Somehow, with all the ways terrorists are surely trying to subvert our security, the American Library Association imagines itself at the front lines: simultaneously protecting the precious library rights of both foreign nationals and American citizens, to read up on how to build nukes, without the bother of government jack-booted thugs storming in to arrest everybody on a whim.
Happens all the time, of course. Well, no; actually, it never happens. But it could. And if it did, oh, brother, look out! Yellow stars and death camps!
And so, according to this theory, we must get politically atwitter about this theoretical potential suspension of our non-existent library rights. Can't trust a certified psycho like a Republican Attorney General, ya know!
He has nothing better to do, apparently, than search the library records of innocent people. Or more accurately, to keep that option open, so that he can choose the exact opportunity to pounce on unsuspecting library patrons. The cads.
Of course, I'm sure that the ALA and all their brothers-in-books were similarly hyperventilating about the reign of Janet Reno, using the FBI to investigate Clinton's political enemies. You know, just like Nixon. Remember him? King of the Evil Republicans. Clinton, even though he did the same thing, is perceived so much differently. Imagine that.
Or the various actual killings, attributed to mismanagement of both FBI and ATF, like the Branch Davidian debacle at Waco, or the Randy Weaver episode. You heard about that, didn't you? An FBI sniper shot and killed Weaver's wife, while she was holding a weapon. Nope, check that, it was her baby. Odd choice of weapon, that. At Waco, federal agents heard the screams and cries of children as they burned to death, as a direct result of the actions of those agents.
So when an out-of-control Dept. of Justice led by an out-of-control Attorney General, kills real live mothers and children, while a Democrat is in office, that's just one of those things. Sorry!
But when a law such as the Patriot Act is passed by both Houses of Congress, attempting to level the playing field for prosecutors trying to track down real live terrorists, while a Republican is in office, that is the beginning of the end for freedom in this country.
I'm so glad we have that cleared up.