My Letter to the Senators: Against Attacking Syria

Click on the link after the letter to send your own through The Nation Magazine.  They made it simple, you can change it into your own words...their words were different than mine!

I agree that it is not acceptable to ignore such action by any political leader on their own people and such an action is plainly against international human rights justice.

I too have seen horrible injustice in times of conflict and war, being a war photojournalist in the Middle East for almost ten years.  The evil than man is capable of is unbearable.  I have walked in regions of utter poverty, hunger, and social inequalities where those is power are full of both greed and pride allowing others to suffer in extremes without blinking an eye.

However, it is my deepest hopes that the United States of America waits just a bit to gather global and national approval through the UN before we fly one plane, drone or take one step upon Syria's soil.  After living and working in war torn area's and analyzing conflict worldwide, I am highly concerned that this action will greatly harm hundreds if not thousands of innocent people.  It will put our country and American's on foreign soil at high risk for their own safety.  If we do not wait the few weeks that it takes to gain allies at this time, we will not only increase our security concerns but gain many new enemies who were once allies.

Not only is our security at risk, but also our national debt.  This may sound cruel, but in the name humanity should we not first spend the billions for our own people who are downtrodden and sleeping in cars, behind bushes and under bridges or those who work full time at an unsustainable living wage, or those who cannot get medical care when they are diagnosed with cancer?  Are we not then like the other countries who spend their nations wealth making themselves and others more wealthy while their citizens die of hunger?

Are we not then becoming the global police who ignores international law and does as we please?  It is time to show the world that we are not like that, we are patient to wait for the pieces to be put into place to have the ability to have the support of the rest of the world and the courts use just cause for the crimes that Assad has committed.  We are just to adhere to international protocol before jumping into action.  It is our chance to undo the damage that was done during and before the incursion in Iraq.  It is our chance as a nation to shine and become the example that we presented during the Vietnam war and WWII.

CLICK HERE FOR easy letter writing to your Senators

America- The Police State and our Guns

Susan Brannon
19 December 2012

The Associated Press reports that the medical examiner Dr. Karber said that all of the victims were killed up close by multiple rifle shots, yet the shooter killed himself and was found with two handguns.  How did he kill the kids with rifle shots from handguns?  There are conflicting reports from the media.  The news is agenda driven and it is difficult to filter through the information to find out what is true.  At first, the reporting was all wrong, they named the wrong shooter  that the father and brother were killed and reported them as facts instead of waiting for the official statements.

While filtering the news, we must remain aware that the news is agenda driven and figure out what that agenda is.  When we can do that, then we can understand what the next political moves might be.  After the 9/11s so called attacks, the American public was bombarded with phrases such as war on terrorism, weapons of mass destruction while casually inserting sentences on Saddam Hussain and Iraq.  In time our army went into Iraq and continued to remain there in spite of the blatant lies on both the American public and the world.

While filtering the news, think about reality and do not take the "news" as the final truth. I can tell you with a sure mind that today the U.S. army has killed at least 20 children in Afghanistan,  Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia etc...and we do not hear anything about it.  We only hear about the killing of children in our own country.

The national rifle association said that they will help assist in reducing the gun violence.  Yet, if we cannot control drugs, alcohol (during the probation) we will not be able to control guns.  If the U.S. government decides to take the guns away then we will have the same result as we had during the probation where Al Capone made millions of dollars from boot legging and others making millions from drugs.  Most likely, someone will take over the black market on guns and make millions from the sale of the guns.

The problem here is that America is a police state and there is no doubt about it.  We have the most extensive spying on citizens in human history that goes beyond the imagination of George Orwell in his 1984 doomsday book.  America now has the power to arrest American citizens without due process, they can declare someone a terrorist anywhere in the world,  our government can detain an American for life without ever presenting evidence...Obama can take away the guns.

You can't have an armed population and a police state.