Les Jones

I would give more weight to Napolitano than anybody else cited on the timeline. I won't argue that centralization of power hasn't occurred. GW sure will be handing over a lot of power to his successor, who is likely to be a Democrat. I can't imagine anyone elected president rolling back any additional powers handed to them either.

The lengthy list is misleading and vague in many places. It's hard for me to see the "Bong hits for Jesus" court case as either an encroachment of civil rights or something that is connected to Bush. Last I checked the courts are in the Judicial branch. Just one example.

On September 12, 2001 nobody thought we would go 6 days or 6 months without another major attack on the United States. Now we've gone more than 6 years. I've never seen anybody presented as a law-abiding private citizen who was harmed in any way by the increased security measures taken since 9/11. Do we have evidence of American citizens wrongly accused, jailed or denied employment, commerce or credit on account of the Patriot Act?

I doubt if it is even 1. Question is - how many would you be willing to tolerate for the security of 380 million people?

Re: "Bong Hits for Jesus" I agree there's some overreach in the list. No doubt, too, that some of the things on the list would never have happened if not for 9/11.

At the same time, I was against Ashcroft's intrusion on states rights WRT medical marijuana before 9/11, and Bush overreached on elements of the Patriot Act and suspending habeus corpus for U.S. citizens.

FWIW, I think you could make a similar list for Clinton. Every president encroaches on rights a little more.

I've criticized the historic suspensions of habeas corpus, so I'd be a hypocrite to defend this one. It was a bad remedy, feeble in conception. And it failed to resolve the problem it was intended to address.

Unlike our greater rights which the Constitution expresses as inherent - habeas corpus is referred to as a privilege in Article I, Section 9. The privilege may be suspended in time of rebellion or invasion for public safety. This wording offers some cover for incautious (or malicious) public officials. Give them the proverbial inch...