Conservatism vs. Authoritarianism: The British vs. The US Right, Glenn Greenwald

[Echo In Light]

Conservatism vs. Authoritarianism: The British vs. The US Right
by Glenn Greenwald

In Britain, the Labour Party, led by Prime Minister Gordon Brown, is attempting to enact legislation empowering the Government to detain terrorist suspects for 42 days without bothering to charge them with any crime (as a result of post-9/11 legislation, the British Government may do so now for 28 days). Much of the opposition to this expansion of the Government’s detention power comes from the British Right, which sees it as an intolerable expansion of unchecked government power and a severe erosion of core Western liberties. Factions within the British Left are opposed to the legislation for the same reason.

The official position of the British Conservative Party is to oppose the legislation, and former Tory Prime Minister John Major — who himself was the target of a 1991 bombing-assassination plot by the IRA — wrote an Op-Ed in the Times Online emphatically opposing these increased detention powers and also opposing new DNA and other domestic surveillance programs. Headlined “42-day detention: the threat to our liberty — The Government’s plan is simply part of an assault on our ancient rights,” the conservative former Prime Minister wrote:

he case for war was embellished by linking the Iraqi regime to the 9/11 attacks on New York — for which there is not one shred of evidence. As we moved towards war, that misinformation was compounded by the implication that Saddam’s Iraq was a clear and present danger to the United Kingdom, which plainly it was not.

These actions damaged our reputation overseas. And, at home — on the back of the threat of terror and two serious incidents in London — they foreshadowed a political climate in which civil liberties are slowly being sacrificed.

...While British conservatives rally to defeat the Government’s attempt to increase its detention powers, the U.S Right is plagued by — defined by — a truly warped, deeply authoritarian and profoundly un-American mentality.

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/06/14/9618/

[Stargleamer]

1. 'New Labour' is such a betrayal

It's like letting the Joe Liebermans take over.

I wish people like Glenda Jackson held more sway.