Health of the Nation

Pilitus

This is always a question that's bothered me throughout my study of history and politics: The pardoning of Richard Nixon and people trying to put the crimes behind them and start over. It's said to be the right decision because it was felt that is was necessary to "heal the nation," but all it seemed to me to do was heal the political discourse of the nation while leaving untouched the ideas that forced Nixon to leave office. I think we might have only cured the symptoms, while leaving the disease intact.

This leads me to my question: is it more important that the discourse remain civil, or that the ideas that lead to the crimes and problems be torn apart and completely discredited?

HMTKSteve

The dialogue must remain civil in order to "get things done". A house divided accomplishes nothing.

The problem occurs when the actions go from "the search for justice" to a "witch hunt". Once this occurs everyone circles the wagons and cooperation vanishes.

Apreche

Perhaps one of the chief reasons we have avoided things like military dictatorship in the US is because we have a peaceful transfer of power. When someone loses an election, they just step down without a fight. If just one person broke the trend, it would pretty much ruin everything. This is why Al Gore conceding was at least partially a good idea. Pardoning Nixon was part of the same thing. As long as everything remains cool we can eventually make everything nice, even if it takes decades. If we get out of control for 10 minutes, it's game over.

tuttle88

Its the difference between the Office of the President and the actual President. The Office must go on otherwise you get anarchy and despite certain president's predilections for wiretapping or blow jobs the office has to go on and you have to make a choice. Is what this person did bad enough to risk the office or do we have to forgive something morally dubious for the good of the Nation.

Its not something that you can say is defiantly right or wrong and I certainly wouldn't want to be the one to make the decision.

HMTKSteve

tuttle88 hits on an important point; separating the office from the office holder.

When politicians throw their attacks around they need to think on how their attacks affect both the president and the office. I think many of the pundits and the fringe types are too eager to burn down the office just to get the man in the chair.

kenjura

I actually agree with that, in a way.

That's why I think the best solution to the politics of today is to accuse and try George W. Bush and members of his administration for their crimes. Yes, in fact, they have committed crimes. It is important that they are punished for them, but it is far more important to send a message to future administrators, that the Presidency and the Constitution are still held in high regard by the American people, and that the office is, as it always was, an obligation to the American people, rather than a carte-blanche ticket to unrestrained power.

However, the chair gets in the way. The President cannot be tried for crimes as he sits; rather, he must be impeached. This requires the consent of much of Congress, and politicizes what should be a purely judicial issue. Unable to build such a consensus, or at least unsure if they are ready to make the jump, the Democrats have been pursuing a piecemeal approach to dismantling his operation. If enough of the abuses of power, unconstitutional practices, and underhanded dealings of this administration come to light, they seem to believe, then such a consensus may possibly be built, or at least the support for a full ousting of the Republican executive branch in 2008 will exist.

I honestly believe that nobody really cares much about a few attorneys, no more than anyone cared about a page. It's about the cause behind the symptoms. It's about a President and an administration who values loyalty over competence, integrity, and willingness to obey the law and the Constitution. Because nobody is allowed to bring such charges against him (especially with only cronies in the position of Federal prosecutor), in lieu of impeachment, it becomes a political battle.

What I'm saying is, the system politicizes issues that might otherwise be resolved in the justice system, or worse, through the cutthroat tactics of old empires. If you agree or disagree with that, I'd love to hear it. If you disagree with whether or not Bush and his associates are guilty of crimes, leave that for another discussion. What can we few say about that that 6 billion have not already?

HungryJoe

Yesterday I was able to leave work a little earlier than usual. I decided to walk by the White House on my way to the Metro. There were about thirty people outside dressed as "V" carrying signs that said "No Answers, No Taxes", "U.S. Out Of Iraq", and things like that.

When multiple people dressed as "V" show up on your doorstep, it's probably a sign that things might not be going that well.

Jason

Nothing like cosplaying to add credibility to a political protest. Idiots.

Apreche

Nothing like cosplaying to add credibility to a political protest. Idiots.

I always wondered this myself. At RIT there was a pretty active group of socialists. They would go out on the quarter mile and hand out their socialist newspapers and protest Bush and the war. I didn't entirely disagree with everything they were saying, but let me paint this picture for you.

So you've got this group of people. They're handing out cheap newspapers with lots of bright red ink. They're dressed like stoners. They smell like stoners. They're playing hacky-sack. It is unknown how many of them actually wash their hair.

The thing is, these people are well-meaning and intelligent. What they are not is professional. If you're going to sell completely crazy ideas, learn from the pros, i.e: Mormons and Scientologists. Put on dress clothes. Cut your hair and take a shower. Approach people in a nice and friendly way. Only say positive things and only ask leading questions. Make people feel good about talking to you instead of scaring them away.

I really think a lot of dirty hippies would be a lot more successful if they weren't, well, dirty hippies.

Andrew

They're handing out cheap newspapers with lots of bright red ink. They're dressed like stoners. They smell like stoners. They're playing hacky-sack. It is unknown how many of them actually wash their hair.

If more commies looked like this, I would have to change my political views

tuttle88

I really think a lot of dirty hippies would be a lot more successful if they weren't, well, dirty hippies.

I agree, the guy that wanders around campus selling the 'Green Left' would sell a lot more if he didn't look so creepy.

RainbowRaven

I really think a lot of dirty hippies would be a lot more successful if they weren't, well, dirty hippies.

I agree, the guy that wanders around campus selling the 'Green Left' would sell a lot more if he didn't look so creepy.

Hehe, nonconformists are the best. Revolutions don't succeed by playing by the rules. What was it that Laurence Fishburne said? Free your mind baby. ...well I added the baby... and the voice of Samuel L. Jackson.

HungryJoe

I found a couple of photos of the people I saw Friday:

Sail

WTF XD

kenjura

Let me say, that is pure awesome.

Massing for public protest shows solidarity. Massing in costume shows REAL solidarity.

And it's not like I disagree with their messages. Well, I'm hoping "9/11 Truth Now!" means "admit you used 9/11 as an excuse to wage illegal war" not "admit you secretly planned it because you, of all people, really needed a casus belli to invade Iraq, which you had clear, concrete plans for long before you were even appointed President, as did your Republican predecessors, and, in fact, 9/11 never had anything to do with Iraq, they still needed to invent fictitious WMD's based on African uranium at the cost of one CIA agent's covert identity."

Oh wait, did I load that statement?

Sigh. I really hope these 9/11 conspiracy nutjobs don't completely ruin the anti-Bush agenda with their radical bullshit.

HungryJoe

I really think a lot of dirty hippies would be a lot more successful if they weren't, well, dirty hippies.

Karl Rove was at American University here in D.C. last night. There was a protest by some dirty hippies:





Now, I'm not happy to see Shaggy thrown to the ground by the cops like that, but I agree with Scott. If he had been clean and respectable, he probably wouldn't have been hassled as much.

Jason

Oh come on, you can't tell me he ended up there because the security thought he was dirty. What are the chances, do you think, that he ended up on his back because he resisted the officers' lawful, legal right to exercise their powers?

HungryJoe

I agree he probably was engaged in some sort of tomfoolery that encouraged the cops to put him down. I said "clean and respectable". He should have worn a nice blazer, had a shave and a hair cut, and stood with nice posture while quietly protesting.

The "V" guys weren't thrown to the ground by cops. In fact, when I was there, a cop told a couple of them to get off the sidewalk. They said, "O.K.", hopped off the sidewalk, and there was no problem.

This leads me to my question: is it more important that the discourse remain civil, or that the ideas that lead to the crimes and problems be torn apart and completely discredited?

I just found this video of the "V" protest. Notice how civil they are even though their message may be a little controversial to some. Very different from the AMU dirty hippies.

HMTKSteve

Damn, that's clearly motivated by racism. A BLACK cop keeping the WHITE man down! Where's my bullhorn and soapbox!!!

RainbowRaven

He should have worn a nice blazer, had a shave and a hair cut, and stood with nice posture while quietly protesting.

ROFL

Guess that's how the U.S. got independence.

Jason

If he had been clean and respectable, he probably wouldn't have been hassled as much.

Your statement suggested that his appearance was the predicate of his fall at the hands of authority. I doubt this very much. His appearance should in no way affect his right to demonstrate. It does, however affect his effectiveness.

HungryJoe

Well, I meant to head off that impression by writing "clean and respectable". If you didn't read it that way, it's my fault for bad writing. I apologize for that.

Partly I wanted to contrast the hippie protest with the "V" protest, but mostly I think the hippie being thrown to the ground is kinda funny.

Also, the AU hippies were trying to effect a citizen's arrest of Rove. Even funnier.

Jason

Is there even really such a thing as a "citizen's arrest?" I thought that was a myth. Wouldn't a citizen's arrest be... uh... vigilantism?

Vigilante...ism... ness... itation... ism?

HungryJoe

District of Columbia Law 23- 582(b) reads as follows:

(b) A private person may arrest another -

(1) who he has probable cause to believe is committing in his presence -

(A) a felony, or

(B) an offense enumerated in section 23-581 (a)(2) (some misdemeanors - my note); or

(2) in aid of a law enforcement officer or special policeman, or other person authorized by law to make an arrest.

(c) Any person making an arrest pursuant to this section shall deliver the person arrested to a law enforcement officer without unreasonable delay. (July 29, 1970, 84 Stat. 630, Pub. L. 91-358, Title II, § 210(a); 1973 Ed., § 23-582; Apr. 30, 1988, D.C. Law 7-104, § 7(e), 35 DCR 147.)

I don't believe the AU hippies could've lawfully arrested Rove unless they could convince a judge that his felonious activities are continuously committed everywhere he is present. They're arguing that his felony is storing WH emails on the RNC server so, at least the felony has an inchoate-y nature and they might get a "creative" judge to agree, but I doubt it. That "mere presence" argument is what the minutemen types are relying on to "arrest" illegal aliens.

Apreche

So it has to be commission of a felony in your presence, eh? What if I'm standing there when the president signs an unconstitutional bill into law? Is that a felony?

HungryJoe

No, just bad government.

HMTKSteve

So it has to be commission of a felony in your presence, eh? What if I'm standing there when the president signs an unconstitutional bill into law? Is that a felony?

You would need a lot of handcuffs because you would also have to arrest the legislature for passing it in the first place!

HungryJoe

Do any of you computer guys have anything to say about Sen. Patrick Leahy's speculation speculation that the missing WH emails couldn't have just been lost?

Apreche

Do any of you computer guys have anything to say aboutSen. Patrick Leahy's speculationspeculation that the missing WH emails couldn't have just been lost?

There are only two ways to "lose" e-mail. The first way is that you delete it. Sure, you might delete it by accident, but you still deleted it. The second way is for the server storing these e-mails to become broken in some way. If your e-mail server is working, any e-mails on it will be there forever. Some people have their e-mail clients configured in such a way that the e-mails are deleted from the server when they read them. That's fine because the e-mails are still on your desktop or laptop you used to read the e-mail with. Those e-mails will stay on your client machine unless it breaks or you delete them.

There is one more thing to consider. Even if you delete e-mails that were sent to you, the sender most likely still has those e-mails in their outbox. Most e-mail clients and servers are configured by default to store outgoing e-mails in the outbox folder forever. Even if the sendee low-level formatted their hard drives and servers, if the sendee used a different server, those e-mails are probably in their outbox.

There are pretty much two equal possibilities for this instance of e-mail loss. In one case, the people handling those e-mails are fools. In the other case, they are trying to fool people who don't understand technology. Sadly, that's most people.

TheWhaleShark

I'm a bit of two minds on this topic. There is no doubt that the "V" protest is cool, because it is, if nothing else, people coming together over a common concern. However, the point of a protest is to convince other voters of your point, and most people will dismiss such a protest because, as has been mentioned, you look like a wacko.

He should have worn a nice blazer, had a shave and a hair cut, and stood with nice posture while quietly protesting.

However, that is the most laughably ineffective thing I've ever heard. One cannot protest quietly. If you are protesting against a governing body that has demonstrated a flagrant disregard for its own laws, and you think they'll actually listen to a peaceful protest as though they cared, then you're a damned fool. Moreover, a quiet protestor will give other voters the impression that they're not truly committed to the idea.

To protest effectively, you need numbers, a professional appearance, a clear message, rock-solid facts, and noise. You need to make a lot of noise for a long time. Politicians, by and large, don't give a rat's ass about your concerns; they care about their political office the most. You have to make an issue embarassing for their career before they'll really listen.

Jason

If you are protesting against a governing body that has demonstrated a flagrant disregard for its own laws, and you think they'll actually listen to a peaceful protest as though they cared, then you're a damned fool. Moreover, a quiet protestor will give other voters the impression that they're not truly committed to the idea.

To protest effectively, you need numbers, a professional appearance, a clear message, rock-solid facts, and noise.

The anti-war movement would have succeeded if Cindy Sheehan (sic) wasn't so bat-shit crazy. Her arguments were emotional rather than logical, and her message was piercing rather than persuasive. Imagine if Dawkins used Sheehan's tactics to spread his message; it would be far, far less effective.

Plus, it all came down to, "Your son was in the military. What did you think he'd be doing, making candy canes?"