Will the Democratic Party be hurt by the NSA scandal?

[Savannahmann]

83. It's going to decide who controls the parties of the future.

The Democratic leadership seems determined to pretend that nothing is wrong. They use artful phrases like balancing civil rights with security. Civil Rights are not balanced, they are the default position. When in doubt, pick the Civil Right. We don't decide that the Sixth Amendment is being followed because fifty one percent of the accused were allowed an attorney. We don't claim that on balance, a majority of those accused had access to legal council. We demand it for every single person accused period.

We don't decide that the First Amendment is all fine and dandy when the lock the protesters into a cage and call it a free speech zone.

But we say that the 4th Amendment is not being violated in a majority of cases, and therefore on balance we're following the rules.

The first party that figures this out wins. The first party that gets out in front on this issue, wins. If the Rand Paul faction of the Rethugs get the Republicans to listen to this issue, then the Republicans will pick up seats in the House, the Senate, and have the momentum headed into the Presidential.

We all know why the Democratic Party refuses to see it. Dukakis. We are terrified of being labeled soft on anything. So we come out of the chute with both guns blazing.

Look at Pardons. The President used to Pardon just about anyone who wrote a letter. Harry Truman pardoned over 2,000 people. He wasn't even in office for two full terms, and he pardoned over 2,000 people. By Comparison, with an even larger Prison Population, President Clinton pardoned just 459.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_pardoned_or_granted_clemency_by_the_President_of_the_United_States

We don't dare pardon a bunch of people now, why it might look like we were soft on crime. And God forbid that those pardoned commit another crime, we'd look like we victimized the people and we'd hear about Willie Horton all over again.

Nobody can over-rule a Presidential Pardon. He could walk into the Oval office every day and pardon fifty people, and no soul on earth can do a damn thing about it. It is his Constitutional Privilege. Yet we don't dare use that authority, because someone might say we're soft on crime.

For God's sake, George W. Bush III Jr. pardoned more people by this point in his terms than our guy, the Compassionate Democrat has. Granted, most of Bush's were signed in Crayon, but still.

If we don't order the Military in every time someone shakes their fist at us, we're labeled as soft on defense. So we bomb the crap out of anyone who whispers that America is bad.

So as long as the fear of being labeled soft on defense exists. We're going to defend spying on the citizens, and we're going to hand the advantage on the issue over to the fucking Rethugs that started it. But it won't matter who started it. It will only matter who appears to be fighting it.