Why Did I Bother? (Blame Blue.)

So you might be wondering why exactly I went to the trouble of writing all those long War on Terror posts. (I remember one commentator saying "Why don't you cast your vote already?", which made me laugh.) Basically, it's all Blue's fault. When I wrote the initial Why I will not vote for Bush post -- the one on the Constitution -- Blue was, if memory serves, one of the few conservatives to comment on it, and his argument was, basically, that after 9/11 we need to keep ourselves safe, and if that requires that we suspend some Constitutional principles, then, unfortunately, we must suspend them. (I apologize if I have got it wrong.) And I thought that argument needed answering.

We can debate whether we should suspend central parts of the Constitution in the name of security when we have exhausted every other means of keeping ourselves safe, and found them inadequate. But even if we conclude that we should, scrapping habeas corpus and the right to counsel should, I think, be an absolute last resort, not the first thing that leaps to mind. And one of the things that bothers me about the Bush administration is that there are so many other things they have not done to keep us safe. They have left tons of fissile material unsecured in Russia, a country which is disintegrating before our eyes. They have, as far as I can tell, no serious plan to deal with other nuclear proliferation threats. Outside aviation, they have not made anything like an adequate effort to secure our transportation, our infrastructure, our borders, and our nation as a whole from terrorist attacks. And these are not subtle, difficult-to-think-of steps: they are completely obvious steps to take if one wants to secure our nation.

The fact that the Bush administration has not done these things is, I think, incomprehensible after 9/11, and it is profoundly irresponsible. But it also makes it impossible for me to accept the idea that the Bush administration's attacks on the Constitution and the rule of law are required by our national security. There are too many other things that should have been tried first, long before we even thought of damaging the Constitution that has served our country well for over two centuries, and that we rightly prize.

So Blue: here's my answer.

Comments

[carsick]

Not to mention the fact that Ashcroft detained over 5000 people in the aftermath of 9/11 and has convicted exactly zero.

[Katherine]

In other news, the U.S. refuses to cooperate at all with the Arar inquiry, and says that

"This decision was made by U.S. government officials based on our own assessment of the security threat to the United States posed by Mr. Arar," the letter says.

"We believe that Mr. Arar's removal was in the best interests of the United States."

I am 90-95% sure Arar was innocent and 99.9%+ sure that he was tortured in Syria. We have expressed no regret and apparently taken no steps to ensure that this does not happen again.

In view of this, could some Bush supporter explain to me why on earth I should believe:
1) one word coming out of the administration's mouth about Abu Ghraib?
2) that our foreign policy is based on "the equal value and dignity of every human life", "the rule of law", and "the transforming power of freedom"? (those are quotations from the UN speech.)

[Laurence]

A life-long conservative, I will be voting this year for the Democratic candidate for the first time in my life. My primary reasons are:

1. The Constitution. It is simply wrong to deprive a US citizen of his rights to due process of law, a speedy and public trial, the right to know the charges against him, the right to confront witnesses against him, and his right to counsel. I am flabbergasted that our President and our Attorney General argue otherwise.

2. The National Budget. "Borrow And Spend" is clearly not responsible policy.

3. International Law, Treaties, and Organizations. Yes, they do matter. The dismissiveness of this Administration damages our credibility, our ability to lead, and often our national dignity.

In summary, I do not insist that my candidate agree with me on every issue, but I cannot in good conscience vote for a candidate that disagrees with me on the most fundamental issues. In my opinion, the three issues above should be fundamental to every thinking American.

I wish Kerry were making a more convincing case on #2, and I wish he were campaigning more on #1. But on these three highly important issues he's clearly an improvement on Bush.