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My Profile
Fairytales for a Practical Princess - 2008-11-30
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11:15 p.m. - 2005-07-26
You know, I think the Dems should just bend over and take it on the Roberts nomination. Don't make a stink. Don't go all hairy apeshit about Roe v Wade. Confirm him and be done with it. Then if he decides to gut or overturn Roe you are going to see a serious wake-up call to all those Reagan Democrats and those who turned Republican because they were jealous Clinton got a blow-job and they didn't. I'll bet the mainstream GOP is sweating bullets about this nominee. If he turns out to be some hardcore Uber-Righty the sane people in the GOP (there has be a few, the law of averages demands it), they are going to be far more shocked and awed than any native Bagdagian was. Roe isn't just about a bunch a open-legged sluts murdering babies, it's about privacy. Just how far is the government allowed to step into your life? Or, as we saw with Terri Schiavo, how much say the government should have over your death? Privacy is under assault on several different fronts right now and sitting some troglodyte on the bench who demands in on your most intimate personal decisions will not stint at also demanding to know (and give permission on) your reading habits, your right to carry a backpack on the subway, your cell phone conversations, your daily routine via public video surveillance, your travel habits gleaned from your credit card and Metro-pass/E-Z Pass/plane reservations, your children's' statistics from their Social Security numbers right on down to which lunch they chose off the school menu. The government will demand the right to sift your trash and tap your phone 'just in case' you are a tax cheat…cough…outspoken against the current administration…er…in case you are a terrorist. And people don't see it. They've been too well trained by the consumer market. Whither the practice of business goes so follows the government. Softened up by years of nosey questions and privacy invading 'customer policy' by retailers, the average American gives it up dozens of times a month. Blithely acquiescing to providing phone numbers and zip codes to save a few bucks or to be permitted to write a check at their fave grocery store. Thanks to relentless customer tracking Shoprite knows more about you than your mother does. As the Fourth Amendment is eroded away by the paranoid Orwellian Right, is it really such a stretch to think the government might not decide to demand that stores turn over their data? And then? How long is it before the government becomes interested in Joe Citizen because of his buying habits? Why just look at Joe Citizen. He's made several recent trips to a coastal city with a large naval base. While he was there Joe Citizen purchased a couple of suspicious items. Joe bought lawn fertilizer and moth balls. He also rented a post office box and made a deposit on a rental moving truck. None of these things is illegal, but taken together they look mighty peculiar. So the gov decides to look a little closer. They tap Joe's phone. They pull his tax records. They make inquiries. Joe's boss. His landlord. Eventually the government finds out that Joe isn't a terrorist. Turns out Joe's dad is dying in a VA hospital near the naval base. Joe is closing up his dad's house and tidying it to sell it. But while the g-men were poking around they discovered Joe has $300 in unpaid parking tickets and he bets on the Suns through a local bookie. How 'bout that? Now Joe is doing 22 months in the pen on a gambling charge and Americans are no safer from terrorists than they ever were. But by gum, fishing around in Joe's life would be perfectly LEGAL if things keep going the way there are now. If in fact John Roberts is an anti-privacy nutcase and he does side with Scalia and his posse to overturn Roe, man, that is a gamble worth taking. Americans, no matter how complacent and consumer trained they are, will finally wake up to what's happening here. It's worth risking my reproductive self-determination (for a short time anyway) if it means finally getting people to see the light. We have to do something about the constant erosion of our documented rights. The very freedoms which (at one time) made this country the greatest and most successful experiment in self-rule in the whole of human history. Confirm the guy already. An argument about abortion just works in the freedom killers' favor. Trying to nail John Roberts to the anti-abortion cross will once again be setting pro-choicers up as a bunch of bloodthirsty baby killers and these anti-privacy schmendricks as the defenders of 'innocent life' and by default netting Mom, apple pie, and our wholesome God-fearing 'Merican life across the land. Yes, reproductive privacy is important. But an even bigger issue of privacy is at stake here. With the renewal of the Patriot Act and jerks like Mayor Bloomberg getting the go ahead to stage random searches of ordinary mass-transit riders, there's a lot more at stake than just the right to terminate a pregnancy. In case you've forgotten: The Fourth Amendment: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. You're entitled to this, people. Do not let bullshit about terrorists and baby killers blind you to exactly what is at stake. Shaky legs or no, this is one soapbox I stand firmly on, ~LA
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