Comment by javajosh | Hacker News Reader

Comment by javajosh | Hacker News Reader

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> The Constitution is far more important than any single president, administration or election.

Yes.

Which makes me wonder about the motives of those who pushed for a broad interpretation of section 215. As tempting as it is to think of them as power-hungry, evildoers, I actually don't think that's the case.

There is a cultural movement away from self-restraint, that was nowhere exhibited more freely and forcefully than by George W Bush. His example has been copied in public and private, showing how powerless "the public" really is when it comes to checking unethical, or even illegal behavior of the powerful.

I think we all thought Obama represented a movement back toward self-restraint as a virtue. And yet, time and again he shows himself to be even less restrained than his predecessor - a failing that is all the more terrible for being so very unexpected. The Obama administration should have actively resisted a broad interpretation of 215, and indeed lobbied Congress to amend the bill to avoid any possible loophole. That would have been restraint. Instead, the Obama administration stretched the law to it's breaking point, then did complex legal dances to give their power grab an air of legitimacy.

My heart is broken.

"By the people, of the people, and for the people" is a description, not a prescription.

Take a look around -- that movement away from self-restraint is evident everywhere, in public and in private, in business and in government. You can even see it in people's bodies, from eating too much to working out too much.

By the people: a description. If as a society we don't restrain ourselves, it is not a great leap in logic to predict that government will do the same. We are a society obsessed with loopholes & me-first attitudes and we glorify rampant consumerism and pretty people that consume rampantly. Our companies publicly claim to "do no evil" and privately do what they want.

The surprising truth should be that the government is a mirror on ourselves. If we don't like the government, we have a much more sinister problem.

We have met the enemy, and he is us.

It is a human condition to have endless wants. The genius of the American experiment was that the Founders understood this, and created institutional checks on the size and power of government-- after all, governments are made up of people. The problem is that these institutional checks are crumbling under the twin weight of the military industrial complex and the entitlement state.

"I actually don't think that's the case."

Neither do I. I think people make honest mistakes.

Alas, under pressure, people also try to cover them up.

I forget where I read it but some insider in the intelligence community said he thought that Obama's behavior could be explained by the fact he never had such access to such secrets before (unlike the Bush family who are closely connected with the CIA) and he quickly became obsessed with his newfound power of secrecy.

The question is whether he is man enough to admit he (and those before him) made a mistake and whether "yes we can" fix it.

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