Your Papers Please.

The Department of Homeland Security will move forward with plans to implement the REAL ID Act despite widespread opposition from citizens and state legislatures. But DHS spokesman Russ Knocke said Tuesday that even the states which have already passed laws or resolutions against the act would eventually come around and implement the national identification standards, because the citizens who now oppose it would start demanding it.

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Civil Penalties if Authorities Merely Misinterpret Your Intentions

Sen. Kennedy’s bill, S. 735, the so-called Terrorist Hoax Improvements Act of 2007. The act would, among other things, attach civil liability to anyone whose actions were misinterpreted by authorities as being a hoax and who didn’t immediately notify those authorities about the actual nature of the incident.

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Destroying Freedom

George Christian, executive director of Library Connection, a consortium of 27 libraries in the Hartford, Conn., area, has, since 2005, been fighting a National Security letter request from the FBI for subscription information on patrons of the library system. Because of the way the PATRIOT Act is written, he was only recently, through a court order, un-gagged to be able to testify to Congress about the experience.

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Impeachment Now?

I really have not been clamoring for the impeachment of Dick and George Cheney-Bush. I had held out hope that an opposition party in power in Congress might be able to offset the abuses of power wrought by the current administration. Unfortunately, the total disregard by this administration for the Constitution and systems of shared power and checks and balances has become egregious.

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363 Tons of Cold Hard Cash Shipped to Iraq – No Kidding

On December 12, 2003, $1.5 billion was shipped to Iraq, initially “the largest pay out of U.S. currency in Fed history,” according to an e-mail cited by committee members. It was followed by more than $2.4 billion on June 22, 2004, and $1.6 billion three days later. The CPA turned over sovereignty on June 28.

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You Say Decision Maker, I Say Constitution, Let's Call the Whole Thing Off

Apparently the President still doesn’t get this Democracy/Constitution thing with the co-equal branches of government and checks and balances. Poor George has repeated his “I’m the Decider” declaration, amending it slightly to “I’m the decision-maker.”

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Thoughts on The Surge

I guess the biggest story going on now is the President’s “surge” strategy for Iraq, and their obvious attempts to generate a confrontation iwth Iran. While I have always felt that George and Dick were stupid and dangerous, I have refrained from calling for an impeachment. However, it is clearly time to set loose the dogs. In the past several months more domestic surveilance by the CIA and the Defense Department has come to light. Bush has started to fire Federal Prosecutors who are investigating Republican congressman.

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