Is American Liberty Imperiled? Cato Institute discussion on C-Span 2

[Democrat 4 Ever]

Caught the last 20 minutes of this discussion this morning that was taped on December 14, 2004 - before the signing of the last "intelligence reform bill." Initially I was skeptical of anyone who is a commentator for Faux News but Judge Andrew Pl. Napolitano made a strong argument against the Patriotic Act and the reform bill that just passed the Congress.

Would love to discuss why the assertions made by Napolitano and Healy aren't being screamed about from the roof tops. According to these two guys there are whole sets of new horrors in the intelligence reform bill just passed and signed - including doing away with some of the sunset and safety provisions included in the first "Patriotic Act." Do our Congress people have any clue what they are signing anymore? Is their job to just rubber stamp anything the White House and the Attorney General send their way. Guess so. Anybody read the either or both of the books being discussed?

Is American Liberty Imperiled?
BOOK FORUM
Tuesday, December 14, 2004 (originally aired)
12:00 PM

Featuring Judge Andrew P. Napolitano, Senior Judicial Analyst, Fox News, and Author, Constitutional Chaos: What Happens When the Government Breaks Its Own Laws (Nelson Books, 2004); Gene Healy, Senior Editor, Cato Institute, and Editor, Go Directly to Jail: The Criminalization of Almost Everything (Cato Institute, 2004); and moderated by Tim Lynch, Director, Cato's Project on Criminal Justice

See the full video or hear the audio of the tape at:
http://www.cato.org/event.php?eventid=1774

If the price of liberty is eternal vigilance, then it is necessary to take a step back from the transient issues of the day, which so often transfix our capital city, and assess the state of liberty in America. According to two new books, liberty in America has been under a relentless, though often subtle, assault. In Constitutional Chaos, Judge Andrew Napolitano maintains that most Americans take their constitutional rights and liberties for granted and are largely ignorant of how the government breaks its own laws and gets away with it. In Go Directly to Jail, Cato Institute senior editor Gene Healy shows how the government has been criminalizing more and more citizen conduct. With more than 4,000 federal offenses on the statute books and thousands more buried in the Code of Federal Regulations, Healy points out that there are good reasons to be alarmed by the government’s perfectly “legal” restrictions, investigations, and prosecutions. Please join us for a discussion of these disturbing trends and what might be done about them.

[davidgmills]

1. davidgmills

That's the way corporatism, more commonly known as fascism, works. I would bet that most of these laws were written by corporate lobbyists who put corporate rights ahead of individaul rights.

I am a lawyer and I have seen the steady decline in individual rights since I began my practice 27 years ago. Individual rights and corporate rights are usually in conflict. The corporations have more money, they get their people into office, their people make laws favoring corporations, and the individuals lose.

Then they control the media, and through propaganda, make all individuals who attempt to assert their rights look like frauds or greedy people, etc.

Believe me it works. The odds of an individaul going to court now and winning, are probably at an all time low. Those of us who represent individauls see it only getting worse.

[cornermouse]

2. Does Congress have a responsibility to read

what they are voting on before voting? Apparently not.

Does Congress have a responsibility to listen to their voters? Not anymore. The deck has been stacked to the point that they now have a more than 90% chance of retaining their office. Basically voters have become irrelevant.

[hatrack]

3. Well, well, well - Cato pulls at the reins of their Koch funding

Good thing they didn't ask questions before the election - that might have been . . . partisan!

[proudbluestater]

4. I saw a bit of Gene Healy talking about his book

and I was surprised when the little identifier "Cato Institute" came up. I didn't realize conservatives were all about civil liberties. I do know that true conservatives are supposedly for "getting the government out of our private lives." Sad how far those in power have strayed from true conservative principles of less government and less spending. This administration is definitely not conservative at all.

[Selatius]

5. I think Cato is libertarian

It may help to explain their criticism of things like the Patriot Act.