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Bush Claims Mail Can Be Opened Without Warrant
don_combatant writes to note that President Bush claimed new powers to search US mail without a warrant. He made this claim in a "signing statement" at the time he signed a postal overhaul bill into law on December 20. The signing statement directly contradicts part of the bill he signed, which explicitly reinforces protections of first-class mail from searches without a court's approval. According to the article, "A top Senate Intelligence Committee aide promised a review of Bush's move."
Bush keeps saying he wants everyone to work in a bipartisan fashion, but I don't think "bipartisan" means what he thinks it does. Rather bipartisan appears to mean to him "do it my way" or "because I say so" and "I'm the decider".
Seriously though, and back on topic: Even the American Bar Association has described the use of signing statements to modify the meaning of duly enacted laws as "contrary to the rule of law and our Constitutional system of separation of powers". When is the American public going to wake up on both sides of the isle here? From a Republican standpoint, this administration has gone so far off from Republican ideals, that it is not even funny. Republicans used to be the ones who were for a strong military, smaller government, less government intrusion into our lives and lower taxes and what we have is a military that is weaker and smaller now than it has been in decades, we have the largest federal bureaucracy in the history of the world, fewer Constitutional rights and lower taxes are only for large corporations. From the Democratic side, well..... those guys just got hosed for the last few years and they do not appear smart enough to position anyone capable enough to compete with someone even as unappealing and dangerous to our lives as Bush and Co.
I worry for our future as we have signed away many of our Constitutional rights and protections, we have alienated many foreign countries and allies after squandering perhaps the most support we've ever had in history after 9/11, we are entrenched in a combat zone that has very little positive outcome potential, we are signing away our financial future through one of the largest deficits in history and Cheney is on record as saying deficit spending does not matter.
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AFAIK, the last I checked the legality or effectiveness of signing statements (of which Bush has made hundreds of by now, pretty much attaching one to nearly every bill he has signed since he has been in office) was extremely dubious at best. The second something that tries to play off one of these signing statements goes to court, does anybody really, honestly believe that they would hold any legal water? The bill is the bill, and regardless of what little post-it note that the president attaches to it when he signs it doesn't change that fact.
Honestly, I'm not too worried about it at this point, but I'm sure others will follow up if I am completely off base, as IANAL.
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I'm not so surprised that Bush is claiming he can read mail without a warrant as I am that he can read at all.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
Bush just wants to maximize his chances of winning Ed McMahon's $10 million.
Monstar L
Bush keeps pulling BS powers out of his ass based solely on letting him do whatever he wants to do at any given time.
"Hmm... I want to eavesdrop on phone calls, but as the law is written now, I can't. Fortunately, I can use my Presidential Wiretapping Power to authorize warrantless wiretapping!"
"Hmm... I want to torture prisoners to get information that, while not accurate, will support my foreign policy goals. But it's against US and international law. Aha! Super Secret Presidential Rendition Powers!"
And so on. Somebody really needs to tell Bush he can't go to Superdickery.com anymore.
Never give in--never, never, never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to conviction
Seriously, who can argue that as the person in charge of enforcing the rule of law and "protecting the constitution" that George W. Bush is doing the exact opposite. He's not just not doing it he's actively working to undermine the entire idea of separation of powers and role of the executive branch.
Impeach.
Now.
=tkk
PS See you at GITMO!
Bill Gates - Creationist?!?
In theory, you are quite right, since the president has not been in charge of interpreting the laws for a long time. In practice, however, very few acts of the "FedGov" are ever challenged in court – a large portion of your constitutional protections arise from what the government decides not to do, rather than from you retroactively getting a court order enforcing your rights. In particular, if the government decides to ignore a particular right, they can effectively nullify it.
Actually, to the extent that Mr. Bush is saying "if we believe there's a ticking bomb in a letter we will send the bomb squad in first and resolve the legal issues later", there is no controversey. Unfortunately, he also seems to be saying "if we believe the sender and reciever are contemplating un-american behaviour during a time of national emergency, we will read their mail first and put them on the no-fly list later".
Yes, the new Congress will immediately pass a bill making signing statements illegal. Unfortunately, President Bush will attach a signing statement to that law invalidating it.
I can't imagine what they'd do about it. They can complain, but the separation of powers means that the executive branch has essentially infinite power to execute the laws according to its own interpretation. Ultimately, the Supreme Court itself can issue its rulings but depends on the good will of the executive branch to actually do it.
Congress' main check on that power is the ability to impeach. If the President violates the laws or court decisions, then it's a "high crime and misdemeanor", and they can remove him. That's the nuclear option, but the Constitution forbids any other control. It's a kind of Mutually Assured Destruction.
In practice the President has always had to execute the laws more or less in line with what Congress said when they passed them, precisely because the nuclear option is sitting there. But Bush is discovering that really he can do whatever he wants, no matter what the law actually says. He likes to think he's doing it to preserve the security of the country, but I've got a terrible feeling he's destroying that village in order to save it.
I encourage everyone, no matter what your political leanings are, that is sick and tired of this president's blatant misuse of executive power, to consider sending a "Memorial of Impeachment" to incoming Speaker Pelosi on January the 15th of this year. You can read more about this, and print out the Memorial (pdf file) at ImpeachForPeace.org. I've already printed mine out, signed it, and got it notarized. It's sitting on my computer desk, waiting for the 15th. I urge everyone to do the same. It may be the proverbial straw that breaks the camel's back, and we may be the ones that are able to initiate the impeachment procedure.
"We may face a scorched and lifeless earth, but they're accountable to their shareholders first."
He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient; he may, on extraordinary Occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in Case of Disagreement between them, with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them to such Time as he shall think proper; he shall receive Ambassadors and other public Ministers; he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed, and shall Commission all the Officers of the United States.
"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) 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."
Now that he is directly countermanding the bills he passes, can we not finally admit that Bush has broken his oath as President?
but rather his view of the law.
Or are you claiming is that despite "his view of the law" he's not going to order anyone to open mail?
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
Actually, he's saying "I want to be dictator of the USA"
"If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator."
George w Bush, Washington, D.C., Dec. 19, 2000
"We are all geniuses when we dream"
- E.M. Cioran
Thomas Jefferson badly paraphrased Ben Franklin just like everyone on Slashdot does? Neat. But I bet Alexander Hamilton modded him -1 Redundant, the bastard.
Don't blame me; I'm never given mod points.
A "state of" emergency has ever been the excuse for taking away people's liberties. GWB thinks 9/11 gives him the right to do whatever he pleases, constitution be damned.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Honestly, don't come to Canada if you believe that it is a more democratic or free country than the US
Essentially, whenever Canada has a majority (which is impossible without strong support from the eastern provinces) it is a benign dictatorship; being that everyone in the West doesn't count (lower representation in the Senate, Lower representation in the House of Commons) we are constantly abused in favour of eastern interests.
Here is the video of Shrub saying "If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator."
Where is Gerald Ford when our nation needs him to rescue us from a cowboy?
Call Your Senator now and demand the arrest,
trial, conviction, and sentencing of AL-QAEDA's CHIEF OF
OPERATIONS.
Thanks again for your support,
Kilgore Trout, ACTIVIST
Celebrities should not comment on science
Bill Gates comments on robotics
and now:
George Bush comments on constitutional law
The scary part is that one of these is really dangerous.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
- Yet another reason to use encrypted email
- Yet another reason to impeach him
- Yet another reason to abolish presidential signing statements
- Yet another reason to 'not trust the government'
The constant barrage of unconstitutionality baffles me. This man just keeps adding and adding to the reasons why he's the worst president ever.Colin Dean Go a year without DRM
Actually, to the extent that Mr. Bush is saying "if we believe there's a ticking bomb in a letter we will send the bomb squad in first and resolve the legal issues later", there is no controversey.
Well, yes, because if you have reason to believe there's a bomb in a letter that might blow up if you take the time to go to court that's Probable Cause for doing a search, and a search warrant can be retroactively granted by a judge based on their initial evidence. This is all fine and rational and even Constitutional.
The problem with Bush's wiretapping program is that he never got warrants, and never had probable cause to get a search. His agents never went to the FISA court that was specifically designed for these cases and rarely ever rejects a warrant request. Because, like I said, warrants can be granted retroactively there is no argument based on urgency against getting a warrant, and it is important to be aware of this when defenders of this policy bring up emergency situations. The only reason not to get a warrant from FISA is because there was no Probable Cause basis for the search, FISA would therefore not have granted a warrant, and the search was unreasonable and hence un-Constitutional.
So regarding this current signing statement, the question is, what situation does it fall under? The specific wording is not contained in the article. If all he is saying is "under emergency cases of Probably Cause I authorize the search and will worry about warrants later", that's okay. If he is saying "I authorize searches whenever I feel it is necessary for National Security and will not worry about warrants at all", then this is the same as the wiretapping. The President's idea of what constitutes a necessity for National Security is clearly not limited to cases involving Probable Cause, and hence his authorization would not be limited to searches which are Constitutional.
The enemies of Democracy are
Bingo...that's the issue, not the fact that signing statements don't hold water, nor that these things kind of, maybe violate the constitution. The fact that the current regime has made it crystal clear that they feel they have the right to take any action they desire, regardless of the downstream implications, the poor survey results, or the "legality" or such actions...that is scary as shit, folks. Example: the PATRIOT act, which actually has the word "terrorist" in the acronym, is regularly used to gather evidence in non-terrorism cases. They did it, nobody sued (at least, successfully), so they set a precedent. Same thing with this crap: gosh, we knew it wasn't a bomb in that box being sent to Senator Harry Reid, but because search and seizure is now a gray area, we thought we'd just see what was in that package from the Hualapai tribal council... .
The fact that Bush has issued orders of magnitude more signing statements than any other sitting president is clear evidence that such behavior sits in his overall strategy, and the signing statements are to cover his bible-thumping, two-bit warlord ass when (if) we ever buck up and decide to run him out on a rail.
My debut novel AMITY now available: http://jeremydbrooks.c
Did the American people ratify a new Constitution? Has the old one been burned?
No, and Yes.
'Sensible' is a curse word.
Obviously he is not writing these signing statements.
The proof is the use of the word 'exigent'.
He has no idea what that means, and he certainly
would have misspelled it.
You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
Yes, he is.
This is not at all true. Near the bottom, the article does not "reveal" that "Presidents have always had such power". It instead quotes a White House spokesman that doesn't even claim Presidents have always had such power, but instead that the Constitution does not forbid the government to engage in such searches. While this is certainly true, it is irrelevant: statute law can restrict the authority of the executive beyond the limits the Constitution places on the government. The Constitution places an outer limit on what the law may allow, but not everything that is within the scope permitted to the government by the Constitution is legal for the President, particularly when law is passed expressly forbidding the action at issue.
So that the Constitution permits warrantless searches in certain circumstances, and that those exceptions might apply to the mails as well, has no bearing here.
The fact is this: Bush is signing a law adding to the protection of first-class mail beyond what is obligatory under the 4th Amendment while claiming the right to ignore it in every case in which the provisions of the law aren't redundant with those of the 4th Amendment, directly in opposition to his oath and duty to faithfully execute the laws.
Ordinarily I don't respond to ACs, but...
The framers created the constitution and bill of rights because they were facing the type of threats that we are currently facing: totalitarian government control. Terrorism is the worst thing our country has had to face in possibly centuries, granted, and it needs to be dealt with directly. But, there is very clear evidence that the Bush family and their buddies want to make their stamp on history as not the regime which battled terrorism abroad, but as the team who brought the term "executive power" back into the oval office. Rumsfeld and Cheney both worked for Gerald Ford, and were appalled at the amount of power taken away from the executive branch after Watergate, and they supposedly blamed Ford for that. The absolutely phenomenal amount of liberties being shed under the flag of Fighting Terrorism, much of which has absolutely nothing to do with Al Qaeda, Iran, Syria, etc, provide evidence to that end.
Do you feel safer since 9/11? Are you confident the Freedom Tower will stand forever because W can open your mail? Did hanging Hussein and killing 3,000 american soldiers as punishment for Hussein executing 148 Sunnis shut down the suicide-bomber factories? Don't even get me started on the irreversable damage done to the establishment clause...This is about control and power, not security.
That's why we can meet in groups and discuss politics without control. That's why we can protest in public. That's why we can carry guns. That's why we can publish information and criticisms of the government. Once you let those rights go (which W has been doing a great job on, summarily), it is really hard to go back; and if we can't discuss what our leaders are doing publicly and criticise them and protest their actions and not have to worry about if that letter to the editor of the Times was intercepted and "stored as evidence of terrorism", then we lose our quasi-democracy and become a full-fledged plutocracy/oligarchy, just like the one we went to war to split from in the 1770's.
My debut novel AMITY now available: http://jeremydbrooks.c
... look forward to the pending constitutional crisis triggered when a Postal Inspector places an FBI agent under arrest.
Well, yes, because if you have reason to believe there's a bomb in a letter that might blow up if you take the time to go to court that's Probable Cause for doing a search, and a search warrant can be retroactively granted by a judge based on their initial evidence. This is all fine and rational and even Constitutional.
Actually, the legal idea that permits investigating a possble bomb in the mail is Exigent Circumstance not simply probable cause. In the case of Exigent Circumstances they *may* make a warrantless search, but the thing is that there has to be strong evidence that an emergency situation exists, where waiting to get a warrant will result in either destruction of evidence, escape of the suspect, or the key part: to prevent imminent danger to life or serious damage to property.
If they had probable cause to search the mail, then they should get a warrant to open it. The only time where a warrant isn't necessary is for the reasons given above.
Of course, we used to have a right to privacy of your person, which covered things like a diary. According to what I heard, this right was never written down, because the consitituonal framers considered it to be such an undeniable right, that it's not necessary to write it down. (After all, you're not required to testify against yourself, why should the government be able to use your diary against you then?) Although, no such right exists anymore, and your diary may be used against you, because it was never written down.
WARNING! This girl exceeds the MAXIMUM SAFE standards established by the FDA for BRATTINESS
>The men who wrote the Bill of Rights had absolutely no idea what kind of threats would be facing this country, and as such, their perspective is simply no longer valid.
I beg to disagree. The men responsible for the Bill of Rights, which took effect in 1791, were still around a few years later when our country was physically invaded by foreign troops. In fact, the chief author, James Madison, was President when the Brits marched in and burned the White House to the ground along with a few other important bits of Washington, DC. Since there were still plenty of Loyalist collaborators around, you could make the same arguments about opening mail, warrantless searches, etc. being in the interest of "national security." The biggest threat to our liberty then was the same as it is now, authoritarian government.
Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
No, of course not. Because technology oriented people never use or work with standard mail. It has nothing to do with you at all. Don't worry, it'll just affect those old people you see from time to time being wheeled into the rest homes. And those troublesome immigrants.
Same thing for phone taps, loss of habeas corpus, misuse of the commerce clause, ex post facto laws and punishments, free speech "zones", government support of religion, the prosecution of a war of aggression based on lies... none of these things have anything to do with you.
Hey, did you know Sony's PS3 won't play Blueray disks back in 720p?
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
I'm going to bitchslap the next right-wing pussy
Of course, if you do this, they will loudly complain that all liberals (you may not actually be one, but if you disagree with them, you are in their eyes) are hateful and mean spirited. Never mind that they will bitch-slap you every chance they get and then when you complain call you a liberal cry-baby, or claim that they were "only joking."
Of course, this is a catch-22 because if you don't fight back then you look like a pussy. If you fight back with logic, you come off as a boring dweeb, not a gung-ho action man. If you fight back with emotion, you are a hate-filled wingnut.
The average right-winger has no introspection. In fact, it would only get in the way. He needs to convince others that his world-view is correct, and he doesn't care how he does it. Looking dispationately at his own behavior would only weaken him, so he just doesn't do it. This leads to some amusing conversations where the poor right winger appears not to even remember completely contradictory statements he made just moments earlier. Facts, logic, rationality and consistencey are all irrelevant to convincing others to believe in his twisted paradigm.
Pretty much any statement a right winger makes about others is actually, through psychological projection brought about by an extreme lack of introspection, a direct statement about that right winger. Gays are bad? He's gay. Welfare cheats are bad? He'd mooch off his dying grandma. Lazy immigrants a re a drain on the system? He's a lazy git who never worked harder than he had too in his life. Liberal bias? Conservatives own the majority of the media. Liberals lack morals? He has the morals of starving weasel.
In order to translate from right-wingenese to reality-speak, just assume that whatever a right-winger says to others actually applies to himself. Their world view is based on lies and manipulation so in order to validate themselves, they must spread those lies and the culture of manipulation and dehumanization that goes along with them. Ever wonder why they so frequently rant about "Humanism?" It's because they hate humans, themselves in particular. They see humans as greedy, immoral, sinful creatures only capable of civilization and cooperation so long as someone with a big stick is watching over them. That is not, in fact, the case for most of us, but it is the case for the average right-winger.
Thus, they need to spread their lunacy, in order to drag us all down to their level.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Actually, the legal idea that permits investigating a possble bomb in the mail is Exigent Circumstance not simply probable cause
Ah, thanks for the correction. I was using Probable Cause to mean Exigent Circumstance, when Probable Cause is only what you need to get a warrant, not bypass it.
Of course, we used to have a right to privacy of your person, which covered things like a diary. According to what I heard, this right was never written down, because the consitituonal framers considered it to be such an undeniable right, that it's not necessary to write it down. (After all, you're not required to testify against yourself, why should the government be able to use your diary against you then?) Although, no such right exists anymore, and your diary may be used against you, because it was never written down.
I've always thought that the 4th Ammendment was pretty clearly granting a right to privacy. If I turn "right to be secure against unreasonable searches" into a positive statement I get "right to privacy". That's what privacy is -- the right to not have people search through your business without justification. Also, it specifically states "right to be secure in their persons... and effects against unreasonable searches" which sounds to me like privacy of your person and any diary you might be carrying.
If that's not the case in practice, well, surprise surprise another of our Constitutional rights is trampled with hardly a murmor from the people. To me, that is exactly why cases like this are important. It's already bad enough how our Constitutional rights are ignored and denied us -- when the powers that be openly state that they do not intend to follow the Constitution, then the level of abuse is only going to be throttled up.
The enemies of Democracy are
Well then I considerify myself a dictation only in a hypertheatrical situification.
Love, George.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
"but at the same time complain about the 2nd Amendment and the general pro-gun attitudes of Republicans."
We're not anti-gun, we're just anti- the pro-gun people such as yourselves who constantly pop up with off-topic comments like these, evangelizing about what we "really should" care about. Really, unless your plans involve yelling "Sic semper tyrannis!" while jumping off a balcony, how exactly would easy access to firearms prevent the Bush Administration from reading your mail?
"an armed public is the only way to have any level of resistance if a government becomes truly oppressive."
If a republic becomes "truly oppressive," it's already too late; there's little that easy access to firearms could accomplish other than make things bloodier. Rifles are meant to defend civilization, not to act as some sort of back-up plan if civilization fails.
"Yea, well, unarmed crowds really don't do so well against a M16 equipped military controlled by the government (need examples? see China, 1989)."
They're not limited to rifles. The example you cite famously involved tanks. They also have airplanes with bombs, artillery, and any number of mean and nasty ways to kill you without being anywhere near you. And a truly oppressive government, the bogey man you try to use, wouldn't just stop at killing the man who has an AK-47 in his hands, they'd also wipe out his family and several of his neighbors to use you as an example. The only recourse would be the ones that Islamist militants are trying to use against us now: throwing their own bodies into the gears of war in the hopes of getting enough dead bodies to jam up the machinery.
The Kurds had AK-47s. Sadam Hussein had Sarin. Guess who won?
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/12/20 061220-6.html
"The executive branch shall construe subsection 404(c) of title 39, as enacted by subsection 1010(e) of the Act, which provides for opening of an item of a class of mail otherwise sealed against inspection, in a manner consistent, to the maximum extent permissible, with the need to conduct searches in exigent circumstances, such as to protect human life and safety against hazardous materials, and the need for physical searches specifically authorized by law for foreign intelligence collection."
Begin Rant
Scientific evidence shows that neither liberals nor conservatives actually switch off the logic centers of the brain and work solely using the emotional centers of the brain when anything related to politics is being considered or if a political party is mentioned.
Apparently, both the left and the right and all adherents of a two party system make their political decisions with an IQ of 3. It is especially sad is that some of those IQ 3 decision makers are extremely intelligent when they get away from politics.
The rest of us only emit a sad sigh as these idiots put one corrupt and power mongering parasite after the next into office. We helplessly watch as you decide which rights and freedoms we must give up this week by picking an (R) or a (D). Both your R's and D's seek to strengthen the power of their level of government rather than keeping the government to the absolute minimum required for society to function. Both cater to corporate special interests rather than the interests of the people. I hope against hope in my little heart of hearts that one day political parties will be abolished, and congress will spend an entire year doing nothing but repealing existing laws that run contrary to the interests of the common man rather than tacking on new ones.
If you'd like to really run with it, you might even hope that candidates will be chosen according to merit and intellect rather than popularity and purchased academic honors. It seems the children of extremely wealthy old school money always come away with a masters from an ivy league school. They must all be brilliant eh?
End Rant
The distinction you are avoiding is between a war where someone like Bush Jr simply begins attacking a non-aggressive opponent for reasons economic (or imaginary), and a war where an attack is made to defend against such unreasonable actions (eg, Kuwait, WWII.) Aggression on the one hand, defense on the other. Got it now?
The "Gestapo", as you call our authorities, has arrested many, held them without recourse to representation or even a hearing before a court, tortured them. It has also tapped other's phones, opened their mail, put them secret lists (no-fly, for example), and censored them.
If you believe these crimes must be committed against me before I can legitimately object to them or characterize them as representing a negative trend, then I firmly disagree.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
I'm sorry, perhaps I'm simply obtuse, but I fail to see how a story entitled "Bush Claims Mail Can Be Opened Without Warrant" in a political section entitled "Your rights online" while the rest of slashdot pursues technical issues as per usual is in any way "putting our lives on hold otherwise."
I read the story, and commented (several times), because citizen's rights are a concern to me, having people's mail opened is a concern to me, and I'm definitely a "nerd." I find the idea that this issue is not important and/or inappropriate to the site or the particular section on the site to be nearly incomprehensible. Furthermore, "nerds", to me, is a collection of (mostly) pretty smart people with a fair amount of collective power; people, in other words, who I am interested in going over such issues with.
Your milage obviously varies. However... I suppose I have to ask: Why are you even reading the story? Did you fail to read the title, the section, the summary, or were you simply not interested in any of the technical topics offered to you today as alternatives to this story?
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Well, that is a simplification of things, but mostly true in my experience. There are many different breeds of liberal. I was describing the stereotypical Eastern Establishment Liberal, such as the Kennedy Clan. Good hearted, but just as fond of aristocracy and heirarchy as your average neo-con. You are describing the college/activist liberal, or perhaps the hippy/granola liberal. Different beasts entirely.
Remember, not all conservatives are the same, either. For example, some think the magical free market will fix everything, while others think the magical man in the sky will do it. Of course, none of them think they will be the ones to fix everything. Don't be ludicrous, that would require effort that isn't entirely selfish, and everyone knows that humans are completely selfish, right?
The problem with the magical free market is that it isn't free enough. If we just do away with all labor, environmental, safety and monopoly regulations, abolish all taxes and just let the most sucessful do whatever they please, then everything will magically work perfectly. Really. Trust us, why would we lie to you? Oh, to try to get you to pay for our mistakes? LALALALA I can't hear you! Personal Responsibility! Don't look behind that curtain over there, look over here! Morals! MORALS! MORALS!
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
put them secret lists (no-fly, for example), and censored them.
I have personally been affected by the no-fly list even though I am not a target of the government campaign of "better security".
Every time I go to the airport to travel I expect to wait an extra while during the time they freak out over my name (which is very common actually) and then realize I'm not in my 40's and my middle name isn't the same as the other person (just the same initial). Then they apologize for the delay and I go on my way.
The first time was cute, but it happens every single time I go to the airport. I don't bother trying to use the automated baggage drop off teller because it won't let me without over ride from them so I always go to the counter first.
"I am the king of the Romans, and am superior to rules of grammar!"
-Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (1368-1437)
You actually hit a nail on the head.
Full disclosure: I'm pretty much somewhere to the left of most people. Im not a socialist, but I'm a greeny humanitarian athiest non-nationalist who really does think people are more important than profits (but conceeds its rarely as simple as that).
I've noticed something quite interesting watching across the pacific at the political debates in the US, and one thing is that whats often being called a "conservative" often doesnt seem to be that well conservative. Its pretty much the same here.
I'm going to do something really fucking wierd for me and argue for traditional conservatism for a bit.
I've always taken conservatism to be a grand old tradition starting with Edmund Burke basically stating in a round about way that tradition trumps human reason. Now whilst that can be accused of anti-intellectualism (and its a correct accusation on some level) its good to look at the context historically.
a-priori reason up till at least the modern times lead to two major strands of politico-economic thought. The workerist communism of Karl marx, and the free market liberalism of Adam Smith. Both brilliantly argued, but both historical failures (some would argue free market liberalism, the dominant ideology of the west has infact redeemed in the past 100 or less years. maybe) itself in its ability to deliver positive outcomes for people.. Consequently conservatism argues for small business, authoritarian but not necesarily too economically intrusive government, against welfare , for monarchy (although Burke was fond of the liberal republicanism of the US revolution despite its origins in the french revolution he despised, but for diferent reasons, principally that he saw them as patriotic and without much of a tradition anyway to squash) and conservatism was largely protectionist. He didnt like the idea of a free market that would squash village and farm economys. Although Karl marx's mob wasnt around yet at the time of Burke, he would of passionately hated it, for its complete untraditionalism and anti-monarchism. Burke also strongly suggested traditional social mores always trumped 'experimental' philisophical social moralitys. If your social system came from a philosopher rather than a pulpit or king, chances are Burke hated it.
Now you can see some of that in the republican rhetoric, but not all of it, and the US is somewhat of a special case, in that the founding fathers republicanism was also profoundly classically liberal. The support base of the republicans tends to come from agricultural communitys, its supporters, and southern 'patriotic' sorts of sentimentalism. Basically a conservative electorate.
But heres the rub. Whilst the republicans (despite the rhetoric about small govt, a liberal idea) do tend to do local policy in a vaguely conservative manner, the foreign policy is deeply non conservative.
Burke always valued tradition. And that means that stomping traditional muslim countries and replacing govts with liberal democracys is a bad thing for conservatives, because conservatism understands that the local tradition is what 'evolved' under the 'best of all possible worlds' within that community. Many traditional conservatives have noted this, and pointed out that neo-conservatism (as many of these neuvo conservatives have dubbed themselves. When said 'conservatives espouse free market ideas, they will tend to be refered in academia as 'neo liberals') appears to have verry little respect for local tradition and thus isnt conservatism)
So yeah. What Im arguing is that at least on foreign policy , and on some level foreign trade, the conservatives of the US establishment appear to be anything but, and paradoxically the liberals appear to be more conservative.
Its an odd conundrum.
Excuse the Unicode crap in my posts. That's an apostrophe, and slashdot is busted.