Posted on 09/24/2001 3:10:00 AM PDT by Ada Coddington
Unfree Republic
by Jeff Elkins
Let the stench of Middle East flesh reach Paradise reassuring them that these filth have gone to hell permanently."
The quote above is representative of many posted on the FreeRepublic.com site in the wake of the WTC attack, and unfortunately its like is not uncommon elsewhere. Americans are angry, predictably and rightly so, but just as predictable are the side effects. As always, that righteous anger will be accepted as a beloved gift by the state and molded into tools of oppression.
It’s funny how that works. Every single state-sponsored war the US has become embroiled in has resulted in an inexorable increase in the power of the state.
It’s also funny that it’s always assumed that human behavior in the past has no relation to how we behave today. Why those people were old-fashioned, we’re modern, educated, etc.
The beginning of this repeating pattern has already become public with the establishment of the Department of Homeland Security. It has an ominous sound, that name, almost Germanic. (I can’t wait to see the uniforms.)
On April 13, 1917, days after our entry into World War One, President Wilson created the Committee on Public Information to promote the war domestically while publicizing American war aims abroad. Bush has replicated that step, with this new cabinet-level department.
Under the leadership of journalistic muckraker George Creel, the CPI was a propaganda apparatus unparalleled at that point in world history. The CPI functioned as a de facto public censor, vetting nearly all published material about the war and helping to draft legislation such as the Espionage Act of 1917 and the Sedition Act of 1918. In the months prior to our entry into the war and especially after our entry when they were nearly criminal, antiwar viewpoints were rarely heard.
The same pattern emerges now: Penn. Gov. Tom Ridge will be President Bush’s George Creel, and just as in those dim days of yesteryear, he’ll have plenty of willing civilian accomplices. And after all, there’s so much more to censor -- Ridge will need all the help he can get. In seeking warriors for the front line of Internet censorship, Ridge needs look no farther than FreeRepublic.com. The atmosphere there is now poisonous.
Again, look back to Wilson's CPI. It encouraged businesses to spy on their employees, parents to spy on their children, children to spy on their parents, neighbors to spy on neighbors, and above all to report "disloyal," pro-German sentiments. State authorities banned the teaching of German in schools and changed German street names. As the madness mounted, those regarded as pro-German were hounded from their jobs, pressured to change their German names, beaten, and in a few cases lynched. Almost all cases of violence, while incited by the state, were carried out by "civilians" in the grip of war hysteria.
Along with this anti-German hysteria, Congress passed several measures designed to rigidly suppress criticism of the war. In particular, the Espionage Act, passed in June 1917, specified a fine of $10,000 or twenty years in prison for "whoever, when the United States is at war, shall willfully obstruct the recruiting or enlistment service of the United States, and whoever, when the United States is at war, shall willfully utter, print, write, or publish any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language about the form of government of the United States, or the military or naval forces of the United States, or the flag."
The Espionage Act was very popular in its day. It was cheered on by mindless lemmings under the influence of state propaganda. Their great grandchildren now inhabit FreeRepublic.com, viciously attacking anyone who questions the wisdom of the state.
Our Congress is considering similar measures under the rubric of "anti-terrorism," and as it was at the beginning of the 20th Century, the FreeRepublic lemmings of the 21st are cheering the morally corrupt politicians along.
It’s not just message posters on the site. The management of FreeRepublic has instituted a "loose lips sink ships" campaign, with new moderators patrolling the forum to delete posts that in their opinion are detrimental to the "war effort."
The FreeRepublic mission statement claims "We're working to roll back decades of governmental largesse, to root out political fraud and corruption, and to champion causes which further conservatism in America."
Sanctimonious hogwash. Everything old is new again – the keyboard warriors of FreeRepublic would be right at home in 1917 shilling for Wilson.
September 24, 2001
Jeff Elkins is a freelance consultant and writer living in North Central Florida. His personal website is located at www.elkins.org.
Maybe you could help this along by proving your allegation. It is impossible to prove a negative.
It figures that you are unable to discriminate between the use of force in defense of rights versus the initiation of force to violate rights.
On the night of May 24, 1856, John Brown and his company of Free State volunteers murdered five men settled along the Pottawatomie Creek in southeastern Kansas. The victims were prominently associated with the pro-slavery Law and Order Party, but were not themselves slave owners. This assault occurred three days after Border Ruffians from Missouri burned and pillaged the anti-slavery haven of Lawrence, and two days after Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner was severely beaten by Senator Preston Brooks of South Carolina.At the Doyle farm, James and two of his sons, William and Drury, were dragged outside and hacked up with short, heavy sabres donated to Brown in Akron, Ohio.
http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER/CONTEXTS/Kansas/jbrown.html
Anyway, to paraphrase him would not do his self-bannishment justice and it would be difficult to select any one, or ten, things to mention. He started the process with his first thread shortly after the attacks and continued to work diligently in that direction until he succeeded.
I advocate private violence used in self-defense.
Aside from guilt by association, I'm not sure what your point is re: Spooner, or why you
have a problem with somone advocating just guerilla warfare against a government that
advocated slavery.
As I explained, government leaders are considered legitimate targets under traditional rules of war.
All right Hank, I'll do what I can. During his last posting day here on FR, Demidog had an entire thread dedicated to him by his old arch-enemy CSAZ (currently posting as Imberedux). A quick search of the archives reveals that this thread has been quietly pulled, but I'll give you the run-down from memory. CSAZ broke the "don't carry arguments across threads" rule by dedicating the "treason defined" thread to Demidog. The ol 'Dog handled it well and tried to engage in honest debate (as always). He didn't name-call, he didn't flame, and as far as I know he didn't break the rules. What I asked the Admin Moderator to do was to prove that I was lying by sending me the offending post that got Demi whacked. I followed that thread and didn't see any, but I could be wrong. In the event that I'm wrong, and the moderator can prove it, I will publicly say so.
That's what I asked of him. I'm not playing "prove a negative" games. Just looking for some reasoning. If I was wrong in what I said, I'm not above apology.
So.... Was I wrong?
You weren't in the golf cart that day on Martha's Vineyard when it was just Bill, Bubba and the USSS.
No, it is not surprising that a terrorist like Osama bin Laden condemns our nation. It is also not surprising that most people are able to discern the difference between a slaveholder who market in human flesh and the people who inhabited the World Trade Centers on September 11th. Are you somehow trying to equate the two?
I agree. I've noticed that you and your compatriots have not skipped a beat in your ceaseless critisim of all things American that does not fit your beliefs. Even when faced with a national emergency nothing can deter you folks from marching in lock step.
Have you folks ever considered doing parades?
Who suggested the WTC event was 'staged' in order for the government to take away liberties? Who?
It figures you'd start out your post with such a ridiculous proposition. The FACT is, it doesn't MATTER who 'staged' the WTC/Pentagon attacks. What matters is that the government WILL use it as an excuse to take away freedoms and liberties. The Homeland Security office is now one more budget item that wasn't there last year. The suggestion of national ID cards wasn't on the table last year, either, but now it gets all sorts of play, as does facial-recognition hardware in airports.
NO ONE is suggesting the WTC/Pentagon were 'staged'. But some of us ARE suggesting that it will inevitably result in the loss of liberties.
Believing so doesn't make me a pansy, it doesn't make me a peacenik, it doesn't make me Un-American, and it doesn't make me Muslim.
It makes me concerned about our country's future.
And, plainly, even the name "Homeland Security" is starting to get a little Orwellian.
As for censorship, there do seem to be an awful lot of posts that are pulled for what could best be described as 'matters of taste' as opposed to 'matters of security' or 'matters of slander'. And I wonder if THAT situation is going to get better, or worse. Just MHO.
However I raise this point: there are many reasons people inquire into the reason behind someone's banishment. Although there are those who would like to scream and bark at the moon about management decisions (hence turning the forum into a meta-discussion that becomes irrelevant to the stated purpose) many people want to know so they have an example of what not to do. Most long time posters that I know who are concerned about such things are not interested in spitting in Jim's face and having their posting privilages revoked, but rather in gaining a better sense of what is not acceptable. When the reasons are not apparent for certain action, speculation abounds.
"Us folks" have condemned the attacks.
"Us folks" have condemned national ID cards.
"Us folks" have condemned censorship (unless it has to do with troop movements).
"Us folks" have expressed concern for the health of the Bill of Rights in the wake of these attacks.
"Us folks" don't believe in dropping a bunch of bombs on innocent civilians that have nothing to do with the Taliban.
"Us folks" have examined the seriousness of the Clintionian/Goreian security failures associated with the 9-11 attack.
"Us folks" are getting banned daily.
What have you been doing?
I didn't see this thread, so I can't say whether this is correct... But, if this is true, I hope demidog e-mails Jim and requests to be reinstated. Many of us, myself included, have gotten "timeouts" for going over the line at one point or another. I hate to see a longtime freeper banned long-term over something that happens in the heat of an argument. Heck, if A+Bert can be reinstated time after time, there is hope for all of us!
Anybody can find an outrageous post or two in this forum or any other open forum. And just as Internet users are increasingly aware, they mean absolutely nothing about either the general ambiance of the forum cited or the strength or weakness of the question under discussion.
The Left is frantically angling for some defensible way to allow Osama bin Laden off the hook for murdering thousands of Americans on American soil. Elkins is simply running his contribution to that effort (risibly, Wilson and WWI) up the flagpole to see if anybody salutes.
The above post on another thread made me mad...I said I felt like hitting the abuse button(This is mindless Bush Bashing in my book)and asked if anyone else thought the same....boy did I catch flak...does anyone agree that this statement in the middle of a crises should not stand? I must note I did not hit the abuse button as I rarely do...
No.
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