January 18, 2006

The Polite Majority

By Robert C. Koehler

The media buzz about impeachment may be at 1 percent of the level it was during Monicagate, but guess what? The imperial presidency has less public support right now than the promiscuous presidency did at its lowest point - and as this administration's outrages pile up, George Bush seems to be losing his mandate simply to finish his term.

In two recent polls - one in October, just before the Scooter Libby indictment, and one in January, in the wake of the domestic-spying revelations - a majority of respondents considered impeachment the proper course of action for the crimes Bush is accused of.

The emperor may not be naked, but he's down to his fig leaf.

The October poll, conducted by Ipsos Public Affairs, which was commissioned by AfterDowningStreet.org, presented 1,001 U.S. adults with the statement: "If President Bush did not tell the truth about his reasons for going to war with Iraq, Congress should consider holding him accountable by impeaching him." An astounding 50 percent agreed with the statement; 44 percent disagreed.

In January, Zogby International, also commissioned by AfterDowningStreet.org (filling the void in media interest in this matter), asked 1,216 U.S. adults, randomly selected, from every region of the country and of multiple political parties: "If President Bush wiretapped American citizens without the approval of a judge, do you agree or disagree that Congress should consider holding him accountable through impeachment?" This time the margin was 52 percent in favor, 43 percent against.

By comparison, the worst it ever got for Bill Clinton, according to Democrats.com, was 36 percent public support for hearings to consider impeachment and 26 percent support for actual impeachment. In other words, his removal from office never had serious public support at all, despite the X-rated media scandal-fest that filled our living rooms 24/7.

If you are among the ranks of appalled Americans who think that deceiving the country into a hellish war, countenancing torture, spying on U.S. citizens and generally bloating up with power in order to pursue a secret agenda - to hell with Congress, the U.N. and international treaties - constitute grounds for impeachment, while oral sex in the Oval Office does not, these numbers may take a moment to sink in.

We're a majority who aren't even aware of ourselves, a reluctant, subterranean force for sanity who restrain ourselves for the good of the whole. Impeachment, after all, is not only a radical measure but tainted for all time by its misuse against Clinton. We are a polite, tolerant majority who prefer to suck in our outrage and ride out the Bush administration's constitutional rampage just to show the other side how you're supposed to behave in a democracy. After all, if neither side will submit to an opposition presidency, we'll have an ungovernable country.

The problem with this point of view is in its underestimation of the extremity of the agenda of that other side and the fragility of our system of government.

How do you spot a moderate Republican? He's the one with the broken kneecaps. This is the joke I heard during the Clinton impeachment hearings, but six years later it hardly seems like a joke. The virulent Bush presidency - and its central con of endless threat, endless fear and endless war - may be the very creature our Constitution was designed to protect us against.

So the question is, how far can the polite majority be pushed? I'd like to believe that we're at our limit right now, poised on the brink of screaming enough is enough. That may be too much to hope for, but then, what do I make of the formerly mild-mannered Al Gore, the John Kerry of his day, decrying "a dangerous breach in the fabric of the Constitution" brought on by George Bush's "shameful exercise of power"?

Speaking on Martin Luther King Day, Gore quoted the slain civil rights leader: "Perhaps a new spirit is rising among us. If it is, let us trace its movements and pray that our own inner being may be sensitive to its guidance, for we are deeply in need of a new way beyond the darkness that seems so close around us."

Amen and hallelujah. The new spirit, if it is indeed rising, is more than an informed outrage at the criminal arrogance of the Bush administration. It is the spirit of democracy itself, mankind's hope, breaking the chains of the torturers.

Let the impeachment hearings begin.




- - -
Robert Koehler, an award-winning, Chicago-based journalist, is an editor at Tribune Media Services and nationally syndicated writer. You can respond to this column at bkoehler@tribune.com or visit his Web site at commonwonders.com.
© 2006 Tribune Media Services, Inc.
http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_ro...te_majority.htm

Published on Wednesday, January 18, 2006 by the Village Voice

Empirical News - The Secret's Out: Bush Is Overtaken By Events-And Overwhelmed

by Sydney H. Schanberg


Transfixed as I've become by the new empire spreading out of Washington, I offer some empirical news bits that have recently drawn my attention. President Bush, who for now has resisted accepting the "emperor" title and its crown and scepter, gave a speech last week to a select group of admirers in Lexington, Kentucky. It was one of those unilateral orations about his Iraq war and related subjects, such as the patriotic, secret spying on Americans that he authorized shortly after the 9-11 terrorist attack. Of course, it's no longer secret, because the treasonous New York Times outed the covert operation on December 16. But the president has acted swiftly, ordering a secret investigation into that heinous act. More reporters may be going to jail. The president says no mercy will be shown to those who comfort the enemy.

Anyway, I'm watching his speech on CNN and suddenly the president utters one of those giggly little fibs he likes to tease America with. He says of the soldiers he has sent into battle: "When you put these kids in harm's way, we owe them the best equipment, the best training, and a strategy for victory."

It was the "equipment" part that crossed my eyes. Omigod, I thought, his staff has failed him again and made him look like a fool. I guess they didn't tell him about the repeated news stories since the war's start, nearly three years ago, that showed soldiers were being killed and maimed because of outdated body armor and vehicle armor. The latest undisputed report was on page one of the Times on January 7, just four days before his speech. The president says he doesn't lie, so it must have been another staff bungle.

The Times story, by Michael Moss, said that a secret Pentagon study the paper had obtained concluded that of the 2,100 American soldiers who have died in Iraq—roughly 1,700 of them in combat—more than 300 could have been saved with adequate protective vests. Simply enlarging the existing shields, the study said, "would have had the potential to alter the fatal outcome." Reporter Moss better get himself a good lawyer.

The study is still labeled secret. The president and his coterie have put so much information behind "classified" walls that now even the president apparently doesn't have clearance. A reasonable person might opine that this makes our leader blind and naked. I wouldn't wish that on an evildoer.

I think Bush should fire Cheney and Rumsfeld and maybe Wolfowitz, who now hides at the World Bank. They're the planners and executors of the war. They're the ones who have kept him out of the loop. It's not nice to turn the president, almost an emperor, into a figure of ridicule.

That's only the half of it, though. A story came out the other day reporting that Wall Street bonuses had hit a record of $21.5 billion. I guess that's what the president means when he keeps reminding us how well the economy is doing. But he didn't say anything in his speech about most of the money going to the Gekkos at the top. Maybe his handlers kept that from him too—those bums. It can't be the president. He's a regular guy.

There's even more economic stuff Bush is not told about, as the national debt soars out of sight, subsidized by Communist China. Consumers are borrowing on their homes to pay their current bills. Household spending is running at more than 70 percent of gross domestic product, an unprecedented level. Bankruptcy filings hit a record in 2005. The president seems oblivious. Secrecy, like a wasted mind, can be a terrible thing.

The new book State of War, by New York Times national security reporter James Risen, takes the lid off the secret eavesdropping on Americans by the National Security Agency but also uncovers many other intelligence failures in the run-up to the Iraq war. Risen reveals, for example, that in 2002, the CIA sent some 30 Iraqi Americans, at great risk, back to Iraq to interview family members who were weapons scientists. All the Iraqi Americans returned to the U.S. and reported that their relatives were astonished by their inquiries because, the scientists told them, the nuclear weapons program had been abandoned a decade ago. The CIA said it believed the scientists were lying—and rejected the information. A month later, in October 2002, the intelligence community issued a National Intelligence Estimate that said Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear program.

The CIA director, George Tenet, whom some believe was cherry-picking intelligence to satisfy the president's determination to invade Iraq, stepped down from his post in mid July 2004. Mr. Bush awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor. In his Kentucky speech last week, the president said nothing about Tenet's selective intelligence. There's an old vaudeville joke: Two elderly women meet on a Brooklyn street. One asks the other: "Hannah. Did you see what's happening in Israel?" "See?" shrugs Hannah. "I live in the back. I don't see anything." Poor George.

A different Times reporter (the paper had a good week) delivered still more eye-opening news. David Cay Johnston disclosed hanky-panky by the IRS. Here is Johnston's lead:

"Records showing how thoroughly the Internal Revenue Service audits big corporations and the rich, and how much it discounts the additional taxes assessed after audits, are being withheld from the public despite a 1976 court order requiring their disclosure, according to a legal motion filed last week in federal court in Seattle."

First, the IRS insisted no such court order existed. How could that be? The IRS has been providing the litigant, Syracuse University professor Susan B. Long, with this very data for many years at no charge, based on the court order. (She makes the data available to the public on the Internet at trac.syr.edu.). She provided the IRS with a copy of the document. It doesn't matter, the IRS spokesman responded, we're denying the data anyway. Could it be that the rich-leaning Bush administration doesn't want the public to have access anymore to the proof of this giveaway? For the record, the president's speech was also silent on this news item. Johnston will need a lawyer too.

The proverbial man in the street can draw no other conclusion: The clandestine Bush administration is so afraid of letting the public see what it's doing that it has denied the president himself all access to outside information except for the sports pages and religious news. You read it here first.


http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0118-28.htm

January 18, 2006

The Bush Power Grab: How did it get this far?

And why hasn't it been stopped before now? And what about Samuel Alito?


By Rev. Bill McGinnis



It is now obvious to anyone who can see, that George W. Bush is in the midst of pulling off one of the greatest power grabs in the history of our Nation. It is not yet as great as Hitler's power grab in Germany, or Stalin's power grab in The Soviet Union, but it is far greater than anything we have ever seen before in the United States. George W. Bush's Administration is the tightest, most organized, most disciplined, most secretive Presidential Administration that we have ever had. Bush has almost completely neutered both Houses of Congress, to the point that when he totally disregards their Laws, arrogantly announcing that he will only follow them if he feels like it, they don't even try to fight back. They sputter and wave their arms a little bit, but take no action. Congress has the power to kick him completely out of office. It is called "Impeachment." It's in the Constitution for cases just like this. But they won't even talk about Impeachment, much less take action. The House of Representatives impeached Democrat Bill Clinton for virtually no reason, compared to the obvious crimes against America which Republican Bush has committed, without any mention of Impeachment.

And now Congress may soon lose the power to remove him even if they tried, because Bush may be only one Supreme Court confirmation away from having the votes he needs on the Court to over-rule an Impeachment and Conviction by the House and Senate. If impeached by the House and convicted by the Senate, Bush would simply go before the Supreme Court and claim that the radical "Unitary Executive Theory," combined with his supposedly "Inherent Powers" as Commander in Chief of the Military, together give him the Constitutional Authority to do whatever he wants to do in time of perpetual war, which is forever. And if Samuel Alito is a member of this Court, it seems very likely that he might be the deciding vote in a 5 to 4 majority voting in favor of Bush and against Congress and the People. Alito is a strong supporter of the Unitary Executive Theory ("Fuehrerprinzip," as Hitler called it), as is Chief Justice Roberts. As a Reagan Administration lawyer years ago, Alito helped develop the "Signing Statement" technique which Bush has been using to claim authority to disobey the Laws. Then why shouldn't he vote to uphold the very practices which he helped to create?

So how did we get to this terrible place where we now find ourselves? How did the Bush Power Grab get this far? And why hasn't it been stopped before now? Let's try to see . . .

In the space of a few short years, here's what has happened:

1. BUSH HAS COMPLETELY CAPTURED THE "BIG BUSINESS" AND "FAT CAT" WINGS OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY. Bush is their long-time dream come true. He actively tries to give them everything they have always wanted from the Federal Government, but never could get before, namely: To reduce taxes at the upper end, which immediately pays them off for their support; To try for flat-rate taxes wherever possible, which always helps the upper end most; To reduce all kinds of Government Regulation on business, which helps profits by reducing expenses; To deny the obvious reality of Global Warming, which avoids expensive pollution controls; To undermine the effectiveness of all Government agencies, which reduces their usefulness and importance, as a prelude to their total elimination; To seek Privatization of everything Public, which transfers ownership and control from the Public to the Private Investors; To undermine Public Education, which is part of the Privatization effort mentioned above; To try to destroy Social Security as we know it, which would reduce business expenses and force people to "invest" (gamble) in the stock market, where the biggest guys usually win; To work for unrestricted Free Trade everywhere, which allows Private Investors to move jobs from expensive labor markets (like the USA) to cheap ones (like India and China), and also to buy up the property and natural resources of other countries in order to gain private profits from them in the future.

The "Big Business" and "Fat Cat" Republicans are the natural heart of the Republican Party - always have been, since Lincoln's death; always will be. And they provide the massive flow of money which finances the Republicans in all important elections. "You help me with money, I'll help you with money." Thus the Bush power grab is always well financed.

2. BUSH HAS ELIMINATED ALL SERIOUS CRITICISM IN THE MAJOR NEWS MEDIA, BECAUSE THE "BIG BUSINESS" AND "FAT CAT" REPUBLICANS NOW OWN AND CONTROL THEM. Earlier Federal restrictions on Corporate ownership have been lifted, and the Corporations have gobbled up all the news media. The heart of Journalism has been cut out and replaced with entertainment and fluffy features. American Corporate Journalism is now a bad joke. Nobody should take it seriously because it does almost no serious work. Its true purpose is to make money for the owners and to keep the Republicans in power. The so-called "Liberal bias in the Media" is pure illusion. Sure, the owners let a few coo-coos on the left rant and rave, just to make it look like we have "Freedom Of The Press For All People." But that is just a useful fantasy, and not the truth. "See! We have Freedom of the Press! Look at that hippie over there calling us bad names. See, we let him express himself. We have Freedom!" But when push comes to shove, the dissident voices are not heard, because the owners won't allow it to happen. And many of the so-called reporters are now wealthy celebrities themselves, with no motivation to rock the boat for any reason.

By Corporate policy, the voting Public is kept insulated from any de-stabilizing truth, and sedated on Pablum and candy bars pretending to be news. When is the last time you saw ANYTHING on the news which seriously threatens the Republicans? NEVER! If you want to see the murdered bodies of thousands of innocent Iraqis caught in our "military operations," you have to watch Al Jazeera or some other foreign news source. You won't get it on Nightly News, for sure. There is a huge scandal brewing with electronic voting machines which can be rigged by their Republican Corporate manufacturers to always provide the desired results, untraceable. (Like in Ohio and Florida in 2004?) And a Republican committee chairman has been single-handedly blocking any serious investigation. Do you hear about it in the news? No. There is about 20-25% of the population which wants Bush to be impeached today, and maybe go to jail tomorrow. Do you hear anything about that? No. Al Gore makes a serious, excellent speech identifying the criminal behavior of our President. And the corporate media dutifully report that "Gore is grandstanding once again."

So the Republicans are never seriously criticized in the Media, and voters are kept in the dark. Thus the Bush Power Grab always gets the favorable news coverage it needs to continue and expand.

3. BY KEEPING INTEREST RATES ARTIFICIALLY LOW, PLUS MASSIVE SPENDING ON THE WARS, THE ECONOMY HAS BEEN ARTIFICIALLY BOOSTED IN THE SHORT RUN. Housing prices have soared and spending has been strong, giving a false and temporary illusion of prosperity to millions of people. Meanwhile, the National Debt has increased by $2.508 trillion dollars, or 44%, since Bush came into office in January of 2001, from $5.662 trillion at the end of 2000 to $8.170 trillion at the end of the year 2005. (See http://www.loveallpeople.org/publicdebt.html for details. And Consumer Credit Outstanding has risen by $.336 trillion, or 33% from 1.021 trillion in November, 2000 to $1.357 in November, 2005 (the latest figures available today - seasonally adjusted.). Source: http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/g19...cc_hist_sa.html So we are living way too high off borrowed money. Some writers are even predicting total collapse of our economy because of this excessive debt. (Search Google.com for "United States debt") But the media are asleep again, and most most people do not recognize the problems ahead. And the Bush Power Grab continues.

4. BY ALWAYS FAVORING ISRAEL OVER ITS ENEMIES, BUSH HAS AVOIDED SOME OF THE CRITICISM HE MIGHT OTHERWISE HAVE RECEIVED. Many of our finest intellectual, political, and religious leaders are emotionally attached to the state of Israel, for one reason or another. They feel warmly toward Bush because he always seems to support their favorite foreign country, no matter what kind of trouble it faces. Thus the Bush Power Grab receives less opposition than would be expected from these key Leadership individuals in both parties.

5. THE COLLAPSE OF THE SOVIET UNION HAS HURT THE MORALE OF THE ECONOMIC LEFTISTS AND GREATLY HELPED THE MORALE OF THE LAISSEZ-FAIRE CAPITALISTS. Marxist economics was always the intellectual heart of the anti-Capitalist forces in the world. It was Karl Marx who invented the word "Capitalism," and it was he who explained what it was and how it worked. Marxism provided an organized way of understanding the world, a way in which Capitalism, by its very nature, was seen to be inherently evil: it unfairly exploited the workers, created great social and economic injustice, and always led to war. So they had a fairly strong case for opposing Capitalism. But unfortunately for the Marxists, Communism doesn't work very well, and it failed in head-on competition with the Capitalist economies. Did you know that one of the main causes of household fires in the Soviet Union was exploding television sets! That's right, exploding television sets! (This supposedly from Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976 - "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 100) To me, that says everything you need to know about Communism: it just doesn't work. (P.S. The Chinese aren't Communists any more; they're Fascists. But that's another story for another day.)

So American Capitalists were invigorated with victory, and their harshest opponents were left with a theory that had failed the reality test. And all the Soviet money that had been funneled into American leftist organizations suddenly stopped coming. When I was in school forty years ago, the Economics Departments were filled with big-Government Keynesians plus a few outright Marxists. Now, they are filled with messianic supporters of free-trade, laissez-faire Capitalism. So when Bush began his Power Grab, the institutional forces against him were weaker and more disorganized than before.

6. "CULTURE OF LIFE, SANCTITY OF MARRIAGE, BELIEF IN GOD, THE OWNERSHIP SOCIETY" vs. "BABY KILLERS, SEXUAL PERVERTS, ATHEISTS, AND WELFARE RECIPIENTS." You tell me which sounds better. So the Democrats got branded with some very unfortunate names, and the Republicans easily claimed the moral high ground.

7. 9/11/2001 - THE TERRORIST ATTACKS OF SEPTEMBER 11, 2001 HAVE PROVIDED BUSH WITH THE APPARENT REASON HE NEEDS TO JUSTIFY HIS POWER GRAB: "TO KEEP AMERICANS SAFE!" Never mind that it was Bush himself who made America unsafe by his negligence in disregarding repeated warnings of terrorist trouble ahead, before 9/11. And never mind that the way in which Bush responded to these attacks has ignited anti-American hatred throughout the Muslim world, boosting the number of willing terrorists maybe ten to twenty times more than before 9/11, thus making us less safe than we were before. And never mind the total disaster of this idiot war in Iraq. And never mind the fact that Iran is no longer restrained by a strong Saddam in Iraq. No. All of these things are covered over by the oft-repeated need to Keep Americans safe."

So where will it end? Will Samuel Alito be confirmed and take his place on a Bush-Majority Supreme Court? Will it become impossible to remove Bush from office, no matter what he does? Will his political enemies such as myself start to disappear mysteriously, for "National Security" reasons? I don't know. It's up to you, the readers, and your elected Representatives in the United States Senate, who will soon be voting to confirm or reject Samuel Alito.

Blessings to you. May God help us all.


http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_re...wer_grab_3a.htm

January 17, 2006

Why Doesn’t Presidential Dismantling of the Constitution Get the Same Intense Scrutiny as Presidential Adultery?

By Andrew Bard Schmookler

Eight years ago, a president entering his sixth year in office came under suspicion: had he conducted an adulterous affair with a young intern? For months thereafter, the media could talk of little else. It was the national topic of conversation for most of that year. The House eventually impeached the president, and the Senate tried him.

Now again, a president entering his sixth year in office has come under suspicion: has he deliberately and unjustifiably violated both the Constitution and federal statutes by conducting searches without a warrant? But this suspicion is not getting anything like the kind of media attention of the Monica Lewinsky story.

Why is that?

The presidential oath of office states: “I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.” Thus the core of his job is expressed in terms of defending, not our standard of living, nor even the general welfare, but our Constitution itself.

So why was Monica more deserving of attention? None of the possible “explanations” can stand as justifications.

1) The grounds for suspecting President Bush of violating both the letter and the spirit of his oath of office are not weaker than were the grounds for suspecting President Clinton of hanky-panky with an intern.

2) The possible wrong-doing by the current president would in no way be less important for Americans to confront than the wrong-doing of his predecessor; indeed, the present suspicion against the president is precisely the kind of thing that most worried our Founding Fathers.

3) The media may assume that the American people are less interested in protecting the Constitution than in sex scandals, but they haven’t bothered to test that proposition. And even if it were true, that would not justify the failure of the press to fulfill its duty as watchdog and protector of our democracy.

Grounds for Suspicion

The president has admitted to ordering wiretaps to be conducted without getting the court warrants required by the 4th Amendment to the Constitution and by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) of 1978. To justify his actions, he and his people have made two claims: first, that they had the legal authority to do so; and second, that their actions were required for the sake of national security in a time of war.

It is hardly reassuring about the moral and intellectual integrity of this administration that the legal justifications offered thus far are regarded as almost laughably flimsy by the independent legal authorities who have commented on them.

First, they’ve claimed that the congressional authorization to fight the terrorists abroad, passed in the aftermath of 9/11, also authorized domestic surveillance. But the language of the enabling legislation supports no such claim, and the record of the debate at the time suggests that the Bush administration fully understood that such authorization would require additional provisions that Congress expressly declined to enact. In addition, why would President Bush have given his subsequent (false) public reassurance that his administration abides by the requirement to get warrants before conducting searches if he felt he’d been authorized by Congress to do otherwise?

Second, the Bush administration claims that the powers constitutionally given to the president as commander-in-chief permits him to do whatever he pleases in waging war, regardless of the law or of the prerogatives of the other branches of the government. Such a claim has been widely regarded by legal scholars as baseless as a reading of the Constitution, and as antithetical to the whole spirit of our constitutional system.

Still, there could be important national security reasons for a president to violate the law. And it’s possible that the American people –whether wisely or not—would be willing to allow the president to take illegal measures if they were required to defend the nation. But here, too, there are also reasons to doubt the presidential claims that his apparently illegal actions have been required by the demands of national security.

FISA created a court especially for the purpose of issuing such warrants, and it has issued many thousands of such warrants, while refusing only four. The law even makes provision for those situations in which urgency makes it impractical to go first to court: the executive has three whole days after emergency surveillance to come to the court for its actions to be scrutinized and validated.

So what legitimate national security reason there might be that would have prevented the president from both protecting the nation and obeying the law and the Constitution?

There remain strong grounds for suspicion that the president was serving no national good, but only hijacking power that the Framers of the Constitution expressly sought to deny him. And it does not help allay our concerns that this conducting of warrantless searches fits into “a pattern of disregard” for legal restraints, both domestic and international. But if the president has a good justification, let us hear it.

In any event, why isn’t President Bush being pressed to provide justification, and why isn’t the evidence being explored publicly with the same intensity that was devoted to the Lewinsky affair?

The Most Vital of National Interests

The moral character of the president in his private life does matter. As the most prominent personal embodiment of the nation, the president inevitably is a kind of role model. So President Clinton’s dalliance was not altogether irrelevant to his fulfillment of his job as president.

But the suspicions about President Bush’s violating his oath to protect the Constitution relate to the very core of his presidential responsibilities.

As the oath makes clear, the Constitution is the heart and soul of America. It is the inner sanctum that our public servants swear to protect; the great gift that our soldiers have fought and died for, the very foundation of our national identity. Even while we Americans divide on many issues, the sanctity of the Constitution is what unites us. It is our core assertion to the world that “we are a nation of laws, not of men.”

In this context, what could matter more than whether the President of the United States is honoring his oath of office, or whether he is treating the Constitution as an obstacle to be casually, needlessly swept aside?

Our Founding Fathers certainly would have known that this is an absolutely major story. The system of checks and balances was not a casual thing. It was a profound vision they had into meeting the challenge of how to avoid tyranny. And, as human history shows, the avoidance of tyranny is no small accomplishment. Free and decent societies have been few.

The fourth amendment protection against “unreasonable search and seizure” represented the Founding Fathers’ understanding, based on the millennia of human history in which they were schooled, of the tools of tyranny. If the King does not need the approval of the Judge to invade the privacy of the citizen, freedom is imperiled. So “We the People” determined that the court would serve as a check and a balance against the potentially tyrannical power of the executive.

If there was no imperative need for President Bush to conduct searches without first getting a warrant, then why did he do it? Would he grab a tyrant’s powers if he didn’t have a tyrant’s intentions?

We urgently need an independent investigation to discover just what purposes were being served by these warrantless wiretaps. Was this monitoring confined to those people who might reasonably be suspected of being a terrorist threat to America? Or were people perhaps chosen as targets for surveillance simply because they were political opponents of this president and his policies?

What could be more important than to know whether the great achievement of our Founding Fathers is being dismantled? But one would hardly know anything of such vital importance was at stake from watching how our mainstream media are dealing with this possible constitutional crisis.

What Master Are the Media Serving?

Is the reason for the media’s casualness in treating this administration’s possible running roughshod over the Constitution that the media don’t think this story will grab an audience the way, say, stains on a blue dress did?

But how would they know?

Watergate certainly transfixed the nation thirty-some years ago.

If Linda Tripp’s disclosures had been given no more play than those of the NSA’s warrantless spying on Americans, would people have gotten so swept up in the that affair? And if the present suspicions of presidential usurpation of powers were getting the kind of wall-to-wall coverage that Clinton’s extramarital dalliance received, might the American people be just as engaged in this story?

Recall that the upshot of the Lewinsky affair was that the American people, while repelled by Clinton’s conduct, mostly rallied to his defense. Though the House impeached him, and the Senate tried him, the president’s approval ratings climbed to levels exceeding those preceding the scandal—presumably because the American people decided that the assault on Clinton was an even bigger scandal than the president’s inability to control his sexual impulses. This was not, a majority of the American people decided, a matter that warranted bringing to bear the heaviest of constitutional machinery to bear to remove a president.

When the Congress investigated Watergate, however, President Nixon benefited from no such rallying of popular support. The public recognized that the abuse of presidential power was a vital national concern. There is simply no evidence from the Watergate story that the defense of our political system has no “sex appeal” to the American public.

So why then do the mainstream media not treat this with the urgency that they gave to Monicagate? Is the difference perhaps not in the nature of the possible offense, but in the nature of the media’s relationship to the respective presidents? Just what master are these media serving?

Even if the American people did prove to be slow to care, is it not the job of the media not just to pander to public interests but also to direct public attention to the important public business of the times? Is it not the ultimate job of the press not just to get ratings and make a profit but also to serve the public interest?

The danger of a tyrant arising in the executive and abusing his power was far more compelling to our Founding Fathers than the danger of our being unable to defend ourselves against foreign threats. Would our Founders have accepted, without stringent proof, that America has had to adopt the police-state tactics of this commander-in-chief to protect ourselves against outside enemies?

James Madison wrote in The Federalist Papers, in promoting our Constitution: “If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.”

And then there is the line widely attributed to Thomas Jefferson: “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.”

If Jefferson and Madison were alive now to see the lack of vigilance of the mainstream America media in the face of these suspected threats to our constitutional protections against tyranny, they’d turn over in their graves.

If tyranny is not stopped in its earliest stages, it only grows stronger and becomes still more difficult and dangerous to stop.





http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_an...tream_media.htm

Constitution in Peril

Jon Roland


The Constitution that has protected our rights and liberties for more than 200 years is now in greater danger of being overthrown than at any time in our history. Though generations of patriotic citizens have fought and died to defend it against enemies foreign and domestic, it is now that the Cold War is over and we no longer face the threat of thermonuclear Armageddon that it is in the greatest peril. If action is not soon taken to defend it against its enemies, all those lives may have been sacrificed in vain.

So who are the enemies that now threaten what we have so long defended? Drug lords? Terrorists? Hungry hordes of foreigners? Economic or ecological collapse? Nuclear proliferation? Space aliens?

No, some of these things may pose serious challenges, but none of them are as deadly as a cancer of fascism that is grasping for power within the very institutions that we founded to keep us free. We fought World War II against countries that had allowed themselves to be taken over by fascism, and we thought that we had defeated fascism when we won that war. But we didn't. We have comforted ourselves with the delusion that our democratic traditions are too strong to allow such a thing to happen here, that even in the deepest economic crisis we would remain true to the principles on which this country was founded.

Could the government of the United States be overthrown by a coup? Nonsense, most people would say. There is no one in sight who might try such a thing, nor any reason why anyone would want to. If they tried, they would fail. No one would follow them. The military, the people, would never stand for it.

Maybe. But suppose that almost no one knew it was happening, or recognized it for what it was? Could the Constitution be overthrown a little at a time, over a period of decades, or overthrown in secret, allowing the external trappings of constitutional governance to continue while the real power was exercised behind the scenes by persons no longer accountable to the people?

Skeptics will laugh and say that Americans have long entertained themselves with fantastic conspiracy theories, and that when they find evidence that such conspiracies might actually be taking place, they are only reading their vivid imaginings into ordinary events.

Maybe not. We have the evidence that for more than 60 years much of the legislation that has been passed, and much of what officials have done, is in substantial violation of the Constitution. Federal and State governments, especially the Federal, have assumed powers that have no foundation whatsoever in any of the provisions of the Constitution. These powers are justified as needed to deal with various kinds of "bad guys", whatever is the flavor of the month, but they are increasingly being used to deprive good guys of their rights. We see even the most beneficial of programs being turned into avenues of corruption and abuse. Officials continually test the tolerance of the public, trying to see how much they can get away with. It is not just a few rogue governmental of corporate officials, overcome by greed or zeal, who pose an occasional threat. The culture of entire institutions is becoming criminal in both execution and intent.

Is this a conspiracy to overthrow the Constitution, or mere "emergent behavior" that, while it may pose a threat, is not conscious or deliberate? Emergent though it may be, it can no longer be said to be unconscious of its true role, and it is too tightly coordinated not to bear the name of Conspiracy.

A few decades ago, if you asked many of those involved about compliance with the Constitution, most would make excuses, saying that it was only bending the Constitution a little, and that the needs of the moment justified a little flexibility until the crisis was over. But no one would openly say that the Constitution was not the sacred ground on which our system of law and justice was founded. Now you can hear, more and more, an attitude of contempt toward the Constitution by those sworn to defend it. We have more and more reports of officials saying, "F___ the Constitution!", and getting away with it.

And we, the people, do let them get away with it. Asked why he didn't argue against a piece of proposed legislation that it would be a violation of the Constitution, a member of Congress once said, "If I insisted on complying with the Constitution, I wouldn't stay in Congress very long." So the provisions of the Constitution become just so many special-interest pleadings, to be ignored or discarded if no pressure is brought to bear to sustain them, to be compromised with the winds of politics change.

Thomas Jefferson once suggested that we ought to have a revolution every 20 years, and that the Tree of Liberty needed to be occasionally watered with the blood of patriots. One has to wonder whether the blood of patriots will again have to be shed to get people to take the Constitution seriously again

January 19, 2006

New evidence of old chicanery

By Ted Bohne

After reading the speeches of the Bush cartel, clearly they have painted themselves into a corner from which they may never leave. Most recently the revelation of the NSA listening into at very least, overseas calls from Americans or whoever they please. The claim that war time law gives them the authority to do this. This, in addition to email surveillance and telephone surveillance by the FBI and most likely the CIA as well. We are clearly at the mercy of a nonresponsive despotic regime whose lies become more pathetic and transparent with the passing of each day.

Sadly, the America people have yet to reach a point when they will tolerate no more of this obvious fraudulent regime. They have made every effort to silence any and all data coming from Iraq and Afghanistan save that that is filtered through US Army censors. Further, though this regime has already bombed hell out of Al Jazeera and apparently had plans to do this again. Every non (in bed with) journalist wakes each day with no certainty of seeing the next. Not because of Iraqi fire, but from American fire. So desperate is this regime to keep a sorry theater going that it is willing to commit any sort of crime to foul the efforts of honest journalists whose only desire is to bring the truth out of these war torn, clearly failed states. To bring the truth of the historic crimes committed by US military, and American Multinational Corporations.

Secret prisons in Romania and Poland, Uzbekistan, and now North Africa. Of course, while not forgetting GITMO. This is the very behavior of depots such as Josef Stalin. Kangaroo courts that have no resemblance to real jurisprudence whatever. Even now, the regime is considering releasing Mr. Padilla after detaining this American citizen without consideration of the rights his citizenship allegedly guarantee him. Hundreds of these "prisoners" are being released as the regime finally realizes that just roaming the world kidnapping Arabs very likely won't stop terrorism. People who haven't seen their families in years just being tossed out with no ceremony whatever, not even an apology for the crimes committed against them. Crimes such as beatings, electrical shocks, food and sleep deprivation to mention only a few which by all definitions is clearly and undeniably torture, despite this rotten regimes pathetic attempts to "redefine" terms that already have accepted definitions, or making up terms and phrases and forcing new definitions to them.

One must go to sources like Al Jazeera and Dahr Jamil to find the truth about these fraudulent "free elections" that have to be heavily guarded by heavily armed men to maintain a basic sense of order. We know that the insurgency is of Iraqi people. People who have been bombed back to the stone age by America in a failed attempt to open the Caspian Sea oil region to the world. The trans-Afghan Pipeline, the Pipeline to the port at Aqaba and other projects.

There is great doubt that without supervision the Iraqis will survive as a "nation." Most people divorced of ideology and in possession of some knowledge of the Islamic world, well know democracy is an impossibility in Iraq. They know that these "governments" are merely puppets for picture purposes in an attempt to show the world a terrible lie dressed in ridiculous propaganda. The regime doesn't seem to realize that it has failed wholesale to do this. Only the inbreds and mental defectives believe that the mission was about democracy in the first place instead of trying to reestablish a foothold in the oil rich Middle East, which the regime failed to do. The comique of all of the aftermath arises out of clear unplanned and thoughtless attempts to cover a massive fraud with pathetic theater.

Despite the regimes efforts to restrict truth from leaving the borders of Iraq and Afghanistan by any and all means available, it still flows steadily out. Now, only those who refuse enlightenment and those who profit from this nightmare are left on the side of the regime. Now we can only hope that some Democrat with the fortitude to do so, will file charges against the Bush regime via the articles of Impeachment. For God's sake, if the republicans can bring impeachment charges against former President Clinton for such a lame indiscretion as was committed with Lewinski, then Bush and his regime can CERTAINLY be charged with mass murder, defiling the Constitution, making a mockery of International Law and horrific crimes against the Human Race.

He has referred to the Constitution as a "Goddamned piece of paper," he has begun to drink again and has used sick behavior in the face of other officials, and clearly had to have known who the person who outed Mrs. Wilson was. The truth of 911 remains to be discovered and the REAL criminals brought to justice. Lying to congress as limpwristed as their behavior has been constitutes a felony, which the regime has done many times.

These people are genuinely a low form of hominid life. With all the crimes that are outed and vetted, and lies that are likewise, to see them as the architects of the WTC debacle becomes very easy. Further, the 28 pages redacted from the 911 report very likely will indicate that the alleged "hijackers" are still alive. It is sad in the extreme that many Americans must ALWAYS perceive someone else as responsible for the actions of their "government." But REAL history clearly demonstrates without ANY equivocation, the historic nature of such crimes as are seen today. This country began it's life with a persistent century long genocide against the Native People. I takes what it wants by force. It has never competed fairly in ANY markets then, or now. It was easy to walk all over other people for their goods and services then!, but now, countries like China, Taiwan and others have evolved to the state where they can compete with the US with ease, and to win as well. This fact may well be the sound of the "death knell" of American world superiority.

In any case, if America plans to save any portion of its former place at the world's table, this regime must be disbanded and brought to justice preferably in front of the International Criminal Court, if only in abstentia. If measures are not taken soon, we will all be destined to suffer the consequences of our collective arrogance. We will be just as guilty for all the criminal acts as the people in the government who committed them. Ignorance is no defense. Further, the means necessary to cure the ignorance exist now. With this fact in mind, ignorance can no longer be feigned.

The Constitutions clearly outlines the means to bring this regime to justice. So does the Declaration of Independence. It is time for us to declare our Independence again from tyranny. It is time to bring these criminals to justice. Righteousness demands it. The World demands it.





Ted Bohne N96173@msn.com is a Vietnam Vet, 51 years old, disabled, formerly a paramedic and adjunct faculty at Texas Tech University School of Medicine and tenured faculty at Odessa College, Odessa Texas.


http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_te...nce_of_old_.htm

NSA Spying Evolved Pre-9/11


By Jason Leopold
t r u t h o u t | Investigative Report

Tuesday 17 January 2006


In the months before 9/11, thousands of American citizens were inadvertently swept up in wiretaps, had their emails monitored, and were being watched as they surfed the Internet by spies at the super-secret National Security Agency, former NSA and counterterrorism officials said.

The NSA, with full knowledge of the White House, crossed the line from routine surveillance of foreigners and suspected terrorists into illegal activity by continuing to monitor the international telephone calls and emails of Americans without a court order. The NSA unintentionally intercepts Americans' phone calls and emails if the agency's computers zero in on a specific keyword used in the communication. But once the NSA figures out that they are listening in on an American, the eavesdropping is supposed to immediately end, and the identity of the individual is supposed to be deleted. While the agency did follow protocol, there were instances when the NSA was instructed to keep tabs on certain individuals that became of interest to some officials in the White House.

What sets this type of operation apart from the unprecedented covert domestic spying activities the NSA had been conducting after 9/11 is a top secret executive order signed by President Bush in 2002 authorizing the NSA to target specific American citizens. Prior to 9/11, American citizens were the subject of non-specific surveillance by the NSA that was condoned and approved by President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, according to former NSA and counterterrorism officials.

The sources, who requested anonymity because they were instructed not to talk about NSA activities but who hope they can testify before Congress about the domestic spying, said that in December 2000, the NSA completed a report for the incoming administration titled "Transition 2001," which explained, among other things, how the NSA would improve its intelligence gathering capabilities by hiring additional personnel.

Moreover, in a warning to the incoming administration, the agency said that in its quest to compete on a technological level with terrorists who have access to state-of-the-art equipment, some American citizens would get caught up in the NSA's surveillance activities. However, in those instances, the identities of the Americans who made telephone calls overseas would be "minimized," one former NSA official said, in order to conceal the identity of the American citizen picked up on a wiretap.

"What we're supposed to do is delete the name of the person," said the former NSA official, who worked as an encryption specialist.

The former official said that even during the Clinton administration, the NSA would inadvertently obtain the identities of Americans citizens in its wiretaps as a result of certain keywords, like bomb or jihad, NSA computers are programmed to identify. When the NSA prepares its reports and transcripts of the conversations, the names of Americans are supposed to be immediately destroyed.

By law, the NSA is prohibited from spying on a United States citizen, a US corporation or an immigrant who is in this country on permanent residence. With permission from a special court, the NSA can eavesdrop on diplomats and foreigners inside the US.

"If, in the course of surveillance, NSA analysts learn that it involves a US citizen or company, they are dumping that information right then and there," an unnamed official told the Boston Globe in a story published October 27, 2001.

But after Bush was sworn in as president, the way the NSA normally handled those issues started to change dramatically. Vice President Cheney, as Bob Woodward noted in his book Plan of Attack, was tapped by Bush in the summer of 2001 to be more of a presence at intelligence agencies, including the CIA and NSA.

"Given Cheney's background on national security going back to the Ford years, his time on the House Intelligence Committee, and as secretary of defense, Bush said at the top of his list of things he wanted Cheney to do was intelligence," Woodward wrote in his book about the buildup to the Iraq war. "In the first months of the new administration, Cheney made the rounds of the intelligence agencies - the CIA, the National Security Agency, which intercepted communications, and the Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Agency. "

It was then that the NSA started receiving numerous requests from Cheney and other officials in the state and defense departments to reveal the identities of the Americans blacked out or deleted from intelligence reports so administration officials could better understand the context of the intelligence.

Separately, at this time, Cheney was working with intelligence agencies, including the NSA, to develop a large-scale emergency plan to deal with any biological, chemical or nuclear attack on US soil.

Requesting that the NSA reveal the identity of Americans caught in wiretaps is legal as long as it serves the purpose of understanding the context of the intelligence information.

But the sources said that on dozens of occasions Cheney would, upon learning the identity of the individual, instruct the NSA to continue monitoring specific Americans caught in the wiretaps if he thought more information would be revealed, which crossed the line into illegal territory.

Cheney advised President Bush of what had turned up in the raw NSA reports, said one former White House official who worked on counterterrorism related issues.

"What's really disturbing is that some of those people the vice president was curious about were people who worked at the White House or the State Department," one former counterterrorism official said. "There was a real feeling of paranoia that permeated from the vice president's office and I don't think it had anything to do with the threat of terrorism. I can't say what was contained in those taps that piqued his interest. I just don't know."

An NSA spokesperson would not comment for this story. Because of the level of secrecy at the agency, it's impossible to ascertain for the record how far the agency has gone in its domestic surveillance.

James Bamford, the author of the bestselling books The Puzzle Palace and Body of Secrets, which blew the door wide open by first revealing the NSA's covert activities, said he doesn't believe terrorism was a priority for the administration before 9/11 and he doesn't think the agency targeted specific Americans as it is doing now.

"I looked into that theory," Bamford said in an interview. "And I was assured that domestic surveillance was a black area the NSA stayed away from before 9/11. The NSA was sort of a side agency before 9/11. At that point they were looking for a mission. Terrorism was not a big priority. (American) names may have been picked up but I was told they dropped them immediately after. That's the procedure."

But Bamford said it's possible the NSA may have conducted the type of spying prior to 9/11 that the former NSA officials described. "It's hard to tell" if that happened, Bamford said. "It's a very secret agency."

In the summer of 2001, the NSA spent millions of dollars on a publicity campaign to repair its public image by taking the unprecedented step of opening up its headquarters in Fort Meade, Maryland to reporters, to dispel the myth that the NSA was spying on Americans.

In a July 10, 2001, segment on "Nightline," host Chris Bury reported that "privacy advocates in the United States and Europe are raising new questions about whether innocent civilians get caught up in the NSA's electronic web."

Then-NSA Director Lt. Gen. Michael Hayden, who was interviewed by "Nightline," said it was absolutely untrue that the agency was monitoring Americans who are suspected of being agents of a foreign power without first seeking a special warrant from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.

"We don't do anything willy-nilly," Hayden said. "We're a foreign intelligence agency. We try to collect information that is of value to American decision-makers, to protect American values, America - and American lives. To suggest that we're out there, on our own, renegade, pulling in random communications, is - is simply wrong. So everything we do is for a targeted foreign intelligence purpose. With regard to the - the question of industrial espionage, no. Period. Dot. We don't do that."

But, when asked "How do we know that the fox isn't guarding the chicken coop?" Hayden responded by saying that Americans should trust the employees of the NSA.

"They deserve your trust, but you don't have to trust them," Hayden said. "We aren't off the leash, so to speak, guarding ourselves. We have a body of oversight within the executive branch, in the Department of Defense, in the president's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, which is comprised of both government and nongovernmental officials. You've got both houses of Congress with - with very active - in some cases, aggressive - intelligence oversight committees with staff members who have an access badge to NSA just like mine."

One former NSA official said in response to Hayden's 2001 interview, "What do you expect him to say? He's got to deny it. I agree. We weren't targeting specific people, which is what the President's executive order does. However, we did keep tabs on some Americans we caught if there was an interest" by the White House. "That's not legal. And I am very upset that I played a part in it."

James Risen, the New York Times reporter credited with exposing the NSA's covert domestic surveillance activities that came as a result of a secret executive order President Bush issued in 2002, wrote in his just-published book, State of War, that the administration was very aggressive in its intelligence gathering activities before 9/11. However, Risen does not say that means the administration permitted the NSA to spy on Americans.

"It is now clear that the White House went through the motions of the public debate over the (2001) Patriot Act, all the while knowing that the intelligence community was secretly conducting a far more aggressive domestic surveillance campaign," Risen wrote in State of War.



http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011706Y.shtml

The Invariable Degeneration of Non-Conventional Conflicts


By Arnaud de La Grange
Le Figaro

Thursday 19 January 2006


It is undoubtedly, Osama bin Laden's one real victory. If no "apostate" Arab regime has fallen under al-Qaeda's blows, if its attacks wound democracies without really threatening them, it is America that has vacillated in its moral and legal certitudes. Through the apocalyptic dimension of his struggle, the great conductor of international jihadism has succeeded in making George W. Bush lose his cool, in dragging him into a dark and tormented terrain. And the controversy over torture and CIA black sites has inflicted collateral damage in Washington and in the world.

At the same time, the French Army finds itself shaken up by the "Mahé Affair," named after a prisoner sordidly murdered by a patrol in Ivory Coast. Of course, the two subjects are not of similar scale. On the one hand, a repressive system implemented by politico-military actors. On the other, a blunder committed by a few individuals. But in both cases, non-conventional conflicts destabilized those who were supposed to contain them. And awoke the specter - always waiting in ambush - of dirty war.

On the side of the "total war" against terrorism, the terms of the debate are finally rather simple, even trivial: does the end justify the means? "Yes," a phalanx of American strategists has answered without any dithering, shocked by the September 11 massacre. Only victory counts, and the anti-terrorist struggle demands that you rather openly dirty your hands. The Pentagon boss himself, Donald Rumsfeld, asserted then that traditional rules of war were "outmoded." Four years later, American Vice President Dick Cheney seems to continue to hold that opinion, since, during the autumn of 2005, he firmly crossed swords with Senator John McCain to exempt certain American services - notably the CIA - from an amendment proscribing any act of torture. None other than this Vietnam War hero could militate as effectively to prohibit "inhumane, cruel, and degrading treatment" against prisoners. In 2002, in the name of the bitter fight to be conducted against al-Qaeda, certain techniques, such as "water-boarding," which provokes the feeling of being drowned, were officially approved.

Sub-contracting the war doesn't help at all. The privatization of violence, with growing recourse to the new "mercenaries," for exotic conflicts as well as alongside bigger Western armies, sandbags ethical considerations. Geographic out-sourcing, when the CIA moves its presumed terrorists to countries where scruples about torture don't encumber anyone. Technical out-sourcing, when private contractors participate in interrogations alongside CIA agents and American military, as in the sadly famous Abu Ghraib prison. Suddenly, in Iraq, the liberators transform themselves into torturers. Thousands of kilometers away, at Guantánamo, "enemy combatants" are swallowed up in a lawless penumbra. By changing the rules of the game, Washington has taken the risk of leaving its honor behind.

Abu Ghraib, the Mahé Affair, the problems, their scales, are not, therefore, related. Yet one connection allows them to be considered together: the absence of a classic front and classic enemy, which makes it difficult to follow or respect any ethical guideline. In military action, two principles clash: efficiency and mastery. Use of force must be massive enough to win out over the adversary's violence. That's the principle of "efficiency." But, at the same time, that force may not be exercised in contradiction with the values in the name of which it is engaged. That's the principle of "mastery." It pronounces that one will not use any means at all to achieve one's ends. The legitimacy of the action is based on that requirement. It's that legitimacy that is threatened today by the Iraqi prison indignities and the abuses in the hunt for international jihadists. And all the fine discourse about the war for law - for international law and human rights - that Occidental powers have held forth since the end of the Cold War, ends up weakened and discredited. The new situation has not put war out of the game, but must that war be outside of the law?

Alongside these moral aspects, there is also the legitimacy of intervention and consequently the geopolitical balance of power that is in play. To believe that tactical efficiency wins out over morality can, perniciously, undermine all strategic efficiency. The brain of the French military institution, General Jean-René Bachelet, expresses this very well when he writes in Inflexions, the new and remarkable upscale review of the land army, that "the combination of crushing military capacities and humiliation of the demonized closes a vicious circle: it constitutes the very breeding ground for the terrorism we are fighting, this strategy of surprise attacks by the weak on the strong." If we follow the general's reasoning, winning a battle while losing one's soul bears the seeds of future defeats.

Taking into account America's crushing technological and military superiority, the French officer deems that Europeans should be bearers of an alternative, "not in terms of military power, but in the conception of how that power is deployed." Thus neo-conservative thinker Robert Kagan opposed two geopolitical visions in "Power and Weakness:" that of a "Kantian" European world, where we dream of constructing peace by means of law alone, and that of a "Hobbesian" American world, steeped in a culture of international violence, in which each country is a wolf for other countries. This takes us well beyond a simple debate on the meaning of military action toward what seems to be a veritable gamble over civilization.



http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011906H.shtml

Are You Ready to Be Bugged and Tortured By George W. Bush?


by Harvey Wasserman



It's not really terrorists George W. Bush wants to bug and torture. It's YOU.

It's not really terrorism he wants to fight. It's opposition from people he can't control.

It's not really US security he wants to protect. It's the power of his regime.

The Constitutional debate about whether these executive privileges are allowable in war is a smoke screen.

This isn't about war: It's about dictatorship. It’s about making power permanent by using private information against you, and by terrifying you with torture.

Team Bush believes it rules by Divine right. It has already re-defined "terrorist" to mean anyone who questions its power. It will use "anti-terrorist" wiretapping as a tool against anyone who dares oppose it.

All serious indicators show that "information" extracted by torture is virtually worthless in fighting terrorism. So is the information taken from wiretapping huge numbers of people, which Bush has been doing since before 9/11.

So ask yourself: if granted the power to torture, do you trust the Bush Administration---or any regime- - to refrain from torturing its political opponents? If granted the power to record private phone conversations, do you trust Karl Rove to not use this material against his political opponents?

Who will Bush go after first? Al Queda or the Quakers? Bin Laden or Cindy Sheehan?

If Bush gets away with this, then it's simple: if you are too outspoken in opposing this regime's destruction of social security, or the natural environment, or the economy, you will sooner or later be subject to torture.

If Bush's phone buggers pick up information or statements taken out of context that can incriminate or make you look bad, Rove will not hesitate to leak them to FOX and use them for partisan purposes.

The Constitution of the United States is absolutely clear about banning these abuses. The patriotic Americans who demanded the Bill of Rights knew these powers must be outlawed to retain any hope of preserving our freedom and democracy. That's why they did so, clearly and explicitly.

Those who support giving Bush these powers are undoubtedly ready and willing to be tortured and bugged themselves.

As for the rest of us, there can be no compromise with tyranny.




http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0119-22.htm

Opening Statement by John Conyers-NSA Wiretap Hearings

20 Jan 2006

In opening statement, Democrat takes on warrantless wiretaps

01/20/2006 @ 10:59 am
Filed by RAW STORY


There can be no doubt that today we are in a constitutional crisis that threatens the system of checks and balances that has preserved our fundamental freedoms for more than 200 years. There is no better illustration of that crisis than the fact that the president is openly violating our nation’s laws by authorizing the NSA to engage in warrantless surveillance of U.S. citizens.

The Bush Administration offers two arguments to justify their actions. First, they assert, that warrantless searches were authorized by the Afghanistan use of force resolution. Second, they say, the Constitution permits and even mandates such actions. To this member and indeed to most of our nation’s legal community, neither argument is remotely plausible or credible.

As for the Administration’s claim of statutory authority, a plain reading of the text of the resolution reveals that there is no reference whatsoever to domestic surveillance. Former Majority Leader Daschle told us that the resolution was narrowed from the Administration’s initial request to avoid such construction, and the Attorney General went so far as to admit that they were told by Members of Congress that it would be “difficult if not impossible” to amend the law to authorize such a program. As Harvard Law Professor Larry Tribe wrote me, “to argue that one couldn’t have gotten congressional authorization ... after arguing that ... one did get congressional authorization ... takes some nerve.”

In terms of inherent constitutional authority, this too flies in the face of both common sense and legal precedent. If the Supreme Court didn’t let President Truman use this authority to take over the steel mills during the Korean War in 1952, and wouldn’t let President Bush use the authority to indefinitely hold enemy combatants in 2005, it is quite obvious the constitution doesn’t allow warrantless wiretapping of U.S. citizens today. As Justice O’Connor wrote “a state of war is not a blank check.”

Perhaps what is most troubling of all is that if we let this domestic spying program continue, if we let this president convince us that we are at war, so he can do what he wants, we will allow to stand the principle that the president alone can decide what laws apply to him. I submit that is not only inconsistent with the principles upon which our Republic was founded, it denigrates the very freedom we have been fighting for since the tragic events of September 11. That is why we are holding today’s hearing.


http://rawstory.com/news/2005/In_opening_s...es_on_0120.html

Compliments of Wundermaus:



From America, My Country Tis of thee


Let music swell the breeze,
and ring from all the trees sweet freedom's song;
let mortal tongues awake;
let all that breathe partake;
let rocks their silence break, the sound prolong.

How Close Are We to the End of Democracy?

by Martin Garbus

01/20/2006



We have today seen President Bush's legal defense for the surveillance program. There is, he tells us, an unparalled crisis.

It reminds me of the United States Supreme Court in Bush v. Gore, stating they had to interfere with the election and overrule the Florida Supreme Court because we were in a national crisis -- we couldn't have a president elected at the appropriate time and place.

There was then a democracy with the Constitution telling us exactly how the election should be handled.

There is no crisis today that justifies suspending the constitution. There is a constitution in effect today. That constitution has endured for over 200 years.

Bush's cry of "crisis" is as false as former Chief Justice Rehnquist's (and four other Justices) cry of crisis. Each time both Rehnquist and Bush tried to set aside the Constitution to get an illegal result.

No president in over 200 years of our history has ever before claimed the "unitary powers" that Bush claims are his. Not President Lincoln during the Civil War, not President Wilson during World War I, not President Roosevelt during World War II, not President Truman during Korea, and not Presidents Johnson and Nixon during Vietnam.

Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and James Madison all saw the danger -- they never arrogated that power to the presidency.

Alito and Roberts, Thomas and Scalia, claim it, Bush claims it. Kennedy, who said in Bush v. Gore the Court was reconsidering the design of the government, will surely go along.

The President claims that he has the right to interpret laws "in a manner consistent with the Constitutional authority of the President to supervise the unitary executive branch and as the Commander-in-Chief and consistent with constitutional limitations on judicial power."

Bush bridled when asked by a reporter if "unchecked" presidential powers were dictatorial, angrily said, "I disagree with your view of unchecked power. There is the check of people being sworn to uphold the law for starters. There is oversight. We're talking to Congress all the time . . . to say unchecked powers is to ascribe dictatorial powers to the president, to which I object."

His objection is dishonest.

What does "unitary powers" mean? It means that if the President alone decides that the country is faced with what he alone defines to be a critical problem, his authority is unchecked. In other words, he decides where the powers lies in the Constitution -- he decides the contour of his power. This sounds more like a monarchy, more like authoritarianism than a democracy.

The taking of this power is not a coup d'état because the people today have the power of the vote in 2008. But it is dangerously close on that path -- the Founders recognized the danger of a too-powerful President.

The Bush Administration told us it does not deal with reality -- it creates reality -- Bush has created a legal façade allowing him to create his own world and then react to it as he chooses. Unfortunately, we are all dragged into his make-believe world with its make-believe legal system.

Samuel Alito, John Roberts (in his Circuit Court decisions), Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez, and wunderkind John Yoo give the President unchecked domestic and foreign powers to create that world. Bush can start his own wars, preemptive or otherwise, is the ultimate interpreter of foreign treaties, he defines enemy combatants as he wishes, he detains prisoners for as long as he wishes, he continues surveillance on foreign intercepts for as long as he wishes, he tortures as he wishes, he can ignore Congressional directives and statutes such as those creating FISA, as well as essential elements of our Constitution.

This litany has no end. We cannot now anticipate all the ramifications of the "unitary" president and his claim of "inherent powers," except that it clearly allows him to fully take over the government.

Although the Alito nomination process was largely a waste, it was very valuable in showing us how long and hard the Conservatives have thought about the "unitary" president. In Alito's earliest days with the Reagan administration, he laid out his concept of unchecked power -- of inherent authority. Tracing the clear, straight line from Meese to Bork to Alito to Thomas to Yoo to Gonzalez is easy, for those who can look. We can see the further immediate development, deepening and expansion of the concept of the unitary President that it became, long ago, before anyone was aware of it, a critical tenet of the Federalist Society and of the Conservative wing of the Republican Party.

The new power the President has come from somewhere. If you give him new powers, it comes at the expense of the people who previously had the power through the Congress to make those decisions.

This idea of this change of the power structure was not a flash in the pan idea -- it is not a concept without a meaning -- it is very serious and must be treated as such.

Gonzalez, Alito and Roberts argue that if the Constitution does not very specifically preclude the President's actions, he has a free hand. They claim they are writing on a clean slate. If the Founding Fathers did not anticipate everything a President might try and do and did not prohibit it, then Bush can do it. Only a document far, far longer than this Constitution could even attempt to scratch at the surface of these unforeseen events.

The Bush Administration ignore centuries of Constitutional decision-making that limits the President, decisions during the Civil War, World War II, World War II and the Korean, Vietnamese and Cold Wars. In the unlikely event the new Supreme Court does not give him all he wants, he will ignore those decisions as well.

That is truly what a "unitary" president means. If America did not pay attention before, it must now.




http://www.huffingtonpost.com/martin-garbu...-e_b_14171.html

Of Constitutions
Thomas Paine- From Rights of Man


That men mean distinct and separate things when they speak of constitutions and of governments, is evident; or why are those terms distinctly and separately used? A constitution is not the act of a government, but of a people constituting a government; and government without a constitution, is power without a right.

All power exercised over a nation, must have some beginning. It must either be delegated or assumed. There are no other sources. All delegated power is trust, and all assumed power is usurpation. Time does not alter the nature and quality of either.

In viewing this subject, the case and circumstances of America present themselves as in the beginning of a world; and our enquiry into the origin of government is shortened, by referring to the facts that have arisen in our own day. We have no occasion to roam for information into the obscure field of antiquity, nor hazard ourselves upon conjecture. We are brought at once to the point of seeing government begin, as if we had lived in the beginning of time. The real volume, not of history, but of facts, is directly before us, unmutilated by contrivance, or the errors of tradition.

I will here concisely state the commencement of the American constitutions; by which the difference between constitutions and governments will sufficiently appear.

It may not appear improper to remind the reader that the United States of America consist of thirteen separate states, each of which established a government for itself, after the declaration of independence, done the 4th of July, 1776. Each state acted independently of the rest, in forming its governments; but the same general principle pervades the whole. When the several state governments were formed, they proceeded to form the federal government, that acts over the whole in all matters which concern the interest of the whole, or which relate to the intercourse of the several states with each other, or with foreign nations. I will begin with giving an instance from one of the state governments (that of Pennsylvania) and then proceed to the federal government.

The state of Pennsylvania, though nearly of the same extent of territory as England, was then divided into only twelve counties. Each of those counties had elected a committee at the commencement of the dispute with the English government; and as the city of Philadelphia, which also had its committee, was the most central for intelligence, it became the center of communication to the several country committees. When it became necessary to proceed to the formation of a government, the committee of Philadelphia proposed a conference of all the committees, to be held in that city, and which met the latter end of July, 1776.

Though these committees had been duly elected by the people, they were not elected expressly for the purpose, nor invested with the authority of forming a constitution; and as they could not, consistently with the American idea of rights, assume such a power, they could only confer upon the matter, and put it into a train of operation. The conferees, therefore, did no more than state the case, and recommend to the several counties to elect six representatives for each county, to meet in convention at Philadelphia, with powers to form a constitution, and propose it for public consideration.

This convention, of which Benjamin Franklin was president, having met and deliberated, and agreed upon a constitution, they next ordered it to be published, not as a thing established, but for the consideration of the whole people, their approbation or rejection, and then adjourned to a stated time. When the time of adjournment was expired, the convention re-assembled; and as the general opinion of the people in approbation of it was then known, the constitution was signed, sealed, and proclaimed on the authority of the people and the original instrument deposited as a public record. The convention then appointed a day for the general election of the representatives who were to compose the government, and the time it should commence; and having done this they dissolved, and returned to their several homes and occupations.

In this constitution were laid down, first, a declaration of rights; then followed the form which the government should have, and the powers it should possess- the authority of the courts of judicature, and of juries- the manner in which elections should be conducted, and the proportion of representatives to the number of electors- the time which each succeeding assembly should continue, which was one year- the mode of levying, and of accounting for the expenditure, of public money- of appointing public officers, etc., etc., etc.

No article of this constitution could be altered or infringed at the discretion of the government that was to ensue. It was to that government a law. But as it would have been unwise to preclude the benefit of experience, and in order also to prevent the accumulation of errors, if any should be found, and to preserve an unison of government with the circumstances of the state at all times, the constitution provided that, at the expiration of every seven years, a convention should be elected, for the express purpose of revising the constitution, and making alterations, additions, or abolitions therein, if any such should be found necessary.

Here we see a regular process- a government issuing out of a constitution, formed by the people in their original character; and that constitution serving, not only as an authority, but as a law of control to the government. It was the political bible of the state. Scarcely a family was without it. Every member of the government had a copy; and nothing was more common, when any debate arose on the principle of a bill, or on the extent of any species of authority, than for the members to take the printed constitution out of their pocket, and read the chapter with which such matter in debate was connected.

Having thus given an instance from one of the states, I will show the proceedings by which the federal constitution of the United States arose and was formed.

Congress, at its two first meetings, in September 1774, and May 1775, was nothing more than a deputation from the legislatures of the several provinces, afterwards states; and had no other authority than what arose from common consent, and the necessity of its acting as a public body. In everything which related to the internal affairs of America, congress went no further than to issue recommendations to the several provincial assemblies, who at discretion adopted them or not. Nothing on the part of congress was compulsive; yet, in this situation, it was more faithfully and affectionately obeyed than was any government in Europe. This instance, like that of the national assembly in France, sufficiently shows, that the strength of government does not consist in any thing itself, but in the attachment of a nation, and the interest which a people feel in supporting it. When this is lost, government is but a child in power; and though, like the old government in France, it may harass individuals for a while, it but facilitates its own fall.

After the declaration of independence, it became consistent with the principle on which representative government is founded, that the authority of congress should be defined and established. Whether that authority should be more or less than congress then discretionarily exercised was not the question. It was merely the rectitude of the measure.

For this purpose, the act, called the act of confederation (which was a sort of imperfect federal constitution), was proposed, and, after long deliberation, was concluded in the year 1781. It was not the act of congress, because it is repugnant to the principles of representative government that a body should give power to itself. Congress first informed the several states, of the powers which it conceived were necessary to be invested in the union, to enable it to perform the duties and services required from it; and the states severally agreed with each other, and concentrated in congress those powers.

It may not be improper to observe that in both those instances (the one of Pennsylvania, and the other of the United States), there is no such thing as the idea of a compact between the people on one side, and the government on the other. The compact was that of the people with each other, to produce and constitute a government. To suppose that any government can be a party in a compact with the whole people, is to suppose it to have existence before it can have a right to exist. The only instance in which a compact can take place between the people and those who exercise the government, is, that the people shall pay them, while they choose to employ them.

Government is not a trade which any man, or any body of men, has a right to set up and exercise for his own emolument, but is altogether a trust, in right of those by whom that trust is delegated, and by whom it is always resumeable. It has of itself no rights; they are altogether duties.

Having thus given two instances of the original formation of a constitution, I will show the manner in which both have been changed since their first establishment.

The powers vested in the governments of the several states, by the state constitutions, were found, upon experience, to be too great; and those vested in the federal government, by the act of confederation, too little. The defect was not in the principle, but in the distribution of power.

Numerous publications, in pamphlets and in the newspapers, appeared, on the propriety and necessity of new modelling the federal government. After some time of public discussion, carried on through the channel of the press, and in conversations, the state of Virginia, experiencing some inconvenience with respect to commerce, proposed holding a continental conference; in consequence of which, a deputation from five or six state assemblies met at Annapolis, in Maryland, in 1786. This meeting, not conceiving itself sufficiently authorised to go into the business of a reform, did no more than state their general opinions of the propriety of the measure, and recommend that a convention of all the states should be held the year following.

The convention met at Philadelphia in May, 1787, of which General Washington was elected president. He was not at that time connected with any of the state governments, or with congress. He delivered up his commission when the war ended, and since then had lived a private citizen.

The convention went deeply into all the subjects; and having, after a variety of debate and investigation, agreed among themselves upon the several parts of a federal constitution, the next question was, the manner of giving it authority and practice.

For this purpose they did not, like a cabal of courtiers, send for a Dutch Stadtholder, or a German Elector; but they referred the whole matter to the sense and interest of the country.

They first directed that the proposed constitution should be published. Secondly, that each state should elect a convention, expressly for the purpose of taking it into consideration, and of ratifying or rejecting it; and that as soon as the approbation and ratification of any nine states should be given, that those states shall proceed to the election of their proportion of members to the new federal government; and that the operation of it should then begin, and the former federal government cease.

The several states proceeded accordingly to elect their conventions. Some of those conventions ratified the constitution by very large majorities, and two or three unanimously. In others there were much debate and division of opinion. In the Massachusetts convention, which met at Boston, the majority was not above nineteen or twenty, in about three hundred members; but such is the nature of representative government, that it quietly decides all matters by majority. After the debate in the Massachusetts convention was closed, and the vote taken, the objecting members rose and declared, "That though they had argued and voted against it, because certain parts appeared to them in a different light to what they appeared to other members; yet, as the vote had decided in favour of the constitution as proposed, they should give it the same practical support as if they had for it."

As soon as nine states had concurred (and the rest followed in the order their conventions were elected), the old fabric of the federal government was taken down, and the new one erected, of which General Washington is president.- In this place I cannot help remarking, that the character and services of this gentleman are sufficient to put all those men called kings to shame. While they are receiving from the sweat and labours of mankind, a prodigality of pay, to which neither their abilities nor their services can entitle them, he is rendering every service in his power, and refusing every pecuniary reward. He accepted no pay as commander-in-chief; he accepts none as president of the United States.

After the new federal constitution was established, the state of Pennsylvania, conceiving that some parts of its own constitution required to be altered, elected a convention for that purpose. The proposed alterations were published, and the people concurring therein, they were established.

In forming those constitutions, or in altering them, little or no inconvenience took place. The ordinary course of things was not interrupted, and the advantages have been much. It is always the interest of a far greater number of people in a nation to have things right, than to let them remain wrong; and when public matters are open to debate, and the public judgment free, it will not decide wrong, unless it decides too hastily.

In the two instances of changing the constitutions, the governments then in being were not actors either way. Government has no right to make itself a party in any debate respecting the principles or modes of forming, or of changing, constitutions. It is not for the benefit of those who exercise the powers of government that constitutions, and the governments issuing from them, are established. In all those matters the right of judging and acting are in those who pay, and not in those who receive.

A constitution is the property of a nation, and not of those who exercise the government.

All the constitutions of America are declared to be established on the authority of the people. In France, the word nation is used instead of the people; but in both cases, a constitution is a thing antecedent to the government, and always distinct there from.

In England it is not difficult to perceive that everything has a constitution, except the nation. Every society and association that is established, first agreed upon a number of original articles, digested into form, which are its constitution. It then appointed its officers, whose powers and authorities are described in that constitution, and the government of that society then commenced. Those officers, by whatever name they are called, have no authority to add to, alter, or abridge the original articles. It is only to the constituting power that this right belongs.

From the want of understanding the difference between a constitution and a government, Dr. Johnson, and all writers of his description, have always bewildered themselves. They could not but perceive, that there must necessarily be a controlling power existing somewhere, and they placed this power in the discretion of the persons exercising the government, instead of placing it in a constitution formed by the nation. When it is in a constitution, it has the nation for its support, and the natural and the political controlling powers are together. The laws which are enacted by governments, control men only as individuals, but the nation, through its constitution, controls the whole government, and has a natural ability to do so. The final controlling power, therefore, and the original constituting power, are one and the same power.

Dr. Johnson could not have advanced such a position in any country where there was a constitution; and he is himself an evidence that no such thing as a constitution exists in England. But it may be put as a question, not improper to be investigated, that if a constitution does not exist, how came the idea of its existence so generally established?

In order to decide this question, it is necessary to consider a constitution in both its cases:- First, as creating a government and giving it powers. Secondly, as regulating and restraining the powers so given.

If we begin with William of Normandy, we find that the government of England was originally a tyranny, founded on an invasion and conquest of the country. This being admitted, it will then appear, that the exertion of the nation, at different periods, to abate that tyranny, and render it less intolerable, has been credited for a constitution.

Magna Charta, as it was called (it is now like an almanack of the same date), was no more than compelling the government to renounce a part of its assumptions. It did not create and give powers to government in a manner a constitution does; but was, as far as it went, of the nature of a re-conquest, and not a constitution; for could the nation have totally expelled the usurpation, as France has done its despotism, it would then have had a constitution to form.

The history of the Edwards and the Henries, and up to the commencement of the Stuarts, exhibits as many instances of tyranny as could be acted within the limits to which the nation had restricted it. The Stuarts endeavoured to pass those limits, and their fate is well known. In all those instances we see nothing of a constitution, but only of restrictions on assumed power.

After this, another William, descended from the same stock, and claiming from the same origin, gained possession; and of the two evils, James and William, the nation preferred what it thought the least; since, from circumstances, it must take one. The act, called the Bill of Rights, comes here into view. What is it, but a bargain, which the parts of the government made with each other to divide powers, profits, and privileges? You shall have so much, and I will have the rest; and with respect to the nation, it said, for your share, YOU shall have the right of petitioning. This being the case, the bill of rights is more properly a bill of wrongs, and of insult. As to what is called the convention parliament, it was a thing that made itself, and then made the authority by which it acted. A few persons got together, and called themselves by that name. Several of them had never been elected, and none of them for the purpose.

From the time of William a species of government arose, issuing out of this coalition bill of rights; and more so, since the corruption introduced at the Hanover succession by the agency of Walpole; that can be described by no other name than a despotic legislation. Though the parts may embarrass each other, the whole has no bounds; and the only right it acknowledges out of itself, is the right of petitioning. Where then is the constitution either that gives or restrains power?

It is not because a part of the government is elective, that makes it less a despotism, if the persons so elected possess afterwards, as a parliament, unlimited powers. Election, in this case, becomes separated from representation, and the candidates are candidates for despotism.

I cannot believe that any nation, reasoning on its own rights, would have thought of calling these things a constitution, if the cry of constitution had not been set up by the government. It has got into circulation like the words bore and quoz [quiz], by being chalked up in the speeches of parliament, as those words were on window shutters and doorposts; but whatever the constitution may be in other respects, it has undoubtedly been the most productive machine of taxation that was ever invented. The taxes in France, under the new constitution, are not quite thirteen shillings per head,*[18] and the taxes in England, under what is called its present constitution, are forty-eight shillings and sixpence per head- men, women, and children- amounting to nearly seventeen millions sterling, besides the expense of collecting, which is upwards of a million more.

In a country like England, where the whole of the civil Government is executed by the people of every town and county, by means of parish officers, magistrates, quarterly sessions, juries, and assize; without any trouble to what is called the government or any other expense to the revenue than the salary of the judges, it is astonishing how such a mass of taxes can be employed. Not even the internal defence of the country is paid out of the revenue. On all occasions, whether real or contrived, recourse is continually had to new loans and new taxes. No wonder, then, that a machine of government so advantageous to the advocates of a court, should be so triumphantly extolled! No wonder, that St. James's or St. Stephen's should echo with the continual cry of constitution; no wonder, that the French revolution should be reprobated, and the res-publica treated with reproach! The red book of England, like the red book of France, will explain the reason.*[19]

I will now, by way of relaxation, turn a thought or two to Mr. Burke. I ask his pardon for neglecting him so long.

"America," says he (in his speech on the Canada Constitution bill), "never dreamed of such absurd doctrine as the Rights of Man."

Mr. Burke is such a bold presumer, and advances his assertions and his premises with such a deficiency of judgment, that, without troubling ourselves about principles of philosophy or politics, the mere logical conclusions they produce, are ridiculous. For instance,

If governments, as Mr. Burke asserts, are not founded on the Rights of MAN, and are founded on any rights at all, they consequently must be founded on the right of something that is not man. What then is that something?

Generally speaking, we know of no other creatures that inhabit the earth than man and beast; and in all cases, where only two things offer themselves, and one must be admitted, a negation proved on any one, amounts to an affirmative on the other; and therefore, Mr. Burke, by proving against the Rights of Man, proves in behalf of the beast; and consequently, proves that government is a beast; and as difficult things sometimes explain each other, we now see the origin of keeping wild beasts in the Tower; for they certainly can be of no other use than to show the origin of the government. They are in the place of a constitution. O John Bull, what honours thou hast lost by not being a wild beast. Thou mightest, on Mr. Burke's system, have been in the Tower for life.

If Mr. Burke's arguments have not weight enough to keep one serious, the fault is less mine than his; and as I am willing to make an apology to the reader for the liberty I have taken, I hope Mr. Burke will also make his for giving the cause.

Having thus paid Mr. Burke the compliment of remembering him, I return to the subject.

From the want of a constitution in England to restrain and regulate the wild impulse of power, many of the laws are irrational and tyrannical, and the administration of them vague and problematical.

The attention of the government of England (for I rather choose to call it by this name than the English government) appears, since its political connection with Germany, to have been so completely engrossed and absorbed by foreign affairs, and the means of raising taxes, that it seems to exist for no other purposes. Domestic concerns are neglected; and with respect to regular law, there is scarcely such a thing.

Almost every case must now be determined by some precedent, be that precedent good or bad, or whether it properly applies or not; and the practice is become so general as to suggest a suspicion, that it proceeds from a deeper policy than at first sight appears.

Since the revolution of America, and more so since that of France, this preaching up the doctrines of precedents, drawn from times and circumstances antecedent to those events, has been the studied practice of the English government. The generality of those precedents are founded on principles and opinions, the reverse of what they ought; and the greater distance of time they are drawn from, the more they are to be suspected. But by associating those precedents with a superstitious reverence for ancient things, as monks show relics and call them holy, the generality of mankind are deceived into the design. Governments now act as if they were afraid to awaken a single reflection in man. They are softly leading him to the sepulchre of precedents, to deaden his faculties and call attention from the scene of revolutions. They feel that he is arriving at knowledge faster than they wish, and their policy of precedents is the barometer of their fears. This political popery, like the ecclesiastical popery of old, has had its day, and is hastening to its exit. The ragged relic and the antiquated precedent, the monk and the monarch, will moulder together.

Government by precedent, without any regard to the principle of the precedent, is one of the vilest systems that can be set up. In numerous instances, the precedent ought to operate as a warning, and not as an example, and requires to be shunned instead of imitated; but instead of this, precedents are taken in the lump, and put at once for constitution and for law.

Either the doctrine of precedents is policy to keep a man in a state of ignorance, or it is a practical confession that wisdom degenerates in governments as governments increase in age, and can only hobble along by the stilts and crutches of precedents. How is it that the same persons who would proudly be thought wiser than their predecessors, appear at the same time only as the ghosts of departed wisdom? How strangely is antiquity treated! To some purposes it is spoken of as the times of darkness and ignorance, and to answer others, it is put for the light of the world.

If the doctrine of precedents is to be followed, the expenses of government need not continue the same. Why pay men extravagantly, who have but little to do? If everything that can happen is already in precedent, legislation is at an end, and precedent, like a dictionary, determines every case. Either, therefore, government has arrived at its dotage, and requires to be renovated, or all the occasions for exercising its wisdom have occurred.

We now see all over Europe, and particularly in England, the curious phenomenon of a nation looking one way, and the government the other- the one forward and the other backward. If governments are to go on by precedent, while nations go on by improvement, they must at last come to a final separation; and the sooner, and the more civilly they determine this point, the better.*[20]

Having thus spoken of constitutions generally, as things distinct from actual governments, let us proceed to consider the parts of which a constitution is composed.

Opinions differ more on this subject than with respect to the whole. That a nation ought to have a constitution, as a rule for the conduct of its government, is a simple question in which all men, not directly courtiers, will agree. It is only on the component parts that questions and opinions multiply.

But this difficulty, like every other, will diminish when put into a train of being rightly understood.

The first thing is, that a nation has a right to establish a constitution.

Whether it exercises this right in the most judicious manner at first is quite another case. It exercises it agreeably to the judgment it possesses; and by continuing to do so, all errors will at last be exploded.

When this right is established in a nation, there is no fear that it will be employed to its own injury. A nation can have no interest in being wrong.

Though all the constitutions of America are on one general principle, yet no two of them are exactly alike in their component parts, or in the distribution of the powers which they give to the actual governments. Some are more, and others less complex.

In forming a constitution, it is first necessary to consider what are the ends for which government is necessary? Secondly, what are the best means, and the least expensive, for accomplishing those ends?

Government is nothing more than a national association; and the object of this association is the good of all, as well individually as collectively. Every man wishes to pursue his occupation, and to enjoy the fruits of his labours and the produce of his property in peace and safety, and with the least possible expense. When these things are accomplished, all the objects for which government ought to be established are answered.

It has been customary to consider government under three distinct general heads. The legislative, the executive, and the judicial.

But if we permit our judgment to act unincumbered by the habit of multiplied terms, we can perceive no more than two divisions of power, of which civil government is composed, namely, that of legislating or enacting laws, and that of executing or administering them. Everything, therefore, appertaining to civil government, classes itself under one or other of these two divisions.

So far as regards the execution of the laws, that which is called the judicial power, is strictly and properly the executive power of every country. It is that power to which every individual has appeal, and which causes the laws to be executed; neither have we any other clear idea with respect to the official execution of the laws. In England, and also in America and France, this power begins with the magistrate, and proceeds up through all the courts of judicature.

I leave to courtiers to explain what is meant by calling monarchy the executive power. It is merely a name in which acts of government are done; and any other, or none at all, would answer the same purpose. Laws have neither more nor less authority on this account. It must be from the justness of their principles, and the interest which a nation feels therein, that they derive support; if they require any other than this, it is a sign that something in the system of government is imperfect. Laws difficult to be executed cannot be generally good.

With respect to the organization of the legislative power, different modes have been adopted in different countries. In America it is generally composed of two houses. In France it consists but of one, but in both countries, it is wholly by representation.

The case is, that mankind (from the long tyranny of assumed power) have had so few opportunities of making the necessary trials on modes and principles of government, in order to discover the best, that government is but now beginning to be known, and experience is yet wanting to determine many particulars.

The objections against two houses are, first, that there is an inconsistency in any part of a whole legislature, coming to a final determination by vote on any matter, whilst that matter, with respect to that whole, is yet only in a train of deliberation, and consequently open to new illustrations.

Secondly, That by taking the vote on each, as a separate body, it always admits of the possibility, and is often the case in practice, that the minority governs the majority, and that, in some instances, to a degree of great inconsistency.

Thirdly, That two houses arbitrarily checking or controlling each other is inconsistent; because it cannot be proved on the principles of just representation, that either should be wiser or better than the other. They may check in the wrong as well as in the right- therefore to give the power where we cannot give the wisdom to use it, nor be assured of its being rightly used, renders the hazard at least equal to the precaution.*[21]

The objection against a single house is, that it is always in a condition of committing itself too soon.- But it should at the same time be remembered, that when there is a constitution which defines the power, and establishes the principles within which a legislature shall act, there is already a more effectual check provided, and more powerfully operating, than any other check can be. For example,

Were a Bill to be brought into any of the American legislatures similar to that which was passed into an act by the English parliament, at the commencement of George the First, to extend the duration of the assemblies to a longer period than they now sit, the check is in the constitution, which in effect says, Thus far shalt thou go and no further.

But in order to remove the objection against a single house (that of acting with too quick an impulse), and at the same time to avoid the inconsistencies, in some cases absurdities, arising from two houses, the following method has been proposed as an improvement upon both.

First, To have but one representation.

Secondly, To divide that representation, by lot, into two or three parts.

Thirdly, That every proposed bill shall be first debated in those parts by succession, that they may become the hearers of each other, but without taking any vote. After which the whole representation to assemble for a general debate and determination by vote.

To this proposed improvement has been added another, for the purpose of keeping the representation in the state of constant renovation; which is, that one-third of the representation of each county, shall go out at the expiration of one year, and the number be replaced by new elections. Another third at the expiration of the second year replaced in like manner, and every third year to be a general election.*[22]

But in whatever manner the separate parts of a constitution may be arranged, there is one general principle that distinguishes freedom from slavery, which is, that all hereditary government over a people is to them a species of slavery, and representative government is freedom.

Considering government in the only light in which it should be considered, that of a National Association, it ought to be so constructed as not to be disordered by any accident happening among the parts; and, therefore, no extraordinary power, capable of producing such an effect, should be lodged in the hands of any individual. The death, sickness, absence or defection, of any one individual in a government, ought to be a matter of no more consequence, with respect to the nation, than if the same circumstance had taken place in a member of the English Parliament, or the French National Assembly.

Scarcely anything presents a more degrading character of national greatness, than its being thrown into confusion, by anything happening to or acted by any individual; and the ridiculousness of the scene is often increased by the natural insignificance of the person by whom it is occasioned. Were a government so constructed, that it could not go on unless a goose or a gander were present in the senate, the difficulties would be just as great and as real, on the flight or sickness of the goose, or the gander, as if it were called a King. We laugh at individuals for the silly difficulties they make to themselves, without perceiving that the greatest of all ridiculous things are acted in governments.*[23]

All the constitutions of America are on a plan that excludes the childish embarrassments which occur in monarchical countries. No suspension of government can there take place for a moment, from any circumstances whatever. The system of representation provides for everything, and is the only system in which nations and governments can always appear in their proper character.

As extraordinary power ought not to be lodged in the hands of any individual, so ought there to be no appropriations of public money to any person, beyond what his services in a state may be worth. It signifies not whether a man be called a president, a king, an emperor, a senator, or by any other name which propriety or folly may devise or arrogance assume; it is only a certain service he can perform in the state; and the service of any such individual in the routine of office, whether such office be called monarchical, presidential, senatorial, or by any other name or title, can never exceed the value of ten thousand pounds a year. All the great services that are done in the world are performed by volunteer characters, who accept nothing for them; but the routine of office is always regulated to such a general standard of abilities as to be within the compass of numbers in every country to perform, and therefore cannot merit very extraordinary recompense. Government, says Swift, is a Plain thing, and fitted to the capacity of many heads.

It is inhuman to talk of a million sterling a year, paid out of the public taxes of any country, for the support of any individual, whilst thousands who are forced to contribute thereto, are pining with want, and struggling with misery. Government does not consist in a contrast between prisons and palaces, between poverty and pomp; it is not instituted to rob the needy of his mite, and increase the wretchedness of the wretched.- But on this part of the subject I shall speak hereafter, and confine myself at present to political observations.

When extraordinary power and extraordinary pay are allotted to any individual in a government, he becomes the center, round which every kind of corruption generates and forms. Give to any man a million a year, and add thereto the power of creating and disposing of places, at the expense of a country, and the liberties of that country are no longer secure. What is called the splendour of a throne is no other than the corruption of the state. It is made up of a band of parasites, living in luxurious indolence, out of the public taxes.

When once such a vicious system is established it becomes the guard and protection of all inferior abuses. The man who is in the receipt of a million a year is the last person to promote a spirit of reform, lest, in the event, it should reach to himself. It is always his interest to defend inferior abuses, as so many outworks to protect the citadel; and on this species of political fortification, all the parts have such a common dependence that it is never to be expected they will attack each other.*[24]

Monarchy would not have continued so many ages in the world, had it not been for the abuses it protects. It is the master-fraud, which shelters all others. By admitting a participation of the spoil, it makes itself friends; and when it ceases to do this it will cease to be the idol of courtiers.

As the principle on which constitutions are now formed rejects all hereditary pretensions to government, it also rejects all that catalogue of assumptions known by the name of prerogatives.

If there is any government where prerogatives might with apparent safety be entrusted to any individual, it is in the federal government of America. The president of the United States of America is elected only for four years. He is not only responsible in the general sense of the word, but a particular mode is laid down in the constitution for trying him. He cannot be elected under thirty-five years of age; and he must be a native of the country.

In a comparison of these cases with the Government of England, the difference when applied to the latter amounts to an absurdity. In England the person who exercises prerogative is often a foreigner; always half a foreigner, and always married to a foreigner. He is never in full natural or political connection with the country, is not responsible for anything, and becomes of age at eighteen years; yet such a person is permitted to form foreign alliances, without even the knowledge of the nation, and to make war and peace without its consent.

But this is not all. Though such a person cannot dispose of the government in the manner of a testator, he dictates the marriage connections, which, in effect, accomplish a great part of the same end. He cannot directly bequeath half the government to Prussia, but he can form a marriage partnership that will produce almost the same thing. Under such circumstances, it is happy for England that she is not situated on the Continent, or she might, like Holland, fall under the dictatorship of Prussia. Holland, by marriage, is as effectually governed by Prussia, as if the old tyranny of bequeathing the government had been the means.

The presidency in America (or, as it is sometimes called, the executive) is the only office from which a foreigner is excluded, and in England it is the only one to which he is admitted. A foreigner cannot be a member of Parliament, but he may be what is called a king. If there is any reason for excluding foreigners, it ought to be from those offices where mischief can most be acted, and where, by uniting every bias of interest and attachment, the trust is best secured. But as nations proceed in the great business of forming constitutions, they will examine with more precision into the nature and business of that department which is called the executive. What the legislative and judicial departments are every one can see; but with respect to what, in Europe, is called the executive, as distinct from those two, it is either a political superfluity or a chaos of unknown things.

Some kind of official department, to which reports shall be made from the different parts of a nation, or from abroad, to be laid before the national representatives, is all that is necessary; but there is no consistency in calling this the executive; neither can it be considered in any other light than as inferior to the legislative. The sovereign authority in any country is the power of making laws, and everything else is an official department.

Next to the arrangement of the principles and the organization of the several parts of a constitution, is the provision to be made for the support of the persons to whom the nation shall confide the administration of the constitutional powers.

A nation can have no right to the time and services of any person at his own expense, whom it may choose to employ or entrust in any department whatever; neither can any reason be given for making provision for the support of any one part of a government and not for the other.

But admitting that the honour of being entrusted with any part of a government is to be considered a sufficient reward, it ought to be so to every person alike. If the members of the legislature of any country are to serve at their own expense that which is called the executive, whether monarchical or by any other name, ought to serve in like manner. It is inconsistent to pay the one, and accept the service of the other gratis.

In America, every department in the government is decently provided for; but no one is extravagantly paid. Every member of Congress, and of the Assemblies, is allowed a sufficiency for his expenses. Whereas in England, a most prodigal provision is made for the support of one part of the Government, and none for the other, the consequence of which is that the one is furnished with the means of corruption and the other is put into the condition of being corrupted. Less than a fourth part of such expense, applied as it is in America, would remedy a great part of the corruption.

Another reform in the American constitution is the exploding all oaths of personality. The oath of allegiance in America is to the nation only. The putting any individual as a figure for a nation is improper. The happiness of a nation is the superior object, and therefore the intention of an oath of allegiance ought not to be obscured by being figuratively taken, to, or in the name of, any person. The oath, called the civic oath, in France, viz., "the nation, the law, and the king," is improper. If taken at all, it ought to be as in America, to the nation only. The law may or may not be good; but, in this place, it can have no other meaning, than as being conducive to the happiness of a nation, and therefore is included in it. The remainder of the oath is improper, on the ground, that all personal oaths ought to be abolished. They are the remains of tyranny on one part and slavery on the other; and the name of the Creator ought not to be introduced to witness the degradation of his creation; or if taken, as is already mentioned, as figurative of the nation, it is in this place redundant. But whatever apology may be made for oaths at the first establishment of a government, they ought not to be permitted afterwards. If a government requires the support of oaths, it is a sign that it is not worth supporting, and ought not to be supported. Make government what it ought to be, and it will support itself.

To conclude this part of the subject:- One of the greatest improvements that have been made for the perpetual security and progress of constitutional liberty, is the provision which the new constitutions make for occasionally revising, altering, and amending them.

The principle upon which Mr. Burke formed his political creed, that of "binding and controlling posterity to the end of time, and of renouncing and abdicating the rights of all posterity, for ever," is now become too detestable to be made a subject of debate; and therefore, I pass it over with no other notice than exposing it.

Government is but now beginning to be known. Hitherto it has been the mere exercise of power, which forbade all effectual enquiry into rights, and grounded itself wholly on possession. While the enemy of liberty was its judge, the progress of its principles must have been small indeed.

The constitutions of America, and also that of France, have either affixed a period for their revision, or laid down the mode by which improvement shall be made. It is perhaps impossible to establish anything that combines principles with opinions and practice, which the progress of circumstances, through a length of years, will not in some measure derange, or render inconsistent; and, therefore, to prevent inconveniences accumulating, till they discourage reformations or provoke revolutions, it is best to provide the means of regulating them as they occur. The Rights of Man are the rights of all generations of men, and cannot be monopolised by any. That which is worth following, will be followed for the sake of its worth, and it is in this that its security lies, and not in any conditions with which it may be encumbered. When a man leaves property to his heirs, he does not connect it with an obligation that they shall accept it. Why, then, should we do otherwise with respect to constitutions? The best constitution that could now be devised, consistent with the condition of the present moment, may be far short of that excellence which a few years may afford. There is a morning of reason rising upon man on the subject of government, that has not appeared before. As the barbarism of the present old governments expires, the moral conditions of nations with respect to each other will be changed. Man will not be brought up with the savage idea of considering his species as his enemy, because the accident of birth gave the individuals existence in countries distinguished by different names; and as constitutions have always some relation to external as well as to domestic circumstances, the means of benefitting by every change, foreign or domestic, should be a part of every constitution. We already see an alteration in the national disposition of England and France towards each other, which, when we look back to only a few years, is itself a Revolution. Who could have foreseen, or who could have believed, that a French National Assembly would ever have been a popular toast in England, or that a friendly alliance of the two nations should become the wish of either? It shows that man, were he not corrupted by governments, is naturally the friend of man, and that human nature is not of itself vicious. That spirit of jealousy and ferocity, which the governments of the two countries inspired, and which they rendered subservient to the purpose of taxation, is now yielding to the dictates of reason, interest, and humanity. The trade of courts is beginning to be understood, and the affectation of mystery, with all the artificial sorcery by which they imposed upon mankind, is on the decline. It has received its death-wound; and though it may linger, it will expire. Government ought to be as much open to improvement as anything which appertains to man, instead of which it has been monopolised from age to age, by the most ignorant and vicious of the human race. Need we any other proof of their wretched management, than the excess of debts and taxes with which every nation groans, and the quarrels into which they have precipitated the world? Just emerging from such a barbarous condition, it is too soon to determine to what extent of improvement government may yet be carried. For what we can foresee, all Europe may form but one great Republic, and man be free of the whole.

Lafayette

Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen


Approved by the National Assembly of France, August 26, 1789


The representatives of the French people, organized as a National Assembly, believing that the ignorance, neglect, or contempt of the rights of man are the sole cause of public calamities and of the corruption of governments, have determined to set forth in a solemn declaration the natural, unalienable, and sacred rights of man, in order that this declaration, being constantly before all the members of the Social body, shall remind them continually of their rights and duties; in order that the acts of the legislative power, as well as those of the executive power, may be compared at any moment with the objects and purposes of all political institutions and may thus be more respected, and, lastly, in order that the grievances of the citizens, based hereafter upon simple and incontestable principles, shall tend to the maintenance of the constitution and redound to the happiness of all.

Therefore the National Assembly recognizes and proclaims, in the presence and under the auspices of the Supreme Being, the following rights of man and of the citizen:

Articles:

Men are born and remain free and equal in rights. Social distinctions may be founded only upon the general good.

The aim of all political association is the preservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man. These rights are liberty, property, security, and resistance to oppression.

The principle of all sovereignty resides essentially in the nation. No body nor individual may exercise any authority which does not proceed directly from the nation.

Liberty consists in the freedom to do everything which injures no one else; hence the exercise of the natural rights of each man has no limits except those which assure to the other members of the society the enjoyment of the same rights. These limits can only be determined by law.

Law can only prohibit such actions as are hurtful to society. Nothing may be prevented which is not forbidden by law, and no one may be forced to do anything not provided for by law.

Law is the expression of the general will. Every citizen has a right to participate personally, or through his representative, in its foundation. It must be the same for all, whether it protects or punishes. All citizens, being equal in the eyes of the law, are equally eligible to all dignities and to all public positions and occupations, according to their abilities, and without distinction except that of their virtues and talents.

No person shall be accused, arrested, or imprisoned except in the cases and according to the forms prescribed by law. Any one soliciting, transmitting, executing, or causing to be executed, any arbitrary order, shall be punished. But any citizen summoned or arrested in virtue of the law shall submit without delay, as resistance constitutes an offense.

The law shall provide for such punishments only as are strictly and obviously necessary, and no one shall suffer punishment except it be legally inflicted in virtue of a law passed and promulgated before the commission of the offense.
As all persons are held innocent until they shall have been declared guilty, if arrest shall be deemed indispensable, all harshness not essential to the securing of the prisoner's person shall be severely repressed by law.

No one shall be disquieted on account of his opinions, including his religious views, provided their manifestation does not disturb the public order established by law.
The free communication of ideas and opinions is one of the most precious of the rights of man. Every citizen may, accordingly, speak, write, and print with freedom, but shall be responsible for such abuses of this freedom as shall be defined by law.

The security of the rights of man and of the citizen requires public military forces. These forces are, therefore, established for the good of all and not for the personal advantage of those to whom they shall be intrusted.

A common contribution is essential for the maintenance of the public forces and for the cost of administration. This should be equitably distributed among all the citizens in proportion to their means.

All the citizens have a right to decide, either personally or by their representatives, as to the necessity of the public contribution; to grant this freely; to know to what uses it is put; and to fix the proportion, the mode of assessment and of collection and the duration of the taxes.

Society has the right to require of every public agent an account of his administration.

A society in which the observance of the law is not assured, nor the separation of powers defined, has no constitution at all.

Since property is an inviolable and sacred right, no one shall be deprived thereof except where public necessity, legally determined, shall clearly demand it, and then only on condition that the owner shall have been previously and equitably indemnified.



The above document was written by The Marquis de Lafayette, with help from his friend and neighbor, American envoy to France, Thomas Jefferson. Lafayette, you may recall, had come to the Colonies at age 19, been commissioned a Major General, and was instrumental in the defeat of the British during the American Revolutionary War. He considered one special man his 'father': George Washington. French King Louis XVI signed this document, under duress, but never intended to support it. Indeed, the Revolution in France soon followed, leading to the tyrannical rule of Napolean Bonaparte.

Ominous Sign: The President's Growing Disregard for the Law

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette | Editorial

Friday 20 January 2006


President Bush's latest tool for disrespecting the Constitution, Congress and the American people, used more than a hundred times so far, is the presidential signing statement.

That statement is normally a few words that a president says when he signs a bill passed by Congress. In the past it was an occasion for the president to congratulate legislators who had been particularly active in passing the bill and to praise the new legislation generously, even if he himself had been unsympathetic to it.

There is no mention of the statement in the Constitution, nor does it have any role in how laws are passed and put into effect.

Yet Mr. Bush has taken the presidential signing statement as another means of asserting his will over and above the country's laws, whatever they may say. In effect, he is trying to establish that whatever he says when he signs the bill overrides whatever the legislation itself may stipulate. Historians and presidential scholars, among others, find it alarming.

This is nothing new for Mr. Bush. He began disregarding the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 in 2002 when he authorized wiretapping of foreigners and Americans' telephone calls and e-mails by the National Security Agency without first obtaining a warrant from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. The practice continues today.

His new use of the presidential signing statement turned up egregiously when after signing the bill sponsored by Sen. John McCain to ban the torture of prisoners in American custody, Mr. Bush issued a statement Dec. 30 that in effect said he would enforce the new law only as he saw fit.

We repeat - there is nothing in the Constitution that says he can do that. To the degree that the American system functions, Congress passes laws that put into effect the will of the people.

Mr. Bush's subversion of the process is particularly ironic since the laws passed by Congress that he chooses not to carry out are the product of a legislature controlled by his own political party. Unfortunately, that is also a prime reason that Congress is not in open revolt over the president's disregard for its work.

Everyone loses when a president chooses to carry out only the laws that he wants to, as he wants to. Fundamental governance of the United States through the rule of law is sabotaged by this practice. We'll see what happens when Mr. Bush's ability to do so is challenged by a court - assuming there will still be independent courts after he succeeds in stocking them with acquiescent appointees.

Mr. Bush's presidential signing statements are a practice designed to paint the Constitution, Congress and the American people into a shrinking corner. If Congress can't pass a law and expect the president to respect it, where exactly is this nation left?


http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/012006K.shtml

Civil Disobedience - Part 1 of 3

by Henry David Thoreau

I HEARTILY ACCEPT the motto,—"That government is best which governs least";(1) and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which also I believe,—"That government is best which governs not at all"; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have. Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient. The objections which have been brought against a standing army, and they are many and weighty, and deserve to prevail, may also at last be brought against a standing government. The standing army is only an arm of the standing government. The government itself, which is only the mode which the people have chosen to execute their will, is equally liable to be abused and perverted before the people can act through it. Witness the present Mexican war,(2) the work of comparatively a few individuals using the standing government as their tool; for, in the outset, the people would not have consented to this measure.

[2] This American government—what is it but a tradition, though a recent one, endeavoring to transmit itself unimpaired to posterity, but each instant losing some of its integrity? It has not the vitality and force of a single living man; for a single man can bend it to his will. It is a sort of wooden gun to the people themselves. But it is not the less necessary for this; for the people must have some complicated machinery or other, and hear its din, to satisfy that idea of government which they have. Governments show thus how successfully men can be imposed on, even impose on themselves, for their own advantage. It is excellent, we must all allow. Yet this government never of itself furthered any enterprise, but by the alacrity with which it got out of its way. It does not keep the country free. It does not settle the West. It does not educate. The character inherent in the American people has done all that has been accomplished; and it would have done somewhat more, if the government had not sometimes got in its way. For government is an expedient by which men would fain succeed in letting one another alone; and, as has been said, when it is most expedient, the governed are most let alone by it. Trade and commerce, if they were not made of India rubber,(3) would never manage to bounce over the obstacles which legislators are continually putting in their way; and, if one were to judge these men wholly by the effects of their actions, and not partly by their intentions, they would deserve to be classed and punished with those mischievous persons who put obstructions on the railroads.

[3] But, to speak practically and as a citizen, unlike those who call themselves no-government men, I ask for, not at once no government, but at once a better government. Let every man make known what kind of government would command his respect, and that will be one step toward obtaining it.

[4] After all, the practical reason why, when the power is once in the hands of the people, a majority are permitted, and for a long period continue, to rule, is not because they are most likely to be in the right, nor because this seems fairest to the minority, but because they are physically the strongest. But a government in which the majority rule in all cases cannot be based on justice, even as far as men understand it. Can there not be a government in which majorities do not virtually decide right and wrong, but conscience?—in which majorities decide only those questions to which the rule of expediency is applicable? Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislator? Why has every man a conscience, then? I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward. It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right. The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right. It is truly enough said that a corporation has no conscience; but a corporation of conscientious men is a corporation with a conscience. Law never made men a whit more just; and, by means of their respect for it, even the well-disposed are daily made the agents of injustice. A common and natural result of an undue respect for law is, that you may see a file of soldiers, colonel, captain, corporal, privates, powder-monkeys, and all, marching in admirable order over hill and dale to the wars, against their wills, ay, against their common sense and consciences, which makes it very steep marching indeed, and produces a palpitation of the heart. They have no doubt that it is a damnable business in which they are concerned; they are all peaceably inclined. Now, what are they? Men at all? or small movable forts and magazines, at the service of some unscrupulous man in power? Visit the Navy Yard, and behold a marine, such a man as an American government can make, or such as it can make a man with its black arts—a mere shadow and reminiscence of humanity, a man laid out alive and standing, and already, as one may say, buried under arms with funeral accompaniments, though it may be


"Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his corse to the rampart we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero we buried."(4)


[5] The mass of men serve the state thus, not as men mainly, but as machines, with their bodies. They are the standing army, and the militia, jailers, constables, posse comitatus,(5) etc. In most cases there is no free exercise whatever of the judgment or of the moral sense; but they put themselves on a level with wood and earth and stones; and wooden men can perhaps be manufactured that will serve the purpose as well. Such command no more respect than men of straw or a lump of dirt. They have the same sort of worth only as horses and dogs. Yet such as these even are commonly esteemed good citizens. Others, as most legislators, politicians, lawyers, ministers, and office-holders, serve the state chiefly with their heads; and, as they rarely make any moral distinctions, they are as likely to serve the devil, without intending it, as God. A very few, as heroes, patriots, martyrs, reformers in the great sense, and men, serve the state with their consciences also, and so necessarily resist it for the most part; and they are commonly treated as enemies by it. A wise man will only be useful as a man, and will not submit to be "clay," and "stop a hole to keep the wind away,"(6) but leave that office to his dust at least:—

"I am too high-born to be propertied,
To be a secondary at control,
Or useful serving-man and instrument
To any sovereign state throughout the world."(7)

[6] He who gives himself entirely to his fellow-men appears to them useless and selfish; but he who gives himself partially to them is pronounced a benefactor and philanthropist.

[7] How does it become a man to behave toward this American government to-day? I answer, that he cannot without disgrace be associated with it. I cannot for an instant recognize that political organization as my government which is the slave's government also.

[8] All men recognize the right of revolution; that is, the right to refuse allegiance to, and to resist, the government, when its tyranny or its inefficiency are great and unendurable. But almost all say that such is not the case now. But such was the case, they think, in the Revolution of '75.(8) If one were to tell me that this was a bad government because it taxed certain foreign commodities brought to its ports, it is most probable that I should not make an ado about it, for I can do without them. All machines have their friction; and possibly this does enough good to counterbalance the evil. At any rate, it is a great evil to make a stir about it. But when the friction comes to have its machine, and oppression and robbery are organized, I say, let us not have such a machine any longer. In other words, when a sixth of the population of a nation which has undertaken to be the refuge of liberty are slaves, and a whole country is unjustly overrun and conquered by a foreign army, and subjected to military law, I think that it is not too soon for honest men to rebel and revolutionize. What makes this duty the more urgent is the fact that the country so overrun is not our own, but ours is the invading army.

[9] Paley, a common authority with many on moral questions, in his chapter on the "Duty of Submission to Civil Government," resolves all civil obligation into expediency; and he proceeds to say that "so long as the interest of the whole society requires it, that is, so long as the established government cannot be resisted or changed without public inconveniency, it is the will of God that the established government be obeyed, and no longer"—"This principle being admitted, the justice of every particular case of resistance is reduced to a computation of the quantity of the danger and grievance on the one side, and of the probability and expense of redressing it on the other."(9) Of this, he says, every man shall judge for himself. But Paley appears never to have contemplated those cases to which the rule of expediency does not apply, in which a people, as well as an individual, must do justice, cost what it may. If I have unjustly wrested a plank from a drowning man, I must restore it to him though I drown myself. This, according to Paley, would be inconvenient. But he that would save his life, in such a case, shall lose it.(10) This people must cease to hold slaves, and to make war on Mexico, though it cost them their existence as a people.

[10] In their practice, nations agree with Paley; but does any one think that Massachusetts does exactly what is right at the present crisis?

"A drab of state, a cloth-o'-silver slut,
To have her train borne up, and her soul trail in the dirt."(11)

Practically speaking, the opponents to a reform in Massachusetts are not a hundred thousand politicians at the South, but a hundred thousand merchants and farmers here, who are more interested in commerce and agriculture than they are in humanity, and are not prepared to do justice to the slave and to Mexico, cost what it may. I quarrel not with far-off foes, but with those who, near at home, co-operate with, and do the bidding of those far away, and without whom the latter would be harmless. We are accustomed to say, that the mass of men are unprepared; but improvement is slow, because the few are not materially wiser or better than the many. It is not so important that many should be as good as you, as that there be some absolute goodness somewhere; for that will leaven the whole lump.(12) There are thousands who are in opinion opposed to slavery and to the war, who yet in effect do nothing to put an end to them; who, esteeming themselves children of Washington and Franklin, sit down with their hands in their pockets, and say that they know not what to do, and do nothing; who even postpone the question of freedom to the question of free-trade, and quietly read the prices-current along with the latest advices from Mexico, after dinner, and, it may be, fall asleep over them both. What is the price-current of an honest man and patriot to-day? They hesitate, and they regret, and sometimes they petition; but they do nothing in earnest and with effect. They will wait, well disposed, for others to remedy the evil, that they may no longer have it to regret. At most, they give only a cheap vote, and a feeble countenance and Godspeed, to the right, as it goes by them. There are nine hundred and ninety-nine patrons of virtue to one virtuous man; but it is easier to deal with the real possessor of a thing than with the temporary guardian of it.

[11] All voting is a sort of gaming, like checkers or backgammon, with a slight moral tinge to it, a playing with right and wrong, with moral questions; and betting naturally accompanies it. The character of the voters is not staked. I cast my vote, perchance, as I think right; but I am not vitally concerned that that right should prevail. I am willing to leave it to the majority. Its obligation, therefore, never exceeds that of expediency. Even voting for the right is doing nothing for it. It is only expressing to men feebly your desire that it should prevail. A wise man will not leave the right to the mercy of chance, nor wish it to prevail through the power of the majority. There is but little virtue in the action of masses of men. When the majority shall at length vote for the abolition of slavery, it will be because they are indifferent to slavery, or because there is but little slavery left to be abolished by their vote. They will then be the only slaves. Only his vote can hasten the abolition of slavery who asserts his own freedom by his vote.

[12] I hear of a convention to be held at Baltimore,(13) or elsewhere, for the selection of a candidate for the Presidency, made up chiefly of editors, and men who are politicians by profession; but I think, what is it to any independent, intelligent, and respectable man what decision they may come to? Shall we not have the advantage of his wisdom and honesty, nevertheless? Can we not count upon some independent votes? Are there not many individuals in the country who do not attend conventions? But no: I find that the respectable man, so called, has immediately drifted from his position, and despairs of his country, when his country has more reason to despair of him. He forthwith adopts one of the candidates thus selected as the only available one, thus proving that he is himself available for any purposes of the demagogue. His vote is of no more worth than that of any unprincipled foreigner or hireling native, who may have been bought. Oh for a man who is a man, and, as my neighbor says, has a bone in his back which you cannot pass your hand through! Our statistics are at fault: the population has been returned too large. How many men are there to a square thousand miles in this country? Hardly one. Does not America offer any inducement for men to settle here? The American has dwindled into an Odd Fellow (14)—one who may be known by the development of his organ of gregariousness, and a manifest lack of intellect and cheerful self-reliance; whose first and chief concern, on coming into the world, is to see that the almshouses are in good repair; and, before yet he has lawfully donned the virile garb, to collect a fund for the support of the widows and orphans that may be; who, in short ventures to live only by the aid of the Mutual Insurance company, which has promised to bury him decently.

[13] It is not a man's duty, as a matter of course, to devote himself to the eradication of any, even the most enormous wrong; he may still properly have other concerns to engage him; but it is his duty, at least, to wash his hands of it, and, if he gives it no thought longer, not to give it practically his support. If I devote myself to other pursuits and contemplations, I must first see, at least, that I do not pursue them sitting upon another man's shoulders. I must get off him first, that he may pursue his contemplations too. See what gross inconsistency is tolerated. I have heard some of my townsmen say, "I should like to have them order me out to help put down an insurrection of the slaves, or to march to Mexico;—see if I would go"; and yet these very men have each, directly by their allegiance, and so indirectly, at least, by their money, furnished a substitute. The soldier is applauded who refuses to serve in an unjust war by those who do not refuse to sustain the unjust government which makes the war; is applauded by those whose own act and authority he disregards and sets at naught; as if the state were penitent to that degree that it hired one to scourge it while it sinned, but not to that degree that it left off sinning for a moment. Thus, under the name of Order and Civil Government, we are all made at last to pay homage to and support our own meanness. After the first blush of sin comes its indifference; and from immoral it becomes, as it were, unmoral, and not quite unnecessary to that life which we have made.

Civil Disobedience Part 2 of 3

by Henry David Thoreau

1] The broadest and most prevalent error requires the most disinterested virtue to sustain it. The slight reproach to which the virtue of patriotism is commonly liable, the noble are most likely to incur. Those who, while they disapprove of the character and measures of a government, yield to it their allegiance and support are undoubtedly its most conscientious supporters, and so frequently the most serious obstacles to reform. Some are petitioning the State to dissolve the Union,(1) to disregard the requisitions of the President. Why do they not dissolve it themselves—the union between themselves and the State—and refuse to pay their quota into its treasury? Do not they stand in the same relation to the State, that the State does to the Union? And have not the same reasons prevented the State from resisting the Union, which have prevented them from resisting the State?

[2] How can a man be satisfied to entertain an opinion merely, and enjoy it? Is there any enjoyment in it, if his opinion is that he is aggrieved? If you are cheated out of a single dollar by your neighbor, you do not rest satisfied with knowing that you are cheated, or with saying that you are cheated, or even with petitioning him to pay you your due; but you take effectual steps at once to obtain the full amount, and see that you are never cheated again. Action from principle—the perception and the performance of right —changes things and relations; it is essentially revolutionary, and does not consist wholly with anything which was. It not only divides states and churches, it divides families; ay, it divides the individual, separating the diabolical in him from the divine.

[3] Unjust laws exist; shall we be content to obey them, or shall we endeavor to amend them, and obey them until we have succeeded, or shall we transgress them at once? Men generally, under such a government as this, think that they ought to wait until they have persuaded the majority to alter them. They think that, if they should resist, the remedy would be worse than the evil. But it is the fault of the government itself that the remedy is worse than the evil. It makes it worse. Why is it not more apt to anticipate and provide for reform? Why does it not cherish its wise minority? Why does it cry and resist before it is hurt? Why does it not encourage its citizens to be on the alert to point out its faults, and do better than it would have them? Why does it always crucify Christ, and excommunicate Copernicus (2) and Luther,(3) and pronounce Washington and Franklin rebels?

[4] One would think, that a deliberate and practical denial of its authority was the only offence never contemplated by government; else, why has it not assigned its definite, its suitable and proportionate, penalty? If a man who has no property refuses but once to earn nine shillings for the State, he is put in prison for a period unlimited by any law that I know, and determined only by the discretion of those who placed him there; but if he should steal ninety times nine shillings from the State, he is soon permitted to go at large again.

[5] If the injustice is part of the necessary friction of the machine of government, let it go, let it go; perchance it will wear smooth—certainly the machine will wear out. If the injustice has a spring, or a pulley, or a rope, or a crank, exclusively for itself, then perhaps you may consider whether the remedy will not be worse than the evil; but if it is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law. Let your life be a counter friction to stop the machine. What I have to do is to see, at any rate, that I do not lend myself to the wrong which I condemn.

[6] As for adopting the ways which the State has provided for remedying the evil, I know not of such ways. They take too much time, and a man's life will be gone. I have other affairs to attend to. I came into this world, not chiefly to make this a good place to live in, but to live in it, be it good or bad. A man has not everything to do, but something; and because he cannot do everything, it is not necessary that he should do something wrong. It is not my business to be petitioning the Governor or the Legislature any more than it is theirs to petition me; and if they should not hear my petition, what should I do then? But in this case the State has provided no way; its very Constitution is the evil. This may seem to be harsh and stubborn and unconciliatory; but it is to treat with the utmost kindness and consideration the only spirit that can appreciate or deserves it. So is an change for the better, like birth and death which convulse the body.

[7] I do not hesitate to say, that those who call themselves Abolitionists should at once effectually withdraw their support, both in person and property, from the government of Massachusetts, and not wait till they constitute a majority of one, before they suffer the right to prevail through them. I think that it is enough if they have God on their side, without waiting for that other one. Moreover, any man more right than his neighbors constitutes a majority of one already.

[8] I meet this American government, or its representative, the State government, directly, and face to face, once a year—no more—in the person of its tax-gatherer;(4) this is the only mode in which a man situated as I am necessarily meets it; and it then says distinctly, Recognize me; and the simplest, the most effectual, and, in the present posture of affairs, the indispensablest mode of treating with it on this head, of expressing your little satisfaction with and love for it, is to deny it then. My civil neighbor, the tax-gatherer, is the very man I have to deal with—for it is, after all, with men and not with parchment that I quarrel—and he has voluntarily chosen to be an agent of the government. How shall he ever know well what he is and does as an officer of the government, or as a man, until he is obliged to consider whether he shall treat me, his neighbor, for whom he has respect, as a neighbor and well-disposed man, or as a maniac and disturber of the peace, and see if he can get over this obstruction to his neighborliness without a ruder and more impetuous thought or speech corresponding with his action? I know this well, that if one thousand, if one hundred, if ten men whom I could name—if ten honest men only—ay, if one HONEST man, in this State of Massachusetts, ceasing to hold slaves, were actually to withdraw from this copartnership, and be locked up in the county jail therefor, it would be the abolition of slavery in America. For it matters not how small the beginning may seem to be: what is once well done is done forever. But we love better to talk about it: that we say is our mission. Reform keeps many scores of newspapers in its service, but not one man. If my esteemed neighbor, the State's ambassador,(5) who will devote his days to the settlement of the question of human rights in the Council Chamber, instead of being threatened with the prisons of Carolina, were to sit down the prisoner of Massachusetts, that State which is so anxious to foist the sin of slavery upon her sister—though at present she can discover only an act of inhospitality to be the ground of a quarrel with her—the Legislature would not wholly waive the subject the following winter.

[9] Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison. The proper place to-day, the only place which Massachusetts has provided for her freer and less desponding spirits, is in her prisons, to be put out and locked out of the State by her own act, as they have already put themselves out by their principles. It is there that the fugitive slave, and the Mexican prisoner on parole, and the Indian come to plead the wrongs of his race, should find them; on that separate, but more free and honorable ground, where the State places those who are not with her, but against her—the only house in a slave State in which a free man can abide with honor. If any think that their influence would be lost there, and their voices no longer afflict the ear of the State, that they would not be as an enemy within its walls, they do not know by how much truth is stronger than error, nor how much more eloquently and effectively he can combat injustice who has experienced a little in his own person. Cast your whole vote, not a strip of paper merely, but your whole influence. A minority is powerless while it conforms to the majority; it is not even a minority then; but it is irresistible when it clogs by its whole weight. If the alternative is to keep all just men in prison, or give up war and slavery, the State will not hesitate which to choose. If a thousand men were not to pay their tax-bills this year, that would not be a violent and bloody measure, as it would be to pay them, and enable the State to commit violence and shed innocent blood. This is, in fact, the definition of a peaceable revolution, if any such is possible. If the tax-gatherer, or any other public officer, asks me, as one has done, "But what shall I do?" my answer is, "If you really wish to do anything, resign your office." When the subject has refused allegiance, and the officer has resigned his office, then the revolution is accomplished. But even suppose blood should flow. Is there not a sort of blood shed when the conscience is wounded? Through this wound a man's real manhood and immortality flow out, and he bleeds to an everlasting death. I see this blood flowing now.

[10] I have contemplated the imprisonment of the offender, rather than the seizure of his goods —though both will serve the same purpose—because they who assert the purest right, and consequently are most dangerous to a corrupt State, commonly have not spent much time in accumulating property. To such the State renders comparatively small service, and a slight tax is wont to appear exorbitant, particularly if they are obliged to earn it by special labor with their hands. If there were one who lived wholly without the use of money, the State itself would hesitate to demand it of him. But the rich man—not to make any invidious comparison—is always sold to the institution which makes him rich. Absolutely speaking, the more money, the less virtue; for money comes between a man and his objects, and obtains them for him; and it was certainly no great virtue to obtain it. It puts to rest many questions which he would otherwise be taxed to answer; while the only new question which it puts is the hard but superfluous one, how to spend it. Thus his moral ground is taken from under his feet. The opportunities of living are diminished in proportion as what are called the "means" are increased. The best thing a man can do for his culture when he is rich is to endeavor to carry out those schemes which he entertained when he was poor. Christ answered the Herodians according to their condition. "Show me the tribute-money," said he;—and one took a penny out of his pocket;—if you use money which has the image of Cæsar on it, and which he has made current and valuable, that is, if you are men of the State, and gladly enjoy the advantages of Cæsar's government, then pay him back some of his own when he demands it; "Render therefore to Cæsar that which is Cæsar's, and to God those things which are God's"(6)—leaving them no wiser than before as to which was which; for they did not wish to know.

[11] When I converse with the freest of my neighbors, I perceive that, whatever they may say about the magnitude and seriousness of the question, and their regard for the public tranquillity, the long and the short of the matter is, that they cannot spare the protection of the existing government, and they dread the consequences to their property and families of disobedience to it. For my own part, I should not like to think that I ever rely on the protection of the State. But, if I deny the authority of the State when it presents its tax-bill, it will soon take and waste all my property, and so harass me and my children without end. This is hard. This makes it impossible for a man to live honestly, and at the same time comfortably in outward respects. It will not be worth the while to accumulate property; that would be sure to go again. You must hire or squat somewhere, and raise but a small crop, and eat that soon. You must live within yourself, and depend upon yourself always tucked up and ready for a start, and not have many affairs. A man may grow rich in Turkey even, if he will be in all respects a good subject of the Turkish government. Confucius said, "If a state is governed by the principles of reason, poverty and misery are subjects of shame;(7) if a state is not governed by the principles of reason, riches and honors are the subjects of shame." No: until I want the protection of Massachusetts to be extended to me in some distant Southern port, where my liberty is endangered, or until I am bent solely on building up an estate at home by peaceful enterprise, I can afford to refuse allegiance to Massachusetts, and her right to my property and life. It costs me less in every sense to incur the penalty of disobedience to the State than it would to obey. I should feel as if I were worth less in that case.

[12] Some years ago, the State met me in behalf of the Church, and commanded me to pay a certain sum toward the support of a clergyman whose preaching my father attended, but never I myself. "Pay," it said, "or be locked up in the jail." I declined to pay. But, unfortunately, another man saw fit to pay it. I did not see why the schoolmaster should be taxed to support the priest, and not the priest the schoolmaster: for I was not the State's schoolmaster, but I supported myself by voluntary subscription. I did not see why the lyceum (8) should not present its tax-bill, and have the State to back its demand, as well as the Church. However, at the request of the selectmen, I condescended to make some such statement as this in writing:—"Know all men by these presents, that I, Henry Thoreau, do not wish to be regarded as a member of any incorporated society which I have not joined." This I gave to the town clerk; and he has it. The State, having thus learned that I did not wish to be regarded as a member of that church, has never made a like demand on me since; though it said that it must adhere to its original presumption that time. If I had known how to name them, I should then have signed off in detail from all the societies which I never signed on to; but I did not know where to find a complete list.

[13] I have paid no poll-tax for six years. I was put into a jail once on this account, for one night; and, as I stood considering the walls of solid stone, two or three feet thick, the door of wood and iron, a foot thick, and the iron grating which strained the light, I could not help being struck with the foolishness of that institution which treated me as if I were mere flesh and blood and bones, to be locked up. I wondered that it should have concluded at length that this was the best use it could put me to, and had never thought to avail itself of my services in some way. I saw that, if there was a wall of stone between me and my townsmen, there was a still more difficult one to climb or break through, before they could get to be as free as I was. I did not for a moment feel confined, and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortar. I felt as if I alone of all my townsmen had paid my tax. They plainly did not know how to treat me, but behaved like persons who are underbred. In every threat and in every compliment there was a blunder; for they thought that my chief desire was to stand the other side of that stone wall. I could not but smile to see how industriously they locked the door on my meditations, which followed them out again without let or hindrance, and they were really all that was dangerous. As they could not reach me, they had resolved to punish my body; just as boys, if they cannot come at some person against whom they have a spite, will abuse his dog. I saw that the State was half-witted, that it was timid as a lone woman with her silver spoons, and that it did not know its friends from its foes, and I lost all my remaining respect for it, and pitied it.

[14] Thus the State never intentionally confronts a man's sense, intellectual or moral, but only his body, his senses. It is not armed with superior wit or honesty, but with superior physical strength. I was not born to be forced. I will breathe after my own fashion. Let us see who is the strongest. What force has a multitude? They only can force me who obey a higher law than I. They force me to become like themselves. I do not hear of men being forced to have this way or that by masses of men. What sort of life were that to live? When I meet a government which says to me, "Your money or your life," why should I be in haste to give it my money? It may be in a great strait, and not know what to do: I cannot help that. It must help itself; do as I do. It is not worth the while to snivel about it. I am not responsible for the successful working of the machinery of society. I am not the son of the engineer. I perceive that, when an acorn and a chestnut fall side by side, the one does not remain inert to make way for the other, but both obey their own laws, and spring and grow and flourish as best they can, till one, perchance, overshadows and destroys the other. If a plant cannot live according to its nature, it dies; and so a man.

Civil disobedience Part 3 of 3

by Henry David Thoreau

[1] The night in prison was novel and interesting enough. The prisoners in their shirt-sleeves were enjoying a chat and the evening air in the doorway, when I entered. But the jailer said, "Come, boys, it is time to lock up"; and so they dispersed, and I heard the sound of their steps returning into the hollow apartments. My room-mate was introduced to me by the jailer as "a first-rate fellow and a clever man." When the door was locked, he showed me where to hang my hat, and how he managed matters there. The rooms were whitewashed once a month; and this one, at least, was the whitest, most simply furnished, and probably the neatest apartment in the town. He naturally wanted to know where I came from, and what brought me there; and, when I had told him, I asked him in my turn how he came there, presuming him to be an honest man, of course; and, as the world goes, I believe he was. "Why," said he, "they accuse me of burning a barn; but I never did it." As near as I could discover, he had probably gone to bed in a barn when drunk, and smoked his pipe there; and so a barn was burnt. He had the reputation of being a clever man, had been there some three months waiting for his trial to come on, and would have to wait as much longer; but he was quite domesticated and contented, since he got his board for nothing, and thought that he was well treated.

[2] He occupied one window, and I the other; and I saw that if one stayed there long, his principal business would be to look out the window. I had soon read all the tracts that were left there, and examined where former prisoners had broken out, and where a grate had been sawed off, and heard the history of the various occupants of that room; for I found that even here there was a history and a gossip which never circulated beyond the walls of the jail. Probably this is the only house in the town where verses are composed, which are afterward printed in a circular form, but not published. I was shown quite a long list of verses which were composed by some young men who had been detected in an attempt to escape, who avenged themselves by singing them.

[3] I pumped my fellow-prisoner as dry as I could, for fear I should never see him again; but at length he showed me which was my bed, and left me to blow out the lamp.

[4] It was like travelling into a far country, such as I had never expected to behold, to lie there for one night. It seemed to me that I never had heard the town-clock strike before, nor the evening sounds of the village; for we slept with the windows open, which were inside the grating. It was to see my native village in the light of the Middle Ages, and our Concord was turned into a Rhine stream, and visions of knights and castles passed before me. They were the voices of old burghers that I heard in the streets. I was an involuntary spectator and auditor of whatever was done and said in the kitchen of the adjacent village-inn—a wholly new and rare experience to me. It was a closer view of my native town. I was fairly inside of it. I never had seen its institutions before. This is one of its peculiar institutions; for it is a shire town.(1) I began to comprehend what its inhabitants were about.

[5] In the morning, our breakfasts were put through the hole in the door, in small oblong-square tin pans, made to fit, and holding a pint of chocolate, with brown bread, and an iron spoon. When they called for the vessels again, I was green enough to return what bread I had left; but my comrade seized it, and said that I should lay that up for lunch or dinner. Soon after he was let out to work at haying in a neighboring field, whither he went every day, and would not be back till noon; so he bade me good-day, saying that he doubted if he should see me again.

[6] When I came out of prison—for some one interfered, and paid that tax—I did not perceive that great changes had taken place on the common, such as he observed who went in a youth and emerged a tottering and gray-headed man; and yet a change had to my eyes come over the scene—the town, and State, and country—greater than any that mere time could effect. I saw yet more distinctly the State in which I lived. I saw to what extent the people among whom I lived could be trusted as good neighbors and friends; that their friendship was for summer weather only; that they did not greatly propose to do right; that they were a distinct race from me by their prejudices and superstitions, as the Chinamen and Malays are; that in their sacrifices to humanity, they ran no risks, not even to their property; that after all they were not so noble but they treated the thief as he had treated them, and hoped, by a certain outward observance and a few prayers, and by walking in a particular straight though useless path from time to time, to save their souls. This may be to judge my neighbors harshly; for I believe that many of them are not aware that they have such an institution as the jail in their village.

[7] It was formerly the custom in our village, when a poor debtor came out of jail, for his acquaintances to salute him, looking through their fingers, which were crossed to represent the grating of a jail window, "How do ye do?" My neighbors did not thus salute me, but first looked at me, and then at one another, as if I had returned from a long journey. I was put into jail as I was going to the shoemaker's to get a shoe which was mended. When I was let out the next morning, I proceeded to finish my errand, and, having put on my mended shoe, joined a huckleberry party, who were impatient to put themselves under my conduct; and in half an hour—for the horse was soon tackled—was in the midst of a huckleberry field, on one of our highest hills, two miles off, and then the State was nowhere to be seen.

[8] This is the whole history of "My Prisons."(2)


[9] I have never declined paying the highway tax, because I am as desirous of being a good neighbor as I am of being a bad subject; and as for supporting schools, I am doing my part to educate my fellow-countrymen now. It is for no particular item in the tax-bill that I refuse to pay it. I simply wish to refuse allegiance to the State, to withdraw and stand aloof from it effectually. I do not care to trace the course of my dollar, if I could, till it buys a man or a musket to shoot one with—the dollar is innocent—but I am concerned to trace the effects of my allegiance. In fact, I quietly declare war with the State, after my fashion, though I will still make what use and get what advantage of her I can, as is usual in such cases.

[10] If others pay the tax which is demanded of me, from a sympathy with the State, they do but what they have already done in their own case, or rather they abet injustice to a greater extent than the State requires. If they pay the tax from a mistaken interest in the individual taxed, to save his property, or prevent his going to jail, it is because they have not considered wisely how far they let their private feelings interfere with the public good.

[11] This, then, is my position at present. But one cannot be too much on his guard in such a case, lest his action be biased by obstinacy or an undue regard for the opinions of men. Let him see that he does only what belongs to himself and to the hour.

[12] I think sometimes, Why, this people mean well; they are only ignorant; they would do better if they knew how: why give your neighbors this pain to treat you as they are not inclined to? But I think, again, This is no reason why I should do as they do, or permit others to suffer much greater pain of a different kind. Again, I sometimes say to myself, When many millions of men, without heat, without ill-will, without personal feeling of any kind, demand of you a few shillings only, without the possibility, such is their constitution, of retracting or altering their present demand, and without the possibility, on your side, of appeal to any other millions, why expose yourself to this overwhelming brute force? You do not resist cold and hunger, the winds and the waves, thus obstinately; you quietly submit to a thousand similar necessities. You do not put your head into the fire. But just in proportion as I regard this as not wholly a brute force, but partly a human force, and consider that I have relations to those millions as to so many millions of men, and not of mere brute or inanimate things, I see that appeal is possible, first and instantaneously, from them to the Maker of them, and, secondly, from them to themselves. But, if I put my head deliberately into the fire, there is no appeal to fire or to the Maker of fire, and I have only myself to blame. If I could convince myself that I have any right to be satisfied with men as they are, and to treat them accordingly, and not according, in some respects, to my requisitions and expectations of what they and I ought to be, then, like a good Mussulman (3) and fatalist, I should endeavor to be satisfied with things as they are, and say it is the will of God. And, above all, there is this difference between resisting this and a purely brute or natural force, that I can resist this with some effect; but I cannot expect, like Orpheus,(4) to change the nature of the rocks and trees and beasts.

[13] I do not wish to quarrel with any man or nation. I do not wish to split hairs, to make fine distinctions, or set myself up as better than my neighbors. I seek rather, I may say, even an excuse for conforming to the laws of the land. I am but too ready to conform to them. Indeed, I have reason to suspect myself on this head; and each year, as the tax-gatherer comes round, I find myself disposed to review the acts and position of the general and State governments, and the spirit of the people, to discover a pretext for conformity.

"We must affect our country as our parents,
And if at any time we alienate
Our love or industry from doing it honor,
We must respect effects and teach the soul
Matter of conscience and religion,
And not desire of rule or benefit."(5)

[14] I believe that the State will soon be able to take all my work of this sort out of my hands, and then I shall be no better a patriot than my fellow-countrymen. Seen from a lower point of view, the Constitution, with all its faults, is very good; the law and the courts are very respectable; even this State and this American government are, in many respects, very admirable and rare things, to be thankful for, such as a great many have described them; but seen from a point of view a little higher, they are what I have described them; seen from a higher still, and the highest, who shall say what they are, or that they are worth looking at or thinking of at all?

[15] However, the government does not concern me much, and I shall bestow the fewest possible thoughts on it. It is not many moments that I live under a government, even in this world. If a man is thought-free, fancy-free, imagination-free, that which is not never for a long time appearing to be to him, unwise rulers or reformers cannot fatally interrupt him.

[16] I know that most men think differently from myself; but those whose lives are by profession devoted to the study of these or kindred subjects, content me as little as any. Statesmen and legislators, standing so completely within the institution, never distinctly and nakedly behold it. They speak of moving society, but have no resting-place without it. They may be men of a certain experience and discrimination, and have no doubt invented ingenious and even useful systems, for which we sincerely thank them; but all their wit and usefulness lie within certain not very wide limits. They are wont to forget that the world is not governed by policy and expediency. Webster never goes behind government, and so cannot speak with authority about it. His words are wisdom to those legislators who contemplate no essential reform in the existing government; but for thinkers, and those who legislate for all time, he never once glances at the subject. I know of those whose serene and wise speculations on this theme would soon reveal the limits of his mind's range and hospitality. Yet, compared with the cheap professions of most reformers, and the still cheaper wisdom and eloquence of politicians in general, his are almost the only sensible and valuable words, and we thank Heaven for him. Comparatively, he is always strong, original, and, above all, practical. Still, his quality is not wisdom, but prudence. The lawyer's truth is not truth, but consistency or a consistent expediency. Truth is always in harmony with herself, and is not concerned chiefly to reveal the justice that may consist with wrong-doing. He well deserves to be called, as he has been called, the Defender of the Constitution. There are really no blows to be given by him but defensive ones. He is not a leader, but a follower. His leaders are the men of '87.(6) "I have never made an effort," he says, "and never propose to make an effort; I have never countenanced an effort, and never mean to countenance an effort, to disturb the arrangement as originally made, by which the various States came into the Union." Still thinking of the sanction which the Constitution gives to slavery, he says, "Because it was a part of the original compact—let it stand."(7) Notwithstanding his special acuteness and ability, he is unable to take a fact out of its merely political relations, and behold it as it lies absolutely to be disposed of by the intellect—what, for instance, it behooves a man to do here in America to-day with regard to slavery, but ventures, or is driven, to make some such desperate answer as the following, while professing to speak absolutely, and as a private man—from which what new and singular code of social duties might be inferred? "The manner," says he, "in which the governments of those States where slavery exists are to regulate it is for their own consideration, under their responsibility to their constituents, to the general laws of propriety, humanity, and justice, and to God. Associations formed elsewhere, springing from a feeling of humanity, or any other cause, have nothing whatever to do with it. They have never received any encouragement from me, and they never will."

[17] They who know of no purer sources of truth, who have traced up its stream no higher, stand, and wisely stand, by the Bible and the Constitution, and drink at it there with reverence and humility; but they who behold where it comes trickling into this lake or that pool, gird up their loins once more, and continue their pilgrimage toward its fountain-head.

[18] No man with a genius for legislation has appeared in America. They are rare in the history of the world. There are orators, politicians, and eloquent men, by the thousand; but the speaker has not yet opened his mouth to speak who is capable of settling the much-vexed questions of the day. We love eloquence for its own sake, and not for any truth which it may utter, or any heroism it may inspire. Our legislators have not yet learned the comparative value of free-trade and of freedom, of union, and of rectitude, to a nation. They have no genius or talent for comparatively humble questions of taxation and finance, commerce and manufacturers and agriculture. If we were left solely to the wordy wit of legislators in Congress for our guidance, uncorrected by the seasonable experience and the effectual complaints of the people, America would not long retain her rank among the nations. For eighteen hundred years, though perchance I have no right to say it, the New Testament has been written; yet where is the legislator who has wisdom and practical talent enough to avail himself of the light which it sheds on the science of legislation?

[19] The authority of government, even such as I am willing to submit to—for I will cheerfully obey those who know and can do better than I, and in many things even those who neither know nor can do so well—is still an impure one: to be strictly just, it must have the sanction and consent of the governed. It can have no pure right over my person and property but what I concede to it. The progress from an absolute to a limited monarchy, from a limited monarchy to a democracy, is a progress toward a true respect for the individual. Even the Chinese philosopher(8) was wise enough to regard the individual as the basis of the empire. Is a democracy, such as we know it, the last improvement possible in government? Is it not possible to take a step further towards recognizing and organizing the rights of man? There will never be a really free and enlightened State until the State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and independent power, from which all its own power and authority are derived, and treats him accordingly. I please myself with imagining a State at least which can afford to be just to all men, and to treat the individual with respect as a neighbor; which even would not think it inconsistent with its own repose if a few were to live aloof from it, not meddling with it, nor embraced by it, who fulfilled all the duties of neighbors and fellow-men. A State which bore this kind of fruit, and suffered it to drop off as fast as it ripened, would prepare the way for a still more perfect and glorious State, which also I have imagined, but not yet anywhere seen.

Published on Saturday, January 21, 2006 by CommonDreams.org

Should the President be King? Reflections from the Deep Origins of America

by Robert Freeman


When he wrote the Constitution in 1789, James Madison had a specific goal in mind: to create a system of government that would constrain the tyrannous behavior of an unaccountable executive. Only in this way, Madison knew, would the "blessings of liberty" be able to flourish and grow in the new United States.

The essential features of the government he envisioned to carry out this aim included representation of the people, separation of powers, checks and balances, the rule of law, and protection of the citizenry from unwarranted intrusion by the government.

But many of those ideals are at risk today in President Bush's breathtaking assertion that he is accountable to no one in his determination to spy on American citizens. Indeed, according to the theory of the "unitary executive" espoused by Samuel Alito, there are literally no limits to presidential actions so long as they are couched as part of the "war on terror."

Yet claims of unchallengeable authority rooted in the Constitution are belied in a straightforward understanding of what Madison intended to create. The founders had just fought the Revolutionary War to free themselves from the tyranny of an unbridled King - one who would not even deign to obey his own laws. And before that, in the 1600s, the English people had fought a Civil War to prevent their own subjugation to a series of despotic monarchs.

It is preposterous, therefore, to imagine that Madison would then turn around and design a government where the Executive, the president, had uncontrollable powers in any circumstance. Only a fantastically licentious, indeed, deceitful reading of the history of the time can produce such an interpretation.

Democracy first died when Augustus Caesar overthrew the Roman Republic in 28 B.C. It was not reborn until the 1600s when the English people confronted a new king, James I, who claimed to rule under the doctrine of "the divine right of Kings."

James was an arrogant man. He had members of Parliament arrested for questioning his conduct of the war with Spain. Parliament responded that such arrests challenged its very existence and that that existence was not subject to the king's whim. This was the first statement of the inherent right to legislative representation independent of the authority of the king.

James' son, Charles I, was even more imperious than his father. He extracted "forced loans" from wealthy members of Parliament and threw 76 of them in jail when they refused to pay. Parliament responded in 1628 with the Petition of Right, a landmark in western constitutional law. It stated that the king could not force money from people without the approval of Parliament. This idea would become the rallying cry of the American Revolution: no taxation without representation.

Unbowed, Charles began imprisoning adversaries on trumped-up charges including treason and even murder. Parliament replied that before such charges would be taken up, the king would have to "show us the body," habeas corpus. This became the foundation of the due process of law, one of the most important protections of the citizenry against a vengeful or renegade executive.

In 1637, Charles started a war with Scotland. But he did so without consulting Parliament, something that had not happened since 1323. The war ended before Parliament could rebuke Charles but when the Irish rebelled four years later, Parliament refused to grant Charles an army. It was a harbinger of the U.S. Congress' power both to declare war and to allocate monies for public purposes.

Charles' conflict with Parliament escalated into Civil War. Charles lost the War and in 1649 Parliament cut off his head. It was the first time in the western world that a sitting monarch had been executed by a rebellion of his own people. It signaled an astonishing reversal in the historical relationship between executive and legislature, and between citizen and sovereign.

In 1685, Charles' son, James II, became King. His conflicts with Parliament harkened back to those of his father. But by 1689, Parliament had wearied of James' contemptuous treatment and threatened him with the same fate as his father: beheading. James abdicated and quietly quit England for France.

In his stead, Parliament invited James' son-in-law, William of Orange, then king of Holland, to become king of England. William and his wife, Mary, accepted the position, but only after they had acceded to the creation of the English Bill of Rights.

This "Glorious Revolution" of 1689 was a peaceful, bloodless coup d'etat. For the first time in history the rights of an entire people were enshrined into a Constitution and a Bill of Rights-a framework of laws that define how a king may govern and how a government must relate to its citizens.

Over the course of this century, then, England made the first-time-in-the-history-of-the-world transition from an absolute monarchy based on the claim of the divine right of kings to a constitutional monarchy based on the twin ideals of the rule of law and the consent of the governed. It was a breathtakingly noble ascent to political maturity, the willingness of a people to govern themselves by laws rather than submit as cattle to the autocratic dictates of a single man.

The colonists, of course, were Englishmen. The American Revolutionary War occurred because a new King, George III, refused to honor these ideals, denying the protections of English law to his own citizens, the colonists. As Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence, Americans had "suffered a long train of abuses and usurpations.designed to reduce them under absolute Despotism."

In the Declaration, Jefferson listed 27 specific offenses including, among others, the facts that the King had:


. Dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly.
. Obstructed the Administration of Justice
. Quartered large bodies of armed troops among us
. Imposed taxes without our consent
. Deprived us, in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury
So grave were these violations, and so intransigent was the King in remedying them, that the colonists had no recourse but to go to war.


There is no room for interpretation here: the Revolutionary War was fought and the Constitution was written to free the colonists from the abuse of "absolute Despotism." The manner of securing such freedom was the system of separation of powers embodied in the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches of government and the checks and balances attendant on each of their roles.

Given this history, it is startling, even brazen, that some try to claim a "unitary executive" that cannot be challenged by Congress, at least in times of war. Challenging the executive in time of war is precisely the way that America was born. Madison himself could not have been more lucid on this point.

In 1795, he wrote, "Of all the enemies of true liberty, war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. In war, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds are added to those of subduing the force of the people." A more prescient description of the allure of war - at least for the executive - could hardly be written.

The supreme irony - if not hypocrisy - of the theory of the "unitary executive" is that it is espoused by the very same people who purport that the Judiciary should be bound by an equally phantasmical theory of "original intent." Under this theory the Supreme Court should interpret the Constitution according to the intent of its authors, an intent only these latter-day "originalists" claim to be able to accurately divine.

But the Executive, on the other hand, should be freed entirely from such original intent, liberated to pursue a starkly post-modern vision of a virulently anti-democratic authoritarianism that would have been wholly repugnant to the very same founders. Either Madison and the founders were schizophrenic or the current "theorists" are duplicitous. They can't have it both ways.

The most dangerous of George Bush's formulations surrounding the issue of unwarranted wiretapping is that his own usurpations must continue so long as the country is at "war." Bush's "war on terror" is effectively endless because it is inherently self-catalyzing, spawning more terror than it is capable of eradicating.

Before Bush's invasion, Iraq was not a source of terrorism. Today, it is the world's pre-eminent trainer and exporter of terror. Major incidents of international terrorism have tripled since the invasion in 2003. Perhaps it is this auto-inflammatory dynamic that Dick Cheney referred to when he claimed we were facing a war, "that will not end in our lifetimes." Tellingly, Madison wrote, "No nation can preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."

The confluence of these two startling facts, the claim for unlimited power based on war, and the endless nature of the war itself, poses grave threats to the American Constitutional order. And the threat is made all the more dire in the realization that the war had been planned since the first days of the Bush administration and that it was sold to the American people through a vigorous, sustained campaign of Executive deceit.

Shorn of all distractions, the "unitary executive" and Bush's claim to legitimacy in spying amount to this: that one man can lie the country into war and then, on the basis of that war, declare himself above the law - essentially suspending the Constitution. It is a legal prescription for the self-destruction of democratic government.

But the American form of government is a legacy that belongs to all Americans, indeed, to all humans. It is the product of four centuries of human aspirations for protection from an abusive executive. It is not Bush's to take away. Which is not to say that it cannot be lost. Hannah Arendt once wrote that, "Although tyranny may successfully rule over foreign peoples, it can stay in power only if it first destroys the national institutions of its own people."

Bush has openly declared and imperiously acted out his preference for a dictatorship-provided, of course, that he is the dictator. But dictatorship stands against every value, every virtue that lies at the heart of America. It will require a fierce determination on the part of the people to keep what is their most long lived, hard won, and (hopefully) deeply treasured gift. But it is a fight that can and must be waged. The alternative is a return to a medieval darkness of divine right, autocracy and oppression.




http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0121-22.htm

Published on Saturday, January 21, 2006 by the Madison Capital Times

Choose King's Path by Renouncing War

by John Kaufman


It was very sad to hear some of our senators defending the latest killing of innocents in Pakistan, among them women and children, in the name of the "war on terror" and killing members of al-Qaida:

"We apologize, but I can't tell you that we wouldn't do the same thing again," said John McCain.

"It's a regrettable situation, but what are we supposed to do?" said Evan Bayh of Indiana.

"Clearly justified by the intelligence," said Trent Lott, which is the same thing the Bush administration said about the invasion of Iraq, another war now in the process of killing innocent people.

Such comments by such distinguished men gives one pause: Apparently the "right to life" and human rights in general should only be granted to American infants. If we kill other people and children, as all wars do, it is merely regrettable. We uphold the right to kill anyone we please in the name of peace, and if we accidentally also kill the wrong people, well, at least our intentions were good.

Even a child can see through such a pathetic grasping at moral straws.

I am writing on the day set aside to honor the memory of Martin Luther King Jr., a man who fiercely believed in the efficacy of nonviolence in both domestic and foreign affairs. He no doubt would have, as a good Christian in things political (his extramarital affairs were somewhat less upright), denounced both invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, just as he denounced our debacle in Vietnam.

King understood the blatant hypocrisy and hopelessness of trying to instill peace and democracy through violent means, that the use of violence always includes an element of fascism, even when the ends are noble.

The deaths of innocents, the torture of prisoners, the loss of civil liberties are all part of the means of war. Choosing war, we cannot then apologize for its effects, as if such pronouncements of regret absolve us of responsibility. They do not, senators, absolve us.

After 9/11 this nation had a choice take stock of American/Arab history and respond with the democratic restraint and Christian good will we have long touted but too little lived by or do what we did: Unleash the arrogant and vengeful dogs of war that even in a clear-cut victory call forth other dogs and other wars.

The "war on terror" is as inane as the "war on drugs": Both attempt to eradicate and incarcerate the enemy and ignore the root causes of the problems. Both will fail, but will kill and jail a lot of people.

King said all this and much more 40 years ago, and still the only way to wipe the blood from our hands is to regret our choice of war and pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan immediately. One does not regret adultery, for instance, and then continue the affair until the time is right to end it. One ends it.

So to answer Sen. Bayh's question, let's bring our soldiers back home to the people who need them most.




http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0121-26.htm

An Essay by Indianhead~


Is this the Sunset of Americana?


The value, the legacy of the United States of America has
always been the participation of the people in government.

The informed consent of the governed has always been the balance,
the guarantee that the nation did not stray too far from
the truth before it was returned to the center. A center
found in the hearts and souls of people who came here
for land, and freedom from intrusive government and the
imposition of religious dogma by the rich and powerful.

Now we find our government run almost exclusively by a group
with a philosophy based on investor finance and underpinned
by the adoption of homogenized neo-protestant verbiage.
Protestants, as the namesake suggests, were rebels from a
strict, overpowering and governing church. They fled a continent
on which The Church (which varied by nation) had formed an
axis with royalty…inflicting a self-generating oppression by
the two. That axis only considered their survival and enrichment
as the canons of government and faith. Rebellion against this axis
was the cause our forefathers claimed deism, rather than a particular
religion, as their driving belief. A natural understanding of liberty
for the individual was the foundation for representative government.

Decisions were made in public, in great meeting halls where
debate and oratory were the methods, and compromise the avenue.

Today we have returned to the secret conclave, a small number of
sworn allies without regard to public discussion or transparency.
A self- proclaimed illuminati that feels they must rule the less
informed, not only in the US, but across the world. Such
attitudes also lead to an attempt to keep the governed uninformed,
less they slow or disagree with the decisions of governors.

The explanation they offer is that secrecy is required
to protect the liberty of the people from a vague, ideological
enemy: terrorism. They claim a need to sacrifice this provision of
information to the governed on the altar of “security”.
Since they believe themselves intellectual royalty, chosen by
God, reasons for failures can not be theirs, but instead their
predecessors or those who reject their strict dictates.

Meanwhile, the rest of the world watches in shock as
the most open and free society in the world collapses
back toward a medieval mind-set. Leaders who have
pledged fealty to the ruling council are the new Lords
of this kingdom, those who must make decisions for
the peasants. Peasants, who are simply labor, service, personnel-
required to make their enterprises operate, and the more cheaply the better.

Until the president is required to tell Congress openly and
exactly on what basis he spies on Americans and what his
goals are in Iraq (both governmental and resource based)
there can be no informed consent. There can only be a divided
populace consisting of the Lords and bureaucrats loyal to
the system that provides their banquets, and those who
serve the aristocracy, and survive from meal to meal.

Secrecy is a darkness which must be reserved for actual, tactical
decisions concerning military operations. It can not be claimed to provide
information strictly to the executive branch, which declares we are perpetually
at war, for eternity.

The fault that enabled 9/11 was the failure to communicate and act on
intelligence which was known, not that secrecy was lacking. The failure
of intelligence leading to the invasion of Iraq was a failure to communicate
the sum of intelligence to Congress – the cherry-picking, slanting of
intelligence – and secrecy involving the balance of that information.

Unless our leaders again trust the people, and seek informed consent,
there can be no government of the people, by the people, and for the people.
We will have deserted our legacy as a result of fear. And, that is a vile insult
to a million Americans who spilled their blood in service to that legacy.

Saving Our Democracy

by Mark Green
01/22/2006


Below is the welcoming address I gave yesterday, January 21, to the "Saving our Democracy" colloquium at Cooper Union's Great Hall. 500 attendees heard me and 24 others throughout the day - John Conyers, Katrina vanden Heuval, Bill Greider, Wade Henderson - speak behind the actual podium that Lincoln used to launch his fateful 1860 presidential campaign:


18 months ago, Demos, the Nation Magazine, People for the American Way and the New Democracy Project together saw the irony of administration and its cheerleaders rhetorically talk about exporting democracy while systematically subverting it at home.

THEN came irrefutable evidence of torture and rendition by our country in our name...then came case after case when religion pushed aside science in health and environmental decisions...then came a 5th tax cut transferring a cool trillion dollars from middle class families to the Paris Hiltons...then came about the biggest congressional scandal in American history showing how Congress Inc. was the real west wing of this white house...then we saw a president systematically, unapologetically and illegally spying on American citizens in violation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act...and this is the same President with the chutzpah to lecture the world that HE would bring his brand of democracy everywhere. Is he kidding?

But when I realized that 42% of Americans believed in satanic possession, I stopped assuming that no one could buy what he was selling and we began organizing "Saving our Democracy" in earnest.

Can we really brag that we are a model of exportable democracy:

*when 1% give more money to candidates than the other 99% -- and have a bigger say,

*when Brazil has an 80% voter turnout and nearly all vote online - while we hit 35% in congressional elections, miscount butterfly ballots and deny hundreds of thousands of black voters their franchise after they've paid their debt to society for crimes,

*when legislatures draw lines that enable 99% of incumbents to win their "elections";

*when tens of thousands of the working poor can no longer afford to go bankrupt or get access to justice;

*when there are 66 lobbyists per member in Washington DC - which helps explain a drug bill that enriches drug companies more than it helps seniors and an energy bill that contains more corporate subsidies than ways to decrease our reliance on foreign oil;

*and when a government lies us into a war that drains us of lives, funds and allies for a real war on terrorism.

You know, if that Korean scientist who DIDN'T clone a live person had to confess to his fabrications and is now shunned - why is Cheney still vice president?

American has always been a brain with two parts -- a left sphere where the voice of democracy is located and a right sphere where the commerce of capitalism is located. Both were needed in a complex balance for our great experiment to prosper. But recently, the right sphere has been subsuming the left, as companies buy not just other companies but congressmen themselves - and the values of the market come to dominate not just the private sector but the public sector as well. Think Tom Paine vs. Robinson Crusoe - we're all in this together vs. we're all in this alone.

But democracy means literally rule by the people - and is grounded in the values of participation, transparency and accountability. It means that decisions are made from the bottom up. But that is exactly what George W. Bush and Dick Cheney and James Dobson and Ken Lay and Jack Abramoff dont believe in.

So where's the media as our democracy is in a long, slow descent? The disappearance of poor Natalie Hallway and the decline of poor Terry Schiavo each got perhaps 100 times the attention of our disappearing and declining democracy.
But the goods news is that, just as its darkest just before the dawn, there are now thousands of activists, advocates and authors who won't let the new autocrats and plutocrats posing as populists steal our democracy.

For we need nothing less than our own pro-democracy movement in America. Recall how in other countries in the late 80s people went from jail to leadership - like a Mandela, a Walensa, a Havel - today in Washington officials are more likely to go instead from leadership to jail.

In an effort to help inspire and flesh out what a pro-democracy movement can look like then, 25 speakers over nine panels will cover such issues as official lawlessness, voter suppression, a Congress for Sale, Religious McCarthyism, and grass roots organizing. They will also discuss the new pro-democracy efforts and ideas that are taking hold, largely out of the sight of the national media. Then Demos, The Nation, People for the American Way and The New Democracy Project will stitch together the best reforms into a Democracy Agenda - a Contract with Democracy, if you will - and send them in a brochure to each of you and others...and then publish a book grounded in these proceedings on August 1.

So if you're tired of phony patriots waving the flag and then violating her principles daily, get ready for authentic patriots embodying our oldest value of self-governance. If content is your nutrition, get ready to gorge.

To conclude, the perils to our democracy are not as great as faced Lincoln when, in 1860 behind this very podium, he faced a rapidly and racially dividing America. But the anti-democracy values of Bush & Co. and the religious far right and big business are challenge enough to us today.

And as Congress appears ready to confirm Sam Alito and Bush argues that illegal spying is legal and he'll ignore a ban on torture if he chooses, let us keep in mind today the spirit of Tom Paine, when he wrote that "There is too much common sense and independence in America to be long the dupe of any fiction, foreign or domestic." And let us keep in mind the sign I actually saw in a store window near our home on 19th street: "Democracy", it said, "is like sex - it works best when you participate."


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mark-green/s...cy_b_14274.html

Alito Filibuster: It Only Takes One

By Robert Parry
January 22, 2006


With the fate of the U.S. Constitution in the balance, it’s hard to believe there’s no senator prepared to filibuster Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito, whose theories on the “unitary executive” could spell the end of the American democratic Republic.

If confirmed, Alito would join at least three other right-wing justices – John Roberts, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas – who believe that George W. Bush should possess near total control of the U.S. government during the ill-defined War on Terror. If Anthony Kennedy, another Republican, joins them, they would wield a majority.

Alito’s theory of the “unitary executive” holds that Bush can cite his “plenary” – or unlimited – powers as Commander in Chief to ignore laws he doesn’t like, spy on citizens without warrants, imprison citizens without charges, authorize torture, order assassinations, and invade other countries at his own discretion.

“Can it be true that any President really has such powers under our Constitution?” asked former Vice President Al Gore in a Jan. 16 speech. “If the answer is ‘yes,’ then under the theory by which these acts are committed, are there any acts that can on their face be prohibited?”

The answer to Gore’s final rhetorical question would seem to be no, there is nothing prohibited to Bush. The “unitary executive” can assert authoritarian – even dictatorial – powers for the indefinite future.

Under this government envisioned by Alito and Bush, Americans would no longer have freedoms based on the Constitution and the law, but on Bush’s tolerance and charity. Americans would, in essence, become Bush’s subjects dependent on his good graces, rather than citizens possessing inalienable rights. He would be a modern-day king.

Resistance

In the face of such an unprecedented power grab, Americans might expect senators from both parties to filibuster Alito and resist Bush’s consolidation of power. But Republicans seem more interested in proving their loyalty to Bush, and Democrats so far are signaling only a token fight for fear of suffering political reprisals.

A meeting of the Democratic caucus on Jan. 18 to discuss Alito drew only about two dozen senators out of a total of 45. The caucus consensus reportedly was to cast a “strategic” – or a symbolic – vote against Alito so they could say “we-told-you-so” when he makes bad rulings in the future. [See NYT, Jan.19, 2006]

But it’s unclear why voters would want to reward Democrats for making only a meaningless gesture against Alito, rather than fighting hard to keep him off the court. An extended battle also would give them a chance to make their case about why they see Alito as a threat to the U.S. Constitution.

A filibuster could give voters time, too, to learn what Alito and Bush have in mind for the country under the theory of the “unitary executive.” If after a tough fight the Democrats lose, they could then say they did their best and the voters would know what was at stake.

Losing, however, might not be the end result. A swing in public opinion is certainly possible if even one senator takes the floor to wage an old-fashioned, “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” filibuster in defense of the most fundamental principles of the American democratic experiment.

A filibuster could touch a public nerve if it concentrates on protecting the Founding Fathers’ framework of checks and balances, the Bill of Rights, and the rule of law – all designed specifically to prevent an abusive Executive from gaining dictatorial powers.

Secondarily, the filibuster could explain to the American people the need for courage in the face of danger, especially at a time when some political leaders are exploiting fear to stampede the public into trading freedom for security.

Rallying the Nation

If an elder statesman, like Robert Byrd, or a younger senator, like Russell Feingold, started speaking with a determination not to leave until Bush withdraws the Alito nomination, the filibuster could be a riveting moment in modern American politics, a last line of defense for the Republic.

In effect, the filibustering senators would be saying that the future of democracy is worth an all-out congressional battle – and that Alito’s theory of a “unitary executive” is an “extraordinary circumstance” deserving of a filibuster.

A filibuster also could force other senators to face up to the threat now emanating from an all-powerful Executive.

Democrats would have to decide if they’re willing to stand up to the pressure that Bush and his many allies would surely bring down on them. Republicans would have to choose between loyalty to the President and to the nation’s founding principles.

For some senators, the choice might define how they are remembered in U.S. history.

Republican John McCain, whose law against torture was approved in December but was essentially eviscerated when Bush pronounced that it would not be binding on him, would have the opportunity to either demand that the torture ban means something or accept Bush’s repudiation of its requirements.

Democrats who think they have the makings of a national leader – the likes of John Kerry, Hillary Clinton and Joseph Biden – could either demonstrate a toughness for meaningful political battles or confirm their reputations for ineffectual gestures.

The American people also would have a chance to rise to the occasion, showing that they are not the frightened sheep as some critics say, but truly care about democracy as a treasured principle of governance, not just a pleasing word of self-congratulations.

An Alito filibuster could be a galvanizing moment for today’s generation like the Army-McCarthy hearings were in the 1950s when red-baiting Sen. Joseph McCarthy finally went too far and was recognized as a dangerous demagogue.

Dangers

On the other hand, there are reasons to suspect that the Senate will recoil from a battle of such constitutional magnitude.

Democratic consultants already are saying that the Senate Democrats should finesse the Alito confirmation – letting it proceed without a big fight – and then focus instead on corruption as an issue with more “traction.”

This advice parallels the party’s strategy in 2002 when Democratic consultants urged congressional leaders to give Bush what he wanted in terms of authority to invade Iraq so the debate could be refocused on the Democrats’ domestic agenda. That approach turned out to be disastrous, both on Election Day and in the Iraq invasion that followed.

Nevertheless, a similar approach was pressed on Democratic presidential nominee Kerry in 2004. The goal was to neutralize the national security issue by citing Kerry’s Vietnam War record and then shifting the campaign to domestic issues.

So, instead of hammering Bush on his recklessness in the Iraq War, Kerry softened his tone in the days before the election, turned to domestic issues, and failed to nail down a clear victory, allowing Bush to slip back in by claiming the pivotal state of Ohio.

The strategists are back to the same thinking now, urging Democratic leaders to withdraw from a battle over Alito and to keep their heads down over what to do in Iraq, so they can supposedly gain some ground on the corruption issue.

There is, however, no guarantee that corruption will trump national security in November 2006 anymore than domestic issues did in 2002 and 2004.

Even if the Democrats do filibuster, they could still botch it by muddying the waters with appeals about abortion rights. A longstanding Democratic Party tendency is to pander to liberal interest groups even when doing so will hurt the overall cause.

As strongly as many people feel about Roe v. Wade, it would detract from what is of even greater importance in the Alito confirmation, that he would help consolidate the precedent of an American strongman Executive with virtually no limits on his powers.

A disciplined filibuster focused on protecting the Constitution and the Bill of Rights would have a chance of attracting traditional conservatives as well as moderates and liberals in a cause larger than any political grouping.

Indeed, the filibuster could be the start of a grand coalition built around what many Americans hold as dear as life itself, the principles of a democratic Republic where no man is above the law, where no man is king.


http://www.consortiumnews.com/2006/012106.html

January 22, 2006

Manufacturing Fear

By Charles Sullivan

The mere mention of the name Osama bin Laden, so conspicuously absent from the news in recent years, is enough to make one’s blood curdle, and the hair on the back of one’s neck stand up. Images of flaming buildings consumed by billowing black smoke come vividly to mind. One recalls the stench of death hanging ominously in the air, as horrified victims flee for their lives amid the rubble of fallen skyscrapers. Now the ashen gray ghost of Osama bin Laden once again hangs over the nation like a specter, casting a dark pall of fear and death. Duct tape sales must be soaring.

The relationship between Osama bin Laden and George Bush is an interesting one. Never mind what you see in the commercial media, they are inseparable allies who feed off each other. Bush benefits from the presence of bin Laden whenever events become too overwhelming for him. In the climate of moral degeneracy that is so rampant in the Bush cabal, bin Laden can easily be trotted out onto the stage and presented as an imminent threat to America. Bush gets to play the role of the great protector, the war president, commander-in-chief, that he so obviously relishes. The benefit to bin Laden is that his puny power is impressively amplified on the world stage.

The images of terror generated by the commercial media during the attacks of 9-11 are stamped indelibly on our collective memory. Those events were purportedly masterminded by Osama bin Laden and nineteen terrorists armed with nothing more than box cutters. We are supposed to believe that a group of cave dwelling fanatics were responsible for bringing the US to its figurative knees. If that is in fact what happened we are in deep trouble.

Those terrible events were supposedly investigated by an independent bipartisan committee, the 9-11commission. The rather bizarre conclusions about them simply do not fit the evidence. Believing the official story requires that tons of physical matter behave in ways that defy the laws of physics. It also requires that we ignore any and all contradictory evidence, of which there is plenty.

The issue is too complex to treat in a short essay of this scope, so I will refer my readers to the extensive body of evidence that exists in Michael Ruppert’s book ‘Crossing the Rubicon’ and at the Oil Empire web site. There are many other sources out there. Do the research and draw your own conclusions.

This brings us full circle back to Osama bin Laden, to the Bush cabal of fascists who are seeking to secure the world’s remaining oil reserves; and to the latest perceived threats from Al-Qaeda.

Amid stories that Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda are planning new attacks on civilian targets in the US, it is important to remember one very important fact: The government is lying. They lie continuously. Their record speaks for itself. Mired in corruption, the empire is falling apart and the Bush cabal is in a panic. The situation is spiraling out of control. The White House needs to create some catastrophic event to hold onto power. Clouds of impeachment are gathering on the horizon, as the people slowly begin to awaken from long years of apathetic stupor. Once again the Bush cabal is manufacturing a threat to frighten the people into submission to the emperor and his minions. We would be fools to fall for it.

The chief architects of the Bush cabal responsible for the war on Iraq are the same ones who wrecked terror upon defenseless civilians in South America during the 1980s during the Reagan era. Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and John Negroponte are among the most prominent names involved. Rumsfeld was Reagan’s special representative to the Middle East in those days. Some may recall the 1983 photograph that depicts Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam Hussein—another CIA creation.

According to Noam Chomsky, in Nicaragua alone, the US killed in excess of two million defenseless people with the aid of CIA sponsored death squads; a total that exceeds the per capita sum of American soldiers killed in all the wars America has ever fought. Their purpose was to suppress progressive movements in the Southern Hemisphere, to assassinate labor organizers, and indigenous leaders; to prevent the rise to power of leaders who favor people above profits. The US has a long and bloody history of suppressing populist movements wherever they occur. Perhaps they bear too much resemblance to Democracy—so they have to be destroyed. Reagan and his minions labeled them communist threats because that is what sells among the gullible American people.

Consider also the enormous resources that have been marshaled against Fidel Castro in Cuba for decades; and now especially Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. The people responsible have dark histories that are going unwritten and unreported in the annals of history. The CIA also played a key role in these horrendous events—and it continues to this day.

My point is that we are wasting both time and resources chasing down ghosts while the real terrorists continue to operate safely out of sight. Like Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden is the smoke screen behind which the real terrorists operate. We must be wise enough to see beyond the mists of illusion that have been created to deceive us. We must be prepared to look in some dark places and to be shocked by the truth we find.

Recently declassified CIA documents such as Project Northwoods, whether actually carried out or not, reveal the willingness of the CIA to murder American civilians for the purposes of empire. I urge readers to do a Google search and read these documents for themselves.

I realize that decent people do not want to believe that their own government is capable of such horrific acts of terror against the world, yet alone its own citizens. They assume that we are dealing with conscientious human beings like themselves; people with values similar to our own. But they are not like us; and they are not whom they purport to be. A deep understanding of US history reveals that nothing about America is what it seems. Behind the words recorded in our history books there are hidden histories that must be brought into the light for all to see. Only when this is accomplished will we know who is really running the government and committing acts of terror against innocent people everywhere.

There is considerable evidence that implicates the CIA, the FBI, as well as secret police forces in the murders of John F. Kennedy, Malcolm X, Dr. Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy, among others. Malcolm X and Dr. King were silenced by an assassins’ bullet when they were on the threshold of changing the nation’s power structure. It is a familiar story. Whenever anyone rises to threaten the status quo, they are assassinated, and always the work of a lone gunmen. Bogus investigations are created to hide or destroy the evidence. It happened in the case of the above mentioned assassinations; it happened with 9-11; and it will happen again.

Know that whatever the American government has done domestically to put down insurrections against the ruling class, it also carries out on a global scale. Reagan’s unthinkable acts of aggression and terror against the people of Nicaragua are not only connected to the assassinations of Malcolm X and Dr. King—they are connected to the events of 9-11 and the Middle East.

So whenever you hear the president or one of his cabal beating the drums of war, accusing some individual or a nation of terrorism, you can be absolutely certain of one fact. They are themselves guilty of the very same crimes against humanity that are magnitudes of order worse than the accused. The rest of the world knows this because their media is considerably freer than ours’; and the people pay attention.

Whenever the next terrorist attack occurs on American soil, as it inevitably will, some familiar names will be associated with it. Osama bin Laden, or whoever takes the blame, will once again provide cover for the real culprits.





http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_ch...turing_fear.htm

Speaking Out Against Wars of Aggression
Harry Belafonte Reaffirms a Proud Tradition

By WILLIAM LOREN KATZ


"President George W. Bush] lied to the people of this nation, distorted the truth, declared war on a nation who had not attacked us . . . put Americas sons and daughters in harm's way . . . and destroyed the lives of tens of thousands of [Iraqi] women and children who had nothing to do with it. It was an act of terror."



Harry Belafonte, Amsterdam News, January 25, 2006, Page 1, 30

Harry Belafonte did more than speak truth to a President who lied to justify an invasion that has taken the lives of more than 2,000 Americans and tens of thousands of Iraqis. He became part of a proud African American tradition Frederick Douglass started in 1848.

Frederick Douglass excoriated President Polk's administration for "grasping ambition, atrocious aggression, and wholesale murder of an unoffending people" in "a disgraceful, cruel, and iniquitous war," and demanded "the instant recall of U.S. forces from Mexico." President Polk lied to justify a U.S. invasion that seized land stretching from Texas to California for new slave states. "I would not care if tomorrow, I should hear of the death of every man who engaged in that bloody war," said Douglass. (Congressman Abraham Lincoln also reviled Polk for ordering an invasion of an innocent neighbor based on a lie.)

During the Spanish American War of 1898, another conflict based on a lie, anti-lynching crusader War Ida B. Wells urged her people to oppose all overseas actions until Black citizens at home were safe from lynching. Lewis Douglass, Civil War hero and the son of Frederick Douglass, said the McKinley administration's invasion of the Philippines would bring "race hate and cruelty, barbarous lynchings and gross injustice to dark people." A.M.E. Bishop Henry M. Turner not only denounced the occupation but was appalled that 6,000 Black soldiers were sent "to subjugate a people of their own color. I can scarcely keep from saying that I hope the Filipinos wipe such soldiers from the face of the earth."

Black U.S. troops were divided. One soldier charged his country was conducting "a gigantic scheme of robbery and oppression," and another admitted, "These people are right and we are wrong, terribly wrong." Twenty U.S. soldiers, including 12 African Americans, defected to Filipino General Emilio Aguinaldo and his freedom-fighting army.

In 1951 during the Korean War Paul Robeson opposed U.S. helping "a corrupt clique of politicians [in South Korea]." "If we don't stop our armed adventure in Korea today," he warned, "tomorrow it will be Africa." W.E.B. Du Bois saw the war as "the culmination of a wicked and shameful policy . . . which our government has ruthlessly pursued with respect to the colonial people of the world." Government agents harassed Robeson and Du Bois, and the U.S. State Department lifted their passports. Du Bois, who had founded a Peace Information Center to circulate the "Stockholm Peace Petition" demanding a ban on nuclear weapons, was arrested and tried as a foreign agent. After Du Bois won in court, he told a Madison Square Garden Rally "We are peddling freedom to the world . . . and dropping death on those who refuse to use it."

African Americans were a vital part of the massive protests that helped end the Viet Nam War. In 1965 the first organization to denounce the war was the Black-led Freedom Democratic Party of McComb, Mississippi. Stokely Carmichael and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. brought a huge anti-war march to the United Nations where Carmichael led the chant: "Hell no, we won't go." King called the United States "the largest purveyor of violence in the world today" and urged young men to avoid the draft. When world heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali was stripped of his title because he refused to report for military service, he refused to be silent: "No, I am not going ten thousand miles to help murder and kill and burn other people simply to help continue the domination of white slave masters over the dark people of the world."

Harry Belafonte has raised to new heights a proud, patriotic, American and African American tradition--opposition to a President who sacrifices young Americans lives in the course of promoting and justifying wars of aggression




http://www.counterpunch.org/katz01232006.html

Truth is proper
and beautiful
In all times
and in all places

~ Frederick Douglass

The End of 'Unalienable Rights'

By Robert Parry
January 24, 2006



Every American school child is taught that in the United States, people have “unalienable rights,” heralded by the Declaration of Independence and enshrined in the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights. Supposedly, these liberties can’t be taken away, but they are now gone.

Today, Americans have rights only at George W. Bush’s forbearance. Under new legal theories – propounded by Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito and other right-wing jurists – Bush effectively holds all power over all Americans.

He can spy on anyone he wants without a court order; he can throw anyone into jail without due process; he can order torture or other degrading treatment regardless of a new law enacted a month ago; he can launch wars without congressional approval; he can assassinate people whom he deems to be the enemy even if he knows that innocent people, including children, will die, too.

Under the new theories, Bush can act both domestically and internationally. His powers know no bounds and no boundaries.

Bush has made this radical change in the American political system by combining what his legal advisers call the “plenary” – or unlimited – powers of the Commander in Chief with the concept of a “unitary executive” in control of all laws and regulations.

Yet, maybe because Bush’s assertion of power is so extraordinary, almost no one dares connect the dots. After a 230-year run, the “unalienable rights” – as enunciated by Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and the Founding Fathers – are history.

Legal Analysis

The Justice Department spelled out Bush’s latest rationale for his new powers on Jan. 19 in a 42-page legal analysis defending Bush’s right to wiretap Americans without a warrant.

Bush’s lawyers said the congressional authorization to use force against the perpetrators of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks “places the President at the zenith of his powers” and lets him use that authority domestically as well as overseas. [NYT, Jan. 20, 2006]

According to the analysis, the “zenith of his powers” allows Bush to override both the requirements of the Fourth Amendment, which protects against searches and seizures without court orders, and the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which created a special secret court to approve spying warrants inside the United States.

In its legal analysis, the Justice Department added, “The president has made clear that he will exercise all authority available to him, consistent with the Constitution, to protect the people of the United States.”

While the phrase “consistent with the Constitution” sounds reassuring to many Americans, what it means in this case is that Bush believes he has unlimited powers as Commander in Chief to do whatever he deems necessary in the War on Terror.

Since the War on Terror is a vague concept – unlike other wars the United States has fought – there also is no expectation that Bush’s usurpation of traditional American freedoms is just a short-term necessity. Instead it is a framework for future governance.

For a time, some Americans also may have thought that Bush’s commander-in-chief powers applied only to foreigners linked to al-Qaeda and to the occasional American who collaborated with the terrorist group. So they didn’t mind much when Jose Padilla was arrested in Chicago and locked up without charge as an “enemy combatant.”

That indefinite detention might have violated the constitutional principle of habeas corpus – the requirement that every citizen has a right to due process and a fair trial – but many Americans were swayed when Bush called Padilla a “bad guy” who was getting what he deserved.

Now, Americans have learned that Bush considers his powers to extend to a much broader category of citizens. That is the significance of Bush’s warrantless wiretapping program directed against hundreds of American targets at any one time.

In bypassing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, Bush demonstrated his belief, too, that he has the power to ignore specific laws as well as broader constitutional principles.

Lies and Lies

Another factor complicating the ability of Americans to understand the emerging constitutional crisis is that Bush has shown a readiness to lie about the cases.

For instance, though he secretly approved the wiretap program in 2002, he kept telling the public that wiretaps could only be done with court warrants. In a speech in Buffalo, N.Y., on April 20, 2004, Bush went out of his way to state that he had not abrogated the rights of American citizens under the Fourth Amendment.

“By the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires – a wiretap requires a court order,” Bush said. “Nothing has changed, by the way. When we’re talking about chasing down terrorists, we’re talking about getting a court order before we do so.”

After the warrantless wiretaps became public in December 2005, Bush continued to misrepresent the program, calling it “limited” to “taking known al-Qaeda numbers – numbers from known al-Qaeda people – and just trying to find out why the phone calls are being made.”

In his folksy style, he told an audience in Louisville, Kentucky, on Jan. 11 that “it seems like to me that if somebody is talking to al-Qaeda, we want to know why.”

But Bush’s reassuring tale wasn’t true. The program that Bush described could easily be accomplished under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act using a provision that lets the government wiretap for 72 hours before going to the special court for a warrant.

The reality is that Bush has authorized the National Security Agency to scoop up a vast number of calls and e-mails. The operation is so large that it has generated thousands of tips each month, which are passed on to the FBI.

“But virtually all of [the tips], current and former officials say, led to dead ends or innocent Americans,” the New York Times reported. “FBI officials repeatedly complained to the spy agency that the unfiltered information was swamping investigators. … Some FBI officials and prosecutors also thought the checks, which sometimes involved interviews by agents, were pointless intrusions on Americans’ privacy.” [NYT, Jan. 17, 2006]

Another example of Bush’s assertion of his supremacy over laws enacted by Congress came in December 2005 when he signed Sen. John McCain’s amendment barring cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of detainees in U.S. custody.

Bush then issued a so-called “signing statement” that reserved his right to ignore the law.

“The Executive Branch shall construe [the torture ban] in a manner consistent with the constitutional authority of the President to supervise the unitary Executive Branch and as Commander in Chief and consistent with the constitutional limitations on the judicial power,” the signing statement read.

In other words, since Bush considers his commander-in-chief authority boundless, he can waive the torture ban whenever he wants, making it virtually meaningless.

The Bush/Laden Symbiosis

But just as public skepticism about Bush’s exercise of authority was approaching critical mass, Osama bin-Laden resurfaced on Jan. 19 in a new audiotape sent to al-Jazeera TV, ending more than a year of silence.

The voice on the tape – identified as that of bin-Laden both by al-Jazeera and the CIA – predicted America’s defeats in Afghanistan and Iraq while warning of new attacks inside the United States.

“Operations are under preparation, and you will see them on your own ground once they are finished,” said bin-Laden, according to a transcript of the tape.

So, Bush can now cite this new threat from al-Qaeda as well as the bloody conflict in Iraq as justifications for continuing to consolidate his powers as the “unitary executive.”

The latest bin-Laden audiotape also continues a long – and curious – symbiotic relationship between the Bush family and the bin-Ladens, dating back to Bush’s days as a young businessman.

In 1979, Bush’s friend James Bath was the sole U.S. business representative for Salem bin-Laden, scion of the wealthy Saudi bin-Laden family and Osama’s half-brother. While fronting for Salem bin-Laden, Bath helped bankroll Bush’s first company, Arbusto Energy, by investing $50,000 for a five percent stake.

In the 1980s, Osama bin-Laden established himself as an Islamic fighter by battling side-by-side with Afghan rebels whose guerrilla war against the Soviet Army and its surrogates was staunchly supported by George H.W. Bush, first as vice president and then as president.

By the late 1990s, bin-Laden had become recognized as a major terrorist threat against the United States. Still, when the CIA warned George W. Bush on Aug. 6, 2001, that bin-Laden was determined “to strike in U.S.,” Bush went fishing and continued a month-long vacation, failing to rally the government to examine available clues and tighten security.

A little more than a month later, on Sept. 11, 2001, when hijacked planes crashed into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon, the senior George Bush and members of the bin-Laden family were participating in a Carlyle Group investment meeting in Washington.

In the days that followed, as George W. Bush’s Justice Department rounded up hundreds of Arab cab drivers and other Muslims on minor visa violations, the bin-Ladens were spirited out of the United States after only cursory questioning. [For details, see Craig Unger’s House of Bush, House of Saud.]

Ironically, too, Bush’s accumulation of power since the Sept. 11 attacks has gone hand-in-hand with his failures connected to Osama bin-Laden. For instance, if Bush had finished off al-Qaeda’s leaders in Afghanistan in late 2001 and early 2002, he would have a weaker foundation for his new authority now.

By letting bin-Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders escape when they apparently were cornered in the mountains of Tora Bora, Bush kept alive a plausible scenario for additional al-Qaeda attacks inside the United States and thus the justification for his unrestrained powers as Commander in Chief.

The escape from the Americans in Afghanistan helped bin-Laden, too. He emerged as a folk hero to many Islamists.

By invading Iraq in 2003, Bush breathed more life into his presidential powers. But another winner was bin-Laden, who exploited Islamic resentment about the Iraq War to recruit new terrorist cadre and train them in direct conflict with American soldiers.

Just as Bush’s boasts about getting bin-Laden “dead or alive” boosted the Saudi’s standing with radical jihadists, bin-Laden’s public hostility to Bush has helped the president’s standing with the American people at key junctures.

In fall 2004, when Bush was locked in a tight race with Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry, bin-Laden released a videotape that conservative pundits billed as Osama’s endorsement of Kerry, a development that predictably helped Bush gain ground in the campaign’s closing days.

Now, as Bush faces increased U.S. public skepticism about the Iraq War and his accretion of powers, bin-Laden shows up again with a statement that calls on the United States to admit defeat in Iraq and threatens new terror attacks on U.S. soil.

Not surprisingly, the reaction of many Americans to the bin-Laden tape is to harden their commitment to keep U.S. troops in Iraq – the outcome that both bin-Laden and Bush favor, albeit for different reasons.

Bin-Laden’s warning of a new terrorist assault also stokes the fears of Americans who are likely to react by giving Bush greater leeway in the War on Terror.

A day after bin-Laden’s audiotape was aired, Bush’s chief political adviser Karl Rove signaled that the Republicans would again try to ride the War on Terror to another round of victories in November 2006.

“Republicans have a post-9/11 worldview and many Democrats have a pre-9/11 worldview,” Rove told a Republican National Committee meeting on Jan. 20. “That doesn’t make them unpatriotic – not at all. But it does make them wrong – deeply and profoundly and consistently wrong.” [Washington Post, Jan. 21, 2006]

Like the symbiotic relationship that exists when birds feed off ticks burrowed into the hides of rhinos, the Bush/Laden symbiosis may be entirely unspoken and even unintentional. But there can be little doubt that Bush has raised bin-Laden’s stature among radical Islamists while bin-Laden has helped Bush consolidate his authoritarian powers inside the United States.

Today’s Challenge

But the crucial question now is whether the American political system will acquiesce to Bush’s historic power grab – or resist it.

So far, the major U.S. news media and leading Democrats have closed their eyes to the totality of Bush’s claims to unprecedented Executive power. Senate Democrats have even shied away from threatening to filibuster Bush’s Supreme Court nomination of Samuel Alito, one of the legal architects of the Imperial Presidency.

One of the few political leaders who has sounded the alarm is former Vice President Al Gore, who addressed the issue in a speech on Jan. 16, the holiday honoring Martin Luther King Jr.

“An Executive who arrogates to himself the power to ignore the legitimate legislative directives of the Congress or to act free of the check of the judiciary becomes the central threat that the Founders sought to nullify in the Constitution – an all-powerful Executive too reminiscent of the King from whom they had broken free,” Gore said.

“As the Executive acts outside its constitutionally prescribed role and is able to control access to information that would expose its actions, it becomes increasingly difficult for the other branches to police it. Once that ability is lost, democracy itself is threatened and we become a government of men and not laws.”

Except for Gore, however, few national leaders or news commentators have dared to draw clear conclusions about Bush’s authoritarian tendencies.

No one, it seems, wants to give up on the most memorable passage of the Declaration of Independence, that “we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.”

Today, however, these truths are no longer “self-evident,” nor are the rights “unalienable.” They depend on the beneficence and generosity of George W. Bush.

Despite his assertion of unlimited power, Bush surely will not interfere in the lives of most Americans; just the small number who somehow get in his way. Most Americans probably won’t even notice their altered status, from citizens to subjects.



http://www.consortiumnews.com/2006/012406.html

Alito a Threat to Our Fundamental Rights'

By Senator Patrick Leahy
t r u t h o u t | Statement

Tuesday 24 January 2006



This nomination raises the fundamental question whether the Senate will serve its constitutional role as a check on the President by preserving the Supreme Court as a constitutional check on the expansion of presidential power. Today I urge Senators and, in particular, Republican Senators, to approach this discussion with open ears and open minds.

This is a nomination that I fear threatens the fundamental rights and liberties of all Americans now and for generations to come. This President is in the midst of a radical realignment of the powers of the government and its intrusiveness into the private lives of Americans. This nomination is part of that plan. I am concerned that if confirmed this nominee will further erode the checks and balances that have protected our constitutional rights for more than 200 years. This is a critical nomination, one that can tip the balance on the Supreme Court radically away from constitutional checks and balances and the protection of Americans' fundamental rights.

This past week I introduced a resolution to clarify what we all know, that congressional authorization for the use of military force against Osama bin Laden did not authorize warrantless spying on Americans as the Bush Administration is now claiming. I thought, we all thought, that when we joined in the bipartisan authorization of military action against Osama bin Laden more than four years ago, that action would have been more effective and have succeeded by now in ridding the world of that terrorist leader. I still hope that the clarifying resolution I introduced last week will become a bipartisan statement upholding the rights of all Americans.

As Justice O'Connor underscored recently, even war "is not a blank check for the President when it comes to the rights of the Nation's citizens." Now that the illegal spying of Americans has become public and the President has acknowledged the four-year-old program, the Bush Administration's lawyers are contending that Congress authorized it. The September 2001 Authorization to Use Military Force did no such thing. Republican Senators know it, and a few have said so publicly. We all know it. The liberties and rights that define us as Americans and the system of checks and balances that serve to preserve them should not be sacrificed to threats of terrorism or to the expanding power of the Government.

In the days immediately following those attacks, I said, and I continue to believe, that the terrorists win if they frighten us into sacrificing our freedoms and what defines us as Americans.

I joined with others, Republican and Democrats, and we engaged in round-the-clock efforts over the next months in connection with what came to be the USA PATRIOT Act. During those days the Bush Administration never asked us for to amend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to accommodate the spying on Americans they were already undertaking contrary to law. That law does contain an express reservation for the 15 days following a declaration of war by the Congress. But neither when Attorney General Ashcroft demanded that we pass his so-called Anti-Terrorism Act proposal that he presented us on September 19 or at any time in September 2001 or thereafter has the Bush Administration sought congressional authorization for the NSA spying program that affects Americans. Indeed, Attorney General Gonzales admitted at a recent press conference that the Bush Administration did not seek to legal authorization of the NSA spying program on Americans because "it was not something we could likely get." Consider that damning admission. It is utterly inconsistent with the Bush Administration's current argument that Congress authorized warrantless spying on Americans.

The Bush Administration's after-the-fact claims about the breadth of the Authorization to Use Military Force are the latest in a long line of manipulations and another affront to the rule of law, American values and traditions. We have also seen this type of overreaching in that same Justice Department office's twisted interpretation of the torture statute; with the detention of suspects without charges and denial of access to counsel; and with the misapplication of the material witness statute as a sort of general preventive detention law. Such abuses serve to harm our national security as well as our civil liberties. By way of illustration, sources at the FBI reportedly say that much of what was forwarded to them to investigate from the NSA spying program was worthless and led to dead ends. That is a dangerous diversion of our investigative resources away from those who pose real threats, while precious time and effort is devoted to looking into the lives of law-abiding Americans.

Throughout the Alito hearing, from my opening statement on Monday afternoon, to my first questions on Tuesday morning, to my last written question, which received a response last Friday, I asked Judge Alito about these matters. I am not reassured.

The Need for an Effective Check on Unfettered Presidential Power

A central question during the hearings on this nomination was whether Judge Alito would serve as an effective constitutional check on the presidency. We have a President prone to unilateralism and assertions of Executive power that extend all the way to illegal spying on Americans.

Preventing government intrusion into the personal privacy and freedoms of Americans is one of the hallmarks of the Supreme Court. There is no assurance that Judge Alito will serve as an effective check and balance on government intrusion into the lives of Americans. Indeed, his record suggests otherwise.

We know that Samuel Alito sought to justify absolute immunity for President Nixon's Attorney General John Mitchell from lawsuits for wiretapping Americans, among other violations of their privacy. That is immunity even if the Attorney General acted willfully to violate their rights.

We know that as a judge, Samuel Alito was willing to go further than even Michael Chertoff, the former head of the Ashcroft Justice Department's Criminal Division, a former U.S. Attorney, and the current Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, in excusing government agents for searches not authorized by judicial warrants. We know Judge Alito would have excused the strip search of a 10-year-old girl that was not expressly authorized by the search warrant.

We know he was part of the effort within the Meese Justice Department to expand the use of presidential signing statements to increase the president's role is construing what a law passed by Congress means. That is the practice that the Bush Administration has taken to new heights. This President does not veto laws with which he disagrees as contemplated by the Constitution. Instead, he signs them and then picks and chooses what he will faithfully enforce. Often the Bush Administration makes a unilateral statement declaring what it will not follow or how it will choose to construe the measure. In these signing statements, the President is reported to have relied upon the theory of the "Unitary Executive" more than 100 times.

This is not just theory, it has practical effects on Americans' lives and liberties. We saw it recently in the President's signing statement on Congress's declaration against torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of detainees. After months of obstruction and delay by the Bush Administration, Congress passed a bill last month containing a provision against torture known as the McCain Amendment, which Senator Durbin and I cosponsored. The McCain Amendment was passed overwhelmingly by large bipartisan majorities in the Senate and the House after being stalled for months by this Administration. Vice President Cheney lobbied against it. The Administration tried to create a loophole in the law to get out of following it. When Congress said no, the President had a widely-publicized meeting with Senator McCain at the White House to announce that they had worked it out and that President Bush now agreed to the prohibition against torture.

Shortly after that meeting with Senator McCain, after Congress had enacted the measure and the President had signed it into law, the President released a signing statement proclaiming that his Administration would construe the law "in a manner consistent with the constitutional authority of the President to supervise the unitary Executive branch." Many of us, Republicans and Democrats, are concerned that the President is still trying to have it both ways. He is apparently signally that he thinks that he can choose to disregard the law, at his discretion, based on his own self-serving view of his powers.

A Deferential Nominee At a Pivotal Point in History

In this blessed land, with the constitutional legacy that has been entrusted to us through the blood, sweat and tears of earlier generations of Americans, we must not yield to the temptation to sacrifice our liberties and our way of life. If we do, the terrorists win. Benjamin Franklin warned against such a choice when he observed: "Those who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security." With enough effort and foresight, we can and we should demand both.

I chaired the Judiciary Committee after the 9/11 attacks, and in working with the White House and with congressional partners in crafting the USA PATRIOT Act, I pushed hard to add a variety of checks and balances, such as judicial review and sunsets, to many of its provisions. The Bush Administration resisted those additions at the time, but today they brag about them as if they were their own.

This President has made some of the most expansive claims of power since American patriots fought the war of independence to rid themselves of the oppressive rule of King George III. This President is claiming power to illegally spy on Americans, to allow actions that violate our values and laws protecting human rights, and to detain U.S. citizens and others on his say so, without judicial review or due process. This is a time in our history when the protections of Americans' liberties are at risk, as are the very checks and balances that have served to constrain abuses of power for more than two centuries.

The Supreme Court is the ultimate check and balance in our system. The independence of the Court and its members is crucial to our democracy and way of life. The Senate should never be allowed to become a rubber stamp, and neither should the Supreme Court. I asked Judge Alito to demonstrate his independence from the interests of the President, and he failed that test.

A President's Choice

We know Judge Alito took time from his busy schedule and docket to attend a Federalist Society convention in Washington just days after the presidential election in 2000 to discuss his adherence to the theory of the "Unitary Executive" and criticized the Supreme Court for upholding the constitutionality of the independent counsel statute. He went so far as to call the "Unitary Executive" "gospel" and to say that in his view it "best captures the meaning of the Constitution's text and structure."

That audition before the Federalist Society appeared to work, reminding those advising the new President that they had a known quantity in Samuel Alito. It led to a White House interview in connection with a possible future Supreme Court vacancy shortly thereafter in 2001. Judge Alito had other meetings and interviews but the key one took place in May 2005 with Vice President Cheney, Scooter Libby, Karl Rove and others at the White House. It was months before Justice O'Connor made her announcement to retire - that came in July. But in May, Judge Alito was called to a meeting with this Administration's key political strategists.

I suspect that the answer to the question Judge Alito posed at the hearing regarding how he got the nomination can be answered in large measure with regard to his demonstrated deference to government power, his adherence to the "Unitary Executive," his rulings in favor of government intrusions, and whatever he said in his job interviews at the White House that convinced those advising this President that he will be a reliable vote against challenges to presidential power.

No President should be allowed to pack the courts, and especially the Supreme Court, with nominees selected to enshrine presidential claims of government power. Our system was designed to ensure a balance and to protect against overreaching by any branch. The Senate should not be a rubber stamp to this President's effort to move the law dramatically to the right and to give him unfettered leeway. I will not lend my support to an effort by this President to move the Supreme Court and the law radically to the right and to remove the final check within our democracy.

I voted for President Reagan's nomination of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, for President Reagan's nomination of Justice Anthony Kennedy, for President Bush's nomination of Justice Souter, and for this President's recent nomination of Chief Justice Roberts. I cannot vote for this nomination.

At a time when the President is seizing unprecedented power, the Supreme Court needs to act as a check and to provide balance. Based on the hearing and his record, I have no confidence that Judge Alito would provide that check and balance. I will vote against granting the Senate granting its consent to this nomination by this President.



http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/012406Y.shtml

The End of Democracy: Part II

by Martin Garbus

01/24/2006


In 1959, in Baker v. Carr, the Supreme Court said it was a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause to make one person's vote count less than another's. It was an attack on racist legislatures and entrenched powers who suppressed minority rights. Baker v. Carr has withstood challenge for 45 years.

Conservatives, including Roberts, Alito, Thomas, Scalia (and Bork) are against its principle.

One man/one vote, more than any other Supreme Court case, dramatically changed the political landscape -- it enfranchised blacks, it stopped gerrymandering in a number of cases -- it tried to create equal votes for rural and urban voters.

Samuel Alito said in a 1985 memo he is against the principle of one man/one vote, against the most important principle of this democracy. He and Roberts agree with the dissenters in Baker v. Carr.

The minority of the Baker Court did not want to take the Baker case, saying the legislature, not the courts, were responsible for deciding apportionment cases. The Baker minority, said that under our Constitution, there is not a judicial rememdy for every political mischief, for every wrongful exercise of legislative powers.

The arcane language of the law keeps the general public (and the Senators, it seems) from seeing the past, present and future clearly. The Conservative court can roll back the law based on the question of whether a case is justiciable -- does this case present of the kind of controversy that the Court has the power to adjudicate or does the Constitution require federal courts to leave the decision of "political questions" such as apportionment to the political process.

The Court, by narrowing its docket, as the Rehnquist Court did, refused to review blatant gerrymandering cases. Since 1959, legislatures have carved up electoral districts to give themselves safe seats. The Rehnquist Court, without overruling Baker, allowed those decisions to stand.

The Roberts Court will probably not reverse Baker on the one man/one vote concept, but certainly will, on a variety of procedural grounds, end what the Rehnquist Court started -- sending Baker "to the dustbin of history."




http://www.huffingtonpost.com/martin-garbu...ar_b_14369.html

January 25, 2006

Fascism Doesn’t Always Roar...

...Sometimes, It Creeps on Cat’s Feet


By Mark S. Tucker


Lexicographers to the side, a word can, in certain instances, be best defined by its most ardent supporters. Catholics are not the wise choice in consulting a description of zen, History teachers are ill-equipped to define the vocabulary of quantum physicists, and one would not repair to the hut of a palm reader for technical terms in the building of 747s, so to whom might we go for a reliable working understanding of ‘fascism’? Why, to a fascist, of course! And who better than Il Duce Benito Mussolini, a figure who once extolled it as the marriage of corporations and the State. One of the most faithful of its practitioners, we can trust this gentleman’s insight, I think, seeing as how he yet stands as a reliable yardstick, heels kicking in the air though they may have for his pains.

The definition itself, though, reveals the insanity of the condition a little more lucidly when one understands the idea of ‘corporation’, a word drawn from the latin ‘corpore’, meaning ‘body’. ‘Corpore’, in latin, referred to an actual, physically verifiable, biological unit, and perhaps a non-biological one, but certainly to a tangible form in nature. Simple, yes? Well, no. Somewhere along the way, in the land that mothered us - and got bit for her pains - some lawyerly weasel decided that a ‘corpore’ could also be entirely fictional...yet...still be a “body”! This was done in service to business and intended to provide a way to shed liability, which it did quite nicely, once the insane concept was forced down the throats of the British.

Here in America, Jefferson and any number of lawyers and others decried the practice, so the idea of creating invisible “bodies” was verboten. How, then, did it come to be the business standard in America? Through law, right? Right? Ahhh, so glad you asked.

Actually, a corporation has always been competely illegal in America, as Prof. Morton J. Horowitz clearly and irrefutably showed in his landmark The Transformation of American Law, 1870 - 1960: The Crisis of Legal Orthodoxy, in the chapter “Santa Clara Revisited: The Development of Corporate Theory”. That section inspects the Santa Clara V. Southern Pacific Railroad (118 U.S. 394 [1886]) case, in which, completely irrelevant to the question before the court, the sentiment was rendered that “[t]he court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of opinion that it does.”

As the good professor points out, there was no precedent in law to support any part of that statement, nor was counsel for either side allowed to comment on it. It was, speaking of that which the conservative (read: business) element in the society decries: an outrageously egregious example of legislation from the bench. Mostly, nowadays, this stand-out bizarre occurrence is assiduously avoided, but one will occasionally catch a gaggle of esquired monkeys battling over how many angels can fit on the head of the period closing it. How appropriate. A point of law that would never have withstood populist inspection, probably not even broad legal community scrutiny, became standing law through the witting sabotage of a set of justices colluding to birth it. After all, the opinion reads “we are all”, not “some of us” or even “a 5-to-4 decision”.

So, should you wish to take the opposite stance, you mean to tell me that a group of uberlawyers, what has been called “nine scorpions in a bottle”, well past law school, into a long career of diverse cases, did not know to quote law when stating that the law says “such and such”? All those averring in the affirmative, please address me through the e-address below; I have a bridge I think you’re going to like.

In case you didn't catch it, that sentiment, for it was not an opinion, in Santa Clara was an act of fascism. The business community, represented by the railroads here, persuaded justices to fiat something strange that never became law. It also managed to keep them shut afterwards somehow. Prof. Horowitz goes so far as to say this was not even unusual but represented a disturbing growing trend in American jurisprudence: (I’ll say it, so he won’t have to have words shoved in his mouth that he might not want to elucidate so plainly) law and its minions as servants of business. Nice. Yet, there it was, and I’m willing to bet that some have tried to bring a question on it to the Court and the Court has chosen not to entertain it, as is it’s ill-gotten right. Maybe not, but what are the odds? Hence, some weasel, or some outfit of weasels, slipped a little bomb into the public register, and the interested parties thereafter went nuts. Sound like something we’re looking at right now?

Governo-corporate toad-eater Samuel Alito has invented a theory of, now get this, “unitary executive”, a more meaningless phrase as could never be concocted, and is trying to pull another Santa Clara on the public. The irony is that if he is admitted to the Supreme Court, he’ll be his own facilitator and abettor!. Neat trick, Sammy. This will not to be, as you may infer, a one-time farrago, as Santa Clara was, but now stands as a signal of subservience to the ruling class, a bid to join the nobles as a useful courtier.

Look at Alito. Another Il Duce? Hardly. He’s a poster boy for the Christian Far Right, an Ivory Soap Miltowner with a Pepsodent smile, a faceless body in the multitude, the better to escape suspicion as much as is humanly possible. Ever wonder why so many commercials feature kindly mothers, soft-spoken well-intentioned grandfathers, and burblingly cute little kids trying to sell you on some damn commodity you’re going to regret buying? It’s for the same reason we’re now seeing geeks dominate the political scene. They’re playing on your psychological paradigms. You’re already a bit too wary of roughnecks like Uncle Joe Stalin and and Benny Mussolini, so you’re getting, instead, gents you’d never suspect otherwise.

“Unitary executive” is indeed another “corporation” Santa Clara ploy, but with a far deadlier effect. It’s well camouflaged, carefully kept from inspection, and intended to be a flashpoint “fact” that will herald the sort of legislatve nightmare Prof. Horowitz would never have imagined. It will be, as the idiotic phrase itself clearly intimates, the ingress by which dictatorship finally gains a firm and irremovable foot in the threshold of the country.

So, don’t look to wild-eyed Gadaffis, bearded Husseins, or flaming-faced bin Ladens for fascism in America; those are CIA creations and that’s not how it will come. Look for the well-scrubbed, kissy-faced, prayerful hands class president for our own proud mutation of the hoary tradition. We do nothing quite like anyone else and this will be no exception. The new facilitator will beam and quote scripture as he reveals his horns and tail. The Repuglicans will rejoiceth in his presence, yea, even while the Dimocrats bow and scrape, begging for a crust of the royal bread...and thus fascism will have decended upon America, not roaring and fierce, not raking the air with bloody claws, not squalling and preening, but softly, quietly, unnoticed, on cat’s feet.




http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_ma...sn_92t_alwa.htm

President Jonah


by GORE VIDAL

[posted online on January 25, 2006]


While contemplating the ill-starred presidency of G.W. Bush, I looked about for some sort of divine analogy. As usual, when in need of enlightenment, I fell upon the Holy Bible, authorized King James version of 1611; turning by chance to the Book of Jonah, I read that Jonah, who, like Bush, chats with God, had suffered a falling-out with the Almighty and thus became a jinx dogged by luck so bad that a cruise liner, thanks to his presence aboard, was about to sink in a storm at sea. Once the crew had determined that Jonah, a passenger, was the jinx, they threw him overboard and--Lo!--the storm abated. The three days and nights he subsequently spent in the belly of a nauseous whale must have seemed like a serious jinx to the digestion-challenged whale, who extruded him much as the decent opinion of mankind has done to Bush.

Originally, God wanted Jonah to give hell to Nineveh, whose people, God noted disdainfully, "cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand," so like the people of Baghdad who cannot fathom what democracy has to do with their destruction by the Cheney-Bush cabal. But the analogy becomes eerily precise when it comes to the hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico at a time when a President is not only incompetent but plainly jinxed by whatever faith he cringes before. Witness the ongoing screw-up of prescription drugs. Who knows what other disasters are in store for us thanks to the curse he is under? As the sailors fed the original Jonah to a whale, thus lifting the storm that was about to drown them, perhaps we the people can persuade President Jonah to retire to his other Eden in Crawford, Texas, taking his jinx with him. We deserve a rest. Plainly, so does he. Look at Nixon's radiant features after his resignation! One can see former President Jonah in his sumptuous library happily catering to faith-based fans with animated scriptures rooted in The Simpsons.

Not since the glory days of Watergate and Nixon's Luciferian fall has there been so much written about the dogged deceits and creative criminalities of our rulers. We have also come to a point in this dark age where there is not only no hero in view but no alternative road unblocked. We are trapped terribly in a now that few foresaw and even fewer can define, despite a swarm of books and pamphlets like the vast cloud of locusts that dined on China in that 1930s movie The Good Earth.

I have read many of these descriptions of our fallen estate, looking for one that best describes in plain English how we got to this now and where we appear to be headed once our Good Earth has been consumed and only Rapture is left to whisk aloft the Faithful. Meanwhile, the rest of us can learn quite a lot from Dark Ages America: The Final Phase of Empire, by Morris Berman, a professor of sociology at the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC.

I must confess that I have a proprietary interest in anyone who refers to the United States as an empire, since I am credited with first putting forward this heretical view in the early 1970s. In fact, so disgusted with me was a book reviewer at Time magazine that as proof of my madness he wrote: "He actually refers to the United States as an empire!" It should be noted that at about the same time Henry Luce, proprietor of Time, was booming on and on about "The American Century." What a difference a word makes!

Berman sets his scene briskly in recent history. "We were already in our twilight phase when Ronald Reagan, with all the insight of an ostrich, declared it to be 'morning in America'; twenty-odd years later, under the 'boy emperor' George W. Bush (as Chalmers Johnson refers to him), we have entered the Dark Ages in earnest, pursuing a short-sighted path that can only accelerate our decline. For what we are now seeing are the obvious characteristics of the West after the fall of Rome: the triumph of religion over reason; the atrophy of education and critical thinking; the integration of religion, the state, and the apparatus of torture--a troika that was for Voltaire the central horror of the pre-Enlightenment world; and the political and economic marginalization of our culture.... The British historian Charles Freeman published an extended discussion of the transition that took place during the late Roman empire, the title of which could serve as a capsule summary of our current president: The Closing of the Western Mind. Mr. Bush, God knows, is no Augustine; but Freeman points to the latter as the epitome of a more general process that was underway in the fourth century: namely, 'the gradual subjection of reason to faith and authority.' This is what we are seeing today, and it is a process that no society can undergo and still remain free. Yet it is a process of which administration officials, along with much of the American population, are aggressively proud." In fact, close observers of this odd presidency note that Bush, like his evangelical base, believes he is on a mission from God and that faith trumps empirical evidence. Berman quotes a senior White House adviser who disdains what he calls the "reality-based" community, to which Berman sensibly responds: "If a nation is unable to perceive reality correctly, and persists in operating on the basis of faith-based delusions, its ability to hold its own in the world is pretty much foreclosed."

Berman does a brief tour of the American horizon, revealing a cultural Death Valley. In secondary schools where evolution can still be taught, too many teachers are afraid to bring up the subject to their so often unevolved students. "Add to this the pervasive hostility toward science on the part of the current administration (e.g., stem-cell research) and we get a clear picture of the Enlightenment being steadily rolled back. Religion is used to explain terror attacks as part of a cosmic conflict between Good and Evil rather than in terms of political processes.... Manichaeanism rules across the United States. According to a poll taken by Time magazine, 59 percent of Americans believe that John's apocalyptic prophecies in the Book of Revelation will be fulfilled, and nearly all of these believe that the faithful will be taken up into heaven in the 'Rapture.'

"Finally, we shouldn't be surprised at the antipathy toward democracy displayed by the Bush administration.... As already noted, fundamentalism and democracy are completely antithetical. The opposite of the Enlightenment, of course, is tribalism, groupthink; and more and more, this is the direction in which the United States is going.... Anthony Lewis, who worked as a columnist for the New York Times for thirty-two years, observes that what has happened in the wake of 9/11 is not just the threatening of the rights of a few detainees, but the undermining of the very foundation of democracy. Detention without trial, denial of access to attorneys, years of interrogation in isolation--these are now standard American practice, and most Americans don't care. Nor did they care about the revelation in July 2004 (reported in Newsweek), that for several months the White House and the Department of Justice had been discussing the feasibility of canceling the upcoming presidential election in the event of a possible terrorist attack." I suspect that the technologically inclined prevailed against that extreme measure on the ground that the newly installed electronic ballot machines could be so calibrated that Bush would win handily no matter what (read Representative John Conyers's report on the rigging of Ohio's vote).

Meanwhile, the indoctrination of the people merrily continues. "In a 'State of the First Amendment Survey' conducted by the University of Connecticut in 2003, 34 percent of Americans polled said the First Amendment 'goes too far'; 46 percent said there was too much freedom of the press; 28 percent felt that newspapers should not be able to publish articles without prior approval of the government; 31 percent wanted public protest of a war to be outlawed during that war; and 50 percent thought the government should have the right to infringe on the religious freedom of 'certain religious groups' in the name of the war on terror."

It is usual in sad reports like Professor Berman's to stop abruptly the litany of what has gone wrong and then declare, hand on heart, that once the people have been informed of what is happening, the truth will set them free and a quarter-billion candles will be lit and the darkness will flee in the presence of so much spontaneous light. But Berman is much too serious for the easy platitude. Instead he tells us that those who might have struck at least a match can no longer do so because shared information about our situation is meager to nonexistent. Would better schools help? Of course, but, according to that joyous bearer of ill tidings, the New York Times, many school districts are now making sobriety tests a regular feature of the school day: apparently opium derivatives are the opiate of our stoned youth. Meanwhile, millions of adult Americans, presumably undrugged, have no idea who our enemies were in World War II. Many college graduates don't know the difference between an argument and an assertion (did their teachers also fail to solve this knotty question?). A travel agent in Arizona is often asked whether or not it is cheaper to take the train rather than fly to Hawaii. Only 12 percent of Americans own a passport. At the time of the 2004 presidential election 42 percent of voters believed that Saddam Hussein was involved in 9/11. One high school boy, when asked who won the Civil War, replied wearily, "I don't know and I don't care," echoing a busy neocon who confessed proudly: "The American Civil War is as remote to me as the War of the Roses."

We are assured daily by advertisers and/or politicians that we are the richest, most envied people on earth and, apparently, that is why so many awful, ill-groomed people want to blow us up. We live in an impermeable bubble without the sort of information that people living in real countries have access to when it comes to their own reality. But we are not actually people in the eyes of the national ownership. We are simply unreliable consumers comprising an overworked, underpaid labor force not in the best of health: The World Health Organization rates our healthcare system (sic--or sick?) as thirty-seventh-best in the world, far behind even Saudi Arabia, role model for the Texans. Our infant mortality rate is satisfyingly high, precluding a First World educational system. Also, it has not gone unremarked even in our usually information-free media that despite the boost to the profits of such companies as Halliburton, Bush's wars of aggression against small countries of no danger to us have left us well and truly broke. Our annual trade deficit is a half-trillion dollars, which means that we don't produce much of anything the world wants except those wan reports on how popular our entertainment is overseas. Unfortunately, the foreign gross of King Kong, the Edsel of that assembly line, is not yet known. It is rumored that Bollywood--the Indian film business--may soon surpass us! Berman writes, "We have lost our edge in science to Europe.... The US economy is being kept afloat by huge foreign loans ($4 billion a day during 2003). What do you think will happen when America's creditors decide to pull the plug, or when OPEC members begin selling oil in euros instead of dollars?... An International Monetary Fund report of 2004 concluded that the United States was 'careening toward insolvency.' " Meanwhile, China, our favorite big-time future enemy, is the number one for worldwide foreign investments, with France, the bête noire of our apish neocons, in second place.

Well, we still have Kraft cheese and, of course, the death penalty. Berman makes the case that the Bretton-Woods agreement of 1944 institutionalized a system geared toward full employment and the maintenance of a social safety net for society's less fortunate--the so-called welfare or interventionist state. It did this by establishing fixed but flexible exchange rates among world currencies, which were pegged to the US dollar while the dollar, for its part, was pegged to gold. In a word, Bretton-Woods saved capitalism by making it more human. Nixon abandoned the agreement in 1971, which, according to Berman, started huge amounts of capital moving upward from the poor and the middle class to the rich and superrich.

Mr. Berman spares us the happy ending, as, apparently, has history. When the admirable Tiberius (he has had an undeserved bad press), upon becoming emperor, received a message from the Senate in which the conscript fathers assured him that whatever legislation he wanted would be automatically passed by them, he sent back word that this was outrageous. "Suppose the emperor is ill or mad or incompetent?" He returned their message. They sent it again. His response: "How eager you are to be slaves." I often think of that wise emperor when I hear Republican members of Congress extolling the wisdom of Bush. Now that he has been caught illegally wiretapping fellow citizens he has taken to snarling about his powers as "a wartime president," and so, in his own mind, he is above each and every law of the land. Oddly, no one in Congress has pointed out that he may well be a lunatic dreaming that he is another Lincoln, but whatever he is or is not he is no wartime President. There is no war with any other nation...yet. There is no state called terror, an abstract noun like liar. Certainly his illegal unilateral ravaging of Iraq may well seem like a real war for those on both sides unlucky enough to be killed or wounded, but that does not make it a war any more than the appearance of having been elected twice to the presidency does not mean that in due course the people will demand an investigation of those two irregular processes. Although he has done a number of things that under the old republic might have got him impeached, our current system protects him: incumbency-for-life seats have made it possible for a Republican majority in the House not to do its duty and impeach him for his incompetence in handling, say, the natural disaster that befell Louisiana.

The founders thought two-year terms for members of the House was as much democracy as we'd ever need. Therefore, there was no great movement to have some sort of recall legislation in the event that a President wasn't up to his job and so had lost the people's confidence between elections. But in time, as Ecclesiastes would say, all things shall come to pass and so, in a kindly way, a majority of the citizens must persuade him that he will be happier back in Crawford pruning Bushes of the leafy sort while the troops not killed or maimed will settle for simply being alive and in one piece. We may be slaves, but we are not unreasonable.

One way that a majority of citizens can help open the road back to Crawford is by heeding the call of a group called The World Can't Wait. They believe that the agenda for 2006 must not be set by the Bush gang but by the people taking independent mass political action.

On January 31, the night of Bush's next State of the Union address, they have called for people in large cities and small towns all across the country to join in noisy rallies to make the demand that "Bush Step Down" the message of the day. At 9 PM Eastern Standard Time, just as Bush starts to speak, people can make a joyful noise and figuratively drown out his address. Then on the following Saturday, February 4, converge in front of the White House with the same message: Please step down and take your program with you.




http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060206/vidal

Published on Thursday, January 26, 2006 by the Guardian / UK

A Call to the Faithful
Karl Rove has once again proved his ability to obliterate history in the cause of his president


by Sidney Blumenthal

In a curious juxtaposition, some leading figures from the Bush administration have recently argued that the president is blind, while others, such as Karl Rove, maintain he is omniscient. Rove, Bush's political "architect" and deputy chief of staff, is an expert at arranging the smearing of the motives and patriotism of the president's critics. He remains under investigation for his role in the disclosure of the identity of a CIA operative in order to tarnish the reputation of her husband, the former ambassador Joseph Wilson - who had revealed that the rationale for the Iraq war was based on false evidence. Every day for the past two weeks, the White House press secretary Scott McClellan has stonewalled questions about Rove's and George Bush's connections to super-lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who pleaded guilty to fraud and bribery and is cooperating with prosecutors. McClellan refuses to name officials who attended "staff-level meetings" with Abramoff.

Under these clouds, Rove stepped up to the lectern at the gathering of the Republican national committee in Washington last Friday to invoke the spectre of 9/11. Little else matters but that Bush grasps that it changed everything and that Democrats, of course, do not. "We need," Rove said, "a commander in chief and a Congress who understand the nature of the threat and the gravity of the moment America finds itself in."

As Rove spoke, Lewis Paul Bremer III, the former presidential proconsul in Iraq and head of the coalition provisional authority (CPA), was promoting his memoir, My Year in Iraq. "We really did not see the insurgency coming," Bremer told NBC. His arguments for more troops had been rebuffed by Donald Rumsfeld.

Rove's call to the faithful lacks Bremer's specificity. For the political theme to remain vital, recent history must be obliterated. For the moment, Rove appears not as a citizen under suspicion, but the cardinal of the Sacred Congregation de Propaganda Fide.

But Bremer's apologia is also challenged by facts. In January 2003, Larry Johnson, a CIA operative who served with Bremer in the state department's office of counterterrorism, sent him a memo that accurately predicted an Iraqi uprising - "no matter how benign or charitable" - and the influence of a "belligerent Iran". "Bremer's reaction," Johnson told me, "was that this was off base, doesn't matter, we're going to war, don't undermine the effort. His mind was made up. There was no brooking any alternative analysis. This is the doctrine, the truth, either you admit to it or you're a heretic." When Bremer became head of the CPA, Johnson tried to brief him with information that the Bush administration had not considered, but Bremer did not "want to listen".

Bremer was modelling himself on his commander in chief. In fact, elder statesmen of the foreign policy establishment and the Republican party repeatedly warned Bush to his face what the consequences of the war would be - including the former national security adviser Brent Scowcroft and former secretaries of state James Baker and Lawrence Eagleburger. It was "never thought the war would come off right", one of those who spoke to Bush told me. "It was going to end with an Islamic republic dominated by Shias and influenced by Iran ... If you know history, you don't have to be a genius." But Bush would not listen. "It's a sad story."

Rove is again playing the patriot game to salvage Bush's political position. This time he is attempting to turn Bush's domestic spying into a false issue of whether Democrats support gathering intelligence on terrorists. The history of the Bush presidency underlines Rove's premise, but not as he wishes: we do need a commander in chief who understands the gravity of the moment.


http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0126-27.htm

Published on Thursday, January 26, 2006 by the Boulder Daily Camera (Colorado)


Our Leaders Are Feeding Us Propaganda

by Molly Ivins


We live in interesting times, we do, we do. We can read in our daily newspapers that our government is about to launch a three-day propaganda blitz to convince us all that its secret program to spy on us is something we really want and need. "A campaign of high-profile national security events," reports the New York Times, follows "Karl Rove's blistering speech to national Republicans" about what a swell political issue this is.

The question for journalists is how to report this. President Bush says it's a great idea and he's proud of the secret spy program? Attorney General Gonzales explains breaking the law is no problem? Dick Cheney says accept spying, or Osama bin Laden will get you?

Or might we actually have gotten far enough to point out that the series of high-profile security events is in fact part of a propaganda campaign by our own government? Should we report it as though it were in fact a campaign tactic, a straight political ploy: The Republicans say spying is good for you, but the Democrats say it is not — equal time to both sides?

Perhaps we have some obligation to try to sift through what it means that our government is spying on us in violation of the law and the Constitution.

Then there's the problem of reporting within the context of this administration's other propaganda efforts. "We do not torture," and, "We are not running a gulag of secret detention centers," are two of the more recent examples, superceding the golden oldies — like the smoking gun in the form of a mushroom cloud.

Furthermore, the Rove offensive is not to admit that we are indeed running a gulag of secret detention camps, but to attack those who point it out and put them under investigation for revealing government secrets and helping the enemy. Even without the intimidation, how do you report something claimed by George W. Bush as though you hadn't recently heard him say he would support John McCain's amendment barring torture — and then turn around and claim that he has the right to violate that law?

I genuinely appreciate the response by real conservatives on this issue. It's called principle. But I am confounded by the authoritarian streak in the Republican Party backing Bush on this. To me it seems so simple: Would you think this was a good idea if Hillary Clinton were president? Would you be defending the clear and unnecessary violation of the law? Do you have complete confidence that she would never misuse this "inherent power" for any partisan reason?

The warrantless wiretaps reportedly covered thousands of calls, and the information obtained was widely circulated among federal agencies. I know one guy who is now on the federal no-fly list. His sin? Co-authoring an unflattering book about Karl Rove. What a menace to national security he is.

One of the odder features of our time is that much of our political debate is cast in "moral" terms, with such helpful authorities as Pat Robertson holding forth on whom we should assassinate next. A more useful contribution from this direction comes from Jimmy Carter in his new book, "Our Endangered Values: America's Moral Crisis." I am a great admirer of Carter's and glad to hear his soft Southern Christian voice once more. But it occurs to me that in his quiet way, many of his arguments are as pragmatic as they are moral.

As one with considerable faith in the common sense of Americans , it occurs to me we may yet rescue ourselves from this bootless skunk match over morality by using plain sense, instead. Many of Carter's points center on the fact that our war on terrorism is not working. Iraq is not working (hard to even count the ways). Major terrorist attacks themselves more than tripled from 2003, to 655 attacks in 2004. Our support in the Middle East sinks lower and lower. The region is not becoming more democratic.

What would happen if we had not a political, but a pragmatic debate about all of this: We have made a horrible mess of this entire war on terrorism, now how do we fix it? What do we do? I realize it's a bit simplistic of me after all this time, but I really think one of the best things we could do for ourselves is deal honestly with the facts. Because we have made a mess of this does not mean we are a pitiful, helpless giant — the United States still has more sheer military power than anyone else on earth. But using it is not necessarily the best way to get the results we want.

Because we are stuck with this administration for another three years, I think it important to to get past the defensiveness and drawing attention away and blame games that big messes provoke. And part of that calls on American journalism to get over reporting the Bush administration as though it were a credible source. We need to face facts.




http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0126-21.htm

Checks, Balances and the Duty to Filbuster

by John Nichols


No one runs for the U.S. Senate on the slogan: "Elect me and I will maintain the status quo."

No one runs for the U.S. Senate promising to go along to get along.

Yet, when push comes to shove, most senators end up as cautious players who choose the easy route of partisanship, ideological predictability and personal political advantage over the more dangerous path of adherence to the Constitution. Americans have grown so accustomed to the compromised nature of the chamber that they often forget that the founders of the American experiment intended the Senate, in particular, to serve as a check and a balance on the excesses of the executive branch.

Unfortunately, major media outlets that now serve as little more than a stenography service for the D.C. consensus regularly reinforce this misinterpretation of senatorial duty by painting members of the body who choose to embrace their Constitutionally-mandated responsibilities as, at best, eccentric or ambitious and, at worst, vindictive or dangerous to the healthy functioning of the body politic.

The move, led by Massachusetts Senators John Kerry and Edward Kennedy, to block the nomination of Judge Samuel Alito to the U.S. Supreme Court with a filibuster is already being dismissed by White House aides, Republican operatives and their echo chamber in the media as a mad misadventure that exposes the Democrats as legislative anarchists bent on wrecking the smooth-functioning processes of the Senate. The Republican National Committee's Tracey Schmitt summed up the sentiment when she peddled the official line of the man who would be monarch, arguing that in George W. Bush's America the Senate's advice and consent responsibilities are no longer required.

"The judicial confirmation process, particularly one for the nation's highest court, should be insulated from such thoughtless bomb throwing..." Schmitt growled.

Bomb throwing?

Samuel Alito has established himself, through his record as an appellate court judge and his testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee, as the consumate judicial activist. He seeks a place on the Supreme Court in order to advance his vision of an imperial presidency that does not obey the laws of the land or answer to the Congress. Alito is, by his own admission, intellectually and politically at odds with the intents of the founders, and with the Constitutional system of checks and balances that they established. He has gone so far as to advise past presidents on strategies for expanding executive power and, as a judge, he has erred on the side of even the most reckless abuses of executive authority.

As Jonathan Turley, the George Washington University law professor and Constitutional scholar, explained: "In my years as an academic and a litigator, I have rarely seen the equal of Alito's bias in favor of the government. To put it bluntly, when it comes to reviewing government abuse, Samuel Alito is an empty robe."

Turley put the Senate consideration of this nomination in context when he wrote that: "The Alito vote might prove to be the single most important decision on the future of our constitutional system for decades to come. While I generally defer to presidents in their choices for the court, Samuel Alito is the wrong nominee at the wrong time for this country."

Seen in the context of the threat that Alito poses, the use of the filibuster -- an entirely legitimate legislative tool -- to block Alito's nomination is not "bomb throwing." It is an appropriate and necessary embrace of duty by senators who recognize the entirety of their advice-and-consent mandate. Of course there will be political risks for those who back the filibuster. But senators do not swear allegiance to their political security; they swear it to a Constitution that requires them to hold the executive branch to account. In this moment, and in this circumstance, senators can only provide the necessary checks and balances by backing the filibuster.



http://www.thenation.com/blogs/thebeat?bid=1&pid=53470

"The Revolution was effected before the war commenced. The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people... This radical change in the principles, opinions, sentiments, and affections of the people was the real American Revolution."
John Adams -- 1818

Impeach or Indict Bush and Cheney

By Ronnie Dugger
The Texas Observer

Friday 27 January 2006


The year 2006 will be historic for the nation, and probably for humanity. Texans Bush and Rove and their conspirators in the second Bush presidency have disgraced American democracy at home and in the world with debasements of our nation and our values that have now entered their climactic phase. What part will the rest of us Texans play in this decisive year?

As I have written in a review-essay that appears in the tenth-anniversary spring issue of Yes!, the quarterly of new solutions published in Washington state by David and Frances Korten (YesMagazine.org), we are living and working in the very days and nights of the American Emergency, the climactic American Crisis. Our elections are bought, and our government is run by and for the major transnational corporations. Bush announced in 2002 his illegal presidential policy that the United States can and will attack other nations first, waging war on them, when he so decides. He is now waging, as if he were doing it in our names, a bloody war of aggression against Iraq, which on the face of it is a crime against humanity under the Nuremberg principles that we and our allies established and enforced with hangings after World War II. The President, the Vice-President, and their factors sold this war to Congress with twistings and lies that were crafted to infuriate and terrorize us about Iraq’s alleged connections to al Qaeda and mass-murder endangerments to us from Iraq itself, all of which literally did not exist. In polls now six of 10 Americans do not believe the president is honest. Yet he has three more years of dictatorial control over our nuclear and other arms and our Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps and seems now to be maneuvering to use that control to wage another aggressive war on Iran, with literally incalculable consequences.

We Texans are a major source of this deterioration into crisis. The leading Democrats of the state so dishonored the liberal traditions of their party that in the resulting political vacuum, Bush was elected Governor here, and from Austin he mounted the campaign that a 5-4 majority of the U.S. Supreme Court illegally decreed made him President. After that, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, from Sugar Land, crafted his scheme to use corporate money to widen the Republicans’ majority in the Texas delegation to Washington, D.C., battening down right-wing GOP control of the House and the Congress. The third President from Texas and his Republican Congress then waged aggressive war on Iraq, drove the nation into insolvency to further enrich the already rich, and just for good measure tore up the Constitution.

As we in Texas bear guilt for this we have also begun to join the resistance and revolt against it, starting with Cindy Sheehan’s brigades in Crawford. By happy accident the Texas trip-root that now threatens to help bring the Bush presidency crashing down, crushing itself under its own arrogance, hubris, and criminality, is a law against corporate money in Texas elections that was passed a century ago in the state’s populist afterglow. To uphold that law, Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle has braved ruthless contumely, as he had done often before in order to prosecute public officials he believed had violated the laws. While it is merely seemly to await the outcome of the trial of DeLay and his co-defendants on the charges that they laundered corporate money through Washington to elect Republicans to the House from Texas, in a speech in September Earle declared what he believes his prosecution is all about. "Corporate money in politics" has become "the fight of our generation of Americans....It is our job - our fight - to rescue democracy from the money that has captured it," he said. "The issue that we’re faced with is the role of large concentrations of money in democracy, whether it’s individuals or corporations, the issue is the same."

Since 1994, although the polls show a majority of Texan citizens support progressive reforms such as adequate taxation for equal education for Texas schoolchildren, the leaders of the disappearing Texas Democratic Party and their statewide candidates, finking out on every ethically important political issue, have proved again and again that nothing fails like failure. Rot-gut Republicans have swept every statewide office and achieved mercenary domination of the Texas courts, too. In my opinion, Texas Democrats ought to have concluded by 2002 at the latest that they should be choosing, from among the waves of the on-comers, entirely new sets of state and local party leaders and candidates. For example, rather than be taken in, even a jot, by the torrent of contemptuous abuse directed at Ronnie Earle by Tom DeLay, his lawyers, and that ilk, Texans should be realizing that - just as the dramatic prosecutions of Thomas E. Dewey in New York made him a Republican presidential candidate and now the populist prosecutions of Eliot Spitzer in New York State are making him a national figure - Ronnie Earle has fully qualified himself as a front-rank leader in Texas politics. For another example, this year, in my opinion - shared, by the way, by Jim Hightower - Texans are very fortunate to have running for Attorney General the lifelong labor lawyer and Democratic firebrand David Van Os of San Antonio. The Observer does not make political endorsements, but I may say here for myself alone that David, in my carefully considered personal judgment, is the Ralph Yarborough of his generation.

The national resistance to Bush, Cheney, Rove, et al., is coming into focus, too. John Conyers, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, which is the logical source for impeachment initiatives, has taken the significant step of calling for an investigation of Bush and Cheney with a view to censure, which obviously could metamorphose into impeachment. Tom Daschle, until recently the Minority Leader in the Senate, Sen. Edward Kennedy, and Nancy Pelosi, the House Minority Leader, are all calling for investigations of Bush and Cheney. Elizabeth Holtzman writes for impeachment in the current Nation, and the Internet is on fire with initiatives to impeach Bush and Cheney for crimes committed in office, foremost among them lying our nation into a war of aggression. Impeachment is unlikely as long as the House remains firmly in GOP control, but this year it would be gratifying to see citizens seeking the election of House candidates - whether Democrats, Republicans, or independents - who promise explicitly to vote, if elected, to impeach Bush and Cheney.

If impeachment does not become possible, let me broach with you the idea that a grand jury, federal or state, should indict Bush and Cheney for their manifold official crimes. Are we, as we are so often piously assured, "a nation of laws and not of men," or is the President above the law if his party controls the House and can block impeaching him?

The Constitution is silent on whether a seated President and Vice President can be indicted, while in office, for crimes committed while they have held those offices. Constitutional lawyers are congenitally prone to announcing that this cannot be done because it would disrupt the ongoing business of the government. But it is time to do it, if necessary absent impeachment, for exactly that reason - to disrupt the continuation of THIS government.

I have not yet found one constitutional lawyer who can cite a Supreme Court case or any other judicial precedent prohibiting their indictment - if you know of one please let me hear from you. In 1973 Nixon’s attorney general said the President can’t be indicted, but why should Nixon’s attorney general bind us?

Committed to nonviolence, determined, in this post-Gandhi era, against violence, nevertheless we are once again in the position of the Framers of the Constitution. In the post-revolutionary emergency, the Founding Fathers took things in their own hands, violating their clear instructions from the states by proposing to create the United States, which the states then created. In the crisis we are in now we must not be misled by expostulating lawyers or posturing politicians. We the citizens can make up our own minds whether we can indict Bush and Cheney and, if they are convicted, throw them out.

May we close here, then, as we began two centuries and more ago, with the words of Tom Paine. "We have it in our power to begin the world over again," he said. "The birth day of a new world is at hand… We are a people upon experiments. It is an age of revolutions, in which everything may be looked for."



http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/012806Z.shtml

From Common Sense

Thomas Paine


SINCE the publication of the first edition of this pamphlet, or rather, on the same day on which it came out, the king's speech made its appearance in this city. Had the spirit of prophecy directed the birth of this production, it could not have brought it forth at a more seasonable juncture, or at a more necessary time. The bloody-mindedness of the one, shows the necessity of pursuing the doctrine of the other. Men read by way of revenge. And the speech, instead of terrifying, prepared a way for the manly principles of independence.
Ceremony, and even silence, from whatever motives they may arise, have a hurtful tendency when they give the least degree of countenance to base and wicked performances, wherefore, if this maxim be admitted, it naturally follows, that the king's speech, IS being a piece of finished villany, deserved and still deserves, a general execration, both by the Congress and the people.

Yet, as the domestic tranquillity of a nation, depends greatly on the chastity of what might properly be called NATIONAL MANNERS, it is often better to pass some things over in silent disdain, than to make use of such new methods of dislike, as might introduce the least innovation on that guardian of our peace and safety. And, perhaps, it is chiefly owing to this prudent delicacy, that the king's speech hath not before now suffered a public execution. The speech, if it may be called one, is nothing better than a wilful audacious libel against the truth, the common good, and the existence of mankind; and is a formal and pompous method of offering up human sacrifices to the pride of tyrants.

But this general massacre of mankind, is one of the privileges and the certain consequences of kings, for as nature knows them not, they know not her, and although they are beings of our own creating, they know not us, and are become the gods of their creators. The speech hath one good quality, which is, that it is not calculated to deceive, neither can we, even if we would, be deceived by it. Brutality and tyranny appear on the face of it. It leaves us at no loss: And every line convinces, even in the moment of reading, that he who hunts the woods for prey, the naked and untutored Indian, is less savage than the king of Britain. Sir John Dalrymple, the putative father of a whining jesuitical piece, fallaciously called, "The address of the people of England to the inhabitants of America," hath perhaps from a vain supposition that the people here were to be frightened at the pomp and description of a king, given (though very unwisely on his part) the real character of the present one: "But," says this writer, "if you are inclined to pay compliments to an administration, which we do not complain of (meaning the Marquis of Rockingham's at the repeal of the Stamp Act) it is very unfair in you to withhold them from that prince, by whose NOD ALONE they were permitted to do any thing." This is toryism with a witness! Here is idolatry even without a mask: And he who can calmly hear and digest such doctrine, hath forfeited his claim to rationality an apostate from the order of manhood and ought to be considered as one who hath not only given up the proper dignity of man, but sunk himself beneath the rank of animals, and contemptibly crawls through the world like a worm.

However, it matters very little now what the king of England either says or does; he hath wickedly broken through every moral and human obligation, trampled nature and conscience beneath his feet, and by a steady and constitutional spirit of insolence and cruelty procured for himself an universal hatred. It is now the interest of America to provide for herself. She hath already a large and young family, whom it is more her duty to take care of, than to be granting away her property to support a power who is become a reproach to the names of men and christians, whose office it is to watch the morals of a nation, of whatsoever sect or denomination ye are of, as well as ye who are more immediately the guardians of the public liberty, if ye wish to preserve your native country uncontaminated by European corruption, ye must in secret wish a separation. But leaving the moral part to private reflection, I shall chiefly confine my further remarks to the following heads:

First, That it is the interest of America to be separated from Britain.

Secondly, Which is the easiest and most practicable plan, RECONCILIATION or INDEPENDENCE? with some occasional remarks.

In support of the first, I could, if I judged it proper, produce the opinion of some of the ablest and most experienced men on this continent: and whose sentiments on that head, are not yet publicly known. It is in reality a self-evident position: for no nation in a state of foreign dependence, limited in its commerce, and cramped and fettered in its legislative powers, can ever arrive at any material eminence. America doth not yet know what opulence is; and although the progress which she hath made stands unparalleled in the history of other nations, it is but childhood compared with what she would be capable of arriving at, had she, as she ought to have, the legislative powers in her own hands. England is at this time proudly coveting what would do her no good were she to accomplish it; and the continent hesitating on a matter which will be her final ruin if neglected. It is the commerce and not the conquest of America by which England is to be benefited, and that would in a great measure continue, were the countries as independent of each other as France and Spain; because the specious errors of those who speak without reflecting. And among the many which I have heard, the following seems the most general, viz. that had this rupture happened forty or fifty years hence, instead of now, the continent would have been more able to have shaken off the dependence. To which I reply, that our military ability, at this time, arises from the experience gained in the last war, and which in forty or fifty years' time, would be totally extinct. The continent would not, by that time, have a quitrent reserved thereon will always lessen, and in time will wholly support, the yearly expense of government. It matters not how long the debt is in paying, so that the lands when sold be applied to the discharge of it, and for the execution of which the Congress for the time being will be the continental trustees.

I proceed now to the second head, viz. Which is the easiest and most practicable plan, reconciliation or independence; with some occasional remarks.

He who takes nature for his guide, is not easily beaten out of his argument, and on that ground, I answer generally that independence being a single simple line, contained within ourselves; and reconciliation, a matter exceedingly perplexed and complicated, and in which a treacherous capricious court is to interfere, gives the answer without a doubt.

The present state of America is truly alarming to every man who is capable of reflection. Without law, without government, without any other mode of power than what is founded on, and granted by, courtesy. Held together by an unexampled occurrence of sentiment, which is nevertheless subject to change, and which every secret enemy is endeavoring to dissolve. Our present condition is, Legislation without law; wisdom without a plan; a constitution without a name; and, what is strangely astonishing, perfect independence contending for dependence. The instance is without a precedent, the case never existed before, and who can tell what may be the event? The property of no man is secure in the present un-braced system of things. The mind of the multitude is left at random, and seeing no fixed object before them, they pursue such as fancy or opinion presents. Nothing is criminal; there is no such thing as treason, wherefore, every one thinks himself at liberty to act as he pleases. The Tories would not have dared to assemble offensively, had they known that their lives, by that act, were forfeited to the laws of the state. A line of distinction should be drawn between English soldiers taken in battle, and inhabitants of America taken in arms. The first are prisoners, but the latter traitors. The one forfeits his liberty, the other his head.

Notwithstanding our wisdom, there is a visible feebleness in some of our proceedings which gives encouragement to dissensions. The continental belt is too loosely buckled: And if something is not done in time, it will be too late to do any thing, and we shall fall into a state, in which neither reconciliation nor independence will be practicable. The king and his worthless adherents are got at their old game of dividing the continent, and there are not wanting among us printers who will be busy in spreading specious falsehoods. The artful and hypocritical letter which appeared a few months ago in two of the New York papers, and likewise in two others, is an evidence that there are men who want both judgment and honesty.

It is easy getting into holes and corners, and talking of reconciliation: But do such men seriously consider how difficult the task is, and how dangerous it may prove, should the continent divide thereon? Do they take within their view all the various orders of men whose situation and circumstances, as well as their own, are to be considered therein? Do they put themselves in the place of the sufferer whose all is already gone, and of the soldier, who hath quitted all for the defence of his country? If their ill-judged moderation be suited to their own private situations only, regardless of others, the event will convince them that "they are reckoning without their host."

Put us, say some, on the footing we were in the year 1763: To which I answer, the request is not now in the power of Britain to comply with, neither will she propose it; but if it were, and even should be granted, I ask, as a reasonable question, By what means is such a corrupt and faithless court to be kept to its engagements? Another parliament, nay, even the present, may hereafter repeal the obligation, on the pretence of its being violently obtained, or unit wisely granted; and, in that case, Where is our redress? No going to law with nations; cannon are the barristers of crowns; and the sword, not of justice, but of war, decides the suit. To be on the footing of 1763, it is not sufficient, that the laws only be put in the same state, but, that our circumstances likewise be put in the same state; our burnt and destroyed towns repaired or built up, our private losses made good, our public debts (contracted for defence) discharged; otherwise we shall be millions worse than we were at that enviable period. Such a request, had it been complied with a year ago, would have won the heart and soul of the continent, but now it is too late. "The Rubicon is passed." Besides, the taking up arms, merely to enforce the repeal of a pecuniary law, seems as unwarrantable by the divine law, and as repugnant to human feelings, as the taking up arms to enforce obedience thereto. The object, on either side, doth not justify the means; for the lives of men are too valuable to be cast away on such trifles. It is the violence which is done and threatened to our persons; the destruction of our property by an armed force; the invasion of our country by fire and sword, which conscientiously qualifies the use of arms: and the instant in which such mode of defence became necessary, all subjection to Britain ought to have ceased; and the independence of America should have been considered as dating its era from, and published by, the first musket that was fired against her. This line is a line of consistency; neither drawn by caprice, nor extended by ambition; but produced by a chain of events, of which the colonies were not the authors.


I shall conclude these remarks, with the following timely and well-intended hints. We ought to reflect, that there are three different ways by which an independency may hereafter be effected, and that one of those three, will, one day or other, be the fate of America, viz. By the legal voice of the people in Congress; by a military power, or by a mob: It may not always happen that our soldiers are citizens, and the multitude a body of reasonable men; virtue, as I have already remarked, is not hereditary, neither is it perpetual. Should an independency be brought about by the first of those means, we have every opportunity and every encouragement before us, to form the noblest, purest constitution on the face of the earth. We have it in our power to begin the world over again. A situation, similar to the present, hath not happened since the days of Noah until now.


The birthday of a new world is at hand, and a race of men, perhaps as numerous as all Europe contains, are to receive their portion of freedom from the events of a few months. The reflection is awful, and in this point of view, how trifling, how ridiculous, do the little paltry cavilings of a few weak or interested men appear, when weighed against the business of a world.

Should we neglect the present favorable and inviting period, and independence be hereafter effected by any other means, we must charge the consequence to ourselves, or to those rather whose narrow and prejudiced souls are habitually opposing the measure, without either inquiring or reflecting. There are reasons to be given in support of independence which men should rather privately think of, than be publicly told of. We ought not now to be debating whether we shall be independent or not, but anxious to accomplish it on a firm, secure, and honorable basis, and uneasy rather that it is not yet began upon. Every day convinces us of its necessity. Even the Tories (if such beings yet remain among us) should, of all men, be the most solicitous to promote it; for as the appointment of committees at first protected them from popular rage, so, a wise and well established form of government will be the only certain means of continuing it securely to them. Wherefore, if they have not virtue enough to be WHIGS, they ought to have prudence enough to wish for independence.

In short, independence is the only bond that tie and keep us together. We shall then see our object, and our ears will be legally shut against the schemes of an intriguing, as well as cruel, enemy. We shall then, too, be on a proper footing to treat with Britain; for there is reason to conclude, that the pride of that court will be less hurt by treating with the American States for terms of peace, than with those, whom she denominates "rebellious subjects," for terms of accommodation. It is our delaying in that, encourages her to hope for conquest, and our backwardness tends only to prolong the war. As we have, without any good effect therefrom, withheld our trade to obtain a redress of our grievances, let us now try the alternative, by independently redressing them ourselves, and thenoffering to open the trade. The mercantile and reasonable part of England, will be still with us; because, peace, with trade, is preferable to war without it. And if this offer be not accepted, other courts may be applied to.

On these grounds I rest the matter. And as no offer hath yet been made to refute the doctrine contained in the former editions of this pamphlet, it is a negative proof, that either the doctrine cannot be refuted, or, that the party in favor of it are too numerous to be opposed. WHEREFORE, instead of gazing at each other with suspicious or doubtful curiosity, let each of us hold out to his neighbor the hearty hand of friendship, and unite in drawing a line, which, like an act of oblivion, shall bury in forgetfulness every former dissension. Let the names of Whig and Tory be extinct; and let none other be heard among us, than those of a good citizen, an open and resolute friend, and a virtuous supporter of the RIGHTS of MANKIND, and of the FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES OF AMERICA.

The Phoenix or the Resurrection of Freedom 1776-1808 James Barry

Published on Friday, January 27, 2006 by the Boulder Daily Camera (Colorado)

Bush: 'L'etat, C'est Moi'

by Helen Thomas


We are now learning what President Bush considers to be the limits of his power—nothing.

In public appearances this week, Bush defended his program of domestic spying without court approval, citing the inherent war powers of the presidency under the U.S. Constitution.

The president points to his status as commander-in-chief and the resolution — approved by Congress three days after the 9/11 attacks — authorizing him to use "all necessary and appropriate force" against the terrorists.

It is an obvious overreach of presidential prerogative; thin justification for what amounts to a snooping foray against Americans and others in the U.S.

It all smacks of France's Louis XIV's famous dictum: "L'etat, c'est moi"— "I am the state."

The administration is on shaky legal ground. Last week, the Justice Department issued a 42-page analysis declaring the president "will exercise all authority available to him, consistent with the Constitution, to protect the people of the United States."

The Justice Department brief also contended that some presidential powers are simply "beyond congressional ability to regulate."

But the law is the law. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 — which was enacted after in-depth congressional hearings on domestic spying — established a special court to issue warrants for electronic eavesdropping on suspected foreign agents inside the United States.

So far, that court has been basically a rubber stamp for government petitions, rarely turning down a request at crisis times. The court permits emergency wiretaps without court approval for up to 72 hours.

If court procedures tie law enforcement's hands, Congress is open to fixing it. "I know of no member of Congress, frankly, who, if the administration came and said, 'Here's why we need this capability,' that they wouldn't get it," said Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.

But the Bush administration wanted unfettered freedom to spy on who they want, when they want, with no legal constraints whatsoever.

The president and his cohorts are engaged in a full court press to justify their dubious legal position.

Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold hearings on domestic spying Feb. 6. But if this GOP-run Congress runs true to form, Bush will have clear sailing.

In an appearance at Kansas State University earlier this week, President Bush claimed that the post-9/11 congressional resolution provided him with all the justification he needed.

"Congress gave me the authority to use necessary force to protect the American people, but it didn't prescribe the tactics," Bush said. "It said, 'Mr. President, you've got the power to protect us, but we're not going to tell you how.'"

Bush's stand is all too reminiscent of former President Richard Nixon who said during the unraveling of the Watergate scandal: "If a president does it, it's not illegal."

Bush might take note that the Supreme Court and Congress said otherwise, leading to Nixon's resignation from the highest office in the land in 1974.

Civil liberties' advocates are pressing lawsuits to challenge domestic spying. But with Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito Jr. expected to win Senate approval within the next week, the Supreme Court is likely to tilt further to the right. So I doubt if President Bush is worried that a civil libertarian challenge to presidential power will survive court scrutiny.

The Democrats, silent for too long, are finally stepping up to the plate, with former Vice President Al Gore leading the charge.

Gore — who lost out to Bush in the presidential race in 2000 — is loud and clear, standing with the growing number of critics.

"A president who breaks the law is a threat to the very structure of our government," Gore said. He called for the appointment of a special counsel to investigate Bush's domestic spying.

Gore called the spying "a shameful exercise of power."

The administration claims the American people are on its side. White House press secretary Scott McClellan told reporters that recent surveys "overwhelmingly show that the American people want us to do everything within our power to protect them."

McClellan skirted around whether that included breaking the law, but contended that Bush was within his presidential power "to do everything he can to prevail in the war on terrorism."

But the polls are mixed.

A recent AP-Ipsos poll said 56 percent of those polled believed that the Bush administration should seek a warrant before eavesdropping on overseas calls to Americans, or vice versa.

A Gallup Poll on Tuesday showed 51 percent of Americans deemed domestic spying without court approval "wrong" and 58 percent backed appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate.

The Fourth Amendment in the Bill of Rights speaks of the right of people "to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects against unreasonable searches..."

I wonder what other secret orders Bush has issued to enhance his powers and diminish ours?




http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0127-20.htm

This is what is required for a successful Revolution....the majority must be of one mind on the basic principle that drives the revolution...how else can the devilish details of the "hows" be worked out unless all are committed to the same "Cause"....The Iraqis are not of one mind as to what they want so is there any wonder that they're having just a few problems working out the details of an unclear mission? Unlike our Revolutionaries, the Iraqis had not gone through the pre-revolution steps of internalizing a committment to one cause, a step necessary for the unity required to drive a successful revolution....

(Bush's reptilian brain):"They need not ever know."

Of course, but not always. Our Revolution started with only one-third of the colonists who were willing to rebel against Britain and the monarchy. Another third were complacent and yet another third tied to the apron strings of King George. One has to start somewhere. The problem with Iraq is more tribal and sectarian.

Published on Friday, January 27, 2006 by CommonDreams.org

American Tragedy - The Death of the Triumphant Individual

by Bob Burnett


In a March article in The New Republic, Robert Reich wrote of four essential American stories. One of these is the triumphant individual, the underdog who pulls him- or herself up by the bootstraps.

While the myth lives on, the opportunity is dead for most Americans - thanks to the Bush Administration

Reich explained that the triumphant individual "works hard, takes risks, believes in himself, and eventually gains wealth, fame, and honor." "The moral: With enough effort and courage, anyone can make it in the United States." American culture has always been characterized by the optimistic belief that no matter how humble the circumstances of our birth, we could rise above them.

At its core, the story of the triumphant individual depends on three elements: perseverance, access to education, and fair treatment. Americans believe that if they stick in there and work hard, they will eventually succeed. However, working hard is no longer enough to get ahead in America. One in four American workers - 30 million - are mired in low-wage jobs that do not provide for a life with dignity. Why has this happened?

The answer is that worker's wages are no longer tied to productivity. In July, Jonathan Tasini wrote "For decades, workers' wages were tied to productivity... Historically, increased efficiency flowed to workers in the form of higher wages." Now that link has been broken. "Productivity has grown almost three times faster than wages since 2001. During that time, 70 percent of the nation's income growth has gone straight into corporate coffers as profits--presumably to continue to finance staggering pay and benefits for executives--a complete reversal from the previous seven business cycles when 77 percent of the overall income growth went to wages." Simply stated, the heart of the American notion of productivity has been broken. When workers improve their output, this gain no longer benefits them or society in general; it goes straight to corporate profits. American productivity is no longer something we can all be proud of - it is a cruel hoax, a broken promise to Americas workers.

The second essential element in the story of triumphant individual is access to quality education. There is compelling research that shows that compensation is closely related to level of education. Most Americans understand this and routinely return to school to upgrade their skills. However, the Bush Administration, as a side-affect of the "no child left behind" program has denied the American educational system the resources it needs to ensure that our workers remain competitive in the world economy. During the past five years, the total funds allocated to worker training have diminished. Further, the ancillary services that many workers need to receive, in order to take advantage of this job training, have also been cut: child care, vocational counseling, and the like.

Finally, the President and his friends have set a dreadful example for the average citizen. The subliminal message from this Administration is that one does not succeed on merit, but rather through connections - It's not your competence that counts, but your cronies. George W. Bush was a failure as a CEO; one after another his businesses tanked - nonetheless, he was continuously bailed out by family connections. Dick Cheney provides another example of succeeding because of connections rather than competence. Michael "Brownie" Brown's tenure as FEMA head is merely the most notorious of a series of crony appointments by the Bush White House. Recent articles indicate that the Administration learned nothing from the debacle following Hurricane Katrina; they continue to appoint cronies to senior governmental positions regardless of their lack of qualifications.

The last Gallup poll on "opportunity" was conducted in January 2005. It contained a question regarding the respondents satisfaction with "opportunity for a person in this nation to get ahead by working hard?" 66 percent were "very" or "somewhat satisfied." The myth of the triumphant individual endures,

However, in the same time period, The Economist ran an article noting that while Americans continue to believe that anyone can change social class through hard work, "A growing body of evidence suggests that the meritocratic ideal is in trouble in America. Income inequality is growing to levels not seen since the Gilded Age, around the 1880s. But social mobility is not increasing at anything like the same pace: would-be Horatio Algers are finding it no easier to climb from rags to riches, while the children of the privileged have a greater chance of staying at the top of the social heap. The United States risks calcifying into a European-style class-based society." This, and more recent studies, indicate that opportunity is disappearing for those who would become triumphant individuals.

The American character is based upon optimism. Confidence that the myth of the triumphant individual continues. Belief in the American dream.

When will we recognize that the George Bush and his cronies have turned this dream into a nightmare? When will we build a new economy that works for all Americans? That honors our commitment to those who struggle to become triumphant individuals?




http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0127-33.htm

Alito's Mythical Feel-Good America

By Jonathan Zimmerman
The Los Angeles Times

Saturday 28 January 2006


Alito's feel-good vision of America before hippies and protests simply isn't true.


Once upon a time, Americans lived by a few simple maxims: God, country and family. Children respected their parents; students listened to their teachers; citizens followed the law. Then along came the 1960s, when liberal elites undermined traditional sources of authority. College kids smoked dope, feminists burned their bras and black militants burned down the cities. So now we have welfare, divorce, crime and a sick society that has lost its moral compass.

That's the Republican Party line on the 1960s, when everything good turned sour. Well, maybe not everything. Amid the tumult and violence, a few Americans held fast to timeless American values. And that's where our next prospective Supreme Court justice comes in.

Samuel A. Alito Jr., you see, has become the GOP's anti-'60s cultural hero. Republican supporters seized eagerly on Alito's opening remarks at his confirmation hearing, when he compared his traditional upbringing in Hamilton Township, N.J., to the chaos and unrest he encountered at Princeton University.

Hamilton was "an unpretentious, down-to-earth community," Alito recalled, where kids went to school in the morning and played baseball in the afternoon. But at Princeton, where Alito enrolled in 1968, he found something else. "I saw some very smart people and very privileged people behaving irresponsibly," Alito said at the hearing. "I couldn't help making a contrast between some of the worst of what I saw on the campus and the good sense and the decency of the people back in my own community."

Alito's story meshes perfectly with the larger Republican narrative about the 1960s: A lot of bad things happened, but a few good people resisted them. "Judge Alito is a paragon of the old-fashioned working-class ethic," gushed the New York Times' David Brooks. "In a culture that celebrates the rebel ... he respects tradition, order and authority."

To Michael Barone of US News & World Report, Alito symbolizes the "dutiful people" who adhered to tradition when the "beautiful people" attacked it. "While Manhattan glitterati thronged Leonard Bernstein's apartment to celebrate the murderous Black Panthers," Barone declared, "ordinary people ... were going to work, raising their families and teaching their children to obey lawful authority and work their way up in the world."

There's only one problem with this GOP version of postwar history: It isn't true. The feel-good Republican vision of pre-'60s America is a myth. Urban kids were already using drugs in the 1950s, when J. Edgar Hoover called heroin a menace to American society. The FBI was busily harassing gays, who formed visible communities in many cities. And urban poverty was on the rise, even as most middle-class Americans looked the other away.

Most of all, a vicious racism infected enormous swaths of American society. And not just in the "Jim Crow" South, which is the story we know best, but in the urban North as well. In such cities as Chicago and Detroit, whites organized to keep African Americans out of their neighborhoods. They rallied outside city housing agencies to bar black tenants; they picketed white homeowners who sold property to black buyers. Even more, as University of Pennsylvania historian Thomas Sugrue has shown, whites often assaulted and vandalized blacks who did move into white areas. Were all whites racist? Of course not. But we can no longer pretend that they uniformly "respected authority" and "followed the law," as Brooks and Barone maintain.

While turning a blind eye to the problems of the 1950s, Republicans also exaggerate the disorder and conflict of the 1960s. In 1967, the year before Alito came to campus, more than half of Princeton's students said they supported American involvement in the Vietnam War. Visiting Princeton that spring, New Republic reporter Dotson Rader was shocked at how little political discussion or dissent he encountered.

"I wandered around the campus and heard the band play for the Princeton-Yale game and saw the students with their dates wander toward the stadium," Rader wrote, "as if no war was being fought and no people were in prison for opposing it, as if Harlem and Watts and the Mississippi Delta country did not exist, as if the world were just and men did not die senselessly."

To be sure, student protests would escalate after Alito arrived. In May 1970, as Alito was finishing his sophomore year, students staged a campuswide strike to protest the escalation of the Vietnam War into Cambodia.

Did some Princeton students behave "irresponsibly," as Alito recalled? Of course they did. Several days after the May 1970 strike, for example, students took over an off-campus office where Princeton faculty members performed defense-related research. They painted the walls with graffiti, set fire to the office's air-conditioning unit and littered the grounds with trash.

But such incidents were rare. As journalist Don Oberdorfer documents in his history of Princeton, most protest was orderly and peaceful. Campus demonstrations reflected the nation's best democratic traditions: free speech, debate and, yes, responsibility.

And that brings us back to Alito. Despite his paeans to the decency of his childhood neighbors, did he know that many hard-working white communities were working hard to keep blacks out? And when he indicted Princeton students for behaving irresponsibly, was he including their peaceful protests against the Vietnam War?

Although he doesn't remember his membership in the conservative Concerned Alumni for Princeton, Alito does remember his youth and college years - indeed, he freely described them in his opening statement. So the rest of us should feel free to inquire about what he actually meant.





http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/012806H.shtml