kangaeru

Let me just pre-face this by saying that while I am very politically minded, every time I've poked my head in here recently, the threads and comments therein have been purely based on the waves of current political trends, rightest vs leftists, dems vs republicans, coke vs pepsi, whatever. Nothing worth reading, much less posting about.

So, I'd like to put forth a subject I think is worthy of discussion and might foster some interesting bipartisan debate.

The price of Liberty. One of the major themes of the Bush administration has been advancing an agenda to consolidate power of the executive branch of the government. This has been done in indirect ways, such as Bush's conservative Supreme Court picks, and direct ways, in his pushing for the passage, renewal, and expansion of The Patriot Act. The Administration has had to deal with numerous scandals involving wiretapping, spying, information collection, etc, on US citizens without having to go through any judicial checks and balances. This essentially hands the US Government a blank check to spy on any American it thinks might be up to possible terrorist actvities. The criteria for establishing these suspisions are pretty much completely arbitrary, and can change at the whim of those the rule is meant to set limits and boundaries for in the first place.

I have talked with many people about this, and the biggest rebuttal I have received is that, "If you're not doing anything wrong, you should have nothing to worry about." While I agree with this statement to a degree, what it doesn't take into to account is that when you surrender your liberty to those in power, if that organization ever succumbs to tyrrany or corruption, how are we to stop them? How are we to justify our own facilitation of their proliferation due to our eagerness to hand over social liberties explicitly designed and included by the drafters of our constitution so that such an outcome would be impossible?

The goal of Osama bin Laden all along has been to rot the core of western society--the things which have allowed us to be a economically flourishing and freedom loving people. Now, our Government uses threats of nuclear dirty bombs, biochemical weapons, and a plethora of other horrible, gruesome possibilities to scare people into hand over the most sacred rights which define us as Americans.

At what point should we accept that, yes, we may have to wait in airport lines for an extra hour, because the government can't as easily background check people and therefore must search everyone more thoroughly.

At what point should we accept that the possibility of a successful terrorist attack is increased because it is more cumbersome for the government to arrange for wiretapping, data sniffing, and surveillance of American citizens who may be involved in terrorist plots?

The way I see it, we are Americans, and we used to be known for our gung-ho attitudes and bravery. Now, we are known for fat bank accounts, fat asses, and hyper sensitive cry babies. If you don't believe this, you have never seen an episode of "The Lardburgers", on London's most popular morning show, Big Breakfast.

To me, it is more important to maintain the integrity of our nation and the things which keep us a free people than to surrender them for some additional security. In the long run, allowing those in power to propgate their influence unchecked will only lead to darkness--as the famous quote says, "Absolute power corrupts absolutely"

To me, the safety of myself or my family is not a high enough bid for me to support the circumvention of the structural mechanisms which ensure that the freedom and liberty of the citizens of this country are guaranteed; that every move to exercise or expand power must be brought against a balancing factor which will veto such action if it is not in the best interest of the people.

When we are so afraid of boogymen stories that we happily hand over the securities which protect our guaranteed liberties, we have forsaken everything which America stands for, and bin Laden has won. His aim has never been to militarily defeat us--but to manipulate us through fear, ironically allowing the dark, power mongering, insatiable side of those men who would rise to the elite echelons of US government, who supports puppet rulers, economically strong arms weaker countries, assassinate unruly leaders, etc, to be turned upon us so that we too may be subjected to the effects of their drunken power lust.

I am not saying that all men in the government are like this, or there are not those who are much more altruistic, but the fact is that those evil men who will insatiably acquire power will always exist, and if they see an exploitable channel through which to better amass power, they will take it. It is these kinds of men which the current safeguards are in place to stop. Men like Karl Rove, and Dick Cheney, and George Bush, in my opinion, but that's a whole nother thread alltogether.

In closing, I will quote Benjamin Franklin, who most accurately described my thoughts hundreds of years ago when he said,

"Those who would sacrifice essential liberties for a little security, deserve neither liberty nor security."

What's the asking price of YOUR liberty?

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