Wednesday, December 21, 2005

When Will It End, George, When Will It End?

Let me ask those of you who grew up during or because of the ‘60s whether you find comforting or unsettling revelations that the Bush administration is engaged in warrantless electronic surveillance of American citizens and that it has directed the FBI to spy on domestic activist groups? It goes without saying that we should all feel unsettled and very concerned about the administration’s decision to spy on PETA and Greenpeace as well as organizations that are certainly on the forefront of pushing for a change of policy toward Iraq. At the same time, however, having grown up learning to be suspicious about everything the government does, I have to admit to a bit of nostalgia and…yes…comfort in a return to the way things used to be. After all, there’s nothing wrong with not taking everything at face value and questioning the goals and motives of the government when those goals and motives appear to be having such dire consequences. Indeed, were it not for the fact of Nixon’s campaign against organizations that opposed the war in Viet Nam, we would never have had confirmation that the opposition was actually having its desired effect. Why else would the seemingly impregnable United States government have devoted so many resources to maintaining watch over peace organizations large and small were it not afraid that those organizations were actually making progress toward turning the nation against the war.

In all seriousness, however, in the current climate there is every reason to be very concerned about the Bush administration continuing to expand the limits of the executive beyond the confines of the law as defined by both the constitution and the Congress. Time and again, we have seen this President and this administration abuse or ignore the limits set or proscribed by the Constitution, treating its fundamental principals as nothing more than an advisory opinion. The Sixth Amendment says what? “What do you mean, submitting a nomination for associate justice of the Supreme Court because she is “one of us” isn’t allowed?” “The Fourth Amendment prohibits warrantless eavesdropping? The hell you say”.

And now we come to Article II, Section 2 – the framework for functioning of the executive. This seems to be the biggest problem for Georgie boy. He just doesn’t seem to like the idea that his job description is actually encompassed and limited by the Constitution. This latest revelation is an obvious case in point. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I just don’t seem to see any evidence in the Constitution of the President’s right to order warrantless electronic spying on his own citizenry no matter how broad a reading you give to it. I understand that he was able to gain the support of Congress to use all necessary force against those responsible for the attacks of September 11th and has, as a consequence, committed us to the wars now raging in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as the detention of hundreds if not thousands of people around the world suspected of having ties to Osama Bin Laden (whether actual or simply because his first name is Abdul). However, nowhere in the Constitution nor anywhere in the legislation now being cited by Bush and his Attorney General does it support the kind of domestic spying that is now taking place. Indeed, the legislation that does exist has actually prescribed a process for Mr. Bush to obtain the type of covert intelligence of persons and/or organizations in this country that are believed to pose a threat to our security. However, a piece of legislation like FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillence Act) in the hands of the Bush administration invariably turns into an invitation to excess and abuse and that appears to be precisely what is happening.

The question, of course, is why Bush, already possessed of the power to obtain electronic surveillance of our presumed enemies operating within our borders would nevertheless simply ignore those broad though admittedly somewhat proscribed powers for limitless power? The question is being posed by so-called “Liberals” and “Conservatives” alike including George Will in a recent Op-Ed piece in the Washington Post. The Constitution spells out in great detail the natural and necessary inter-relation of the branches of government and the necessity that each act as check on the other? Whatever limitations that FISA imposed on the President required only that the executive make a good showing to a secret court of the need for the surveillance and little more. In doing so, the Congress left to the President (through his Attorney General) complete control over the when, why and who of the application for surveillance without any requirement that Congress be consulted. Yet even these broad powers are not enough for our President and, again, the question is “why”? Would it not have been appropriate for the executive to return to Congress and ask that the already loose leash attendant to FISA be loosened further to permit him to conduct the type of surveillance we are now being made aware of and let Congress fulfill its “advise and consent” responsibilities on the subject? One can only conclude from the fact that this President chose to go with a secretive, extreme legal interpretation of FISA rather than asking that the law be further amended given the exigencies of the day because he has no regard or understanding of the Constitutional limits placed on his office and because this abuse of power is but the tip of the proverbial iceberg and such an application to Congress would likely lead to revelations about other illegal activities being carried out by this administration all in the name of national security.

With George Bush at the helm, we have been on a journey to undermine and destroy everything that this country has come to stand for. On the afternoon of September 10, 2001, we stood atop the moral high ground embraced by the world community as the victims of an unspeakable act. When Mr. Bush stood on the smouldering pile in the ruins of the Trade Center, we cheered the resolve to make those who brought us so much despair pay from what they had wrought. Our regrettable mistake was believing that Mr. Bush was capable of a measured and appropriate response to the horrors of that day. Instead, we opened a pandora’s box of violence and despair that has effectively yanked us off that high ground and lowered us to the level of those who intend us so much harm. Left to their own devices, the collective imaginations of George Bush, Dick Cheney, Don Rumsfeld et al have produced innumerable unimaginable practices from torture at Abu Ghraib to foreign nationals being kidnapped and held in secret prisons to the “rendition” of supposed terror suspects to foreign countries known to practice torture as part of its interrogation practices and now electronic surveillance of American citizens without warrant or credible justification.

And, yet again, the question is “why”? We are, above all else, a nation of laws that are not intended to reveal themselves only in times of peace and succumb in the face of terror and tyranny. It is the very fact that those laws prevail regardless of circumstance that has permitted us to assume and maintain the moral high ground. That fact, however, seems to have escaped Mr. Cheney, for one, a master of inference and innuendo who (not surprisingly) implied that the death of more than 100 people in US custody, many of which are being investigated as homicides, were acceptable and justified as a reminder to the American people that the pain of September 11th should never be far from their collective conscience.

When you think about it its an astonishing statement for one so close to the pinnacle of power in this country. It certainly makes one wonder what other reminders Messers Bush and Cheney have in store for us and the rest of the world.

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