Bush's tax cuts were in response to the fact that the economy was fucking tanking before Bill left office. He inherited a recession that was further exacerbated by Sept 11th.

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Basically what you're espousing is the Puritanical roots of our country, not what the law says. That all people are morally corrupt, and therefore should be suspect.

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This is a matter of convenience. For as long as the scrutiny is invisible, no one minds. Your safety is not guaranteed by stricter delving into the personal affairs of the population. If you were to sift through every home with a fine tooth comb, it won't actually make you safer, but at the same time, it will actually introduce a more formidable foe, that being the government itself. Granted, it hasn't gotten nearly as bad as the picture I painted above, but I truly believe that the tipping point for people is only when things become an impedance. If suddenly there were random bag searches on the sidewalk, and police asked you for your ID without cause, if you were pulled over on the highway just so that they can search your trunk, it's very possible that they could catch a criminal in the middle of doing something dreadful, but does this truly justify the strict controls? My answer, is no.

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It's government. It's slow. Somtimes good government means coming to compromises nobody likes but everyone can live with. Cut the man a little slack. Nobody's going to like everything he does. Let's keep a little perspective. Let's be patient. Mmmkay?

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When the Nazis came for the communists,

I remained silent;

I was not a communist.

When they locked up the social democrats,

I remained silent;

I was not a social democrat.

When they came for the trade unionists,

I did not speak out;

I was not a trade unionist.

When they came for the Jews,

I remained silent;

I was not a Jew.

When they came for me,

there was no one left to speak out.

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If this report turns out to be true, then I hope that we all will take him to task in 4 years when he's up for re-election.

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It isn't about whether or not you're guilty, it's about Roe vs Wade. The basic expectation of privacy as a right.

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Kind of how gays are unable to marry because it protects the rights of non-gays. That somehow them being able to marry would cheapen marriage.

It is your civil duty and right to question and demand answers from your government. You are the only person who can stand up for yourself and demand that your right be upheld.

The basic premise of recording everything is the presumption that you're doing something wrong and need to be monitored. That somehow even though you're an adult, you're not responsible enough to police your own actions.

This governmental either you're with us or you're not an American bullshit needs to end. We're a partisan country, our government is a partisan government. This is because we need people to dissent, to disagree, to make sure that the other side of the argument is heard.

The government has no business listening to my private life. For all you know, the murder charges I'm being brought up on are because I was insane and having a conversation about nothing that happened.

Grow up and learn to protect your rights. Hell, where I live you see people with both NRA stickers AND OBAMA 08, Kerry 04 stickers on their cars.

Maybe the government should take our guns away, because we might commit a crime with them. Or, our cars away because we might speed. Innocence until proven guilty is a basic premise of our constitution and due process. If the government has no reason to believe you're doing anything wrong, they're not to interfere.

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Anyone who says I DUN CARE IF THEY LISSEN TO ME TALK TO MAH GRAMMA needs to take a history course.

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As my Driver's Ed instructor put it. "Nothing is illegal until you get caught." You are innocent until proven guilty.

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We may not like all, many, or most of his decisions. We may not agree with his opinions. But I'm sure the man did the best he felt he could, making the decisions he felt he needed to. Unfortunately he let his ego get the best of him. He's far from being a moron and as far as I can tell his texan drawl is a trained afectation to appeal to the common people.

If you listen to his debates from when he was Governor of Texas he was far more articulate and well spoken.

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Bush did what he felt would advance his political goals. Many of the things that happened, while not intentional, were by-products of active strategic decisions.

Bush is a hard-right neoconservative who believes in full deregulation and as little government as possible. Ten years ago, were you to propose getting rid of FEMA, you'd be run out of town on a rail. FEMA was the symbol of governmental efficiency during the Nineties when the Mississippi was flooding. So how do you get rid of a government program? Break it.

If you can show people that government doesn't work, they'll want to get rid of it. And if you have to break it, so be it.

Louisianans have no faith in FEMA anymore. Put it to a vote and they'd get rid of it. Same with the NHTSB in Minneapolis.

Why should the government pay to maintain roads? Privatize them. Let the roads rot until people complain. Then, have private companies own and maintain the roads. They can charge tolls. Better roads will get more traffic. It's the invisible hand of the free market.

Public schools stink. Break the system. Make it so people don't trust public schools. Instead, private companies can teach our children. We'll pay people a stipend to make up the difference.

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This was why Obama was going to gut their funding until NASA blackmailed him and threatened to wipe out the White House with him in it after they hid the satellite.

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If that doesn't you a signal that some things won't change, I don't know what will.

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It isn't surprising, I doubt Bush would happily want to wiretap everyone unless he truly felt he had to.

Which is the better president? The one who does what is popular, or the one who does what he feels he has to in order to do his sworn duty which is protect the people. As much as I detest Bush I do no believe that he is, or ever was evil. Just heavily misguided.

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If only Monica Lewinsky had been one of those...

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Above all, Obama is a politician. He might be a bit better choice but, he's still one of "them".

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They're not Mexicans, they're also central and south americans. They're people so poor that living in poverty in the US is such an insane increase in quality of life that they'll risk their lives to get here.

They're people who don't speak spanish, who don't speak english. They speak some tribal dialect after crawling out of the jungle where they've been living in 16th and 17th century conditions to provide for their families.

Yes, let's throw out +11 million people when our statue of liberty says, "Give me your tired your poor your huddled masses." We need them, just as much as they need us.

Yes, we need better border enforcement, but we also need to drop our xenophobic rhetoric, fix our immigration laws, and develop better ways to indoctrinate and integrate these people openly into US culture. Even BUSH understands this basic premise.

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We live in a world where we have to adapt. Which means that as technology advances, the rules governing monitoring of those devices needs to adapt as well. There is a balance to be had, and the current patriot act falls to far on the side of government, and not enough on the side of the people.

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PS- just because he's asked the court to drop a case, doesn't mean he's going to continue Bush's policies. He could be requesting dismissal for being moot as he's not going to do it anymore.

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I disagree with this. Obama obviously knows that the Patriot Act is unpopular. If he was getting rid of wiretapping, he would say so; its good PR. For instance, they made a big announcement about closing Guantanamo Bay, which is (was?) similar in spirit and contentiousness to the Patriot Act.

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