http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4MnpzG5Sqc
I'm a firm believer of a constitutional foreign policy. I'm a firm believer that the Iraq and Afghanistan wars were a mistake. I don't want to be the policeman of the world. But how can I provide meaningful support to stopping this guy without supporting sending American troops overseas. I never abandon my principles, but it's difficult not to in this case.
Well giving our kids weapons and sending them off to fight for something they didn't sign up for is wrong too. They signed up to protect the United States, not be the world policemen. So advocating sending US soldiers is pretty hypocritical for this guy to do when he is against Kony, who gives kids weapons and has them fight without there consent.
Wanna help? Send your money or yourself to help stop Kony, but don't be for forcing our soldiers and other citizens to pay the cost of getting this guy.
We do have a possible constitutional option to solve this issue. It's called "Letter of Marque and Reprisal "
Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 of the United States Constitution
[Congress shall have Power...] To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water.
A "letter of marque and reprisal" would involve permission to cross an international border to effect a reprisal (take some action against an attack or injury) authorized by an issuing jurisdiction to conduct reprisal operations outside its borders.
The U.S. has used this before to capture pirates and Ron Paul suggested this for Bin Laden after September 11th and again in July of 2007.
He also suggested it for use on pirates in 2009.
However, the bills he introduced were not enacted into law and we decided to go to "war".
A War is not needed, but we can resolve this issue and help.
Are the people in the region Kony operates deprived of sense,reason and intelligence to stop him them self's? Do they not have a government and an army?
An old Ak-47 can go as low as 10-50$.Why are they not arming them self's if the government is not helping them.
If someone wants to help them he can start collecting man,money and weapons and go there to arm the Ugandans and fight with them against Kony.But because 99% of the people chanting in the video would not even set foot in Uganda let alone take weapons and fight for them in some god-forsaken wilderness this movement has no point .
What they want to do is send the "international community" which would be a complete disaster.No politician would risk dead soldiers on TV for Uganda so it would probably be just aircraft and logistical support.Everyone can witness how successful that was in Pakistan.A few "collateral damage " bombing runs and they may even give the mad-man Kody legitimacy before the people which would turn it in a real war.
Hey this is my first post on here and I'm glad I'm finally joining a Ron Paul community as I read the blogs and websites including this one and keep up with Ron Paul all the time. I just wanted to say some things about this. I remember when Obama sent in the 100 advisers and did some research on it. Search "Uganda oil" on google and read some things that come up. Also the guy whose president in Uganda has become corrupt and is basically a dictator and has removed his constitutionally limited term restrictions. He's destroying their currency there and certainly has had the money to track down the LRA. We should not support this guy, it may come back to haunt us in the future
There's another thread of this in General Politics... Here is what my friend posted...
"You do not need to ask my permission to share this. Please link it widely. For those asking what you can do to help, please link to visiblechildren(dot)tumblr(dot)com wherever you see KONY 2012 posts.
I do not doubt for a second that those involved in KONY 2012 have great intentions, nor do I doubt for a second that Joseph Kony is a very evil man. But despite this, I’m strongly opposed to the KONY 2012 campaign.
KONY 2012 is the product of a group called Invisible Children, a controversial activist group and not-for-profit. They’ve released 11 films, most with an accompanying bracelet colour (KONY 2012 is fittingly red), all of which focus on Joseph Kony. When we buy merch from them, when we link to their video, when we put up posters linking to their website, we support the organization. I don’t think that’s a good thing, and I’m not alone.
Invisible Children has been condemned time and time again. As a registered not-for-profit, its finances are public. Last year, the organization spent $8,676,614. Only 31% went to their charity program (page 6)*. This is far from ideal, and Charity Navigator rates their accountability 2/4 stars because they haven’t had their finances externally audited. But it goes way deeper than that.
The group is in favour of direct military intervention, and their money funds the Ugandan government’s army and various other military forces. Here’s a photo of the founders of Invisible Children posing with weapons and personnel of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army. Both the Ugandan army and Sudan People’s Liberation Army are riddled with accusations of rape and looting, but Invisible Children defends them, arguing that the Ugandan army is “better equipped than that of any of the other affected countries”, although Kony is no longer active in Uganda and hasn’t been since 2006 by their own admission.
Still, the bulk of Invisible Children’s spending isn’t on funding African militias, but on awareness and filmmaking. Which can be great, except that Foreign Affairs has claimed that Invisible Children (among others) “manipulates facts for strategic purposes, exaggerating the scale of LRA abductions and murders and emphasizing the LRA’s use of innocent children as soldiers, and portraying Kony — a brutal man, to be sure — as uniquely awful, a Kurtz-like embodiment of evil.” He’s certainly evil, but exaggeration and manipulation to capture the public eye is unproductive, unprofessional and dishonest.
As Christ Blattman, a political scientist at Yale, writes on the topic of IC’s programming, “There’s also something inherently misleading, naive, maybe even dangerous, about the idea of rescuing children or saving of Africa. […] It hints uncomfortably of the White Man’s Burden. Worse, sometimes it does more than hint. The savior attitude is pervasive in advocacy, and it inevitably shapes programming. Usually misconceived programming.”
Still, Kony’s a bad guy, and he’s been around a while. Which is why the US has been involved in stopping him for years. U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) has sent multiple missions to capture or kill Kony over the years. And they’ve failed time and time again, each provoking a ferocious response and increased retaliative slaughter. The issue with taking out a man who uses a child army is that his bodyguards are children. Any effort to capture or kill him will almost certainly result in many children’s deaths, an impact that needs to be minimized as much as possible. Each attempt brings more retaliation. And yet Invisible Children funds this military intervention. Kony has been involved in peace talks in the past, which have fallen through. But Invisible Children is now focusing on military intervention.
Military intervention may or may not be the right idea, but people supporting KONY 2012 probably don’t realize they’re helping fund the Ugandan military who are themselves raping and looting away. If people know this and still support Invisible Children because they feel it’s the best solution based on their knowledge and research, I have no issue with that. But I don’t think most people are in that position, and that’s a problem.
Is awareness good? Yes. But these problems are highly complex, not one-dimensional and, frankly, aren’t of the nature that can be solved by postering, film-making and changing your Facebook profile picture, as hard as that is to swallow. Giving your money and public support to Invisible Children so they can spend it on funding ill-advised violent intervention and movie #12 isn’t helping. Do I have a better answer? No, I don’t, but that doesn’t mean that you should support KONY 2012 just because it’s something. Something isn’t always better than nothing. Sometimes it’s worse.
If you want to write to your Member of Parliament or your Senator or the President or the Prime Minister, by all means, go ahead. If you want to post about Joseph Kony’s crimes on Facebook, go ahead. But let’s keep it about Joseph Kony, not KONY 2012.
~ Grant Oyston, visiblechildren@grantoyston.com
Grant Oyston is a sociology and political science student at Acadia University in Nova Scotia, Canada. You can help spread the word about this by linking to his blog at visiblechildren(dot)tumblr(dot)com anywhere you see posts about KONY 2012.
*For context, 31% is bad. By contrast, Direct Relief reports 98.8% of its funding goes to programming. American Red Cross reports 92.1% to programming. UNICEF USA is at 90.3%. Invisible Children reports that 80.5% of their funding goes to programming, while I report 31% based on their FY11 fiscal reports, because other NGOs would count film-making as fundraising expenses, not programming expenses."
So go over there yourself and do something about it if you care. Although I bet there are plenty of kids that need support within your own city and state, are you doing everything you can for them already?Quote:
Originally Posted by Nubraskan
Exactly.Quote:
Originally Posted by Yowan
And good to see this said from someone else in Jax.
It's sad, a lot of people are so worried about War they forget about the other options we have to solve problems without sending in our troops. A "letter of marque and reprisal" would be a great solution to this problem that follows the Constitution.Quote:
Originally Posted by TheViper
It seems like the African governments are not doing enough to tackle this problem. The countries in that area are making a large amount of money from oil and could defiantly increase their military power and security in the area without American help. It seems like the leaders are concerned only with themselves.
I thought a letter of marque and reprisal is only for threats against the US. Kony is not a threat against the US. It's not the role of the US government to protect foreign citizens from their tyrants.
Most people have NO idea what Letters of Marque are.Quote:
Originally Posted by iamse7en
Perhaps you need to be a bit pirate to understand, but the US would have NO grounds for issue in this case..
unless some private businessman could prove that Kony attacked him and stole his property.
Then he may gave grounds to recover his loss.
May as well merge this thread with the other.
As if the USA has any moral authority to stop him anyways.Quote:
Originally Posted by Nubraskan
Konys been up to this for 25 years why all of a sudden does everyone give a shit?
if you wanna stop him get a gun and a plane ticket
I wonder who made this video...it screams propaganda.
THIS. Plus. Rep.Quote:
Originally Posted by CaseyJones
I WOULD GET A FUCKING GUN AND A TICKET EXCEPT MY GOVERNMENT WONT FUCKING LET ME. That is the solution. VOLUNTEERS that FUND THEMSELVES. Not the government stepping in. This guy with the camerma wants to send in other men to fight this battle. Next time he should bring a rifle to Uganda and not a camera. "YAY we sent other men to do the fighting for our cause." fucking cowards!
This bastard deserves to go down. No way else to say it....
Sorry for the double post - but it would be very interesting to here Dr. Paul's response to this issue. If we weren't in such a sh#t mess financially, I would actually support anybody willing to do something through the Article I, Section 8, Clause 11.
Yes, he deserves to go down, I agree, however using the US military to take him down would be a terrible idea for a plethora of reasons. A volunteer force, perhaps one that signs a CONTRACT with the opposing powers in uganda, should go over there and kill this scum... I would volunteer for such a force and I know I am not alone. However with their monopoly on force, the governments of the world are effectively stopping this from happening. Fuck it, I am down to try... anyone else here want to hunt down Joseph Kony in Uganda? We will have to do it on a small budget and efficiently as we will not have the largesse of poor Americans to tap into. The model set by Executive Outcomes (not blackwater) could be followed effectively. I lack the organizational skills and training to orchestrate this myself, but sure wish any like minded people would shoot me a PM.
If Congress feels that this is not a waste of our time, money, and lives then by all means sure let's go help them. But right now I care about the kids who are being shot in my city.
This Volunteer Army would not be a bad idea. Just a few problems, They would have to have approval from the Uganda government, U.S. government and probably a lot of other random groups.Quote:
Originally Posted by bolil
I think these people should use their profits (millions of dollars) to offer a reward for the killing of Kony. It would see results, especially if the children that Kony armed with guns knew about the large reward.
did you read CONTRACT... it was in caps. That is exactly what I am saying the Statist monopoly of force is keeping people who want to help from helping. I don't have any money to send, all I have is my body which is in good shape now and with some intense training would be frigging Olympian... I would volunteer to go in and extract that cocksucker. I do not have the training as I would not volunteer to be used as a police officer in Iraq. Is this all bluster: yeah, because there is no way in HELL the cooperating governments in this world would allow a volunteer company go and do something like this as it would lessen their strangle hold on the "violence market".
We need to solve our own problems 1st here in Amerika before we are the Kony Kids!
Anyone who has a problem with something going on in Uganda is welcome to go there and try to solve whatever problem they perceive. The US gov has no business dragging the whole population into it.
Agreed, but this is absolutely heartbreaking. If I had any military experience, had the balls to go, I would seriously consider volunteering.Quote:
Originally Posted by KMX
I don't have any military experience, but would be down to go and get some there. Problem is there is nothing to volunteer for and going alone is suicide.
This is absolutely correct: " Anyone who has a problem with something going on in Uganda is welcome to go there and try to solve whatever problem they perceive. The US gov has no business dragging the whole population into it. "
-Interesting thought process I have, I need help lol.
current reward for information leading to the capture of Joseph Kony is 11,000
Bring Me the Head Of Joseph Kony Moneybomb?
Can you either delete or merge the 1748 threads on him?Quote:
Originally Posted by CaseyJones