Monkey Security and the F-word (Freedom)

It amazes me how everything political has become an issue of “Security”, even global climate changes that may be the result of global warming or may just be industrialization, or both. It really doesn’t matter what the cause is to Washington, but does this effect our Security? It was never about the conditions we create that may or may not effect life on this planet, but rather how we, as a Nation, protect our dominant positions on the socio-political and economic structure, chess board.

When I was a kid we used to play something like that called Risk, but we never really took it that seriously. Well, this morning I was doing some light reading and came across this section of the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act* (see below) and was less than surprised that they had turned the Green Movement to Stop Global Warming into another version of the security game. You know, the one that was magnified into a monster the size of a low budget Tokyo film after Bush and friends, I mean the terrorists, started their war.

Lets just stop for a minute and try to understand this (stream of thought). According to the Websters Dictionary** (see below) – Security means to be free from anxiety or fear. The irony here is that you must first be subjected to an idea in order to be freed from it. In other words you can’t really be freed from prison without first going. “So what does this have to do with the environment?”, you ask. Well, that’s the point isn’t it. It really doesn’t have to do with the environment at all, and that’s my point.

“INTERAGENCY CLIMATE CHANGE AND NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL” He muses thoughtfully, and I wonder when Webster decided to make security and freedom equinimitous.
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*SEC. 4801. INTERAGENCY CLIMATE CHANGE AND NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL.

(a) Establishment- There is established a Climate Change and National Security Council (referred to in this subtitle as the `Council’).

(b) Membership- The Council shall include–

(1) the Secretary of State, who shall serve as Chairperson of the Council;

(2) the Administrator;

(3) the Secretary of Defense; and

(4) the Director of National Intelligence.

(c) Duties- The Council shall–

(1) submit annual reports to the President, the Committees on Environment and Public Works and Foreign Relations of the Senate, and the Committees on Energy and Commerce and Foreign Relations of the House of Representatives that describe–

(A) the extent to which other countries are committing to reducing greenhouse gas emissions through mandatory programs;

(B) the extent to which global climate change, through the potential negative impacts of climate change on sensitive populations and natural resources in different regions of the world, may threaten, cause, or exacerbate political instability or international conflict in those regions; and

(C) the ramifications of any potentially destabilizing impacts climate change may have on the national security of the United States, including–

(i) the creation of refugees; and

(ii) international or intranational conflicts over water, food, land, or other resources; and

(2) include in each annual report submitted under paragraph (1) recommendations on whether it is necessary to enhance the national security of the United States by funding programs with amounts made available under section 4802 that the Council determines would assist in avoiding the politically destabilizing impacts of climate change in volatile regions of the world.

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**Security 1: the quality or state of being secure: as a: freedom from danger : safety b: freedom from fear or anxiety c: freedom from the prospect of being laid off

Another Waste of Breath

It only took Congress 5 years to finally complete phase 2 of an investigation to the pre-war intelligence over the invasion of Iraq, and the build up by the White House to go to war on stretched information and sometimes blatant lies. I mean we all saw Colon Powell deliver that hopeless bull to the UN about the aluminum tubes. It was on every channel and no one questioned it at the dinner table, or thought about how many lives would be destroyed by sitting there listening and not voicing there objections.

We all saw the President stand up in front of Congress and tell us about the Nigeria paper that had already been disproved by Valerie Plame’s husband, as a fraudulent forgery, that Saddam was trying to get yellow cake (enriched uranium), and this was part of his “WMD” program, but the Republicans in Congress were trying to protect their buddies and had no intentions of protecting the sovereign citizens they supposedly represent.

It amazes me that we have come to this point as a “democracy”. What do people expect when there is nothing remotely close to a reaction over something that has killed literally hundreds of thousands of people while the mentality of complacency rings in with banners and bumper stickers to support our troops. What a joke. And if the pre-war intelligence for Iraq was theater for our entertainment then so must be everything else this administration has claimed and Congress has rolled over for.

Maybe if we hadn’t allowed Congress to lock the number of House Representatives at 450 something in the early teens, we might still have a voice in our political process. The story isn’t even important anymore. No one really cares about it. All we care about is our life-style obsessions.

America is as broken as it can get and Congress is so blinded by soft money and lobbyists that it can’t even end farm subsidies in the wake of a world food shortage. Of course they’re not going to impeach the President for one of the lies that took us to war. That would be doing something.

I find it amazing that there may not be enough solid evidence to convict Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and yet we as a nation have gone to war twice because we were so sure we were right about 9/11, that we were willing to kill for it. So where’s the WMD’s?

The bottom line is that the President swore an oath to protect the Constitution. It clearly states that the President must annually inform the Congress of the “State of the Union”. When He stepped behind that podium and told Congress and the American people that the Nigeria paper was solid evidence that Saddam had Nuclear ambitions he knowingly committed perjury under oath. The CIA had informed him after reading his speech, previous to the State of the Union address, that the intelligence might not be accurate.

The investigation into the leaking of Valerie Plame’s identity to the media, and the conviction of I. Lewis Libby’s perjury, reveals foreknowledge of the Presidents actions before Congress, that the White House Administration was attempting to hide the indiscretion, by discrediting an OpED article by Joseph C. Wilson (Plame’s husband), which revealed the Nigeria Paper to be a forgery. It reveals the motive behind misleading Congress, the UN and the American People, that the White House was intent on attacking Iraq, even if they had to lie to achieve this end.

Senate Panel Finds Iraq Intelligence Exaggerations

Casual Acquaintance

I find it pretty common that the stress in many situations seems to be the inherent lack on understanding we gain through poor communication, at least when it comes to the people who have the ability to listen to each other and just forget about taking the time to do it (communicate). The last weeks here in the Park have been a bit quirky due to something that had been built up out of someones imagination. Something that was quite easily remedied by communicating.

I guess from an outside perspective others (may) interpret me as this alpha type, and i would just as soon walk away from most things because they seem a bit pointless, given the big picture, and this is often misunderstood about me. I admit that very little frightens me about anyone and I assume that they might consider that a threat.

The fact is that truth is often a compromise between people and is based in acceptance. If i can accept another’s reason (taking the time to understand their motive) even though I may not agree with their intention, I don’t have to because it is their work and not my responsibility [horrible uncorrectable sentence]. We all learn something through our own trials and the choices that create them, so who am I to interfere with that process. And, if something they are choosing has some effect in my life, I am uncomfortable with, I have several choices; one I can walk away from the situation, or (if I believe it important) I can communicate my truth about it. Sure there are other options like conflict or destroying their autonomy, but where does that lead. It’s just attachment in disguise.

I had another opportunity this week to see it in every variation, before I finally realized what was happening, and I sometimes wonder how we remember anything at all. I mean what is it we are suspicious of in the first place that causes us to forget the things that seemed so simple when we realized them in the first place. Are we so complex that we can’t ever truly accept what needs no proof, is it a need for accomplishment that keeps us constantly striving for the beyond and complex. In any case I do hope that someday it will all seem to simple to forget!