Solomonia Archive: Boston Globe: The ACLU is out of line

Saturday, March 19, 2005

A rare bit of sensibility in today's Globe. Sometimes their "conservative" tokenism results in something good. A critique of the ACLU:

The ACLU is out of line By Anil Adyanthaya

THE AMERICAN Civil Liberties Union has long trumpeted itself as the protector of America's freedoms. But in a bizarre tactical decision, it has decided to abdicate that self-appointed role in exchange for membership in the shrill chorus of Bush administration opponents. The decision to file suit against Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in connection with the alleged abuse of foreign detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan places the ACLU outside of its stated mission. It also places the group firmly in opposition to an organization -- the US military -- that is actually working for what the ACLU purports to be about -- the protection of American freedoms.

On its website, the ACLU says its ''job" is to ''defend the rights of every man, woman and child in this country" and ''defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to all people in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States" (emphasis added). Yet, none of the eight plaintiffs for whom the ACLU is providing pro bono representation is either an American citizen or a legal (or illegal) resident of this country. The plaintiffs are all citizens of either Iraq or Afghanistan who were captured by US military forces during the wars being fought in those two countries. How then does this lawsuit advance the cause of American civil liberties?[...]

I can't wait for the letters to the editor on this one. I'll make a prediction, one of the themes will be that the ACLU ought to be involved in this, because our freedoms are directly tied to how we treat others - something along those lines, y'know? Remember the refrain of the freedom riders who went down from North to South back in the day? When asked why they said, "Because if my brother isn't free, then I'm not free..." they understood how it was all tied together back then. Today's ACLU and their allies aren't really interested in that. As the author points out, they're just playing politics - domestically and internationally. If they were really interested in the cause of freedom, they'd show a little interest in freedom in Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, Syria...but they don't. In fact, their interest is in fighting and trashing the people who are helping freedom's march in all those places (and making us safer along the way). They are now in the role of the old southern cop with a firehose in hand, doing what they can to keep history in check.

There are a lot of people out there in need of free legal services (hell, I'm one of them!), but protecting the interests of terrorists is how they choose to spend their resources instead.

Posted by Solomon at 12:42 PM on Saturday, Mar 19, 2005
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