One American's View

Finally, A Terrorist Who May Be Guilty

The Bush administration can finally put a feather in its cap with the war on terror!  Yep, since Bush has been too incompetent to catch Osama or virtuall anyone else related to 9-11, and the Guantanamo detainees have proven to be harder to convict than anticipated, even with rumors admitted as evidence, someone here in the US screwed up and tipped his terrorist hand in the newspaper!

The Secret Service went to the home of 81 year old Dan Tilli of Bethlehem PA after a letter to the editor he wrote was published on the topic of the hanging of Saddam.  The last sentence of his letter said "I still believe they hanged the wrong man," making him a threat to Democracy and our Great Leader, George II.  The Secret Service searched Mr. Tilli's home and took his picture.

This is the second time that agents of the "Bustapo" have arrived at Mr. Tilli's home.  Last year, the FBI branch arrived to question him after he wrote a letter encouraging civil war to remove Bush from office.  Well, I'm glad to see that the Bush administration is keeping its promise to America that they will keep everyone safe from geriatric terrorists who are stalking them from rural Pennsylvania.

On the other hand, it was Thomas Jefferson who wrote in the Declaration of Independence that it was the right, the DUTY of every citizen to throw off ANY GOVERNMENT when that government is no longer functioning for the welfare and happiness of the governed.  I am going to suggest that Mr. Jefferson would not be very proud of the tactics now employed in America today to protect us from the evil genie Bin Laden, the Mr. Tilli's and yes, the Bryan Galt's in this world.

As I see it, if change cannot be created from within because of government corruption and ignorance, the public is entitled to consider other means to an end.  Of course, I forget that Bush probably doesn't know anything about history, you know those sections that describe the consequences of treating your people with indifference, allowing the gap between rich and poor to widen to such an extent that it creates anger, envy and rage in the general population which, historically speaking, usually leads to the loss of the "head" of the heads of those states.

Alas, I can say with 100% certainty that civil war in America impossible.  The public has become so attached to the toys of technology that it would be unthinkable to do anything that could disrupt the power supply or cause the X-Box to sell for $1900 next year!  Anyone that believes in that kind of action should be stamped out at once!  Or, they could be sent to Cuba for the next 10 years for suggesting that Osama Bin Laden was the man that should have been hanged, not Saddam.  In today's environment, who has time to find out what these darn Senior Activist Terrorists really mean!

SHAME TO THE SECRET SERVICE AND THE FBI FOR MISUSING THEIR AUTHORITY ON THESE MATTERS AND SHAME TO US ALL FOR NOT BECOMING OUTRAGED AT ALL THE OUTRAGES THAT CONTINUE TO OCCUR.

A Case Study

I was recently given information from a close associate of mine about a miscarriage of justice that has taken place in California.  The defendant in the case, Douglas Stankewitz, was convicted of murder almost 30 years ago by a jury not of his peers, but of a group of people that have historically found people from Douglas' family to be the enemies of the United States.

Mr. Stankewitz is a Native American who was tried in Fresno California.  His defense team didn't bother to take that into account when getting ready for the trial.  This area has a long history of racial prejudice against the Natives.  Once the trial got underway, his defense team didn't challenge outright lies coming from the prosecution.  They didn't challenge the only witness against him who had received a payoff from the prosecution in exchange for his testimony.  They didn't challenge anything.  The defense team simply let their client get convicted.

This case is a miscarriage of justice that continues to go on.  Even with Douglas' lawyer admitting under oath that he failed to provide adequate defense because he had other business interests he was concerned with, he has yet to get a new trial.  Even with a federal appeals court order directing the Fresno Superior Court to retry this case, issued in 2003, Douglas is still locked away.

I would surely hate to be thrown away like that.  The fact of the matter is, none of us would like it.  The question is, why do we tolerate it when it happens to other people?  An injustice against one of us is an injustice against all of us.  If we allow it to happen to others, we are gambling that it could never happen to us, and your life could end up on the line one day as a result.

In the case of Mr. Stankewitz, it appears that the justice system is more concerned about covering up for its own failures than in correcting an injustice that has gone on for far too long.  Its time to reexamine his case and then let him go.  We, the People of the State of California have deprived him of his freedom because we tolerated racism, judicial misconduct and violations of a citizens civil rights.  We took his life away from him in the process, which is something that he can never recover and that we can never replace.

When will there be some justice in this case?