Man. I can't help but feel that the US is becoming more like the old Soviet Union every day. Two recent examples scare the hell out of me.
First, the news that Bush wants to be able to tap all conversations, in order to "protect us". Yes, I want the government reading all my emails, noting what I read, and listening in on my conversations, without due cause.
Second, and this one that blows me away. The US has a highly respected department with some of the best minds on the planet working on all sorts of advanced problems. This department is called NASA. Bush appointed a 24 year old college dropout, who's only credential is that he worked on the 2004 election campaign, to decide what NASA gets to say publicly.
George C. Deutsch, it turns out, lied on his resume by claiming he had a degree in journalism from Texas A&M. He resigned his NASA yesterday after being busted by a real Texas A&M grad and Rhodes Scholar studying science in Oxford University.
Deutsch claims his job at NASA was only to make George Bush "Look Good". In other words, NASA had to toe the party line. George C. Deutsch didn't like what a senior NASA scientist was saying about global warming. This senior environment scientists didn't want to toe the party line, so George C. Deutsch threatened him with "trouble".
Deutsch also tried to twist NASA public statements to make sure they supported the idea of the religious right's "Intelligent Design". He demanded that the words "Big Bang" always be called the "Big Bang Theory", presumably to lower to the level of the "Intelligent Design Theory".
Gee. Doesn't this sound like the old Soviet Union Party Minders, or the Nazi Gestapo? They stick some totally unqualified, brainwashed, punk kid in NASA to control what NASA is allowed to say?!? They didn't even bother to verify the so-called 'facts' on his resume?
Third... the new Attorney General of the DOJ is going on "fishing expeditions" looking for porn on the Internet. They are demanding the Google turn over records of what Americans are looking for on the Internet. It seems like Bush has heard a rumour that there are naked women on the net, and that must be stopped!
So is that were we are at now? The government is listening in on our private conversations, and sticking political Gestapo henchmen into the institutions to control their speech? Damn.... I thought we won the Cold War. I guess I was wrong.
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