I think what he meant was pretty easy to decipher. Liberals emphasize fear about attacks on civil liberties out of all proportion to the actual danger–but they accuse Bush of emphasizing fear of 9/11 out of all proportion to the actual danger.
One poster referrred to Pearl Harbor as an example of how long memories last.
But I think a better example is McCathyism. Like Pearl Harbor, it is ancient history, based on an enemy who no longer exists. But for the OP, it seems likely to raise its head anew.
So maybe we could rephrase the OP–“how long will politicians be able to milk McCarthyism for political capital”?
We can live with a few terror attacks, and we can live with the Patriot Act. So far, the balance has been about right.
Now which party is it that is trying to mine Move-On dollars by emphasising “torture”, “wire-tapping” outing “covert” operatives, blocking SCOTUS nominees for being out of the “mainstream” etc etc?
That was my point … as long as you folks push left… us folks will be able to push right.
If there is torture happening, then the lefites and Move On (and McCain) are right to keep it out in public view.
If there is illegal wiretapping, the Dems and Repubs who are against it are right to demand investigations.
If Libby or Rove or Rice did out a covert agent, then others are right to call them on it.
If a SCOTUS nominee was rejected by the Repub far right “base”, then that has nothing to do with anyone else… Alito and Roberts were confirmed, after some political postuirng and grandstanding. That othe one was done in by her own party.
So, it isn’t the left that pushed at all. Now the right i ushing again - Rove’s threat to blaklist his own party members if they oppose the president on the wiretap issue. So really. Who is doing the pushing??
I hadn’t realized that civil liberties and respecting basic human rights were necessarily leftist positions. However, if the right wants, they are welcome to run on the pro-torture, anti-freedom platform. Just one question. Will the trains at least run on time?
And the torture and executions will continue until everyone loves our Benevolent Leader!
Steve, I don’t think that it’s the fact that the “left” raises the issues you mention (and I’m not willing to concede that it’s just the “left;” plenty of “traditional conservatives” are just as alarmed), but the cries of “Doom! DOOM!” that accompany them.
J. Average American can seriously empathize with the 9/11 attacks, because of the “that could’ve been me” factor, whereas with the torture, imprisonment, and wiretappings, I think that J.Average American is reasonably comfortable with the notion that “they’re only doing it to someone else.”
They either have faith that the government isn’t abusing their power, or they feel comfortable living in a certain state of denial. As long as it’s just done against those “brown people who proclaim a certain religion.”
Until (I think it’s just a matter of time) it is revealed that non-Muslim, non-brown skinned Caucasoids are being widely spyed upon and “detained indefinitely” under the mandate of National Security, the “left” (and traditional conservatives) will NOT gain mainstream traction in elevating those issues.
Lemme guess, you’re part of the “non-Muslim, non-brown skinned Caucasoid” group, ain’cha? Which reduces this argument to “Hey, as long as it doesn’t inconvenience me, go right ahead!”
The terrorists are coming! We’re all like doomed and stuff!
Voter for us or we’re all gonna die!
They hate us for our (fill in the blanks)!
Run away! Run away!
BOTH sides do it. That’s a simple fact. But, to risk equivalency, is it fair play to call one side on it and not the other (not that either side would ever stop)?
My point is that many good people look at your so-called “torture” and compare it to completely innocent people getting their heads cut off and are happy to have the “torture” continue if the people fighting this war deem it neccesary.
We get a kick out of blow hards like Teddy Kennedy standing up for the poor terrorists! Keep pushing !!!
I didn’t say it was my position; how you got that I don’t know. :dubious:
But it is one I understand. For most Americans, until it directly happens to them or someone they know personally, the situation is Somebody Else’s Problem.
It’s just a problem of social visibility, and an Us vs. Them mentality. From our (American) POV, we were minding our business until one day, a buncha terrorists drove some airplanes into our buildings. It was happening to US, live and in color.
All the bad stuff that came after (Abu Ghraib, Domestic Surveillance, Indefinite Incarceration, etc.) is just words on the news, happening to someone else, usually half-a-world away, and happening to people “linked” to terrorism by our government, whom most Americans still trust is Doing The Right Thing (the odd stumble notwithstanding).
Like I said, it ain’t my position, and I don’t agree with it. But I do understand it.
The problem with the two sides of the situation Steve is again one of social visibility. 9/11 was an in-your-face, impossible to ignore kinda thing. All the heinous shit Benevolent Leader is doing in the name of The War on Terror are individually little, insidious things (taken as a whole, though, they are pretty alarming to anyone who’s awake and paying attention).
For Americans, anyone selling something with 9/11 written all over it is going to be miles ahead of someone selling something with “Domestic Surveillance Erodes Liberty”
Call what (little) we’ve seen out of Abu Ghraib “torture,” call it something else – no good person would tolerate it, and certainly not for the reasons you’ve given.
Even if those reasons had any relevance. Which they don’t. This shit does nothing to stop terrorism or the insurgency. Quite the reverse.
And certainly nobody who accepts the Alberto Gonzalez definition – “it’s not torture unless it’s equivalent to major organ failure” – for operational purposes could possibly be a good person. Argue it as a semantic point all you like, but when it comes to defining what will and won’t be allowed, that’s an utterly indefensible position.
