The ever expanding government power

Early yesterday, I came across this article. Please read it. To sum it up, there is a defense bill in front of the Senate that will expand the power that our military has. It will label the entire US a "battlefield". It gives the military power to detain and hold(INDEFINITELY) any use citizen on US soil or overseas. This is a dangerous, dangerous precedent. Many thought the Patriot Act was bad... this is just as bad or could be unimaginably worse. Below are a few observations I've had on the expansion of power.

  The overall expansion of power has been mind numbing. First the Patriot Act and Bush's unilateral wars via preemptive strike. Then detention of prisoners at Guantanamo. Then president Bush started using "signing statements", which in essence let the president choose how they want to apply(or if they want to enforce) the written laws. Bush also restricted access to documents previously available by the Freedom of Information Act, as well refused to provide information requested by Congress that was necessary for oversight. While at the time, many of these seemed to be necessary(or still could be considered needed moves), this was a dangerous expansion of power.

When president Obama came into office, he gladly accepted the Bush expansions and even had some fun of his own. He further expanded power by allowing US troops to go to Libya and assassinating a US citizen (Anwar al-Awlaki). Obama even campaigned against these expansion of powers, only to do an immediate turn-about upon election. As alarming as all this is, the most alarming part is it is both administration's opinion that they shouldn't be questioned, or have to answer questions on these incidence... the opinion that they are the law.  

Throw out political parties, it's a mandate the president becomes a war monger. With Bush in office, as soon as given the opportunity, he took a hard-line stance on war. And he was encouraged by the people. What everyone didn't expect was Obama to do the same thing. Immediately upon entering office, Obama extended his deadlines to leave Iraq/Afganistan. Next, Obama authorized use of our troops in Libya. I could give many other examples, but I'll stop for the sake of length.


So what is my point? There has to be a driving factor to this. My opinion is that it's a combination of 2 things: unfamiliar presidents & misleading intelligence community leadership. I think Both Bush and Obama were shocked by the information being presented to them. They weren't sure how to act. Both were overwhelmed by the magnitude. The other side of the coin is a major problem: the intelligence agencies framing of the argument. Intelligence data can be manipulated. Reading about Bush's presidency, it became very clear... Agencies would give the president his morning intelligence report with outdated information just to appease Bush's request. According to some reports, Bush was given Al-Qaeda leads that were years old! It is admitted that during Bush's presidency, small shreds of intelligence would be duplicated on reports over a period of time. So if the president asked for information on Bin Laden, the CIA would use small clues and create a picture over a number of months that a study stream of threats/attacks were being planned. Yes, the president asked for the data, but he didn't ask to be misled. This blame falls both on the president and the intelligence community(for having an agenda & trying to please their "boss").

  We should be concerned. The office of president has evolved drastically since 2000, when Bush entered into the office. We need to carefully examine what presidential power should be and how to control it. At this point, we've probably lost control. But, we need to do something. What do you ask? First, get Obama out... and elect someone who will occupy the office in a manner that keeps the power in check. Congress also needs to do it's job in controlling presidential power. They had the ability to slow down the Bush or Obama wars, but did nothing. The question we need to ask is, who in this field of candidates will work to get the office of the president back under control? That's a question I don't have an answer to. The only candidate I know who would do that is Ron Paul. With him, there are many other reservations... too many to discuss now.

We are in a crazy time. With all the threats facing this country, many will look at the expansion of power and claim it shouldn't be of our concern. They are wrong... it's a major problem. The next move, it's on us...