Month: July 2009

 Sean Safford counters Yglesias and me.

Norm Geras takes issue with this post of mine:

Andrew says, 'This country is no longer as free as many others in the world – and unrecognizable compared with the free country I found in 1984. And it's getting less free every day.' But does he really believe it's more appropriate to label the contemporary US as if it belonged in the same category as Nazi Germany, North Korea, the USSR – rather than with the world's other democracies? It's hard to imagine that he would want to. That isn't his usual style.

Could it be that application of the term 'police state' to America today is justified by way of signalling a danger? The trouble is that, even if so, it sounds very much like one of those hysterical claims regularly put about by political loonies of one kind and another. Even in gradual transformations of the kind I alluded to at the beginning of this post, there's usually some decisive turning point, a threshold event which enables us to say that what was once there has been lost – that (for the present case) 'This is no longer a democracy, it's a police state'. I can't believe Andrew really thinks this. He'd be wrong to if he did. It's possible to condemn illiberal measures in a liberal polity without suggesting that that polity is already a thing of the past.

My intent is to protest the creeping growth of police and state power in a republic remade by 9/11. It is not to compare the US with "police states" as such. The increasing incidences of abuse of police power, the staggering incarceration rates in the US (beyond any other democratic society by a mile), the cultural belief that the police are to be obeyed and feared, the draconian measures at the border, the insane protocols on airplane flights, the blithe acceptance of systematic government torture of criminal suspects … I could go on. But Norm does not live here. My posts are not designed to engage in moral equivalence with the Soviets or Nazis – and I haven't mentioned them. They are designed to raise awareness of government power growing and growing and freedom of the individual vis-a-vis the security state being whittled away.

Hard-liners in Iran threaten to depose  Ahmadi if he continues to defy Khamenei:

The Islamic Society of Engineers, a political group close to parliamentary speaker Ali Larijani, warned in an open letter to Ahmadinejad that he could suffer the same fate as Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh, who was deposed in 1953 in a CIA-backed coup with the acquiescence of the clergy.

The newest reason for their ire:

Conservatives are also bothered by Ahmadinejad's push to broadcast the confessions of detainees, local media reported. His supporters see airing the confessions as a way to discredit and silence reformists and protesters, a tactic used extensively by hard-liners in the early 1980s. But conservatives say televised confessions could prove politically explosive and appear dangerously out of step with the national mood.

Fox does a poll. Homemaker and TV talk show host are the most popular choices.

Today on the Dish we continued to piece together the details of Gates-gate – a controversy that clearly dominated the news last week. Some of the more illuminating analysis came from Colin Powell, Andrew Napolitano, and Conor Friedersdorf, while Malkin was Malkin as usual. Also, thank God this cop is off the Boston beat.

We compiled some disturbing details of dwindling US civil liberties here, here, here, and here. We also saw how cannabis can make people do horrible things, such as break world swimming records and maintain beautiful, low-crime cities.

In health care news, these two charts show Obama faltering with the public, and Nate Silver explains why. Megan and Drum have some constructive thoughts on policy. 

And after a flurry of emails today over Obama's birth certificate, Andrew has a final word.

— C.B.

To all those readers furious at me for even asking to see the original birth certificate, I should note that I was made aware today that FactCheck.org did see the original, and I'd encourage the Obama peeps to show it to other outlets. After following all these confusing stories, and realizing that others have indeed seen and vetted the original, I don't see any further obligation on Obama's part. I'm still confused as to how the same original could be simultaneously in Chicago and Hawaii, but it seems to me that the president has done what is necessary.

My goal here is transparency and avoiding double standards. I'm sorry I got lost a little in the weeds there. And I would think it's clear enough I'm not part of the Birther crowd. I'm trying to defuse them. I'm done now. Conor has a good take here.

A Boston cop describes his view of Henry Louis Gates, Jr. If this is what they're putting in emails, imagine what they're saying in private.

You don't have to be black to be targeted for resisting abuse of police power.

Americans are losing confidence in Obama’s ability to bring change. Because he hasn’t: