Big Brother Calling

There are plenty of people in this country who see no problem with illegal surveillance by the Bush administration. "I have nothing to hide," they say. Then they promptly go bury their heads back in the sand while the United States Constitution crumbles around them.

The problem with such surveillance is that it's a symptom of unchecked power. When one branch of government begins breaking the law--and the other two branches are oblivious to it--such unchecked power leads to an arrogance of power. Of course, Bush, Cheney, and the rest of the Big Brotherhood say it's for our own good, that they're just protecting us from terrorism. Then they'll remind us about 9-11, and how they're just trying to prevent another attack.

The only problem with that argument is that there were, in fact, plenty of opportunities to prevent what happened five years ago, and it has nothing to do with unauthorized wiretaps or collecting the phone records of tens of millions of American citizens. The truth of the matter is that the 9-11 attacks could have been prevented if FBI supervisors had simply read the damn memos from field offices warning about suspicious activity at flight schools, or if the President himself had acted on the warnings provided in his own security briefings.

And if some people continue to doubt that an Arrogance of Power has now taken over the White House, they need only look at what Alphonso Jackson, the Secretary of housing and Urban Development, said in Dallas recently:

"He had made every effort to get a contract with HUD for 10 years," Jackson said of the prospective contractor. "He made a heck of a proposal and was on the (General Services Administration) list, so we selected him. He came to see me and thank me for selecting him. Then he said something ... he said, I have a problem with your president.

"He didn't get the contract," Jackson continued. "Why should I reward someone who doesn't like the president, so they can use funds to try to campaign against the president? Logic says they don't get the contract. That's the way I believe."

So there you have it: If you're trying to get a government contract, it no longer matters if you're the lowest bidder or what your other qualifications may be. What does matter is what you believe.

Actually, that's really not all that surprising. After all, Bush himself once famously said that if you're not with us, you're against us. It's exactly that attitude of stifling dissent and debate that leads to the loss of the very liberties and personal freedoms Bush insists he is protecting.