This time Glenn Greenwald weighs in with more commentary. Sorry if I keep harping on this, but I feel it’s a very important issue.
Eliminating all risk of the Terrorist Threat is what matters, and nothing else can stand in its way. Hence, torture, indefinite detention, warrantless eavesdropping — the whole array of authoritarian powers sought by this administration — are justified because none of the abstract principles and values that are destroyed by vesting such powers matter when placed next to the scary prospect that The Terrorists will kill us. That is the precise opposite of the American ethos, but — as the President’s remarks this week illustrate, appropriately voiced when our country legalized torture and indefinite detention — it is the predominant mindset under which the country is being governed.
