Wednesday March 6th there was a shift in this country, but most people did not notice. A defense of Freedom, Liberty and the Bill of Rights was on display in the US Senate. Senator Rand Paul stood up in the well of the Senate and spoke for over 13 hours.
The media will tell you the purpose of the filibuster was to block the CIA nominee John Brennan, but the truth is so much bigger.
Attorney General Holder sent a letter to Sen. Paul that said,” In an emergency, the Federal Government could execute a drone strike on US soil.” While AG Holder added the caveat “in an emergency”, the answer was yes, the executive branch of the United States government could serve as judge, jury and executioner, in an emergency.
Who determines what constitutes an emergency? Why of course the Executive branch does. According to the top US attorney the executive branch can declare an emergency, thereby, having the authority to execute a drone strike.
Sen. Paul stood up with 14 other senators and demanded the executive branch answer the question, can American Citizens have their 4th, 5th and 6th amendment rights denied by a President? Can a President, with a drone strike , take away an American citizens right to “be secure in their person”, “be indicted by a Grand jury”, “not be deprived of life liberty and property without due process of law” or to the “right to a speedy and public trial by an impartial jury”?
This is why this moment was so important. The Bill or Rights has been under attack for decades, but the last 12 years have seen an unprecedented attack, the Patriot Act, warrantless wiretaps, surveillance of e-mails, monitoring of cell phones, social media and attacks on religious freedom and the curtailing of free speech. Yet during this attack on the Bill of Rights few in power stood up and took on the executive branch.
Sen. Paul and those that supported the filibuster did just that, they stood up and demanded that the executive branch tell them if they had the power to ignore the constitution. These few rebels’ shook the earth in DC, evidence by the reactions by those in power the next few days.
The “old guard” of the GOP took to the senate floor and called Sen. Paul everything from “dangerous” “Wacko Birds” and the “leader of the code pink republicans”. Those in DC that believe in party over principle understood what had happened and it scared them.
If the American people begin to understand that what is happening in DC is just a game of R’s vs. D’s and as long as they keep us fighting each other, we will not notice the government overstepping its bounds and taking away our rights, the ruling class’s power would disappear.
Sen. Paul lifted the veil just a little and an amazing thing happened. The people’s media, Twitter, Facebook, internet news sites and citizen journalist covered the filibuster with astounding success. The news that someone was standing for freedom and the Bill of Rights spread across that internet, from C-Span to the twitter hashtag #standwithrand trending to number 1. Even today if you Google stand with rand there are hundreds of blogs and new media stories, many of them left leaning news sources, even the progressive site Mother Jones questioned the use of drone strikes as Raha Wala, an attorney with Human Rights First said, “Any use of drone strikes or other premeditated lethal force inside the United States would raise grave legal and ethical concerns”
If we can stand together on the issue of liberty and freedom, we can stop this attack on our basic freedoms and present a united front to remind those in government that the only power they have is what the people grant them.
The ground has shifted, the veil lifted and the game has been exposed. We are purposely being pitted against each other, to keep us distracted. We need to stop fighting each other and unite to defend our rights against a government that thinks it is ok to be judge, jury and executioner, as long as there is an emergency.
No comments:
Post a Comment