uly 24, 2013 "Information Clearing House - I spent the summer of 1961 behind the Iron Curtain. I was part of the US-USSR student exchange program. It was the second year of the program that operated under auspices of the US Department of State. Our return to the West via train through East Germany was interrupted by the construction of the Berlin Wall. We were sent back to Poland. The East German rail tracks were occupied with Soviet troop and tank trains as the Red Army concentrated in East Germany to face down any Western interference.

Fortunately, in those days there were no neoconservatives. Washington had not grown the hubris it so well displays in the 21st century. The wall was built and war was avoided. The wall backfired on the Soviets. Both JFK and Ronald Reagan used it to good propaganda effect.

In those days America stood for freedom, and the Soviet Union for oppression. Much of this impression was created by Western propaganda, but there was some semblance to the truth in the image. The communists had a Julian Assange and an Edward Snowden of their own. His name was Cardinal Jozef Mindszenty, the leader of the Hungarian Catholic Church.

Mindszenty opposed tyranny. For his efforts he was imprisoned by the Nazis. Communists also regarded his as an undesirable, and he was tortured and given a life sentence in 1949.

Freed by the short-lived Hungarian Revolution in 1956, Mindszenty reached the American Embassy in Budapest and was granted political asylum by Washington. However, the communists would not give him the free passage that asylum presumes, and Mindszenty lived in the US Embassy for 15 years, 79% of his remaining life.

In the 21st century roles have reversed. Today it is Washington that is enamored of tyranny. On Washington’s orders, the UK will not permit Julian Assange free passage to Ecuador, where he has been granted asylum. Like Cardinal Mindszenty, Assange is stuck in the Ecuadoran Embassy in London.

Washington will not permit its European vassal states to allow overflights of airliners carrying Edward Snowden to any of the countries that have offered Snowden asylum. Snowden is stuck in the Moscow airport.

In Washington politicians of both parties demand that Snowden be captured and executed. Politicians demand that Russia be punished for not violating international law, seizing Snowden, and turning him over to Washington to be tortured and executed, despite the fact that Washington has no extradition treaty with Russia.

Snowden did United States citizens a great service. He told us that despite constitutional prohibition, Washington had implemented a universal spy system intercepting every communication of every American and much of the rest of the world. Special facilities are built in which to store these communications.

In other words, Snowden did what Americans are supposed to do--disclose government crimes against the Constitution and against citizens. Without a free press there is nothing but the government’s lies. In order to protect its lies from exposure, Washington intends to exterminate all truth tellers.

The Obama Regime is the most oppressive regime ever in its prosecution of protected whistleblowers. Whistleblowers are protected by law, but the Obama Regime insists that whistleblowers are not really whistleblowers. Instead, the Obama Regime defines whistleblowers as spies, traitors, and foreign agents. Congress, the media, and the faux judiciary echo the executive branch propaganda that whistleblowers are a threat to America. It is not the government that is violating and raping the US Constitution that is a threat. It is the whistleblowers who inform us of the rape who are the threat.

The Obama Regime has destroyed press freedom. A lackey federal appeals court has ruled that NY Times reporter James Risen must testify in the trial of a CIA officer charged with providing Risen with information about CIA plots against Iran. The ruling of this fascist court destroys confidentiality and is intended to end all leaks of the government’s crimes to media.

What Americans have learned in the 21st century is that the US government lies about everything and breaks every law. Without whistleblowers, Americans will remain in the dark as “their” government enserfs them, destroying every liberty, and impoverishes them with endless wars for Washington’s and Wall Street’s hegemony.

Snowden harmed no one except the liars and traitors in the US government. Contrast Washington’s animosity against Snowden with the pardon that Bush gave to Dick Cheney aide, Libby, who took the fall for his boss for blowing the cover, a felony, on a covert CIA operative, the spouse of a former government official who exposed the Bush/Cheney/neocon lies about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.

Whatever serves the tiny clique that rules america is legal; whatever exposes the criminals is illegal.

That’s all there is to it.

Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy and associate editor of the Wall Street Journal. He was columnist for Business Week, Scripps Howard News Service, and Creators Syndicate. He has had many university appointments. His internet columns have attracted a worldwide following. His latest book, The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism and Economic Dissolution of the West is now available.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article35643.htm

Good article!

Good article and bad news. If only we had a real media to report stuff like this.

Hussein still has his trolls idolizing him.

Let's hope that it doesn't get worse.

This vid more or less tells the story of how the USA became the USSA:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKwO1onXAaI&feature=player_embedded

Wow! Even some of the liberals are turning on Obama.

I think they're turning on the crooked government itself. Obama's bad, but he's just a stooge. Nobody seriously believes he's the man in charge.

OMG!

Obama is JUST like Stalin!





This horrid persecution/torture of those stellar patriots of freedom
Julian Assange and Edward Snowden has PROVED it beyond any possible
doubt.

I urge you all to EMIGRATE to China immediately!!

NK would be a better choice!

He ain't going far enough,that's why!

"I do not ask that you place hands upon the tyrant to topple him over, but simply that you support him no longer; then you will behold him, like a great Colossus whose pedestal has been pulled away, fall of his own weight and break in pieces." -Étienne de La Boétie


Besides,Pauly is the wrong one to complain!
He is as staunch a Statist as the Obama-Crowd is!
Just from a Rival Gang fighting over the same Territory!

some are very ignorant and play that bi partisan game. Both parties are owned and operated by the economic elite.

One can only speculate that with all the police state surveillance going on how many of our politicians are being blackmailed.

yep,just vote in our Gang,and ALL will be well!

I wonder if even China records every phone and text message and internet browsing of its people, I doubt it.

Actually China is much, much more possessive and controlling over its citizens (from what i've heard). They've always monitored all of the above, and also have much more control over the media than the U.S. does (including the internet). Although the U.S. has had very strong media influence since 1917.

However, my purpose was not to contradict you on something so minor, but to commend you on a great article, sir.

We've all seen where "follow the leader has gotten us!

I say it's time that The People took the reigns of power away from the criminals. This implies a DUTY on the part of EACH AND EVERY ONE OF YOU to do just that. Note that a failure to do your duty at this point does NOT bode well for the future!

The ball is now in the peoples' court...Are you as an individual component of a UNITED FREE PEOPLE going to make an ace serve, or are you just going to lie down and beg for mercy like a whipped slave because you're afraid you'll get "in trouble" with your master??

Oh yeah,Craigy will free you!

He will fix everything with his own brand of Statism!
He will become another great Leader leading his People to Freedom if they just trust him!
Can't leave a Man like this out in the Cold!
Hasn't it gotten in your Heads yet that all they want is to perpetuate the System,just as long as they get to run it!

I think it's time the herd got it thru its collective head to quit following a leader to the slaughterhouse and all decided together as individuals to abandon the leader-ship, turn around and start a stampede of their own...in the opposite direction.

Maybe a national referendum to change their monetary system & kick out the banks? That'd be a step in the right direction, after all, the country belongs to its people...They should be the ones who decide on what to do with it, not some crooked administration working for the international banking cartel.

It is a lot better in China and Iran!

Yeah,need only elect the Right Gang,and there will be Paradise on Earth,including the Unicorn-Poop for the Masses!

Yep,A National Referendum!