Tonight's first segment on Countdown tipped me over the edge once and for all. The WH has launched an FBI investigation in an effort to find out who leaked the NSA eavesdropping program. These people are control freaks who must be brought to heel before they toss 200+ years of Constitutional govt out the window once and for all.
As Olbemann so aptly noted, the same people who outed a covert CIA agent b/c her husband had the temerity to oppose them politically want to prosecute others who leaked the existence of an illegal program. Their double standard and their hypocrisy have become too much to accept. We have clearly reached a "them or us" point.
My first real political memories are of the Watergate era. I followed the scandal as closely as a teen could years before the internet(s). It took me awhile to come around to the realization that Nixon had to go, but, once I did, I was thrilled when he was forced to resign.
This WH (which, interestingly enough, is peopled by 3 key figures who were around in the Nixon era) is as contemptuous of the rule of law as the Nixon WH was. If anything, it is even more power-hungry. To make matters worse, its policies are clearly contrary to the well-being of the vast majority of the American public.
In 1998-99, we saw a majority of the House and 1/2 of the Senate vote to remove Clinton from office for lying under oath in a civil deposition. While I still think that Clinton made a bad situation worse, that whole contentious and drawn-out process seems pretty frivolous now. I WISH that lying under oath about a personal matter was the worst thing that W did while in office.
While "rehabilitating" him in 1984, O'Brien asked Winston Smith why the Party sought absolute power. After Smith answered incorrectly, Smith frankly admitted that the Party sought power for its own sake. We are ruled by people w/ an identical mindset today. This year's elections may be the last chance we really have to do something about that.
