Silly me, I thought the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution WAS the "shield law".

Kissinger, the undead. So thoroughly evil even Hell won't have him.

Feasts on the blood of infants, bathes in the blood of fresh-killed virgins, powders his hair with the ground bones of his victims. Oh, yes, the zombie vampire statesman himself. The walking Curse of the World. Foul creature of the charnel ground.

Like Kerry, I would meet with him - unlike Kerry, I would come armed with a sharpened wooden stake and a heavy mallet.

"Do you like to ride?" He asked, his icy blue eyes seeming to look into my very soul.

A hot flush suffused my face and neck. My breath caught in my throat. I had to lower my gaze as I fought to quell the trembling that seemed to spread from my very core, rendering all my limbs weak. I stammered a whispered, "Yes, sir." and pressed back against the wall of the cottage as I struggled to hold myself from falling faint.

His hard calloused hand gently stroked my cheek, then softly grasped my chin, raising my head up again, to meet his searching eyes. "You must come with me, little comrade. You are meant for finer things than harvesting potatoes in the hot sun."

Without another word his strong hands clasped my waist and lifted me onto the bare back of his waiting steed. A moment later, with the grace of a mighty lion, he vaulted onto the muscular back of his beautiful golden mount, settling in front of me. "Hold on to me, little comrade, hold tight!" And with a forceful nudge of his heels against the horse's flanks, we set off at a gallop.

Oh, how to describe that wild reckless run across the steppes! Flying over the ground, my thighs pressed tightly against the rolling muscles of the galloping horse, my arms wrapped tightly around his muscular torso, pressing my breasts against the warm, sweat-dampened skin of his bare back.

I had no sense of time, nor of the miles passing. I felt utterly taken outside myself, with no thought but for the ecstatic sensations of the wind passing by and the heat the bodies beneath and before me.

It seemed a timeless time until we reached a shaded glade at the edge of a forest. With just a word he brought his steed to a stop, then dismounted in a single graceful leap, and his sinewy hands wrapped around my waist and set me on the ground.

Without a word he wrapped his arms around me, and suddenly his warm lips were pressed against mine. I felt myself quivering with desire and surrendered utterly. As one we sank down upon the mossy bed, surrounded by the tall fragrant pines towering above us. My heartbeat was racing as his hot mouth slid down to my throat, while his hands expertly began to unlace my bodice. I felt his manhood swelling against my trembling thighs.

"Oh yes, take me!" I moaned...

"Do you like to ride?" He asked, his icy blue eyes seeming to look into my very soul.

A hot flush suffused my face and neck. My breath caught in my throat. I had to lower my gaze as I fought to quell the trembling that seemed to spread from my very core, rendering all my limbs weak. I stammered a whispered, "Yes, sir." and pressed back against the wall of the cottage as I struggled to hold myself from falling faint.

His hard calloused hand gently stroked my cheek, then softly grasped my chin, raising my head up again, to meet his searching eyes. "You must come with me, little comrade. You are meant for finer things than harvesting potatoes in the hot sun."

Without another word his strong hands clasped my waist and lifted me onto the bare back of his waiting steed. A moment later, with the grace of a mighty lion, he vaulted onto the muscular back of his beautiful golden mount, settling in front of me. "Hold on to me, little comrade, hold tight!" And with a forceful nudge of his heels against the horse's flanks, we set off at a gallop.

Oh, how to describe that wild reckless run across the steppes! Flying over the ground, my thighs pressed tightly against the rolling muscles of the galloping horse, my arms wrapped tightly around his muscular torso, pressing my breasts against the warm, sweat-dampened skin of his bare back.

I had no sense of time, nor of the miles passing. I felt utterly taken outside myself, with no thought but for the ecstatic sensations of the wind passing by and the heat the bodies beneath and before me.

It seemed a timeless time until we reached a shaded glade at the edge of a forest. With just a word he brought his steed to a stop, then dismounted in a single graceful leap, and his sinewy hands wrapped around my waist and set me on the ground.

Without a word he wrapped his arms around me, and suddenly his warm lips were pressed against mine. I felt myself quivering with desire and surrendered utterly. As one we sank down upon the mossy bed, surrounded by the tall fragrant pines towering above us. My heartbeat was racing as his hot mouth slid down to my throat, while his hands expertly began to unlace my bodice. I felt his manhood swelling against my trembling thighs.

"Oh yes, take me!" I moaned...

"Actions have ends." Maybe you forgot that 2 years ago, in 2011, Obama began saying "Assad must go"?

Maybe you've missed the news that the CIA has been arming the insurgents for some time, and that the U.S. has recently pledged to increase the amount of arms going to them? What kind of "ends" does this lead up to except regime change?

And maybe you've also missed the news that Saudi Arabia has promised to entirely bankroll a U.S. strike on Syria? Yes, those well-known humanitarians, the House of Saud, has offered to pay for using U.S. muscle to "degrade" Assad's capabilities. Entirely out of concern for the dead children, I'm sure.

And Israel, who had no problem with using white phosphorus in poplulated areas of the Gaza Strip, is becoming rather concerned that the U.S. might not go through with bombing Syria. APAIC is planning on a busy week lobbying our Congresscritters.

I stand by what I posted.

The PNAC may no longer exist as a formal organization (above ground, that is),

but their plans live on in those disposed to that particular world view.

As for Saudi Arabia, it's been reported for some time that they are funding at least certain factions of the "rebels", and it was just reported in the last day or so that SA have offered to pay all the costs of a U.S. military strike on Syria. Sorry I don't have a link handy, but it's been posted several times on DU over this weekend.

It's also no secret that SA is worried about Iran obtaining nuclear weapons - this has been a long-standing theme of several year's standing.

Along with the Sunni (SA)/Shia (Iran) thing, the relationship between SA and Iran is not disimilar to the relationship between the U.S. and the Soviet Union during the early beginnings of the Cold War. SA wants to make sure Iran doesn't get nukes, because SA wants to remain the dominant power in the region.

Please understand, any U.S. military action in Syria means that we're being dragged into a proxy war

between Saudi Arabia and Iran, with Israel cheering it on. Sunni Saudi Arabia wants uncontested hegemonic power in the region, and Shiite Iran is its main rival. Israel has been pimping for an attack on Iran for years, and nothing would make them happier than to see Iran enveloped in the general ME chaos.

On a larger scale, this is all part of the PNAC blueprint, to destablize the entire Middle East, to foment "regime change" in one country after another - always protecting the interests of Big Oil.

Is THIS what you really want the U.S. to be a part of? Because if you're supporting an attack on Syria, this is what you're really signing up for.

(edited for typo)

Speaking as someone born in 1949, I say no, not even a bit.

I graduated from HS in '67. I remember the 60s well. There is absolutely nothing in air now that resembles what was in the air back then. Nothing.

What was in the air in the 60s was hope and excitement and a splendid belief in the power of love, a belief in possibilities, a belief in freedom, a feeling of determination and a feeling of joy and empowerment in that determination. There was a feeling of mass rising up, and faith in the power of that rising up.

Faith, hope, and love - those were the forces that moved us in the 60s - not confined to just the religious sense of those words, although that religious sense was most certainly encompassed in the Civil Rights movement.

We had faith in the inevitability of social and spiritual progress. We had hope for the triumph of true humanity over war and hatred. And we were fired with the power of love - love of truth, love of justice, love of beauty, love of free expression, love for the greater world.

The 60s was a wave of light passing through millions of hearts. There's nothing like that now. Now, there's only impotent anger, frustration, seething resentment, apathetic resignation or accomodation as a means of self-preservation.

There's no overwhelming will to agitate. No sense of solidarity. No love, no joy.

Nothing but NOTHING will ever change unless we can get private money out of election campaigns.

Our system of privately-funded election campaigns has created a closed loop, unvirtuous circle of unrestricted influence by and for the Owner Class throughout every governmental institution.

No fundamental systemic changes are possible while this paradigm is in place.

My take on it, if I may.

For me, one of the most important parts of Snowden's relevations is not just what they show about the extent of the NSA's surveillance, but the fact that this data collection has been placed in the hands of private contractors.

Private companies are being paid billions of taxpayer dollars and are profiting handsomely for doing NSA's dirty work. The current head of Booz Allen, the contractor who employed Snowden, is Mike McConnell, former head of the NSA. The current head of the NSA used to work for the Booz Allen. This incestuous revolving door relationship between private, for-profit corporations and government agencies basically guarantees that (a) funding for these operations will continue to grow, and (b) the War on Terror (which is the current raison d'etre for this whole surveillance apparatus) will never end, since it contributes so nicely to the private contractors' bottom line.

Aside from the scope of the surveillance itself, there's something very wrong here in regard to the whole paradigm of corporate/government entwinement. The trend is already well underway to treat activists and protestors as "terrorists" if they object to such things as environmental destruction (Fracking, Keystone Pipeline), animal cruelty (factory farms and slaughterhouses), or GMO crops (Monsanto).

It's not just the "Military Industrial Complex" that Eisenhower warned us about. It has now morphed into the Military Intelligence Complex, which cannot be anything but anathema to a "Republic of the People, by the People, and for the People." When the government can use its secret surveillance capability to treat its own people as potential threats, we are no longer living in a free democracy.

sw