Civil Rights and the Right to Know

Steven Dutch, Natural and Applied Sciences, Universityof Wisconsin - Green Bay
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"They Don't Tell Us What to Look For"

One complaint in the wake of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, andthe anthrax incidents afterward, is "They tell us to be alert, but theydon't tell us what to look out for."

The Federal Government advises people to watch for packages with loose wires,suspicious stains, excessive postage and incomplete addresses. Frankly, if youget a package like that, you're dealing with a very stupid terrorist. Shamefulhow people don't take pride in their work any more.

Terrorists by definition use surprise and concealment. A predictableterrorist is no threat. So it is impossible to give a simple list of what tolook for.

So here it is. You notice everything. You identify every potentialthreat, everywhere, all the time, and have a plan to deal with it if somethinghappens. Always. You no longer have a right to go through life in a fog oncruise control. You never really did, but the penalties before now were notsevere - your career was lackluster, your achievements were nil, other peoplepicked up the slack because you underachieved, they paid the bills when yournegligence got you in trouble, but there were no really badconsequences. Now your inattention might get you killed. So you spend all yourtime, 24/7/365, observing and thinking. Gerbils eat, sleep andreproduce, and go through life without thinking. If you want to live that way,don't complain about other people "dehumanizing" you. You did ityourself.

Here's What We're Up Against

On a recent plane change at O'Hare Airport in Chicago, my wife had a soreback so we got a ride on a motorized cart. These things are about the size of asmall car and emit a constant beeping sound. Our trip was a short one betweentwo adjacent concourses. At least a dozen times, the driver had to ask people toget out of the way. These people were so oblivious to what was going on theydidn't notice that a car-sized vehicle, emitting a constant beep - indoors!- had come up to within three feet of them from behind.

These are the people we are asking to "report anything suspicious."Even scarier, many of them were traveling on business. These are the people whohave the U.S. economy in their care.

"I Have a Right to Know What's Going On"

This isn't the Jon-Benet Ramsey case, where people get to know things for thesake of titillation or idle curiosity. I was watching the news one night when abulletin broke in, announcing that the grand jury in the Jon-Benet Ramsey casehad decided not to return an indictment. I sat there for a few minutes doing thegoldfish thing, then I turned to my wife and said: "Do you realize whatjust happened? They interrupted a news broadcast to tell us that nothingwas happening!"

Months before September 11, a news story revealed that our intelligenceagencies had been tracking Osama Bin Laden's cell phone. He immediately stoppedusing it.

After September 11:

One news item explained how easy it is to disable the black boxes on airliners. That could be very useful after the next terrorist attack. That might not affect the outcome but it could cripple our efforts to find out exactly how the attack was carried out.
Somebody actually asked why the President spent the day under tight security. The person who did this works for the New York Times, which until then had pretensions of being a serious newspaper.

So what do you have a right to know?

You have a right to know anything that directly affects your actions or decisions.
You have a right to know anything that helps you be a more effective and better informed citizen.
You have a right to access any information that might reveal public wrongdoing.

None of this applies to the Jon-Benet Ramsey case. Only people in theimmediate region had any reason to know about the murder, in case it was thework of someone who might strike again. And people in that area have alegitimate interest in being sure their police function competently. Nobodyelse has the slightest reason to take an interest in this case at all.

In the case of military operations that could fail if the enemy found outabout them, your right to know at the time is nil. It will not hurt yourcapability as an informed citizen in the least if you find out about an event 72hours or a week later.

Presenting information is journalism. Informing the public may mean holding astory until there is time to run it properly and completely, running informativestories in preference to sensational ones, and making sure errors andcorrections get the same exposure as the original story. Presenting stories forsensation, shock value, novelty, or emotional impact is entertainment. Both journalism andentertainment are protected by the First Amendment, but one is serious, evensacred, and oneisn't.

So if you really want to know, I suggest you start with the things youalready have a duty to know:

Since this is a clash of ideologies and values, you should know American history inside and out.
You should know the Constitution and the American political system inside and out.
You should know the corresponding facts about the enemy.
Since this conflict is portrayed in some quarters as a war against Islam, you should know Islam and Christianity thoroughly. I don't care what your religion is - you should read both the Bible and the Koran cover to cover and be intimately familiar with their contents.
You should know all the military ranks, insignia, and decorations. Foreign allies and adversaries, too.
You should know all the military organizations: company, battalion, brigade, division, squadron, wing. Who commands a cruiser or a carrier? What weapons do they have?
How are conventional and special military operations conducted? Chances are, if you know this much about the military, you probably won't have to ask why certain details are not being published.
You should know all this stuff to the point of not having to think about it. If someone says "Alexander Hamilton" or "Lieutenant Commander" or "Pashtun," you know immediately what's being discussed and how it relates to everything else.

A number of books have come out challenging the official account of the death of Osama bin Ladin. I think this is great! The more conflicting information is out there, the more confused our adversaries will be. If I were President, after every high profile Special Ops mission, I'd get a literary agent for every key player and have them write a book. They can keep all the profits. The only restrictions would be they can't reveal seriously sensitive information, and the books have to be seriously in conflict with each other.

September 11 and Civil Rights

First, let's deal with some non-issues. Being asked questions is not aviolation of your rights. If an identifying characteristic narrows the possiblechoice of suspects, police have a right to use it. If a murder victim were foundin my town tomorrow with a geologist's pick embedded in his skull, you can betthe police would drop by and see me for a visit. And they'd have every right to.And if that identifying characteristic is ethnic, cultural, linguistic orracial, nothing changes. If you want to call that "ethnic profiling,"be my guest. If you confuse labels with rational arguments you don't haveanything to contribute to this discussion.

If you're really concerned about preserving civil rights in this time ofcrisis, allow me to suggest we start by eliminating some existing civil rightsviolations:

In a society under the rule of law, no civil right is more basic than the right to know, absolutely and without fail, whether or not you are liable to litigation. There is no greater threat to civil liberties than the tort system. It has been used on many occasions to stifle dissent and commentary. It restricts the freedom of all citizens by curtailing choices and raising costs.
The most nearly infallible recipe for injustice is complexity. If O. J. Simpson can get off while poorer defendants are convicted, and this happens after decades of judicial activism and legislation to protect the rights of defendants, we are forced to conclude that the injustice happens not despite, but because of, all the "reforms."
No person should ever have to maintain records for the purpose of showing his or her innocence. In civil litigation, the principle is called control of the facts; the person who is closest to an event has the obligation to present evidence showing what happened. It would be hard to prosecute many cases without this principle. I understand completely why this principle exists. Nevertheless, it should be abolished. I agree it would make many regulations difficult or impossible to enforce. But nobody is holding any regulator's loved ones hostage, forcing them to be in that line of work. If they don't want to put in the hours and effort it would take to enforce the laws -24/365 if need be - there are lots of exciting career opportunities in the fast food industry.

When it was suggested a few years ago that the IRS have to assume the burden of proof in tax cases, the director of the IRS testified before Congress that the IRS would be unable to perform its functions under that rule. I submit that any government employee who says he can't perform his job under a proposed rule has publicly admitted to being incompetent to hold his position.

The burden of the law should fall first and foremost on violators, second on those who choose enforcement as a job. Under no circumstances should laws be imposed on the law-abiding simply to make life easier for regulators. This principle is especially pertinent to the present crisis. Security agencies should be made to figure out how to provide security without impeding the activities of ordinary citizens. If they can't, there are tacos to be stuffed, lettuce to be picked and gutters to be swept, and maybe some of the people now stuck in those jobs will figure out a better way to provide security.

There has been a lot of commentary on the use of untrained minimum wage employees in security positions. I recently retired from the Army Reserve with 21 years service and saw a lot of security people (I'm speaking of higher level types, not the S-2 and G-2 folks who have the day to day responsibility for security in military units). They are almost all of them drugstore cowboys and James Bond wannabes. A kid fresh off the French fry vat at McDonald's would be no worse that many of the "professionals" I've met.

Civil libertarians have a curious tendency to protect the liberties of someby massive violations of everyone else's liberties. In the wake of September 11,one writer lamented the fact that television wasn't presenting any criticism ofa military response for fear of losing sponsors. Her remedy? Make it illegalfor sponsors to withdraw support of programs. First Amendment? What's that?Suggested alternative remedy: this writer and her soul mates can raise money tosponsor whatever viewpoints they like.

Civil libertarians who want to preserve civil liberties in this time ofcrisis would do well to start by asking ordinary citizens what liberties theymost want protected. I would venture to guess the answers would be:

They want the right to keep their property and earnings. Maybe a Constitutional amendment placing an absolute limit on total taxes is due. How about an absolute ban on unfunded mandates; the government body that mandates some measure picks up the whole tab?
They want minimal interference from government regulation. Maybe we could have a Constitutional amendment placing broad areas of activity off limits to regulation of any kind.
They want to be safe from the predations of sociopathic individuals.

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Created 2 January 2002, Last Update 15 January 2020

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