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I honestly can not tell if you are being sarcastic or not... >Where are the secret police whisking away "dissenters" in the middle of the night? Think IRS tar

I honestly can not tell if you are being sarcastic or not... >Where are the secret police whisking away "dissenters" in the middle of the night? Think IRS targeting; think of the secret targeted kill lists (not only can you not know who is on it, you can not know the criteria to get on it). >Where are the mass forced migrations of ethnic minorities? Check the farms where you will find field hands who are likely undocumented immigrants. Or check the slums, no need to physically relocate anyone when you can economically relocate them. >Where are the mass executions of political prisoners? Thank goodness there is no argument here. However, we do have indefinite detentions and targeted kill lists without due process/judicial review. Maybe not mass executions, but one targeted killing by the government is to much for my tastes. >Fraudulent elections? Um...2000 Bush v. Gore? Florida? Certainly no known fraud, but an election decided by a single state and a few hundred votes, where thousands went missing for a period of time, not to mention the "faulty ballots" in Florida. I would say this is more like MLB during the steroid era, sure the new records still stand, but there is a asterisk next to the names. >A one party state? You have a choice between red or blue, either way you get budget deficits, a surveillance state, Gitmo, war of terror(opps *on), ect...

lukifer 13y ago
Read up on Greg Palast's investigation of voting machines. There's substantial evidence of vote tampering in 2000 and 2004.
- specialist 13y ago
  VoterAction.org proved in court that Kerry won New Mexico in 2004, even though its electoral votes were awarded to Bush. Just the tip of the iceberg.
- adventured 13y ago
  And the regular, massive voter fraud throughout major Democrat strongholds like Philadelphia. There's little question BOTH parties are engaging in routine election fraud.
  - lukifer 13y ago
    Even if one generously ascribes good motives to every political campaign, politicians and their staff are under enormous pressure to win. If there exists any way to cheat the system (hacked voting machines, gerrymandering, voter suppression, the list goes on), it will be taken advantage of. And We The People deserve what we get for allowing these flaws to persist.
jasonlotito 13y ago
So, while we have problems that should be addressed, it's no where close to the police state the GP was referring to.
- will_brown 13y ago
  My understanding of the GP is specifically that we should not be comparing ourselves to 1984, but instead acknowledge the real problems we are facing, the OP article being a reflection of one of the real problems. I agree it really does not do a great deal of good to compare ourselves to some hypothetical society, especially when we have such a rich and vast historical record to compare our modern actions against. We just need to look to the history of the NSA and CIA and see a whole range of domestic spying operations (the Prisms of their day): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_CHAOS http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_CHAOS http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MERRIMAC http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MERRIMAC http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MINARET http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MINARET http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_RESISTANCE http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_RESISTANCE http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_SHAMROCK http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_SHAMROCK The truth is comparing the US to some hypothetical police state we are simultaneously better off and worse off (so who cares if we are close to being that police state), but one thing is for sure our problems affect real lives on a daily basis, I think that is the point the GP was making.

lukifer 13y ago

Read up on Greg Palast's investigation of voting machines. There's substantial evidence of vote tampering in 2000 and 2004.

specialist 13y ago
VoterAction.org proved in court that Kerry won New Mexico in 2004, even though its electoral votes were awarded to Bush. Just the tip of the iceberg.
adventured 13y ago
And the regular, massive voter fraud throughout major Democrat strongholds like Philadelphia. There's little question BOTH parties are engaging in routine election fraud.
- lukifer 13y ago
  Even if one generously ascribes good motives to every political campaign, politicians and their staff are under enormous pressure to win. If there exists any way to cheat the system (hacked voting machines, gerrymandering, voter suppression, the list goes on), it will be taken advantage of. And We The People deserve what we get for allowing these flaws to persist.

jasonlotito 13y ago

So, while we have problems that should be addressed, it's no where close to the police state the GP was referring to.

will_brown 13y ago
My understanding of the GP is specifically that we should not be comparing ourselves to 1984, but instead acknowledge the real problems we are facing, the OP article being a reflection of one of the real problems. I agree it really does not do a great deal of good to compare ourselves to some hypothetical society, especially when we have such a rich and vast historical record to compare our modern actions against. We just need to look to the history of the NSA and CIA and see a whole range of domestic spying operations (the Prisms of their day): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_CHAOS http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_CHAOS http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MERRIMAC http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MERRIMAC http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MINARET http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MINARET http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_RESISTANCE http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_RESISTANCE http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_SHAMROCK http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_SHAMROCK The truth is comparing the US to some hypothetical police state we are simultaneously better off and worse off (so who cares if we are close to being that police state), but one thing is for sure our problems affect real lives on a daily basis, I think that is the point the GP was making.