Apropos of nothing...

Everyone else in my house is sleeping, and god knows I should be, too. However, just as I was heading to bed, a discussion thread on Fark caught my eye, and I've just spent the past hour trying to unravel the details behind it, getting angrier by the minute, mouth literally hanging open and red eyes half-closed in exhaustion and futile rage.

Before I even go into what I've been reading, I have to say how frustrated I am that this is not headline news everywhere. People need to know what this administration is doing. It's like we have corruption fatigue - maybe Bush and his people have figured out that by piling corruption on corruption and never pausing or apologizing, the public focus will never remain on any one abomination long enough to force resolution.

Okay, so here's what I understand. This week, as the legislative session wrapped up, the House passed a resolution that had buried in it a provision protecting any personnel involved in torturing detainees from prosecution, retroactively to September 11, 2001. Now that the Supreme Court has ruled that the detainees are covered by the Geneva convention, the adminstration is concerned, because under the War Crimes Act, violations of the Geneva convention are war crimes. The administration is preempting legal action, eliminating the need for pardons later, by waving its hand Obi Wan Kenobi-like and saying "these aren't the torturers you're looking for." Here's a link to the bill - the relevant portion begins on page 81, with "protection of personnel."

This is bigger than a what the hell is wrong with people post, this is more despair than annoyance. I want to hire a skywriter and a television station and a bullhorn and a Broadway stage and any other venue I can think of that people actually look at and shout "open your eyes!" Our freedoms have been being chipped away under the guise of protecting us for the past 4 years, and now the people responsible are throwing a blanket of protection over themselves before the mid-term elections, just in case they lose their monopoly.

I used to be more specific in my political views. I used to care a lot about issues like the death penalty, and taxation, and abortion rights. Right now, all I want is a return to democracy. I'd be happy with a Republican leadership that at least acted in what they believed to be the interests of the country, rather than in a constant struggle to acquire and conserve their own power. Democracy is supposed to be the government working for the people, not against them. Our leaders should feel constrained by their obligations to the citizenry, rather than private citizens feeling powerless and even frightened in the face of a governing body that can and does write its own rules to suit its chosen behavior.

I wish I were rich. Hell, I'd settle for articulate. I wish I could think of a way to rein these people in without hurting what I think is still the best, most viable form of government for our country. I am horrified by the current Republican leadership and disdainful of the weak Democrats who have let them twist the Constitution for four years. I guess my most specific wish at this point is that every single representative who voted for this atrocity would be voted out in November. Our leaders - Republicans and Democrats alike - need a reminder that ours is a government of checks and balances.

So ends the late-night political ramble. I need to stop reading political news right before bed. I so do not need George Bush in my dreams.