Put Your Civil Liberties Down and Back Away Slowly

I have just finished reading Takeover: The Return of the Imperial Presidency and the Subversion of American Democracy by Pulitzer Prize-winning Boston Globe reporter Charlie Savage, and can sum it up this way:

The phrase "we are so completely fucked" is the understatement of the century.

Over the past two years, as one outrage after another by the Smirky-Darth administration has come to light, the cumulative impact has been numbing: Abu Graib, torture, rape and murder of innocent civilians, American citizens secretly and indefinitely detained, warrantless wiretapping of anyone and everyone, hundreds of billions of dollars stolen from taxpayers to enrich bush/cheney cronies, laws ignored, laws broken, the Constitution shredded.

Even the death of our last hope - the self-strangling of the "Democratic" Congress - is just one more hardly-felt blow to a body politic already at death's door.

The great revelation of Savage's meticulously documented book is just how thoroughly, successfully and permanently this maladminstration has stripped power from citizens, from Congress, from the bureaucracy and from the courts, until there is legally and literally nothing anyone can do to stop this or any other president from exercising the absolute power he has finally acquired.

Right now, this minute, if Smirky took it into his head to declare martial law, dispatch Blackwater to round up everyone who objects and throw them into Guantanamo forever or just summarily execute them, there is nothing - nothing - to stop him.

(More after the jump.)


Martial law? Specifically authorized by Congress in the Military Commissions Act of 2006.

Secret and indefinite detention of citizens? Once it was stopped only by the prospect of a Supreme Court decision on Jose Padilla, but Congress specifically stripped the courts of jurisdiction in such cases in - you guessed it - the MCA.

"The Republican-led Congress used the Military Commissions Act to virtually eliminate the possibiity that the Supreme Court could ever again act as a check on a president's power in the war on terrorism. The bill aslo granted a congressional blessing, in statute, for many of the hugely expanded executive pwoers that the Bush-Cheney administration had previously seized onb its own, ensuring that they would be even more difficult to roll back."

The "Commander in Chief" of America now has powers over his own citizenry that dictators like Pinochet, Somoza, and Mugabe, who slaughtered thousands of their countrymen, could only dream of.

Because the powers of the "Commander in Chief" of America were handed to him on a silver platter by a Congress democratically elected by the people.

We asked for it, we deserve it, we got it.

Forgive us, Ben: you gave us a Republic, but we couldn't keep it.

If you're thinking about next year's elections, don't bother. Seriously, if you'd spent seven years accumulating unprecedented power, the kind of power that allows you to straddle the world as a colossus and do exactly as you damn well please, would you just give it up and walk away? Especially if it meant handing all that hard-won power to someone who stands for everything you hate, despise and loathe?

And if you were that someone, suddenly handed, by virtue of having won a democratic election, power on the level of that wielded by medieval kings, would you demand that Congress take it away from you? Especially when you need all the power you can get to undo the damage done to your beloved country and the world over the previous eight years?

The kind of power that we, the people, have handed to the Commander in Chief of America is the kind of power I wouldn't trust in the hands of anyone. Not Obama, not Edwards, and certainly not Hillary.

Hell, that kind of power would turn even gentle, Department-of-Peace-creating Dennis Kucinich into a monster.

We are lip-deep in the quicksand, people, and sinking fast. This one is not going to be fixable in a year, or a decade, or a generation.

No, I don't have the answer. I don't think a real, bullets-flying revolution is practical, much less winnable. Nor do I think continuing to elect "Democrats" who perpetuate the status quo is going to cut it.

But because so many of these dictatorial powers are tied to Smirky's claims of inherent and exclusive executive powers in prosecuting the "war on terror," the key may be taking that excuse away.

I've argued for a long time that the Iraq occupation and the temporarily derailed attack on Iran have nothing to do with terror, oil or even enriching cronies. They are all about creating and perpetuating permanent war. And permanent war is the one irreplaceable ingredient in establishing and maintaining a dictatorship.

Leaders at peace are leaders with minimal power. Leaders at war have carte blanche.

So the first step in restoring the Constitution is to not just end the Iraq occupation, but change the "war on terror" into what it should have been from the beginning: a criminal investigation, with law enforcement making arrests and civilian courts trying suspects before civilian juries.

It's going to be a long, hard slog through the enemy jungle, dodging snipers, drinking fever-water, eating our boots.

But it's one we've faced before, and one that the smartest sumbitches who ever lived (thank you Molly) knew we'd face again. One of them spoke the words that gave them strength then, and give me strength now:

Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death."

Happy New Year.

Cross-posted at BlueGrassRoots.

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Rall: Is Dems’ “No to Iraq, yes to Afghanistan” any better than Bush?

Bhutto assassination seems to confirm his take

His succinct answer? No. First, Ted Rall makes the case this is the wrong war in the wrong place:

In fact, Osama bin Laden was in Pakistan the whole time U.S. forces were “looking” for him in Afghanistan. So was Al Qaeda, and most of its training camps. The money for 9/11 came from Saudi Arabia. The hijackers came from Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

Being fought by the wrong military:

I’m not convinced the military can fight terrorists. Blowing up schools and weddings is a lousy way to fight Islamic extremism. The history of counterinsurgency shows that it’s easier to kill your enemies with an open mind than with bombs. But if you’re determined to go the military route, you’d be better off taking on Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Egypt — in that order.

Rall says he expects little different from both Democratic Congressional leadership and presidential candidates.

But, he notes that some educated voters are starting to see things differently.

Not everyone is falling for the Democrats’ “forget their war, let’s fight our war” spiel, though. A letter to the editor of the Times began: “I hope that when the Bush administration and NATO conclude their analyses of the Afghanistan mission they will reach one inescapable, common-sense conclusion: that Western-style democracy cannot be militarily imposed on a culture that is based on tribal loyalties. Maybe at that point, our nation and the world will be able to finally use our economic and human resources in a more efficient manner.”

Personally, I accepted the war in Afghanistan when it started, though I wasn’t gung-ho about it.

But, if you look at things today, short of pumping far, far more troops in their than the Soviets ever did (extra troops needed to offset the Soviets’ indiscriminate use of mines), we don’t have a chance in Afghanistan.

And, getting back to Rall’s initial point, the assassination of Benazir Bhutto in Pakistan shows that fighting in Afghanistan without doing anything about Pakistan is like Sisyphus vainly pushing the rock up the hill.

I would say that we should privately give Afghan President Hamid Karzai a Dec. 31, 2009 deadline (very generous) for us wrapping up our presence in Afghanistan. We then should get serious with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and threaten not just a cutoff of economic aid, but a push for international sanctions.

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I Do Not Think I'll Ever See....

Timber... one of the Whitehall trees is felled

They hate us for our treedom.

At a time when Gordon Brown has pledged to make environmental issues one of his key priorities, the decision to chop down trees just yards from No 10 has been criticised by Tory MPs and environmental groups.

Conservative environment spokesman Peter Ainsworth said he was 'depressed and unhappy' at the loss of the trees, which he said made the environment 'another victim of the so-called War on Terror'.

Six trees will disappear from Whitehall, three from neighbouring Parliament Street, two from Horse Guards Avenue and one from Privy Gardens. They are London Plane, Maidenhair and Oak. The work was due to be completed by the end of the weekend.

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Four Thousand American Deaths In "War On Terror"

I find this extraordinarily sad, but Bloomberg is reporting that America's losses in Iraq and Afghanistan have just reached 4,000.

According to Bloomberg

Four thousand U.S. service members have died in U.S. President George W. Bush's ``war on terror'' in Iraq and Afghanistan 5 1/2 years after American forces ousted the Taliban in December 2001.

A total of 3,596 have died in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion that removed Saddam Hussein from power. Some 2,957 of that number were killed in action, according to the latest Department of Defense figures. More than 26,500 personnel have been wounded in that conflict, 11,959 of them so seriously they couldn't return to duty.

In Afghanistan, 404 American personnel have died, of which 224 were killed in action. Those deaths include 61 personnel who died in Pakistan and Uzbekistan in support of the operation. Some 1,361 have been injured; 813 of them couldn't return to duty.

Even if you don't believe in God, you might want to say a prayer for all of them tonight. You might want to say a special prayer for the nearly 12,000 who were so injured they couldn't return to duty. It is so easy for us to forget them. They must never become faceless.

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Let us remember who we are

On this day 231 years ago, 56 Americans signed their names to a revolutionary document. In so doing, they branded themselves as traitors and risked paying an awful price. They also defined what it means to be a citizen of the United States.

Not only did Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin and all the others declare our independence from a king, but they also set forth on paper who we are as a people. We have tried to live up to their ideals ever since. We succeed, sometimes in surprising ways, but we also fail. We stumble. We stagger up. And we try again.

To be a patriot of the United States is to remember who we are.

To be a patriot of the United States is to hold our neighbors and our government accountable.

To be a patriot of the United States is to hold even ourselves to these ideals as difficult as they may sometimes be to follow.

To forget -- to claim that "all" means only our friends, only our family, only our closest neighbors or only the people within our borders -- is to turn our backs on the legacy of our founders. It is to lose our way as Americans.

Two hundred and thirty one years ago, brave people signed their names to the most revolutionary idea of all:

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.

Amid the fireworks and barbeques today, I pray that we can remember what our country is supposed to be.

Even in a time of war, terror and fear, we must remember our ideals. We do not stand for torture, persecution of others, discrimination and the imperial idea that we can do anything we want to anyone who frightens us.

On this day, let us remember who we are.

[This was cross posted from In This Moment.]

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Two Unequivocal Truths

According to TPM Election Central John Edwards has released advance excerpts of a speech he is going to give later on today. Within that speech Greg Sargent finds the quote of the day.

"Today, we know two unequivocal truths about the results of Bush's approach -- there are more terrorists and we have fewer allies."

In related news the AP reports that President Bush's approval rating in the AP-Ipsos poll has tied its all time low--32%.

Damn, I wish the "War on Terror" was just a bumper sticker. It sure isn't much of a policy.

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I lubz muh guns; I needs muh guns...

... not really. I don't actually own any firearms (oh no, better watch out; burglars will soon flock to my apartment...), but I don't have a fundamental problem with people owning them with restrictions. Assault rifles, automatic hand-guns (tech-9, Uzi, etc.), and the like are probably better left in the hands of professional... um... gun users, like the military; they don't really offer much in the way of civil purposes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, second amendment and all that - whatever, we put all kinds of restrictions on speech, property seizure, assembly, yadda yadda yadda. There's no (rational) reason why similar restrictions should not be put on the second amendment.

Anyway, Joe Sudbay over at AMERICAblog wrote a little ditty about the NRA's opposition to Sen. Frank Lautenberg's (D- New Jersey) proposed legislation to

increase public safety by permitting the Attorney General to deny the transfer
of firearms or the issuance of firearms and explosives licenses to known or
suspected dangerous terrorists

Sudbay writes:

Think of all the things the Bush administration has done, all the laws
they've broken, all the rights they've taken away, in order to "fight terror."
They've tapped our phones, read our emails, thrown us in jail without the right
to an attorney or even a trial, assumed that we're guilty until proven innocent.
But all of that, we are told, is necessary if we are to stop suspected
terrorists from killing another 3,000 Americans, or worse, killing 1 million
Americans with a nuke.

But God forbid a suspected terrorist isn't permitted to buy an Uzi. Oh no,
we wouldn't want to take away the constitutional rights of a suspected terrorist
to buy the weapons he needs to kill us all. No, that would be un-American.

I think he has missed point, and I think I'm with the NRA (!!!) on this one.

Here's the thing... one of the (many) problems I have with the Bush administration is their (mis)use of the words "suspected terrorist." When you start treating "suspect" people different, you are inherently assuming guilt. Of course, assuming guilt isn't always a bad thing; individuals make assumptions of guilt all the time. It is a problem, however, when the State begins to value the assumption of guilt over that of innocence. Sudbay's correct when he cites the DoJ's crimes against our rights and privacy - data mining phone records, reading e-mail, labeling people "enemy combatants" to circumvent civil liberties - so why would he support further violations of civil liberties based entirely on "suspect" status. Of course, my opposition to S. 1237 is much different from that of the NRA - mine is based on conceptions of justice, while the NRA's is drawn from their apparent desire to see a fully armed and militarized society, but yes, our substantive opposition is the same.

I can understand someone reading this and thinking Egad! I don't want a terrorist buying a gun! Why, they might... terrorize with it! Have you forgotten VIRGINIA TECH!? Of course I haven't. But here's the thing, either 1) remove the word 'suspected' from the language of the bill and simply bar 'terrorists' from purchasing firearms (???) or b) screw this bill entirely and do something about individual 'suspected terrorists' based on the evidence collected.

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Dana Rohrabacher Says You Deserve to Be Killed By Terrorists

We've spent so long through the looking glass, accepting the Usurper's insane view of the world, that it's hard to remember the words we used to use - just six years ago! - to describe diatribes like this one by Rep. Dana Rohrabacher on the floor of the U.S. Congress.

Ludicrous? Outrageous? Psychotic? Anti-American?

Come up with your own description.

Thanks to Salon commenter adnoto, who interrupted a thread on the death of David Halberstam to bring this Think Progress post to our attention (link includes a transcript):

With respect to Mr. Halberstam...
I don't want to hijack here but I beg of you all to click on my signature link and watch the video of Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) tell a group protesting America's use of torture and rendition that, because they don't support these illegal and fundamentally un-American policies, he hopes their families "suffer the consequences." Now what do you suppose he meant by that?

Get angry folks. This guy should be out of a job by the end of the week.

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Once Bitten, Twice Shy

There's an old saying in Tennessee -- I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee -- that says, fool me once, shame on -- shame on you. Fool me -- you can't get fooled again.

Haven't we been here before? Sketchy evidence, based on suspect intelligence, is being touted as absolute proof of malfeascence on the part a foreign government. And since that malfeascence is a security threat to the United States, pre-emptive military action may be called for.

"We have been able to determine that this material," especially sophisticated roadside explosives called explosively formed penetrators, "is coming from the IRGC-Quds Force," said a briefer, identified only as a senior defense analyst. Direction for operations using the weaponry, he said, came from the "highest levels" of Iran's government.

Asked by reporters yesterday to provide more information on the charge, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said, "The Iranians are up to their eyeballs in this activity." He called the Baghdad presentation a "very strong circumstantial case," saying he was "not going to try to embellish that briefing" and "any reasonable person . . . would draw the same conclusions."

White House spokesman Tony Snow offered similar responses. "Let me put it this way," he said. "There's not a whole lot of freelancing in the Iranian government, especially when it comes to something like that."

Sounds rather definitive, even damning. Of course Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denies involvement. "While not denying that Iranian weapons may have been found in Iraq, Ahmadinejad implied that if they were, it was not his government's doing. We are opposed to any kind of conflict in Iraq." But we know he's a liar, and insane, right? So, are we in "slam dunk" territory? Perhaps not.

Marine Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said yesterday that he has no information indicating Iran's government is directing the supply of lethal weapons to Shiite insurgent groups in Iraq. "It is clear that Iranians are involved, and it's clear that materials from Iran are involved," he continued, "but I would not say by what I know that the Iranian government clearly knows or is complicit."

Oops. Okay, with all this evidence of Iranian wrongdoing, someone must be on top of disseminating said evidence to the press & public. What say you, Tony Snow?

"Look, the Department of Defense is doing this. What I'm telling you is, you guys want to get those questions answered, you need to go to the Pentagon."

All-righty then. Off to the Pentagon. Is the Office of Special Plans still up and running?

A call to the Defense Intelligence Agency brought a referral to the main Pentagon press office. That office referred a caller to the Washington office of the Multi-National Force-Iraq, which responded with an e-mailed copy of Sunday's briefing slides -- containing no mention of the "highest levels" allegation and a request for questions in writing. Written questions brought no response. An official from the Pentagon Joint Staff said last night that Pace had seen the briefing slides but had "no personal knowledge of any senior involvement by senior Iranian officials."

Mmm-hmm. Why am I beginning to get a vague sense of déjà vu? Oh, maybe because of these types of statements about another rogue government:

President George W. Bush on Chemical and Biological Weapons:

"We found the weapons of mass destruction. We found biological laboratories. And we'll find more weapons as time goes on. But for those who say we haven't found the banned manufacturing devices or banned weapons, they're wrong, we found them."
--Source: Interview with TVP, Poland, White House (5/29/2003)

Vice President Richard Cheney on Al-Qaeda:

"Saddam Hussein had a lengthy history of reckless and sudden aggression. His regime cultivated ties to terror, including the al Qaeda network, and had built, possessed, and used weapons of mass destruction."
--Source: Remarks to Veterans at the Arizona Wing Museumm, White House (1/15/2004)

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld on Chemical and Biological Weapons:

"We do know that the Iraqi regime currently has chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction."
--Source: Testimony before the House Armed Services Committee, House Armed Services Committee (9/18/2002)

Secretary of State Colin Powell on Chemical and Biological Weapons:

"And we made a case, I made the case to the United Nations just in February as to what we knew, and I showed drawings of a biological laboratory. We found that biological laboratory, now everybody can see it."
--Source: Interveiw with Italian TV Canale 5, Italian TV Canale 5 (6/2/2003)

National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice on Chemical and Biological Weapons:

"Going into the war against Iraq, we had very strong intelligence.
I've been in this business for 20 years. And some of the strongest intelligence cases that I've seen, key judments by our intelligence community that Saddam Hussein . . . had biological and chemical weapons . . . ."
--Source: Interview with ZDF German Television, ZDF German Television (7/31/2003)

None of these people have ever lied to us, have they, in order to wage war against a nation that posed no security threat to the US...right? Fool me once, guys....

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Let's Get Quizical

I am going to take a moment and step outside my portfolio and post something about Iraq. Generally, I am reluctant to write much about the war simply because so many others do so with much more skill. But I feel I have an opening. There has been something missing from the debate.

Every time Bush, Chaney, Lieberman et al speak on the subject of a draw down they assert two things:

1. What’s left of Iraq and the rest of the Middle East will dissolve into chaos
2. The terrorists (whoever they may be) will be able to gain the advantage of using Iraq to attack the United States.

Also thrown into the mix are assertions that:

• Terrorists will be able to use oil as a weapon against us
• Terrorists will be a step closer to their ultimate goal of establishing a caliphate
• This conflict is existential – our survival as a nation is at risk just as it was during WWII

My debate teacher used to tell me that an argument unchallenged was an argument accepted. So would some one please tell me why the Democrats are not aggressively challenging these assertions?

Where are the experts : Cole, Clarke, Albright and the others who could address these issues? Where are the white papers?

These seem to be the only arguments that resonate with what’s left of those who either still support the war or are undecided. To my thinking, this is a huge and unforgivable flaw in the conduct of this so-called debate on the part of Democratic leadership and the Democratic intelligencia.

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Surging in the wrong direction

Somehow, the Republicans managed to paint the Democrats as wanting to surrender the "War on Terror" because we see the folly of continued involvement of American forces in Iraq.

Nothing could be further from the truth, and it is time to set the record straight.

The war in Iraq and the War on Terror are far from the same thing. In fact, I would argue that their respective circles barely overlap. Iraq is a sectarian civil war and American forces are caught in the crossfire. The front in the War on Terror is located on the other side of Iran, in Afghanistan.

They keep asking for a Democratic plan. Fine. This Democrat has one. The first thing we do is get our diplomats together with Iranian diplomats and we agree to stop meddling around on their borders if they will stop meddling in Iraq. (And make Juan Cole one of the Diplomats we send.) Acknowledge that the location of American combat forces on two of her borders has something to do with Iran's sudden interest in developing nuclear weapons. Especially when it is established fact that a lot of American commando activity has been going on in Iran below the CNN line. I understand their motivation because I can read a map.

The next thing we do is start pulling brigades back to Kuwait and let them rest up and have some leave. Reduce forces in Iraq by 10,000 a month, and when they are rested, add them to the NATO effort in Afghanistan, where 21,500 additional troops would make a real difference.

I accept that Iraq is a disaster no matter what, and can't be won militarily. It is an apostacy that 3000 Americans have died in an unnecessary war. But I am not willing to lose Afghanistan too.

But that is what is certain to happen if we continue focusing on Iran, and if we lose Afghanistan, then literally, the terrorists win. (That might be the only time those words have been used properly.)

As it stands, all signs point to a Taliban re-emergence in Afghanistan in the spring, and that comes in February in the south.

It is time for us to put Afghanistan at the forefront. I support the justified and justifiable war, but I can't support the vanity war George W. Bush is intent on pursuing to the bitter end in Iraq. It is time we all take a hard look at reality, and not just the parts we want to see, and start making some hard choices. And it is time we started framing the issues.

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