rights is endangered. Those people were--and are--fools. Next to killing its own citizens, imprisoning people without charges is the world thing a government can do. It is the most literal infringement of liberty. On a more abstract level, it assumes that the state's prerogatives come before the individuals constitutional liberties; this is the all-too-common epitome of statist arrogance,"[7]

Further, in the conclusion, “The government's suspension or disregard for Habeas Corpus is always troubling...but it isn't a new problem... The U.S. Constitution is full of Habeas Corpus protections, both explicit and implicit. The 5th Amendment requires due process--from arrest to trail to jail; the 6th Amendment requires a speedy trail before a jury of your peers. The 8th Amendment prohibits excessive bail and unusual punishments...In times of war most of all, constitutional rights need to stand strong. If they don't, the state has no cause to continue fighting."[8]

The second document we should investigate is the infamous Patriot Act. The Patriot Act has some good reasons for its existence and numerous reasons which really tick Americans off. Basically, the good should stay and bad should go away. For example, Representatives Sensenbrenner and Conyers found out a couple of interesting points like how the Justice,

"Department had used the Patriot Act for non-terrorism cases (drug violations, credit card fraud, theft from a bank account, a lawyer who defrauded his clients)."[9] In Liberty in Troubled Times Walsh's conclusion is the appropriate one, "In the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, Americans wanted their government to do something. John Ashcroft's Justice Department was very savvy at producing that "something." As time moves away from 9/11, the need for "something" diminishes...and the Patriot Act should, too... Maybe the worst effect of the Patriot Act is that it gave state agencies one more excuse to be secretive. It has encouraged the Attorney General to be uncooperative with the head of the House Judiciary Committee. A few parts of the Patriot Act are important tools for fighting terrorism--the ability to use roving wiretaps and the increased flexibility in using evidence gained from FISA search warrants in domestic prosecutions are reasonable changes. But, in 2005, the rest should fade into sunset."[10]

CATO says a rather concise, "Policymakers should not make the mistake of underestimating the American people. Of course, the electorate wants safety, but it wants the federal government to secure that safety by fighting the terrorists themselves, not by turning America into a surveillance state. [11]"

The American people want reasonable measures in America, as we see; they don't want Orwell's 1984 society. Walsh also deduces, "History suggests that those fundamental liberties will rebound. They did after the statist power grabs that produced Adam's Aliens and Seditions Acts, Lincoln's suspension of Habeas Corpus and Roosevelt's imprisonment of Americans of Japanese extraction. Current laws like the Patriot Act will likely join those measures in the reject bin of U.S. legal history. [12]"

Third, we have Posse Comitatus. What is it? Well it basically prohibits our military from carrying out law enforcement tasks inside the United States. The reason for this is quite simple as Walsh writes how,

"This comes down to the issue of rules of engagement. Civilian law enforcement requires the recognition of and focus on individual rights; it seeks to protect those rights, even if the person being protected is a criminal suspect. Prior to the use of force, police officers attempt to de-escalate a situation. Police officers are trained to use lesser forms of force when possible to draw their weapons only when they are prepared to fire. On the other hand, soldiers are trained to use deadly force. Escalation is the rule. In an encounter with a person identified with the enemy, soldiers need not focus on--or even recognize--individual rights. And the use of deadly force is authorized without any aggressive or bad act by that person."[13]

What I hate the most about this law is what Walsh says would be a logical extension: martial law,

"Some fear that the logical extension of the erosion of the Posse Comitatus Act and the Bush Administration's desire for secretiveness is--and there's no way to report this without sounding like a conspiracy nut--martial law... The details of martial law exist currently in the law. Section 32 CFG 501.4 of the Code of Federal Regulations states, tautologically:

'Martial law depends for its justification upon public necessity. Necessity gives rise to its creation, necessity justifies its exercise; and necessity limits its duration. The extent of the military force used and the actual measures taken, consequently, will depend on the actual threat to order and public safety which exists at the time.' Virtually any military officer in a position of authority can make the decision to declare it. The Code states: 'In most instances, the decision to impose martial law is made by the president, who usually announces his decision by proclamation, which usually contains his instructions concerning its exercise and any limitations thereon. However, the decision to impose martial law may be made by the local commander on the spot, if the circumstances demand immediate action, and time and available communications facilities do not permit obtaining prior approval from anybody.'

Most of the Code of Federal Regulations is made up of dry, legally-precise technicalities. The sections on martial law are distinctive because they're so vague."[14]

Walsh's conclusion is one I agree with,

"In the United States, the Posse Comitatus Act and the tradition of civilian control of the military are strong deterrents to the coups and military juntas that plague so many developing countries. But Americans need to be careful to maintain these deterrents. There's nothing in the American water or Americans' genes that make us free. Our institutions and laws do that... The erosion of liberty--like all erosion--is difficult to recognize because it goes so slowly, so gradually. Bright lines can help prevent erosion. The Posse Comitatus Act and the Freedom of Information Act are two such bright lines. People who love liberty should protect these bright lines jealously."[15]

The final problem we have to deal with is with National ID cards. They provide a negligible amount of security for a rather large amount of privacy. It makes no sense to use them. Cato’s handbook on policy goes well in-depth so I may as well make their argument mine,

"Every policy proposal should be carefully examined for effectiveness and consistency with our values and freedoms. A national or uniform ID system offers less protection at greater cost to freedom than it appears to. Verifying identity is just one, fallible, way of attempting to secure transportation systems and infrastructure. A national or uniform ID system would be a small but significant step toward future impingements on freedom, including mandates that all Americans carry identity cards at all times, the creation of an internal passport system, and government tracking of individuals' travels and financial transactions...

Indeed, past incidents of terrorism have been carried out by people born and raised in the United States, people who had been issued proper, fully valid identification. Knowing who a person is reveals little about his plans or motivations, and a national ID system would do nothing to distinguish first-time terrorists before they attack. Terrorist recruits or people who newly adopt terrorist methods will not be revealed by a national ID system until after our security has failed and disaster struck...Proponents of national ID systems point to countries in Europe, such as France, that already have national ID card systems. But the experience of those countries is nothing to brag about. The people in those countries have surrendered their privacy and their liberty, yet they continue to experience terrorist attacks. National ID cards simply do not deliver the security that is promised."

What I find most important is the reasoning in third paragraph,

"In the countries that already have the national ID card systems, the police have acquired the power to demand identification at will. Implemented widely, such power would become an "internal passport" system. "Your papers, please" could again become a familiar request, harking back to the worst totalitarian states of the last century. Americans are rightly suspicious of national IDs for this reason. A uniform requirement to carry and produce identification could quickly devolve into a comprehensive tracking mechanism, used by government at first to investigate ordinary crime but over time to systematically track and control ordinary, law-abiding citizens."

Therefore, "It is very important that policymakers not lose sight of what we are fighting for in the war on terrorism. The goal should be to fight the terrorists within the framework of a free society. The federal government should be taking the battle to the terrorists, to their base camps, and killing terrorist leadership; it should not be transforming our free society into a surveillance state."[16]

All of these cases brought up infringe our Constitutional freedoms. Constitution burners: flag embracers and religious zealots, tend to be unscrupulous. They contend that our Constitution holds us back from safety and “freedom.” It makes me sick to see this case of ironic intuition. It’s sad how 9/11 is used by these zealots in an attempt to proselytize its citizens. Banning gay marriage? Is this some kind of joke? It’s practically guaranteed by the Constitution, if anything. There are no double standards in the Constitution. Everyone is equal and able to pursuit whatever their heart desires so long as it doesn’t infringe the rights of others. If politicians can’t understand that they are hypocritical. If somebody swears to uphold the Constitution but doesn’t why isn’t he punished? Maybe the great American experiment was destined to fail. I won’t give up on it, though.

Thomas Jefferson said, “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.” It’s unfortunate that “we” the people are going to have to do this sooner or later; but, this tree is suffering from a drought.

Works Cited:

[1] http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/19/09/06/your-papers-please-2/
[2] CATO Handbook on Policy: Chapter 49 ‘Dismantling Al-Qaeda’
[3] CATO Handbook on Policy: pg. 511
[4] CATO Handbook on Policy: pg. 501
[5] CATO Handbook on Policy: pg. 508
[6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habeas_corpus
[7] James Walsh’s Liberty in Troubled Times: pg. 130
[8] Liberty in Troubled Times: pg. 134
[9] Liberty in Troubled Times: pg. 238
[10] Liberty in Troubled Times: pg. 241
[11] CATO Handbook on Policy: pg. 204
[12] Liberty in Troubled Times: pg. 328
[13] Liberty in Troubled Times: pg. 146
[14] Liberty in Troubled Times: pg. 148
[15] Liberty in Troubled Times; pg. 150
[16] CATO Handbook on Policy: Chapter 27 ‘National ID Cards’
[17] http://www.songmeanings.net/lyric.php?lid=3530822107858581264
[18] http://news.findlaw.com/wp/docs/terrorism/sjres23.es.html"

Amputees

Wow, more reason for my lack of faith: http://whywontgodhealamputees.com/god26.htm . It makes very good sense. I'm all for science, but I still think until they figure out "Why are we here?" through the origin of the universe, there is still reason to believe in God. I'll don't think I'll ever fully let go, but there's nothing wrong with that. I'm not imposing any belief system on anyone, like the Christians do. I'm just hopeful, you know, to keep happy.
I already finished my first semester, which was marvelous. I'm pretty sure my GPA is like a 4.0, so I'm glad. Gotta keep it up, and if I'm lucky, and maybe if I'm lucky enough I'd go to Yale for the final two years. Maybe I'm stretching. I don't really think so. Well, hopefully my credits would transfer over with no problem. It's not like I'm taking any bootleg courses, they're all grand. I suppose I really would just do it for the title. Alumi of Yale, whatever. If I get in, swell. Maybe I'll talk to my advisor about it.
Well um, that's it. I have to study. Bye now.

Balkans - Israel

At http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/5012690.stm there's an interesting comments section filled with many points of view about Montenegro's independence. Perhaps Kosovo is next, but a lot of people say the repercussions are far-reaching, and the result is a bunch of unorganized tribal states. That statement made me think: What if the countries of the Balkans at least begin cooperating and started their own "EU"? Perhaps, BU, for a Balkan Union. A lot of the comments I see show that Serbs are sorry, except maybe the nationalists, and overall the only people that really hate each other are the nationalists. Still, if people have some sort of union and begin doing business it might ease the tension and hate people have for each other, yet we're are so alike. It would be nice if that whole area was just one country, under a name and leader a majority of folks like. It could be like a mini United States, accepting all cultures and peoples. Wouldn't it be nice? I think so.
Although I'm losing my faith, (after watching some videos of terrorists beheading people) I'll still say Inshallah, I hope one day the hatred there will be a thing of the past.
I've never seen something so vile as those terrorists beheading people in the name of Allah. Fucking religion. “With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.” I'm not saying those terrorists doing that are good people, but perhaps they once were. That's the point, the power of belief broke my heart and left me wobbling in awe. I literally was shaking and making weird ass noises, I had no control over my self. I think it was the Eugene Armstrong video that killed me.
God. Isn't here. Please don't watch the video. After that I looked through all of the Palestinian arguments against Israel and saw what it was. Crap. Perhaps Israel came and took Palestinian land, well America did the same thing to the Indians and everyone laughs about it now.
Those animals in the videos do not deserve freedom, or even their own way of life, I want the Jews to wipe out all of the terrorists. I guess the only thing Palestinian innocents can do is emigrate and let Israel do what they have to. I'm not saying Israel should take control of the Middle East, no. I'm not even sure what they should have, but the priority is to kill all the terrorists. After innocent people emigrate out of the terrorist influence, the terrorists will die quicker with lack of support and new recruits. Every person will know what kind of bastards they really are. Oh I didn't even mention the terrorists killing Iraqi security forces. You know, the newly trained troops who want to protect their homeland. Those are the terrorists I'm talking about. Killing people of their own religion, sect, and ethnicity just because they have a different uniform.
I have nothing else to say besides: Religion sucks. There are so many sick people in this world.