You may be “shocked” to hear this but George W. Bush and his administration have lied almost continuously about the state of the US economy since they came to power 5 years ago. As Paul Krugman has been saying consistently, the stats put out the bureau of labor statistics have been at best misleading if not downright bullshit. Well the bls has now published revised statistics about the job market for the period January 2001 to January 2006. Over at smirkingchimp.com Paul Craig Roberts has posted a scathing indictment of the bush economy titled Nuking the economy. Here is a small sample:

No sane economist can possibly maintain that a deplorable record of merely 1,054,000 net new private sector jobs over five years is an indication of a healthy economy. The total number of private sector jobs created over the five year period is 500,000 jobs less than one year’s legal and illegal immigration! (In a December 2005 Center for Immigration Studies report based on the Census Bureau’s March 2005 Current Population Survey, Steven Camarota writes that there were 7,9 million new immigrants between January 2000 and March 2005.)

Just so you don’t think he is some lefty liberal like Krugman, here is his bio from the bottom of the article:

Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. He was Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal editorial page and Contributing Editor of National Review. He is coauthor of The Tyranny of Good Intentions.

Go over and read the article, it is not that long and worth the read. If you are having trouble telling when Bush is lying about something, just remember, his lips will be moving.

According to Websters:

sedition
One entry found for sedition.
Main Entry: se·di·tion
Pronunciation: si-‘di-sh&n
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, from Middle French, from Latin sedition-, seditio, literally, separation, from se- apart + ition-, itio act of going, from ire to go — more at SECEDE, ISSUE
: incitement of resistance to or insurrection against lawful authority

The first amendment to the US Constitution:

Amendment I – Freedom of Religion, Press, Expression. Ratified 12/15/1791. Note

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances

The concept of sedition is completely incompatible with the First Amendment to the US Constitution. If someone cannot complain out loud about the policies of the government, and advocate changing those policies than the constitution has no meaning whatsoever. The true threat to American freedom comes not terrorists, but from those who want to vacate the constitution. Indeed acts of terror are a threat to life and limb. However, if we refuse to sacrifice our freedom, we can still combat criminal acts of violence which is what terrorism amounts to. If we allow corrupt politicians to vacate the constitution in the name of security and co-opt specific religious views in the name of benefiting their rich cronies, it is not the terrorists who have won, it is the powerful rich elites of this country who will end up enslaving us.

Words are indeed powerful, but words in and of themselves do not cause a drop of blood to be spilled. Only someone who acts upon the words is responsible. A person cannot control the events around them, they can only control their response. If a person acts in a foolish or violent manner based on words alone, that person needs to be held accountable for their acts. Banning the words only leads to that inexorable slide into tyranny. I don’t like hate speech but I will always be the first person to defend someone’s right to say stupid shit. Any politician who says that law of the land, does not apply to them, should be held accountable in an appropriate manner when they violate that law and the rights of Americans. A nurse who writes a letter to a newspaper has done nothing wrong by that act and is only exercising her constitutional rights. The only acts of treason that I have seen are being directed from Washington.