As far as I can find out, about 2,819 people completely innocent people were killed in the September 11 attacks.
That is a huge and intolerable number. But ponder this:
Each year in the US: 43,200 people die in car crashes; 14,900 people die in falls; 8,600 people die from poisonings; 4,000 people drown; 3,700 people die from fires and burns; and another 3,300 people choke to death. (Numbers found here.)
I do not mean to belittle what happened on September 11. It was an attack on our nation's sovereignity and a mass slaughter of innocents -- outrageous and sudden, and without provocation, justification, or cause.
But think about the magnitude of our response in relation to the actual threat for a moment.
John Ashcroft and his ilk are using it as a giant excuse to infringe upon (if not repeal) your civil rights. If you're a thinking citizen, you have to ask yourself why.
Ashcroft would spend billions for new ID systems, new secret agencies to spy on us, new warrentless searches, new ways to deport immigrants. He'd secretly keep thousands of people (including children) in military prisons for years without access to lawyers and without any hearing. And he'd keep them there in conditions that Amnesty International considers to amount to torture.
He'd read your email, listen to your phone conversations, and track you online all without a warrant. Why? He'll tell you that it's because of the "threat of terror."
I'd counter that it's because he has a boundless, near-fascist neo-Christian and neo-conservative political agenda.
He wants to know if you are looking at porn. He wants to know if you touch yourself. Why? Because if you ever challenge him, he can destroy you with his data.
He wants to know what you read. He wants to know what you think. Why? John Ashcroft is J. Edgar Hoover on acid, and you�d better be scared.
Think about it. If John Ashcroft cared at all about your life, his first priorities would be seat belts and air bags. The fact is, he couldn't care less whether you die or not. All he wants is the power to force you to live the way he thinks you should. In case you missed that, I�ll repeat it:
What John Ashcroft wants is the power to force you to lead the life that he thinks you should lead.
We call that fascism. We sacrificed (and killed) tens of millions of people during World War II to stop fascism�s spread. I (for one) will not sit idly by and watch while Ashcroft and Cheney and Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld fire up the Fourth Reich. Look closely. That�s essentially what they are doing.
(You are starting to think that I'm insane, right? I wish I was . . . . Just look at John Ashcroft's record, and the disinformation campaign that got us into Iraq. All I ask is that you keep one eye open. These people are dangerous.)
I understand that this is an outrageous thing to say, and I don�t say it lightly. I predict that I will stand by it in five and ten years� time:
The current U.S. administration is the closest that any Western government has gotten to fascism since the death of Spain�s Franco.
Keep your eyes open.