US Constitution--Life, Liberty, & The Pursuit of Happiness (Pt3)

Joseph R. John, USNA ‘62

Capt            USN (Ret)

Chairman, Combat Veterans For Congress PAC

This is the third article in a series of articles written to protect and defend the US Constitution; each article is posted on the Home page of our Web site.  The 4^th Amendment to the US Constitution guarantees all American citizens from “unreasonable search and seizures”; federal law requires that a specific warrant must be issued by a court to obtain specific information from a US citizen, provided there is a valid legal reason to issue the warrant.  One of the reasons members of the Continental Congress executed the Declaration of Independence was because of the unreasonable search and seizures by the British Redcoats who invaded the homes of colonists, violating their privacy to search for weapons, food, beverages, or other items they confiscated from colonists.  The Invasion of privacy by a government bureaucracy today is much more oppressive than it was by the British Redcoats before the Revolutionary War (I.e. the IRS scandal, the warrant issued against James Rosen under the Privacy Protection Act, and the current collection of billions of E-mails by the NSA every day).  The collection of phone call records, and the E-mail transmissions of law abiding citizens would have been acceptable by most Americans, if their privacy rights and their right to assemble/vote had not been systematically suppressed by the Obama Administration from February 2010 thru today, a period of over 3 years.   The Constitutional rights of religious organizations, conservative organizations, tea party groups, patriotic organizations, right to vote organizations, Republican organizations, organization supporting marriage between a man & woman, organizations designed to ferret out voter fraud, Veterans organization, etc. numbering in excess of 500  had been systematically and repeatedly violated for over three years by Obama’s political appointees in the IRS to delay their tax-exempt status of 501 (c)(4)s until after the 2012 presidential election.   Violators should be prosecuted for their criminal acts, but to date that has not happened.  American citizens do not trust the Democratic and Republican representatives in Congress to guarantee their privacy rights because they not only failed to do so for over 3 years, but don’t seem to be interested in criminally prosecuting the employees of the IRS and the Obama administration in federal court for violating the rights guaranteed to all Americans by the US Constitution (one know violators is being fully paid her excessive government salary while she is on administrative leave, and was in her office on June 3^rd going thru her E-mail account).

We listened to discussions with former NSA Intelligence Analysts, who said software programs doing data mining can be modified to still secure needed foreign contact information, without intruding into an individual’s 3^rd party records. The Patriot Act specifically prevented the NSA from doing data mining and going after 3^rd party records, yet it appears this information is being collected.  The 3^rd party records they may be currently collecting is detailed information on where Americans spend their money; they can therefore track every private transaction for the 80 year life of an individual, i.e. commercial purchases, bank records, checking account records, tax records, family medical history, donations to a church of their choosing, donations to organizations they supports, what political party they belongs to, donqt5ions to Tea Party organizations, where their children went to private schools &  college, what magazines they subscribe to, where they drive and buy gas each week, any family therapy session attended to resolve marriage or child care difficulties, what car they purchased, what sports bar they visit to watch sporting events, what Veterans organizations they may belongs to, where they go for target practice with other members of the NRA, where they purchased  their weapon’s ammunition for hunting or  for target practice, if they are recovering alcoholics, if they have or have had  a drug problem, if they were ever involved in minor law violations like traffic convictions or shop lifting, and so much more that can be used against an individual by abusive government employees who do not agree with their conservative politics of individuals and have violated the public’s trust  by oppressing them.  Since the Obama Administration repeatedly violated its trust by attacking Americans because of their political views, and Congress failed to prevent the abuses of IRS employees in its oversight responsibilities, Americans no longer trust the government not to use their confidential information against them.  No American citizen should be required to go thru life with a Damocles sword consisting of the threat from government employees hanging over their heads because of their political views.  The Obama administration’s abuses using the IRS makes the British Redcoat abuses of privacy seem insignificant.  Most Americans do not know that the freedoms guaranteed by the US Constitution have been regularly violated by the below listed policies of the IRS for many years—the Congress did nothing to stop the below listed violations of the US Constitution—so in light of the below listed policies, Americans doubt that the Congress  will protect them from abuses of the NSA.

Only the IRS can attach 100% of a tax debtor’s wages and/or property.
Only the IRS can invade the privacy of a citizen without court process of any kind.
Only the IRS can seize property without a court order.
Only the IRS can force a citizen to try his case in a special court governed by the IRS.
Only the IRS can compel the production of documents, records, and other materials without a court case being in existence.
Only the IRS can with impunity publish the details of a citizen’s debt.
Only the IRS can legally, without a court order, subject citizens to electronic surveillance.
Only the IRS can force waiver of statute of limitations and other citizen’s rights through the threat of arbitrary assessment.
Only the IRS uses extralegal coercion. Threats to witnesses to examine their taxes regularly produce whatever evidence the IRS dictates.
Only the IRS is free to violate a written agreement with a citizen.
Only the IRS uses reprisals against citizen and public officials alike.
Only the IRS can take property on the basis of conjecture.
Only the IRS is free to maintain lists of citizen guilty of no crime for the purpose of harassing and monitoring them.
Only the IRS envelops all citizens.
Only the IRS publicly admits that its purpose is to instill fear in the citizenry as a technique of performing its function.
—– Cong George V. Hansen (R-ID-2)
       Source: To Harass Our People, by George Hansen, (August 1993)

Most Americans believe the IRS employees have too much unchecked power, and that the complex IRS tax regulations should be replaced by a simple flat tax system for Americans.

After only being employed by Booz Allen Hamilton for 3 months, Edward Snowden betrayed his country by exposing two vital highly classified intelligence programs to the terrorists that have been trying to kill Americans for over 30 years, and alerted enemies of the Republic about the US’ most sophisticated intelligence-collection capabilities.  He took it upon himself to disagree with the collective judgment of the Congress, the President, Federal Court judges, and the intelligence agencies (FBI, CIA, NSA, &DIA).  Snowden’s type of shoot from the hip action can get someone killed.  Those programs were originally established by the Patriot Act after 9/11 and were designed to keep all Americans safe, however there may have been an absence of continued informed oversight by knowledgeable members of Congress (to defend the Constitutional rights accorded all Americans). It is also time to take a very hard look at the software programs for data mining program that the NSA is currently employing.  Snowden violated his sworn oath to protect the information with which we entrusted him. He lied about who we target, aided those terrorists who want to kill Americans, hinted that he can do even more damage to our intelligence organizations, and most probably fled to China or Russia.  In the course of exposing that vital information, Snowden may have put the wheels in motion to have the program looked at by Congress and possibly modified to protect Americans from the abuses that the Obama administrations perpetrate against Americans during the IRS scandal.  Snowden will probably end up in a US prison, defect to China  or Russia (who will extract Top Secret SCI information from him—with or without his consent), or may go on the run to avoid execution  of an arrest warrant issued by the US Government.  We do not consider Snowden to be a hero; “traitor” would be a more appropriated way to describe him.

The need to collect all 3^rd party information, 3 billion phone records daily, the texts of billions of Internet transmissions daily, has not proved effective for the last 13 years.  Why didn’t NSA or the intelligence agencies use the multiple phone communications records and tracking information to intercept the 9/11 terrorist who were in US going thru flight training, why didn’t they intercept the shoe bomber who was stopped by passengers in the in aircraft coming in from Europe, why didn’t they intercept the US citizen terrorist who perpetrated the attempted Times Square bombing whose truck was positioned and would have exploded if his bomb device didn’t malfunction, why didn’t the intercepts track & arrest the US citizen Al Q’ieda cleric/terrorist Anwar Al-Awlaki who was recruiting US citizen to be terrorists and had to be taken out by a drone strike in Yemen, why didn’t they intercept the 20 E-mails that the Fort Hood terrorist, Maj Hasan, had with Anwar Al-Awlaki before he killed 12 and wounded 31 military and law enforcement personnel, and why after Russian intelligence warned the FBI about the Boston marathon bomber, Tamerlan Tsamaev , didn’t they track his overseas movements (when he went to Chechnya and Dagestan in the Caucasus region of Russia).  The Obama administration has shown a propensity to bypass the Bill of Rights and violate precepts of the US Constitution at will.  The above discussed NSA program should be reviewed carefully and modified somewhat to protect Americans from further abuses of the Obama administration.  The 20 endorsed Combat Veterans For Congress listed below have sworn to protect and defend the freedoms of all Americans in accordance with provisions of the US Constitution; we ask supporters who receive our transmissions to support their elections in the 2014 mid-term election.

Joseph R. John, USNA ‘62

Capt            USN (Ret)

Chairman, Combat Veterans For Congress PAC

2307 Fenton Parkway, Suite 107-184

San Diego, CA 92108

Fax: (619) 220-0190

http://www.combatveteransforcongress.org

Then I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?” Then I said, “Here am I. Send me!”-Isaiah 6:8

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20 Combat Veterans For Congress in 14 States—–Embedded Integrity

Senator John McCain, Capt-USN, USNA ’58, (R-AZ-Senate) http://www.countryfirstpac.com

Senator Mark S. Kirk, Cdr-USNR (R-IL-Senate) http://www.kirkforsenate.com

Cong Duncan D. Hunter, Capt-USMCR (R-CA-52) http://www.hunterforcongress.com/

Cong Steve Pearce, Capt-USAF (R-NM-2) http://www.peopleforpearce.com

Cong Michael Coffman, Maj-USMC (Ret) (R-CO-6) http://coffmanforcongress.com

Cong John P. Kline, Col-USMC (Ret) (R-MN-2) http://www.klineforcongress.com

Cong Chris Gibson, Col-USA (Ret) (R-NY-20) http://chrisgibsonforcongress.com

Cong Steve Stivers, Lt. Col-USANG (R-OH-15) http://www.stivers4congress.com    

Cong Tim Griffin, Maj-USAR (JAG) (R-AR-2) http://www.timgriffinforcongress.com       

Cong Adam Kinzinger, Cpt-AFNG (R-IL-11) http://www.electadam.com

Cong Michael Grimm, USMC/FBI (R-NY-11) http://grimmforcongress.com

Cong Joe Heck, Col-USAR (MC) (R-NV-3) http://heck4nevada.com

Cong Jeff J. Denham, SSgt-USAF (R-CA-10) http://www.DenhamForCongress.com    

Cong Paul Cook, Col-USMC (Ret) (R-CA-8) http://www.joinpaulcook.com   

Cong Scott G. Perry, Col-PAARNG(R-PA-4) http://www.patriotsforperry.com                       

Cong Brad Wenstrup, Lt Col-USAR (MC) (R-OH-2) http://www.usabrad.com

Cong James Bridenstine, Lcdr-USNR (R-OK-1) http://jimbridenstine.com/

Cong Ron DeSantis, Lcdr-USNR (JAGC) (R-FL-6) http://voteron2012.com/

Cong Thomas B. Cotton, Cpt-USA (R-AR-4) http://www.cottonforcongress.com

Col Robert L. Maness, USAF (Ret) (R-LA-Senate) http://www.robmaness.com    

               http://www.CombatVeteransForCongress.org