Tryannies are Toppling across the Middle East--Could the US be Next?

Egypt has thrown off a tyrannical regime.  When will we topple ours?

I'm not talking about President Obama; He's just a cog in the machine.  I'm referring to this large bureaucratic regime, this clanking soul-draining monster, this federal, state and municipal steamroller that is built, fed and operated by the statists of all parties.

Egypt's situation is fundamentally different than ours, for we do not suffer under a military dictatorship, but read this excerpt and broadly replace references to "military" with "bureaucracy," and you'll see what I'm talking about...

The democratic wave that has finally struck the Arab world is, among other things, a civilian protest movement against the militarization of Middle Eastern life. Old Oriental despotisms, for all their unpleasantness, did not fundamentally assault the civilian nature of Muslim societies, where men of the cloth, letters, the bazaar, and small-town aristocracies defined the “good and noble.”

Robbed of ideology and military purpose (defeating Israel became a millenarian dream, like the ancient Arab aspiration to conquer Constantinople), Arab armies became instruments of political oppression and private enrichment. (Reuel Marc Gerecht - Weekly Standard)

The tyranny we groan and strain under is a bureaucratic one
FDR built a civilian statist army back in the 1930's and put it on war footing.  Government was supposed to wage war on poverty, ignorance and those on the outside attacking us and our way of life.  Instead, it now fosters poverty and ignorance and joins in the  multicultural jihad against our borders, language and culture (Yes, I got that from Doc Savage).

This out of control government that cannot manage its own finances nonetheless lectures us on what we should eat and how we should live.  It incompetently stumbles and bumbles its way through international diplomacy and blows hundreds of billions on intelligence, only to be surprised when a friendly dictator is toppled.  Meanwhile, domestic surveillance of innocent citizens increases.

Fighting Citizens is Easier than Fighting Criminals
Governments across the spectrum have found fighting crime and improving the lives of its citizens too challenging, so it now turns on them, spies on them, regulates and scolds them.  America's army of bureaucrats long ago turned on the people it was supposed to serve, and like the Egyptian Army, enjoys its perks and will not give them up willingly.

Real criminals with real guns are robbing and killing in Denver, but the Jefferson County DA goes after a kid with an airsoft gun.  This is just one story in an avalanche of government-sponsored outrages and abuse.  The EPA demanding dairy farmers treat milk spills as hazardous waste, and calling the dust they kick up "pollution" adds to the bonfire of regulatory stupidities now raging against the job-providers in this country. Our unemployment is government-induced.

Fighting criminals and protecting borders is hard; it's so much easier and satisfying to turn the power of the state against the people.  Government is everywhere.  They have robbed us of the private nature of our lives and our societies.

The price of apathy towards public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.
-Plato

FCC: Fascists Controlling Communication

Inside Every Progressive is a Tyrant Struggling to be Free... And Oppress Others

When liberals like Al Crapton (he calls Limbaugh "Lumbar," so I call Sharpton, "Crapton") shout about conservatives having no right to talk on public airwaves, it means liberal talk radio is getting its ass kicked by conservatives.

When irrelevant nobodies like the Reverend or any MSNBC ranter talks like this, no one even takes notice anymore. Their audience can fit in a port-o-potty.

But when a government official proposes such dangerous and un-American absurdities, it's time to sit up and take notice.

FCC Commissioner Michael Copps is proposing all radio and TV stations that broadcast over public airwaves submit to a "public values test."

Copps had suggested that the test would make a broadcaster's license renewal contingent upon proof that they meet a prospective set of federal criteria. (Hillicon Valley – FCC Push)

Local boards packed with angry, agenda-driven liberals would sit in judgment on radio and tv stations, using government-approved criteria such as "Diversity Compliance."  Gotta have the government recommended daily amount of one legged lesbian church bishops, gay soldiers, peace-loving Muslims and of course the stupidest species in America:  The White Male Father and Husband!

Progressives cannot win in the free marketplace of ideas so they propose to use the coercive power of the state to shut it all down.

Media outlets would be required to submit to the Ministry of Truth disclosure reports and programming plans proving their worthiness and "meaningful commitment to public affairs and news programming."  Progressive toadies and bullhorn-wielding activists at the local level will be the foot soldiers in this Obama-approved Hush Rush campaign.  

And make no mistake, Copps and his fellow statists want to expand their purview to all communications outlets, including cable and internet.  Here is Der Kommissar in his own words:

"What we've had in recent years is an aberration where we have had no oversight of the media.

It's a pretty serious situation that we're in. I think American media has a bad case of substance abuse right now. We are not producing the body of news and information that democracy needs to conduct its civic dialogue [...] we have to reverse that trend." (Copps quoted at NewsBusters)

Is this guy crazy? We've got news coming out our ears. Yes, much of it is sports and celebrity-driven frivolity, but serious news and analysis is as close as your computer keyboard or local library periodicals section.

All Palin, All the Time
Maybe he has in mind a press that flocked to Alaska for synchronized Sara Palin dumpster dives?  This same press corps spent more time investigating an Ohio plumber than they did the Democratic nominee for president. Is this the news media dereliction the FCC Kommissar seeks to stamp out?  I doubt it.

The IBD editors ask the most important question:

Who is Copps to make such demands? And why does a man who thinks like a tyrant hold such a high-ranking position in the U.S. government?

It's reasonable to ask, as Republican Rep. Joe Barton of Texas did in a letter to Copps this week, if the commissioner means to give the federal governmentthe power to determine what content is available for Americans to consume. (IBD)

Indeed.  The federal government and its batwinged gargoyles like Copps are not neutral.  They are biased and are therefore unfit to be the arbiters of what free men and women can or cannot read, see and hear.  We're smart enough to figure it out on our own without a paternalistic statist holding our hand.  MSNBC's ratings are in the toilet; America knows crap when they see it.