national security
GRITtv: Vince Warren: Freedom, Privacy, and the Courts
“Do we want to live in a place where the U.S. government can torture and kill people at will? Or do we not?” asks Vince Warren, executive director of the Center for Constitutional Rights. A new Amnesty International report says that thousands of detainees in Iraq, many recently transferred from U.S. custody, are still at risk of torture, and back in the U.S. the Obama administration continues to use "national security" as justification for everything from dismissing lawsuits to searching laptops. Vince joins Laura in studio to discuss all this and more, and he points out that he is free to discuss all these issues publicly on GRITtv, while the only place the accusations cannot be discussed is in a court of law.
Email this pageGRITtv: Julian Zelizer: National Security Myths
Presidents who don't articulate some kind of distinct national security agenda leave themselves open to continual attack from their opponents and often fall into a defensive posture while trying to formulate their policies. By trying to avoid angering everyone, they often end up pleasing no one. That's what Julian Zelizer, Princeton professor and author of Arsenal of Democracy: The Politics of National Security - From World War II to the War on Terrorism, said in a critique of Obama's foreign policy in his first year. In his book, Zelizer lays out a history of national security policy in the U.S. and makes the point that bipartisanship has largely always been a myth here. Instead, presidents who succeed lay out a concrete plan for what they want and fight to get it accomplished. Obama, he suggests, should take a lesson or two from the past.
GRITtv: Can We Scan Ourselves to Safety?
"There's money to be made and there are people out there who are going to say it can be done. And, yeah, it's techie and sexy and sounds good." That's Bruce Schneier quoted in a piece by Liliana Segura at AlterNet, talking about new airport security technology. In the wake of the failed underpants bombing attempt, new rules have been added, and discussion has ramped up of the use of full-body scanners and other invasive technologies. We ask Segura and Spencer Ackerman of the Washington Independent if we can scan ourselves to safety, or if this is just more security theater designed to get us to give up our civil liberties.
