US Constitutional Issues – Page 23

Why Does The FBI Work For The Koch Brothers?

“If you have nothing to hide, it will still be found.”

Climate Progress referenced a story in the Canadian Press:

Unexpected visitors have been dropping in on anti-oil activists in the United States — knocking on doors, calling, texting, contacting family members. The visitors are federal agents.

Opponents of Canadian oil from tar sands say they’ve been contacted by FBI investigators regarding their involvement in protests that delayed northbound shipments of equipment to Canada’s oil sands. These protests have blocked highways in order to delay shipment of the equipment.

The FBI visits have been happening in Oregon, Washington State, and Idaho, and a lawyer working with the activists told the Canadian Press that he has advised them not to talk to the agents: (brackets and emphasis by the Wrongologist)

It’s always the same line [by the FBI]: ‘We’re not doing criminal investigations, you’re not accused of any crime. But we’re trying to learn more about the movement.’

Yet, the FBI told the Canadian Press that it doesn’t investigate political movements, but focuses on crimes. They quote FBI spokesperson, Ayn Dietrich:

The FBI has the authority to conduct an investigation when it has reasonable grounds to believe that an individual has engaged in criminal activity or is planning to do so…This authority is based on the illegal activity, not on the individual’s political views.

But the FBI made public in January 2014 that they had changed their mission statement. Instead of listing “law enforcement” as its “primary function,” as it has for years, the FBI fact sheet began to list “national security” as its chief mission. Foreign Policy reports:

Between 2001 and 2009, the FBI doubled the amount of agents dedicated to counterterrorism, according to a 2010 Inspector’s General report. That period coincided with a steady decline in the overall number of criminal cases investigated nationally and a steep decline in the number of white-collar crime investigations.

Back in 2000, the FBI sent prosecutors 10,000 cases. That fell to 3,500 cases by 2005. Foreign Policy reports on a 2007 Seattle Post-Intelligencer investigation that the Justice Department did not replace 2,400 agents assigned to focus on counterterrorism in the years following 9/11. The reductions in white-collar crime investigations became obvious:

Had the FBI continued investigating financial crimes at the same rate as it had before the terror attacks, about 2,000 more white-collar criminals would be behind bars.

That explains why no executive in a “Too Big to Fail” bank went to jail after the 2008 economic meltdown.

Now, we have one serious issue. The FBI is essentially doing pre-emptive security work for a private corporation, and it’s a Canadian corporation at that. From Charlie Pierce:

The idea that your friendly neighborhood Fed is stopping by to “learn more about the movement” should be chilling for a number of reasons. The first is…the FBI has no business dropping in on citizens who have not committed a crime, nor are they suspected of having committed one, and especially not at the behest of a private multinational concern.

If Keystone were approved, it is likely that there would be demonstrations up and down the route of the pipeline, from northern Alberta to the Gulf of Mexico. More from Pierce:

That the FBI is already gathering intelligence indicates that the Bureau knows this and is warming up for such eventualities. Names are going into a file…This never has worked out well in the area of political dissent in this country, and, given the fact that we now have a staggering network of covert domestic intelligence-gathering and a huge government law-enforcement apparatus, it’s unlikely to work out well in the future…

There is a name for what happens when the government’s law-enforcement powers are put at the direct convenience of private corporations. Fascism.

Here are a few questions: Is this just a little hippie punching by the Fed Coats?

Is the ghost of J. Edgar Hoover back, dresses and all?

Why do the Koch brothers’ corporations now justify FBI support?

The FBI owes the oil sands activists and the rest of America, a better explanation than, “Don’t worry. We’re not doing what all of you know we did in the past.”

Sunday Cartoon Blogging – February 8, 2015

Today is Sunday, the day when Christians worship their God. So, it’s appropriate that we focus on the reaction of certain right-wing Christians to Mr. Obama’s talk at the National Prayer Breakfast last Thursday. He spoke for about thirty minutes but the part of the speech that the right wing are focusing on is when he brought up the Crusades: (brackets by the Wrongologist)

Humanity has been grappling with these questions [violence in the name of religion] throughout human history. And lest we get on our high horse and think this is unique to some other place, remember that during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ. In our home country, slavery and Jim Crow all too often was justified in the name of Christ.

The righties are complaining that Obama is saying that Christianity is equivalent to ISIS. Which of course, isn’t what he said. He was saying that Islam was not ISIS, and demonizing Islam for the sins of ISIS is hypocritical, because, among other reasons, Christians have plenty to answer for, given their historical actions in the name of religion. So, conservatives are slamming Obama for not equating terrorism with Islam. For example, Jim Gilmore, former Republican governor of Virginia said:

He has offended every believing Christian in the United States…Mr. Obama does not believe in America or the values we all share.

The blog Red State said:

Barack Obama, leftwing community organizer and closet theologian, used the National Prayer Breakfast to throw a tu quoque at anyone critical of Islam while continuing to fancy himself as the Pope of Islam

When did the clearly dominant religion in the US develop a glass jaw?

Mr. Obama has attended this prayer breakfast each year to speak about his faith. And the things he said this time were things that Christians agree with: that at times, the religion has been perverted, that we have to walk humbly before God, that God’s purposes are mysterious to us. These thoughts are accepted by every Christian. And so what he said was normal, a recognition of historical fact, and an urge towards some level of perspective and humility.

But what Obama says is never enough for these crypto-Christians. And as for American’s Christian conservatives, they love, love, love violent retribution. One example is their love affair with torture. Do you need the reminder that Sarah Palin said about waterboarding:

that’s how we baptize terrorists

Here is your OTHER approved form of Sunday worship:

But today, we have as many deniers as believers:

Mr. Christie, a denier, needs a different vaccine:

Mr. Romney’s exit creates a stampede:

Bibi gets to address Congress, but teleprompter has ideas:

Brian Williams not always honest:

Is The Waze App Killing Cops?

You may not have heard of, much less used, the mobile phone GPS app Waze. Waze is a free social GPS app that has turn-by-turn navigation to help drivers avoid traffic. That makes it just like a lot of other smart phone navigation apps. But Waze is different, since it’s also a community-driven application that draws information from other drivers. And it even learns from users’ driving times to provide routing and real-time traffic updates.

Developed by an Israeli start-up, Waze has gained a strong following worldwide. Over 50 million users globally use it. In June 2013, Google acquired Waze for $966 million. The charm is that it makes the auto industry’s dashboard navigation systems obsolete. While auto navigation systems offer beautiful graphics and larger screens, they have their faults. Aside from expensive prices, most of these systems require updating via pre-made DVDs, instead of the Internet. This is far less competitive than real-time updates by apps like Waze. In the case of Waze, the updates are crowd-sourced in near-real time.

One Waze advantage is that it lets users know where police are located along the driver’s route. That feature means that ~~our whiniest~~ the police are far from pleased with that feature of the Waze app. Waze users mark police, who are generally working in public spaces, on maps without much distinction other than “visible” or “hidden.” Users see a police icon, but it’s not immediately clear whether police are there for a speed trap, a sobriety check or a lunch break:

(This screen shot is illustrative, the police could be more than .2 miles away)

That might make you want to download the app right now. But there is trouble in paradise. DailyTECH reports that the Los Angeles PD’s Chief, Charlie Beck, is among a growing contingent of police officers nationwide who claim Waze and its new owner Google, are endangering officer safety by warning people of the location of police. To some in law enforcement, this feature makes Waze a stalking app for people who want to harm police; and they want Google to disable the feature. In a letter sent on Dec. 30, Chief Beck warns Google that the app: (Brackets by DailyTECH)

[The service’s information could be] misused by those with criminal intent to endanger police officers and the community…I am confident your company did not intend the Waze app to be a means to allow those who wish to commit crimes to use the unwitting Waze community as their lookouts for the location of police officers.

There are no known connections between any attack on police and Waze, although the Associated Press reported that Chief Beck said in his letter to Google, that Waze was used in the killing of two New York Police Department officers on Dec. 20. The fact is that Ismaaiyl Brinsley’s (the gunman) Instagram account included a screenshot from Waze along with other messages threatening police.

But, it was impossible for Brinsley to have used Waze to ambush the NYPD officers, since he tossed his cellphone away more than two miles from where he shot the officers.

This is not the first time law enforcement has raised concerns with these types of apps. In 2011, four US Senators asked Apple to remove all applications that alerted users to drunk driving checkpoints. The effort to disable Waze’s police function reminds us of when police tried to give tickets to people who would flash their headlights to warn oncoming drivers of speed traps. Last year, a Missouri Federal Judge decided that it violated the 1st Amendment free speech rights of the people ticketed.

The cop killer argument is hilariously wrong. You could simply look up the address of your local police station and drive nearby if your plan is to kill cops. The honest reason the police are against Waze is because it helps people avoid speeding tickets. You can’t take something that was used once by Ismaaiyl Brinsley and label it a “cop killer” app.

Google isn’t “helping” people break the law. It’s not against the law to tell someone where an officer is. People just want to know where those nasty speed traps are – it doesn’t have to be so complicated! But, if you are caught by one, you can at least be comforted by the thought that there is legal help available to you, should you find yourself facing repercussions.

We already live in a police state. They monitor us dozens of different ways, some of them unconstitutional, like the Stingray devices. But the second someone makes a video recording of an interaction with a cop, or uses an app that indicates their whereabouts, they get all indignant about their privacy and security.

Waze isn’t increasing the exposure of the police force to “cop killers”.

Shock and Awe, Part Deux

From the Wall Street Journal: (emphasis by the Wrongologist)

Jeb Bush is crisscrossing the country on a 60-event fundraising blitz aimed at raising enough money to give other Republicans second thoughts about entering the race.

The fundraising effort, which Mr. Bush’s team has dubbed a “shock and awe’’ campaign, could be particularly meaningful for Mitt Romney , who is competing with Mr. Bush for support from the same small circle of longtime Republican donors.

How can talking about “shock and awe” in a supposed positive way be a part of your election plan? We all remember “shock and awe”, and not fondly. Probably as many as 100 million Americans understand that the high volume bombing of Baghdad by Jeb’s brother George W. did not bring about a pacified Iraq. In fact, the “shock and awe” bombing campaign led to a nasty insurgency and ultimately, a failed campaign to make Iraq a democratic and peaceful place.

The analogy would be that Jeb assumes if he raises a huge amount of money, it will force his rivals out of the race. If the analogy is perfect, he will discover that his opponents don’t quit the race, and he has no plan for what to do then.

But, since Citizens United, it will take a lot of money if the nominee is going to be someone other than Bush or Romney. One lesson of the 2012 Republican primaries was that, with no restrictions on the donations by the rich, candidates did not need to have a plurality of rich guys behind them in order to compete.

Maverick rich guys could keep a candidate sufficiently funded, as both Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum demonstrated. But, the rich guys also learned that there are diminishing returns to funding, particularly in the primaries, so, it is unlikely that Romney can be funds-raised out of the race, he can self-fund. Which means Romney has little to fear from Jeb’s shock and awe fundraising.

The conservative Washington Examiner isn’t convinced that Jeb will be able to raise enough money. (brackets by the Wrongologist)

It has been a while since the Bush machine was in operation…It was last up and running in 2004, for the re-election of George W. Bush, and last at work for the caucuses in 2000, for W’s first run. For the 2016 race, that means the machine has been out of action for a long time. Many Bush donors from 2000 and 2004 became Romney donors in…2012. They have conflicted loyalties, and not all of them will rejoin the [Bush] family.

It is safe to say that Jeb won’t be able to scare Mitt Romney away based on fundraising alone, and that the two of them will divide most of the big donor base. Still, once governors like John Kasich of Ohio, Scott Walker of Wisconsin, and Chris Christie of New Jersey learn how much money that Bush has brought in by doing 60 events, they may realize that they can’t really compete. One or more will go forward to compete in the debates with the hope of landing the VP slot, or positioning themselves for private sector careers. For them, Jeb’s fundraising isn’t going to push them to the sidelines, no matter how much is raised.

And Jeb is supposed to be the smart one.

Finally, we are having a “Snowmageddon” event here in the Northeast. Internet may or may not survive. In the meantime, here is “Call it Stormy Monday, (but Tuesday’s Just as Bad)” by T. Bone Walker, recorded in 1947:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVR8lg1YLuc

Thoughts Before Tonight’s SOTU

Mr. Obama will make the State of the Union (SOTU) speech tonight. Much of what he is likely to outline as his program for 2015 has been leaked, and pundits have focused on the tax cut for the middle class and tax increases for the 1%. Given that the Republicans control both houses of Congress, this is never going to happen, so why now, and not in 2009 and 2010?

On Sunday, the Wrongologist wrote about Mr. Obama’s appalling coattails. Among the reasons his party lost 13 Senate seats, 69 House seats and 11 Governorships since 2010 is that Dems think they can win as “Republican Lite”. In the case of Democrats, they became the “less taste, less filling” brand.

It’s a lot easier to propose these tax policies when there is absolutely no prospect that these policies will ever be enacted. So, the real significance of these proposals will be how it sets up the eventual Democratic nominee for the contest against Bush 3.0, or Romney 3.0, or whoever winds up with the Republican nomination in 2016. But, will the electorate care that the president proposed something that the Republicans laughed out of town over the weekend? Probably not.

Political scientists point out that the 2016 congressional elections will be more favorable to the Democrats than the 2010 or 2014 elections were, because of the higher turnout in the presidential elections and the makeup of Senate seats that will be contested in 2016.

So, why won’t Democrats turn out for off-year elections? Think about it: Voters seem to be perfectly capable of finding their way to the polls in certain years and are motivated enough to take the time to do so. Yet, these same people consistently lose either their motivation or sense of direction, two years later. Democratic pros say that turnout is all about how to “message” better, which for Democrats means how to say the same old things in new ways. But, Democratic candidates, and their messaging have lost credibility, or are no longer relevant to the day-to-day issues of average people. So voting for Democrats is no longer a priority.

Nor is election turnout the only answer. In 2006, Democrats did extremely well with a 37.1% turnout. Yet, Democrats did poorly in 2010 when turnout was 37.8%. Turnout was higher in 2008 than it had been in any Presidential election year since 1968, probably due to the Obama factor. But, turnout in 2002 when Republicans did well, was only slightly off from 2006 when they did badly, at 37.0%.

Strategically, Republicans may not have much left in the potential electorate to motivate, if demographics are now really tilting towards Democrats. Thus, the R’s have no choice but to repress (or suppress) unenthusiastic and unmotivated Democratic voters.

The R’s got a huge assist in 2014 from Democratic candidates that didn’t stand for much, except the meta-message of “we suck less.” Even if a majority of the electorate sort of agrees with that, a certain portion also says, “Yeah, but not enough to care who wins.”

The issue is what strategies will work politically. The bind can be explained simply: to be successful, Democrats must convince the electorate that Washington can and should do things to improve their lives, but the Republicans have enough firepower to ensure that the D’s premise is a loser. With Hillary, Dems won’t beat them badly enough in 2016 to change that.

It’s clear that electing Democrats (usually) leads to better outcomes than electing Republicans. Change came in bunches: in 1933-1945, 1961-1973, 2009-2010. Think about it, in that 35 year period, Dems passed financial regulation, FDIC, SEC, Social Security, Medicare, Civil Rights Act, Equal Opportunity, Voting Rights Act and Obamacare.

If you doubt this, look at the 50 states. Each has its own set of policies. In many cases, states have adhered to a generally consistent policy for decades. So the economic conditions in the states is a strong indicator of the effects those policies. To see whether the economy performs better in red states or blue states, simply look these 2014 statistics for red vs. blue states. The differences in that regard are stark:

Or, you can look at poverty by red vs. blue state:

Or, per student education spending by state:

This may suggest a strategy on the state and local levels, based on: “Why can’t we have the success the blue states have?”

On the federal level, Democrats have not received credit from voters for proposing popular policies that never came to pass. In fact, the entire success of the Republicans in the 2014 elections was predicated on the idea that the president would receive more blame for gridlock and dysfunction in Washington than they would for causing it.

They were correct. And there are zero reasons to believe that the same playbook won’t work again. You can already hear Republicans decrying the “Obama/Clinton failed policies” of the past 8 years.

See what YOU think after the SOTU tonight.

Happy Martin Luther King Day!

Although it was first observed in 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. Day wasn’t recognized by all 50 states until 2000. It isn’t simply a day about the man; it’s a day about a Dream. MLK remains the hero of a certain generation of Americans for whom activism was a building block of their personal journey to adulthood.

In most ways, our nation has lost that sense of can-do, that all things are possible if you follow your Big Idea, because sadly, we no longer have people who can rally us to make Big Ideas happen. And isn’t it fascinating that the three men of the 20th Century who had big ideas and brought them to fruition, Gandhi, Mandela and Dr. King, all faced “it can’t be done” opposition, often violent, from the white power base in their countries. All three modeled non-violence for their followers, and all three lived to see their Big Dream become a reality in their own country.

Since it is Wake Up Monday, here are 3 songs that pay tribute to Dr. King, his ideals and his relentless drive for equality. It is important to remember that he was just 39 when he was killed.

First, “Glory” by Common and John Legend from the soundtrack of the current movie “Selma”:

50 years later, we are far from completely erasing our race-related issues, except on TV, where all day, every day, commercials show people of all races having fun together while shopping for fast food.

Let’s work together to make it a reality outside of TV before too many more MLK days come and go.

Next, U2’s “Pride (In the Name of Love)“. From their 1984 album, “The Unforgettable Fire”:

If listeners have any doubt that Martin Luther King Jr. is the subject of the song, these lyrics drive the point home:

Early morning, April 4
Shot rings out in the Memphis sky
Free at last, they took your life
They could not take your pride.

But, MLK’s assassination took place in the early evening, rather than the early morning. That didn’t matter, everyone loves the song, and the Edge’s guitar at the start is one of the most recognizable riffs of the 1980’s.

Finally, the Wrongologist’s favorite MLK song, “Southern” by OMD from their album “The Pacific Age“. On April 3, 1968, in Memphis, King delivered his last speech, which we now know as his “I’ve been to the mountaintop” speech. He was assassinated the next day. OMD samples some of the content of that speech for their song “Southern”:

Although everyone knows the “I’ve been to the mountaintop” part of the speech, Wrongo thinks our focus should be on the following:

I want young men and young women, who are not alive today
But who will come into this world, with new privileges
And new opportunities
I want them to know and see that these new privileges and opportunities
Did not come without somebody suffering and sacrificing
For freedom is never given to anybody

Why should we focus on that part of the speech? Because one day down the road, and it will not be long, young people will have forgotten what MLK meant to America, and how whatever remains of their rights came to be.

They won’t know anything about the intellectual foundations of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Or, how the 13th Amendment ending slavery came about, and why, 100 years later in 1965, the Voting Rights Act was passed, or how 48 years later, in June, 2013, the Roberts Court eviscerated it.

So, today, teach a child about why MLK is important.

Sunday Cartoon Blogging – January 11, 2015

This was a week when cartoonists and free speech came under assault. The cartoonists died. Free speech will survive. From cartoonist Tom Toles, whose work appears here often:

The one response I saw to the Paris murders that I didn’t care for is that they were killed for ‘just cartoons.’ The event proves the opposite. Amidst the floodtide of ‘content’ that contemporary communications are generating, it was precisely the cartoons that stood out as having so much power that someone felt they needed to be silenced. They still have that kind of power.

Free speech is the single most important aspect of what makes a “free society” free. As a free society, we can debate what is a wise use of our free speech rights. But, we have just been reminded in the most terrible terms, how important and vulnerable it can be. Cartoonist David Horsey, whose work also appears here often, (including today) said this week:

Not only can freedom not exist without truth tellers, freedom cannot exist without obnoxious expressions of opinion, no matter who is offended.

Ted Rall, a cartoonist who also appears here occasionally, said this on his blog:

There could never be a mass shooting of staff political cartoonists in the United States, because American newspapers and magazines have fired almost all of them.

He estimates that today, there are only 30 or so cartoonists employed full-time by American newspapers and magazines. The declining number of cartoonists has made curating Sunday cartoons for this blog more difficult over the years.

How do we move forward? The Wrongologist does not usually quote any Catholic Pope, but this from Paul VI seems appropriate today:

“If you want peace, work for Justice”

What does that mean in practical terms today?

• Work toward achieving economic equality everywhere
• Include the topics “Understanding Cultures” and “Promoting Cultural Integration” in school curriculums. This could help reduce fear of “The Other”, a common human trait
• Encourage moderate Muslims living in the West to root out the extremists among them
• Ask Muslim countries to do more than to offer condolences to France

On to cartoons. If you stop cartooning, the terrorists win:

Their real motivator wasn’t Allah:

In other news, we had a semi-favorable jobs report:

Republicans took over the Congress:

The NYPD continued their soft coup:

NYPD Job Action continued:

Transforming America, Part I

For the past few months, this blog has featured this quote:

He didn’t know what was defeating him, but he sensed it was something he could not cope with, something that was far beyond his power to control or even at this point in time, comprehend –Hubert Selby Jr.

Let’s start this year with a meditation about one transformative idea. Not something that is peddled by the DC think tanks, but an idea that lurks just below the surface.

All of us have wondered, like the characters in Selby’s “Requiem for a Dream” (and maybe, with increasing frequency) “hey, something is wrong here”. Maybe you accept mainstream logic, but now you’ve come to realize that things are getting out of control, despite the constant messaging from your ideological god of choice that tries to pull you back to conventional thinking.

Here is the transformative idea for today: The free market isn’t a beautiful self-correcting machine. Instead, it is consuming our society and our environment for the benefit of a very few.

And it isn’t an orderly process; the trajectory is more like a slow free-fall in which the market system moves downward devouring everything, unless it is met by real opposition. In fact, the globalized version of the free market makes life horrible for lots of people, creating a constant need for intervention.

For a couple of examples, you don’t get the Russian Revolution(s) without the Czar trying to play ‘catch up’ with the West. You don’t get the Cuban Revolution without the crimes of the Batista regime.

When there is a backlash against corporatism, especially on the periphery, capitalists come up with a solution. Anyone is better than a bunch of reformers who want society to pay attention to people’s well-being rather than to profits.

With globalization, local thugs became very useful. Folks like Shah Reza Pahlavi of Iran, the Saud family in Saudi Arabia, Mubarak in Egypt, Suharto in Indonesia, and Hussein in Iraq. Most of the time, these folks did the job big business wanted done (even if it was messy). And the American government protected US corporate assets in-country, and propped up the compliant local politicians. The profits got privatized, and the losses socialized, since our taxes paid for the military aid to the dictators, while the corporates skimmed the profits. And much of those profits remained offshore, out of reach of our taxing authorities.

Today, the useful thugs working on behalf of the American Empire are in Washington DC. They have made our political system a self-replicating support system for free market capitalism. We have retained only a veneer of our democracy, while moving rapidly in the direction of an authoritarian business-state combine, an improved version of Mussolini-style corporatism.

Oswald Spengler, who’s “Decline of the West” argued in the 1920’s that the urban culture of Northern Europe was a “Faustian” world, (his term for one of 8 global cultures) characterized by bigness and rationality, eventually to be dominated by the soldier, the engineer, and the businessman.

Doesn’t that seem particularly relevant to today’s America? Spengler thought that democracy is simply the political weapon of money, and that the media is the means through which money operates a democratic political system. Importantly, he said:

The ‘tragic comedy of the world-improvers and freedom-teachers’ is that they are simply assisting money to be more effective.

So here we are. One day, it was 2014, the next day, 2015. What has changed? Nothing. What will change? Nothing, unless you begin a process of thinking about one transformative idea:

The free market doesn’t self-correct. Therefore, it is an ideology that must be changed.

The struggle between market forces and societal needs has always existed. In the 20th Century, we evolved a series of social democracies that kept the rights of the people balanced against the rights of the corporations, with some of the pushback actually coming from businesses themselves.

But today, well-funded efforts to roll back New Deal and New Society social welfare programs are well advanced. And there are only so many times that this blog and others can point out that many Americans have been unemployed since 2008.

The political question is what happens to this great new underclass in America? An underclass that has grown large because of the past 7+ years of economic disparity. Since the free market system that is grinding up our society is a utopian fantasy, we should be able to turn to our democratic system to help solve the real failures of our economic system.

But, our democratic system has been co-opted by the free marketers. So, who can ordinary people turn to for help AGAINST the market?

The corporatists and their captured politicians have a term, “there is no alternative” or TINA. It has come to mean that “there is no alternative” to free markets, free trade, and globalization, if our society is to prosper. They stress TINA to keep ordinary people from seeing that we need to constrain the worst of free market excesses.

The unbridled free market has to die.

Two Police Killings, Two Different Reactions

A few more words about the killing of two NYPD officers. It was and is a tragedy. No one should think otherwise. The harsh reaction that blamed Mayor de Blasio and the Eric Garner and Ferguson demonstrators should be viewed through a lens of that tragedy, The statements made by the PBA, and Commissioner Bratton were over the top, but under the circumstances, we can let go of them.

It was different with the professional politicians. On Sunday, Ray Kelly, who was the police commissioner during the Bloomberg administration, said that in his view (and in the view of many officers), that Mr. de Blasio ran on an “anti-police” platform.

He wasn’t alone. Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani attributed the killings to the protests that broke out across the city following a grand jury’s failure to indict a police officer for killing Eric Garner. But Rudy being Rudy, went over the top on Fox News on Sunday:

We’ve had four months of propaganda starting with the president that everybody should hate the police.

OK, that makes the killings Obama’s fault. Then, it was Ex NY Governor George Pataki (R) who weighed in, blaming de Blasio and Attorney General Eric Holder for inciting the kind of anti-police fervor that led to the murders:

Sickened by these barbaric acts, which sadly are a predictable outcome of divisive anti-cop rhetoric of #ericholder & #mayordeblasio. #NYPD

— George E. Pataki (@GovernorPataki) December 21, 2014

(For those who receive this blog in email via FeedBurner, the tweet will not display properly. Pataki said):

Sickened by these barbaric acts, which sadly are a predictable outcome of divisive anti-cop rhetoric of #ericholder & #mayordeblasio. #NYPD

This, just days after Pataki said that he was thinking of running for President in 2016. Pataki seizes an issue and runs (literally) with it.

Yet, de Blasio said on the night of the killings, while standing next to Commissioner Bratton:

It is an attack on all of us; it’s an attack on everything we hold dear.

Isn’t it interesting how the shooting of two NYC cops became politicized, not just in NYC but throughout the country. Bratton blamed, in a roundabout way, the protests and so it goes. All of these guys looking for political advantage on Sunday. Then, on Monday, the headline in NYT said:

Officers’ Killer, Adrift and Ill, Had a Plan

Ismaaiyl Brinsley was a gang member who spent time in jail, who hated cops, who shot his girlfriend before he took the bus to NYC. He necessitates shutting down demonstrations, suggesting we recall the mayor, and blaming the White House.

Yet, in Pennsylvania, in September, Eric Frein, a white guy kills one cop and wounds another. But that story isn’t about how we should end marches and protests, or play the political blame game. He was just a loner with authority issues. This is typical of the coverage of the PA killing: (emphasis by the Wrongologist)

Police have not spoken about a possible motive for the crime, other than that Eric Frein has talked and written about hating law enforcement. Authorities have said a review of a computer hard drive used by Frein shows that he had planned the attack for years.

NO motive?? The same story says that Frein claimed to have fought with Serbians in Africa. That he was on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted fugitives list. And that when they found him, he had two fully functional pipe bombs.

Clearly, Ismaaiyl Brinsley was the real threat to democracy, not Eric Frein. Two guys, two different plans, two different attacks on police, and two different reactions by the police and Republican pundits.

No surprise here.

Let’s move on to more music for the season with something to make us forget that the America we knew is disintegrating in front of us.

Here is an old Irish song that dates from the 12th century, “The Wexford Carol”. Take a listen to the melody and beautiful words. This version has Allison Krauss performing along with Yo Yo Ma. That’s the amazing Natalie MacMaster backing them on the fiddle:

First verse:
Good people all, this Christmas time,
Consider well and bear in mind
What our good God for us has done,
In sending His belovèd Son.

America: Fearful and Dysfunctional

It didn’t take long for America’s pollsters to get feedback about the CIA’s torture program. Pew interviewed 1001 people from December 11-14. 500 respondents were interviewed on a landline telephone, and 501 were interviewed on a cell phone. About a third each were Republicans, Democrats and Independents. The results are surprising:

• 51% of the public think the CIA methods were justified.
• 56% believe that torture provided intelligence that helped prevent terrorist attacks.

Here are the top line results:

So, according to a bare majority of the American people, torture is justified, and it works.

Before 9/11, most Americans were against torture. Yet here we are. The drumbeat of propaganda and our deep need to justify what America does (America is good, therefore America does not do evil), has coarsened the country.

And the public is less concerned about the methods used by the CIA, and way more about the Senate committee’s decision to release the report: As many call the decision to publicly release the findings the wrong decision (43%) as the right decision (42%).

A large majority of Republicans (76%) say the interrogation methods used by the CIA after 9/11 were justified. Democrats are divided – 37% say the methods were justified, while 46% disagree. About twice as many liberal Democrats (65%) as conservative and moderate Democrats (32%) say the CIA’s interrogation techniques were not justified.

Young people also are divided over the CIA’s post-9/11 methods: 44% of those under 30 say that the torture methods were justified, while 36% disagree. Among those 50 and older, 60% think the methods were justified. The over 65 group had the highest agreement at 62%. You can review the detailed survey results here.

While we could quibble about the form of the questions asked, every demographic had at least a plurality in favor of torture: men and women, young and old, white and non-white. The exception was Democrats, who did not believe that torture was justified, although they believed it was helpful.

• 65% of liberal Democrats said torture was not justified
• 25% said torture was justified

The opinions of conservative and moderate Democrats were much different: 48% say the CIA interrogations were justified compared with 32% who say they were not.

What does this say about America?

The physical damage done on 9/11 was nothing compared to the psychological damage to the US population. It has seemingly unleashed a latent fascism. We got nuked emotionally, we haven’t recovered, and we may never recover.

We are propagandized to an incredible degree. While people must ultimately take responsibility for their own opinions and actions, the media industry is bent on shaping perception and they are very good at it. Think television isn’t influential? Last night, the Wrongologist’s local TV news covered the hostage situation in Sydney, Australia. But the facts were used only as a jumping off point: The vast majority of the talking head’s time was spent quoting people from the DC security apparatus regarding how such attacks could happen here, how such attacks mean that we should to be hyper vigilant. This continual spinning up of average American’s fears about terror creates a response that isn’t easily calmed.

In post 9/11 America, our politicians have decided that the ends justify the means. They understand that instilling fear pays dividends politically. Their message to the people is that “any means necessary” is acceptable in order to keep us safe. At first, it was the gradual erosion of free speech and habeas corpus. Then, the “collect everything” mode of the NSA.

Now, for the majority of Americans, its “OK, torture if you have to, just keep me safe.”

Those people who think torture is justified are good people who have lost their moral compass, or whose compass points only in a bad direction. This is the dark side of moral relativity: the greater good can lead to terrible outcomes like torture. People do bad things all the time, particularly when they think the good produced outweighs the bad. If a few people’s suffering creates enough “good” (for the rest of us) and that good outweighs the suffering of the few, then, we guess that we should have no issue with it. Thus, torture is now acceptable to the majority of Americans.

And when you look closely at the Pew numbers, although “only” 51% think torture is justified, 20% didn’t have an opinion, so only 29% really think torture is wrong.

Ain’t that America: Fearful, and Dysfunctional.

Smell that American Exceptionalism!

The Wrongologist

Geopolitics, Power and Political Economy

Category: US Constitutional Issues