(2003-12-04) Gore Contra Bush Moveon

Al Gore's Nov9 speech for MoveOn on George W Bush, etc. I want to challenge the Bush Administration's implicit assumption that we have to give up many of our traditional Freedom-s in order to be safe from terrorists (Dealing With Terrorism). Because it is simply not true. In fact, in my opinion, it makes no more sense to launch an assault on our Civil Liberty-s as the best way to get at terrorists than it did to launch an invasion of Iraq (War On Iraq) as the best way to get at Osama Bin Laden... Indeed, this Administration has turned the fundamental presumption of our democracy on its head. A government of and for the people is supposed to be generally open to public scrutiny by the people - while the private information of the people themselves should be routinely protected from government intrusion. But instead, this Administration is seeking to conduct its work in secret even as it demands broad unfettered access to personal information about American citizens. Under the rubric of protecting national security, they have obtained new powers to gather information from citizens and to keep it secret. Yet at the same time they themselves refuse to disclose information that is highly relevant to the war against terrorism... And meanwhile, the real story is that while the administration manages to convey the impression that it is doing everything possible to protect America, in reality it has seriously neglected most of the measures that it could have taken to really make our country safer... Second, these gross violations of their rights have seriously damaged U.S. moral authority and goodwill around the world, and delegitimized U.S. efforts to continue promoting Human Rights around the world...