Bacon's Rebellion

Democracy Thrives in Sunlight

Loathesome Creature

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by

James A. Bacon
in

Kudos to Global Web Solutions, a Roanoke Internet service provider, for cutting off service to William A. White, a Roanoke Nazi and white supremacist, who spews racist vitriol on his website. If the weak-chinned, pasty-faced White thinks he’s an exemplar of a superior race, he’s the only one. (See his photo in this Roanoke Times article.) Short of restricting his right to free speech, we Virginians collectively should do anything we can do to marginalize loathesome creatures like this.

Let’s just hope he doesn’t wind up getting appointed to the Virginia Commission on Immigration.

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Comments

11 responses to “Loathesome Creature”

  1. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    Thank goodness he has a mileage transponder on his car so we can keep up with his movements and associations.

  2. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    hey.. all we have to do is label him a Nazi “terrorist” and we can have him carted off to rot in a jail forever.

  3. Reid Greenmun Avatar
    Reid Greenmun

    Odd … I thought our nation was founded on the principle of FREE SPEECH – I guess not everyone understands what freedom really means.

  4. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    Actually, if I understand correctly, if you are merely labelled a “terrorist” by the Government, (as opposed to actually being found guilty in a court of law), your free speech rights.. as well as many of your other “rights” including habeas corpus and/or a court proceeding to determine your guilt are no longer assured…

    Someone correct me if I’m wrong.

  5. Jim Bacon Avatar
    Jim Bacon

    Larry, give me a single example of an American citizen whom the government simply labeled a “terrorist” without cause, whose rights to free speech, habeas corpus, etc. were abrogated.

  6. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    …”On June 9, 2002, two days before District Court Judge Michael Mukasey was to issue a ruling on the validity of continuing to hold Padilla under the material witness warrant, President George Bush issued an order to Secretary Rumsfeld to detain Padilla as an “enemy combatant,” and Padilla was transferred to a military brig in South Carolina without any notice to his attorney or family. The order “legally justified” the detention using the AUMF, which authorized the President to “use all necessary force against . . . such nations, organizations, or persons” and by opining that a U.S. citizen detained on U.S. soil can be classified an enemy combatant.”

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Padilla_(alleged_terrorist)

  7. Jim Bacon Avatar
    Jim Bacon

    Larry, You left out this part of the Wikipedia article:

    “José Padilla was found guilty of all charges against him on August 16, 2007 by a federal jury, which found that he conspired to kill people in an overseas jihad and to fund and support overseas terrorism.”

    Padilla wasn’t just any old American citizen whom the government arbitrarily labeled a terrorist. He *was* a terrorist.

  8. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    .. yes he “was” determined to be a “terrorist” AFTER he was imprisoned without due process and without a lawyer and without being able to file habeas corpus for being held without charges.

    He is no choir boy – agreed and the bad part is that his treatment (and treatment of others) is now justified … on that basis

    In other words.. we can go after others the same way if we “think” they are “probably” terrorists also.

    Our Constitution says that you cannot be held without charges and cannot be denied legal assistance and cannot be held in secret even if everyone is pretty sure you are guilty.

    Our Constitution says that you must be judged guilty by due process.

    No matter how guilty he turned out to be – he was also an American Citizen put into prison without due process.

    If the Government can do it to one person – they can do it to others

    right?

  9. Jim Bacon Avatar
    Jim Bacon

    Congratulations, six years after 9/11, you can point to one guy whose rights were arguably abused. That one guy, I might remind you, still managed to get his case all the way up to the Supreme Court — so it’s not like they threw him in jail and tossed away the key.

    You can live in fear of out-of-control government arbitrarily labeling people “terrorists” and abusing their rights, if you want, but I’m a lot more worried about a government hand-cuffed by legal procedure (witness the hysteria over surveillance of overseas phone calls) unable to gather the intelligence it needs to wage the war on terror.

  10. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    I think we’re splitting hairs.. on the citizenship issue to start with.

    we’re saying, in effect, that we can label _any_ non-US-citizen with as a “terrorist” and then kidnap him/her and secretly throw them in a prison without any right to confront the charges or their accusers – ever.

    Think about what this means.

    You say this is only done to terrorists? (Jim is an allegation of terrorism a convinction?)

    Wrong! Mistakes ARE being made – (BECAUSE there is no due process).

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/03/AR2005120301476.html

    We promote ourselves to the world on the “human rights” basis..

    we even go so far as to judge other countries on _their_ “human rights”,

    Oh …do …I ever pine away for the good old days when McCarthy was in full flower with “Communism” instead of “terrorism” to hunt folks down.

    In my view, “terrorism” is the biggiest pile of dung ever to hit a fan… since .. communism…

    Some day..hopefully, enough of us will realize that we’ve been “had” on this issue and get back to American Values that we can be proud of.

  11. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    Thomas Friedman expresses thoughts similiar to mine in today’s NYT.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/30/opinion/30friedman.html?em&ex=1191384000&en=3038778814600735&ei=5087

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