What the GOP of Today Has Done

I braved the San Diego rains this afternoon to get some lunch, the turkey was all gone, and I was listening to Big Eddie Schultz on AM 1360, KLSD while I drove to the nearest strip mall for a sandwich. Ed took a call from this woman who was a bit unsure about this memory drug they talked about on 60 Minutes, and all Big Eddie could see was that the drug helps PTSD, but the woman had concerns about the military having a drug that can erase memory.

He pooh poohed her concern, missing the point entirely, as has been known to happen with the big lug. She was concerned about the thought of the military messing with people’s memories, the Manchurian Candidate and all, while he was trying to convince her it was for a good cause. She didn't say it, maybe didn't really know it herself, the fact is that her unease is based on one thing. She doesn’t trust her government. It’s as simple and tragic as that, the American People just do not trust their government. This is what Bush has wrought.

We thought our phone records were private, we thought you couldn’t search our home without us being served a search warrant, we thought our right to peaceably assemble without the FBI spying on us-like the Quakers and Anti-War groups-was guaranteed in the Bill of Rights, we thought we could read what we chose without being questioned, we thought that the President would uphold his oath of office and protect the Constitution against enemies, foreign and domestic. But we thought wrong, because the Bush crowd has broken the compact with the People.

That compact is an alien concept to George W Bush, given his wastrel life, it's a sign of personal weakness to Cheney, it's irrelevent to Rove, yet it is the most basic of foundation timbers of ours, or any, society, the deal we make whereby we cede power with the expectation that power will be used to benefit the society as a whole.

I’m not an enemy to the Constitution simply because I want Bush and Friends to follow the letter and the intent of our laws, yet I get labeled traitor and terrorist lover. And that labeling gives Bush and Abu Gonzalez carte blanch, so they assume, to go ahead and violate my rights because they deem me a threat, not to the Constitution, but to their continued criminal enterprises and un, profoundly un, Constitutional activities.

That's what the Centrists, the conservatives, definitely the republicans, fail to understand. This isn't a political or a policy issue that needs to be addressed by changing the deck chairs on the Titanic, this isn't a game or a race. It's not business as usual, it's tectonic, and Nancy Pelosi can only do so much. People need to step up and take responsibility for their actions, one way or another. Not just the Pols and Leaders and Pundits, but the American People too, for getting distracted by Survivor and Britney and Lady Di and SUV's and greed and comfort and our own little Private Idaho's.