The Real Threat to America

What's done the most damage to our Democracy in the past several years? It certainly hasn't been al Qaeda; despite a one-time strike on 9/11, they have remained out of reach and relatively impotent in the Middle East. And while those terrorist attacks killed thousands of Americas and destroyed some buildings and some airplanes, fundamentally they were unable to put a dent in our country.

But what hijacked airplanes-cum-missiles could not do, BushCo. has been busily working to do; subvert our Constitutional freedoms and rights. If that sounds like hyperbole, consider this:

Over the past year, Vice President Cheney has waged an intense and largely unpublicized campaign to stop Congress, the Pentagon and the State Department from imposing more restrictive rules on the handling of terrorist suspects, according to defense, state, intelligence and congressional officials.

This is not some abstract threat posed by terrorists who may or may not be able to mount another attack inside the US. And considering things like the PATRIOT Act, it's certainly not an isolated act. This is a direct attack against what our country has always stood for and what it should continue to stand for. What does it say about us that we maintain prisons hidden away in former-Eastern Bloc countries and that our Vice-President actively works to derail legislation that would reaffirm our stand on the ethical high ground during wartime?