"Mukasey's radical worldview is now the norm"

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/01/31/mukasey/index.html

This reminds me of something Lysander Spooner once said:

[The Constitution] has either authorized such a government as we
have had, or has been powerless to prevent it.

From the article:

I long ago stopped blaming the Bush administration -- at least
exclusively -- for what has happened to our political system. They were
responsible in the first instance, but the rest of the country's
institutions -- its media, its Congress, the "opposition" party, even
the courts -- all allowed it to happen, choosing to do nothing -- or to
endorse it -- once it all began to be disclosed. It wouldn't have
surprised the Founders that we would have corrupt and lawbreaking
political leaders, including in the White House. The idea was that
there would be numerous checks on that corruption. But when those other
institutions fail, or are complicit, the fault is collective.


Well, yes and no. He's right in spreading the blame to all other government institutions, but we are also to blame. We, the people, should bear a huge amount of responsibility. A man is only a slave when he allows himself to be. We allowed this kind of thing to happen. You think voting does anything? Stupid establishment folks just keep parroting that tired idea of "If you don't like it, then vote for someone else," as if democracy consists of voting every few years and then shutting the hell up. Voting doesn't do shit. "Then you're not supporting the democratic process!" the stupid fuckers whine. If elected officials vote the wrong way we're supposed to vote them out and then sit down and shut up? I don't think so. The wrong vote they gave isn't what pisses us off. What pisses us off is that they think they can vote away things that were never theirs to vote on in the first place (verbatim from Unintended Consequences by John Ross). "The people making the laws think that anything is okay if they can get 51% of the legislators or the people to go along with it." (page 701)

Back to that quote from the article. The Founding Fathers probably wouldn't be surprised at the failure of the checks and balance systems they thought would keep things in order. Those systems were never meant to work. There are no checks and balances. Like the great author Boston T. Party says, the three branches of government are like three bully brothers, each promising to stop the other two from beating you up and stealing your lunch money. The Constitution was deliberately designed to let the national-level government take and exercise as much power as it wants. Some of the biggest supporters of the Constitution were Madison (in his federalist years), Adams, and Hamilton. They all had large interests in letting the national government take huge amounts of power. For more evidence on this subject, read Hologram of Liberty, by Boston T. Party.