As if the author was not already sufficiently embarrassed by her internalization of the false left-right paradigm, she drones on with a knee-jerk analysis of national security failing to once mention the United States Constitution! In fact, the author's discussion of "civil liberties" is completely and utterly undermined by her choice to not talk specifically about any civil liberties, by her ignorance of certain historical contingencies, and by the so-called "experts" she cites to support her claims. Furthermore, the author's sweeping inferences on the topics of war, Osama bin Laden, and Congress's actions since 9/11 expose her as an apologist and shill.
In an essay of only 9 paragraphs, there are 8 attempts by the author to breathe life into the false left-right paradigm. Line 4, "the left has pitched fits," line 8 "loud objections from liberals," line 16 "least of all a conservative," line 30 "civil-liberties types go ballistic," line 39 (implicit) "a process of emasculation," line 53 "liberals are urging," and the last sentence's rhetorical question to the reader on line 70, "which direction would you lean?" Remove these contrived labels, and the essay's claims are suddenly baseless. The point here is that the entire Liberty/Security debate requires that it be formulated within left-right political schemes so that it may be digested by the people similarly to all other dichotomized political options (think here of pro-life/pro-choice, pro-gun/anti-gun, and democrats and republicans being the only serious contenders in presidential elections). It seems Dewey was right that "mankind likes to think in terms of extreme opposites... between which it recognizes no intermediate possibilities," (Dewey, 1938). The debate has to be formulated this way so that it will be taken-up and be seen as salient by the masses. Then, with the masses occupied in hot but otherwise impotent debate, the government may swoop unnoticed to wire...