Big Brother

By TAD BARTIMUS

As we say grace over the sage stuffing, Parker House rolls and pumpkin pie, we'd do well to remember that this holiday began with the Pilgrims' gratitude for their freedom to worship, speak, publish and assemble without fear of reprisal.

With a few shameful exceptions -- slavery, the interment of Japanese-Americans during World War II, treatment of this continent's indigenous peoples -- Americans have mostly enjoyed these liberties. We've fought two world wars to protect them, condemned communism and totalitarianism for denying them, and last year toppled the Taliban to take them to the Afghan people. Our Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution are our greatest exports.

But even as we shop for cranberries and turkeys to celebrate the freedoms that were found in the New World, John W. Poindexter, head of the "Information Awareness Office," is working to undermine them. Worse, he's doing it under the pretext of national security.

Despite his vaunted Harvard MBA, President George W. Bush has big gaps in his management style; Poindexter walked right through one to head a division of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

Poindexter's political comeback is as stunning as it is illogical. It was he, after all, who conspired with Oliver North and other covert zealots to undermine our Constitution by trying to sell arms to Iran in exchange for hostages, then use the profits to finance the contras in Nicaragua. A jury convicted Poindexter of five felony counts of lying to Congress to cover up the scandal, but his appealed verdict was overturned because he received immunity for being a snitch.

Poindexter's past lies to Congress revealed he believes citizens can't be trusted with information about their own government. Now the paranoid Poindexter wants to observe -- and preserve -- nearly every act we commit during our daily lives.

Following on the heels of revelations about Poindexter's intentions comes a decision by a special federal appeals court to allow Attorney General John Ashcroft and other prosecutors to seek permission for wire-tapping anyone suspected of terrorist activities.

Now the Bush Administration has given the disgraced former national security adviser to Ronald Reagan carte blanche to create a huge database to track every American's daily habits. This is not an exaggeration. In a wildly Orwellian appropriation, Poindexter has an initial $200 million budget of our tax money to begin snooping and spying on us.

I demand a refund!

That means if we check out Winnie the Pooh from the library, order a Mozart CD online, e-mail a dirty joke to Aunt Tilly, fill a prescription for Prozac, buy a plane ticket for a mistress, charge a pizza, get tickets to the Rolling Stones, or any of a thousand different things, the government will keep a permanent record of the transaction. Credit cards, debit cards, e-mails, Internet links, passport, driver's license, social security card or any sort of computerized communication will be saved for prying eyes. Remember that old joke about "this is going on your permanent record"? It's not funny anymore.

Does our new "war on terror" mean there are no genuine good guys anymore? Instead, do we have two sets of bad guys? Terrorists trying to destroy us from without, and U.S. government employees trying to destroy our way of life from within?

With Poindexter and Attorney General John Ashcroft conspiring to strip us of our civil rights, it's hard to tell the villains from the heroes. The demonic foreign forces we're fighting in our "war on terror" don't seem nearly as threatening today as do some of my fellow Americans who want to use the Homeland Security Act and the USA Patriot Act to take away our time-honored principles of freedom and justice for all.

There's a thin line between democracy and dictatorship; Poindexter's proposals cross it. What are we fighting for if not to protect the basic tenets that set us apart from oppressed, persecuted people everywhere, especially those living under Saddam Hussein in Iraq, religious fanatics in Iran and Al Qaeda?

We cannot afford to be a complacent citizenry too caught up with Thanksgiving's trappings -- a day off work, football on TV, too much dessert and a badly needed nap -- to defend the freedoms the Pilgrims sought. If we don't start paying attention to what our own elected and appointed officials are doing to us, next year Big Brother will be passing us the candied yams.

© 2002 The Women Syndicate

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