Legion

Others,

The constant push for unlimited spending on national security has resulted in cuts to social security. Pushing for spending on national security creates a conflict that supports the elitist advantage. The technology for the surveillance costs taxpayers. The cost for training, personnel, weapons, armored vehicles, media coverage, cover-up, imprisonment, detention, targeted killing, drones, jets, attack helicopters, and the like adds up.

Wealthy industrialists get richer. They don't pay their share in taxes. They use money from tax shelters to buy decisions in government; when there isn't enough in the federal budget to pay for their costly "solutions," they cut social security to take even more money from taxpayers.

Public Perception
There is a distortion in proportion in the concern over terrorism. There are serious consequences for excessive investment in counter-terrorism. Rights are reduced in civil (domestic) and human (foreign) areas. Surveillance is increased. Privacy is diminished.
Indefinite detention, torture, targeted killing, unauthorized covert ops are associated with counter-terrorism actions in different nations around the world.

Human Rights
Use link to find examples.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counter-terrorism#Human_rights

The FBI conducted an investigation of the Tsarnaevs. They did not find anything that warranted adding them to the databank for suspected and known terrorists. The Tsarnaev that is alive is still a suspect. He has not been convicted. The evidence presented though the media is not conclusive. Yet, they were both hunted as terrorists. The older brother was shot and killed as though he were a known terrorist.

 The CIA had Tsarnaev added to the terrorist databank.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57581350/cia-had-boston-bombing-suspect-tamerlan-tsarnaevs-name-added-to-terror-database-before-attack/
TIDE: Terrorist Identities DataMART Environment
"The CIA determined that Tsarnaev should be included in TIDE, and the National Counterterrorism Center added it into the database. The spelling of Tsarnaev's name in TIDE was not the same as the spelling the FBI used in its investigation. The CIA also shared this information with other federal agencies in October."

Field agents in the counter-terrorist unit sent to Boston must have interpreted the presence of their names on the list as an authorization for lethal force.

There is a SIRG investigation on the Todashev shooting in Orlando, FL.
SIRG: Shooting Incident Review Group
http://www.fbi.gov/news/updates-on-investigation-into-multiple-explosions-in-boston"The FBI is conducting a review of the May 22, 2013 shooting of Ibragim Todashev, 27, which occurred at Todashev’s residence, at 6022 Peregrine Avenue, Orlando, Florida. The FBI’s shooting incident review team interviews witnesses and gathers information regarding the shooting incident for presentation to a Shooting Incident Review Group (SIRG), which consists of members from the FBI and the Department of Justice."

A SIRG investigation needs to be conducted on the Tsarnaev shooting as well.

Spending for Immigration Reform

You’d think that immigration reform would be limited to communication with the state department in Mexico and providing administrative supports for the legalization of law abiding immigrant workers. This is not the case when someone decides to earmark it as another pork barrel project. This has become an exercise in how to establish unlimited spending on national security as the state religion. The plan is to hire 40,000 border patrol agents to reduce the illegal immigrant population by 25%. The use of attack helicopters has not been announced, but it is regarded as an option.

Immigration Reform
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2013-06-20/news/sns-rt-us-usa-immigration-senatebre95i1jl-20130619_1_border-security-u-s-border-agents-landmark-immigration-bill
"Federal agents on the U.S.-Mexican border would double to about 40,000 under a deal reached on Thursday in the Democratic-led Senate to draw more Republicans to a landmark immigration bill headed toward anticipated passage...

"Republican Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama mocked the deal even though he has called for tougher border enforcement. He noted that it was drafted after congressional analysts estimated the bill would trim illegal immigration by just 25 percent."

Meanwhile, unemployment is a larger problem than it appears to be statistically. Homelessness has been addressed by slashing tents as shelter. Where have all the flowers gone? What happened to the kinder and gentler nation? The cry for bloodshed in countering terrorism has blinded the nation to concern for the poor.

The following re-write highlights the personal perspective of Legion, a homeless vagrant in the gospel story. Homelessness and the oppression of the poor are not new in the struggle with imperial power. The poor are treated as incidental in importance. Neo-Platonic blame for the “victim” is invoked as a given implication. They argue that he must have done something to deserve his fate.

This piece asks the question, “Is our Legion guilty of having a social conscience?” Is that why he has been driven into a state of vagrancy?

Legion
Ps42 Ps22 Gal3 Lk8

Sanity with vanity is madnessss.

The hard cool darkness of tomb
contrasts the light for ordinary life,
but gives shelter from the cruelty
of rule by domination.

Weapons have been turned
from defense against attack
to tools for tyranny. The homeless poor
have no recourse but to seek shelter
where it can be found.

Now rats and ravens provide
competition for food.

I have seen affliction
under the rod of wrath.
I have been driven into darkness.
I have been isolated by punishment.

The flesh of my skin wastes away.
My bones feel brittle.
I have been besieged with
bitterness and enveloped
in tribulation.

As a deer thirsts
for flowing streams
of cool, clean water,
so my heart longs
for serenity.

My soul thirsts for God,
the loving source for all being.

My tears have been fluid
in the floodwaters of time,
while I have been asked with arrogance,
“Where is your Savior’s deliverance?”

These things I remember
as my mind is awash with feelings:
how we glowed with anticipation
When I led the procession
into the house of God
with glad thoughts and songs of joy.

We represented a multitude
by keeping the festal feast!

My self-image is cast down.
I recall celebrations from my youth.
The majesty of mountain looked down
on the vibrant green lushness of land
that was fed by the crystal clear clean of streams
that flowed down into the raging peace of river
as we worshipped God outside the temple.

Now, non-being calls to being
at the rumble of the thunder drum.
All the waves of wind and spirit
with all the splattering patter of soul
have washed over me
as rain roars to ground.

The lightning flash
of love commands respect.
The darkness of knowledge
is illumined with question
revealed through prayer
to the Leader of life.

Faith, you are my strength.
Hasten to help me.
Save me from bullets;
my life from the tearing teeth of dogs.

Save me from predation by predators;
my wretched body from the wildness of animals.
I will declare your name as “Salvation.”
It was faith in your salvation that saved me.

Before faith,
we were imprisoned to cruelty
until rights for civility and humanity
could be used to organize civilization.

Now that faith has come
we are not subject to the tyranny
of playing tyrants or the tyrannized.
There is no state religion.
There is no Jewish, Christian or Muslim state.
There is no empire.
There is no Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian,
Greek, Roman, Byzantine, Frankish,
Austrian, British or American empire.

There is no establishment for a state religion.
There is no unlimited spending on security
as the religion for the state.
Proposals for unlimited spending
will be denied.

The storm has passed.
The air has begun to clear.
The mad rush of water to the lake
has slowed to the running of rivulets.

Someone surrounded by others
is gliding into the shore. Such madness!
They were out on the water in this storm?

Food! They may have food.
I need to eat. My stomach
needs to be filled
with solid sustenance.

My feet carry me to him.
“What have you to do with me, Salvation?
I beg you, do not torment me.”

“What is your name?”
He asked.

“My name is Legion.”
There are far too many who suffer
from tyranny.

Sounds of squeals echo down the hill.
A herd of swine rushes down the bank
into the water. Their squeals are drowned.
Now they are drinking with snorts.

He said,
“As the voracious dew of humid air

brings forth the finely-fanned fronds of palm
with tough trunks giving base to growth;

“As the humid heat of air

brings forth hymn and holder
from an unknown Sower,
sensing green flames
fanning forth within thin golden edges;

“And blessed days,

meet sights of youthful heron
perched in slight pause
before spring into flight;

“So, in anyone,
comes forth

forms, growth,
and flame;
insight into being
from perception
to perspective
about law.

“Living being is a reflection
of divine conception

and physical manifestation.
It is a dynamic entity in which we find relation
to the concepts which preceded our existence.
Space, energy, matter, time and probability
find form through interconnected causalities.

“Heavenly Being, Author of all that which is,

in relation to whom we find our being,
guide, govern and guard us by that which
is holy about our understanding of Spirit,
that energy that infuses our being
from the divine personhood of your nature;

“That by your leadership

through all the cares and considerations
of our occupations and social relations
we may remember to dwell
within the design of your plan for being
as extended from each to each
and as deep cries to deep from that within
that belongs to each human person.

“Come share what we have to eat.”

Put your trust in God, the Deliverer.
Divine Being will be praised again
as your Savior’s deliverance.
Happiness now
provides hope
for the future.

Say Yea Yah.
Yea you!

=======================

Legion had been holding on to constitutional hope for justice in society. The bill of rights was and isl the governing body in his political view.

Jesus as Christ directed the poor to place their hope in God as an act for redemption. When the machinery for government has been corrupted; when the real ideals that can be practically invoked are being ignored; the simple act of sharing sustenance transforms our reality into something worthy of praise according to the providential design for nature. Having faith reinforces purpose.  

Live – Lightning Crashes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xsJ4O-nSveg

Lightning crashes.
An old mother dies.
Her intentions fall to the floor.
The angel closes her eyes.
The confusion that was hers
belongs to the baby down the hall.

-------------------------------------

The elitist advantage needs to be reduced. The obsession with national security has to be held in check by legitimate regard for social security. Even excess spending on health care has to be countered by concern for food, shelter, clothing, education and employment for the poor and disabled.

Steve K.