Yes it matters... Liberal Oasis

December 20, 2005 PERMALINK
Why Checks and Balances Help Fight Terror
(posted Dec. 20 2 AM ET)

If ABC’s The Note weren’t on holiday break, they’d probably say something like: “When will stupid Democrats learn that smart Republicans love it when they focus on terrorism, because it reinforces the Strong GOP/Weak Dem narrative.”

And they would have half a point.

The Strong GOP/Weak Dem narrative, regarding national security, most certainly exists.

It’s not a new problem, and there is no quick fix for it.

But the solution is not to mimic Republican foreign policy principles, if for no other reason that Republican foreign policy is bad policy.

Nor is it to duck the issues and keep quiet when Republicans break the law when conducting foreign policy.

The solution, and it’s a long-term one, is to clearly and consistently articulate what Democratic foreign policy principles are, painting a positive vision of where the party would take the country and the world, and contrasting it with the GOP vision.

(LiberalOasis discussed this in terms of Iraq policy earlier this month.)

If you don’t do that, and you only raise your voice when civil liberties are violated, then you risk looking like you don’t have the stomach to do what it takes to protect the nation.

And you give the GOP the opening to say, Dems won’t go to the mat to stop terror.

It’s not enough to note that the laws were broken, or the Constitution was subverted. It can be shrugged off as mere technicality.

It’s not enough to raise the prospect of people’s rights being violated. It’s too easy to think that will only happen to the “bad guys” and not to yourself.

Both of those criticisms should be made, vigorously so.

But they should be put into the context of a larger, consistently articulated, anti-terror strategy.

And that is, if America is going to be a force for credible democracy, and if it's going to rally the world to isolate and suffocate Al Qaeda, we cannot allow America to lose its moral standing.

The torture, the secret prisons, the warrantless invasions of privacy, that gives our enemies ammunition.

That helps them make a case that we are not on the side of average Arabs and Muslims.

Terror suspects must be investigated, interrogated and imprisoned.

But we don’t wantonly invade privacy and secretly imprison people, because you can get it wrong and you can destroy the lives of innocents.

Not only does that hurt individuals, it hurts the larger cause.

We have checks and balances to prevent such errors and allow for mistakes to be fixed.

So sensitive decisions are not made recklessly and politically. So the fight against terror is as effective as possible.

And we are savvy enough to have created systems that allow for checks and balances without sacrificing speed and efficiency.

Bush in particular has shown how power can be abused, and why checks and balances are so important, by claiming legal authority he simply does not have.

It was that same attitude about unbalanced executive power that led to the blown cover of a CIA agent and the rendition of suspects to countries that torture.

Bush and the GOP are fighting terror and conducting foreign policy the wrong way, which is why the Al Qaeda ideology has dramatically spread since 9/11.

Once it’s clear that our way is the best way to fight terror, then not only will the GOP lose its ability to claim that Dems aren’t willing to do what it takes to protect the nation, it will become clear that the opposite is true.