So the FISA extension expires Saturday and House Democrats are about to let it, because they’re still fighting over whether the telecoms should get retroactive immunity for, you know, breaking the law when the government told them to. But as usual, we’re getting the usual hysterical mendacity from our friends on the right - such as Ted Poe, Republican of Texas, saying that:
“I think there is probably joy throughout the terrorist cells throughout the world that the United States Congress did not do its duty today.”
Yes - yes, the Islamo-fascists are overjoyed that we seem to be dillying on the idea of a police state.
Glenn Greenwald notes what I think is an important point in all of this, something that’s driven the debate for quite some time but never been explicity cited as such:
Outside of Andy McCarthy, Mark Steyn and their roving band of paranoid right-wing bloggers who can’t sleep at night because they think (and hope) that there are dark, primitive “jihadi” super-villains hiding under their beds — along with the Very Serious pundit class which proves their Seriousness by placing blind faith in the fear-mongering pronouncements and demands of our military and intelligence officials for more unchecked power — nobody cares about adolescent Terrorist game-playing like this any longer. In the real world, it doesn’t work, and it hasn’t worked for some time.
I think it probably works better than Greenwald imagines, or might were there to be another terrorist attack.
But the “hope” line gets me. Authoritarian conservatives will deny it, of course; but there’s been this sense from them for the past seven years that they see themselves as latter-day Winston Churchills, facing down the overwhelming menace from across the waters. Nevermind that Islamo-fascism can’t hold a candle to actual historical fascism in terms of the threat it actually poses; the point is that these conservatives imagine themselves living in extremely dangerous, and thus thrilling, times.
And they, of course, are the steadfast, rock-solid stars of this movie.
The heroes; American heroes, keeping America safe. Because Teh Dreaded Terrorists are everywhere, lurking under the bed, behind corners, in shadows across this nation. Only they, the real American heroes, understand the nature of this grave threat; only they are serious enough to grasp the stakes. Those of us who dicker with outdated ideas like privacy in this Age of Terror are fools - and endanger us all.
And they do hope for another attack - for it will “prove” them right, and show this shortsighted nation who was right all along.
