Posted on 11/19/2002 7:58:26 PM PST by metalbird1
"The Homeland Security Monstrosity"
Congress spent just a few short hours last week voting to create the biggest new federal bureaucracy since World War II, not that the media or even most members of Congress paid much attention to the process. Yet our most basic freedoms as Americans – privacy in our homes, persons, and possessions; confidentiality in our financial and medical affairs; openness in our conversations, telephone, and Internet use; unfettered travel; indeed the basic freedom not to be monitored as we go through our daily lives – have been dramatically changed.
The last time Congress attempted a similarly ambitious reorganization of the government was with the creation of the Department of Defense in 1947. Back then, congressional hearings on the matter lasted two years before President Truman finally signed legislation. Even after this lengthy deliberation, however, organizational problems with the new department lasted more than 40 years! What do we expect from a huge bureaucracy conceived virtually overnight, by a Congress that didn’t even read the bill that creates it? Surely more deliberation was appropriate before establishing a giant new federal agency with 170,000 employees!
When the Homeland Security department first was conceived, some congressional leaders and administration officials outrageously told a credulous rank-and-file Congress that the new department would be "budget neutral." The agency simply would be a reorganization of existing federal employees, we were told, and would not increase the federal budget. In fact, the agency was touted as increasing efficiency, rather than expanding federal power. Of course the original 32-page proposal sent over by the White House quickly grew to 282 pages in House committees, ending up at more than 500 pages in the final version voted on last week – with a $3 billion price tag just for starters. The sheer magnitude of the bill, and the technical complexity of it, makes it impossible for anyone to understand completely. Rest assured that the new department represents a huge increase in the size and scope of the federal government that will mostly serve to spy on the American people. Can anyone, even the most partisan Republican, honestly say with a straight face that the Department of Homeland Security does not expand the federal government?
The list of dangerous and unconstitutional powers granted to the new Homeland Security department is lengthy. Warrantless searches, forced vaccinations of whole communities, federal neighborhood snitch programs, federal information databases, and a sinister new "Information Awareness Office" at the Pentagon that uses military intelligence to spy on domestic citizens are just a few of the troubling aspects of the new legislation. To better understand the potential damage to our liberties, I strongly recommend a November 14th New York Times op-ed piece by William Safire entitled "You Are A Suspect." The article provides a devastating critique of the new Homeland Security bureaucracy and a chilling warning of what the agency could become. The article can be read on my website, under the section entitled "Speeches."
November 19, 2002
Dr. Ron Paul is a Republican member of Congress from Texas.
[One of the very few who would get my enthusiastic vote. -MB1]
No, it would be more rational if this weren't a simple rewrite of the same overwrought screed that's been posted a thousand times or so over the last year. Why it suddenly becomes thoughtful because it comes from someone touted as one of the shining members of Congress - surely one of the lowest hurdles one can clear in contemporary society - is beyond me.
Gotta go easy on Jimer, bird.
He usually posts minimalist responses.
A full paragraph has got to be an awful strain.
Hmmm...
There was a motion to recommit the bill- that is a vote to consider it more.
BUT RON PAUL VOTED AGAINST IT, AND FOR VOTING ON THE BILL!!!
So if he thought that after nine months of debate there should have been more consideration why didn't he vote for that motion to recommit?
I guess because he's a politician LOL!
============================
THE LIGHTHOUSE
"Enlightening Ideas for Public Policy..."
Vol. 4, Issue 46
November 18, 2002
Welcome to THE LIGHTHOUSE, the weekly e-mail newsletter of The Independent Institute, the non-politicized public-policy research organization. We provide you with updates of the Institute's current research, publications, events and media programs, plus commentary on current affairs.
-------------------------------------------------------
IN THIS WEEK'S ISSUE:
1. Department of Homeland Insecurity
2. Brazil Needs Market Radicalism
3. Psst! Sell Your Kidney?
------------------------------------------------------
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND INSECURITY
Contrary to the White House's intentions, the proposed Department of Homeland Security will make Americans less safe from terrorist attacks, argues Paul Craig Roberts, research fellow at the Independent Institute, in a new syndicated column.
"One hundred government agencies from 22 departments crammed into an unaccountable bureaucracy of 170,000 civil servants creates less security," writes Roberts, whose former service in the Treasury Department gave him ample opportunity to observe the undesirable consequences of bureaucratic turf wars.
The U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, according to Roberts, is a particularly ineffective and unaccountable bureaucracy that would become even less accountable were it to be merged into Homeland Security.
"The INS cannot even rid us of illegal rapist-murderers," he writes. "Once the INS has a 170,000-person bureaucracy in which to hide, the opportunities for passing the buck will be endless."
Roberts also fears that the proposed Homeland Security Department would seek to expand its scope to justify a large budget, leading to civil rights violations, censorship of the Internet and tougher but counter-productive gun control laws.
"Federal police forces will be able to liquidate any group by declaring it 'terrorist,' just as Janet Reno exterminated by Branch Davidians by declaring them 'child abusers,' and FBI and BATF agents murdered Randy Weaver's family by declaring him 'armed and dangerous.'"
Finally, Roberts takes aim at the belief -- popular in influential neoconservative circles -- that Iraq and other countries in the Middle East can easily be make into stable, rights-respecting democracies with only a little nudge from the United States military. A more likely scenario, he argues, is that a U.S. war in Iraq will lead to the spread of militant Islam in Iraq and elsewhere.
"A Leap into the Dark," by Paul Craig Roberts (11/15/02)
http://www.independent.org/tii/lighthouse/LHLink4-46-1.html
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies | Report Abuse ]
Yehaaaaaaaaaaaaaa! What a comeback for these noisy jerks. These 3rd party pooper backbenchers are getting much too much time, isn't their 15 minutes up yet?
Well, there you go. That was pretty easy.
A) It's an overwrought screed
It is. There is nothing of substance in this piece, therefore there is no substantial refutation to be made - demanding such is merely a sign of how deeply you have drunk from this particular jug of kool-aid.
Everything in these sorts of articles is essentially of the form "What if...?" - much as the Safire article that Paul so obviously signs on to. Well, here are some other what-if scenarios for you to entertain. What if GWB snaps and declares himself Emperor of North America? What if he starts strangling babies with impunity at political rallies? What if his alien masters cause him to defecate on the White House lawn while setting fire to the Constitution?
Of course, there is no "refutation" of such fantasies - either you believe them to be likely, or you do not, but in either case, there is little point in trying to persuade someone otherwise.
B) The arguer is a lower life form
Why, my dear sir - he is a lower life form, by definition. He is a congressman. I realize that there are still those innocent souls out there who wish to give exalted status to their representatives, and anoint as holy all that oozes forth from their mouths, but I assure you, Rep. Paul is not absolved of the responsibility for making something resembling a cogent argument by the fact that he is one of our favorite members of Congress. Being the most thoughtful Congressman is akin to winning a gold medal at the Special Olympics - you may be at the top of the heap, but it's a pretty low heap.
"Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself."
- Mark Twain
C) The General's statement of refutation includes at best, only an attack implying guilt by association, and just plain ignores the point of the original argument.
What point? That the federal government will be larger? It's always gratifying to see an elected representative maintain a firm grasp on the obvious, but you had to hear it from Ron Paul to know that to be true? Or did you mean when he spirals off towards apogee with his citation of Safire's hilariously hyperbolic column?
Let's see. The "point" is either trivially obvious, or ridiculously silly, and yet you demand serious argumentation.
I think not. When the Rt. Hon. Cong. Paul writes something of substance, rest assured that I will prepare substantial counterarguments. But it would be unfair of me to do so here - I'd be the only one making arguments of substance, and that would only make Cong. Paul look even sillier.
“At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.”
Abraham Lincoln, The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions: Address Before the Young Men's Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois January 27, 1838
DID THIS COUNTRY JUST SLASH ITS WRISTS -- METAPHORICALLY SPEAKING?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.