Our Constitution - The Open Source for Freedom.

Last week I wrote about the martial law that those in power have been planning for so long. That is the bad news; there are a few more things you should keep in mind as the status quo continues to shred.

Those in power are going to lose. They are the past, the top-down form of human organizing that has always been overthrown by the people with time. We are in the final throes of a revolution that began to reverse the centralization of power with the computer. Now, it is spreading. Those in power know this. Their plans reflect that fear..

Just as we are seeing that open source software will always win we are witnessing a transformation in ourselves. Top-down structure makes those in power dinosaurs, eaten alive by the dispersed, lemurs. Their day is over but they continue to struggle.

The power of open source vs. closed source is a battle that is still shaping the next millennium. Both software engineers and cats understand this. The first has witnessed the change. The second simply refuses to be herded. It only takes a few to innovate. The rest follow.

The world is changing.

The last arenas to feel that change are government and its adjunct, law. They made grandiose and ruthless plans and those are now failing.

We all know about the Red and Blue Lists; we know that Bush and Cheney's plans include instituting martial law and incarcerating approximately eight million Americans whose ideas are hostile to their continued hijacking of America's wealth through the corporate system built up over the last century or more. If you can't control the cats then cage them, they cry.

Most of us have read about the spring night in 2004 when Acting Attorney James Comey, rushed to prevent Chief of Staff Andrew Card and then–White House counsel Alberto Gonzales, sent by George Bush, to bully the hospitalized John Ashcroft from signing papers that would have authorized a surveillance of Americans that they all knew to be entirely unconstitutional. The measure, known by the pompous name of “Continuity of Governance,” was the road map for martial law that would never end. Everyone knows that; in another spring, 2007, the same man, Comey, sat before Congress and told what had taken place that night. An article in Radar Magazine told the story a few days ago but most of us had already heard rumors.

Those in power have been making plans for a long time. They rely on signatures on pieces of paper to immunize them from their crimes. Sometimes those plans worked out; increasingly often they do not.

One of the six nuclear bombs that disappeared last summer left a radio-active crater in Peru, reported by Pravda, September 20, 2007. Naturally, here in the US it was a non-news item.

In most of the world the conflict within the United States over who will dominate is very much under discussion. They cannot change our direction. That, we need to do ourselves.

The problem is greed married to power without conscience. The problem is here.

Today ordinary people struggle to survive the meltdown of our economy, they tremble at the threat of rampant homelessness, a police militarization that has been linked into the use of government to convert all American institutions into reliable if shrinking streams of income which, in cookie cutter fashion, have been replicated everywhere to be changed as needed. One such change is in the offing.

Television and the Internet are merging; that was determined by the logic of technology. Who will be in control is the issue that excites the gluttonous appetites of corporate greed.

According to ipower.ning.com, 2012 will be the Year the Internet Ends . Given the propensities of those in power the wish to extend their business model, all too familiar to Americans today, into the ether regions is not surprising. The computer age is not the sort of thing that megacorporations tolerate. They see the enormous flow of energy and money that began to course through its invisible conduits. They drooled all over the desk of Kevin Martin, the troll of the FCC who has done all possible to give the control of the airways into their hands.

The rise of convergent technologies, technologies will blend all forms of communication into one mighty river; The greedy want control. They believe they are fighting each other, dinosaurs thrashing, clawing, and gouging, for the opportunity to plunder the tiny multitudes. They will fail.

People are open source minded. They move towards freedom whenever and where ever they can. They find or build tools as needed.

Those tools come from all directions. Today a book was republished, and it is a book that anyone who cares about freedom should read. It is a short book, written by a man who said it could be read while sipping a cup of coffee and eating a doughnut. The book talks about things that seem far removed from the open-closed source war, but it encapsulates another debate with the very same underpinnings. That is the militarization of our police and legacy given to us by our Founders and the displacement of that legacy, the Constitution and common law, by statute law and equity courts.

“The Proper Role of Law Enforcement - What Every Citizen Should Know. What Every Cop Should Believe” was originally published by Richard Mack, the Sheriff who first filed against the Brady Bill in 1994. Over the next five years the case worked its way up to the Supreme Court which handed down the opinion in 1998 that the sheriff of a county can make the determination of what is, and what is not, constitutional. The decision cheered gun advocates but it went much further than the 2^nd Amendment in its implications.

The Constitution is an open source document, founded on the common law, which is the open source form for justice.

Statute law, code, and unending agencies constructed on the top-down hierarchal model, are government as we have come to know it. Statute is the artifact of top down thinking, telling us by demonstration that the individual has no power. Government and law perpetuate conflict, converting animosity and control into an industry that squeezes us dry, draining us through all of our relationships, including the most intimate.

It is an ugly picture. Justice should bring peace and with it, happiness. Today the justice system brings fear, bankruptcy, and unending conflict; it is war played out in our communities and lives.

The common law and the Constitution, used as intended by the Founders were reliable, inexpensive, and remained directly in the hands of the people. The Constitution and common law was power in the hands of the people, the open source for freedom, allowing individuals and communities to reduce their conflict and find peace.

Today Americans live in fear of the law. Today the law is war waged against each of us. Ask someone who is stopped for a traffic ticket if they are afraid. Ask a family how they feel when Child Protective Services comes to call.

The war in America is as deep and savage as that being waged in Iraq. It is war made on each of us.

In his book Sheriff Mack said, “ It is time that”…this nation under God, shall have a new birth of freedom… .” It’s time for law enforcement officers to get back to the basics of law enforcement for which their jobs were created---preserving our Constitution. Police have a difficult and thankless job. They put their lives on the line every day in a world affected by drugs and violence and social decay. May each of us in this most noble profession, as we pursue the guilty among us, never be guilty ourselves of the greater crime, that of violating our oath in God’s name to defend the constitutional rights of the people for whom we work.”

When you read the Mack book you cry. Hand it to the cop who wants to make his quota. Hand it to the judge who would hear your case. Give it to your neighbor who thinks there is a difference between McCain, Obama, and Clinton.

Those in power fear the Constitution. They jeer at the common law, but they are afraid. That is why the term, “Home-grown Terrorist,” was crafted. Threats and the posturing of authority are growing thin, and they know it.

The Constitution, laid on the foundation of common law, was intended to be the whole of the law. Read “The Role of Law Enforcement” and you will understand why they are afraid. They know we can still remember freedom.

( Buy The Book. You will be glad you did.)