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[Big_Bird]

[Guri Guy]

[canuckistan]

"The history of liberty is a history of the limitations of governmental power, not the increase of it." - Woodrow Wilson.

"When even one American - who has done nothing wrong -- is forced by fear to shut his mind and close his mouth, then all of Americans are in peril." -- Harry S. Truman

"No Man is justified in doing evil on the grounds of expedience." -- Theodore Roosevelt

"It is to be regretted that the rich and powerful too often bend the acts of government to their selfish purposes." - Andrew Jackson

"Every gun that is made, every warship that is launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed" -- Dwight D. Eisenhower

"The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted." - James Madison

I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts." --Abraham Lincoln



"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we." �George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Aug. 5, 2004 (Watch video clip

"You never know what your history is going to be like until long after you're gone." �George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., May 5, 2006

[deadman]

More quotes about govt power (not necessarily from presidents)

"If neccessary, the people should push the government aside to achieve peace" - Dwight D Eisenhower

"I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it" - Thomas Jefferson

"Silence (when freedom is threatened) is not golden; it is yellow" - Tom Anderson

"The right most valued by all civilized men is the right to be left alone" - Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis

"The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive" - Thomas Jefferson

"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong" - Voltaire

[igotthisguitar]

Knives, rifles and a whip. Are Bush's gift-givers trying to say something?
Gee, this list sounds almost like the one from the Canada terrorist cell raid.

Why, we even have fertilizer! � PID

2004 presents inventory reads like a paranoid survivalist's

By Julian Borger
UK Guardian
June 16, 2006

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,1799599,00.html

WASHINGTON � A braided leather whip, a sniper rifle, six jars of fertiliser and a copy of the "Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook" were among the presents foreign leaders have given George Bush. They are clearly trying to tell him something.



The inventory of official gifts from 2004, published this week by the state department reads like the wish list of the sort of paranoid survivalist who holes up in his log cabin to await Armageddon, having long ago severed all ties with the rest of the world.

The president received a startling array of weapons, including assorted daggers, and a machete from Gabon. He got the braided whip with a wooden handle from the Hungarian prime minister. The "Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook", a gift from the Sultan of Brunei, has some tips on how to use some of these implements in a tight spot.

The paperback also explains how to wrestle with an alligator, escape from a mountain lion, and take a punch to the body. But the small arsenal of guns presented by Jordan's King Abdullah, including a $10,000 sniper rifle, would presumably render much of that advice unnecessary.

The king also gave President Bush six jars of "various fertilisers", on a rotating wooden stand. It sounds like the sort of present likely to cause offence when coming from a mother-in-law or sibling. But according to the Jordanian embassy, the jars contained neither manure nor the sort of chemicals that can be turned into home made bombs, but rather an array of fertile volcanic soils found around the country.

In each instance listed by the state department, the acceptance of the gift is justified by the phrase "non-acceptance would cause embarrassment to donor and US government". But acceptance clearly has its own embarrassments.

For example, it is hard to imagine the tough-talking non-nonsense Donald Rumsfeld summoning much enthusiasm for the gold bracelet he got from the Egyptian minister of defence, or the aromatherapy gift set from those cheeky Jordanians. There will, however, be no calming scents wafting around the Pentagon any time soon, as the gift was hastily passed on to the general services administration, a government department that disposes in unwanted presents.

If the top members of the administration met to compare gifts at the end of the year, Mr Rumsfeld would no doubt have been looking enviously over the president's shoulder at some of his weapons, or at the special presentation edition of "The Art of War" Dick Cheney got from the Chinese vice president.

But Mr Cheney also received presents clearly intended to enhance his gentler, fun-loving side: a "Happy Day" clock from the Swiss president, gold silk pillows, scented candles and a pottery incense burner (the Jordanians again).

It is apparent from this document that a lot of the foreign dignitaries do not do much research before they go looking for appropriate gifts. President Bush, a reformed drunk who does not touch alcohol, was given a cellar full of wine over the course of 2004.

CIA agents seem to get a lot of presents from abroad, although the recipients (other than the director at the time, George Tenet) are not named. Nor are the donor governments although it is usually easy enough to guess from the gifts, many of which are from the Middle East or Pakistan.

Under government rules, officials are only allowed to hold on to the gifts worth under $100 after they leave office. Others are consigned to presidential libraries or the national archives, where they are occasionally put on display to illustrate America's warm ties with the rest of the world.

There will be nothing to show for the much-vaunted special relationship. Despite standing shoulder to shoulder in Iraq and around the world in 2004, President Bush got nothing from Tony Blair, for Christmas or his birthday