You may not be interested in illegal detentions...

By Heraclitus

...but illegal detentions are interested in you. The recently declassified NIE report has a passage warning of the dangers of left-wing groups using the Internet to promote domestic terrorism. Glenn Greenwald explains:

That this claim about "leftist" terrorist groups made it into the NIE summary is particularly significant in light of the torture and detention bill that is likely soon to be enacted into law. That bill defines "enemy combatant" very broadly (and the definition may be even broader by the time it is enacted) and could easily encompass domestic groups perceived by the administration to be supporting a "terrorist agenda."

Echidne of the Snakes adds, "Combine this with the disappearance of habeas corpus and you would have the beginnings of a police state."

Oh, but the good news is that the Democrats have no intention of opposing the bill that will give the president the legal right to torture "enemy combatants." (I have previously lamented their cowardice here.) As Jack Balkin puts it, "The reason why the Democrats have not been doing very well on these issues [of national security], however, is that the public does not believe that they stand for anything other than echoing what the Republicans have been doing with a bit less conviction." As I said earlier today, the Democrats have become just a half-assed, watered-down version of the Republican Party.

What has happened to this country, that this slogan again begins to appear revolutionary:

A government of laws, not of men.