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Security or Liberty? It's a False Choice
In an outburst of common sense, a Multnomah County jury recently acquitted an activist group calling themselves the Seriously P.O.'d Grannies on misdemeanor criminal mischief charges.
In his closing arguments, the prosecutor likened the Grannies to terrorists, even though they had simply protested the Iraq war by pressing red-finger-paint handprints on the window of a local military recruiting center. The deputy district attorney beseeched the jury to "think of some evils that could happen and why it is important for the line to be drawn here. On Sept. 11, some people drove planes into a building to prove a point. The defendants say their conduct is necessary to avoid imminent danger because people are dying in Iraq. That is the same thing suicide bombers say."
As preposterous as this comparison is, we can expect an onslaught of similar logic should the Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act become law.
If you're asking yourself what in tarnation this polysyllabic mouthful is, don't feel bad. The bill has been virtually ignored by the media, despite a frenzy of trepidation in the blogosphere.
The Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act -- which zinged through the House last October on a vote of 404-6 -- would create a national commission with the power to recommend counter-terrorism legislation. The act would also jump-start a university-based "Center of Excellence for the Study of Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism" to investigate "the social, criminal, political, psychological and economic roots" of domestic radicalization and violence.
So who, aside from domestic Osama bin Wannabes, would be targeted by this legislation? Well, as former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld might say, we need to "connect the dots."
Counterterrorism experts from the Rand Corp. have testified multiple times in front of the House Committee on Homeland Security in favor of the bill. In 2005, Rand penned a "Trends in Terrorism" study that made this assertion: "In addition to the terrorist threats posed by al-Qaida . . . a growing groundswell of domestically inspired radicalism has emerged that appears to be based on the spreading phenomenon of anti-globalization."
In reality, this "anti-globalization movement" has no ties whatsoever to jihadist-variety terrorism. But that hasn't stopped the authorities from making that claim. Responding to a 2003 nonviolent anti-war protest, a California Anti-Terrorism Information Center spokesperson asserted, "You can almost argue that a protest against a war ostensibly against international terrorism is a terrorist act. . . . Terrorism isn't just bombs going off and killing people."
The Seriously P.O.'d Grannies help us slice through the fog of ideology. But what if you're just raging and you're not a Granny? Would a protesting tree-sitter receive similar leeway? What about a Muslim imam who questions U.S. foreign policy? An anarchist marching against neoliberal capitalism?
The Portland jury took 30 minutes to acquit the Grannies. Now it's time for the Senate's Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee -- which will soon take up the bill -- to make a similar gesture of level-headed defiance.
The bill isn't yet a done deal. A concerted push from concerned, principled citizens could be the final nail in this misguided legislation's coffin.
Let's get out the hammer.
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13 Comments so far
Show All"Those who trade thier liberty for security deserve neither" Benjamin Franklin.
In order to combat this covert politics of fear, we have to make a conscious choice as to what virtues or vice we intrinsically want.
Hi Common Dreamers
I was born the year another sad piece of s... was passed. It was called The house un-american activities committee. lets not do this again! Call your Senators.
Peace
Is any one Smelling Orwell's "1984"?
Call it what it is:
The "If you Disagree with the Chimp-in-Chief, we're gonna toss your @ss in a concentration camp" bill.
You'll like Dem-appointed law enforcement a lot better than you'll like Bush-Cheney-McCain law enforcement.
Laws are mostly onerous depending entirely on the tone of those in power to emphasize them (or not.)
This kind of stuff is just another reason why the 2008 election is so important.
Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act
SR1959 - HR1955 are the numbers.
Just criticizing anyone publicly would be illegal because someone might be harmed as a result.
Seig Heil !!!!!!!!!
Hell, this crazy bill would turn our founders into retroactive potential "homegrown terrorists":
"But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."
Unleash the hounds!
Workers of the World! Unite! Rise up and throw off your shackles!!!!!
We can't be worried about the loss of liberty when we're so caught up in the Clinton Obama drama. And Daniel David, perpetual Democratic shill, a vote of 404-6 shows how much the Democrats care about our civil rights or liberties.
Did you hear that Bush officially approved oil drilling in the Artic?
http://web1.audubon.org/news/pressRelease.php?id=300
Well, of course, you didn't. Too busy participating in the farce that is the year long media frenzy over nothing. The nauseating overcoverage of the Super Spectacles covered up the continued looting of our children's national heritage, the beautiful land that we live in, the public funds called taxes and the Bill of Rights which used to protect our liberty. (Kind of)
Domestic surveillance in terms of looking for "terrorists" is not only unconstitutional and obnoxious but it is also mathematically ineffective, and possibly countereffective. This has been argued by a highly regarded surveillance expert, Bruce Schneier. See an excellent discussion here:
www.sillyConValley.net/blog
It's also fundamentally anti-American to submit to government surveillance under current circumstances. What an irony, that a government that deceived us into a "war on terror" that will never cease to line the pockets of their buddies arrogates to itself the power to search our e-mail and our Internet posts (to name just a couple). I submit it is WE who should be spying on THEM. We are not under suspicion here. THEY ARE!
"You can almost argue that a protest against a war ostensibly against international terrorism is a terrorist act. . . ."
That's so beautiful. Makes an old propagandist tear up a little.
Speaking of which, you realize the highfalutin' gibberish that makes up the name of this "act" translates to "The Anti-Revolution Act", right?
The best defence against terrorism or any other ism is a free people vigilant in the defense of their constitution and in its application by themselves and by others. Sheep comes to mind, fat sheep, self interest and not even enlightened self interest. Move the capital to Lost Vegas and have done with it.
Little will change with a dem in office, a dem congress can hardly raise its head let alone its voice and it does nothing to curb the excesses of the God Fearing, Fambly Values, chosen one called bush.
The dissolution of a nation by a bunch of well heeled sleazies, how easy it is. Not too many on the parapets.
The Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act — which zinged through the House last October on a vote of 404-6 — would create a national commission with the power to recommend counter-terrorism legislation.
In the US, the power to recommend is the power to manipulate, corrupt, suppress. The commission is not needed. The "Center of Excellence" is most unnecessary. The answers are well-known.
US society values violence, power, and control. Other societies value peace, justice, and equity.