Lame Duck on a Rampage

Think you're finally done with Dubya's idiotic run of our country? Think Dubya can do no more damage? Think again.

In the spirit of so many leaving administrations, the Bush Administration is quickly instituting - via executive order - things that might take us years to be rid of. Here's a few of the sampling the Houston Chronicle reported on:

A proposed Justice Department regulation would allow local and state law enforcement to collect and share sensitive information on citizens even when they are not suspected of involvement in criminal activity. The Americans with Disabilities Act would be weakened by permitting state and local governments to make only a fraction of their facilities accessible to the handicapped.

A Department of Health and Human Services rule change would deny federal funds to family planning organizations and clinics that refuse to hire staffers who will not provide birth control to patients upon request. The regulation would also define forms of birth control as abortion, allowing physicians and others a legal basis for declining to provide family planning counseling that includes birth control techniques.

That's right, Bushie boy, take your last few days to make life worse for the handicapped, damage our civil liberties even more, force employers to hire people who refuse to do their job and enshrine legally your unscientific, medically inaccurate, religious boogaboo definitions of birth control, pregnancy and abortion. That'll do wonders for your legacy.

We're not done with Dubya yet. I just hope he doesn't do too much damage that can't be undone.

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Where is the Outrage?

I'd like to ask you to use your imagination for just a moment. Imagine a typical house of college aged American kids. There might be band posters up on the walls of some of their rooms. There's probably the remains of a pizza and a six pack of beer in the fridge. There's an Xbox in the living room. These kids pay their rent. They are nice to their neighbors. They don't cause trouble.

Now imagine that the kids who live in this house are politically active. They are attached to certain political causes, and they are planning to peacably assemble to protest on behalf of those causes. Maybe they are sitting in the living room excitedly planning out their protest. Maybe they are on the floor with poster board and markers, making up signs.

Now imagine that the police, along with the FBI, show up to this typical house of college kids and break the door down. With weapons drawn, they force our typical American kids down on the floor and bind their hands behind their backs with handcuffs. The kids ask to see a warrant, but the police refuse. They proceed to search the house. After completing their search and finding nothing, the police set the kids free and leave.

Is this the sort of thing that should happen in the "land of the free?" No. Of course not. This is the sort of thing that happens under dictators, not under constitutions. Nothing of the sort should ever occur in the home of typical American college kids planning to exercise their freedom. If this really happened in our country, you'd be pissed, wouldn't you? If this really happened in our country, you'd expect the media to be all over it, right? You'd expect heads in the FBI and on the local police force to roll, no?

Well, it did happen. Several times. Police and FBI have been raiding the homes of those suspected to be planning protests at the Republican National Convention. You can read about it and see videos here, here, here, here, here and here. And that's just a taste.

Now, I've taken a little poetic license in my description of events. I don't know the exact circumstances of each raid. Maybe those raided weren't typical American kids. Maybe they were hippies. Maybe they were communists or anarchists. But they are Americans; Americans who are guaranteed the right to protest and the right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure. It shouldn't matter whether they are typical kids or circus side shows, investment bankers or suffering artists. They have rights, and this seems to be a gross violation of those rights and a gross violation of the principles on which this country is founded.

Of course, I don't know for certain that these people weren't all planning on bombing the RNC and causing chaos. They say they weren't and the police aren't talking. You know who else isn't talking? The mainstream media. I haven't seen a peep about these raids on the 24 hour cable news channels. Nothing in the Washington Post. Nothing in the Chicago Tribune. Not even anything in the "liberal" New York Times. With the exception of a few independent media sources and bloggers, no one is pissed. No mainstream media is anywhere near the story. No heads are rolling.

The police in Minneapolis and the FBI acted like they operate in a police state, and where is the outrage?

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Taking Tolerance Too Far

There is a great op-ed at the Arizona Republic. But while the author – Linda Valdez – is dead right about the fact that religious tolerance, something carefully pushed by the GOP, is infringing on individual rights, there is one thing that bothers me about her piece. She is adamant in her assertion that “it is time for some lines”. But this seems to indicate that we need to work on balancing our tolerance of religion with individual rights. I disagree. Rather, I think we need to scrap this idea of religious tolerance altogether.

Religion has been given a special place in our society. A prime example in current events – the successes of pharmacists who are fighting not to do their job because of religious beliefs. But why should we be tolerant of religion? Sure, tolerance in general is a good thing. But under this idea of “religious tolerance” lies the repugnant notion that religions and religious dogma cannot be challenged, cannot be questioned. Think about it. Someone tells you that they believe an embryo has a soul, as does an individual in a persistent vegetative state. You ask for their reasons. They tell you its part of their religion. This is almost always a conversation stopper, unless you are willing to “attack their religion”. And if you do that, then you are immediately open to a charge of intolerance. Why? Because religious tolerance involves deference to religious practices and, in this case, religious beliefs. Any attempt to undermine those beliefs from outside the religion in question is automatically intolerant.

Ms. Valdez is correct that religious tolerance leads to infringements on individual rights. But her desire to draw lines between tolerance and rights is misguided. Dogma does not respect the boundary of individual rights. You cannot insist that that creationism is false, and hence should not be taught to children, and still be deferent to religious origin myths. You cannot claim that women have a right over their bodies, and yet still be deferent to religious claims that they do not. You cannot claim that homosexuals should be treated like everyone else and still be deferent to religious claims that homosexuality is an act worthy of stoning. You cannot draw a line between deference to religious dogma and rights, for any line you wish to draw will immediately be seen as intolerant.

Now, in claiming that we should scrap the idea of religious tolerance, I'm not advocating any sort of legally forced belief systems. Nor am I advocating discrimination against those who hold these religious beliefs. We should be tolerant of other people. But tolerance of people who happen to religious is not the same as tolerance of religion. Our tolerance of religion has not been just a tolerance of the people who adhere to religion. That is as it should be. Rather, our tolerance of religion has extended itself to encompass a different sort of tolerance entirely - a tolerance of belief without evidence, one that requires that we not challenge this special class of religious beliefs the same way we would challenge other sorts of belief. If we are to protect our rights, that sort of tolerance has to stop.

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Colorado Has Lost It Too

On the heels of Georgia's proposed bill to define personhood as beginning at conception, Colorado now has a proposed amendment to the state constitution that would do the same. And Mike Huckabee has endorsed it.

I don't think it necessary to rehash the idiocy, from a practical standpoint, of legally defining a fertilized egg as a person. What really confuses me is that it seems as though the people of Colorado and Georgia haven't really thought about this - which is certainly something one ought to do before making something the law of the land.

Speaking of the people of Colorado and Georgia making something the law of the land, since when are facts determined by a popular vote? There is a fact of the matter as to whether or not a fertilized embryo is a person. This is something that certainly hasn't been determined. And without significant justification for the claim, which anti-choicers haven't provided (and I suspect can't provide), voting to recognize this "fact" seems both premature and arrogant.

I'm not saying that we can't possibily recognize a fact even when it's not completely settled. What I am saying is that before you can legally recognize a fact, you should have and provide evidence that it is a fact. Anti-choicers have not done this.

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Supreme Court Refuses to Hear Wiretapping Case

The Supreme Court has refused to hear a case brought by the ACLU about the government's warrantless wiretapping program. When the highest court in the land refuses to hear a case involving issues that are at the heart of our civil liberties... and how we have been gladly handing them over to the Bush administration out of fear, you know things are bad.

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Are You A Terrorist? Look Again.

The Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act. Sounds okay, right? It's just our congress trying to keep us safe from the evil terrorists again. Those of us who have been paying attention to what actually goes into congressional attempts to "keep America safe", however, are wary of the consequences of yet another law that focuses on security. And we should be. As an article at AlterNet makes clear, the Act is extraordinarily vague in defining what it seeks to prevent. So vague, in fact, that you might just fit the bill. Long quote below the fold.

The initial text of H.R. 1955 states its aim clearly enough before falling into obfuscation -- "to prevent homegrown terrorism, and for other purposes" -- a characteristic that could be argued to be its defining template. Speaking of definitions (or the lack thereof), H.R. 1955 defines "homegrown terrorism" and "violent radicalization" nebulously; the former is merely "the use, planned use or threatened use of force or violence by a group or individual born, raised, or based and operating primarily within the United States or any possession of the United States to intimidate or coerce the United States government, the civilian population of the United States, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives," while the latter means "the process of adopting or promoting an extremist belief system for the purpose of facilitating ideologically based violence to advance political, religious or social change." Ideologically based violence, in turn, is defined as "the use, planned use or threatened use of force or violence by a group or individual to promote the group or individual's political, religious or social beliefs."

I'm pretty sure that every socialist and anarchist I know fits this description, even though they would never plant a bomb or fire a gun. But they sure do think about it, and talk about it. Anyone who has ever thought that we need to scrap it and start all over again, or who has an ideological perspective that differs from those in power, could easily be viewed as a homegrown terrorist. Pretty much every fundie I know fits this description as well, although I'm pretty sure that, despite their actually having terrorists in their ranks, they won't have to worry. They run the show, after all.

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Big Brother is Watching You

People often roll their eyes when I bring up Orwell's 1984 while complaining about some strike against our civil liberties. Well, roll your eyes all you want; just be aware that the government is watching you do it. Privacy International has released the privacy ranking. And the U.S. has moved from bad to worst.

So, why are we now tied with China on a civil liberties issue? Well, you can probably blame the Bush administration, what with their PATRIOT Act and continued strengthening of the NSA and weakening of the FISA court, their warrentless wiretapping, their National Security letters, their data mining, their no-fly lists, and their cameras everywhere! The only thing we need now is really big posters with Dick Cheney's scowling face on them to serve as a frightful reminder that they've always got their eye on us.

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