Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
Legislative leaders from both parties have agreed to pass another 4 year extension of the Patriot Act, including highly controversial and often abused provisions including National Security Letters, with as little debate as possible.
Top congressional leaders agreed Thursday to a four-year extension of the anti-terrorist Patriot Act, the controversial law passed after the Sept. 11 attacks that governs the search for terrorists on American soil.The deal between Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker John Boehner calls for a vote before May 27, when parts of the current act expire, according to officials in both parties who spoke on condition of anonymity. The idea is to pass the extension with as little debate as possible to avoid a protracted and familiar argument over the expanded power the law gives to the government.
Yeah, why debate over laws that undermine our freedom and expand executive power? Only crazy radicals like Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul worry about such things. At a time when the two parties are at each other's throats over almost every issue, here are the things that our Democratic president and the leaders and majority of both parties in Congress can agree on these days:
1. Screw the Bill of Rights, the executive should be able to perform searches and seizures without a warrant from any judge, even the FISA court which operates in secret.
2. Screw the Bill of Rights, the executive should be able to do anything it wants no matter how clearly it violates the law and the victims of those abuses of power should have no legal recourse whatsoever.
3. No one should ever be held accountable for violating the constitution or our treaty obligations by engaging in torture, warrantless wiretaps or any other clearly illegal abuse of power.
Ladies and gentlemen, your one two party system at work. The one issue both parties can agree on: Screw the Constitution.
Politics
Comments
Like we need a constitutional amendment to whack bin Laden.
We live in a crazy !@#$ world. Being naive is foolish. Walk softly. Carry a big stick.
Posted by: as | May 20, 2011 12:13 PM
Wow, that may be the single dumbest, most irrelevant comment ever left here. Congratulations!
Posted by: Ed Brayton | May 20, 2011 12:17 PM
@as. I don't see how that at all applies to the posting. None of the things in the Patriot Act helped find Bin Laden. The Patriot Act specifically gives the Executive the right to pursue unconstitutional acts against American citizens, you know, the people who aren't bin Laden or his couriers.
Posted by: Joe in A2 | May 20, 2011 12:20 PM
Also, does anyone else keep getting tons of "Stand with Bachmann to defend traditional marriage" ads on Ed's blog?
Although really, I shouldn't be upset. She's paying to advertise to probably the least receptive crowd ever. Let her waste her money maybe?
Posted by: Joe in A2 | May 20, 2011 12:22 PM
Also, does anyone else keep getting tons of "Stand with Bachmann to defend traditional marriage" ads on Ed's blog?
I have AdBlock Plus, so, no.
Posted by: Aquaria | May 20, 2011 12:25 PM
I couldn't agree with you more Ed. Any rep that votes to extend this needs to be voted out.
Also to the first commenter, you said "Being naive is foolish"
clearly from you comment you are both naive and foolish.
Keep spreading the truth Ed.
"Truth is treason in the empire of lies" - Ron Paul.
Posted by: Adam | May 20, 2011 12:27 PM
Wow, that may be the single dumbest, most irrelevant comment ever left here. Congratulations!
Ed, I wonder about you sometimes. You can say that after C5 has slimed all over a thread with incoherent off-topic wankery?
Sheesh, as's little spittle fleck there is nothing!
Posted by: Aquaria | May 20, 2011 12:36 PM
This is another test for the Tea Party congressional caucus. Will they once again abandon their 'small limited government' mantra? Some stuff I read yesterday has them acknowledging this vote presents them with a dilemma so denying it exists won't be a feasible-enough sounding excuse - except to their wingnut voters who I presume are oblivious to this constitutional threat.
This vote is also the same test for self-identified liberals.
I predict both camps will fail though the Tea Partiers will fail at a higher rate and in a far more entertaining fashion.
My freshmen Tea Party congressman Dan Benishek has already voted against the Constitution on past similar votes where his excuse was admitted reluctance and ignorance combined to submission to what his "experts" warn him is a legitimate threat.
Posted by: Michael Heath | May 20, 2011 12:50 PM
It's not just Congress. The Indiana Supreme Court just ruled, "there is no right to reasonably resist unlawful entry by police officers."
http://reason.com/blog/2011/05/18/no-right-to-resist-rogue-cops
Posted by: Joe M | May 20, 2011 1:08 PM
This is one of the things that infuriates me about the Dems and Obama. Much of the mis-named Patriot Act is unconstitutional and its mere existence is evidence that the terrorists have already won. I'm used to the Republicans giving the middle finger to the Constitution.
Posted by: Karl Winkelman | May 20, 2011 1:14 PM
Also known as the "Home Invaders' Employment and Protection Policy."
Recently playing out in Tucson: a neighbourhood-wide no-knock drug raid catches a soldier recently returned from a second tour in Iraq, his wife, and his young son at home. The SWAT team starts shooting, one bullet hits the doorway, the splinters catch another SWAT member, and they pump the nonresisting homeowner full of 71 rounds. Then keep paramedics from going near him for over an hour while he bleeds out with his wife and kid watching.
I wonder how good a job they did of preparing the scene in that hour-plus?
Posted by: D. C. Sessions | May 20, 2011 1:20 PM
Ed, you had it right the first time, it is a one-party system.
Oh, per Greenwald, I also notice that Herr Obama wants to expand National Security Letters.
Vote Green, folks! It's time to STOP buying into the duopoly!
@MichaelHeath ... "test" it may for TPers, but, there's not nearly enough of them, even if all pass the test, to block this.
Posted by: SocraticGadfly | May 20, 2011 1:36 PM
Ed, I think you were closer to the truth before the strikeout of the word "one".
If they walk like a single duck, if they swim like a single duck, if they sound like a single duck . . .
I'm thinking action here; not political philosophy.
Posted by: Crudely Wrott | May 20, 2011 1:41 PM
Traitors.
Posted by: Marcus Ranum | May 20, 2011 6:53 PM
Ah, but what can you do?
Generally people don't care what their government does as long as they feel safe and well fed. And with lunatics generally being the only ones to take up causes like this, you won't see them gain much support. So you're stuck with waiting for governments to eat themselves or needing to do a McVeigh and try to start a violent revolution.
Vote? That only works if you get decent people seeking power, which is unlikely. Or if everyone gets out and votes instead of just the fringe loons. As history has shown, that's even less likely.
In short: We're boned.
Posted by: William George | May 20, 2011 11:25 PM
SocraticGadfly:
Won't help. The electoral system in the U.S. is designed so that only candidates who think like the Demopublicans can get elected. Greens will either go down in flames and give an impassioned concession speech to their seven followers about "fighting the good fight" or they'll sell out and have a chance of winning. Neither does change-activists any good. If you're serious about change, the first thing you need to do is tear up your voter registration, as voting is the #1 distraction preventing activists from doing something worthwhile.
Posted by: Miko | May 20, 2011 11:29 PM
Follow.
The.
Money.
. . . and the schmoozing and glad handing and the usual trails of political tradition. It's clear that we are not likely to be rid of such antics any time soon.
Amazing, isn't it, how we can be so enthused and so able to be living in the twenty first century on the one hand and on the other to languish so contentedly in the twelfth?
When I was a youth I really thought that by now people would have learned better. So much for youthful enthusiasm. Still, I will do what I can to enthuse my children and grandchildren about self determination as well as cooperation. And honesty.
They'll need to know.
Posted by: Crudely Wrott | May 21, 2011 12:05 AM
So OBAMA LIED about this too!
Posted by: OBAMA LIED | May 21, 2011 8:17 AM
Dear tired, wrinkly ol' troll (#18) -
I refer you to the comment immeadiately above yours posted by Crudely Wrott viz:
"Follow.
The.
Money.
. . . and the schmoozing and glad handing and the usual trails of political tradition. It's clear that we are not likely to be rid of such antics any time soon."
So shouldn't your 'goddidit' knee-jerk (if indeed that is all you are jerking) read:
POLITICANS LIE, AND NO-ONE IS SUPRISED.
Curiously, Dingo
Posted by: DingoJack | May 21, 2011 9:12 AM
@18:
A broken clock is right twice a day, and I'm sure eventually you'll say that on an issue where Obama has indeed lied (executive branch transparency, for instance), but in this case, Obama was not mentioned a single time in either Ed's post nor the linked article. Conflating all democrats with Obama, as you seem to be doing, just reveals that you've turned off your brain and aren't actually thinking about things. While that may make you welcome at many right-wing blogs, here we prefer commenters to have a minimum of two brain cells to rub together.
Posted by: Infophile | May 21, 2011 1:50 PM
:-) couldn't resist
Posted by: If you've done nothing wrong, you ha | May 21, 2011 6:28 PM
tear up your voter registration, as voting is the #1 distraction preventing activists from doing something worthwhile.
which would be what?
3rd parties rarely have a chance.
1. they may gain 'legitimacy' via local wins *and* impressive performance.
2. consistently voting for lesser evil ("2nd" party) would be more reliable, except that too many voters vote for greater evil (the fox/murdoch/lush/msm effect). Follow.
The.
Money.
Yep.
Posted by: - | May 21, 2011 6:31 PM
Another article on the effects of the national security madness (specifically about the prosecution of the NSA leakers): The Secret Sharer: Is Thomas Drake an enemy of the state?
Posted by: Chris From Europe | May 21, 2011 10:40 PM
Politicians only lie because people elect liars. If being caught in any lie meant the end of your political career, politicians would be honest. If taking money from big business meant you were unellectable, then politicians would be difficult to bribe. If politicians were held to a high moral standard, then they would behave in a moral manner.
The simple fact is, most people vote like idiots, and so they get the kind of leaders that idiots deserve.
Third parties rarely have a chance because people sit around saying "Third parties rarely have a chance" instead of voting for them. How many millions of people agree with the Greens, but don't vote for them because "it would be a waste of a vote?" I don't know. Maybe they'd still lose, but EVEN if they lost, if a large block is consistently voting to the left of the Democrats, then they will respond by moving to the left to try and capture that vote, because being elected is always the first concern of a politician.
Consider a town where everyone wears red and green clothes. There are only two clothes shops in town, and one only sells red outfits and refuses even to consider the idea of selling green clothes. Now, some people in the two want red outfits, and some want green, but most want a mix of the two - some want 90% red, some 50% red, some 10% red. What is the best possible choice for the second store to maximise their customer base, assuming everyone goes to the store that most closely matches their preference?
Now, if they choose to sell 100% green, then obviously they will get 50% of the customers - those who want 51% or more green. Those who want 49% or more green will go the other way. But say they instead decide to sell outfits that are 50/50. Now they get 75% of the customers, since anyone who wants less than 75% red will find them closer to their preferences than their competitor. Finally, if they should switch to selling outfits that are 99% red, 1% green, they will get every customer except those who want 100% red. After all, any green is better than none, and the only alternative is to get arrested for indecent exposure.
Obviously, this example is extremely simple, but I believe it makes the gist of the point. In a two party system, where one party is completely intractable in its position, the optimal position for the second party is one that is only the tiniest possible increment away from the other party. The smartest thing for the democrats to do, assuming they want power, is be as close as possible to identical with the republicans, except on one or two, preferably trivial, issues.
Unless there is a third party to their left which actually draws substantial votes, there is no reason for the democrats EVER to move left - it will only diminish their ability to draw votes. Yes, creating such a party would entail some republican victories in the short term, but the alternative is (at best) a stream of pyrrhic victories.
Posted by: GroovyJ | May 22, 2011 11:18 AM
The so called patriot act reminds me of what the White rose people in Nazi Germany wrote on walls'A police state is a country run by criminals'.Of course at the time the patriot act was call the enabling act.
Posted by: Paen | May 22, 2011 3:20 PM
I should have called my senators but didn't know about this until 4 hrs before they voted. I don't know what to think about any of these people in the whitehouse now. Anti-Patriot? That just doesn't set good with me. We are all patriots and believe in our constitution. Are they trying to pull the wool over our eyes?
Posted by: Julie | May 23, 2011 6:46 PM