Fear in politics - a problem on the left and the right

[FormerRepublican]

There have been a lot of comments on the left about the fear rampant in the Republican Party that has driven legislative action such as the Patriot Act. The fears on the right have eroded civil liberties and the protection of law in favor of questionable security protections. I believe the fears on the right do exist and these fears have driven enormous changes in our Republican controlled government, and by extension to the country as a whole. I believe these fears also led to the acceptance of a "preemptive" war in Iraq that sensible Americans would never have otherwise allowed, and which is proving to be an unmitigated disaster for the US. And most damaging, the fears on the right have allowed the Executive Branch to unconstitutionally gain powers that the founders of our nation wisely denied them.

But there's fear on the left, too. This fear is different. The fear on the left is that the nation we once knew as America is no more. The changes being driven by the fear on the right is morphing the America built by generations of Americans into a nation that no longer respects the constitution or the rule of law. The left fears our much revered Constitution is no longer the guiding principles of our elected officials. Long held traditions that banned torture and carefully controlled detention of prisoners have been defied and ignored. Rampant lawbreaking by the Executive has been ignored. Threats to our national security driven by political considerations have been ignored. Decades of close foreign relations with allies have been significantly damaged, and global opinions of the US have turned decidedly negative. I believe these fears on the left to be very real, as well.

Nothing has changed our country more than the events on September 11. And most of this change has been driven by fear. The danger to our future is evident in the potential for the fears on the right to totally overwhelm our government with no correction put in place by those who rightfully fear the effects of these changes on our country. The strength of our form of government is it's capacity to correct course when government actions threaten our way of life. Nothing proves the wisdom of those who crafted our form of government more than the current out-of-balance government actions driven and controlled solely by the fears on the right. Without the counterbalancing force of fears on the left, our government teeters perilously close to forms of government the founders soundly rejected at our nation's genesis.

Perhaps I'm an eternal optimist, but I believe our nation does not tolerate an out-of-balance state for long before the pendulum swings back toward correction. The days of Republican fear driven control will soon be counterbalanced by Democratic fear driven correction. This is the underlying strength of our form of government, and I believe it will serve us yet again.

But for those of us on the left whose fears have not yet been addressed, the wait is interminable! We're watching a pot that has yet to boil, and years seem like eons. But I believe that change is coming, and this long period of anxiety will soon be behind us. History has proven this over and over again, and I take comfort from the wisdom of history's lessons.

[Mythsaje]

1. K&R!

[AndyTiedye]

2. Is It Even Possible For the Pendulum to Swing Any Direction But Right?

[IChing]

3. I posted on Bruce Sterling's speech in Austin

He talked at length about society in Belgrade, where he is living with his wife, a "Serbian feminist peacenik dissident." And he explained that Serbian society is even more troubled than America's and that much of the vitality there comes from the strength of writers, philosophers and other social thinkers toughened by years of war.

"If I've learned anything from hanging out with the Eastern European dissident crowd," he said, "it's make no decision out of fear."
The line got a rousing cheer.-->>>>snip---
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2515787&mesg_id=2515787

[rhino47]

4. I believe you are correct.

People that are ruled by fear will come to loathe the people that fearmonger.
I think a great shift to the left will come with in the next ten years.
I hope sooner.However the question is what is going to be left of this country
after the rethugs are done with it?