State of health
Clinton takes terror cash
I recently read a news item that really enraged me. And the fact that this hasn’t received wider play in the mainstream media is one of the things that’s gotten me fuming. According to a news report, democratic presidential candidate Sen. Hillary Clinton has taken thousands of dollars in cash donations from Islamist individuals and organizations that are currently under federal investigation for terror-financing, money laundering, and tax fraud.
Please tell me that this gets your blood pressure spiking as much as it does mine!
This sort of incident exposes the dark, money-driven expediency of the American political system. Principles are a thing of the past. Candidates will take money anywhere and from anyone in the hopes that it can buy one more vote. It’s sickening in the extreme.
What makes this incident even harder to believe is that, given all of the stink that was raised over campaign finance reform during the last election, that donations from such suspect individuals and organizations would be accepted in the first place. I’m not sure what makes me more uncomfortable: that Clinton would have people on her staff capable of such gross incompetence, or that she would have people on her staff capable of turning a blind eye toward money from modern-day fifth columnists.
But wait! There’s an even more frightening subtext to this story. Knowing that campaign donations for the odds-on favorite to be the Democratic nominee are sure to be closely monitored and reported, which party has the bigger cojones in this situation? The Clinton campaign or the would-be terrorists? It’s hard to believe that a terrorist organization – the kind we’ve been led to believe are lying low in anonymous “sleeper cells” throughout the country – could be brazen enough to actually donate money to an American presidential candidate.
I’m forever alerting you to the goings-on of Big Pharma using cash to grease the wheels of Big Government, so maybe I’m nave to be as shocked and disappointed by this story as I am.
And it’s not just the Clinton campaign. These same donors are also on record for having given money to other candidates in other races – including Republicans. But Clinton is the only active presidential candidate to receive funds from these suspect sources during this election cycle.
The 2008 election has many more months. What other disappointing, frustrating, and infuriating revelations lie ahead? Only time will tell.
Wave goodbye to privacy
You may want to think before you send your next email. A central witness in a California lawsuit against AT&T recently testified that in 2003, he helped connect a device that diverted and copied every (EVERY!) phone call, email, and Internet site accessed on AT&T lines onto a government supercomputer.
Somewhere, George Orwell is smiling.
This testimony comes to light as Congress looks to pass new legislation to amend the 1978 Foreign Surveillance Act. The new version of the law would protect telecommunications companies from civil lawsuits that may arise from allegedly giving government agencies access to peoples’ private emails and phone calls without a court order between 2001 and 2007.
Last summer, Congress changed the same law to allow the government to eavesdrop inside the United States without court permission, as long as one end of that conversation believed to be originating from outside the U.S. (You know that the operative phrase in that last sentence is “believed to be.”) This law went by the wayside because it was said to be “obstructing intelligence gathering.” Get used to that phrase.
Think that’s bad? During the debate over the latest amendment, Donald Kerr, the principal deputy director of national intelligence said, “It is time people in the United States changed their definition of privacy.” It’s as if a character from 1984 sprung from the page and started spewing double-speak, isn’t it?
I believe the threat of terrorism to be real. And I’m happy when the government is actively doing something to try and root out the threat before it can do more harm. But as the struggle against terrorism continues, our privacy rights will continue to dwindle in the name of national security. And no matter the reason, loss of privacy is supremely un- American.
