It can happen here
That’s the title of this piece by Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX). A taste:
We are not yet living in a total police state, but it is fast approaching. The seeds of future tyranny have been sown, and many of our basic protections against government have been undermined. The atmosphere since 2001 has permitted Congress to create whole new departments and agencies that purport to make us safer – always at the expense of our liberty.
Read the whole thing.
December 21st, 2004 at 10:13 am
It Could Happen Here
I do not believe Safety requires we lose our Liberty, but to be honest here, if push comes to shove I am not sure I would be all that resistant to more lose of liberty as I believe we have gone too far.
Until society as a group realizes where we are a…
December 21st, 2004 at 3:42 pm
Thanks, SU. Ron Paul’s been calling bullshit on his party for a long time, standing up for conservative principles while most of the rest genuflect to money and/or power. Straight talk is right.
December 21st, 2004 at 9:42 pm
Calling B.S., or spewing B.S.? How long does one guy get to repeat the same claptrap about an impending police state being just around the corner before people dismiss him as the alarmist that he obviously is? The only concrete example he offered of a police state was the gun ban in D.C., which has been on the books for 30 years and may well get repealed soon.
Next time someone drones on about the massive loss of liberty since 2001, ask them for specifics. What specific freedoms did you enjoy on September 10, 2001 that you do not enjoy today? Only after they are identified with specificity is it even possible to examine the freedom/security trade-off. And yes, I am calling B.S. on B.F., too. Of course we trade some freedom for some security. The question is how much freedom we must give up, in exchange for how much security.
December 21st, 2004 at 10:03 pm
“What specific freedoms did you enjoy on September 10, 2001 that you do not enjoy today?”
My freedom to not have to show up at the airport 2 hours before my flight.
My freedom to not see militarized police wondering the streets.
My freedom to take tweezers and nail clippers onboard a plane.
My freedom to not have a sneak and peak warrant taken out on me.
December 22nd, 2004 at 1:14 pm
You still have the freedom not to show up 2 hours before your flight. One hour is usually plenty, though of course you do need to budget more time now than post 911. I think it has something to do with someone else using their freedom to bring box cutters onto planes, smuggle bombs onto planes, etc. In any event, trading the freedom of an extra half hour in line for the freedom of making it from Point A to Point B in one piece strikes me as a very reasonable compromise.
Your freedom not to see cops on the street – or for that matter, your freedom not to see anything else – never existed in the first place. Cops and the military have always had the right to go anywhere they want on public streets. Maybe yours look more “militarized” than mine do. Post-911 cops in California look and act exactly like pre-911 cops, except that if the federal government is aware of a likely terrorist plot, the local authorities are now more likely to know about it. Since I’m not a terrorist myself, perhaps I’m having a hard time appreciating the lost “freedom” to sneak a bomb past Chief Wiggims and Officer Bar Brady.
Your loss of freedom to take tweezers and nail clippers on board a plane is silly, but then again, so is getting all that hot and bothered about it.
You never had the “freedom” not to have a “sneak and peek” warrant taken out on you. We’ve discussed this one before. Besides, all that warrant stuff is a privacy issue, it’s not about freedom. Even if the sky were to fall and the Fourth Amendment were abolished outright, that wouldn’t necessarily make us less free – except in the sense that we’d be less free to break laws under circumstances where we previously assumed we would never be caught (or that if we were caught, the evidence would be excluded from trial).
Bottom line: we’re all slightly inconvenienced by increased security measures designed to make sure 9-11 doesn’t happen again. From this, everyone’s favorite crank Congressman just happens to draw all the same alarmist conclusions that he’s been drawing from everything else that’s happened over the last 17 years. [Probably longer than that – I picked that number because he had to be his current “sky is falling, police state coming” kook by 1987 at the latest, or he never would have gotten the LP’s nomination in 1988.]
December 22nd, 2004 at 1:21 pm
Obviously, I was being a bit smarmy. And, while I agree with your general assertion that it is largely just inconvenience, I think it’d be rather not smart to not keep an eye on the wheels set in motion (though some are imaginary).
December 22nd, 2004 at 1:28 pm
I agree, I just think we have to be objective. Ron Paul is about as objective on this issue as Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton is on race.