Coyote Blog

Kevin Drum makes a good point about the Italian rendition trials.  While it is good to see some pushback on the horrible practice of kidnapping people and dumping them in countries that have no qualms about torture (sort of an outsourcing of ethics), the Italians stopped well short of showing any real backbone:

Let me get this straight: the Italian judge was happy to convict a bunch of Americans who he knew would never pay a price since they'll never be extradited, but he wasn't willing to convict the Italians involved in all this, who would have paid a price.  You'll excuse me, I hope, if I don't exactly see this as a triumph of judicial independence.  Convicting a bunch of foreigners is easy.  It's holding your own people to account that's hard.  Wake me up when either of our countries starts doing that.

I am a bit late on this, but this is from Jonathon Turley in the USAToday:

Around the world, free speech is being sacrificed on the altar of religion. Whether defined as hate speech, discrimination or simple blasphemy, governments are declaring unlimited free speech as the enemy of freedom of religion. This growing movement has reached the United Nations, where religiously conservative countries received a boost in their campaign to pass an international blasphemy law. It came from the most unlikely of places: the United States.

While attracting surprisingly little attention, the Obama administration supported the effort of largely Muslim nations in the U.N. Human Rights Council to recognize exceptions to free speech for any "negative racial and religious stereotyping." The exception was made as part of a resolution supporting free speech that passed this month, but it is the exception, not the rule that worries civil libertarians. Though the resolution was passed unanimously, European and developing countries made it clear that they remain at odds on the issue of protecting religions from criticism. It is viewed as a transparent bid to appeal to the "Muslim street" and our Arab allies, with the administration seeking greater coexistence through the curtailment of objectionable speech. Though it has no direct enforcement (and is weaker than earlier versions), it is still viewed as a victory for those who sought to juxtapose and balance the rights of speech and religion.

I continue to be confused why the Left in this country is so absolutely hostile to Baptists in Alabama but are so deferential to Muslims in Saudi Arabia.  Is it simply because one group makes credible threats of violence while the other does not?

Like the rise and fall of empires, or the tendency of revolutions to overshoot into excess, there are recognizable patterns to history.  Along these lines, there seems to be a pattern emerging in 60's and 70's era advocacy groups.  First, Greenpeace co-founder Patrick Moore turned on the organization he founded, criticizing it for ignoring science and being anti-human.  Now Human Rights Watch founder Robert Bernstein is criticizing the organization he founded:

I must do something that I never anticipated: I must publicly join the group's critics"¦.

When I stepped aside in 1998, Human Rights Watch was active in 70 countries, most of them closed societies. Now the organization, with increasing frequency, casts aside its important distinction between open and closed societies.

Nowhere is this more evident than in its work in the Middle East. The region is populated by authoritarian regimes with appalling human rights records. Yet in recent years Human Rights Watch has written far more condemnations of Israel for violations of international law than of any other country in the region"¦.

Meanwhile, the Arab and Iranian regimes rule over some 350 million people, and most remain brutal, closed and autocratic, permitting little or no internal dissent. The plight of their citizens who would most benefit from the kind of attention a large and well-financed international human rights organization can provide is being ignored as Human Rights Watch's Middle East division prepares report after report on Israel.

Something I missed the other day, was this indicator of how far from its principles HRW has drifted:

A delegation from Human Rights Watch was recently in Saudi Arabia. To investigate the mistreatment of women under Saudi Law? To campaign for the rights of homosexuals, subject to the death penalty in Saudi Arabia? To protest the lack of religious freedom in the Saudi Kingdom? To issue a report on Saudi political prisoners?

No, no, no, and no. The delegation arrived to raise money from wealthy Saudis by highlighting HRW's demonization of Israel. An HRW spokesperson, Sarah Leah Whitson, highlighted HRW's battles with "pro-Israel pressure groups in the US, the European Union and the United Nations." (Was Ms. Whitson required to wear a burkha, or are exceptions made for visiting anti-Israel "human rights" activists"? Driving a car, no doubt, was out of the question.)

This reminds me of when the Innocence Project added Janet Reno to its board (though I still think they do good work).

The Bill of Rights were originally restrictions on government power.  Period.  Many people do not want to read them this way today, because they have a strong interest one way or another in the increase in government power.

Take the First Amendment.  "Congress shall make no law..."  In other words, there can be no justification of any kind for the government taking away free speech, press, association, religion, etc.

Unfortunately, forces have been at work for decades from both political parties to undermine this hard and fast protection.  Our most recent assault comes from the Democrats in the guise of the hate crimes bill:

Republican Sam Brownback offered an amendment to the Senate version which said the bill could not "construed or applied in a manner that infringes on any rights under the First Amendment" and could not place any burden on the exercise of First Amendment rights "if such exercise of religion, speech, expression, or association was not intended to plan or prepare for an act of physical violence or incite an imminent act of physical violence against another."

With that amendment, GOP Senators supported the final bill. However when the bill went to the conference committee, key changes were made to the Brownback amendment by the Democrat controlled committee:

Where Brownback had insisted, and the full Senate had agreed, that the bill could not burden the exercise of First Amendment rights, the conference changed the wording to read that the bill could not burden the exercise of First Amendment rights "unless the government demonstrates "¦ a compelling governmental interest" to do otherwise.

That means your First Amendment rights are protected "” unless they're not.

"A compelling governmental interest" leaves the door wide open for your free speech rights to be trampled on the government's whim. Where the First Amendment was designed as a limit on government power (as was the entire Constitution), this law is a blatant attack on those limits and an attempt to expand government power.

So, the government's power is checked unless there is a "compelling governmental interest" in not having its power checked. We're doomed.

Via Carlos Miller:

Police in California used their Taser on a legless man, then dragged him out of his apartment where they sat him on a curb handcuffed and naked from the waist down for several minutes as neighbors complained of brutality.Gregory Williams, 40, a double-amputee, ended up spending six days in jail on charges of domestic violence and resisting arrest before he was released with dropped charges.

It all began when Williams apparently was reluctant to let Child Protective Services in to search his house in response to an anonymous tip.  I don't know the laws in California, but CPS officials often have scary, broad powers that go beyond any reasonable definition of Fourth Amendment rights.

In this case, police get double abuse points for seizing the camera of a bystander video taping the event (something that is entirely legal but which police treat as illegal) and allegedly deleting the video of the police handling of Williams.

Here is my very simplistic take.  You will have to pardon me for referencing the actual text of the Constitution -- I know this is passe in our modern era (jeez, I am probably a tenther too).  The issue looks pretty straight-forward to me, for two reasons

• Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech.  Doesn't say by whom or for what.  There are no modifiers.  Doesn't say "except when individuals organize themselves into a corporation."
• Congress shall make no law ... abridging ...the right of the people peaceably to assemble.  So Congress can make no law restricting free speech and it can make no law restricting assembly but somehow it can make laws restricting free speech of people who have assembled?

Not many people have seen it, but one of my favorite movies is Interstate 60.  It has a story thread through the movie, but what it really becomes is a series of essays on freedom and slavery.  One the best parts is the town where everyone is a lawyer.  The only way anyone makes money is when someone breaks the law, so their laws are crafted such that it is impossible not to break the law.

The town of Jericho, Arkansas sounds very similar.  It has 174 residents, no businesses, but a police force of 6 that tries to find ways to support itself.  Apparently, everyone in town is constantly in court for traffic citations.  When one man got fed up, and yelled at the police in court for their stupid speed traps, the police shot him - right in the courtroom.  In a scene right out of Interstate 60, the DA, after investigating the shooting, couldn't remember the name of the police officer who did the shooting and said no charges would be filed against the police, but that misdemeanor charges were being considered against the man shot.  Probably for littering, due to his bleeding on the floor.

Via Radley Balko (who else?)

Apparently I have entered into a contract, which keeps getting amended, but no one ever sends me a copy or asks for my signature.

I heard an angry town-hall participant in Texas claim health insurance was not a right. If you could not pay for it, you should not have it. That's neither realistic nor desirable. Everyone requires certain goods and services, such as food and shelter. There exists an implicit social contract that people who cannot afford these goods will get them from the state.

The last time I understood that we entered into a social contract was in the late 18th century, when we exited our old relationship with Great Britain and entered a new one defined by the Constitution.  But I am pretty sure that government provision of food, shelter, and health care were not in this contract.

Then, in the 1930s, we were told"food" is in the contract.  Then, in the 1960's, we were told "shelter" is on the list.  Now apparently health care is on the list.  Can someone send me a copy of this contract, so I can know what else is on it?

Isn't it ironic that the only "contract" the Left respects is the kind that I don't sign, don't consent to, and don't enter of my own free will?   Of course, a contract that one party doesn't consent to and only enters into by force is not a contract at all.  As Wikipedia puts it for the definition of a contract, "Agreement [to a contract] is said to be reached when an offer capable of immediate acceptance is met with a 'mirror image' acceptance (ie, an unqualified acceptance)."

It is easy to find examples of police enforcing made-up laws.  Here is an example from the Department of Homeland Security:

"There are certain things that the press cannot do when it comes to national security, and filming federal buildings is one of them," said Luis Martinez, a spokesperson for the Dept. of Homeland Security.

This is a total crock.  If it were true, no tourist would ever leave Washington DC -- they would all end up in jail.  Via Carlos Miller, who is doing a great job blogging about the growing efforts by police to make public photography illegal.  Mr. Miller, by the way, is still fighting in court against charges that he committed the ultimate no-no (as far as police are concerned) -- photographing a police officer in public.

Police have decided that the way to avoid having problems like the Rodney King beating which was caught on film is too.... prevent anyone from filming them!  The police can fix just about any evidence, they will back each other up in even the most outrageous of stories, but the one thing they can't fix is video, so they want it banned.  Lacking cooperation from legislatures in actually banning video, they have decided to ban it de facto if not de jure through their actions on the streets, hoping a cowed public will not question their actions.

I wasn't that familiar with the California Coastal Commission.  I have toyed around with buying some property close to the beach in California to escape Arizona summers.  But once I read this article about their abuses, I have no desire to own California land along the coast.  Because, apparently, you don't actually "own" the land, at least not the way I define it.

The CCC's authority has decidedly grown since its beginnings as a temporary outfit with jurisdiction over 1,000 yards of coastline to an established agency with five miles of nearly absolute power, overriding local decisions and slapping multi-million dollar fines on people building small houses on existing concrete pads that could only be seen from the coast by a Superman with telescopic and X-ray vision.

See, for an example, the story of Kathleen Kenny, one of the stars of Oshen's documentary, now deceased. Kenny beat back local inspectors' assaults on her for building on her own property. She even in 1997 won an unprecedented RICO suit against local government officials for harassing her, a case where she acted as her own lawyer. Despite this, she was never able to shake off the CCC from coming after her for more or less the same offense. It has levied multi-million dollar fines that still hang over the head of her living partner, Arthur Starz.

Indeed, the CCC is still on the march. Even as it's compelling Oshen to kick up his footage, a bill is now being considered in the California state legislature that will give the CCC independent power to levy $5,000-$50,000 "administrative civil penalties" (in addition to any other fines or penalties) for violations of its ukases without having to get a court involved. The agency could then use that money for...more enforcement actions. Another bill would dictate that anyone with an unresolved CCC violation order over their heads could not submit an application for any other development permit from the CCC, on that land or any contiguous land.

I am really left speechless by this.

The Children's Secretary set out £400million plans to put 20,000 problem families under 24-hour CCTV super-vision in their own homes.

They will be monitored to ensure that children attend school, go to bed on time and eat proper meals.

Private security guards will also be sent round to carry out home checks, while parents will be given help to combat drug and alcohol addiction.

Around 2,000 families have gone through these Family Intervention Projects so far.

It actually undershoots the mark to call this "Orwellian," since in "1984" the government monitoring was aimed mainly at combating subversive thought and behavior.  But the Brits are going one better, monitoring families to make sure their kids are eating their vegetables and getting to bed on time.

Incredibly, the oppositions response is that this is... not nearly enough intervention!!!

But Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling said: "This is all much too little, much too late.

"This Government has been in power for more than a decade during which time anti-social behaviour, family breakdown and problems like alcohol abuse and truancy have just got worse and worse."

Is there any voice left for individual liberties in England?  Am I missing something here?  This seems simply horrible.  Is there at least due process involved, such that such measures can only be imposed as a result of a criminal conviction (I don't think so, from my reading of the story and comments -- I think this is like Child Protective Services in the US, with a lot of not-subject-to-due-process intervention powers, but maybe my UK readers can fill in more detail).

I liked this from the comments:

These cameras should be in MPs homes so we can see what the scumbags are up too.

Ditto for Congress.  And how about a Lincoln Bedroom cam?

Hat Tip:  Engadget

Today, here on Cape Cod, where every car has an Obama sticker, I was struck by two cars which had Obama stickers as well as this same slogan, a paraphrase of a Ben Franklin bon mot:

Those who give up their liberty for more security neither deserve liberty nor security.

I have absolutely no problem with this bumper sticker in its original context, which I presume was to protest things like the Patriot Act, indefinite detentions, and wiretapping during the Bush Administration (and all retained, so far, by this Administration).

But my question back to them would be -- do you still support this statement in the context of pending health care legislation, which is yet another example of trading individual liberty for security, albeit security of a slightly different type?

The last post on Elisha Storm's blog before her house was raided and she was dragged to jail for blogging about a local drug enforcement task force.

I personally am all for more citizen imposed accountability on police forces and an tired of the police's resistance to such efforts.  I suppose one could argue that the police need some protection for legitimate undercover efforts, though Virginia apparently does not have a law on its books to this effect, so lacking such legislation it's hard to see how Ms. Storm can be prosecuted (its also unclear if the officers involved were even strictly under cover -- paging Valerie Plame).  My sense is that the courts have been very, very, very leery about applying "harassment" laws to monitoring and criticism of public employees.

Update: We had a kind of similar case here in Phoenix with the New Times and Sheriff Arpaio.

Update#2: Radley Balko has more thoughts.  He says

Assume instead that these officers were investigating organized crime, or a terror cell. What do you think of this woman's arrest? Photographing, writing about, and criticizing police officers, even by name, should of course be legal. But it's a tougher call when the officers in question work undercover. Naming them, posting their photos, posting their addresses, are all pretty clearly efforts to intimidate them, and it isn't difficult to see how doing so not only makes it more difficult for them to do their jobs, but may well endanger their lives.

I might agree with this. But then it (publishing names of undercover officers) should be specifically illegal in Virginia. There are very, very, very few and very narrow exceptions to the First Amendment acknowledged by law and the courts. A reasonable person should expect that if an exception has not been made for the specific activity in which they are engaging, that their behavior is legal.  And besides, one should never have to go to court and wait for a jury verdict for everyone to figure out if an activity is legal or not.

Update #3: I have heard it argued that she was really just tweaking these guys without serving any real positive purpose.  Maybe.  Could be she just had a grudge.  But many of her activities are virtually indistinguishable from those of someone who was really trying to impose some accountability.  I have never heard of the effectiveness of public speech being a criteria for the legality of such speech.

Income inequality was the topic de jour during much of the election.   The left argued that median wages had stagnated, and tried very hard to date this stagnation from 1980 so that it could be blamed on Ronald Reagan.   Others have argued that the the whole median family wage stagnation thing was overblown, as 1) families had changed alot over 30 years;  2) Compensation had changed (such that wages were less of total compensation with the rise in value of health care plans); and 3) individuals matter, not quartiles, and individuals were doing well and still had mobility between income bands.

My sense is that the income inequality numbers have always been fraught with problems.  For example, rich people have huge incentives to manage the income numbers on their tax returns, so trying to draw conclusions about top earners from their tax returns is a bit dangerous.  Just the shift from C to S corps and LLC's over the last 30 years has fundamentally shifted what income high net worth entrepreneurs show on their tax returns.

All that being said, I think it is clear the income gap has grown, and it really started growing in this country around 1970.  Whether this matters is a different story - its clear from comparing to European countries that while our gap has spread vs. their income gaps, its almost 100% because our rich are richer than their rich.  Our lowest quintile is pretty comparable (here).  If that is the case, its an interesting question to see if this bothers folks.

Anyway, I think there still is work to be done to fully explain and rationalize these income inequality numbers.  But I still find it hard to believe they are not somehow related to immigration.  After all, dropping 20 million new immigrants, many of them quite poor, into the bottom quintile of US workers over the last 20 years certainly tends to pull down medians.  Just compare these two charts, with income inequality on the top and the percentage of residents in any given year that are foreign-born (legal or illegal immigrants).  I fitted the two charts together manually to get the time scales to line up, I don't have time to replot them together as I should.  Click to enlarge.

Its hard to see, by the way, how the top chart really reflects a trend starting with Reagan (as much as the left so desperately wants it to be true).  Something happened around 1970 to reverse the curve.  I have offered one possible cause.  I do so reluctantly, because I don't want to be misunderstood -- I am a big supporter of open immigration and would hate to give the anti-immigration folks any ammunition.

Anyway, you are welcome to discuss.  It is something I am thinking about but don't have an answer for.

Postscript: This is the chart comparing the top and bottom US deciles to countries in Europe on an absolute dollar basis. The conclusion I draw is that our poorest are in about the same shape as the poorest in Europe, but our rich are richer than in Europe.  Given this, does our income inequality still worry you?

The reason the analysis is done this funny way is that what one usually sees is some country like Chad with the poor at 80% of the median income.  But 80% of almost nothing is still almost nothing.  So this chart converts everyone to apples and apples - almost.  I still think it underestimates how well off the US poor are, maybe some sort of exchange rate vs. PPP problem.

Some cops just abuse power, and make up rules as they go along.

Gordon Haire, a former newspaper reporter and former police officer, was sitting at a table on the campus of the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston when he snapped a photo of a university police officer strolling towards him.

Officer Tim Wilson then came up to him and told him he was not allowed to photograph the Galveston National Library, which apparently is so top secret that only a Google search will reveal its true appearance.

Wilson told him it was against the law to photograph the building because it is a security threat.

Haire, 66, told Wilson he did not believe him.

Sensing the impending terrorist threat, Wilson asked for Haire's identification.

But having lost his drivers license, Haire was only able to produce a Medicare card (he had arrived by bus for a doctor's appointment).

The cop then asked for his full name and date of birth, then relayed that information to a dispatcher through his collar microphone.

"He's giving me a hard time," the cop said to the dispatcher, according to Haire.

The cop finally left, but not before informing Haire that it was illegal to even photograph the sidewalk.

I don't have a clue if Professor Gates was arrested primarily because he was black.  But I can certainly say that it is not just blacks who are arrested every day for what is being called "comptempt of cop."  Police officers have developped a theory, which is not backed up by any actual written law, that they are the dictators of the immediate area that they occupy, and that citizens owe them absolute obedience to their commands and complete deference to their majesty, or else risk arrest.  While blacks may fall victim to such arrests at a higher rate, this is not just an issue of racism.  It is an issue of abuse of power as well.

Update: Carlos Miller has many of the same thoughts, and a lot more detail.  Having been arrested himself for "comtempt of cop," he should know.

I absolutely love my Kindle, and take it wherever I go.  I particularly like the wireless feature, such that within 60 seconds of wanting a book anywhere in the country I can have the book.

But the recent events surrounding Amazon retroactively removing books from people's Kindles without their knowledge has me really worried about the model.  I have, by the way, no doubt that there were serious legal issues that forced them to take these steps in this case.  But considering the number of book burnings we have seen by religious nuts and totalitarians and statist-wannabees in even the last century, it is scary to me that we've actually made eliminating a book from peoples' homes so much easier.

Ray Bradbury was creepy enough, with his teams of book burners in Fahrenheit 451.  But even in that book the burning was a struggle.  There was conflict, effort, resistance.   How much worse is it now if books can disappear at a keystroke?  It is a cold sort of horror, like being unable to fight against a germ warfare attack without even the ability of a heroic stand against an invading army.

Update: I have read various places that Bradbury has said his book was not about censorship and the state but about TV and pop culture destroying books and reading.  That it is more of a book of low-culture vs. high culture.  Anyone know the truth of this?

It doesn't matter to me.   I am a fan of both high and low culture (I am reading Les Miserables but last night I took a break to watch a rented copy of Underworld).  If folks can read Huckleberry Finn as a Gay novel, I can read Fahrenheit 451 (while listening to my well-worn Rush 2112 CD, of course) as a critique of censorship and totalitarianism.

It is not at all surprising that an Ivy League University professor does not recognize a difference between rationing by individual choice based on price signals and rationing based on government mandate.  What is surprising to me is that I remember this particular professor, Uwe Reinhardt, as the only person who would ever take the free market side of campus debates.  Kind of depressing.  I guess he must have seemed free market just by contrast, or else he has evolved a bit.  Is it ironic to anyone else that radicalism of the 1960s, which purported to be based on individualism and freedom, has led to campuses where it is normal not to even consider individual liberty as part of a public policy equation?  It just reinforced my sense that no one really wants to get rid of "the man," they just want to be "the man" themselves.

In particular he writes:

As I read it, the main thrust of the health care reforms espoused by President Obama and his allies in Congress is first of all to reduce rationing on the basis of price and ability to pay in our health system

We actually have plenty of examples of the government ending rationing by price and ability to pay.  Gas price controls in the 1970s are one very good example.  Anyone remember the result?

Or more recently in China, where gas prices were controlled well below world market levels:

We substituted gas rationing by willingness to pay the posted price with gas price rationing by ability to waste four hours of one's day sitting in lines. (I had never thought of this before, but there must be some interesting economic implications of preferentially routing fuel to those least likely to have a full-time job).

Perhaps worse, Reinhardt equates criticism of the current health care system ( and particularly its productivity) with support for socialization of the system.  Really?  There are perfectly valid free market reasons to criticize health care, where any number of government policy decisions over the years have disrupted the efficacy of price signals and created terrible incentives.

More here from Doug Bandow of Cato

Postscript: Farther left?  Further left?  Sorry, I try, but your scribe is an engineer at heart and sometimes struggles with the native tongue.  When I was in fourth grade, I remember doing a battery of achievement tests, and getting 99+ percentile scores on every test but spelling, where I got something like a 25th percentile.   I think this score put me down mostly with kids for whom English is a second language  (or maybe even worse, with Russian kids for whom ours is a second alphabet).  Only technology in the form of spell-checkers has bailed me out of my personal handicap.

Jonathon Adler argues that Senator Feinstein grossly exaggerated the number of cases where the Supreme Court said the Congress had exceeded the bounds of the commerce clause.  Feinstein said it was dozens of times in the last 10 years, Adler counts about two.  I don't have my own count, but smaller numbers seem right to me -- just look at the extent of activities Congress currently pursues under the banner of the Commerce Clause.   For god sakes, several years ago the Supreme Court ruled that federal marijuana laws trumped state laws based on the commerce clause -- even when the drugs are grown for personal use and don't cross state lines.  As Clarence Thomas wrote in that case in dissent:

Respondents Diane Monson and Angel Raich use marijuana that has never been bought or sold, that has never crossed state lines, and that has had no demonstrable effect on the national market for marijuana. If Congress can regulate this under the Commerce Clause, then it can regulate virtually anything and the Federal Government is no longer one of limited and enumerated powers.

But what I found really depressing in Adler's post was this:

Adding up all of the cases in which the Court found statutes exceeded all of the federal government's enumerated powers, including the sovereign immunity cases, the commandeering cases, and the 14th Amendment cases, in the last twenty years still doesn't get us to the three-dozen-plus cases Feinstein claimed. Add in the federalism-related constitutional avoidance cases, and we're still a ways off.

Given all the expansions of federal and Executive power over the last 10 years, and the hundreds of cases in front of the Supreme Court, the Court has not been able to rouse itself more than a handful of times to declare that the feds have exceeded their powers under the Constitution?  Bummer.

So, how are all you libertarians feeling who supported Obama hoping he could not make too much of a hash of the economy, but were willing to take the risk in exchange for an expansion of civil rights, a demobilizing of the post-9/11 security state, and curbs on executive power?

This from Rahm Emanuel is just nuts.  I remember just 6 months ago Democrats were rightly critical of the no-fly list, arguing (as I do) that there cannot reasonably be a million terrorists running around America and that the list unreasonably curbs civil liberties of everyone put on it without due process, and without any hope of removal in case of mistakes.

I had to listen to the youtube video (in the linked article) to confirm for myself he really said this and in context, but this is exactly what he means, garnering applause from the Brady Center:

"if you're on that no-fly list, your access to the right to bear arms is cancelled, because you're not part of the American family; you don't deserve that right. There is no right for you if you're on that terrorist list."

Wow, a lot of due process here.  What's next,  sending every girl who has her name on a men's room wall (you know, the ubiquitous "for a good time call..." graffiti) to prison as sex workers?

If your second ammendment rights are cancelled (it can't be an accident that he is using nearly the exact text from the Constitution) then doesn't that imply that other Constitutional rights can be cancelled as well?  After all, its dangerous to let terrorists assemble, is it not?  And speak.  And practicing their religion can be a problem.  Etc...

Please, let's not go here.

Thank god we have a "liberal" president, or else we might all have to worry about our civil rights and abuse of power:

Defense Department General Counsel Jeh Johnson moved the Obama administration into new territory from a civil liberties perspective. Asked by Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) the politically difficult but entirely fair question about whether terrorism detainees acquitted in courts could be released in the United States, Johnson said that "as a matter of legal authority," the administration's powers to detain someone under the law of war don't expire for a detainee after he's acquitted in court. "If you have authority under the law of war to detain someone" under the Supreme Court's Hamdi ruling, "that is true irrespective of what happens on the prosecution side."

This is a recurring post on Coyote Blog on Memorial Day, but I forgot this year so I will repost it on July 4.  Greetings this year from the Mother Country, from which I will be returning soon.  And let's give a big shout-out to the Dutch, who seldom get much love on this point, but the Dutch perhaps even more than the English really pioneered a lot of things that are important to us - e.g. capitalism, a republic, and tolerance.

This, or something like it, seems to be the most popular new sign in London:

I don't know if it is clear from this picture, but I counted 7 cameras on this building in about a 50 40 yard stretch (just above the first floor windows, click to enlarge):

The whole Guantanamo issue has to be one of the great bait and switches of our time.  The fundamental human rights abuse was always the notion that civilians could be seized by the US Government and held, as they say in Britain, at the President's pleasure  (ie as long as the Administration wants, up to and including forever).

Somehow, this whole issue got perverted into a debate about Gitmo, rather than detentions per se.  I warned any number of times that if we kept focusing on merely the location of detention, rather than detention itself, it would give the government cover to close the facility and declare victory, while continuing the abusive practice of indefinite detention.

Unfortunately, I was right, both in this fear and my fear that Obama, once give presidential power, would be reluctant to eschew it.

Obama administration officials, fearing a battle with Congress that could stall plans to close the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, are crafting language for an executive order that would reassert presidential authority to incarcerate terrorism suspects indefinitely, according to three senior government officials with knowledge of White House deliberations.

Such an order would embrace claims by former president George W. Bush that certain people can be detained without trial for long periods under the laws of war. Obama advisers are concerned that an order, which would bypass Congress, could place the president on weaker footing before the courts and anger key supporters, the officials said.

Unsurprisingly, after talking about various approaches for Congressional or Judicial oversight of Administration detention decisions, the Administration has apparently dropped plans for this.  Even the "security courts" of which I have always been suspicious (I always picture a jury full of TSA airport security screeners) have been ruled out by Obama.  We are back to the Bush doctrine of detention at the President's pleasure.

Certainly one driver of statism is arrogance -- the technocratic belief that one's intellectual capacity and decision-making ability is superior to that of the masses, and therefore should be substituted (via authoritarian control) for that of the masses.  This was clearly the driver of statism in the early to mid-century.  Its what caused FDR to be so enamored of Mussolini-stype fascism.  A few smart people making the trains run on time.

But I am starting to wonder if there isn't a second driver of statism that comes from the opposite direction -- projecting one's own weaknesses on the rest of humanity and, assuming they share these weaknesses, using this assumption as a reason for mommy-state controls.  This latter reasoning came through in this article summary in my feed reader from the Arizona Republic:

Lamenting his first teenage cigarette, President Barack Obama ruefully admitted on Monday that he's spent his adult life fighting the habit. Then he signed the nation's toughest anti-smoking law, aiming to keep thousands of other teens from getting hooked.