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Here, go read this: War is a Racket, by Major General Smedley D. Butler, USMC.

And before you think he's some kind of whacko, know that he is a two time recipient of the Medal of Honor. Here's a quote from him:

"I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents."

That whole liberty and justice thing we're so proud of? That only lasted about fifty years in and was sacrificed to capitalism a long long time ago.

If I'm wrong, then why is this guy who is guilty of a single charge of copyright violation being hunted down by the FBI like a serial killer over some trumped up notion of potential lost profits? Anyone else commits copyright violation and the FBI wouldn't give them more than a raised eyebrow. I'll bet there are a dozen teenagers on my block right now who've done it hundreds of times. And strangely enough, the FBI is not pursuing them.

I mean, when a judge is passing sentence on a murderer, do they take time out to figure out how much money the victim might have contributed during his lifetime before they pass sentence? Of course not. So why the urgency with this guy? Because he pissed off a money making machine, that's why. Capitalism is offended, and we don't allow that no sir! And that's why they're going to absolutely crucify this poor bastard when they catch him.

It's unequal justice, and evidence that our government cares far more for big business (and the tax money it generates) than it cares for us.

It said "Almost". But, yet, "War is a racket" driven by a scarcity-oriented world view. From: http://www.lexrex.com/enlightened/articles/warisaracket.htm

Ah yes, the post-scarcity myth. I don't buy it. Too-cheap-to-meter resources are still scarce. The scarcity-oriented world view will still hold because the resources will still be scarce. And that's not even counting that we already found numerous ways to implement artificial scarcity.

It said "Almost". But, yet, "War is a racket" driven by a scarcity-oriented world view. From:
    http://www.lexrex.com/enlightened/articles/warisaracket.htm

WAR IS A RACKET

by Two-Time Congressional Medal of Honor Recipient

Major General Smedley D. Butler - USMC Retired

About the Author

CHAPTER ONE

WAR IS A RACKET

WAR is a racket. It always has been.

It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.

A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small "inside" group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes.

In the World War [I] a mere handful garnered the profits of the conflict. At least 21,000 new millionaires and billionaires were made in the United States during the World War. That many admitted their huge blood gains in their income tax returns. How many other war millionaires falsified their tax returns no one knows.

How many of these war millionaires shouldered a rifle? How many of them dug a trench? How many of them knew what it meant to go hungry in a rat-infested dug-out? How many of them spent sleepless, frightened nights, ducking shells and shrapnel and machine gun bullets? How many of them parried a bayonet thrust of an enemy? How many of them were wounded or killed in battle?

Out of war nations acquire additional territory, if they are victorious. They just take it. This newly acquired territory promptly is exploited by the few - the selfsame few who wrung dollars out of blood in the war. The general public shoulders the bill.

And what is this bill?

This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones. Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Depression and all its attendant miseries. Back-breaking taxation for generations and generations.

For a great many years, as a soldier, I had a suspicion that war was a racket; not until I retired to civil life did I fully realize it. Now that I see the international war clouds gathering, as they are today, I must face it and speak out. ...

Retarded and wrong. The only thing that can fix our country is education. For instance, a good start might be educating everyone about why democracy is evil, and not something that we want more of. I'll give you a hint why democracy sucks; people are stupid fucks, for instance crying for democracy which would be the rule of said dumbfucks.

http://www.insecta-inspecta.com/ants/army/index.ht ml Some else beat me to it - the good old army ant. War requires a large centralized organization. As long as the attributes that lead to wars starting are selected for, we will have them. People survive to have more children by either banding together to defend their territory or seizing the territory of another. In the first, defensive case, such people can be roused to go to war by their leadership contriving an external threat - through either putting so much pressure on the nation they want to go to war with or by a false flag operation on their own people. Corporations have also LONG been starting wars. See Smedley Butler, "War is a Racket". http://www.lexrex.com/enlightened/articles/warisar acket.htm

I appreciate the reply.

We can quibble over specifics, especially the issue of who pays the costs versus who gets the benefits, e.g.:
      Banking: The gold standard (gold dinar and islamic banking vs. fiat dollars and usury):
          http://www.moneyfiles.org/goldwar.html
          http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_gold_dinar
          http://www.prosperityuk.com/prosperity/articles/wi zzoz.html
    Health: "Has Canada Got The Cure?"
        http://www.alternet.org/story/40951/
    Empire: "War is a Racket"
          http://lexrex.com/enlightened/articles/warisaracke t.htm
but thanks for the comment about being a good start -- we sure need to start somewhere. :-)

Another excerpt from the essay:
    http://www.kurtz-fernhout.com/oscomak/AchievingASt arTrekSociety.html
"A common denominator in just about each of these areas is the domination
by out-of-date ideologies based on scarcity perspectives and/or the
capture of the government regulatory and funding bodies by narrow
interests who are afraid of losing out by progressive post-scarcity
change (which they fear will leave them impoverished). There is also the
issue of some people desiring to continue to have lots of raw power over
other people's lives (like that of a master over slaves); frankly I
can't address that character flaw other than to point at religious and
humanistic traditions of enlarging one's sense of self to include
community and world responsibilities (including finding joy in helping
the growth of others to be independent decision makers), so I restrict
what follows to monetary aspects of the problem. Ultimately though, raw
power lust has to be dealt with -- and dealing with that I freely admit
will be tougher than the economic aspects of making the case for a
post-scarcity worldview."

That is really where the core of the problem is. We can always argue about specifics in any one area -- but that is the big picture as we transition to a world where kids realize the schools they are forced to be in have little relation to an emerging post-scarcity reality made possible by automation and the internet:
    http://www.whywork.org/

This appears to have expired somtime between Nov 2000 and Sept 2001.

Nope. It expired in 1798

"War is a Racket" by Smedley Darlington Butler dovetails into this picture of widespread conditioning for war:

http://lexrex.com/enlightened/articles/warisaracke t.htm

I'm not so worried about soldiers being trained with simuluations, but the slimy tactics used by our military to condition kids to kill (by giving away America's Army for free) sickens me. Even more so when you start to realize how phony this whole war on terra is, and how much it's driven by Cheney's stock options rather than any of the plentiful real threats that are facing us. We have far more to fear from global warming, overpopulation, peak oil than any number of terrorist attacks.

Whereupon the deputies so appointed being now assembled, in a full and free representation of these colonies, taking into their most serious consideration, the best means of attaining the ends aforesaid, do, in the first place, as Englishmen, their ancestors in like cases have usually done, for asserting and vindicating their rights and liberties, declare,

That the inhabitants of the English Colonies in North America, by the immutable laws of nature, the principles of the English constitution, and the several charters or compacts, have the following rights:

Resolved, N.C.D. 2 1. That they are entitled to life, liberty, and property, and they have never ceded to any sovereign power whatever, a right to dispose of either without their consent.

Thou shalt not steal

In common use, property is simply 'one's own thing' and refers to the relationship between individuals and the objects which they see as being their own to dispense with as they see fit.

What would you say if someone came up to you and said "You deserve to go to jail." And if you ask why, you will be told: "Because I think so."

Regardless of what preceeded the "you deserve..." statement, to say something like that is in essence forcing a value judgement upon another person. That's what makes the second half of Franklin's statement arrogant.

But I guess that's the way the world works these days. If a majority thinks the forceful value judgement, then you are stuck being a minority opinion that gets crushed.

PS: And yes, I do realize that what I just described is touching the subject of the difference between democracy and a republic as a form of government.

Freedom of Speech is not just an issue that affects speakers. It affects listeners. Decency is being used to quiet people in the media who have been critical of the current administration. The definition is intentionally vague such that it can be applied arbitrarily against political enemies.

Think I'm exaggerating? Check out the case where some stations broadcasting Howard Stern were fined by the FCC because he described (without profanity) what a 'Blumpkin' is. Meanwhile, stations broadcasting Oprah Winfrey are not fined when one of her guests defined what 'tossing salad' means.

I do consider the current terorist threat to be serious. Way more deserving of attention than gay marriage, which the republicans in the Senate spent all week trying to ban. But I also think that as a country, we've proven time and time again that our freedoms are more important than human lives. That's why we send soldiers into battles-- for our freedoms.

Movie/radio studios may be fined for not abiding by it but it isn't affecting your level of freedom whatsoever and the role of the gov't is to protect the views of the many over the views of the individual, otherwise there is no reason to be voting on anything if the majority means nothing in this country anymore.

I know this will sound condescending, but please ask your teachers about the validity of what you've said here. The original framers of the Constitution couldn't disagree with you more. Consider this quote from James Madison:

The traditional American philosophy teaches that The Majority must be strictly limited in power, and in the operation of government, for the protection of The Individual's God-given, unalienable rights proclaimed in the Declaration of Independence and, therefore, of the rights of The Minority--of all minorities.

How about this other quote from James Madison:

No majority, however great even all of the people but one Individual--may properly infringe, or possess the power to infringe, the rights of any minority, however small--even a minority of a lone Individual.

Movie studios, by the way, are not at risk of fines from the government. There is no government regulation of content restricting movies, books, newspapers, cable TV, or magazines. Just broadcast radio and television. Somehow, our civilization has survived through the onslaught of bare nipples and four-letter words found in these other media formats.

Oops - corrected url for lexrex (cut and paste was too greedy). Sorry.

You are incorrect. Treaties must be constitutional.
Treaties are limited

But it is dangerous because they are trying to do things our own legislature did not want. It is marketed like : well all these countries aggreed so we should too.

Quote from the link:
"A related and most preposterous allegation is that a treaty "can cut across the rights given the people by the constitutional Bill of Rights"--than which nothing could be further from the truth, partly for two reasons:..."