<strong>You can't follow the constitution "some-of-the-time" and only when it's convienient.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Since you missed it the first time:
I am not for holding Padilla without charge but the other is fine because he really is an enemy combatant.
[quote]<strong>Maybe it's not a threat to protesters now but what happens later?</strong><hr></blockquote>
I don't know, what happens later?
[quote]<strong>There is NO recourse and nothing to prevent the administration from locking up anyone. There is a reason why the constitution was written the way it was.</strong><hr></blockquote>
You over-emphasize the case. There is a recourse outlined in the Constitution. There are a few, actually.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't a judge rule to give Padilla a lawyer?
[quote]<strong>Did you know that Ashcroft is writing up a new and "improved" patriot act that could strip any American of their citizenship even if they unknowingly helped an organization deemed by the administration as "terrorist".</strong><hr></blockquote>
<strong>Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't a judge rule to give Padilla a lawyer?</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yes. After he'd been detained for something like 6 months. In a naval brig. Without having been charged with a crime. One of the hallmarks of a fascist or totalitarian state is the ability to secretly arrest/detain people. How many "enemy combatants" are we holding again? Oh. They won't say. How many of them are US citizens? Dunno. They won't tell us. We know of two so far, one of whom got a quick criminal trial, and the other...well. We'll see, I suppose.
The slippery slope argument with all of this is scary to many. It's especially scary to those who don't like it when the administration (and anyone else) calls people who don't agree with it unpatriotic. It smacks of McCarthyism, and I'm waiting for someone to stand up and ask Bush, Ridge, Ashcroft, and Rumsfeld the question the next time they accuse someone of aiding the terrorists (and by extension not operating in the nation's best interests, and by extension behaving in an unpatriotic manner) by possessing dissenting political opinions. You know the one.
<strong>One of the hallmarks of a fascist or totalitarian state is the ability to secretly arrest/detain people. How many "enemy combatants" are we holding again? Oh. They won't say. How many of them are US citizens? Dunno. They won't tell us. We know of two so far, one of whom got a quick criminal trial, and the other...well. We'll see, I suppose.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Certainly people in this society of free press would report missing relatives/friends? Hmm.
[quote]<strong>The slippery slope argument with all of this is scary to many. It's especially scary to those who don't like it when the administration (and anyone else) calls people who don't agree with it unpatriotic. It smacks of McCarthyism, and I'm waiting for someone to stand up and ask Bush, Ridge, Ashcroft, and Rumsfeld the question the next time they accuse someone of aiding the terrorists (and by extension not operating in the nation's best interests, and by extension behaving in an unpatriotic manner) by possessing dissenting political opinions. You know the one.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Ah, so if you start off paranoid about an administration you're more likely to believe a slippery slope argument against them. Makes sense to me.
I'm not paranoid about the administration so it seems like a load of crap to me.
Well said MW! The thing that always surprises me is that for the first time I see our government begining to follow a lot of the examples in the novel 1984. Good is bad and black is white. The only thing as loyal populace you should be paying any attention to is the war in Eurasia ( Iraq ). I mean they're the enemy right?
Certainly people in this society of free press would report missing relatives/friends? Hmm
</strong><hr></blockquote>
Indeed. They have. We know about Daniel Padilla. We know that the government is holding people and is refusing to release their numbers or names. In other words, there are now, and have been since 9/11, secret arrests.
A free press is no guarantee against tyranny. All it does is spread the word. That's all. If the people don't care that the rights of American citizens (whatever their crimes) are being infringed upon, the press can run all the stories it wants and it will make no difference.
Freedom of the press is about the ability of the government to control the dispensation of information. If the government refuses to release any information to that free press, then there is little point in the press being free in the first place. And if the populace doesn't give enough of a damn to raise a stink about it, then there's little point in there being a free press. And if the populace protests in massive numbers and *still* the government refuses to acknowledge the legitimacy of their complaints (and, believe me, the whackier elements of the anti-war movement drive me up the friggin' wall), there is little point in there being a free press to cover their protests.
[quote]<strong>Ah, so if you start off paranoid about an administration you're more likely to believe a slippery slope argument against them. Makes sense to me.
I'm not paranoid about the administration so it seems like a load of crap to me.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Well, I didn't start off any more paranoid about it than I have been about any other administration. And the slippery slope has little, at this point, to do with paranoia. It's about thinking in terms of precedent. And this administration has set some whoppers.
Of course it sounds like a load of crap to you. You disagree with my position. That's what sometimes happens when people disagree about politics: the other side often sounds like a load of crap. But keep in mind that your position here sounds equally like a load of crap to me. Or rather, it seems to suggest an unwillingness to think about the implications of some of the decisions the current government has been making. What's most remarkable to me about all of this is that the republicans, who should be opposed to expansions of government, to political secrecy, to the infringement of individual liberties, have for whatever reason rallied behind an administration that has increased spending, expanded the government in ways unprecedented since FDR, involved the US in now two foreign wars (the second being all but inevitable), been in power while the economy completely tanked (and the firing of the administration's ENTIRE economic team would suggest that they are unhappy with the way they dealt with it), argued for the expansion of domestic surveillance abilities of federal and local law inforcement, and on, and on, and on.
And that's fine and dandy. I'm willing to sit here and debate with you, knowing full well that I cannot change your mind, and that you cannot change mine. The point, for me, is that we're debating. We're at least putting it all on the table.
I'm with you on the un-Constitutional arrests being wrong, but I'm not with you on how rampant you would make it seem, completely without evidence or facts I might add.
Also, the government has acknowledged the protests; President Bush saying "I respectfully disagree." What more do you want, him to change his mind because some protestors got together?
It sounds like that's more of an "I'm not getting my way!" gripe than a legitimate "They're ignoring the protestors!" gripe.
[quote]It's about thinking in terms of precedent. And this administration has set some whoppers.<hr></blockquote>
For instance...
I give no more creedence to the "Bush is a tyrant looking to take away all your civil rights" arguments than I did the "Clinton is a communist looking to take all your money and give it to single-mom drug-dealing prostitutes" arguments I heard from '92-'00.
You mistake me for a Republican. I don't trust big government but I sure as hell don't think we're heading for 1984.
<strong>I'm with you on the un-Constitutional arrests being wrong, but I'm not with you on how rampant you would make it seem, completely without evidence or facts I might add.</strong><hr></blockquote>
How many unconstitutional arrests do you require before you get upset about it?
As for facts (and by this I assume you mean hard numbers about the number of people currently being detained)...it's difficult to give them when the institution you're critiquing won't release them. I'm speaking of "enemy non-combatants" here. Whatever that means.
[quote]<strong>Also, the government has acknowledged the protests; President Bush saying "I respectfully disagree." What more do you want, him to change his mind because some protestors got together?
It sounds like that's more of an "I'm not getting my way!" gripe than a legitimate "They're ignoring the protestors!" gripe.</strong><hr></blockquote>
My point was not that the admin didn't pay them lip service. My point was that the admin seems to refuse to acknowledge the *legitimacy* of their complaints. And there are lots of them.
[quote]<strong>For instance...
I give no more creedence to the "Bush is a tyrant looking to take away all your civil rights" arguments than I did the "Clinton is a communist looking to take all your money and give it to single-mom drug-dealing prostitutes" arguments I heard from '92-'00.
You mistake me for a Republican. I don't trust big government but I sure as hell don't think we're heading for 1984.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Really, actually, I didn't mistake you for a Rep. My comment was meant as a kind of general statement. I do my best not to make assumptions about party affiliation, and tend ot think more ideologically, which can sometimes be far more complex than binary opposites.
Let me turn this around for a minute, because I'm honestly interested in the answer to this question, and you are clearly a thoughtful and articulate guy (?):
I'd like to hear someone explain why they *don't* share my fears. About any of this. You name it.
[quote]<strong>How many unconstitutional arrests do you require before you get upset about it?</strong><hr></blockquote>
It depends on what you mean by "get upset about it".
[quote]<strong>As for facts it's difficult to give them when the institution you're critiquing won't release them. I'm speaking of "enemy non-combatants" here. Whatever that means.</strong><hr></blockquote>
The information is out there, journalists shouldn't be so lazy that they wait for press releases.
[quote]<strong>I'd like to hear someone explain why they *don't* share my fears. About any of this. You name it.</strong><hr></blockquote>
I don't fear a slippery slope into tyranny because there have been cries that we're soon to slip onto that slope since the early 19th century.
I hear cries constantly about how all our civil rights are being taken away, trial-by-jury is gone forever, etc... etc... and all I've gotten for proof is one wrongfully jailed guy who has been given his rights and a lot of murky insinuations.
<strong>It depends on what you mean by "get upset about it..
</strong><hr></blockquote>
To become either worried or angry. How many people have to be held in a naval brig without access to a lawyer for 6 months? Two? Five? Twenty? A thousand?
[quote]<strong>The information is out there, journalists shouldn't be so lazy that they wait for press releases.</strong><hr></blockquote>
I'm not really sure what that means. Where is it? Are you suggesting that every journalist in the world is somehow either too uninterested, too incompetent, or too lazy to go dig it up? Where would they go to find it? My point is that you seem to be arguing that if there were something they would've found it by now. I'm arguing that the source of the information is refusing to reveal it. Suggesting that they're all just too lazy to get it does little to change the fact that we know neither how many people are detained nor what their names are.
[quote]<strong>I don't fear a slippery slope into tyranny because there have been cries that we're soon to slip onto that slope since the early 19th century.
I hear cries constantly about how all our civil rights are being taken away, trial-by-jury is gone forever, etc... etc... and all I've gotten for proof is one wrongfully jailed guy who has been given his rights and a lot of murky insinuations.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Well, sometimes those cries are right. Sometimes people aren't just crying wolf or being silly. I return to my question earlier: is one person "wrongfully jailed" and yet "given his rights" some months later (and, we should note, only against the administration's wishes) in this "war on terror" not enough?
My apoligies if I seem to be channeling Thoreau in all of this. I've had him on the brain for a few days.
The reason the insinuations are murky is that we are not being allowed access to the information we need. It's ironic that this is largely the same strategy being employed by Iraq right now.
" You mistake me for a Republican. I don't trust big government but I sure as hell don't think we're heading for 1984. "
Then you need to look again. The parallels are pretty plain. We're in the set up phase. That's why it's important to stop now. Of course it won't be exactly like it but close enough.
I don't fear a slippery slope into tyranny because there have been cries that we're soon to slip onto that slope since the early 19th century.
I hear cries constantly about how all our civil rights are being taken away, trial-by-jury is gone forever, etc... etc... and all I've gotten for proof is one wrongfully jailed guy who has been given his rights and a lot of murky insinuations.</strong><hr></blockquote>
groverat ,
I've seen our personal freedoms in decline since I was a youth. One small example When I was a teen a policeman had to have a warrent to search your car now all they need is " probable cause " which is a pretty general term.
The constitution is under attack all the time.
Recording phone and internet conversations gets more and more viable ( this used to be considered a big no, no under any but the most extreme situations ).
Our media ( which shapes our opinions ) is laced with editorialisim. And groverat ( I'm on the fence on this one as hand guns do kill a lot of people but still it is a personal freedom ) strict gun control ( making too difficult for a private party to own one ) will happen.
Even when I was in high school my teachers would talk about the tendancy in the world today for controlled societies to gravitate toward democracy and for democratic societies to gravitate toward the more controlled. And this was back in the late '60s early '70s.
It gets closer all the time. Our freedoms and ability to think and act for ourselves are erroded every day.
<strong> It gets closer all the time. Our freedoms and ability to think and act for ourselves are erroded every day.[ 02-20-2003: Message edited by: jimmac ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
And a major point I was trying to make was that it is an irony that the complaints about this are largely only coming from the left these days.
I'm struck, more and more, by the growing realization that the right wing in America had ceded its interest in small government and personal freedom to an obsession with both "character" and "order."
The last one is the most dangerous, of course. The privileging of order over justice is what Jefferson describes in the D of I. This is what Thoreau describes in Civil Disobedience. This is MLK's complaint about the "white moderate" in his letter from a Birmingham jail.
Hell, just listening to Rush Limbaugh earlier today, I heard him again claim that the protestors (i.e. those who do not respect the order of things) are to be held responsible for the boys who will inevitably come home in body bags. Everywhere, it seems, the message is "let the President do what he wants."
[quote]<strong>To become either worried or angry. How many people have to be held in a naval brig without access to a lawyer for 6 months? Two? Five? Twenty? A thousand?</strong><hr></blockquote>
Angry? 10
Worried? 100
Of course, it depends on whether or not I think they are truly not enemy combatants. The guy found on the battlefield *fighting against the U.S.* is an enemy combatant or a traitor. Both of which are military concerns.
[quote]<strong>Are you suggesting that every journalist in the world is somehow either too uninterested, too incompetent, or too lazy to go dig it up?</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yes.
[quote]<strong>Where would they go to find it?</strong><hr></blockquote>
The people arrested were not shat out of the sky on their day of birth. They did not live in the clouds and not interact with humans.
What a defeatist attitude you have!
[quote]<strong>My point is that you seem to be arguing that if there were something they would've found it by now.</strong><hr></blockquote>
No, I'm arguing that you can't be assured that there's something to it. There very well may be legions of folks locked up illegally, but it'll take something a tad tangible to get me to believe it.
[quote]<strong>I'm arguing that the source of the information is refusing to reveal it. Suggesting that they're all just too lazy to get it does little to change the fact that we know neither how many people are detained nor what their names are.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Or if there are even people illegally detained at all. Willing it doesn't make it so. Waiting for officials to incriminate themselves is BAD JOURNALISM.
[quote]<strong>Well, sometimes those cries are right. Sometimes people aren't just crying wolf or being silly. I return to my question earlier: is one person "wrongfully jailed" and yet "given his rights" some months later (and, we should note, only against the administration's wishes) in this "war on terror" not enough?</strong><hr></blockquote>
Enough for what? To believe we are on a slippery-slope to 1984?
Not enough for me, not even close.
The government does crap things. Waco is a great instance of folks claiming Clinton was bring us into a Communist totalitarian state. And hell, that piece of big government intervention took a lot of lives. I didn't buy it then and I don't buy it now.
[quote]<strong>The reason the insinuations are murky is that we are not being allowed access to the information we need. It's ironic that this is largely the same strategy being employed by Iraq right now.</strong><hr></blockquote>
You aren't allowed or you aren't getting it? There's a very very big difference.
There are no handcuffs on journalists, the information is out there to be found and let's hope someone gets proactive.
--
bunge:
[quote]<strong>If there's one, and it wasn't a mistake, and it can be legally repeated, then there's a problem.</strong><hr></blockquote>
It can't be legally repeated because it wasn't legal in the first place silly boy.
And of course it was bad.
--
jimmmac:
[quote]<strong>The parallels are pretty plain.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Read the book and take an objective look at reality and then try and tell me that again. I'll put you in the closet with Rush.
I agree that government is growing and that freedoms eradicate as the society evolves, but I don't see us heading for 1984. Just as we are now cycling towards big government we will cycle away from it. I do not think of things in extreme terms generally.
" Just as we are now cycling towards big government we will cycle away from it. I do not think of things in extreme terms generally. "
Since they have been talking about this since I was in high school over thirty years ago that's a pretty big cycle. Using that brand of logic I suppose the middle ages was part of a cycle also.
<strong>Of course, 30+ years ago blacks weren't exactly experiencing this more free society you are trying to describe.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Listen, there's still plenty of intolerance to go around. Here in little Salem Or. We don't have a large black population so the local yokals all think the hispanics ( they have other names for them which I shall choose not to share with you )are coming, the hispanics are coming! Don't fool yourself. We've made some progress but it's still not enough. And because the focus has mainly been on blacks there are many other groups who still get the short end of the stick.
I didn't say it was a perfect world back then. I have a personal perspective of 50 years to look back on and I do remember the awful way blacks were treated. But, by the same token the people in power weren't as smart or organized as they are today.
Also after Watergate people aren't quite as trusting of their leaders as they were before. It's a different world. The blacks may have more freedoms but americans ( black, white, or whatever ) as a whole over all have less.
Comments
<strong>You can't follow the constitution "some-of-the-time" and only when it's convienient.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Since you missed it the first time:
I am not for holding Padilla without charge but the other is fine because he really is an enemy combatant.
[quote]<strong>Maybe it's not a threat to protesters now but what happens later?</strong><hr></blockquote>
I don't know, what happens later?
[quote]<strong>There is NO recourse and nothing to prevent the administration from locking up anyone. There is a reason why the constitution was written the way it was.</strong><hr></blockquote>
You over-emphasize the case. There is a recourse outlined in the Constitution. There are a few, actually.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't a judge rule to give Padilla a lawyer?
[quote]<strong>Did you know that Ashcroft is writing up a new and "improved" patriot act that could strip any American of their citizenship even if they unknowingly helped an organization deemed by the administration as "terrorist".</strong><hr></blockquote>
Tell me when it's a bill before Congress.
<strong>Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't a judge rule to give Padilla a lawyer?</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yes. After he'd been detained for something like 6 months. In a naval brig. Without having been charged with a crime. One of the hallmarks of a fascist or totalitarian state is the ability to secretly arrest/detain people. How many "enemy combatants" are we holding again? Oh. They won't say. How many of them are US citizens? Dunno. They won't tell us. We know of two so far, one of whom got a quick criminal trial, and the other...well. We'll see, I suppose.
The slippery slope argument with all of this is scary to many. It's especially scary to those who don't like it when the administration (and anyone else) calls people who don't agree with it unpatriotic. It smacks of McCarthyism, and I'm waiting for someone to stand up and ask Bush, Ridge, Ashcroft, and Rumsfeld the question the next time they accuse someone of aiding the terrorists (and by extension not operating in the nation's best interests, and by extension behaving in an unpatriotic manner) by possessing dissenting political opinions. You know the one.
Cheers
Scott
<strong>One of the hallmarks of a fascist or totalitarian state is the ability to secretly arrest/detain people. How many "enemy combatants" are we holding again? Oh. They won't say. How many of them are US citizens? Dunno. They won't tell us. We know of two so far, one of whom got a quick criminal trial, and the other...well. We'll see, I suppose.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Certainly people in this society of free press would report missing relatives/friends? Hmm.
[quote]<strong>The slippery slope argument with all of this is scary to many. It's especially scary to those who don't like it when the administration (and anyone else) calls people who don't agree with it unpatriotic. It smacks of McCarthyism, and I'm waiting for someone to stand up and ask Bush, Ridge, Ashcroft, and Rumsfeld the question the next time they accuse someone of aiding the terrorists (and by extension not operating in the nation's best interests, and by extension behaving in an unpatriotic manner) by possessing dissenting political opinions. You know the one.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Ah, so if you start off paranoid about an administration you're more likely to believe a slippery slope argument against them. Makes sense to me.
I'm not paranoid about the administration so it seems like a load of crap to me.
[ 02-19-2003: Message edited by: groverat ]</p>
No, we are at war with East Asia. We have always been at war with East Asia.
<strong>
Certainly people in this society of free press would report missing relatives/friends? Hmm
</strong><hr></blockquote>
Indeed. They have. We know about Daniel Padilla. We know that the government is holding people and is refusing to release their numbers or names. In other words, there are now, and have been since 9/11, secret arrests.
A free press is no guarantee against tyranny. All it does is spread the word. That's all. If the people don't care that the rights of American citizens (whatever their crimes) are being infringed upon, the press can run all the stories it wants and it will make no difference.
Freedom of the press is about the ability of the government to control the dispensation of information. If the government refuses to release any information to that free press, then there is little point in the press being free in the first place. And if the populace doesn't give enough of a damn to raise a stink about it, then there's little point in there being a free press. And if the populace protests in massive numbers and *still* the government refuses to acknowledge the legitimacy of their complaints (and, believe me, the whackier elements of the anti-war movement drive me up the friggin' wall), there is little point in there being a free press to cover their protests.
[quote]<strong>Ah, so if you start off paranoid about an administration you're more likely to believe a slippery slope argument against them. Makes sense to me.
I'm not paranoid about the administration so it seems like a load of crap to me.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Well, I didn't start off any more paranoid about it than I have been about any other administration. And the slippery slope has little, at this point, to do with paranoia. It's about thinking in terms of precedent. And this administration has set some whoppers.
Of course it sounds like a load of crap to you. You disagree with my position. That's what sometimes happens when people disagree about politics: the other side often sounds like a load of crap. But keep in mind that your position here sounds equally like a load of crap to me. Or rather, it seems to suggest an unwillingness to think about the implications of some of the decisions the current government has been making. What's most remarkable to me about all of this is that the republicans, who should be opposed to expansions of government, to political secrecy, to the infringement of individual liberties, have for whatever reason rallied behind an administration that has increased spending, expanded the government in ways unprecedented since FDR, involved the US in now two foreign wars (the second being all but inevitable), been in power while the economy completely tanked (and the firing of the administration's ENTIRE economic team would suggest that they are unhappy with the way they dealt with it), argued for the expansion of domestic surveillance abilities of federal and local law inforcement, and on, and on, and on.
And that's fine and dandy. I'm willing to sit here and debate with you, knowing full well that I cannot change your mind, and that you cannot change mine. The point, for me, is that we're debating. We're at least putting it all on the table.
Cheers
Scott
[ 02-19-2003: Message edited by: midwinter ]
[ 02-19-2003: Message edited by: midwinter ]</p>
Also, the government has acknowledged the protests; President Bush saying "I respectfully disagree." What more do you want, him to change his mind because some protestors got together?
It sounds like that's more of an "I'm not getting my way!" gripe than a legitimate "They're ignoring the protestors!" gripe.
[quote]It's about thinking in terms of precedent. And this administration has set some whoppers.<hr></blockquote>
For instance...
I give no more creedence to the "Bush is a tyrant looking to take away all your civil rights" arguments than I did the "Clinton is a communist looking to take all your money and give it to single-mom drug-dealing prostitutes" arguments I heard from '92-'00.
You mistake me for a Republican. I don't trust big government but I sure as hell don't think we're heading for 1984.
<strong>...I sure as hell don't think we're heading for 1984.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Ahhh...so you DO trust big government!
<strong>I'm with you on the un-Constitutional arrests being wrong, but I'm not with you on how rampant you would make it seem, completely without evidence or facts I might add.</strong><hr></blockquote>
How many unconstitutional arrests do you require before you get upset about it?
As for facts (and by this I assume you mean hard numbers about the number of people currently being detained)...it's difficult to give them when the institution you're critiquing won't release them. I'm speaking of "enemy non-combatants" here. Whatever that means.
[quote]<strong>Also, the government has acknowledged the protests; President Bush saying "I respectfully disagree." What more do you want, him to change his mind because some protestors got together?
It sounds like that's more of an "I'm not getting my way!" gripe than a legitimate "They're ignoring the protestors!" gripe.</strong><hr></blockquote>
My point was not that the admin didn't pay them lip service. My point was that the admin seems to refuse to acknowledge the *legitimacy* of their complaints. And there are lots of them.
[quote]<strong>For instance...
I give no more creedence to the "Bush is a tyrant looking to take away all your civil rights" arguments than I did the "Clinton is a communist looking to take all your money and give it to single-mom drug-dealing prostitutes" arguments I heard from '92-'00.
You mistake me for a Republican. I don't trust big government but I sure as hell don't think we're heading for 1984.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Really, actually, I didn't mistake you for a Rep. My comment was meant as a kind of general statement. I do my best not to make assumptions about party affiliation, and tend ot think more ideologically, which can sometimes be far more complex than binary opposites.
Let me turn this around for a minute, because I'm honestly interested in the answer to this question, and you are clearly a thoughtful and articulate guy (?):
I'd like to hear someone explain why they *don't* share my fears. About any of this. You name it.
Cheers
Scott
It depends on what you mean by "get upset about it".
[quote]<strong>As for facts it's difficult to give them when the institution you're critiquing won't release them. I'm speaking of "enemy non-combatants" here. Whatever that means.</strong><hr></blockquote>
The information is out there, journalists shouldn't be so lazy that they wait for press releases.
[quote]<strong>I'd like to hear someone explain why they *don't* share my fears. About any of this. You name it.</strong><hr></blockquote>
I don't fear a slippery slope into tyranny because there have been cries that we're soon to slip onto that slope since the early 19th century.
I hear cries constantly about how all our civil rights are being taken away, trial-by-jury is gone forever, etc... etc... and all I've gotten for proof is one wrongfully jailed guy who has been given his rights and a lot of murky insinuations.
<strong>It depends on what you mean by "get upset about it..
</strong><hr></blockquote>
To become either worried or angry. How many people have to be held in a naval brig without access to a lawyer for 6 months? Two? Five? Twenty? A thousand?
[quote]<strong>The information is out there, journalists shouldn't be so lazy that they wait for press releases.</strong><hr></blockquote>
I'm not really sure what that means. Where is it? Are you suggesting that every journalist in the world is somehow either too uninterested, too incompetent, or too lazy to go dig it up? Where would they go to find it? My point is that you seem to be arguing that if there were something they would've found it by now. I'm arguing that the source of the information is refusing to reveal it. Suggesting that they're all just too lazy to get it does little to change the fact that we know neither how many people are detained nor what their names are.
[quote]<strong>I don't fear a slippery slope into tyranny because there have been cries that we're soon to slip onto that slope since the early 19th century.
I hear cries constantly about how all our civil rights are being taken away, trial-by-jury is gone forever, etc... etc... and all I've gotten for proof is one wrongfully jailed guy who has been given his rights and a lot of murky insinuations.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Well, sometimes those cries are right. Sometimes people aren't just crying wolf or being silly. I return to my question earlier: is one person "wrongfully jailed" and yet "given his rights" some months later (and, we should note, only against the administration's wishes) in this "war on terror" not enough?
My apoligies if I seem to be channeling Thoreau in all of this. I've had him on the brain for a few days.
The reason the insinuations are murky is that we are not being allowed access to the information we need. It's ironic that this is largely the same strategy being employed by Iraq right now.
Cheers
Scott
<strong>
No, we are at war with East Asia. We have always been at war with East Asia.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Oops! Sorry. That's what I get for trying to do too many things at the same time.
" You mistake me for a Republican. I don't trust big government but I sure as hell don't think we're heading for 1984. "
Then you need to look again. The parallels are pretty plain. We're in the set up phase. That's why it's important to stop now. Of course it won't be exactly like it but close enough.
<strong>
I don't fear a slippery slope into tyranny because there have been cries that we're soon to slip onto that slope since the early 19th century.
I hear cries constantly about how all our civil rights are being taken away, trial-by-jury is gone forever, etc... etc... and all I've gotten for proof is one wrongfully jailed guy who has been given his rights and a lot of murky insinuations.</strong><hr></blockquote>
groverat ,
I've seen our personal freedoms in decline since I was a youth. One small example When I was a teen a policeman had to have a warrent to search your car now all they need is " probable cause " which is a pretty general term.
The constitution is under attack all the time.
Recording phone and internet conversations gets more and more viable ( this used to be considered a big no, no under any but the most extreme situations ).
Our media ( which shapes our opinions ) is laced with editorialisim. And groverat ( I'm on the fence on this one as hand guns do kill a lot of people but still it is a personal freedom ) strict gun control ( making too difficult for a private party to own one ) will happen.
Even when I was in high school my teachers would talk about the tendancy in the world today for controlled societies to gravitate toward democracy and for democratic societies to gravitate toward the more controlled. And this was back in the late '60s early '70s.
It gets closer all the time. Our freedoms and ability to think and act for ourselves are erroded every day.
[ 02-20-2003: Message edited by: jimmac ]</p>
<strong> It gets closer all the time. Our freedoms and ability to think and act for ourselves are erroded every day.[ 02-20-2003: Message edited by: jimmac ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
And a major point I was trying to make was that it is an irony that the complaints about this are largely only coming from the left these days.
I'm struck, more and more, by the growing realization that the right wing in America had ceded its interest in small government and personal freedom to an obsession with both "character" and "order."
The last one is the most dangerous, of course. The privileging of order over justice is what Jefferson describes in the D of I. This is what Thoreau describes in Civil Disobedience. This is MLK's complaint about the "white moderate" in his letter from a Birmingham jail.
Hell, just listening to Rush Limbaugh earlier today, I heard him again claim that the protestors (i.e. those who do not respect the order of things) are to be held responsible for the boys who will inevitably come home in body bags. Everywhere, it seems, the message is "let the President do what he wants."
Know thy place, in other words.
Cheers
Scott
[quote]<strong>To become either worried or angry. How many people have to be held in a naval brig without access to a lawyer for 6 months? Two? Five? Twenty? A thousand?</strong><hr></blockquote>
Angry? 10
Worried? 100
Of course, it depends on whether or not I think they are truly not enemy combatants. The guy found on the battlefield *fighting against the U.S.* is an enemy combatant or a traitor. Both of which are military concerns.
[quote]<strong>Are you suggesting that every journalist in the world is somehow either too uninterested, too incompetent, or too lazy to go dig it up?</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yes.
[quote]<strong>Where would they go to find it?</strong><hr></blockquote>
The people arrested were not shat out of the sky on their day of birth. They did not live in the clouds and not interact with humans.
What a defeatist attitude you have!
[quote]<strong>My point is that you seem to be arguing that if there were something they would've found it by now.</strong><hr></blockquote>
No, I'm arguing that you can't be assured that there's something to it. There very well may be legions of folks locked up illegally, but it'll take something a tad tangible to get me to believe it.
[quote]<strong>I'm arguing that the source of the information is refusing to reveal it. Suggesting that they're all just too lazy to get it does little to change the fact that we know neither how many people are detained nor what their names are.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Or if there are even people illegally detained at all. Willing it doesn't make it so. Waiting for officials to incriminate themselves is BAD JOURNALISM.
[quote]<strong>Well, sometimes those cries are right. Sometimes people aren't just crying wolf or being silly. I return to my question earlier: is one person "wrongfully jailed" and yet "given his rights" some months later (and, we should note, only against the administration's wishes) in this "war on terror" not enough?</strong><hr></blockquote>
Enough for what? To believe we are on a slippery-slope to 1984?
Not enough for me, not even close.
The government does crap things. Waco is a great instance of folks claiming Clinton was bring us into a Communist totalitarian state. And hell, that piece of big government intervention took a lot of lives. I didn't buy it then and I don't buy it now.
[quote]<strong>The reason the insinuations are murky is that we are not being allowed access to the information we need. It's ironic that this is largely the same strategy being employed by Iraq right now.</strong><hr></blockquote>
You aren't allowed or you aren't getting it? There's a very very big difference.
There are no handcuffs on journalists, the information is out there to be found and let's hope someone gets proactive.
--
bunge:
[quote]<strong>If there's one, and it wasn't a mistake, and it can be legally repeated, then there's a problem.</strong><hr></blockquote>
It can't be legally repeated because it wasn't legal in the first place silly boy.
And of course it was bad.
--
jimmmac:
[quote]<strong>The parallels are pretty plain.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Read the book and take an objective look at reality and then try and tell me that again. I'll put you in the closet with Rush.
I agree that government is growing and that freedoms eradicate as the society evolves, but I don't see us heading for 1984. Just as we are now cycling towards big government we will cycle away from it. I do not think of things in extreme terms generally.
Since they have been talking about this since I was in high school over thirty years ago that's a pretty big cycle. Using that brand of logic I suppose the middle ages was part of a cycle also.
[ 02-20-2003: Message edited by: jimmac ]</p>
<strong>Of course, 30+ years ago blacks weren't exactly experiencing this more free society you are trying to describe.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Listen, there's still plenty of intolerance to go around. Here in little Salem Or. We don't have a large black population so the local yokals all think the hispanics ( they have other names for them which I shall choose not to share with you )are coming, the hispanics are coming! Don't fool yourself. We've made some progress but it's still not enough. And because the focus has mainly been on blacks there are many other groups who still get the short end of the stick.
I didn't say it was a perfect world back then. I have a personal perspective of 50 years to look back on and I do remember the awful way blacks were treated. But, by the same token the people in power weren't as smart or organized as they are today.
Also after Watergate people aren't quite as trusting of their leaders as they were before. It's a different world. The blacks may have more freedoms but americans ( black, white, or whatever ) as a whole over all have less.
[ 02-20-2003: Message edited by: jimmac ]</p>