The Patriot Act: "Be Afraid"

By Kale S. Bongers | Tuesday, October 19, 2004

Mr. Sanders was late to his own speaking engagement, and the panel leader wasn't happy. The Mr. Sanders in question was Vermont Congressman Bernie Sanders, an avowed socialist with past ties to the Communist Party, and the piece de resistance of a Patriot Act pannel discussion sponsored by the Rockefeller Center Legal Studies Program and PEN New England, an advocacy group for free expression and "Poets/Playwrights, Essayists, Editors, Novelists." The crowd was informed that Mr. Sanders had apparently left Washington later than expected due to some vicious political maneuvers by the "Bush Administration." He would be late, the audience was assured, but he would be there.

In lieu, Grace Paley, Vermont's poet laureate, stepped up to the podium. Armed with extensive peace movement credentials—she went on a peace mission to Hanoi in 1969 and was one of the White House Eleven—Paley proceeded to regale us with her bizarre prose and poetry, which mainly consisted of rants against United States racism, the military, Israel, and men. There was, not surprisingly, a healthy dose of postmodernist verbal regurgitation mixed in; indeed, as Paley noted, "it's the responsibility of the male poet to be a woman." Though, what else could one expect from a wild-haired, wild-eyed elderly woman who once described herself as a "somewhat combative pacifist and cooperative anarchist?" The audience took a moment to silently mourn the decay of her post since Robert Frost was named the state's first official poet in 1961.

Amidst a largely adoring crowd composed of the Upper Valley's tinfoil-hat left and several retirees, the panel proceeded to spin its web of Bush-hate.

To be fair, there was at least one reasonable person there. Michael Mello, a law professor from UVM, admitted he didn't like several sections of the Act, but considered most parts innocuous. The "infamous Section 215" and other heavily-impugned components were mere "codification[s] of pre-Patriot Act statutes and case law." In effect, the good professor claimed, very little of substance had actually changed. In a delicious bit of irony not lost on any conservative in the room, Mello explained that most of the "abridgements of liberty" actually were signed into law in the 1970s by Jimmy Carter. As Mr. Mello wound down, a hush fell over the crowd, followed by whispers among the audience members. Bernie had finally arrived.

Almost pushing aside his introducer in a frantic rush toward the microphone, Bernie took the podium. It was clear that he was fired up. In a rousing speech worthy of a party convention, he quickly silenced the crowd. His arms flailing wildly, Bernie jumped headlong into the fray. He started with the usual rant against the President. The Bush Administration was creating an "intellectual chill" over America. Because of the Patriot Act, Bernie said, children are now afraid to enter libraries; no doubt a hit squad of G-men would jump the youths if they even peered in the direction of a Koran on library shelves. Yet Bernie's vitriol reached a fever pitch when discussing administration leaders: according to him, George Bush and John 'AshKKKroft' "do not have an understanding of what the U. S. Constitution is about." The congressman composed himself, wiped spittle from his foam-flecked lips, and finished on a somewhat conciliatory note. He called upon "honest conservatives" to join him in the battle against the Act. "We've got to be vigorous" in protecting liberties, Bernie said, but added that terrorism is an enemy that must be destroyed at all costs. Despite his frequent exhortations regarding these two central points, he gave no alternatives, no ideas on how to protect his idea of liberty while better defending the nation from those who wish to kill its citizens. Additionally, the irony of an ex-communist complaining about the supposed loss of civil liberties was simply delectable; because after all, liberty has never experienced more halcyon days than the reigns of Mao, Stalin, or Pol Pot. There was no time to point these issues out, however, as Bernie's aides hustled him out of the room before anyone could object to his rhetoric.

Following Bernie's departure, discussion continued along the socialist's line more than that of the esteemed Professor Mello. The next two speakers up were Pulitzer Prize-winning liberal journalist, and a leftist Vermont librarian—hardly the epitome of "fair and balanced." They tried hard to continue the indictment of everything Republican, but, in the end, were more successful at ignoring the facts. Thomas Powers, the journalist, and an utterly useless speaker, could have been recruited from the latest ANSWER rally. After a few comments attacking the War on Terror, Powers sat down, having said essentially nothing about the Patriot Act whatsoever. Vermont librarian Trina Magi came next. She, like Bernie, was sad that children are now afraid to enter libraries. She hailed the American Library Association (ALA) as the vanguard in protecting liberties, citing its lawsuits against the Patriot Act and its standing against Internet pornography filters in library computers.

After these speakers, one would have expected the panel to lose steam; on the contrary, it delivered its coup de grace as New Hampshire ACLU Director Claire Ebel treated the audience to her incoherent thought process. Starting her time at the podium on a winning note ("I want you to be afraid"), she paradoxically proceeded to accuse the Bush administration of fear-mongering. She began, like a scene out of a delusory Michael Moore movie—pick one, it doesn't really matter—by reading the audience pieces of the Act. After reciting a few seemingly damning lines, she nearly shrieked, "You should be afraid" at the startled crowd. Though Ms. Ebel repeatedly pointed out that she is not a lawyer, but an economist, she continued her breathtakingly ignorant legal analysis of the Act. At this point, Professor Mello attempted to interrupt, and told Ebel that her interpretation was completely incorrect. Ebel ignored him, and proceeded to complete her talk, alternating between pleadings to the audience to be afraid, verbatim recitations of the Act, and news of cases in which the ACLU had won victories over the 'RepubliKKKans.'

Following Ebel's paranoid ramblings, the panel, paying lip service to balanced inquiry, offered the few RepubliKKKans present one of their own. However, the lone conservative invited had no connection to or knowledge of the Act whatsoever; he stumbled through a few weak and utterly forgettable points that could have been spoken by any person off the street. It was hardly the vigorous defense of the Patriot Act that the legislation deserved.

The panel concluded with the odd speech of one Nathaniel Tripp, a Vietnam veteran turned against the war whose purpose at a panel discussing the Patriot Act was uncertain. Not surprisingly, Tripp had no substantive points, and instead went off on a bizarre tangent describing his frustration with "Support our troops" bumper stickers, which he believed should be done away with. Why? Clearly, explained Tripp, they're too much of an imperatively-toned command. In other words, the bumper stickers are ordering people to support our troops, and Tripp doesn't want to give them support, nor does he want to be reminded of this fact. Again, the irony of a speaker accusing others of assaults on free speech failing to see similar tendencies in himself was abundantly clear. It was on this note that the panel ended, after a few short questions. Apparently so much Bush-hate can wear on people.

All in all, the panel proved to be one of the more pathetic displays of bias at Dartmouth in recent memory. The poor argument of the lone conservative invited made the leftists' jobs much easier. More glaringly, however, no government representative had been invited to give his or her side of the story. Most of the panel members had spent their time voicing Chicken-Little hearsay about the Act's supposed clandestine, sinister uses, yet no FBI or CIA agent was there to rebut them.

Despite the lack of balance, the near-complete absence of logic, and absurd points made by most of the speakers, the discussion had one redeeming quality: the joy a conservative receives upon seeing leftists worked into a tizzy by anything RepubliKKKan. The party must be doing something right.

The Patriot Act: "Be Afraid"

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