SMILE! YOU’RE ON CANDID CAMERA!!!

So went the tagline for a television show from years gone by. Hiding a camera in some potted plants while filming an innocent bystander doing something silly, for an audience’s viewing pleasure, was the brainchild of comedian Allen Funt. It was supposed to be funny.

• But there is nothing amusing about DHS’ newly announced scheme to amass even more personal data about people who have done nothing wrong. Did we learn nothing from Edward Snowden?

Now that the US Department of “Homeland Security” (classic doublespeak, propagandistic, oxymoronic name there, by the way) is well on its way to achieving more power than even Hitler’s Reich Minister of Propaganda, Joseph Goebbels, ever dreamed of, they are positioning themselves for the ultimate Orwellian horror: their ability to know where each and every one of us is, at any time, no matter where on earth we go.

DHS recently announced they are adding $1 BILLION (that’s a THOUSAND MILLIONS) to fund a facial recognition program that will scan the faces of Americans who board airplane flights exiting the country. Too bad this is as illegal as it is ineffectual.

As described by a report from the Georgetown Law Center on Privacy & Technology dated December 21, 2017:

“At Boston’s Logan International Airport, travelers at one international boarding gate will be surprised that they are being told to stop before what looks like a sophisticated camera.1 But it’s more than just a camera—the device compares each traveler’s face to a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) biometric database to verify her identity and flags as many as 1 in 25 travelers for further scrutiny. These face scans have been deployed at eight other airports, too.2 In Atlanta, Chicago, Las Vegas, Miami, New York City, Houston, and Washington, D.C., travelers departing on certain international flights have their faces scanned by DHS.”

A Boing Boing article puts the system’s effectiveness this way:

“The systems erroneously reject as many as 1 in 25 travelers using valid credentials. At that rate, 1,632 people flying out of JFK alone every day would be falsely flagged as potential criminals and subjected to additional screening.”

This involuntary intrusion into our identities is being questioned by the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) and other critics who question the legality of this DHS maneuver to overreach their power.

Apparently, being able to catalog the facial features in a computer database is Very Important to DHS right now – even though, as the Activist Post article points out:

“While the ‘9/11 Response and Biometric Exit Account’ created by Congress has the funds for the program, ‘neither Congress nor DHS has ever justified the need for the program.’”

Let’s review. $1 BILLION of taxpayer revenue is going to pay for a spy program that isn’t necessary, but basically a whim or “pet project” of the federal organization in charge of protecting us from threatening people, not those never suspected of any wrongdoing.

Sure, they say they’ll start at the airports – and if we don’t stop them, they will.

But then, they’ll start scanning people in traffic, walking around, in parking lots.

Sure, they say they only really probe “persons of interest” – and the ones we hear about in the mainstream media do sound pretty ghastly. But how many do we never hear about, since anyone even suspected of committing a future act of terror (talk about a hypothetical) can now be detained indefinitely, with no due process – no lawyer, no phone calls – in a private prison.

Have you ever heard of the police making a mistake, like a false arrest? And now we would allow the federal police to inventory us like chattel, like Jews in Nazi Germany? Really??

The bottom line here, Dear Readers, is that all types of warrantless surveillance are illegal. Perhaps you have gotten so used to it that you’ve forgotten that?

Adding insult to injury, taxpayers fund DHS, of course. What were we thinking, letting them fool us into creating two monstrous administrative boondoggles, DHS and TSA, after 9/11/01?

After all, there were, in fact, NO weapons of mass destruction, etc. etc. and the US was behind it all, etc.

Let’s hope that Americans now are not so dumbed-down, gullible, and mind-controlled by decades of Nazi-inspired skewed thinking, that we can’t muster up the gumption to say to our elected representatives:

“ENOUGH ALREADY!”

Enough paranoia. Enough “new normals” based on past false assurances. Might we not try shining the light of truth into the dark shadows of deceit?

Did you know that in 2017, DHS got $42.4 BILLION and TSA got $7.6 BILLION? And you know what they say about government budgets: “Spend it or lose it.” DHS and TSA are very good at spending money, but what real value are they delivering?

Since neither TSA nor DHS seems to be providing much service, given the grotesque amount of money they consume, why not suggest to your elected officials that you don’t favor your tax dollars being spent for an illegal, unethical bureaucracy?

Under the guise of “anti-terrorism” and to “strengthen our national security,” We the People of the United States have seen our rights erode right before our eyes – and done nothing about it.

The mainstream media mouthpieces tell us, over and over, that “terrorism” is a clear and present danger – constantly – and, to “combat” it, we must surrender our freedoms.

Incredibly, people today are buying this enormous load of fertilizer.

Joseph Goebbels, who wrote the book on modern propaganda techniques, was very clear about how a government “trains” its citizens to believe what the government wants them to believe. Check this out:

“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”
~ Joseph Goebbels

Mainstream media “news” broadcasts are actually a mixture of opinion with fact, unless actual fake news. Anyone who has taken a debate class in school knows the difference between a “fact” (something proven to be true) and an “opinion” (what someone thinks).

This is why Truthseekers head to “alternative” news sources, despite their bad representations, as represented by – guess who? – yup, the mainstream media.

This is such an elegant propaganda machine, no wonder it is so effective.

One lie being shoved down our throats – and our minds – is that, to achieve “safety from terrorists” we must sacrifice personal civil and Constitutional rights. This type of thinking is as limited as “paper or plastic?” when you have a reusable cloth bag to carry your groceries.

You may recall that former President Barack Obama said, in his final speech to the United Nations General Assembly on September 20, 2016:

“I’m convinced in the long run giving up some freedom of action, not giving up our ability to protect ourselves or pursue our core interests but binding ourselves to international rules, over the long-term, enhances our security.”

The important phrase is “giving up some freedom of action.” What does that mean, really? It means that Obama believed that the US, as a nation, did not have the right (or the capability?) to exercise our powers as we see fit, under the leadership of our Commander in Chief.

To Barack Obama, the red-blooded American declares: “I give up nothing, Mr. President!”

Compare Obama’s compromising posturing with the words of a true patriot, one of our most famous, endearing and enduring actual, factual American HEROES, Benjamin Franklin. Here was his opinion on personal liberties versus “the needs” of national security:

“Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
~ Benjamin Franklin

Nearing his one-year mark in the Oval Office, President Donald Trump does seem to understand that the United States is a sovereign nation. We do our own thing. The right thing.

This is something everyone understood before President Kennedy’s assassination. After that, the world changed. The Nazi propaganda machine cranked up in earnest in these United States.

Now, today, we are faced with the ultimate insult and smack-down of our civil liberties: mandatory facial recognition as we fly, drive, walk, eat, sleep, use the phone or toilet.

Is this really the kind of world you think we need to live in? Do you want to live in a nation where a powerful organization – the DHS – that serves its own interests, not yours, calls all the shots, breaks all the rules, and is never held accountable?

The best New Years resolution you can make is to get involved at the local level in your political community. Find out who represents you in the House and Senate. Communicate your desires and opinions with them. Quote law.

There is an urgent need in this country to stop the Nazi-esque propaganda branch of the Deep State.

Since TRUTH is their enemy #1, please resolve to find some in 2018.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!