Carl Rove will not give up

Carl Rove, George W. Bush’s political advisor and director of the Super Pac Crossroads, said he will not give up the battle.  Even though Romney lost, Rove still believes strongly enough in his own point of view that he will continue to work for them.

Good for you Mr. Rove.  We don’t find answers in our human experience by blindly allowing one side or the other to dominate the debate.

Many years ago, Dr. Jacob Bronowski wrote a book called the “Ascent of Man.”  It accompanied a series that was broadcast on PBS stations.  He explores human existence from the very beginning to the present day.  Not so much a history of man, but more of an outline of man’s search for the truth.  Bronowski believed that by dedicating ourselves to science, research and knowledge we can find the truth that seems to elude us. 

On his journey through time, Bronowski stopped on Auschwitz, the infamous Nazi concentration camp that slaughtered perhaps millions of people.  He found a place in the camp where the ashes of the people that were killed there were dumped.  As Bronowski reached down into the mud on a rainy afternoon that could still contain some of the ashes from over 60 years ago, he looked straight into the camera and quoted Oliver Cromwell, “I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible that you may be mistaken.”

That very thought is the foundation of the research being conducted by SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence).  A scientist was asked during an interview about what happens when they find something that has some of the characteristics of being made by intelligent life.  The first thing they do is challenge their own findings.  This challenge doesn’t take the form of confirmation, that might lead them to just reinforce their discoveries.  It takes the form of error checking, that would lead them to another conclusion if they were originally wrong.  Then, they turn to the outside scientific community and ask them to tell them why they are wrong.  Repeat, why they are wrong!   

We don’t find truth for our country by adopting something that sounds good and resonates with us alone.  That is a personal outlook.  We find truth by asking questions of those around us and having questions asked of ourselves.  To have a single power in our culture or any culture that defines what is right and wrong is a dictatorship.  Looking back at the Nazi’s, that is what killed over ten million people.

The words of Voltaire, "I disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it" is still true today.  Our collective quest for the truth must be based on that very phrase.  To silence on a single voice means that we have denied the freedoms that we all share to that single voice.  That could be our undoing. 

So, Carl Rove, keep up your work and your quest.  I will from time to time (if not a little more often than time to time) disagree with you.  But, the continuing conversation in the public form will help all of us find the right path.

Demand to know who is speaking

The next time you go to the doctor, don’t worry about who he is or what his credentials are.  It doesn’t matter and he shouldn’t have to tell you.  Or, when you go to your financial advisor, if he keeps hidden that he is an employee of the fund he suggests when he leads you to believe he isn’t, he has a right to privacy.  Oh, and your baby sitter – not to worry that you are not able to find out who she is and anything about her past. 

If you think those are really dumb statements, I would agree with you.  But, when a clandestine organization goes on television with information about one of the constitutional proposals or a candidate; you don’t have the right to know who they are.  If you wouldn’t accept advice or trust people in your personal life that you don’t know, why would you trust a group that you know nothing about in your political decisions?

That is what has happen during the last election more than any other time in United States history.  Claims, accusations and downright lies filed the advertising of the political ads.  It should make honest, good people ill.  (Yes, everyone, before you get excited, both sides have committed this sin.)  But, we didn’t have the chance to evaluate their point of view because we don’t know who provided the financial support for the advertising. 

Additionally, people and organizations called “bundlers” skirted campaign laws and used them to hide the source of money for candidates and parties.  Many of us were upset when we found out that Romney said things in private that were difficult to support in public.  Romney himself even said that it could have been said better.  But, did any of us find out who was in the room that night (other than the host, a bundler)?

Is there anyone that thinks that the “smoked filled rooms” of yore where secret deals were made was the proper way to govern?  Well, of course not.  If your local politician takes money from an oil company then votes in support of their petition to drill in your neighborhood, wouldn’t you want to know?  Do black hooded people stand on the floor of the United States Senate and make a speech about policy?  No, because we all demand to know who is speaking.

Yet, we put up with Super PAC's and bundlers that raise, over the last election in this case, literally billions of dollars.  This money flows to candidate’s campaigns and their parties like water down a hill, filling the lowest ground.  In this case, the money fills the coffers of candidates that are willing to accept every last cent.  There are candidates that don’t accept the money blindly, demanding to know where the money came from.  But, many of them, I feel confident, feel great pressure to accept the money so they can compete against a foe that does take the money. 

Don’t be fooled.  When people go to the store to buy a stove, they want certain features and they want it to work.  No one, let me repeat, no one, gives a dime to any campaign if they don’t think they will get the results they want.  Give enough, your voice will be heard.  A little more, your plan will be enacted. 

The Supreme Court has ruled that money is speech.  It is an amplifier to your own voice.  This is true.  Also, people do have the right to assemble to combine their resources so that their voice will be louder – and delivered with force.  But, the voters, as the ultimate decision maker in any policy decision, should have all the information available to make an educated decision. 

Let's all cry, "Enough of this lunacy!"  In a Responsible Community, when someone exercises their right, they are to take responsibility for their action.  It is not a violation of someone’s freedom of speech to ask that they take the responsibility to say who they are.  

If it takes a new ruling from the Supreme Court to change the current situation, then let’s find a case to carry to their doorstep.  If it takes more than that, then let’s change the Constitution.

The "Internet Kill Switch" needs some safe guards

Recently, under the radar of all the other arguments that our culture is currently debating, the senate passed out of committee a bill entitled, “Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act.” (at this writing it is not clear to the author what the current status of the bill is). The act would establish the “Office of Cyberspace Policy and National Center for Cybersecurity and Communications.” It directs this new office to set standards and coordinate cybersecurity efforts within the government. The bill is sponsored by Senator Joseph Lieberman (I, Connecticut), Susan Collins (R Maine) and Tom Carper (D Delaware).

The biggest concern about the bill is that it would authorize the President of the United States to shut down all or parts of the internet during Internet-based attacks that threaten national security without review of the courts. Whenever the term “national security” is used, it is suppose to make all of us flinch and allow our freedoms to be limited. It provides the ground work to take action without authorization from the courts much like Bush’s actions after the 9-11 attacks.

Before anyone thinks that this is national issue that doesn’t affect main street and your neighborhood, please reconsider. The uprisings in many countries around the world over the last year, especially during the Arab Spring, have been supported by the internet. The right to free speech about the issues in those faraway places was enhanced by communication on the internet. It drove the passions of people that seek their freedom from the dictators of countries that oppressed their citizens for far too long.

If the freedoms of everyday people in those oppressed nations had not been stomped down, there would have been evolutionary change in the governments that control those countries and violent change would not have been necessary. But, since freedoms that are basic to all people were suppressed, the governments held a firm hold over the masses. It was the rise of the internet that allowed people to coordinate protests (the basic right of assembly) and demand change (a redress of their grievances).

With the free flow of information about issues, we can all make informed decisions about the threats that face our community. To hear from many voices about the ideas and actions of others is to foster an open dialogue about solutions and actions to take. In the countries that experienced the upheavals of the last few months, especially the more sophisticated and developed countries, the internet was controlled or in some places shut down as a first line of defense to the protests. In the United States, or any nation, to place the same power as is held by the dictators in the hands of very few people without review, is a dangerous act.

But, there is a more practical and simple reason to prevent such power without review to take place. Much of our communication not only between political groups but also between loved ones, friends and others is facilitated by the internet. To be able to connect with them in times of trouble is to ease the fear and panic that is created by crisis.

There does need to be a policy, well developed and measured, in the event of attack to the internet. We can’t be blind to the fact that there are those that would do us harm. The community needs to respond appropriately to prevent the loss of lives and assets. The creation of a cybersecurity team may be the correct path to take. But, the power placed in the executive branch must be balanced by a review from both the courts and the congress. This will prevent a stomping down of rights that is the hallmark of totalitarian governments.

This is the way an open community works best.

Note: Three things presented themselves while writing this blog post.

The First amendment of the Constitution guarantees not only the freedom of speech, but also of the press. The authors clearly meant to identify two issues, speech and the right to distribute that speech through a medium, in this case the internet.

Second, another issue linked to this one is net neutrality. There are those in congress that would like to limit the amount of the internet that users can connect to, leaving that decision to the market. But, as is identified above, the Constitution clearly makes the distribution of speech a right. To limit it would be hard to justify.

Finally, the word cybersecurity used in the act. It is such a new term that the word processing software used to write this post didn’t have the term in the spell check data base. Therefore, it marked the word as misspelled. This is how new this issue is in our culture.

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