Letters to the Editor
William Timberman
Published Letters: 3298 Editor's Choice: 7
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@Che Pasa
[Read the article: The DOJ's explicit refusal to obey the law]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]You and I have much in common, I suspect. When I hear the phrase that these honored dead shall not have died in vain, I think of Joe Hill and Martin Luther King as well as Nathan Hale. With Glenn and Mona, I think let there be politics between us. With Rush Limbaugh, GWB and Attorney General Gonzales, only scorched earth is possible.
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@ Kovie
[Read the article: The DOJ's explicit refusal to obey the law]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Understood. My view is that their own incompetence has already overtaken them. Short of another 9/11, or an eyes-shut, all out, devil take the consequences attack on Iran, I'm of the opinion that they're more likely to end with a whimper than a putsch.
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Good governance still exists
[Read the article: The DOJ's explicit refusal to obey the law]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Kovie, I met your governor briefly and heard her speak here in AZ. Given what I've read about her agonies in 2004, I admired her good humor about it, and her no-nonsense approach to her state's problems. A very different person from our governor, Janet Napolitano, but equally devoted to the real business of government.
If we needed an example of partisanship which resorts neither to rancor nor extremist characterizations of the opposition, we could do worse than refer everyone to Christine Gregoire. Enough people like her in visible positions, and over time our Republican ideologues will begin to look more and more like the hysterics they are. It's a start.
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Eine kleine Nachtmusik
[Read the article: The DOJ's explicit refusal to obey the law]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Arne, if only they'll be so careless in their frustration as to start biting one another on the ankles instead of us, they can rage all they want. Limbaugh's comment about carrying water for the lame is encouraging in that regard.
If I were an adept at Voodou, or Santaría, my curse on them would have his little moment of pique serve as the prologue to a long, long melodrama of savage introspection culminating in the fifth act in an orgy of self-immolation.
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The vices of liberalism
[Read the article: The DOJ's explicit refusal to obey the law]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Yes, James K, I agree that the evolution of New Deal social democracy brought vices of its own. Those you mention were real enough, and did alienate the middle class. The unrelenting enmity of monied interests, however, was at least partially responsible for the distortions.
Attempts, for example, to organize welfare reform recipients into interest groups to expand their tax-supported entitlements by political action, which were both economically and morally questionable, were able to gain traction precisely because influential segments of the economic elite never accepted the basic principles of social democracy at all, and fought them tooth and nail. Why do we not have universal health care in this country? Were the excesses of liberalism at fault? I hardly think so. Such a program would be expensive, yes, but do you have any idea what a B-2 bomber costs, or who its construction benefits? Certainly not the middle class. And don't let me get started on farm subsidies....
Court-mandated bussing to satisfy the with all deliberate speed, provision of Brown v. Board of Education, and the callous social engineering which it sometimes embodied, was alienating to many, but it was also a genuine attempt to end institutionalized racism in the country forever. Absent passionate opposition to any attempt to solve the underlying problem, and malicious demagogery about the solutions attempted, cynically pursued throughout by the right, wiser solutions might well have been found.
In short, the middle class was disgruntled by what it perceived as its own neglect at the hands of liberal bureaucrats, who often did have a tin ear when it came to the difficulties of earning a living and getting by, and who -- not without reason -- were contemptuous of business interests. This alone, however, would not have been enough to turn them against their own economic interests, had not the right worked assiduously to turn reform into a holy crusade.
We should congratulate the right for its political acuity, and its tirelessness, but when measuring the evils of left and right, we should never forget who it really is who doesn't want the middle class to have a seat at the table; who doesn't in fact, want a middle class to exist at all.
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An eye on the consequences
[Read the article: The significance of the FBI's law-breaking]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The blogs, particularly Glenn's and Jack Balkin's, have done a masterful job of keeping an eye on the recent flood of unconstitutional legislation -- such as the MCA -- which has enabled our nascent KGB operatives and torturers. They've also been very good at illuminating the known instances when government agencies from the U.S. Army to the FBI have operated outside even these rotten laws.
What they probably cannot do, but the legal profession and the media can do, is to keep track of any suspiciously political prosecutions, harrassment, or blackmail which appear to be based on illegally-collected data. They can also alert us to instances of prosecution for non-terrorism related crimes in which the evidence seems to have been collected by the same illegal machinery.
This will by definition be hard to monitor, but if we're right about the likelihood that illegally-collected data will be used this way, the earlier we can document instances of it, the quicker we can mobilize a constitutional defense against it.
The Bush administration is arguably already guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors, but it also employs a veritable army of people at all levels to sweep such crimes under the rug, and it wouldn't surprise me if one of the crimes we don't know about is blackmail of prominent -- or even not so prominent -- critics both inside and outside the government. What we desperately need is an early warning system -- sniffers, snoopers, whistle- blowers, etc. -- which can provide us with evidence, and we need a mechanism to make this evidence public.
My own belief is that any evil shenanigans which are this widespread, and this cavalierly employed, will leave a trail. In fact, given the demonstrated incompetence of this administration, I think you can count on it. We should be ready to make them pay for it.