I don't know the answer to that question, actually. But in the case of the Valerie Plame, that's exactly what we have. Democrats in hypocrisy. Normally I side with Democrats when it comes to issues such as war, the environment, and civil liberties (but diverge on issues of economics and government administration), but I think the Valerie Plame affair shows that many liberal Democrats don't know what they stand for when it comes to the war on terror and the CIA and are just as partisan as their conservative Republican counterparts. First, some background.
Valerie Plame worked for the CIA for several years. She was one of the agents appointed by the Bush administration to investigate WMDs (weapons of mass destruction) and their impact on America's global position. Plame is married to another CIA agent, Joe Wilson, who also worked on similar projects.
Joe Wilson was sent to Niger to investigate claims that Iraq was attempting to obtain yellowcake, a substance obtained from processing uranium for use in nuclear reactors and/or weapons. This was during George Bush's attempt to prove that we needed to go to full-scale war with Iraq in order to prevent their manufacture of WMDs. (I suspect that this was also during the time that the administration was attempting to point their attention toward Iraq and away from Osama bin Laden, a former US ally). Joe suspected that the Bush administration had exaggerated claims that Iraq was attempting to obtain yellowcake from Niger based upon Wilson's analysis of what he believed were falsified documents, and published his finding in the newspaper. (For a full time line, read this). In reaction to Wilson's claims, the administration sent forth its puppets to rebut Joe publicly, and in the process revealed his wife, Valerie Plame, as a covert CIA agent. This sort of revelation not only puts in jeopardy the life of the agent, but all of her previous operations, and the security of the nation. So naturally, anyone who is opposed to Bush's law evasion would cite the Valerie Plame affair in their favor. Plame and Wilson tried to sue Cheney and company for the crime, but sadly the federal judge threw the case out (the judge was a Bush appointee, no less).
But wait, why the title to this post? Why two cancers battling it out? Because here we have something most Democrats fail to realize because of their partisanship: Most Democrats think this case reveals the corruption of the Bush administration, which it does, but fail to realize that the CIA is one of the most corrupt covert forces in the entire world, and responsible for over 6 million deaths since World War II (read this and then this), among other atrocities. Before the yellowcake Plame scandal, a person like Plame would have been viewed as the enemy by a Democrat. The CIA is one of the world's most dangerous enemies for them. So here we have a case of a cancer eating away at a cancer.
I'm not suggesting that the revelation of Plame's identity is laudable, but what I am suggesting is that the Plame affair represents, in part, a dismantling of the CIA, which one would think a typical liberal Democrat would stand for. But since most Democrats are just as partisan as Republicans, and since these sorts of affairs generally polarize along those lines, all that matters is that Bush did something wrong and they have yet another reason to smear him for it, but without even thinking about what it truly is that Bush/Cheney had done - they had eroded one of their own vehicles toward American imperialism and interventionism, the CIA.
I just find it a tad hypocritical by the Dems and also very revealing about how blindly some folks approve or disapprove of a given political affair simply because of party lines. I guess that's why I like where I am - I can pick and choose what stance I take based upon what (little?) logic and reason are in my brain, not because I am registered to vote with one party or another.
***
As a side note, have you ever wondered why it is that the Republicans are the pro-lifers and not the Democrats? I blame religion. Because politically, the sides these two parties have chosen on the abortion issue is counter-intuitive. For example, suspending what we know about how each party feels regarding abortion and/or stem-cell research, and if the abortion issue was re-introduced to us afresh, which party would you guess would be the pro-life party, and which one would be the pro-choice party? I can honestly say that I would get that one wrong. Republicans are usually the ones that stand for using violence for solving problems. Democrats are usually the ones that are more prone toward giving disadvantaged people a second chance or a handout of some kind. It seems to me that if I didn't know anything about the role of religion in American political discourse, I'd say that Democrats would most likely be pro-life given their attitude about life (this not only applies to human life, but they also care more about the life of flora and fauna), and that the Republicans are more prone to be pro-choice given their attitude about life (e.g. that Bush just sits and smiles while thousands of US soldiers die). Just some food for thought.
Friday, October 26, 2007
Saturday, October 20, 2007
Why civil liberties, you ask?
I had a conversation with a relative just the other day. I don't think he knows just exactly how deep I am into my political stances or beliefs - for all he knows, I casually think Bush is an asshole, but rarely do I give my reasons why. He asked "why?" and instead of going off at the speed of light with all the (civil liberty) problems Bush has brought upon us (habeus corpus, Patriot Act, FISA, Guantanamo, etc.), I took the time to explain it, beginning with the Patriot Act and warrantless wiretapping.
His response was "Well, I'm fine if they [the government] listen in on my phone conversations because I have nothing to hide." And that was my initial response when I first learned of the government's illegal and warrantless wiretapping on its own citizens. But we need civil rights. And the natural follow-up question to that statement is, "Why?"
Exegesis is generally described as the art (yes, it's an art) of interpreting a text, contextualizing it, and then applying it rationally and critically to one's own situation without demeaning or altering that text from the meaning the author intended to convey. The term is mostly used in the field of Biblical Studies, but it is also applied to other areas of academic inquiry, like in the textual examination of Shakespeare's works. The term is also used when interpreting the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. These documents are old and far removed from their original contexts. By exegetically examining the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, one finds that the writers of these were not just establishing a democratic republic, but were also safeguarding future generations from imperial rule that was experienced under English tyranny (Sometimes I wonder whether the US would be in better hands if it had remained under English rule, but speculations of this sort are for another day). Moreover, they were also building into these documents many opportunities to make corrections or change course. Case in point: the Second Amendment.
The Second Amendment is the one the NRA loves to tout: the "right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." Fine. But using proper exegetical method, we know that the Second Amendment probably had nothing to do with preserving the right for Americans to own guns for hunting purposes. Hunting was probably not the first thing the writer had in mind when the Second Amendment was put to pen and paper. This document was written in the wake of a revolutionary war, a war of the "common people" against the imperial power that wanted to tax its trade routes and import/export businesses unfairly, among other unfair demands. In a way, I believe proper exegesis of the Second Amendment reveals a very haunting and little understood truth: the writers were preserving the right of the American people to rise up against any form of tyranny in the land, and make changes with force if necessary. This is probably what was on the mind of the writer of that amendment. He saw the use of firearms and their effectiveness at winning battles, and he saw that by winning battles, governments can change. The Second Amendment, I believe, is really about rising up, as these revolutionaries did, and making a change in the government once democracy and diplomatic reasoning fails. So the Second Amendment, and many other civil liberties we now (or once) enjoy(ed), not only grant rights unto us, but allow us to make necessary changes if the government gets out of hand. And if we don't like our government, and our votes stop counting (Al Gore in 2000, anyone?), and democracy starts failing, and there is nothing else we can do, how are we supposed to make the necessary changes to it?
Enter civil liberties. It does matter whether or not the government spies on you, takes your right to know what you've been arrested for, or knows what books you have checked out of the library whether you have "nothing to hide" or not. Why? So that the common citizenry--you and me--still retain the right to rise up against our government (again, if it gets that bad) and make the necessary changes, just like the framers and authors of our founding documents did and observed over 230 years ago. Their mindset upon authoring those documents cannot be stressed enough. Again, they just went through a major revolution - remember that! Civil liberties exist so that the people have the chance to re-gain their independence and freedom once it is taken from them. This is why George W. Bush is so hypocritical and even paradoxical. He feels he has the right to remove or suspend one's freedoms in order to grant the rest of the population more freedom. See the paradox? And once you take it from a select few, who is to say it won't be eventually extended to other groups. These freedoms exist so that the government cannot control our lives and our minds beyond what we can bear.
Are you strange in any way? Are you different? You might be a homosexual. You might be a drug addict. You might be a Jew. That's just three groups I named off the cuff that have, in the past, been rounded up by governments throughout the world who took away their right to a fair trial, their right to know why they were being arrested, etc. If you are different in any way, the day may come when you too will be declared an "enemy combatant" (perhaps even by totally arbitrary methods like the Bush administration has done), rounded up, and "dealt with" because the government view YOU as a threat. At this point, the government no longer exists for the survival of its people, but is now acting for its own self-interest and proliferation. This should disgust you.
Bottom line: civil liberties like habeus corpus and the right to keep and bear arms exist to keep us free, and to allow us to make the changes we need to make if our government becomes over-bearing. They allow us a voice once the ballot box fails. They allow us to bring ourselves together in privacy and secrecy and put an end to oppression if the need arises. That's good exegesis of those original documents. The framers knew what oppression and freedom looked like, and they wanted to build into those documents the right to make change if democracy failed.
So don't allow yourself into the trap of thinking that you're willing to give up some freedom in exchange for security because you have "nothing to hide." You might not have anything to hide today, but there may come a day when you are labeled "weird" because of what you believe, what you look like, where you went (or didn't go) to school, etc. and find yourself being oppressed or deported by your government. It is the civil liberties we have that allow you a chance to speak, to make change, and to demand justice and freedom.
If I had to choose between freedom or security, I'd take my chances on the former.
His response was "Well, I'm fine if they [the government] listen in on my phone conversations because I have nothing to hide." And that was my initial response when I first learned of the government's illegal and warrantless wiretapping on its own citizens. But we need civil rights. And the natural follow-up question to that statement is, "Why?"
Exegesis is generally described as the art (yes, it's an art) of interpreting a text, contextualizing it, and then applying it rationally and critically to one's own situation without demeaning or altering that text from the meaning the author intended to convey. The term is mostly used in the field of Biblical Studies, but it is also applied to other areas of academic inquiry, like in the textual examination of Shakespeare's works. The term is also used when interpreting the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. These documents are old and far removed from their original contexts. By exegetically examining the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, one finds that the writers of these were not just establishing a democratic republic, but were also safeguarding future generations from imperial rule that was experienced under English tyranny (Sometimes I wonder whether the US would be in better hands if it had remained under English rule, but speculations of this sort are for another day). Moreover, they were also building into these documents many opportunities to make corrections or change course. Case in point: the Second Amendment.
The Second Amendment is the one the NRA loves to tout: the "right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." Fine. But using proper exegetical method, we know that the Second Amendment probably had nothing to do with preserving the right for Americans to own guns for hunting purposes. Hunting was probably not the first thing the writer had in mind when the Second Amendment was put to pen and paper. This document was written in the wake of a revolutionary war, a war of the "common people" against the imperial power that wanted to tax its trade routes and import/export businesses unfairly, among other unfair demands. In a way, I believe proper exegesis of the Second Amendment reveals a very haunting and little understood truth: the writers were preserving the right of the American people to rise up against any form of tyranny in the land, and make changes with force if necessary. This is probably what was on the mind of the writer of that amendment. He saw the use of firearms and their effectiveness at winning battles, and he saw that by winning battles, governments can change. The Second Amendment, I believe, is really about rising up, as these revolutionaries did, and making a change in the government once democracy and diplomatic reasoning fails. So the Second Amendment, and many other civil liberties we now (or once) enjoy(ed), not only grant rights unto us, but allow us to make necessary changes if the government gets out of hand. And if we don't like our government, and our votes stop counting (Al Gore in 2000, anyone?), and democracy starts failing, and there is nothing else we can do, how are we supposed to make the necessary changes to it?
Enter civil liberties. It does matter whether or not the government spies on you, takes your right to know what you've been arrested for, or knows what books you have checked out of the library whether you have "nothing to hide" or not. Why? So that the common citizenry--you and me--still retain the right to rise up against our government (again, if it gets that bad) and make the necessary changes, just like the framers and authors of our founding documents did and observed over 230 years ago. Their mindset upon authoring those documents cannot be stressed enough. Again, they just went through a major revolution - remember that! Civil liberties exist so that the people have the chance to re-gain their independence and freedom once it is taken from them. This is why George W. Bush is so hypocritical and even paradoxical. He feels he has the right to remove or suspend one's freedoms in order to grant the rest of the population more freedom. See the paradox? And once you take it from a select few, who is to say it won't be eventually extended to other groups. These freedoms exist so that the government cannot control our lives and our minds beyond what we can bear.
Are you strange in any way? Are you different? You might be a homosexual. You might be a drug addict. You might be a Jew. That's just three groups I named off the cuff that have, in the past, been rounded up by governments throughout the world who took away their right to a fair trial, their right to know why they were being arrested, etc. If you are different in any way, the day may come when you too will be declared an "enemy combatant" (perhaps even by totally arbitrary methods like the Bush administration has done), rounded up, and "dealt with" because the government view YOU as a threat. At this point, the government no longer exists for the survival of its people, but is now acting for its own self-interest and proliferation. This should disgust you.
Bottom line: civil liberties like habeus corpus and the right to keep and bear arms exist to keep us free, and to allow us to make the changes we need to make if our government becomes over-bearing. They allow us a voice once the ballot box fails. They allow us to bring ourselves together in privacy and secrecy and put an end to oppression if the need arises. That's good exegesis of those original documents. The framers knew what oppression and freedom looked like, and they wanted to build into those documents the right to make change if democracy failed.
So don't allow yourself into the trap of thinking that you're willing to give up some freedom in exchange for security because you have "nothing to hide." You might not have anything to hide today, but there may come a day when you are labeled "weird" because of what you believe, what you look like, where you went (or didn't go) to school, etc. and find yourself being oppressed or deported by your government. It is the civil liberties we have that allow you a chance to speak, to make change, and to demand justice and freedom.
If I had to choose between freedom or security, I'd take my chances on the former.
Thursday, October 11, 2007
The Republican Debate on 10-9-07
The modern Republican party baffles me. This is not the conservatism I grew up with, and I'm not even 40 years old yet. I remember believing that the Republican party was the one that stood for monetary/fiscal responsibility, lower national debt, ending wars begun by Democratic presidents, lower taxes, and for personal and collective liberty. No wonder they started calling these guys "neo-conservatives." Regardless, if you want a crash course in historical conservatism vs. today's neo-cons, compare the ideologies of folks like Giuliani, Romney, or McCain, with Ron Paul. Paul's ideologies seem to blend well with the Democrats in matters of civil liberty and the like, but there are echoes of fiscal responsibility akin to the classical conservatism movement of the 1950s. Paul has argued in the past that he is more Republican than his running-mates, and this is true if one considers classical conservatism in the face of neo-conservatism. Paul cleans house at the Republican debate on 10/9/07. I just wish he had been given more opportunities to field questions. Enjoy the video.
Monday, October 01, 2007
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