By Jason Miller

Thomas Paine's Corner

"Thoughtcrime does not entail death: thoughtcrime IS death."

-Winston Smith from George Orwell's 1984

If you needed more evidence that most of our "esteemed" members of Congress are members of a criminal class of ruling elites, who regard the likes of us in the poor and working classes with the disdain most people reserve for cockroaches, look no further than H.R. 1955.

93% of the filth "representing" us in the House voted in favor of the Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act of 2007. Once this vile piece of legislation sails through the Senate and the sociopath on Pennsylvania Ave gleefully slaps his endorsement on it, the mechanisms will be in place for our lords and masters to initiate programs that will make Cointelpro and the murder of Fred Hampton look like child's play.

Interviewer: Mr. Helpmann, what would
you say to those critics who maintain
that the Ministry Of Information has
become too large and unwieldy ...?

Helplmann: David ... in a free society
information is the name of the game.
You can't win the game if you're a man short.

-- From "Brazil"

Newsweek's Michael Hirsh makes this chilling assessment:

The Bush administration calls the war on terror "the long war." But if we are to take the president and his aides at their word, it is more like a permanent war, one that by definition can never end.... And that means the extraordinary powers that George W. Bush has arrogated to himself "during wartime"--including the surveillance of Americans--could become permanent as well. It all sounds frighteningly Orwellian.

After careful consideration, I think that I would like to have my own personal NSA agent. One who can always be within ear-shot of every word that I say, within eyesight of every blog I write, and every web page that I visit. He could document my every move for the War on Civil Liberties. At least then I would know that I was being spied on.