Bush declares that the government is not reading (listening) to the content of the phone messages being tapped by our security apparatus. He’s probably trying to figure out why people are so upset. After all, he’s trying to protect us from terrorists.
Oddly, I believe him when he says this. I believe, at least, that he believes it. But that old saw, the path to hell is paved with good intentions, comes repeatedly to mind.
He seems not to “get” the idea of precedence. Maybe he personally would not abuse his authority by creating and tracking an enemies list like Nixon had, but what about the next president? Bush’s entire posture since he was elected has been to take back what he perceives as legitimate executive authority, stripped in the wake of Watergate. He hasn’t let anyone or anything stop him. He’s been very successful at this so far.
So the next one in the White House gets to look at all this restored authority and comes to the conclusion that this is a good opportunity to rid the country of–
An invasive press. You want to know a reporter’s sources for a particularly stinging article? Look at his/her phone records and just start tracking down those people. No, you don’t have to listen to content, all you need are the names.
How about a grassroots movement for an opposing political view? Call lists that fan out from the spokespeople or movement organizers. A few visits by the FBI, a couple of tax audits…
Lobbyists should be wary of this. As should the politicians they lobby.
Back in the hairy days of HUAC, the thing that got people in deepest do-do with the committee was a refusal to name names. We forget what a chill that sent through the country. We forget that people lost jobs, spouses, their lives over that bit of invasiveness.
But they were trying to protect us from (gasp) COMMUNISTS!
The question that needs to be asked–seriously–smacks of a kind of libertarian posturing, but it is the question. How much personal freedom are we willing to give up for a sense of security?
And it would be just a sense, not actual security. Because the government can’t promise the real thing in this instance, certainly not the way they’re going about it.
Unless…
The terrorists hate us. They admit it. They hate us for our freedom, because the way we exercise it looks decadent and evil to them. And they don’t want their young people infected by it. So maybe Bush Inc. thinks that the best way to protect us is to take away all those expressions of freedom the terrorists hate so much.
I wonder what a Christian D’or burkha would look like?
Nah. They aren’t that clever.
Are they?
A student of my acquaintance recently told me that he had a solution to the whole issue of spying by our own security agencies. He simply did nothing which he was ashamed of. When I told him that neither did most of the victims of HUAC, he didn’t get it.
“What’s culpable is a matter of legal definition. Maybe you’re not ashamed of what you do. But if the law changes to make what you do a crime, you’ll find yourself hiding that activity. Or ending up in jail.”
“That can’t happen here.”
Ah. Where’s that Sinclair Lewis novel?
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