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In the mid 1970s I was involved in a discussion with my father about a political campaign to require safeguards for nuclear power plants to be built in CA. When the conversation ended in disagreement, the ony thing my father could say was to call me a communist. Born in 1913, that was the worst name he could call me. I was initially surprised, but concluded that his fear of confronting the power of the establishment was so great that he had to try to dismiss and demean me. It was a small symbol of what is happening on the Supreme Court and in the depths of the Bush administration: an attempt to enhance the power of the establishment. It is essentially a backward-looking effort to gain a measure of security by giving the president, and established power, total control. Why: in my judgment it is the only way people governed by fear can deal with the messy world we live in. Autocratic and heavy handed responses are the order of the day. The Supreme Court decisions are in essence saying: big daddy knows best. Rather than face the root causes of dissent, we get decisions enhancing the authoritarian solution; the government will decide how to deal with people it considers dangerous. All the secret decisions made by Bush and Cheney, and all the new Supreme Court members support this mindset: the govenment knows best. Now seems to be the perfect time to repeat that old bromide: "the price of freedom is eternal vigilence".
