Obama’s Terrible Civil Liberties Record | Dispatches from the Culture Wars:

I would rate Obama worse than Bush on every relevant subject other than torture (he did prohibit torture, at least officially, though he is just as bad, maybe worse on applying the rule of law in cases of torture), for two reasons. First, because his support for those policies all but eliminated even the mild objections to the growing national surveillance state among Democrats. The civil liberties groups — the ACLU, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, etc. — have remained admirably consistent, as have fringe members of Congress like Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul, but the rank and file in Congress quickly lost any appetite for trying to limit the damage when Obama took office (and Democratic leaders in Congress like Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and Dianne Feinstein were complicit in the demise of civil liberties from the start). With Bush in office, there was at least some tacit resistance, though never enough to stop the onward march of executive power; with Obama in office, there is a clear bipartisan consensus against the Bill of Rights.

Second, because Obama knows better. As a constitutional scholar, something Bush could barely pronounce, he knows the damage he is doing. He knew that the FISA amendments were extremely corrosive to the rule of law and the cause of justice when he threatened to filibuster the bill if it included telecom immunity; he threw principle under the bus when he instead voted for the bill without protest. He knew that the use of the State Secrets Privilege to deny the victims of torture and illegal surveillance made the separation of powers all but obsolete and ended the rule of law when it comes to executive power because he said so himself repeatedly when Bush was asserting it. Since taking office, he has done the very thing he criticized in every single legal challenge to what is now his own essentially limitless authority.

Barack Obama and the Death of Normal:

David Simon on Obama’s re-election:

But make no mistake: Change is a motherf***er when you run from
it. And right now, the conservative movement in America is
fleeing from dramatic change that is certain and immutable. A man
of color is president for the second time, and this happened
despite a struggling economic climate and a national spirit of
general discontent. He has been returned to office over the
specific objections of the mass of white men. He has instead been
re-elected by women, by people of color, by homosexuals, by
people of varying religions or no religion whatsoever. Behold the
New Jerusalem. Not that there’s anything wrong with being a white
man, of course. There’s nothing wrong with being anything. That’s
the point.

 ★ 

Source: Daring Fireball

The Background Noise Was Louder than I Realized:

All of these things are noise. They’re below the threshold of what matters. Imagine you started hanging out with people who were all, legitimately, writing books. They each have their own work styles and organization methods and issues with finding time to write efficiently. As a software designer, you might see some ways to help them overcome small frustrations with their tools or maybe even find an opportunity for a new kind of writing app. But I can guarantee that GPU numbers and programming language missteps and the horrors of dynamic typing will have no relevance to any of what you observe.

A bias for trust:

Instead of seeking and amplifying the sharp edges, consider focusing on the dignity and goodwill of the people you’re working with.

Sure, there are people out there who will disappoint you. But expecting to be ripped off poisons all your interactions instead of saving you from a few dead ends.

An open mind and an open heart usually lead to precisely that in those that you are about to deal with. Perhaps we should give people a chance to live up to our trust instead of looking for the gotcha.

Source: Seth’s Blog