A friend, to whom I owe a life's worth of favors, asked me to comment on a message he received. Normally, I ignore this kind of junk: okay, that's "normally" as in always.
I have too little time left to entertain the thoughts and ideas of others. I've spent over sixty years formulating a worldview, and do not wish to reformulate chunks of it.
So here's what I received:

Please respond to this egregious message sent to me via an acquaintance-I responded and was accused of being a Communist.
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, August 12, 2009 5:21 AM
Subject: THE AWAKENING OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Carol and to all: (this is going out to many people, but I have sent the emails as blind copies for privacy reasons)
Below you will see you a letter that was written by Greg Evensen a former Kansas State Trooper and Marshall. I asked that you pass it on with to everyone on your email list and ask them to pass it on as well. When I got the letter via email it was so strong in stating the blatant truth about what is going on today in the US that I called him at the phone number that was at the bottom of the letter to verify that he wrote it. Lo and behold I got him on the phone and he verified that he indeed was the author of this letter. We had a long conversation about his views about what was going on in the country, which you can read below.
As you all know I have been saying for a long time that the US is becoming more and more fascist every day. Now if we look back and really analyze the real resulting affects of 911 we will see that it was the grounds for getting us into two losing wars that has cost us over a trillion dollars and thousands of lives and tens of thousands wounded. However, it has made the industrial military complex hundreds of billions of dollars. But it was more than that. If you will remember, 6 weeks after 911 Congress passed the Patriot act. Now the Patriot Act is a massive 342 page document that violates at least six of the ten original amendments known as the Bill of Rights—the First, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh and Eighth Amendments—and possibly the Thirteenth and Fourteenth as well. The bottom line, it has taken away our freedoms that we enjoyed prior to 911.The Patriot Act was rushed through Congress, even though the majority of our representatives admitted to not reading it, reassured perhaps by the inclusion of a five-year sunset provision. But that sun does not seem to be setting on this chilling piece of legislation. Instead, congress has since made the Patriot Act permanent and also expand its reach. The next step in the big brother society will be to chip everybody and do away with money and replaced it with a debit card number so they will have total control over we the people. Sound far fetched, just wait and see.
Now have you ever thought about the fact that the Patriot Act could not have been written in a few weeks and in fact was sitting on the shelf waiting for an event that would insure its passage? That event was 911. By the way at the end of my conversation with Mr. Evensen, I asked him point blank a question. I asked him as a criminal investigator for years with the Kansas State Police have you looked at the evidence of the 911 attacks and have you drawn any conclusions? His comment was that when he first saw the pictures of the Pentagon, he concluded that there was no way a plane hit the building. There was just no corroborating physical evidence. He also said it would have been impossible to fly that commercial jet at 500 miles an hour only a few feet off the ground into the side of the building. He stated that they tried that in simulations and it couldn’t be done. He concluded that a missile hit the Pentagon. Now this is not me making this statement it's a former law enforcement officer who was a criminal investigator.
Now look I am sure all of you have heard about 2012 and the confluence of events that will happen in that year that will cause God knows what. In fact, there is a move coming out in November of this year called 2012 and it starts with the destruction of the planet and the rest of the movie is about survival. As we approach the year 2012 there is a Shift in human consciousness taking place and is occurring even as you read these words. The shift is being triggers by supernovas, earth changes and Earth's alignment with Galactic Center in the years leading up to 2012. This Shift has been documented in a stimulating multimedia presentation entitled “Preparing for the Shift,” by Barry and Janae Weinhold, Ph.D.s. who has spent decades devoted to the study of consciousness and evolution. The Weinholds, both trained psychologists, have gathered overwhelming evidence that humanity is in the middle of a long-awaited Shift in consciousness predicted by hundreds of indigenous cultures worldwide
Today this Shift in consciousness is visible nearly every time you open a newspaper or turn on the TV. It can be seen in the breakdown of many old structures such as those that underpin governments, churches and corporations, as well as in families and individuals. It is also evident in the ecological breakdown of numerous Earth systems, a widespread perception time is accelerating, drastic changes in weather patterns, more people feeling overwhelmed by modern life's complexity, and increased polarization between groups, religions, and regions. You also see it in the huge protests against the government’s health care program, the bailout programs, the take over of major corporations and resuliting huge deficits the 435 are running up for the rest of the 300 million We the People. There is outrage in the land against the crooks and criminals in Washington who are taking the country down a disastrous road towards totalitarianism.
Now you will see by Mr. Evensen letter that his consciousness is switched on. The consciousness of thousands of other Americans are also being switched on as they show up at town hall meetings and express their outrage against a government that is out of control and doesn’t represent them anymore. They are now realizing they have been betrayed and they are mad as hell. Now you have to get your consciousness switched on as well and get mad as hell as you recognized what is going on in US. My statement is that the land of the free and home of the brave has turned into the land of the policed and the home of the fleeced. Switching on your consciousness is simply being aware what is going on and what is going on is the evisceration of your freedoms. They are being wiped out every day and if the masses do not get consciously switched on now, they will soon all be gone. You have to get switched on and get proactive like the thousands who are showing up at the town hall meetings.
So here is the letter from Greg Evensen, if you want to give him a call or send him an email of support. He needs our support and is taking a big risk in speaking out against the fascist big brother government.

THE DEATH OF LIBERTY: THE FINAL SCENE UNFOLDS

By Greg Evensen
July 29, 2009

NewsWithViews.com

When police investigators begin amassing evidence at a crime scene, the bits and pieces of the puzzle begin to take shape. Usually, with several trained men and women working together to come up with an answer, the intent and actions of the perpetrator are almost always revealed.Since my core training and experience over many years was as a state level law enforcement officer, I have worked crime scenes that were large, complex and conflicting. With enough time, effort and resolve, we too, were able to bring the bad guys to account.You certainly do not have to be a trained state trooper—or any other level police agent—to use common sense, logic and knowledge, to assess the crime scene that has become the socialist states of Amerika.I continue to be at a loss to explain how it is that so many tens of millions of Amerikans simply do not see the utter destruction of their former republic by socialists, one worlders, deviates, liars and thieves. The men in black have been roving the country flashing their memory erasers around the clock. Let’s take a check on how things are really going.Our nation’s police forces prior to the criminal thug Richard Nixon were centered on community policing. MOST of their time was spent on looking for, identifying, and monitoring criminals, and responding to unusual or dangerous events that were beyond the control of ordinary folks. We appreciated those officers and were proud to say, “he is OUR Cop!” We knew that we could talk to him, kid him, see him play adult softball, and sit across from him in church. We watched him shed tears when one of our kids didn’t make it home after a night of drinking and driving. We remembered him at Christmas, because he didn’t make much you know.
I said “him” because back then, there were no women in the ranks.As government began its sickening expansion, policing became a meaner and nastier job. It was made that way by badge wearing thugs who didn’t hesitate to do whatever they were told by the S.A.C. (Special Agent in Charge) of the FBI, BATF(E), US Marshal’s Office right down to armed poultry inspectors—yes they have them and they are really tough on criminal chickens. The “us against them” mentality, and the “mission essential” attitude justified SWAT teams, “dynamic entries,” and later use of MACE, TASERS, FLASHBANG GRENADES and “routine” use of SUBMACHINE guns. All in the name of “taking down” the accused—no matter the charge. I abhor such police tactics and was an officer that served my own warrants, rarely with one other officer at the back door.Now we have become eaves-dropping, roadblock setting, door crashing, face grinding, arm breaking, pursuit driven bastards that have sold their asses to the government masters hell bent on establishing the TRUE reincarnation of the dreaded SS. That is NO overstatement. Note: There are significant numbers of officers at all levels that simply detest the forced training at FEMA centers, the requirements to stop Patriots and others simply because they “look” dangerous, and are exercising free speech statements on their vehicles. By whose ultimate authority does this take place? By whose ultimate judgment is it necessary to harass INNOCENT drivers and families? The public sees this Gestapo mentality as far more of a danger than any stickers they put on their vehicles? Where are all these “faithful” enforcers of the law when it comes to confronting the unlawful, unconstitutional, unjustifiable, and unmerciful rotten bunch of usurpers, communists, atheists, deviated, immoral scungebuckets that are walking the halls of Congress, the White House, and the Federal Courts? How is it that the “get ‘em at any cost” morons at Homeland Security have created an environment in Amerika that is an unwarranted intrusion of power in 186 other nations?
And all of this is done in the name of safety and security. I guess that a majority of ignorant buffoons really do believe that Barack Sotero is the Messiah and he does hold the keys to socialist paradise in his hands.So, once again, I implore those officers of the law who are in grave doubt about the legitimate authenticity of their superiors in any agency, to simply read the constitution, re-read their oath of office, seek out retired officers for guidance, and remember this very carefully—to brutalize citizens in the pursuit of order, is a guaranteed recipe for resistance. PLEASE do not pit yourselves (all 650,000 officers at all levels in the US) against a seething and angry populace who outnumber you 5000 to 1. Believe me; you want all of us working with you, not against you.

Greg Eversen

(Greg Evensen is an award winning former Kansas State Trooper and Kansas Marshal. He speaks across the nation for Patriot groups and is available to come to your area as well. Call 906-367-0505 or e-mail him at greg@theheartlandusa.com.)
(No virus found in this incoming message.Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com/ Version: 8.5.392)

Maybe the most disturbing are the references to Doomsday, 2012, as the loonies have almost 1208 days to get really cranked up.
Feel free to respond to Greg as befits his views, and, by all means, contact me, pro, con, or indifferent.

My most humble (just kidding - maybe, depending on your reaction) response, as requested by my commie friend, follows:
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Sweet Jesus, what do people learn in their lives that they even read this bullshit? I usually don't but, since you asked . . .


The Patriot Act was written by the (mal)Administration, to streamline decision making and centralize same in the hands of the President, or whomever was making decisions for the Stooge.
One thing the past administration had was excellent lawyers: given six days they could easily have cobbled together a working version of the Patriot Act. Give them six weeks, and you have the virtually unassailable and heinous Act it is today.
I would agree the Patriot Act is in violation of those same six amendments in the Bill of Rights. I would guess that the 13th is a typo - it repeals slavery - and the author may have meant the 12th, revision of the Presidential election process. I don't know that this has anything to do with the PA, but it was surely ground underfoot when the Supreme Court, filled with cronies of his Daddy, appointed Junior President, despite overwhelming evidence that the vote, and its count, was thoroughly botched in Florida.
That the Patriot Act "has taken away our freedoms" is a bit of a reach.
There are no particular abridgments to Free Speech, the 1st Amendment, described or otherwise outlined in the PA. What the Act does do is suspend some of the protections, defined by the courts, that in specific cases have been judged to violate the intent of the law (Amendment). The most egregious is wiretapping without court order.
I could (maybe should) write an argument defining free speech, but it has been done, many times. However, there is this: when you make your "Free Speech", know what you don't know - your audience. There are over 6.4 billion people in the world. Whatever you say, write, or type, and anything you send over the internet, may reach one, some, or all.
The Patriot Act, then, does not "limit" your right to free speech, but shreds your cloak of privacy.
Amendments 4 through 8 all deal with arrest and due process. The PA does indeed suspend portions of these Rights, but the scope and application probably won't affect you too much.

The "disappearing airliner" in the Pentagon crash is old ground. Whatever the photographs "looked" like, American Airlines Flight 77 went somedamnwhere, taking 59, passengers and crew, with it.
So what is the point, that a missile hit the Pentagon? PanAm Flight 103, which blew up over Lockerbie, Scotland, 12/21/88, resulted in the same prolonged debate - it must have been a missile, with photos released and much-discussed showing a missile, until it was found in 1991 to have been a bomb.
Why was it important to have a missile? to ratchet up paranoia, to justify the Patriot Act, to close our border with Canada, to build a damn wall in the Southwest desert, to invade an emasculated country and kill all its leaders...

In America in the 1840's, a wave of revivalism, known as the Second Great Awakening, swept the country. A group known as the Millerites believed the preachings of a founder, William Miller, that Christ would return to earth on 10/22/1844, triggering the End Times. While they gathered and waited, praying, Jesus must have had other plans.
Many of the Millerites weren't perturbed, however, and their ilk grew into the Seventh-Day Adventists, the 8th largest international body of Christians.
The point being, don't spend a lot of time preparing for 2012.

And don't confuse generalized hysteria and panic with any "Awakening of Consciousness".
As long as three times as many people in this country "believe" in the Virgin birth as understand the order of natural selection, there is a very low ceiling on consciousness.
As far as a world Shift in consciousness, know that the US religions we consider major, Roman Catholic, Methodist, Wesleyan, came here with immigrants. The Seventh-Day Adventists became so large internationally not through resettlement but through proselytizing, preying on ignorance throughout the second and third worlds, spreading the same guilt and despair Christians crave.
The idea of a global raised consciousness is more to do with exposure of the poor of the world to American culture through making outsourced clothing and personal items, and evidenced by wi-fi parlors in Sarajevo, Istanbul, the West Bank, and Timbuktu.
The shopworn pipedream that a butterfly fart in Madagascar becomes a tornado in Kansas is just that, a dream, not raised consciousness.

There is no reason to think that a lifetime in service to the people of Kansas makes one an expert in National policing.

I reject that Government made significant expansion, "sickening" or otherwise, in or after the Nixon era. The only significant growth in Federal Government came during the Roosevelt administration, after twelve years of Republican fiscal incompetence pushed the Country into the deepest of Depressions, culminating in the Stock Market crash of 1929.
The growth in government was to help those out of work to once again earn wages, feed, clothe, and shelter their families, and to regain self-respect, after failure was forced upon them.
And it was a timely, enduring, and wonderful success, this flood of Federal projects and agencies.

The most significant change to policing since the '60's, seemingly everywhere but Kansas, was the pipeline of drugs craved by many of our stout citizens. The War on Drugs has succeeded in doing but one thing - overfilling our jails and prisons. Fully one percent of our adult male population is currently incarcerated, the highest percentage in the Western world, and the highest here, ever.

As for the rearming of Law Enforcement, look to the North Hollywood shootout of 2/28/1997. As hundreds of police were pinned down, shot, wounded, killed, two pieces of human excrement fired 1000 armor-piercing rounds. Only introducing more powerful arms allowed police to end the battle.
In the aftermath, enforcement bureaus across the country upgraded firearms, and, in larger cities, SWAT teams were added or expanded.
The use of MACE, flash-bang grenades, and TASERS are all in the Public Interest, to maintain the demand that only reasonable force be used, and to protect the innocent.
Those larger caliber, higher velocity sidearms find the intended target about 30% of the time, meaning seven of ten shots fired find other targets.

The "jackbooted thugs" line was used before, most famously by Wayne LaPierre, Executive Vice President but actual leader and decision-maker for the National Rifle Association, a paranoid man and leader of the most paranoid group of individuals to walk the planet. In response, George H. W. Bush (41) resigned his life-membership in the NRA. The claim that our police forces in any way resemble anything Nazi is as ludicrous today as in 1993. Before you disagree on any level, Google Kristallnacht and give it some serious, informed, thought.

There is no arguement that there are people in all three branches of government who, by any standard, should be elsewhere, including among the 1% club noted previously. But they are protected by the sad irony that they are representing the wishes of a majority of the people, and most certainly protected from armed insurrection of a group of concerned policemen, however well-intentioned. Bush (43) did all he could to turn this country and its government into a Banana Republic, but the talk of a junta should end here.
Instead, use the old-fasioned way: vote the bastards out. Recall, if needed.
Voting in America should be an obligation, a duty. For the most part, elections are relatively clean (exceptions: Florida, 2000, and Ohio, 2004), yet only about half of those who register bother to vote. Regristration should be mandatory for even the most basic of services - vehicle registration, driver's license, utility services, conracts to buy, sell, or lease, etcetera. And failure to vote would result in forfiture of services and goods.
Only then would our government, designed by some pretty smart guys, function as intended. Stupid laws Right and Left, such as The Patriot Act, could be expunged, and other laws enacted that represent the collective will of the people.
There would be no need for misfits to go off-the-grid, except to avoid prosecution. Militias across the country would become superflous, and the more mentally stable ex-members might actually find a constructive outlet for their energies.
And people could worry about the truly meaningless - the second coming of the christ, the two suns of 2012 (this bs willy really blast off with the dumbass movie), who will win the 2013 Super Bowl, all important stuff for vapid minds.

And never underestimate the capacity of the learned and wise to say something incredibly stupid. In 2000, LaPierre said President Bill Clinton tolerated a certain amount of violence and killing to strengthen the case for gun control and to score points for his party.
Submoronic crap.
Gotta love that Wayne, though. He stays on target. Even when his two most famous frontmen were the Alzheimer-addled Charlton Heston, a C-List former actor, and the psycho rocker Ted Nugent, whose "hits" include WhangBangSweetPoontang.
Adds the kind of credability the NRA has worked to achieve, at a much higher level than they ever dreamed possible.
They vote, but the real damage they do is weaken laws designed to keep weapons out of the hands of convicts, felons, criminals, and youth, in defence of a second amendment never intended to allow same, by papering congress with tens of millions of dollars annually.
The kind of democracy in action that creates a need for the SWAT teams and stun grenades.

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Okay, maybe the potshots at the NRA weren't necessary, but I'm so sick of their one-issue crap ("George Bush (43) was the best president, ever, for protecting our 2nd Amendment rights") that any words spent on exposing the asininity, bribery, stupidity, shallowness, and paranoia that is the NRA are an investment in a better future.

So, what about some bird news?
The Ashy Storm Petrel is still threatened with extinction, and still "not endangered" according to National Fish & Wildlife.
The Ivory-Billed Woodpecker, thought to be extinct for thirty years, has since been spotted once, a flash in front of a canoe in an Arkansas swamp in 2004. The flash wasn't photographed, understandably, and the identification was made on the sounds it made, quite a feat as the bird hadn't been heard from in three decades.
Yesterday I saw a red tail in flight, and almost immediately an American Kestrel left a wire. Either would have been enough, but both made the trip worthwhile, even if I can't remember where I was going.
In some lowground, holding duckweed-covered water this late in the summer, I found a Great Blue Heron, a scaled-down Pterodactyl. The heron, in flight, surely appears prehistoric, a coelacanth of the air. What troubles a casual observer such as I is that the set of the wings, supposedly reptilian, closely resembles a bat, a mammal, and should make you glad I'm not an ornithologist.
The birds are still here, big birds, egrets and herons and red tails. And the warblers are on the way.
Just go look.