As
your cable news networks will have told you in the past couple of days, Sen.
Rand Paul and co. stood on the Senate floor this past Thursday to filibuster
the confirmation of John Brennan as Secretary of Defense by talking for over 13
hours straight about the supposedly imminent threat
of warrant-less drone strikes by the United States on American
nationals on American soil. While it's a great sign that we have elected
officials supporting our right to not be blown to smithereens (whatever
those are) at the touch of a button, the whole episode is rather unsettling for
a different reason.
You
see, there is a significant portion of the population from all sorts of
demographic backgrounds that simply distrusts the government, thinking its only
reason for existence is to slowly chip away at citizens’ civil liberties. This
line of reasoning has even led some to believe that the United States government
is secretly plotting, at all times, to turn this beautiful experiment in
democracy into a “V for Vendetta” style totalitarian government. I am here to
say that this worry of an evil government is an unnecessary one. Additionally,
if taken seriously at the national level, it is downright dangerous.
The
worry is as unreasonable as Eric Holder’s response to Sen. Paul’s speech-a-thon
was laconic. This is mainly because if the United States of America wanted to
become the Totalitarian States of America, they would accomplish that goal in
less time than it will take you to finish this article. The armament gap
between the populace and all the branches of the military are such that a slow
and gradual removal of civil liberties would plainly be too laborious and time
consuming when compared to what a quick strike would do.
However,
let’s indulge those who watch New York fashion week for the latest in tin-foil
headgear. Let’s assume the United States indeed wants to limit civil liberties.
If that were the case, we would have to honestly say that the United States has
been failing tremendously at it. The entire history of the United States
constitution is marked by a continuous stream of enlargement of civil
liberties, first to the people who are to enjoy them and even the specific
rights themselves. Aside from specific Supreme Court rulings and prohibition,
the net result of rights granted to American citizens is largely positive.
Logistically speaking, that’s bad news for anyone wanting to take away
ever-increasing civil liberties.
So
why is this talk dangerous? Should we not just leave it to those of us who read
too many Tom Clancy books? Unfortunately, the more this sort of sentiment is
picked up by those with an audience, or elected officials, or the media the more
exposure it is going to get. The more exposure it gets, the more misinformed
the electorate becomes, and a misinformed electorate is inherently detrimental
to the democratic process.
To
go out and present reason to wrongly fear the government for limiting civil
liberties it may have also has physical consequences; for instance when
President Obama announced intention to more effectively regulate gun-ownership
in America there was a run on guns, and it’s not hard to foresee that more guns
will always lead to more gun deaths, accidental or otherwise.
It’s
important to mention that these sorts of negative externalities are not
generated by the people who fear the government or not even necessarily their
message. They are instead being generated by the element of fear in each
individual that is tapped into whenever these claims are made. In a sense
making these valueless claims is a bit like yelling “fire” in a crowded theater It is very helpful when there is actually smoke present. But when
there is no smoke, and therefore no fire, we would all appreciate it you kept
it to yourself and allowed the rest of us to watch the movie.
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3 comments:
The encroachment of civil liberties is not, historically, one of expanding them. Indeed, if you want to make the argument of cyclical nature of civil liberties, then you'd be closer to the right track. James Madison conventionally understood that unless a power was specifically enumerated to the federal government in the Constitution, then it was not delegated to the federal government and the federal government has no right to exercise that power or restrict the rights of the people in that way. Indeed, the Constitution was written primarily as a limitation on the power of government in this way. It is this central reason why, after ceding to the demands for the creation of a Bill of Rights, that the rights are vague and, at least for the first ten, elucidated as negative rights or outright restrictions on the power of government (e.g. "... shall not be infringed"). While some of this history of civil rights has been expansive (e.g. the 14th Amendment's expansion of limits on states), it has not been without a fight, both literally and figuratively/politically, even in the very recent past.
The question about drones is the use of armed drones for "emergent threats" on US soil. Think about that for a second - this isn't about the use of surveillance drones, which should be repugnant in itself (Why should the federal government need general surveillance on the public without suspicion of wrongdoing?), but about the use of armed drones, patrolling the skies, "just in case".
The "just in case" argument is the very definition of a slippery slope, which the government is basing their own justification on. In opening that can of worms, this allows people with both asinine and valid concerns to speak on the same line of argument - "just in case". For example, it has been proven that Iran can hack into military drone aircraft and remotely pilot them - what would stop them from doing so over our own skies? Also for example, the history of giving military hardware (submachine guns, fully-automatic rifles, armored transport carriers, etc.) to civilian police forces has been their active use for non-emergent situation. The mindset becomes "we have these 'tools' and we should use them," even for their unintended purposes, which begets us unintended consequences.
Every assumed expansion of government power should be, I believe, questioned as to whether it is being done for an arguably valid reason or for its own sake, because power once centralized is rarely ceded back to the people, at least not without those fights I spoke of before. It is easier to halt the usurpation of power in its tracks than it is to fight for its return after the fact.
Jake,
I would argue that civil liberties have indeed expanded in the United States since its birth. The basic rights of a citizen were not available to all from the get-go, and like you mentioned, it took a good fight in that specific case as other cases to get it done right. The end result was a net gain of rights simply because another portion of the population was caught up to the rest of society. Not only that, but laws with regards to marriage and reproductive rights within the last 40 years have signaled another wave of an expansion of these liberties.
As far as the drones are concerned, I haven't heard of any plans to introduce drones into the mainland for any sort of surveillance or aiding of any government authority. In fact last I heard, it was up to the states themselves to decide whether or not to allow drones in the first place, not the federal government. To cite Eric Holder's message to Sen. Paul, there is a very limited and specific case for drone intervention on American soil; only a combatant fighting against the entire union is considered fair game.
But the slippery slope you speak of is exactly what I wanted to get at with this piece. There is, as you point out, this fear of any authority with major weaponry to use a "just in case" argument to justify an extra use of force or to run away mad with power. What I tried to point out here and what I will try to explain again here is that this particular argument doesn't hold much water. The Civil War was the moment that marked the point at which the Union was truly greater than the sum of its parts; so if we really were losing civil liberties to a government trying its hardest to limit our ability to live freely, it would simply be overkill at this point. Essentially, if the United States truly wanted to be tyrannical, it would have done so a long time ago. It did not have to wait for drones to show up to be capable of doing so.
In that case, is the reason why an evil scenario has not happened because the U.S. government has misjudged our capacities as citizens to fight back either in a civil or a physical way? Or is it because the U.S. government simply isn't "out to get us"? I'm going to assume the latter, simply because it seems like the most logical scenario. The fact of the matter is that if the U.S. was as repressive as those like Sen.Paul make it out to be, they would have to have shown it by now, simply because it would be illogical to wait any longer.
I agree with you on this point, that all expansion of powers should be scrutinized and stress tested to the point where every eventuality is a positive one for the nation and the citizenry, but when there is a doubt about anything, I hope it is a believable doubt, and not one that borders on conspiracy theory. I know you're not at that level, but there are unfortunately people who are. Considering everyone has the right to say what they like, I simply hope the voice of reason is louder than the voice of ill-conceived concern.
Who defines what voice is the "voice of reason"? Can you identify the "voice of reason" based on your priors alone?
Eric Holder's statement, like so much in politics, is much less than it appears. Against the whole union? What does that mean? Being against the US government has nothing to do with being against the people of the United States.
Does the government of the United States even have the legitimate moral authority to activate weapons in its defense? Is there any limit to that authority? If the authority does not have moral enforcement, should it be exercised regardless?
If you look back at the killing of Anwar Al-Aulaqi's son, a 16-year-old with no proven ties to any activity, and an American citizen, and you understand that the justification for the extrajudicial killing came AFTER the killing itself, I believe more people should be looking askance at both the justifications used and the assurances that peace loving American citizens have nothing to fear.
Let's not pretend that this government, and this administration, do not have blood on their hands, of the "good" and the "bad" alike. This is, in the ACLU's own words, an unprecedented grab of authority. This policy is making for strange bedfellows, among the Civil Liberties crowd and traditional Conservatives. Of course, that doesn't mean those bedfellows are right and the administration wrong, but it should give pause to people who think the administration is right by default (as many likely do).
You think that the US government just isn't "out to get us" as the more logical answer to the question of why it hasn't acted thus far in such a mad manner. I will have to agree to disagree. The central reason why the government has not gone for a wholesale grab of power might rest in the hands whom the federal government would need to wrest those rights from the citizens - the military. Imagine what you will about the men and women in the Armed Forces, but in my experience, and my bias as a former member of the Armed Forces as well, is that they would not permit it to happen.
Many civilians do not understand that when a member of the military takes their oath, they do not take an oath of allegiance to the president or the government, but to the Constitution. Whether our professors might agree with their interpretation of the Constitution or not is irrelevant to the point that if they were ordered to fire on civilians, they would refuse. However, other officers of our executive branch, like the ATF, FBI, and CIA, have historically not show the same level of restraint.
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