good morning starshine! the federal judiciary says bye bye!

So in the 109th Congress' quest to distinguish itself as klavern of hollow men and Christo-fascists, we get this tasty treat: The Constitution Restoration Act of 2005 (also House Res 1070. Brought to you by Sens. Shelby, Brownback and Burr, the Constitution Restoration Act of 1205 (errr...wait, these ARE the Dark Ages, right?) seeks to eliminate from the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court the right to declare acts of religious establishment by agents of government. In other words, as Democrappy puts it (much better than I):

the United States may not make a law that says Christ Is Our Savior; but if federal officials put giant neon nativity scenes or "Christ is our Lord" posters, or Ten Commandments plaques, up in the lobbies of every government office, the federal judges can't do anything to stop them.

Not only that, but S.520/HR.1070 seeks to streamline the impeachment process for federal judges. This way, President Bush could re-enact the Crucifixion on the White House lawn, crying out from the cross, "all Americans must pray to Jesus Christ today!!" and if a federal court tells him to stop, the judge can be removed from office.

Or to put it less hyperbolically, the bill brings down the Hammer on pretty much the exact principles the U.S. was founded (I mean, other than the ones about "those who own the country ought to govern it").

MN friends, think about calling Mark Dayton: 888-224-9043 and Norm Coleman: 651-645-0323/800-642-6041 and urging them to fight senate bill 520. Others, get at your feds, please!

(no subject)

potential prediction thread stirring
The future is cloudy (obviously I'm still banking on the Apple-HP purchase or something like it, and I was temporarily right about the pope, and I'm sure I've said other crazy shit that's provable with a little tweaking) but history is so clear it hurts the eyes. According to Wikipedia, today is the anniversary of the join assassinations of the Rwandan and Burundian presidents, which could mark the start of Rwanda's genocides. In the article there's a kind of grim reminder about Preparations for the Genocide. I've heard on a number of occasions that Rwanda was one of those watershed events in genocide history that shows 1) how easily history is repeated and 2) how mass genocidal hysteria can erupt in an astonishing flash. Over 930K were killed in about 3 months. That's like, fuck. That's fast.

(That's like... okay, the NFL season is actually a little over 3 months long. Imagine if, instead of playing a football game every week, you went to the Metrodome or a Vikings away game and killed everyone inside. That would pretty much do it. 60,000 a week for 15 weeks would get you to about 900,000.
Or, just walk around South Dakota and Wyoming and kill everyone there in 3 months. Everyone.)

In Rwanda, neighbors were told to kill neighbors (or be killed) and they complied. They were prepared, exhorted, in some way by a call to reclaim the essential purity of their heritage and ethnicity. My friend Lee over at http://www.exodustoegypt.blogspot.com did a ton of research on the Rwandan genocide and could refute or bolster my claims; he'll be the first to tell you it's a lot more complicated than what I'm postulating here. He hasn't posted anything on it, but I'm hoping he does. He's currently living in Egypt, teaching.

So what?

According to Melvern, the Prime Minister of Rwanda, Jean Kambanda, revealed [8] that the genocide was openly discussed in cabinet meetings, and how one cabinet minister said that she was "personally in favour of getting rid of all Tutsi...without the Tutsi all of Rwanda's problems would be over".

It can happen anywhere, motherfucker. Why couldn't it happen here? Where "activist judges" are just asking for it? Liberals, moderates, non-whites, gays and bisexuals, etc etc. It could happen here, darlings.

Dammit, we need to build a HEAP. Almost all the links I found on the subject of Stephenson's HEAP are totally gun-centric. Now, I'm a pro-gun liberal, but the HEAP needs more than just brawn, we need brains too. Cryptography, concealment techniques, language lessons, food storage, political ideas, much much more.