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5.0 out of 5 stars
Smart insight but authors fail to understand terrorism, December 12, 2008
Law professors Eric Posner and Adrian Vermeule have hit upon a key problem when a democracy confronts a difficult international threat such as terrorism. A stateless danger threatens. How can a nation cope with such a threat? The normal procedures of peacetime seem to get in the way. There's widespread agreement to let the commander in chief do whatever is necessary. Posner and Vermeule write "courts shouldn't interfere when executive authority tries to protect us."
Clearly there has been a pattern of deference to executive authority during America's wars; for example, Lincoln imprisoned peace activists. During World War II, leaders believed west coast Japanese-Americans posed a security risk (possibly saboteurs or spies), and the Supreme Court later approved their decision to forcibly relocate tens of thousands of innocent people to prison camps. In retrospect, this decision seems wrong -- the United States committed a giant act of racism since Japanese-Americans looked like the enemy, while Italian-Americans and German-Americans blended in and were not imprisoned. But when America had its back against the wall, the president became practically a dictator and issues such as fairness or rights or tyranny took a back seat to the goal of winning the war.
This book argues for increased executive authority in wartime. They write "courts and legislators are institutionally incapable of second guessing security policy." And they may have a point. If America is fighting a so-called "war on terror," then is the president justified in extra-legal actions such as warrant-less wiretapping, "Sneak and Peek" operations in which government agents search peoples' houses clandestinely without warrants, eavesdrop on phone conversations, record personal Internet searches, and so on? These authors argue the president must have such power, and their book is a legal justification why this should be so. But clearly, this is a highly controversial position.
I think the authors make a grave mistake, but it's not what left-wing critics will think. Rather, the authors miss the big picture. They fail to see that the underlying cause of tyrannical acts is that America lacks an intelligent strategy to prevent terrorism. As a result, government is weak. It flails in its efforts to prevent terrorism and in the process commits tyranny against its own citizens. The list of government violations is well known on the left side of the political spectrum, and include torture of suspected prisoners, espionage on the public, suspension of habeas corpus, and so on.
But neither left nor right understand terrorism, nor do the authors. America must understand terrorism, fight it, and prevent it, and a strong America will feel no need to frisk airline passengers or snoop on transatlantic phone conversations without permission and without oversight, and Americans will be more free and safe.
How is terrorism prevented?
Read my book: "Common Sense II: How to Prevent the Three Types of Terrorism". It's on Amazon & Kindle. It's a terrorism prevention strategy which is tough, non-partisan, rational, non-religious, non-technical, brief, written by a citizen for citizens. It prevents terrorism, even smuggled nuclear bombs. But it isn't easy. One expert found it "bracing". Parts are controversial. If America followed my strategy, government wouldn't have to commit tyranny to fight and prevent terrorism, and law professors like Posner and Vermeule wouldn't have to scramble to justify illegal activity.
Examine America: the political process is broken. Washington is corrupt. Congress is gridlocked by pointless partisan squabbling. There's a dangerous concentration of power in the executive branch in one person -- the president -- and the system of checks and balances has come undone. The federal system is out of whack -- ideally state governments should regulate their own economies, but Washington has usurped this power through numerous rulings, often encouraged by the Supreme Court. And this body of unelected justices has, in many respects, assumed a quasi-legislative role never intended by the Constitution's Framers, because it can strike down any law it deems unconstitutional. Washington is like a giant crashed computer, unresponsive to keystrokes, unable to cope with serious issues such as Social Security underfunding, the specter of terrorism, financial meltdowns, global warming, corruption, lobbying running rampant, and so on.
Americans should read "The American Lie" by Benjamin Ginsberg; "The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Constitution" by Kevin R. C. Gutzman; my book; "Up To Our Eyeballs" by several authors; "Our Undemocratic Constitution" by Sanford Levinson; "How America Got It Right" by Bevin Alexander (a tough critique of American foreign policy despite the positive sounding title). These are non-partisan looks at a nation in deep denial. What's needed is serious, structural reform.
I think the problems are so dangerous that a Second Constitutional Convention is required to fix them. So I have summoned this body, using my authority as a private citizen, to convene in Independence Hall, Philadelphia, beginning July 4th, 2009, to craft a new document based on the existing one but which: (1) prevents crime, tyranny, and foreign terrorism (2) restores citizenship as an active relationship between individual and government with specific responsibilities and privileges (3) restores the federal structure where state governments have the most authority to regulate their respective economies (4) fixes the architecture of government to permit intelligent and long-range foreign policy (5) identifies movement in public (to thwart terrorism) while preserving privacy (6) de-politicizes the Supreme Court (7) limits factionalism (8) restores checks and balances between the branches of government.
This is a controversial book which is essentially right in its main premise, but the nation would be much safer if it enacted a tough terrorism prevention strategy that I've advocated.
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