The Conscience of Abe’s Turn freedom of speech, defense, and life

I’ve been pondering this question ever since before the election, and I have not been hopeful.

During the campaign, Obama’s “civil rights” plank had more to do with removing rights than restoring them. Quoting from that page, he wants to:

• overturn the Supreme Court’s recent ruling that curtails women’s and racial minorities’ ability to challenge pay discrimination [even though employers are people, too, with the right to control their own livelihoods]
• pass the Fair Pay Act to ensure that women receive equal pay for equal work [which I’m sure will eliminate what happens when government agents get too much power]
• [pass] the Employment Non-Discrimination Act to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity or expression [and make every forward-thinking businessperson absolutely fall in love with gays all over again, even though they would now be a business liability]
• reverse the politicization that has occurred in the Bush Administration’s Department of Justice [which might actually sound good, if I knew what it meant]
• put an end to the ideological litmus tests used to fill positions within the Civil Rights Division [and replace them with a different ideology]
• strengthen federal hate crimes legislation [creating even harsher federal criminal laws—Oh goody!]
• expand hate crimes protection [at least for protection against alleged hate-criminals, but not for protection against official government agents]
• reinvigorate enforcement at the Department of Justice’s Criminal Section [and I can hardly wait!]

If this is Obama’s vision of strengthening civil rights, oh my God… Whatever happened to due process? The First, Second, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendments? Leave it to a big-government politician to ignore the abuses that happen at the hands of too-powerful government enforcers and to think that more government power will make America a better place.

Of course, those were just campaign promises. When he fails to keep them, people will “understand.” By the way, Obama also promised to repeal executive orders that “trample on liberty” and to cut wasteful government spending. I don’t believe he’s actually going to come through with either, at least not to any meaningful degree. (Because of what Roosevelt promised in his campaign in 1932, and history repeats itself.)

Now, Jim Babka at DownsizeDC shares my cynicism, but promises to apply the screws to the government to get them to lighten up, and gives some hope for change. He notes that after the New York Times exposed the Bush administration’s illegal citizen-spying program, the administration…

… stonewalled, misdirected, and refused to provide documents to Congress. They even subpoenaed the phone records of the investigating reporters.

Then they demanded that Congress legalize their crimes retroactively, and immunize the phone companies that had conspired with them.

It took two years, but the Bush administration got what it wanted.

First, they had to wait for an election to provide a Congressional majority of “change Democrats.” It was the Democrats who gave the president his “get out of jail free card.”

One notable “change Democrat” showed us what change really means. His name was Barack Obama. He changed from his 2006 stance and voted to give President Bush the unconstitutional powers and immunity from prosecution that President Bush so desperately wanted and needed.

Call me cynical, but perhaps the aspiring President Obama was looking ahead and decided he wanted those powers too. If so, it may be wishful thinking to hope that our “change” president will tell us where the bodies are buried — even though he could simply direct his team to do so. But actually, our hopes are more well-founded.

(Click here to read the whole article.)

He goes on to point out that there are many in the government now who hate what has been going on in the name of home security. And that all Obama really has to do once he takes office is just to stay out of the way, and those people will see to it that the secrets of the Bush administration are brought to light. DownsizeDC also has campaigns to reverse the abusive policies of the Bush administration and to restore some of the checks on government power.

-TimK