The bipartisan war on liberty.

So, some people think there will be major changes when the Democrats take power. Some people are fools. Lets take the legislation to EXPAND the powers of the Bush administration to conduct wiretaps -- as if those powers are not too overly broad already. The International Herald Tribune reports:

A furious push by the White House to broaden its wiretapping authority appeared on the verge of victory Saturday as a bill advanced in Congress to give the Bush administration more latitude temporarily to eavesdrop without court warrants on foreign communications that it suspects may be tied to terrorism. The Senate passed the measure Friday night and sent it to the House for its consideration, where Democratic leaders acknowledged that it would probably pass.

Remember the Democrats control the Senate and they control the House. These measures couldn’t pass with out Democratic support. Caroline Frederickson, of the ACLU, said: “The Democrats caved in to the politics of fear we’re seeing from this administration. They didn’t want to be depicted as soft on terrorism. But this measure removes any court oversight from surveillance on Americans in a large number of cases.”

The White House knows that Congressvermin want to go home for their August break and figure they can push through new legislation at the last minute that otherwise might get some resistance. Don’t think President Cheney and Vice President Bush (not a typo) are particularly devious. Bill Clinton did the same thing. As CNN reported around this time of the year in 1996: “President Clinton urged Congress Tuesday to act swiftly in developing anti-terrorism legislation before its August recess.”

It’s an old trick by politicians to expand their power. Clinton said it was urgent and Bush said “time is short”. Keep the congressvermin in session and watch them pass what you want so they can go on vacation. OOPS, I mean go on “fact finding missions”.

Democratic Senate Majority leader Harry Reid pontificated that “My Republican colleagues chose to rubber-stamp a flawed administration proposal.” Harry! That couldn’t pass the Senate where you are the majority leader without the support of Democrats.

Democratic control of the houses of Congresses don’t appear to be much of a hindrance to the Imperial Presidency. But then why should it? The Democrats figure they will be picking the next Emperor. And then all those lovely little powers will be theirs to use.

The seesaw between Democrats and Republicans is a seesaw between competing tyrannies. The Democrats are not big on religion and spiritual values and tend toward being more materialistic. That means they think the material world is important, far too important to let stupid voters control themselves. Wise, beneficent planners must act in the realm of economics and control man’s material existence.

The Republicans tend to value the spiritual and look with disdain on mere materialism. They are the “values” candidates. So they want wise, beneficent planners to control man’s thoughts and private morals.

In both cases they assume they are wise, beneficent leaders. And it both cases they are only willing to allow freedom in the realm they consider unimportant. Democrats aren’t big into values so what you think or how you live privately is not a major concern to them. But your material existence they will regulate from cradle to grave. Republicans aren’t big on the material world so the economic choices you make are not a major concern to them. But your private morals they will regulate from cradle to grave. “

Here is my prediction. When Bush is evicted from office, and hopefully straight into a courtroom in handcuffs, the Democrats will repeal little of the new powers that the Republicans gave the government. But there will be a flurry of activity pushing for more state control of the economy and social welfare policies. By the time the public is weary of the Democrats, which usually takes no more than one, or two terms at the most, the Republicans will be back.

At the end of the rule of the donkeys the elephants will storm in. They will repeal very little of the measures the Democrats passed in the previous years. Instead they will layer on new controls and regulations.

The reality is that neither the Republicans nor the Democrats act as a check on the power of the other. They compliment each other and in the process steal the heritage of America. They engage in a bipartisan war against liberty. A pox on both their houses.