Enough!

In 2007, then-Senator Obama promised, “While we’re at it we’re going to close Guantanamo. And we’re going to restore habeas corpus. … We’re going to lead by example — by not just word but by deed. That’s our vision for the future.” (Washington Post, June 24, 2007.) Obama’s vision was a refreshing change from the awful, unrelenting, and outrageous mendacity of the Bush years. Obama’s words held out the hope that our republic would be restored, that we could once again be proud of a nation “conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”

Six years on, that hopeful vision is a flickering mirage.

A republic, a res publica, is a “public thing”; it is an instrument for the common good. And, as such, its officers and its practices are subject to public scrutiny. Its laws must be debated and voted upon; those laws must be known (or readily knowable) to its citizens. The laws must be enforced by officials whose actions are subject to the scrutiny of the courts and the public. Those accused of breaking the law must know of what they are accused; they must have the opportunity to defend themselves before the courts and to confront the witnesses and the evidence against them. The courts must be open and their proceedings transparent, not just to those who appear before them, but also to the people in whose name they judge. And those convicted of breaking the law must be sentenced fairly and transparently.

Today, we can no longer scrutinize government. It scrutinizes us. With or without warrants, with or without probable cause, security agencies monitor what we say and what we do. With or without warrants, security agencies kill those it deems enemies of the state.

This is not a republic. This is tyranny. It is time for those in Congress who still believe “that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth” to bring the security agencies and the administration to heel.