Spying on Americans: How does it happen?
This is a two part series, identifying the three main causes of this problem -- all of which are directly tied to the broader issues that we face today.
The first main cause, of course, is a Far Right that is currently confusing big secretive unchecked government with patriotism, and in this instance with an acceptable strategy for gathering necessary anti terrorist intelligence.
This brief two part series will focus on the two other main causes that have enabled, rather than discouraged, such a decidedly anti Liberty, anti Constitutional, anti founding American principles, and cowardly, view.
Spying on Americans; could it be you next?
Of course not, because the Government is only interested in catching terrorists. And if we, the American people, simply trust them on this idea that, therefore, constant pains will be taken by those themselves exercising such power to see that that is only, solely, used for this purpose -- everything, ultimately, will be fine. Never mind that the entire founding principle of our Nation was that power based upon trust, rather than upon legitimate checks and balances, will be abused. Or that our Constitution was specifically established in the first place, to even prevent this possibility.
Yet, of course, the Far Right’s rhetoric on FISA and spying, has been extremely misleading, and highly inflammatory.
"Democrats, and sites like the Daily Kos, are more interested in protecting the rights of terrorists than in protecting America."
Those are some of the outrageous things that the Far Right likes to say.
It means they either don’t understand the issue, or they are lying to Americans.
But the million dollar question is, of course:
Has this been effectively shown to the country?
Consider what would have been the response from the Right and Far Right, had this been flipped around, and had it been Democrats who were making outrageous statements like this.
You can bet that not only would it not have been tolerated, the falsity of the characterization itself, backed up by repeated examples of Democrats own words, and showing loudly, clearly, and constantly, to America how Democrats were either lying, or did not understand the issue, would have been turned in to the main story itself. Not to mention that they would have had our Founding Fathers, the Constitution, our founding principles, and the concepts of Liberty and courage, squarely on their side.
But Democrats have not done this.
As a result, our debate suffers, and one of our most basic founding principles; to establish a system of checks and balances under our Constitution to prevent even the possibility of any type of unchecked powers, is being threatened.
As the New York Times noted in an editorial:
As Democratic lawmakers try to repair a deeply flawed bill on electronic eavesdropping, the White House is pumping out the same fog of fear and disinformation it used to push the bill through Congress this summer. President Bush has been telling Americans that any change would deny the government critical information, make it easier for terrorists to infiltrate, expose state secrets, and make it harder "to save American lives."
There is no truth to any of those claims. No matter how often Mr. Bush says otherwise, there is also no disagreement from the Democrats about the need to provide adequate tools to fight terrorists. The debate is over whether this should be done constitutionally, or at the whim of the president.
The importance of this type of illustration can not be overstated. Yet rather than focusing on this, Democrats have largely capitulated, in order to avoid looking weak, or "soft" on terrorism."
In addition, the framing and illustrating on the issue by Democrats has been horrible:
We are giving the N.S.A. what it legitimately needs for national security but with far more limitations and protections than are in the Protect America Act," [according to]a spokesman for Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California.
Far more limitations"?
Invoking the Protect America Act as if this is an improvement to that, when it was a stop gap "emergency measure" with a six month sunset, intended to be rectified in a few months, which gutted 30 years of oversight under the original FISA and as subsequently amended several times post 9/11?
More importantly, none of the key principles are invoked. And this approach also inadvertently makes it appear as if it is some false battle between "protections" and fighting terrorism," when effective oversight does not have to, and should not, compromise our efforts. The phrase "we are giving the NSA what it needs" does technically speak to this, but in a weak, almost reluctant sounding fashion, and the word limitations compromises it further. Invoking the Orwellian Sounding Protect America Act also adds nothing to the quote and, and in fact may also detract further.
It almost seems as if Democrats are slightly oblivious to the power of phrasing, in a sound bite world. "Well, we are not saying limitations upon our ability to catch terrorists," is what likely would be argued. But it is not what clearly comes across. (Similarly, Democrats may often hear what comes across to them, and confuse that with the way something may then come accross to a broader cross section of Americans.)
Democrats also don’t seem to have a practical sense of procedural implications and strategy. Or, if they do, they don't always exercise it:
That is, by gutting FISA in August, any reinstitutions, as a practical matter, would have to pass by a two thirds veto proof majority; a significant impediment. It is true that the gutted FISA alteration sunsets in six months. But the only thing that will be different in six months is that it will be harder than it was in August. That is, in August, our standard for thirty years had been FISA. The so called "Protect America Act," represented a radical departure from it. Since August, all "proposals" by politicians and the media alike, have been typically based off of the Protect America Act rather than FISA. And it is harder to add protections back in, then to simply have continued them, in the first place.
Yet Democrats, back in August, didn't seem to think of this either. Or erroneously thought it would not matter. Or, also erroneously, felt like they had no choice (perhaps the most debilitating perspective of the three).
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It is time to articulate the principles that matter, and convey them to America. And in Congress, for some with principles or courage, to step forward and filibuster theses cases (and not just the overly emphasized Telecom Immunity aspect of it), if need be. As should have been done with a host of unconstitutional and Orwellian labeled "Signing Statements" by the Executive Branch, that in fact, far from simply "interpreting" the law, often flat out changed or disregarded it.
Part two of this series, will focus on the role of the media in assisting the glut of misinformation that has greatly exacerbated this dilemma, and also helped to undercut an honest debate and examination of the issues.
The conclusion of both pieces is similar:
"Sunlight is the best disinfectant" - Justice Louis Brandeis.
It is time for Democrats, and the media both, to begin shedding some. For the administration has been dark, secretive, and private. And as Harry Truman eloquently put it, "Secrecy, and a free, democratic government don't mix."
Yet the argument has been, at least with respect to this issue, that secretiveness is necessary to prevent terrorists from knowing what we are doing:
Mike McConnell, who took over as the country’s top intelligence official in February, warned that the public discussion generated by the Congressional debate over the wiretapping bill threatened national security because it would alert terrorists to American surveillance methods.
"Now part of this is a classified world," he said in the interview. "The fact we’re doing it this way means that some Americans are going to die."
Asked whether he was saying the news media coverage and the public debate in Congress meant that "some Americans are going to die," he replied: "That’s what I mean. Because we have made it so public."
This argument is false. Yet Democrats, and other moderates, repeatedly allow the Far Right -- which probably legitimately believes the argument -- to get away with it. And this has enormous implications, because intuitively, it seems to makes sense: We don’t want terrorists to know what we are doing.
What is being misconstrued is that what is being kept secretive is not just the specific terrorists we are attempting to spy on and the minutiae involved, but our process of oversight and review, and in fact the operational (and protective) parameters of the program itself (even from many of those involved) -- which have nothing to do with information that can somehow enable terrorists to "avoid" being spied up.
It is the perpetuation of this argument to the contrary, and the seeming inability or unwillingness of Democrats to effectively address it and countless other overtly secretive processes -- much like the fear of falsely being labeled "soft" on terrorism by standing up for basic constitutional principles -- which has enabled what the Bush administration and Far Right have done with respect to the Constitution, as much as anything else.
The conclusion that Democrats, in one sense at least, are as equally responsible as those who have unconstitutionally usurped such power to begin with, may not be a popular one, and the degree of hyperbole that it entails could of course be endlessly and pointlessly argued over. But unless Democrats stop blaming everybody else, and stop concluding that "everybody else already knows this," and start focusing on making an effective case to the rest of America (All Democrats and other moderates), and standing up for it (Democrats and other moderates in Congress specifically), things -- in a process that feeds upon itself and gets harder and harder to rectify -- will slowly continue down the same long term path.