NEWS AND VIEWS THAT IMPACT LIMITED CONSTITUTIONAL GOVERNMENT
"There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with
power to endanger the public liberty." - - - - John Adams
Showing posts with label Benjamin Franklin. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Benjamin Franklin. Show all posts
(Zerohedge) A federal judge on Tuesday ruled that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. can continue to pursue his lawsuit against the Biden administrationover censorship at the direction of the government.
The decision comes after a June ruling by the Supreme Court, which established who can sue the Biden administration for violating their First Amendment rights when government officials pressured social media companies to suppress free speech did not have standing to sue.
According to District Court Judge Terry Doughty, Kennedy meets the standard set by the Supreme Court because there is "ample evidence" to show he was censored at the direction of government actors, and is at "substantial risk" that the censorship will continue, the Daily Caller reports.
Kennedy was named by one of the "Disinformation Dozen" - and was specifically targeted by the government over what they alleged was COVID-19 misinformation, Doughty noted in his ruling - adding that there is "not much dispute" that Kennedy, and his organization - Children's Health Defense, were "were specifically targeted by the White House, the Office of Surgeon General, and CISA [Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency]."
"The Court finds that there is further risk for future risk injury here because Kennedy is a 2024 presidential candidate," wrote Doughty.
"Freedom of speech is a principal pillar of a free government; when this support is taken away, the constitution of a free society is dissolved, and tyranny is erected on its ruins."
California Superior Court Judge Harold E. Kahn ruled on Thursday against Twitter’s petition to dismiss a lawsuit that white nationalist Jared Taylor filed after Twitter banned him from the social media platform.
Kahn ruled that Twitter did not violate Taylor’s First Amendment rights for permanently suspending his account in December, but instead that Twitter may have fraudulently advertised itself as a site that is devoted to free speech. Taylor’s complaint was “very eloquent” and that “it goes to the heart of free speech principles that long precede our constitution,” Khan said, according to a court transcript.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs in the case, Taylor and his publishing company New Century Foundation, argue that the social media platform violated California law by removing Taylor’s account because they disagree with his viewpoints.
Twitter maintained its right to discriminate against any account in its argument and argued that part of the reason they suspended Taylor was because him and other white nationalists benefit by using Twitter to espouse their message.
“I think it reflects that this is a suit about these two plaintiffs with an enormous public stake in this case; they say that their whole enterprise of spewing … white — you know, white racism to the world depends on Twitter; that they built their enterprise around this,” said Patrick Carome, a lawyer representing Twitter, according to the court transcript.
Taylor, who was born in Japan, is an outspoken white nationalist and member of the alt-right who advocates for people of “European origin” to be allowed the right to be “left alone.” He completely rejects the “white supremacist” and “racist” labels, pointing to the supposed higher on average IQ’s of Asians compared to white people, Taylor said in a CNN interview in May 2017.
"In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes."
Benjamin Franklin
By Gary;
With his new tax plan Donald Trump has fully embraced the mainstream position of Conservative Republican Socialism.
While Trump's move is positive there was no talk about abolishing the IRS or a simple flat tax.
Under Trump fewer and fewer voters will have to pay taxes, but those voters who do not pay taxes will still receive benefits from the state that will be paid for by others.
Pro-Business Conservative Socialism, and the Marxist re-distribution of the wealth, dates back to the GOP of William Howard Taft which enthusiastically rammed through the Federal income tax constitutional amendment.
The aim of the GOP was to buy the votes of those who would not have to pay the tax and use that new cash to spend on projects benefiting those voters. The entire income tax is Marxist class warfare that flares up as a useful campaign issue every two years on election day.
Trump's buying of votes is good politics
Only a few "insane" people like me would abolish the IRS and the income tax. So Trump's move is good politics from the mainstream GOP viewpoint.
Trump would consolidate the current seven tax rates to four: 0%, 10%, 20% and 25%. Those changes would exempt all married couples makes $50,000 or less from the income tax. Business taxes would drop to 15%.
Certainly simplifying the tax code and lowering rates moves us closer to the freedom end of political spectrum. With this plan The Donald firmly places himself in the camp of political and financial freedom.
The real test will come on spending where the "small government" Republicans can't stop themselves from ringing up the nation's Visa card and piling debt up to the moon.
American Empire vs Roman Empire: Monetary history repeats itself
Taxes as a Weapon From the dawn of history taxes have been used by the all-powerful state to reward supporters of the regime and to punish political enemies. Thus is has always been and thus I am afraid it always will be.
Republican William Howard Taft k America's First Socialist President kIn 1909 GOP President William Howard Taft urged the Republican controlled Congress to adopt the Marxist progressive income tax. Taft and a GOP Congress brought Marxism and class warfare to the U.S. by passing the income tax amendment to the Constitution.
The Republican Party promised to "soak the rich" (the top 1%). The GOP adopted Marxism in a shameless pandering for the votes of those who would not have to pay the tax. Both Democrats and Republicans have been loyal to Karl Marx ever since. k See our article: It's Income Tax Day - Thank a Republican
Democrats and Republicans working together to establish Secret Courts to hear Secret Evidence and issue Secret Search Warrants and Secret Gag Orders. All together now say "Sieg Heil."
(Tech Dirt) - California judge Paul Grewal continues to hold up his end of the "Magistrates' Revolt." Grewal was the magistrate who shot down the government's open-ended request to grab every email in a person's Gmail account and sort through them at its leisure. He was actually the second magistrate to shoot down this request. The government went "judge shopping" after Judge John Facciola told it the scope of the request needed to be narrowed considerably before he would eventhink about granting it. The government decided it still wanted all the email and traveled across the country to see Judge Grewal… who told them to GTFO without even giving the feds the option to rewrite the request.
Law enforcement cannot indefinitely forbid Yahoo Inc from revealing a grand jury subpoena that seeks subscriber account information, a U.S. judge ruled, because doing so would violate the company’s free speech rights.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Paul Grewal in San Jose, California on Thursday wrote that the government’s request would prohibit Yahoo from disclosing the subpoena, even years after the grand jury concluded its probe. The court order does not disclose the target of the federal investigation.
“In an era of increasing public demand for transparency about the extent of government demands for data from providers like Yahoo!, this cannot stand,” Grewal wrote.
Yahoo has had its fill of government secrecy. It spent a long time fighting both broad subscriber data requests from the NSA and their accompanying 25-year gag orders. Its ardent defense of its subscribers against broad government requests would still be under seal, but thanks to recently declassified documents, it has been able to address the subject publicly -- nearly 18 years before the gag order would have "aged off."
The DOJ again wants to maintain its subpoena secrecy, hoping to keep internet platforms like Yahoo, Twitter and Facebook from discussing grand jury subpoenas until… well, it's not entirely clear there's really an ending date.
Instead of asking that Yahoo be gagged for 60 or 90 days, the government asked that the company be gagged until further order of the court.
Grewal's rejection points out that the government feels entitled to indefinite gag orders, but has yet to offer any reasons why it should have its wishes granted.
The government did not demonstrate why such an indefinite request was necessary, Grewal wrote.
Judge Grewal has sent the government back to perform a rewrite -- either providing justification for its ridiculous demands, or to request something less illogical, like a finite gag order. The government has availed itself of many judicial rubber stamps over the years, but it looks like it's still running into resistance on both coasts: Paul Grewal in California and John Facciola in Washington D.C.
The ACLU has also been engaged in this fight against government secrecy since early last year, bringing more attention and legal expertise to an issue that hasn't achieved the terminal velocity of mainstream media attention. It's a bit more trench warfare, pitting magistrate judges and amicus briefs against the DOJ's assumption that it should have whatever it asks for, because terrorism, drugs, grand juries or whatever.
For reasons of their own, both the Left and the Right rip into the Bill of Rights in
order to build an unconstitutional centralized Big Brother State.
Question of the Day - Does the Republican Party even exist? or are we just looking at a Socialist Democrat-Lite Party pretending to disagree with Democrats on the role of government?
Most of the rank and file of both political parties are circling the wagons to attack Edward Snowden and defend the unconstitutional All-Powerful Surveillance State they created together.
Democrat Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein said on Sunday Edward Snowden should "come back and face the music."
"I don't think this man is a whistleblower," the Socialist witch said on CBS's "Face the Nation." "Whatever his motives are, and I take him at face value, he could have stayed and faced the music. I don't think running is a noble thought."
"He has taken an oath," Feinstein continued. "These oaths mean something. If you can't keep the oath, get out. And then do something about it in a legal way," reports Politico.
Liar, liar, pants on fire - What about you oath Feinstein? as you try to confiscate guns and abolish the 2nd, 4th and 10th Amendments.
Asshole Alert GOP Rep. Mike Rogers: Snowden's Secrets 'Belong To The People Of The US' & He's a traitor for giving them what they own. . Mike Rogers, the head of the House Intelligence Committee, has an incredible knack for spewing pure bullshit in defense of whatever he's supporting, rarely even bothering to make sure his statements are internally consistent. Still, his statements on Meet the Press this weekend take that nonsense to a new high. Rogers goes off on Snowden -- who he has already declared "is a traitor" -- arguing in favor of the "theft of government property" charges against Snowden by making the following statement:
"He has taken information that does not belong to him -- it belongs to the people of the United States."
Right. This information that "belongs to the people of the United States," which has been totally hidden from us, was actually finally given to the people of the United States -- to which Rogers admits it belongs -- by Snowden. (techdirt.com)
Judge Napolitano: I Still Think Snowden's An American Hero
ACLU Files Lawsuit Over Government Massive Phone Record Grab ACLU Files Lawsuit Over Government Massive Phone Record Grab - Judge Andrew Napolitano - Cavuto.
GOP's Peter King urges Obama to get out and aggressively support the Police State
The Constitution and Bill of Rights has no meaning to the vast majority of Senators and Congressmen from both political parties.
Republican Congressman Peter King said Monday that while he’s hesitant to second-guess a president in the middle of an ongoing crisis, President Obama should have been out in front more on the NSA leak case, talking to the American people more effectively about exactly why the country is using broad surveillance techniques and letting the Chinese and the Russians know that being complicit in protecting self-identified leaker Edward Snowden will not be tolerated.
Reichsführer Peter King
“I hate to be in the middle of a crisis second-guessing a president, but where is he? Where is the president?” King, New York Republican, said Monday on CNN. “Why is he not speaking to the American people? Why is he not more forceful with dealing with foreign leaders?”
King, former chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said Hong Kong’s decision not to extradite Snowden was entirely political reports the Washington Times.
“This was strictly a political decision, and I can’t believe Hong Kong would have made it without China encouraging it or certainly acquiescing in it,” King said.
“As far as tipping the balance, we have to take a much tougher attitude with China, certainly don’t give them the benefit of the doubt on issues, whether it involves trade, whether it involves currency or whatever, we have to step back and say that business cannot go on as usual. This is really up to the president to be more aggressive and to know how to play his cards better than I think he has until now.”
A Mrs. Powel of Philadelphia asked Benjamin Franklin, “Well, Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?” With no hesitation whatsoever, Franklin responded, “A republic, if you can keep it.”
Bush-Era NSA Whistleblower: A GOP run NSA wiretapped Democrat Senate candidate Obama
Tit for tat. Then the Obama run NSA ups Bush and spied on the entire fucking nation and the Obama IRS targets the Tea Party.
Neither party gives a damn about the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. The mouth-breathing lackeys in both parties act as the brainless cheerleaders for their respective Dear Leaders.
Police State - Russ Tice, a former intelligence analyst and Bush-era NSA whistleblower, claimed Wednesday that the intelligence community has ordered surveillance on a wide range of groups and individuals, including high-ranking military officials, lawmakers and diplomats.
He also made another stunning allegation. He says the NSA had ordered wiretaps on phones connected to then-Senate candidate Barack Obamaback in 2004reports The Blaze.
“They went after–and I know this because I had my hands literally on the paperwork for these sort of things–they went after high-ranking military officers; they went after members of Congress, both Senate and the House, especially on the intelligence committees and on the armed services committees and some of the–and judicial,” said Tice.
He went on: “But they went after other ones, too. They went after lawyers and law firms. All kinds of–heaps of lawyers and law firms. They went after judges. One of the judges is now sitting on the Supreme Court that I had his wiretap information in my hand. Two are former FISA court judges."
They went after State Department officials. They went after people in the executive service that were part of the White House–their own people.”
Then Tice dropped the bombshell about Obama.
“Here’s the big one,” he said. “[T]his was in summer of 2004, one of the papers that I held in my hand was to wiretap a bunch of numbers associated with a 40-something-year-old wannabe senator for Illinois. You wouldn’t happen to know where that guy lives right now would you? It’s a big white house in Washington, D.C. That’s who they went after, and that’s the president of the United States now.”
FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds and Tice agreed that such wide-ranging surveillance of officials could provide the intelligence agencies with unthinkable power to blackmail their opponents.
“I was worried that the intelligence community now has sway over what is going on,” Tice said.
Democrats and Republicans join together to claim they are idiots and did not know spying was going on
And then there are the neo-Fascists who openly claim that violating the Bill of Rights is good for you and the nation.
By Gary;
Bullshit Alert.
The bought and paid for bi-partisan Washington Elites are circling the wagons to defend the unconstitutional Big Brother Police State that they have been creating.
There are two points of view the Elites are presenting to a disinterested mouth-breathing public more interested in their shiny phones than freedom:
#1 Ignorance: "The administration claims authority to sift through details of our private lives because the Patriot Act says that it can. I disagree. I authored the Patriot Act, and this is an abuse of that law. . . . (but) Technically, the administration's actions were lawful. While some members of Congress were briefed most, including myself, were not." - - - Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner (R)
#2 Fascism: “I’m a Verizon customer, I don’t mind Verizon turning over records to the government . . . ". - - - Senator Lindsay Graham (R)
The response of the Statist neo-Fascists is expected. Senators and Congressmen like Dianne Feinstein and Lindsey Graham have openly promoted ignoring the Constitution and the Bill of Rights on multiple issues over and over again.
What bothers me is the liars like Sensenbrenner who claim they know nothing about what was going on. Never mind that from day one civil libertarians have screamed about the Patriot Act and there have been endless newspaper, magazine and Internet articles about police state Internet spying, Federal funded domestic spy drones, and DHS funded microphones on city streets.
The big media is the lap-dog of the Washington Elites. The Media never asks tough questions of stooges like Sensenbrenner such as: "Gee Congressman, why are both parties voting to build a giant Data-Mining Compound in Utah if there is no spying going on?"
Funny. You never hear those questions on TV.
It was the Internet Media (this Blog included) that told the truth about the growing bi-partisan Police State.
Now you see the Elites circling their wagons and feeding the people the usual Bullshit to cover their tracts. In 30 days it will be back to business as usual.
Congress Planning To Debate CISPA Behind Closed Doors; No Public Scrutiny Allowed
The Conservative "small government" Republican Party passed the Big Brother CISPA Internet act in 2012 but it died in the Democrat Senate. Now the GOP is back again attacking Internet freedom.
Question: Does the GOP even know that a Bill of Rights exists?
The International Business Times reports that Congress will reportedly meet next week to conduct a markup of the controversial Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA), but just like last year, the House Intelligence Committee reportedly plans to hold its debates behind closed doors, away from the public eye.
Originally introduced in November 2011, CISPA purportedly aims to allow sharing of Internet traffic data between companies and the government to better detect and protect critical infrastructure against cyberthreats and cyberattacks. The bill, however, has been condemned by Internet privacy and civil liberties advocates for its lack of limits on how and when the government can monitor one’s Internet browsing information.
Many believe CISPA would undermine the current cybersecurity program that protects civilian privacy, because it would allow companies in the private sector to share any information derived from communications with users directly with the National Security Agency (NSA), which would include personal information like emails and Internet browsing data. Even if the information was protected by privacy law, companies’ sharing of user data would be immune to criminal or civil liability as it is authorized by CISPA says the International Business Times.
CISPA = Big Brother is coming for Internet Freedom
CISPA cyber bill resurrected in Congress
CISPA is Back | Think Tank
Opponents like the ACLU, Electronic Frontier Foundation and a coalition of 41 organizations also believe the bill’s language is dangerously broad, especially regarding the definition of “cyber threat information,” which doesn’t require companies to remove any personally identifying information (PII) unrelated to the threat. And since CISPA’s use restrictions only apply to the Federal government, the bill could potentially permit the government to use any “cyber threat information” for non-cyber security purposes.
“Since CISPA broadly immunizes corporations from criminal and civil liability, it prevents customers from holding those companies accountable if they negligently or recklessly mishandle their data,” former White House Cybersecurity Director Chris Finan wrote in a recent column for Wired.
“To avoid the moral hazards of such broad immunity, lawmakers should carefully tailor corporate liability protections,” he said. “Yes, the risk of a cyber attack is indeed real, and warrants careful legislative action. But as Congress again debates how to address this risk, our elected officials must be willing to reject the false choices and drastic measures that would undermine our fundamental principles.”
Comrade Obama and his administration threatened to veto the CISPA bill last year, warning that the bill “lacks sufficient limitations on the sharing of personally identifiable information between private entities” and “treats domestic cybersecurity as an intelligence activity and thus, significantly departs from longstanding efforts to treat the Internet and cyberspace as civilian spheres.” Given how the bill is largely unchanged from last year’s version, it’s possible Obama will issue a similar response to Congress in 2013.
“The American people expect their Government to enhance security without undermining their privacy and civil liberties,” the Obama administration said in a statement. “Without clear legal protections and independent oversight, information sharing legislation will undermine the public's trust in the government as well as in the Internet by undermining fundamental privacy, confidentiality, civil liberties and consumer protections.”
Over the past couple of weeks, more than 150,000 Internet users have taken action against CISPA, speaking out on Twitter with the hashtag “#CISPAalert,” and joining campaigns on behalf of Demand Progress, Daily Kos and the ACLU. The Electronic Frontier Foundation says more than 37,000 people contacted members of Congress using the organization’s own “action center,” including 15,000 people in the last week of March alone.
“Congress doesn't want an open discussion on the many problems with CISPA, so it does what it does best: try to hide things away and rush them through when (hopefully) not enough people are looking,” Floor64 founder Mike Masnick said on Tuesday via TechDirt. “It makes you wonder just what CISPA's supporters are so worried about. Congress is supposed to work for the public, not hide things away from the public. This isn't a situation where they're discussing classified info or plans -- but merely a bill focused on information sharing between the government and private companies. Any markup on CISPA needs to be public.”
For more about CISPA, the Electronic Frontier Foundation has excellent resources with information about the bill, as well as ways to take action and get the word out.
Conservatives on the Supreme Court Abolish the 4th Amendment in the name of "National Security".
"There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one's safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he were sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to." - - - Joseph Heller, Catch-22
INSANE LOGIC - Democrats and Republicans in Congress have granted the President the unconstitutional power to secretly spy on American's Internet messages and phone calls without search warrants in the name of security. But the Supreme Court says Americans have no right to sue the government because the program is secret and there is no way to tell if you have any "standing" to sue.
Total Catch-22 Bullshit.
The Supreme Court has made some insane rulings over the years (and good ones too) but the Constitutional "logic" of the Conservative majority is off in la-la land.
When Congress and the executive branch collude to keep Americans in the dark about whether their privacy is being invaded, the Supreme Court should be willing to lift the veil of secrecy — at least to the extent of forcing the government to explain how often it is monitoring the confidential conversations of Americans.
The court abdicated that important watchdog role Tuesday when it ruled 5 to 4 that a group of journalists, lawyers and activists couldn't challenge the constitutionality of a shadowy electronic surveillance program. It's only the latest example of the court's refusal to afford victims (or potential victims) of post-9/11 policies their day in court.
Tuesday's decision came in a lawsuit filed by several people — including lawyers for suspected terrorists held at Guantanamo Bay — who claim that a 2008 law authorizing the surveillance of non-Americans abroad violates the constitutional rights of Americans whose phone conversations and emails might be caught up in the electronic dragnet.
Judge Napolitano: Congress Extends Warrantless Wiretapping
That would be a challenging case to make, but the Supreme Court won't even allow the plaintiffs to try. It dismissed their suit on the grounds that they lack "standing" to sue because they can't prove that their conversations with sources and clients abroad actually have been monitored reports the Los Angeles Times.
Writing for the court, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. said that the individuals who filed suit "merely speculate and make assumptions about whether their communications with their foreign contacts will be acquired" under the law. Alito was supported by Conservatives John Roberts, Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas.
Alito was similarly scornful of the argument that they deserved standing because they had incurred expenses necessary to avoid being overheard and would have to travel to talk with clients face to face. He scathingly wrote that they "cannot manufacture standing by choosing to make expenditures based on hypothetical future harm that is not certainly impending."
The requirement that individuals have "standing" — a concrete interest in a legal dispute — is an important principle. But, as Justice Stephen G. Breyer pointed out in his dissent, the court often has recognized standing in situations in which a possible adverse effect on a plaintiff wasn't a matter of "absolute or literal certainty."
Countering Alito's strained analysis with common sense, Breyer argued that "we need only assume that the government is doing its job (to find out about, and combat, terrorism) in order to conclude that there is a high probability that the government will intercept at least some electronic communication to which at least some of the plaintiffs are parties."
Of course, in a Catch-22, the plaintiffs can't prove that because the surveillance program is secret.
The law challenged in this case was extended for another five years by the last Congress, without amendments that would have required the government to provide an accounting of how often conversations and email exchanges involving Americans were collected and accessed. The lawsuit blocked by the court on Tuesday would have provided another avenue for accountability.
Supreme Court Approved. Insanity is a universal human trait. In the 1940s a liberal Democrat controlled Supreme Court gave a rousing "Hell Yes!" to rounding up Americans of one racial group, putting them in concentration camps without a trial and confiscating their private property. Bill of Rights. What Bill of Rights?
Supreme Court Approved. Big Brother Concentration Camps, confiscation of private property and racial
identity cards. The only thing missing was a final solution plan.
Court OKs warrantless use of hidden surveillance cameras
Digital sensors become cheaper and wireless connections become more powerful.
The Justice Department would allow police to install cameras on private property without court oversight as required by the Bill of Rights.
And both Democrats and Republicans have joined together to approve and fund the new American Police State.
The Coming Police State - Once again the failed "war" on drugs is being used to abolish the Bill if Rights. Police are allowed to install hidden surveillance cameras on private property without obtaining a search warrant, a federal judge ruled.
U.S. District Judge William Griesbach ruled that it was reasonable for Drug Enforcement Administration agents to enter rural property without permission -- and without a warrant -- to install multiple "covert digital surveillance cameras" in hopes of uncovering evidence that 30 to 40 marijuana plants were being grown.
This is the latest case to highlight how advances in technology are causing the legal system to rethink how Americans' privacy rights are protected by law.
In January, the Supreme Court rejected warrantless GPS tracking after previously rejecting warrantless thermal imaging, but it has not yet ruled on warrantless cell phone tracking or warrantless use of surveillance cameras placed on private property without permission reports Cnet News.
Griesbach adopted a recommendation by U.S. Magistrate Judge William Callahan dated October 9. That recommendation said that the DEA's warrantless surveillance did not violate the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unreasonable searches and requires that warrants describe the place that's being searched.
"The Supreme Court has upheld the use of technology as a substitute for ordinary police surveillance," Callahan wrote.
Two defendants in the case, Manuel Mendoza and Marco Magana of Green Bay, Wis., have been charged with federal drug crimes after DEA agent Steven Curran claimed to have discovered more than 1,000 marijuana plants grown on the property, and face possible life imprisonment and fines of up to $10 million.
Mendoza and Magana asked Callahan to throw out the video evidence on Fourth Amendment grounds, noting that "No Trespassing" signs were posted throughout the heavily wooded, 22-acre property owned by Magana and that it also had a locked gate.
Judge Napolitano
"Government Violating 3rd/4th/5th/9th Amendments from 30,000 Ft. Above"
Both parties in Congress create and fund un-elected "independent" government agencies who rule over the people like Kings.
These un-elected agencies tax and regulate and you have zero say in your own government.
The un-elected Federal Communications Commission is starting the process to tax broadband Internet services.
The move would funnel tax money to the "Connect America Fund", a subsidy the agency created last year to expand Internet access.
The FCC issued a request for comments on the proposal in April. Dozens of companies and trade associations have weighed in, but the issue has largely flown under the public's radar reports The Hill.
"If members of Congress understood that the FCC is contemplating a broadband tax, they'd sit up and take notice," said Derek Turner, research director for Free Press, a consumer advocacy group that opposes the tax.
Numerous companies, including AT&T, Sprint and even Google have expressed support for the idea. Why? Because they don't have to pay the tax, but they do get to reap the rewards from the government spending.
Consumers already pay a fee on their landline and cellular phone bills to support the FCC's Universal Service Fund. The fund was created to ensure that everyone in the country has access to telephone service, even if they live in remote areas.
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"Taxation without representation is tyranny." James Otis
"If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare… The powers of Congress would subvert the very foundation, the very nature of the limited government established by the people of America." Alexander Hamilton
"The mistaken policy of the Stamp Act first disturbed this happy situation; but the flame thereby raised was soon extinguished by its repeal, and the old harmony restored, with all its concomitant advantage to our commerce.
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The subsequent act of another administration, which, not content with an established exclusion of foreign manufactures, began to make our own merchandise dearer to the consumers there, by heavy duties, revived it again; and combinations were entered into throughout the continent to stop trading with Britain till those duties should be repealed. All were accordingly repealed but one, the duty on tea. This was reserved (professedly so) as a standing claim and exercise of the right assumed by Parliament of laying such duties."
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