One danger in Guiora's approach

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UtahOwl
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One danger in Guiora's approach

Post by UtahOwl »

I bring several points to your attention:
  • Even the Obama admins DOJ has been quick to go after Wikileaks (yes, Assange is an asstard, but the necessity for organizations like Wikileaks and Anonymous is clear) and Tim DeChristopher, but has been notably slow to go after the rampant corruption in the mortgage forclosure business.
  • There is already a quite terrifying below-the-radar power structure that can do a much better job than McCarthy and HUAC in destroying individual Americans.
Together these have already manifested how individual civil rights can easily be violated, in the Strange Episode of The Liberal Blogger that's hit the news in the past few weeks:( See http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn ... index.htmland http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/02/spy/
As Greenwald says:
But the real issue highlighted by this episode is just how lawless and unrestrained is the unified axis of government and corporate power. I've written many times about this issue -- the full-scale merger between public and private spheres -- because it's easily one of the most critical yet under-discussed political topics. Especially (though by no means only) in the worlds of the Surveillance and National Security State, the powers of the state have become largely privatized. There is very little separation between government power and corporate power. Those who wield the latter intrinsically wield the former. The revolving door between the highest levels of government and corporate offices rotates so fast and continuously that it has basically flown off its track and no longer provides even the minimal barrier it once did. It's not merely that corporate power is unrestrained; it's worse than that: corporations actively exploit the power of the state to further entrench and enhance their power.
So do we really want to weaken our civil rights further than FISA and the privatization effects detailed above have already done?

solutions
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POINT OF ORDER

Post by solutions »

.
I don't see what the Wikileaks or DeChristopher imbrogios have to do with religion!!!

Ditto any alleged coziness between business and government.

UtahOwl
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Re: One danger in Guiora's approach

Post by UtahOwl »

Guiora's book is not about religion per se - To me, it's about the tension between constitutional freedoms granted to citizens and the need to safeguard the security of society. Specifically, it's about whether it would be prudent to impose limits on the right to freedom of religious speech, in the name of national security. In order to impose limits on freedom of religious speech, it would be necessary to MONITOR religious speech. Who would do this, and how? Who would "watch the watchers"? My initial comment was directed to the ways in which the government currently uses its power to monitor our free speech and actions, and may move to sanction citizens' speech and actions.

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