That Which We Are, We Are...

Diagnarfl links to me on the Bush Torture Bill, which provokes a... disturbing thought:

diagnarfl: The State of the Union: Brad DeLong says of the torture bill:

This is bad. Very bad. I can't underscore how bad this is. This is our Fugitive Slave Act, our Sedition Act, our Korematsu. This is a danger to our domestic liberties and a terrifying threat to our national security--for its impact on our international standing and on our alliances may be terrible indeed.

[..]

Daniel Webster will certainly walk tonight, for nobody today can say that the Republic is rock-bottomed and copper-sheathed. But she nevertheless does stand as she stood. Things have been just as bad, and things have been almost as bad in the memory of men yet living.

And then [Brad] talks about the events of the McCarthy era. Let's hope that the Edward R. Murrow's of today are hard at work against these latest crazed fear & hate mongers.

My thought: We are the Edward R. Murrows of today. It's up to us (for some broadly construed value of "us", of course).

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Though much is taken, much abides
And though we are not now that strength
Which once moved heaven and earth
That which we are, we are...