Could We Be the Bad Guys?

If you’ve been asleep for the past few years or dead for the past two centuries like Thomas Jefferson, you may be otherwise asking yourself the question: “Could we be the bad guys?” In case you were sleeping, here’s what you missed. The government of the United States is now officially responsible for the following acts, once relegated to the acts of our most ardent enemies:

1. Kidnapping citizens both domestically and of foreign nations, formerly the calling card of North Korea;

2. Denying prisoners access to the very basic legal channels for challenging their captivity, including suspending habeas corpus;

3. Torturing prisoners using a myriad of creative techniques, some of which were likely borrowed from the North Vietnamese, just ask presidential candidate John McCain; and

4. New to our repertoire in 2007, destroying evidence that was material to identifying who was responsible for terminating the lives of over 2,974 United States citizens just a few Septembers ago.

The New York Times (yet again) recently reported that the CIA has destroyed hundreds of hours of interrogation video obtained during the aftermath of the September 11th attacks. There is no doubt that these tapes were repeatedly the subject of numerous information requests by the 911 Commission.

The only conceivable reason why the CIA would cover up and later destroy material evidence is that it is directly contrary to their position. Either way, the excuse offered by the CIA is so precious, as a CIA spokesman indicated that the agency had been prepared to turnover the interrogation videotapes to the 911 Commission, but that Commission staff members “never specifically asked for interrogation videos”. It’s important to keep in mind that these are the same people that are supposed to be foiling future attacks against our nation.

Since we are obviously no longer a country of laws, it is now even more important that we are absolutely certain that our right to keep and bear arms remains intact, particularly to afford our citizenry a means of protection against the tyrannies of government. Interestingly enough, the Supreme Court of the United States will be deciding this very issue in the coming months, with regards to whether the second amendment right to keep and bear arms pertains to private citizens or whether this right is available only to “a well regulated militia”.

While the rest of this nation waits patiently for the Supreme Court to interpret our rights, my mind is already made up. They’ll have to peel the gun out of my cold dead hand, just bury me next to Jefferson.