a short quiz on big brother

1. if there were a clickbox labled "allow gov't surveillance", would you click "yes"?

2. do you believe anyone else would click "yes"?

3. if not, then why is there unlimited gov't surveillance?

"better guilty than impotent"

sometimes there is no third option to use, you can't get out of a situation without making yourself look bad. so your best option is basically to take the lesser of two evils.

the catch is that the options that gives you the least problems is also the ones that makes you look like you had no idea what you are doing. so instead you make yourself look guilty in an effort to keep up your reputation.

named from the film version of the sum of all fears, where the russian president takes responsibility for a military strike done by a general acting without orders so it doesn't seem like he was incompetent.

"better guilty than impotent", tvtropes.org

this trope's been rattling around in my head since obama's chosen to vigorously defend the wholesale rifling of all domestic messages by the nsa. in "the sum of all fears" (2002), newly minted and wholly innocent russian president nemerov, after ordering the rogue generals responsible "disappeared", defiantly defends the atrocity as a legitimate response to "a nation of criminals" attacking innocent russians, in order to not appear not in control of his own military. the hero, cia analyst jack ryan, to the derision of washington's defense and intelligence chairs, correctly surmises that nemerov isn't the hardliner he pretends to be and didn't order the attack — ultimately helping both countries avoid being manipulated into global thermonuclear war.

it's difficult to reconcile a constitutional scholar and government transparency proponent defending, much less overseeing, a massive ongoing violation of the fourth amendment. but it's not hard to imagine the nsa (with profiteer booz allen) doing what they're paid to do, in secret, and in the name of the war on terror, simply deciding they could and would eavesdrop on everyone. these are not revelations of new ambitions. so we're left to scratch our heads and wonder if obama chose the lesser of two evils rather than plead ignorance and admit that our intelligence agencies are out of control. or maybe a movie is just a movie. perhaps we'll find out in fifty years or so after the papers are finally declassified (or even sooner if wikileaks or anonymous ever gets hold of them).

the not ready for prime time players

it's saturday night, so let's tune into the not-ready-for-prime-time players. but it's not the cast of nbc's saturday night live we'll be watching, though this season's replacements from washington d.c. — that tragicomic capital of calumny and calamity — should prove as entertaining as the originals, if nothing else. we should by now be used to nothing else.

as i forewarned in my post "elegy", the constitutional crisis facing the country can only be resolved by congress' resumption of its responsibilities to both its constituents and itself as a concrete bulwark against any encroachment on its powers and duties by either of the other two branches of government — in these circumstances, the encroachments of the bush administration against the nation's time-tested system of checks and balances.

as glenn greenwald argues with his characteristic clarity — and frustration — in his post "a new low — the senate seeks to 'pardon' the president for past lawbreaking", from which i excerpt liberally, the 109th congress, especially as represented by senate intelligence committee chair arlen specter, is not quite ready for prime time:

observing and commenting on the behavior of arlen specter is one of the most unpleasant obligations a person can have, but for anyone following the nsa eavesdropping scandal specifically, and the bush administration's abuses of executive power generally, it is a necessary evil. the principal reason that the bush administration has been able to impose its radical theories of lawbreaking on the country is because congress, with an unseemly eagerness, has permitted itself to be humiliated over and over by an administration which does not hide its contempt for the notion that congress has any role to play in limiting and checking the executive branch. and few people have more vividly illustrated that institutional debasement than arlen specter, who, along with pat roberts, has done more than anyone else to ensure that congress completely relinquishes its constitutional powers to the president. congressional abdication is so uniquely damaging because the founders assumed that congress would naturally and instinctively resist encroachments by the executive, and the resulting institutional tension — the inevitable struggle for power between the branches — is what would preserve governmental balance and prevent true abuses of power. but for the last five years, congress has done the opposite of what the founders envisioned. they have meekly submitted to the almost total elimination of their role in our government and have quietly accepted consolidation of their powers in the president. if the congress is unmoved by their constitutional responsibilities, then at least basic human dignity ought to compel them to object to the administration's contempt for the laws they pass. after all, the laws which the administration claims it can ignore and has been breaking are their laws. the senate passed fisa by a vote of 95-1, and the mccain torture ban by a vote of 90-9, and it is those laws which the president is proclaiming he will simply ignore. and yet not only have they not objected, they have endorsed and even celebrated the president's claimed power to ignore the laws passed by congress. and that failure, more than anything else, is what has brought us to the real constitutional crisis we face as a result of having a president who claims the power to operate outside of, and above, the law. a bill proposed yesterday by arlen specter to resolve the nsa scandal — literally his fifth or sixth proposed bill on this subject in the last few months — would drag the congress to a new low of debasement. according to the washington post, specter has introduced a bill "that would give president bush the option of seeking a warrant from a special court for an electronic surveillance program such as the one being conducted by the national security agency." this proposal is the very opposite of everything specter has saying for the last several months: specter's approach modifies his earlier position that the nsa eavesdropping program, which targets international telephone calls and e-mails in which one party is suspected of links to terrorists, must be subject to supervision by the secret court set up under the foreign intelligence surveillance act (fisa). a law which makes it "an option" — rather than a requirement — for the government to obtain a warrant before eavesdropping is about as meaningless of a law as can be imagined. but that complete change of heart by specter is not even nearly the most corrupt part of his proposed bill. for pure corruption and constitutional abdication, nothing could match this: another part of the specter bill would grant blanket amnesty to anyone who authorized warrantless surveillance under presidential authority, a provision that seems to ensure that no one would be held criminally liable if the current program is found illegal under present law. the idea that the president's allies in congress would enact legislation which expressly shields government officials, including the president, from criminal liability for past lawbreaking is so reprehensible that it is difficult to describe. ... what makes this proposed amnesty so particularly indefensible is that specter himself has spent the last two months loudly complaining about the fact that he — along with the rest of the country — has been denied any information about how this illegal, secret eavesdropping has been conducted. has that power been abused? has it been exercised for political, rather than national security, reasons? before one even considers shielding those responsible for this lawbreaking from liability, wouldn't one have to at least know the answer to those questions? ... specter receives substantial criticism because of the flamboyant way in which he engages in what can only be described as sado-masochistic rituals with the administration. he pretends to exercise independence only to get beaten into extreme submission, and then returns eagerly for more. it is as unpleasant to watch as it is damaging to our country. but specter's unique psychological dramas should not obscure the fact that it is the entire congress which has failed in its responsibilities to take a stand against this president's lawbreaking and abuses, and there is plenty of blame to go around in both parties. the reason the president has been allowed to exert precisely the type of unrestrained power which the founders sought, first and foremost, to avoid, is because the congress has allowed him to.

update:

to glenn's further consternation, it looks like the post may have only imagined the heinous amnesty proposal in specter's bill:

before i wrote the post, i searched for the actual text of specter's bill in order to read it myself, but could not find it (specter's website is one of the worst sites for any senator, as it is usually a month or more behind). as a result, my post ... was based upon the post's reporting about specter's bill, rather than my own reading of it. i have now had a chance to review the actual text of specter's bill and cannot find any basis for the post's claim that it contains an amensty [sic] provision for past violations of the law. ... there is simply nothing in it which supports the post's report.

glenn had good cause to be cautious — this wasn't the first time that the post bungled the reading of the ever-multiplying proposals spawning from the senate intelligence committee:

before i wrote the post on friday, i was very reluctant to post anything about specter's bill in reliance on the report of the washington post. that's because the post previously published a front-page article about another fisa-related bill, this one proposed by sen. michael dewine, which was completely inaccurate about what the bill actually provided — not with regard to minor details of the bill, but with regard to its fundamental provisions. this is what happened. on march 17, the post published a front-page article by charles babington regarding the proposed legislation introduced by dewine (co-sponsored by sens. snowe, hagel, and graham), which was offered by those senators as the "compromise" solution when the republicans on the senate intelligence committee refused to hold hearings to investigate the nsa warrantless eavesdropping program. the post article falsely depicted this gop bill as vesting oversight power in the congress to stop warrantless eavesdropping, even though the bill provided nothing of the kind. specifically, the post article claimed — erroneously — that the bill would allow the administration to engage in warrantless eavesdropping only if a newly formed senate intelligence subcommittee approves of the program's renewal every 45 days. in fact, the legislation provided nothing of the sort. it gave no power whatsoever to any senate committee to approve or disapprove of warrantless eavesdropping. contrary to the post's front-page claim, that legislation would have vested no power whatsoever in the congress (or the courts) to stop the warrantless eavesdropping. it merely required that the administration "brief" the subcommittee, but the subcommittee (along with everyone else) would be completely powerless under that bill to stop the administration from engaging in warrantless eavesdropping. on that day, i first read the post article about this proposed legislation, but then found the legislation itself and read it. it was very clear that the post was simply wrong in what it told its readers on its front page about this significant legislation — wrong about the legislation's fundamentals.

poll pall

virtually overnight the washington post has generated a poll showing twice as many supporters than objectors to bush's illegal nsa spying program, which only yesterday was revealed to have been accumulating records on "tens of millions of americans", contrary to the administration's repeated assurances. bush supporters are of course ecstatic at any news that can be wrung into kool-aid while bush critics seem to be reflexively retreating into their ready disenchantment with the apathetic hordes.

i was planning to post my own analysis of the poll, whose construction raises serious questions regarding the framing of issues, and which completely ignored the central issue of warrants, court orders and oversight, but glenn greenwald's "polling hysteria and the nsa program" nimbly beat me to the punch:

... when the nsa eavesdropping scandal was first disclosed, rasmussen reports quickly issued a blatantly flawed poll purporting to show that "sixty-four percent (64%) of americans believe the national security agency (nsa) should be allowed to intercept telephone conversations between terrorism suspects in other countries and people living in the united states." the question mentioned nothing about warrants. it mentioned nothing about fisa. and it specified that the government would be eavesdropping only on conversations "between terrorism suspects." the only surprise with the results was that only 64% favored that. One would think that virtually everyone would favor eavesdropping on terrorism suspects. nonetheless, since that was the first poll, it was held up by bush followers as proof that the nsa scandal was political suicide for democrats ... as the debate over the nsa scandal became more informed and more americans understood the issues at stake, virtually every poll thereafter showed that a majority or plurality of americans oppose warrantless eavesdropping and/or believe the president broke the law, and some even show that a plurality favors the censure resolution. opinions change when people stand up and explain why what the government is doing is wrong and dangerous, and americans respect politicians who are willing to do that even when — especially when — they are not guaranteed by the consulting class ahead of time that they will win. all other issues aside, there is nothing for bush opponents to lose here by pursuing this issue. nobody who has abandoned george bush is going to again become a supporter of his because he is keeping track of the telephone calls of every single american.... ... meanwhile, in the real world, ever since the nsa scandal was revealed, the president's approval rating has done nothing but plummet. that, of course, does not demonstrate a causal relationship, but it certainly proves that scandals of this type do not remotely help the president in any way. all of those frightened beltway democrats who were anonymously screeching that russ feingold's censure resolution played right into karl rove's omnipotent hands, that it destroyed the grand democratic plan, that it would allow the president to recover by forcing the debate back onto his turf — how wrong were they, as always?

i encourage you to read the entire post.

meanwhile, for a no-nonsense takedown of the poll's questions themselves, be sure to also check out former telephone pollster krazypuppy's "worst poll ever: americans do care" at daily kos.

seven days in may

(cross-posted at daily kos)

what if they had a war and nobody came?

in his recent post "does the debate over iran matter?", constitutional law litigator glenn greenwald points out that there is frankly nothing — no law, no political body — that might stand in the way should bush decide to launch the attack, whether conventional or nuclear, that he has been threatening over the past weeks.

bush's attorneys have argued that even if the president lacks the congressional authority for such an attack — a position that they do not concede — he does have the inherent constitutional authority under article ii to exercise, unilaterally, any force he deems necessary in the conduct of his global war on terror:

we conclude that the constitution vests the president with the plenary authority, as commander in chief and the sole organ of the nation in its foreign relations, to use military force abroad — especially in response to grave national emergencies created by sudden, unforeseen attacks on the people and territory of the united states. — "yoo memorandum", september 25, 2001

since congress has yet to formally challenge this assertion, and since congress has already demonstrated during the nsa hearings its fawning acquiescence to the white house's expanding exercises of power, we cannot expect any potent resistance from that quarter, certainly not while congress remains under the control of the president's party.

but even if congress were today populated entirely by jealous and power-hungry democrats hellbent on obstructing bush's tiniest move, there exists no legal or procedural mechanism it can invoke that would bar the chief executive from unilaterally dispatching any kind of military action anywhere in the world, especially when this particular chief executive is fiercely determined to demonstrate his authority and his ability to exercise it. congress may decide to punish him afterwards, in any number of ways, from defunding his operation all the way up to impeachment, but it has no means to preemptively block such an action. the world's "sole superpower" truly sits under the sword of damocles, now dangled by a man whose constituents deem an "incompetent", an "idiot" and a "liar". and no one can predict whether the threat of that sword will serve to prevent or precipitate its fall.

a curious development at this phase of what appears to be a somnambulant second act to the iraq war is the never-before-seen and growing number of senior military personnel now taking the stage — on television, the radio and in print — to voice opposition to its civilian leadership and to specifically demand the resignation of secretary of defense donald rumsfeld:

army lieutenant general john riggs, retired, former director, objective force task force:

everyone pretty much thinks rumsfeld and the bunch around him should be cleared out. [they] made fools of themselves.

army major general charles swannack, retired, former airborne commander in iraq:

i feel that he has micromanaged the generals who are leading our forces there to achieve our strategic objectives. i really believe that we need a new secretary of defense.

army major general john batiste, retired, former division commander in iraq:

i believe we need a fresh start in the pentagon. we need a leader who understands team work, a leader who knows how to build teams, a leader that does it without intimidation. a leader that conforms and practices the letter and the law of the goldwater-nichols act ... it speaks volumes that guys like me are speaking out from retirement about the leadership climate in the department of defense ... when decisions are made without taking into account sound military recommendations, sound military decision making, sound planning, then we're bound to make mistakes. when we violate the principles of war with mass and unity of command and unity of effort, we do that at our own peril.

army general george joulwan, retired, former nato supreme allied commander:

it's our responsibility as military leaders to stand up and be counted on tough issues ... i think we've got to get more officers to stand up and be counted at the table, when they're on active duty. i think you're going to see more of that because there is a degree of frustration with the way things are going ... blitzer: what are you hearing from your friends at the pentagon, the top three, four-star generals right now behind the scenes? how frustrated, how angry are they with rumsfeld? joulwan: many of them very much so, particularly the last two or three years. the issue was, they don't trust us. the team that secretary rumsfeld has surrounded himself with doesn't trust the military. blitzer: ... would the country be better off, would the u.s. military be better off right now if the president found a new defense secretary? joulwan: i'm going to leave that up to the president of the united states.

army major general paul eaton, retired, former office of security transition commander in iraq:

defense secretary donald rumsfeld is not competent to lead our armed forces. first, his failure to build coalitions with our allies from what he dismissively called “old europe” has imposed far greater demands and risks on our soldiers in iraq than necessary. second, he alienated his allies in our own military, ignoring the advice of seasoned officers and denying subordinates any chance for input. in sum, he has shown himself incompetent strategically, operationally and tactically, and is far more than anyone else responsible for what has happened to our important mission in iraq. mr. rumsfeld must step down. in the five years mr. rumsfeld has presided over the pentagon, i have seen a climate of groupthink become dominant and a growing reluctance by experienced military men and civilians to challenge the notions of the senior leadership ... donald rumsfeld demands more than loyalty. he wants fealty. and he has hired men who give it ... more vital in the longer term, congress must assert itself. too much power has shifted to the executive branch, not just in terms of waging war but also in planning the military of the future. congress should remember it still has the power of the purse ...

marine lieutenant general greg newbold, retired, director of operations, joint chiefs of staff:

i think i was outspoken enough to make those senior to me uncomfortable. but i now regret that i did not more openly challenge those who were determined to invade a country whose actions were peripheral to the real threat — al-qaeda. i retired from the military four months before the invasion, in part because of my opposition to those who had used 9/11's tragedy to hijack our security policy. until now, i have resisted speaking out in public. i've been silent long enough ... with the encouragement of some still in positions of military leadership, i offer a challenge to those still in uniform: a leader's responsibility is to give voice to those who can't — or don't have the opportunity to — speak. enlisted members of the armed forces swear their oath to those appointed over them; an officer swears an oath not to a person but to the constitution. the distinction is important ... the bush administration and senior military officials are not alone in their culpability. members of congress — from both parties — defaulted in fulfilling their constitutional responsibility for oversight. many in the media saw the warning signs and heard cautionary tales before the invasion from wise observers like former central command chiefs joe hoar and tony zinni but gave insufficient weight to their views ... we need fresh ideas and fresh faces. that means, as a first step, replacing rumsfeld and many others unwilling to fundamentally change their approach.

newbold's avowal that "an officer swears an oath not to a person but to the constitution" and joulwan's call for officers to speak out while on active duty are almost incendiary. active duty officers are rigidly constrained in the proper channels and activities available to them for voicing opposition to an order or program or policy. participating in any overtly political activity of any kind is all but entirely verboten. express obedience is not merely the norm but the heart and spine of any military organization. deference to civilian authority is a fundamental safeguard of our republic. the implications of congress' abdication of its constitutional responsibilities have not been lost on them, who now shoulder an unfair burden. just how much longer will the fighting men dutifully follow the orders of demonstrably inept flight-suited civilians who will not listen to them and who do not trust them? will they really follow them over the cliff and into iran?

in the quiet 1964 drama seven days in may, the joint chiefs of staff, fearing soviet treachery, conspire to take command of the government before an unpopular president can succeed in passing a nuclear disarmament treaty. in that tale, of course, the joint chiefs are the bad guys, representing the same sinister forces president eisenhower warned the nation against three years earlier, in the final days of his term. he had been the first president to negotiate strategies for disarmament with the soviets:

we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. the potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. we must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. we should take nothing for granted.

what rich irony then, that the world's only hope against an insatiable corporate-industrial complex, led by a saber-rattling president, just might depend upon a mutiny by a disaffected military establishment!

as extraordinary and momentous as it might be to actually witness, do not expect this revolution to be televised. the white house would never allow the public to learn of bush's emasculation, nor would the pentagon allow itself to be brought before congress for treason. instead, a quiet agreement would be reached under the cover of an announcement, with great fanfare, of a "breakthrough in secret talks" with iran.

unfortunately, it is, of course, far more likely that bush will be able to find a boykin or a bork ¹ to wage his iranian campaign. it is a big military, after all, with plenty of room for advancement. let us hope then, for the world's sake, that there is also plenty more room for dissent.

if there is any irony left to be had in this mad lurch towards nuclear armageddon, we shall know within the next few weeks.

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¹ a "bork" is a subordinate called to fulfill a legally or morally questionable task that his superiors refuse to perform. the term comes from robert bork, who fired watergate special prosecutor archibald cox at president nixon's insistence, when he assumed the role of acting attorney general after his superior john ruckelshaus was fired and ruckelshaus' superior elliot richardson had resigned. this series of firings and resignations became known as the "saturday night massacre".