Many are frustrated that so little has changed since Obama became President. But one thing has changed. People used to dread things suddenly getting far worse in a hurry. Today, no one looks at the crackdowns in Iran as an omen on what might happen in the US.

I remember exposes claiming internment camps and secret memos. However, we live in the cyber-age where we may have so idea of the exact address of the people we communicate with. Ordinary people can get suspicious when a website that screams too much disappears, without wondering if an important phone call never was received. Junk mail may continue to arrive, but not an important letter.

Reservations are expected even on buses and cash discouraged, even at gas stations. If one buys a Greyhound bus ticket a month in advance it is 2/3 off, a step toward debit and credit card only. The government when it gets angry can freeze bank accounts and credit cards instead of making arrests. If everyone in the country has to wear an ankle bracelet, even when a dissenter rings another dissenter's door bell it might not work. It also might not work when a stranger rings it, unless one called for a pizza delivery first. If the next President is a Republican as the Republican Party gallops to the right, and a future Dick Cheney type doesn't want a mass rally, as he brags how there was no second terror attack under Bush's term and vows there won't be one under his term as long as terror suspects have no rights, doesn't want a large protest he will not allow credit or debit card purchases for those heading toward Washington DC. The no fly list to DC extending to everyone who doesn't have routine expenses periodically in DC. If gas stations can only accept credit cards, not cash, perhaps only walkers will show up for the protest. Of course the second time this happens, even a perfect stranger, (for enough money) might allow one to siphon gas from their gas tank. But most heading toward a protest would decide to then turn around if every traffic light turned red as soon as they approached. If someone siphoned gas just because they couldn't find their credit or debit card, they would curse the badly timed traffic lights continuing on to their designation near the protest.

Persistent protesters while having their bank accounts and cards frozen, might nevertheless be allowed one unfrozen debit card, where only paychecks could be posted to, but only for physically exhausting jobs such as working at McDonalds and will only be usable if over 50 hours was worked the previous week. Clever dissenters will get a job at a fast food outlet not near public transportation, meaning their debit card would be usable for gas purchases. So on Saturday evening after work two or three determined agitators will drive together to Washington DC for a Sunday picket at the White House with their handwritten signs and hand-drawn fliers, since their computers won't work, to tell the next Republican President who like Nixon will claim to have a secret plan, to end the war, that he lied, and hand out fliers reminding people that repression is un-American. Most handed a flyer will respond with blank stares. However, coins and even bills will appear in their belongings letting the picketers know that some were listening. Taking turns driving back Sunday evening will be real hell, despite being able to use the toll roads on the way back, because the person at turn driving will keep nodding their head making the stay awake alarm too frequently go off. Some Mondays they may end up late for work, so not to be able to work 50 hours that week. So their debit card won't work until they earn 50 hours the next week leading them to be able to picket at the White House only once a month and occasionally twice a month on Sunday.

I am struck by the amazing similarity between the way Johnson and Obama have run things and the way they see the world. Could history repeat itself? The war escalated under Nixon into Laos and Cambodia and with the next Republican President escalating into Iran and beyond. Again, the war finally ending soon after war supplemental funds kept increasing to the point Congress refused to pass another one.

There is some cause for hope. Obama is negotiating with some lower level Taliban seeing if some of them can be induced to renounce al Qaeda. A UN peace conference (that somehow most Americans never heard about) was held in Prague,
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/02/02-8/

The UN leaders at the peace conference asked the US to take most of the Taliban off the Terrorist list so the UN could try to arrange negotiations with all of the Taliban, the US agreed to for four ex-Taliban officials. Next Afghan President Karzai defied the US by calling for negotiations with all of the Taliban. The US, under General McChrystal, tried to prove that al Qaeda are the goons to the local population rather than the US, and succeeded in Iraq. In response, the Taliban announced an even stricter code of conduct of its own,
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/21/world/asia/21taliban.html
This most didn't believe including Muslims until the failed attempt to blow up the central bank, January 19, instead of conducting a bloodbath in front of the bank, the suicide vested bombers retreated into a shopping center and ordered everyone out, followed by incidents several days later where again more attackers died than victims. Suddenly far less killings by them. They will tire of being on their best behavior so the US negotiating before they do would make sense. A good article in the Salon Magazine blog got only seven responses.

I remember how different it was early in the Vietnam War when "Negotiate Now" was the antiwar cry. It is very revealing to look at the early protests before the antiwar movement was fixated on the belief that Johnson was the enemy of peace,
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1499&dat=19650215&id=St0jAAAAIBAJ&...

Calling for negotiations might organize better, and end up more likely to bring results while a war is still somewhat popular here at home. Unfortunately had Johnson agreed to a cease-fire and shook Ho Chi Minh's hand at a peace conference, more than the Southern Racists (who already did so) would have accused Johnson's Great Society programs of being Communistic.

A bad omen for today is instead of cheering that peace might be at hand, during the February 2009 cease-fire in the Swat Valley, US doves joined hawks in condemning the cease-fire because in included Shria Law being applied there. If we continue to not want to cheer any raw looking or flawed cease-fire agreement then ending the war before the next Republican administration in 2014 or 2018 won't occur. Thus those of us who like to protest the war, might under the next administration, just have to resign to working 50 hours a week at McDonalds and hope we will still have the energy to squawk without the help of our computers or telephones to squawk with.

Today the monopolies tend to own the media and commerce. The latest Supreme Court ruling will only make things worse. I want to cheer the way Obama stoped things from getting far worse in a hurry.

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Http://RichardKanePA.blogspot.com

cyberterror, Karzai, RichardKanePA, "Negotiate Now" cyberwar, cyberprison, cyberrepression,