3/2/09

Civil Liberties under the Obama administration

punditman says...
I think it is safe to say that there was not only the hope—but also the assumption—that Obama would go about overturning eight years of Bush administration illegality.

Yet as Glen Greenwald, American Constitutional and civil rights litigator and Salon.com columnist says, the Obama Department of Justice is:
...not merely trying desperately to keep the Bush administration's spying activities secret, and not merely devoting itself with full force to preventing disclosure of relevant documents concerning this illegal program, but far worse, doing everything in its power even to prevent any judicial adjudication as to whether the Bush administration broke the law by spying on Americans without warrants.
Indeed, it is starting to very much to look like business as usual in Washington on the Constitutional front.

Greenwald spoke recently at the annual conference of the ACLU of Massachusetts regarding impediments to the restoration of civil liberties under the Obama administration. When you have half an hour, take the time to listen. It may change some of your assumptions:

MP3 here