The rise and hopefully fall of...

I had always wondered how the German people had let Hitler take so much power and let their Republic wither away into a dictatorship. Oh yes I had read the history, especially "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" by William L. Shirer, and I knew the steps that were taken to consolidate power, but I never saw why the people let it happen, and when it happened why they didn't question it and protest against the rise of the dictatorial state.

Now I get it. The recent news of the Bush/Cheney administration performing domestic spying, which was probably illegal, is being defended by the right wingers as necessary in our perpetual war against an emotion (aka "War on Terror"), rather than a group of agressors. Some are questioning the patriotism of anyone who questions it: Democratic Senators Side With Terrorists! What is crucial here is not that domestic spying has occured. We all know that is an ongoing necessary action and not many are questioning the need for it. The crucial issue is that there is little or no oversight of the executive branch by the other branches of government. Bush informing Congress is not oversight but rather after the fact on a need-to-know basis. Shame on Congress for not calling Bush on the carpet for this. Of couse we can look back at the act that congress passed in 2001 in a frenzy of getting in line to look patriotic (aka idiotic) which gave the Bush administration perhaps virtually unlimited authority to do whatever it took to go after anyone that was involved with or supported the attacks of Sept. 11th. Right behind that was probably an effort to go after anyone that questioned granting that authority. I knew in 2002 we were living in dark times, but I didn't realize how dark they were until now that the shroud of secrecy has been peirced in a few places. Is there a light at the end of this tunnel or is that an NSA searchlight coming after me?

Hobbes