Jr and I have very similar viewpoints regarding government and the role of government.
One creates a system, a framework for governance and measures the results with that framework in mind (The Constitution, a system of laws). If the system works one doesn't change much. Just keep the machine running. If the system doesn't work, change the system. At this point in the history of America, I would say it has been largely successful. A remarkable period of stability with, I would argue, increasing stability.
Though individuals sometimes make individual decisions that rub us the wrong way, everything does seem to work out in the end. The whole is greater than the sum of the parts. Sure, there are many decisions made by individuals in government that I may personally disagree with in principle - for philosophical reasons - but in the big scheme of things they don't matter much.
We have a system of laws. Laws should be enforced. There is not 100% priority given to enforcement of any individual law. One may say "why are police spending so much time
giving parking tickets when there are people out there getting mugged?" We don't catch all the criminals and law-breakers. It's important that they think they might get caught. We can't catch them all. We enforce laws when we can as we can.
I can't tell by the information in the story if I would even be upset on philosophical grounds. What is the law that was broken? What is the precedence? etc, etc. I don't know the whole story and I am not going to make up the rest. Like the story the other day of the Florida professor that is being accused of supporting terrorism. Is he? Is he not? How can any of us, with no more information that that, make any assumptions greater than that?
Why I don't worry about a John Ashcroft is that he is limited by his powers. The system of checks and balances is much greater than he. There is a process by which anyone in any
position in government can be removed from that office. There is a judicial process any case must go through.
I'm a libertarian in the sense that I think there shouldn't be laws regarding such things.
That's a selfish point of view though. A Utopian dream. One that probably wouldn't even be very effective in practice. I don't want people to tell me what I can and cannot do.
The system is bigger than I though and more important than my individual belief system, a belief system which has relevance more for me more than everyone else. I have to live in society. I cannot control it.
I cannot reconstruct society from the ground up. Here we are. Enforce the laws that are on the books as much as possible. Some of the enforcement will seem arbitrary but if the law is being enforced, I will not complain. One should know the dangers of one's transgressions.Most people do and they still complain when they are caught. Funny.
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