5.04.2005

free country

Since I'm so pressed for time these days, I'll borrow a post from two of my favorite bloggers, TJ at Welcome To Gilead and Redsock at In Cold Blog. (You guys often post about the same stuff.)

It's not a new story, but it's an important one, and it can't get too much coverage - since the blogosphere seems to be the only place it exists. From Ted Rall:
They've vanished into the netherworld of a Homeland Security gulag and their story has already disappeared from the headlines, but the shocking case of two 16-year-old girls from New York City arrested a month ago ought to inspire outrage among every American worthy of the name. Since the government's reasons for the girls' imprisonment could apply to virtually any teenager, it should also spark fear.

. . .

Without a warrant, NYPD detectives and federal agents burst into the girl's home--no wonder they don't have time to look for Osama!--where they "searched her belongings and confiscated her computer and the essays that she had written as part of a home schooling program," say her family. "One essay concerned suicide...[that] asserted that suicide is against Islamic law." The family is Bangladeshi. They are Muslim. That, coupled with the mere mention of suicide bombing in her essay, was enough to put the fuzz on high alert.

Although she is conservative and devout, the girl and her parents vigorously deny that she is an Islamist extremist (not that such opinions are illegal), but this is post-9/11 America and post-9/11 America is out of its mind.

Based solely on an essay written by one of the two, the FBI says both girls are "an imminent threat to the security of the United States based upon evidence that they plan to become suicide bombers." But the feds admit that they have no evidence to back their suspicions. Nothing.

. . .

Homes searched without a warrant, kids thrown in prison for thoughts real and imagined, people's lives destroyed by an out-of-control federal government--will Americans speak up for what's right? Please call and write your congressman and senator to demand the release of the two girls from Queens.
Read Rall's story here.

Here's another good one from Rall on how your vote - and your blog - can get you fired. Doesn't matter if it never interferes with your work. It's discriminatory, and in some states, it's perfectly legal. P.S. Rall decries this dangerous intrusion into our personal lives from any ideology or political party. There are examples from all the Republicrats.

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