It’s not difficult to become Captain of an airliner.

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jonvcaples said:
Groundpounder, what personal freedoms did we loose?
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Well, we now need PERMISSION to leave the country. Can't leave without prior approval now, and that's at the Federal level. Along with a few other due processes as long as they slap the label of terrorism on it.
 
jonvcaples said:
Groundpounder, what personal freedoms did we loose?
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In addition to what everyone else has mentioned, the government started spying on American Citizens like it never had before. Thankfully Edward Snowden exposed the unconstitutionality of these programs, and they were rolled back slightly, but I would imagine there are still programs out there that would be deemed unconstitutional.
 
jonvcaples said:
Groundpounder, what personal freedoms did we loose?
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The Fourth and Fifth Amendments, along with Article 1 § 9, have been reduced to quaint relics of the past. The words don't have to be repealed for the protections to be voided. All that's necessary is for the sheeple to tolerate it, which too many will because the violations are cloaked in the guise of safety and marketed as appeals to emotion rather than reason.

Rich
 
James331 said:
True, historically the bigger the government the smaller the citizen.
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I find this to be historically true, if overly broad.

mryan75 said:
What does that even mean?
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I think the question is fair, but begs argument (for argument's sake)

mryan75 said:
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I've lived on 3 different continents, and I generally find that people making these kind of statements have little to back them up besides blind patriotism. They sure do sound good though.
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IMO They "sound good" because there's a basis in truth.

As to "blind patriotism" I'm certain there are "blind patriots" in countries, on continents, which suffer "big government" to a greater degree than citizens in the US. And if they're not "blind patriots" they best pretend to be, or risk "re-education" provided by their own benevolent government...
 
Groundpounder said:
In addition to what everyone else has mentioned, the government started spying on American Citizens like it never had before. Thankfully Edward Snowden exposed the unconstitutionality of these programs, and they were rolled back slightly, but I would imagine there are still programs out there that would be deemed unconstitutional.
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In fairness, some of this started a long time ago when random DUI checkpoints started popping up.

It was the kind of thing that people my age can remember believing would never happen in America: Hundreds, maybe thousands of people being detained in their cars; subject to questioning, field sobriety tests, and chemical tests; with no probable cause to believe that they (nor anyone else) had committed a crime; which said crime no one had any probable cause to believe had even been committed at all; and subject to arrest should they merely assert their right to refuse to be tested for such crime that there was no probable cause to believe had been committed. That was the kind of thing that only happened in places like Russia and Red China, we foolishly believed.

Unfortunately, in one of the most idiotic decisions ever handed down by SCOTUS, the practice was ruled constitutional (Michigan Department of State Police v. Sitz, if you care to look it up).

The moment I read about that decision, I knew that the America in which I was born and had grown up, loved, and sworn to defend at the cost of my own life if need be, was dying.

Rich
 
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Rich, I've said that for years. The other 2 big things:
* Using eminent domain to steal property to give to private developers because their development will generate more tax revenue than the homeowner.

* Civil Asset Forfeiture...the gov't stealing people's property without them even being accused, much less convicted.
 
EdFred said:
Well, we now need PERMISSION to leave the country. Can't leave without prior approval now, and that's at the Federal level. Along with a few other due processes as long as they slap the label of terrorism on it.
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How so?
 
RJM62 said:
In fairness, some of this started a long time ago when random DUI checkpoints started popping up.

It was the kind of thing that people my age can remember believing would never happen in America: Hundreds, maybe thousands of people being detained in their cars; subject to questioning, field sobriety tests, and chemical tests; with no probable cause to believe that they (nor anyone else) had committed a crime; which said crime no one had any probable cause to believe had even been committed at all; and subject to arrest should they merely assert their right to refuse to be tested for such crime that there was no probable cause to believe had been committed. That was the kind of thing that only happened in places like Russia and Red China, we foolishly believed.

Unfortunately, in one of the most idiotic decisions ever handed down by SCOTUS, the practice was ruled constitutional (Michigan Department of State Police v. Sitz, if you care to look it up).

The moment I read about that decision, I knew that the America in which I was born and had grown up, loved, and sworn to defend at the cost of my own life if need be, was dying.

Rich
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I disagree, but you make an interesting case, particularly the highlighted protion. Though if you refuse the test they're going to give it to you anyway (blood test), and if you're sober you'll walk.

I think the most absolutely blatantly unconstitutional police procedure is "stop and frisk", the practice of patting down certain people for absolutely no reason at all. But that happened to a specific group that most people like us really don't care enough about to protest. But that was some seriously unconstitutional crap.
 
Gerhardt said:
Rich, I've said that for years. The other 2 big things:
* Using eminent domain to steal property to give to private developers because their development will generate more tax revenue than the homeowner.
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I won't say it.
I won't say it.
I won't say it.
I won't say it.
I won't say it.
I won't say it.
I won't say it.
I won't say it.
I won't say it.
I won't say it.
 
RJM62 said:
The Fourth and Fifth Amendments, along with Article 1 § 9, have been reduced to quaint relics of the past. /QUOTE]
Yep. And again, I won't say it.
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mryan75 said:
I disagree, but you make an interesting case, particularly the highlighted protion. Though if you refuse the test they're going to give it to you anyway (blood test), and if you're sober you'll walk.

I think the most absolutely blatantly unconstitutional police procedure is "stop and frisk", the practice of patting down certain people for absolutely no reason at all. But that happened to a specific group that most people like us really don't care enough about to protest. But that was some seriously unconstitutional crap.
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Here's my take on it: Barring exigent circumstances (Amber alerts and so forth), an officer needs some reason to pull you over. It could be something trivial like touching the white line, going 1 MPH over the limit, or having a blown license plate lamp; but there has to be some reason. If you're driving within the law, the vehicle has no equipment violations, and there are no exigencies, you're supposed to be left alone. There's no violation of law and no probable cause.

So if it's illegal to stop one vehicle without probable cause, then why is it legal to stop a hundred or a thousand vehicles without probable cause? Because maybe one of them might have been drinking? I don't buy it.

As for "stop-and-frisk," it stretched Terry v. Ohio past the breaking point because it pretty much ignored the requirement that the officer have a reasonable basis for suspicion. That's one of the reasons why Scheindlin ruled in Floyd v. City of New York that NYPD's application of Terry was unconstitutional, not the practice itself. The other was that it lopsidedly targeted Black and Hispanic young men.

"Reasonable basis for suspicion" isn't quite the same as "probable cause," but at least it's something. With the roadblocks, there is no basis whatsoever for the stops. Yes, one can safely assume that in any group of drivers, some are over the legal BAC. But one can also assume that on any city block, some people have weed in their possession. That doesn't give the police the right to search every house for weed, and neither should it give them the right to block the road and stop traffic for miles because some unknown person might have been drinking.

Thankfully, GPS with crowd-sourced live traffic has made getting stuck in those jams pretty much history. Even if the device or app maker doesn't actually label a jam as a roadblock, the stopped traffic is enough reason to seek another route irrespective of the cause.

Rich
 
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