David C. Calderwood
Loves Park, IL
Don't be so quick to sell out our freedoms. Did increased security measures (read: less freedom) stop the Irish Republican Army from bombing in England? Did increased security measures stop the bombings in Lebanon? Did increased security measures stop the embassy bombings? Did increased security measures stop the attacks on September 11th (or did they actually facilitate the terrorists' evil deeds)?
Why do so many people buy into the increased security scenario, when it has never stopped determined terrorists and probably never will? Anything that intelligent people in the government put into place can be thwarted by determined, equally intelligent radical nuts.
The government has jumped to suspend our freedoms with every attack in recent history: the Kennedy assassination, Oklahoma City, the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and now the September 11 events. The fact is that the Constitution was intended to protect us from the government, and we cannot expect the government to enforce it willingly.
David E. Hoffmann
Prescott, AZ
I was pleasantly surprised to read, in the most recent issue, several perspectives on the potential threats to liberty from the ongoing efforts to curb terrorism. There are two points that I believe ought to be made more clearly, however.
First, to those like Cathy Young who advocate more government intelligence gathering and are willing to part with a great deal of their freedom for a sense of safety, recall that this is the same government that fills the "pig book" with $43 billion of pork barrel spending annually. This is the same government that can't run a school for children and spends more than 50 cents of every dollar it takes in to administer the ever-decreasing remainder, which it then passes on to other incompetents. Let's not place too much stock in the capacity of such an institution to manage this feat.
Second, to those who shudder at every possible tool being placed in the hands of our government to guard against terrorism, the proof will be in the results. What is done with the information and how it is used (to successfully head off and prosecute criminals or to punish simple malcontents, activists, and free speech advocates) will be the litmus test.
It is probably time for a wait-and-see approach -- reserving legal challenge to the new laws until someone is legitimately aggrieved by their application. I, for one, am not concerned about some underpaid, overworked, shoddy bureaucrat in an office across the continent having a file somewhere among 250 million others that says what Web sites I visited last month, assuming that the capacity to do so will provide some modicum of protection to my family and the American way of life.
Joseph L. Stark
Valencia, CA
Cathy Young replies: To those who believe that I am advocating "statism," I would like to point out that in "Liberty's Paradoxes" I was discussing one of the few essential functions of the state. It is one that even the staunchest proponents of limited government recognize: to "insure domestic tranquility" and "provide for the common defense," in the words of the U.S. Constitution.
The scope of the powers the government should be allowed for this purpose is, of course, subject to debate. Personally, I don't believe that judicially authorized surveillance of a suspect's electronic communications equals the loss of a great amount of liberty.
The government may have a mixed track record in combating terrorism (though it is worth noting that we rarely think of the plots that were thwarted, such as the potentially devastating plan to blow up New York City's Holland and Lincoln tunnels several years ago). However, there seems to be no realistic alternative.
Rebels on the Air
As a person who works for a large radio corporation (CBS/Infinity), I found Jesse Walker's article ("Free Your Radio," December) rather short-sighted and ignorant of recent history. Walker wrote, "Most radio stations today are boring and homo- geneous, chains of clones controlled by an ever-dwindling handful of focus-group-driven corporations." This trend can be directly traced back to the deregulation of the 1996 Telecommunications Act. Before 1996, there were plenty of focus-group-driven corporations, but the Telecom Act freed them to spread chains of clones at an unprecedented level.
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