Senate Passes Patriot Act Renewal

IAmTheDave writes "The Senate has passed a renewal of the Patriot act, 89-10, after two extensions caused by months of negotiations. The only thing standing in the way of a full renewal is a House vote, expected to pass next week. The renewal comes with some privacy protections attached, however, some worry they are only cosmetic. Some lawmakers who voted for the package acknowledged deep reservations about the power it would grant to any president. "Our support for the Patriot Act does not mean a blank check for the president," said Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada, who voted to pass the bill package. Certain lawmakers supported passing the bill even though they were still wary about it - Arlen Specter urged his colleagues to pass it even as he promised to introduce a new measure and hold hearings on how to fix it. Terrorism aside, the bill also includes new legislation that has almost nothing to do with terrorism, like one measure, which would make it harder for illicit labs to obtain ingredients for methamphetamine by requiring pharmacies to sell nonprescription cold medicines only from behind the counter. I know that people like Arlen Specter promise further hearings - but why pass what you know is flawed?"

Easy

I know that people like Arlen Specter promise further hearings - but why pass what you know is flawed?

Think of it as the beta release.

Re:Easy

Wait a second. I have a sneaking suspicion that Google is some how involved in all this. How long has this Patriot Act been out in what is essentially beta?

Re:Not Flawed Legislation

Um, no one is every going to look for people that checked out Winnie the pooh; its books say on islam that tend to attract attention. People have a right to be informed and to make their own decisions and you shouldn't come under suspesion just because you read a book the majority doesn't like. Popular speech doesn't need to be protected, its the unpopular speech that does.

Re:Not Flawed Legislation

"... as if concealing the fact that you checked "Winnie the Pooh" out of the library is more important than gathering enough information to stop the next WTC bombing before it happens."

It's attitudes like that which terrify me for the future of society. Two world wars and other more local ones were fought with many millions killed from many countries and the one saving grace, that many of us are immensely proud of and justifies that many deaths, is that these people fought and died to protect our rights and way of life.

Now 3000 people are killed on American soil and everyone is running scared saying "Here take my rights away! What do I care if the government monitors me, I'm not doing anything wrong. They can do anything they want and take away any freedoms that I'm not really using regularly; just please don't let any more people die."

I've never seen such a bunch of self-centered scared wimps. It's a disgrace and disrespectful to those who died in the past to protect these rights and freedoms. The American Founding Fathers would have a fit. Ben Franklin too would probably just hang his head in shame:

"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both."
- Ben Franklin

Re:Not Flawed Legislation

"You're butchering the quote and as a result perverting it for your own uses:"

Hold on a sec. I am not butchering anything. I obtained and confirmed the quote from several [quotedb.com] independent [brainyquote.com] sources [wikipedia.org]. You only provide one. While yours does look like it has been researched (or copied) by that wiki author in a little more detail, that doesn't guarantee it is more accurate. For the sake of argument that yours is correct since it really isn't important at all to the point.

What is perhaps more important than the actual wording of the quote is the point: that trading rights and freedoms for security is generally not a good idea. I don't think anybody would have interpretted it as mean any right or freedom starting from 100% no restrictions. That's just silly.

But you are completely bypassing the point I was making for the sake of trying too be geekier about the correct quote. Millions died protecting the rights to not have government monitoring them over reading books on Winnie the Pooh, or Islam, or whatever (as an example). That 3000 more have died and everyone turns 180 degrees on these issues, without even requiring the government to demonstrate the necessity or usefulness, is a travesty and says a lot about the self-centeredness of today's society in America and the ability of propaganda to scare the crap out of them and just start handing over their rights.

I'd rather live with a 1/100,000 chance (3000 out of 300 million) of being killed by a terrorist on American soil than have 300 million people lose rights like this. And that terrorist risk also doesn't take into account the bungling of the intelligence under the existing system in 2001 nor in the increase in security that could be done without reducing rights and freedoms. It hasn't been demonstrated that these measures are even necessary. In some cases, the response security measures (and potentially violations of rights) are even counter-productive [mit.edu] towards securing against terrorism.

Re:Not Flawed Legislation

Show me the evidence that the government has been spying on US citizens and not on foreign terrorists? Got any?

No?

Gee, I wonder why.

Have you missed all the flak about domestic spying recently?

Anyway, it's very difficult to get information about a secret spy program when it's, you know, secret.

If all these "freedoms" Liberals crow about were so important to the Founding Fathers, why were they in a Amendments to the Constitution instead of in the Constitution itself?

Thomas Jefferson (at least) thought the Constitution was good except for two things: no bill of rights and the lack of a term limit for the President. The Bill of Rights was added in 1791.

Re:Not Flawed Legislation

Just call 9/11 a gasoline tax. If you want to stop terrorist acts at home, it's real simple. Stop playing the global bully.

They are coming after YOU!

Ha! Gotcha. I meant you, over there burning that DVD torrent you've been downloading for 6 hours. And YOU, you SOB. Stop moving those CD's to your Ipod, thief. Oh, and not to mention YOU, who told you that it was fine to tamper with that TiVo? You say you learned to do it at the Library? NO, NOT THE LIBRARY!!!

meth

All of the crap when purchasing certain cold meds makes me want to start a methlab just out of spite.

Re:meth

You're a friggin idiot. Try living across the street from a meth lab for a while. Enjoy the sight of tweekers coming in and out of your neighborhood, eyeballing your house and vehicles. Yeah, you should start a lab, go right ahead. The fume exposure should do you some good (or kill you).

I think you are blaming the wrong people. You obviously know where the meth lab is, as do your neighbors. Therefore there is no reason why the police can't "figure it out". Are the police doing anything about your problem? No? If not, why not?

How is treating ordinary people like criminals going to solve your particular problem, just because they have a cold or flu and want over the counter medicine? Why is it that the solution to crime always involves further measures to criminalize and penalize the law abiding? Is it that Big Brother is just too lazy to bother going after criminals who don't roll over and go along with the law, when it is so much easier to penalize us sheeple because we are stupid enough to obey the law and do as we are told?

Just who is running this madhouse, anyhow?

Re:meth

Do you think the extra hassle for customers has stopped meth labs?

Yes, essentially it did stop them. They used to be large barns/warehouses buying the precursers in in bulk and producing large high quality batches. The addition rate for meth follows the purity of the drug. Once the supply chain was locked down all that was left was the kitchen labs. The usage dropped significantly, especially with the poor quality crap made from crushed cough medicine pills.

Banning the precursor has worked for several drugs, some of which you won't have heard of because of the success. The only reason these cold and flu remedies weren't banned outright is because of the drug industry bribery to politicians.

PBS's Frontline did a good documentary on the topic; worth a look.

Re:meth

This Sudaphed thing is a real hastle to me. I need it when I get sick and the "monthly limits" are stupid. What do you do if more than one party in your home needs the stuff? I can get 20 pieces a month?! I don't mind signing in but this is stupid. It gets hard to get and it gets impossible just as I need it.

As to the Meth Lab stuff. I had drug runners running a regular wholesale operation next door. You could watch them exchanging money and drugs in the street. They were outside the house with cell phones "dialing for dollars" every single day and all sorts of people were pulling up. I tried to call the FBI, you know the guys who are charged with catching this sort of crud. Well they didn't answer their answering machine. I tried calling the DA..., his people didn't care. I called the Sheriff..., he said call the "drug taskforce" with the state. I called the drug taskforce...., No result. I even offered to have the under cover guys stay in my house and film the operation from my house.

I finally threatened the Sheriff with advertizing for the drug guys by painting the street and with "Drugs this Way" signs and putting up signs on the lamp posts. That got the guys parole revoked for a while. But now the guys are back. What am I going to have to do? Shoot the guys? I know they would show up and arrest me if I did that. They cannot be bothered otherwise.

For the ignorant fools who believe the USA is either fighting terrorism or is fighting drugs, you simply do not know what is going on. The Patriot Act is a fraud. Start a business and you will find out what the Patriot Act is about. It is about TAXES! It is nothing else!

As to the stopping of Meth Labs and drug abuse. NOT! The restriction of precursors may have slowed the labs but the import via that border with Mexico that the US President refuses at all costs to protect is going through the roof. The dealer is next door to me. I know! I wish we could see a happier situation but the reality is that the President and his corrupt buddies are not stopping drugs, they are protecting their business in drugs against competition. Don't believe me? Try calling the FBI to deal with the drug running terrorists who are killing and drugging in our streets in the USA. I have tried. They don't even answer their phone!

For the MODS out there who might be tempted to disagree. Why on earth would you stop people from reading the truth?

Re:meth

"For the MODS out there who might be tempted to disagree. Why on earth would you stop people from reading the truth?"

If you mod this post down, you hate children. You don't...hate children ...do you?

Re:meth

Wow, what a surprise! "Half-Baked" is calling someone with an anti drug-dealing stance a "tool". Nice work, you tool.

I completely agree with cluckshot, and it has nothing to do with whether I think people should be allowed to use this drug or that drug. This is about the kinds of people (or behaviors) that these drugs (meth) attract. Do you know why we don't allow people to wander the streets intoxicated? Because people do things they normally wouldn't do while under the influence of alcohol. Most people, I would assume, are not excited by the prospect of a neighborhood full of "Half-Baked" visitors who would barter children for their next fix.

I used to live in an apartment complex that was acress the street from a drug house. My car was broken into several times because of the goons that house was attracting. So I don't want to hear this "You're a fucking narc-tool" gibberish. If they could have just picked up whatever they came for and then left, I wouldn't have had a problem. Instead, they would scour the parking lot and vandalize multiple cars with each visit.

If you want to do your meth, then get it legalized. If you lack the conviction to try that, then at least go through someone who deals discretely. If the people of the neighborhood don't know what's going on they won't complain. IANADD, but that would be my objective. If your dealer is advertising the fact that they are running an illegal business, regardless of whether you feel it should be illegal, they deserve to be caught.

So, maybe you should tell your dealer cronies to get a clue and to not be so god damned obvious in their illicit dealings, k-thx?

Please Note: I know I have terrible grammar and probably made several mistakes.

Funny

I like how the patriot act gets renewed virtually without any coverage, cause Dick Cheney accidently shooting some guy is a much better story than covering an act that restricts our civil liberties. This isn't a troll, i'm just pissed off.

Re:Funny

I think there really ought to be much more attention paid in the news media to our civil libHOLY SHIT GOOGLE JUST WROTE A WEB PAGE EDITOR IN JAVASCRIPT

Re:Funny

Actually there was very little coverage of the fact that Cheney was out hunting with a woman who was not his wife.

Re:Funny

But no matter how you cut it civil liberties won't shoot you in the face.

http://www.uiowa.edu/~policult/assets/VietNam/Kent State.jpg [uiowa.edu]

Why Pass It?

"... - but why pass what you know is flawed?"

I'm no political science student, but I can assume that it's because of the political consequences that would come with not voting for passing the act - could you imagine how easy it would make life for the campaign manager for a candidate running for office against one of the people who voted against it?

"[Insert Senator Name] hurt American security by not voting for the absolutely vital PATRIOT Act"

Or some nonsense like that.

Not that it makes it right.

Re:Why Pass It?

Yea, but if enough people didn't vote for it, it would quickly move away from being something that was bad to something that was good. The argument "Senator X voted to open this country to terrorists!" would move to "Senator X voted to protect his constituent's rights!"

Reminds me of those High School popularity contests...

Re:Why Pass It?

That's exactly what the Republicans are aiming for. In recent years, the ruling party has enacted the Clean Skies act, Healthy Forests Initiative, No Child Left Behind, and the PATRIOT act - all of which are (a) ironically named - the skies are not cleaner, forests are less healthy, children are left behind, and eradicating civil liberties is hardly "patriotic" - yet (b) difficult if not impossible to vote against. Even though it's only a front for the deregulation of the logging industry, what politician is going to vote against the "Healthy Forests Initiative"?

Re:Why Pass It?

Yes, let's say "Republicans" when talking about the PATRIOT ACT, because only 2/3rd of the Democrats voted to make it permanent. Why, I couldn't imagine a more stinging rebuke by the Democrats than supermajority support!

Re:BECAUSE IT WORKS

With these kinds of opinions rampant in the US, I'm so glad that I don't have to live there.

Protect your country by giving up the civil liberties that the US stood for, once upon a time. Uh. Do you realize that the hypocrisis of the PATRIOT act is one of the reasons why US politics are now so despised in the world, when they were used to be a role model for a free society?

Pain in the ass

like one measure, which would make it harder for illicit labs to obtain ingredients for methamphetamine by requiring pharmacies to sell nonprescription cold medicines only from behind the counter.

This is already the case in Australia, although its a good idea a lot of pharmacists love to treat you like a criminal when you go in with a head cold to buy a pack of cold and flue tablets. Last year one of them refused to hand my drivers license back and I had to go to collect it from the police station after a few questions, turns out another guy with a name similar to mine had bought a few packets recently from that same chemist. All I wanted was bloody cold and flue tabs!!!!

You know what this means?

You know what this means? This is muuch worse than I originally thought. At first I thought the lawmakers were just incompetent last time for not reading the bill, but now I know that the majority of them are downright fucking evil for renewing it.

Re:I suppose you've read the bill then?

I will read as much of it as Congress did when it was passed in 2001, i.e. none.
I shouldn't have to read a 200 or however many page bill/law to find out what it is.
If it were 10 pages maybe but I doubt Congress ever reads most of any bill, not just that, that are so long.

Yes I know this is a different law than the older one but I doubt it is much shorter. If you can tell me it will take an hour for the layman, who it affects, to read and understand it I will do so. I don't care what judges will say as I generally won't pass a law using that criteria.
I will vote on it according to if it is moral.

The fact that laws are in legalese, or I assume so as all I have ever seen are in that way, makes it hard to read.
I know I have some trouble with olde English books like Shakespeare or Chaucer.

Re:I suppose you've read the bill then?

I'll name one: the creation of the Secret Service Uniform Division

We have a new police force, this for the homeland security department. They have the power to arrest and detain anyone seen as a threat to the United States of America. That's an awfull lot of power, don't you think?

Scanning the comments, and seeing READ THE BILL, I thought you were propping the Read The Bills Act. Might be the only thing to slow down this avalanche of legislature. Unlike other proposed bills, this one means just what the title says: Every bill must be read, out loud, and every congressional voter must sign her name that she has read or heard every word of it.

The lobby behind this last ditch effort to stop the toboggan-to-hell is http://downsizedc.org/ [downsizedc.org]. Give them a minute of your eyeballs, and maybe everyone's blood pressure will come down around here.

Re:I suppose you've read the bill then?

Every bill must be read, out loud, and every congressional voter must sign her name that she has read or heard every word of it.

Quizzes. Don't forget quizzes. Anyone who scores too badly gets replaced.

Ignorant Population

I doubt 10% of Americans understand the Constitution in any depth. This is why our elected officials can take away our freedoms and usurp power.

According to a recent study

I doubt 10% of Americans understand the Constitution in any depth. This is why our elected officials can take away our freedoms and usurp power.

Sadly, it's more like 0.1% [usatoday.com] (although most citizens seem to be pretty familiar with the Simpsons).

Guess who the real patriots are.

There are 10 true patriots out there.

Yes

Those who understand binary, and those who don't.

Sen. Russ Feingold: True Patriot

Feingold reads constitution on Senate floor

http://rawstory.com/news/2006/Feingold_reads_const itution_on_Senate_floor_0301.html [rawstory.com]

In Soviet America

TV Watches You!

Vote Out Incumbents

Damn them all. How 'bout this shit! [democracynow.org]

The 10 senators who voted against it...

Check out the senate roll call [senate.gov] [www.senate.gov] for the vote breakdown. Here's the only 10 senators with enough guts to stand up for america's civil liberties: Akaka (D-HI) Bingaman (D-NM) Byrd (D-WV) Feingold (D-WI) Harkin (D-IA) Jeffords (I-VT) Leahy (D-VT) Levin (D-MI) Murray (D-WA) Wyden (D-OR) I realize some other senators were trying to compromise and we don't live in a perfect society and blah blah blah. But this was just too important of a vote to play political games. If you're against the Patriot Act, these 10 people are the only incumbents who deserve your vote this November!

I for Independent?

Does the I for I-VT Jeffords stand for independent? I didn't think Americans were even capable of breaking out of the two-party trap. Which state was it that had the guts to elect an independent senator?

Thinking of that, why isn't there a single republican in that list? You would think that a party that is supposedly about small government and staying out of people's affairs would have at least a few members opposed to the PATRIOT act. Doesn't the republican party contain ANY classical consevatives anymore? Is it really all neo-conservatives (AKA Fascists, in the Mussolini sense of the word)?

Democrazy

You know, back in the pre-phases of the Iraq-invasion, when the citizens of Europe where out protesting and an overwhelming majority was against the war, the majority of our politician truely preferred licking Bush's balls. This is pretty much the same deal, politicians only pay lipservice to 'the will of people' and will show themselves as the corrupt m*therf*ckers they are whenever something vaguely important comes up.

Which leads me to wonder; where is the disrepancy between what the people want and what the politicians do, the largest; Autharitan China or Democrazied West? Personally, I think the answer is really, really scary.

Why pass it indeed?

It was passed by an overwhelming majority because an overwhelming majority in both parties agree wholeheartedly with pushing the US further towards a fascist state ... and they don't have far to go.

The Democrats are absolutely pathetic. They handed the 2000 election to the Republicans on a silver platter. They rolled over and played dead in the last elections. They made a point of pretending that there was NO opposition to the wars in the middle east. They pushed strong anti-war candidates and slotted in a pro-war candidates. They attacked Bush from the right in arguing that he wasn't doing enough to protect the world from terrorism, win the war in Iraq, etc, etc.

The problem is that the Democrats are a party that defends big business interests - just like the Republicans, only a litle less competent. This is why less than 50% of Americans vote - they realise that it doesn't matter who you vote for, the same people keep winning ... and those people aren't ordinary workers.

Americans should take a good look at their 2-party system, and ponder what democracy is supposed to be about, and consider the difference between the two. It's a huge gap, and it's increasing at an alarming rate. Thank God the US hasn't been so successful at exporting their brand of democracy to the rest of the world.

Re:Hysteria Unleashed

You have no idea what fascism is

Sure I do. Have a got at these features, taken from http://www.omnicenter.org/warpeacecollection/facis m.htm [omnicenter.org]:

Powerful and continuing expressions of nationalism.

Disdain for the importance of human rights.

Identification of enemies/scapegoats as a unifying cause.

The supremacy of the military/avid militarism.

Rampant sexism.

A controlled mass media.

Obsession with national security.

Religion and ruling elite tied together.

Power of corporations protected.

Power of labor suppressed or eliminated.

Disdain and suppression of intellectuals and the arts.

Obsession with crime and punishment.

Rampant cronyism and corruption

Fraudulent elections.

Sounds like America to me.

You're so swamped in hysteria and paranoia

Oh bullshit! I'm not hysterical. I'm just pointing out that your country is fucked up. Deal with it without namecalling.

you wouldn't recognize a real fascist if one was standing beside you

I think this might apply to you before me. As for standing next to fascists, I tried to when Emperor Dubya came to Canberra, but the fucking police wouldn't let me get anywhere near him. Next time ...

Re:Why pass what you know is flawed? I'll tell you

The US government failed to do that on 9/11.
BS. The US government showed incompetence, from the top on down. How easy everyone forgets the information that was available to the government before 9/11:
There were clear signs that Osama Bin Laden was planning an attack in the US, including a presidential briefing [cnn.com].
The above briefing discusses the failed "millenium plot" which was successfully prevented, which was linked to Bin Laden, and which showed the terrorist's interest in airplanes.
The FBI office in Phoenix, AZ received a memo regarding Bin Laden supporters [cbsnews.com] taking flying lessons [cnn.com].
A month later, the FBI actually arrested Moussaoui in Minnesota, but didn't find it necessary to search his computer [cnn.com].

All of this was accomplished without the PATRIOT Act, and nothing in the PATRIOT Act would have made a difference if the same mistakes were made.

Also, the attacks in Madrid and London happened while the Patriot Act was in full force (and the illegal wiretapping was already going on). How come they were not prevented?

This is not a crime-enforcing bill, it is a counter-terrorism bill.
Keep lying to yourself, hopefully one day you will wake up...

Re:Why pass what you know is flawed? I'll tell you

Also, the attacks in Madrid and London happened while the Patriot Act was in full force (and the illegal wiretapping was already going on). How come they were not prevented?

Oh! Oh! I know! I know!... because Spain and England aren't subject to US Legisla

Re:Why pass what you know is flawed? I'll tell you

The Patriot Act provides the same tools for counter-terrorism officials that anti-narcotics officials have been using for years.

Anti-narcotics officials have been able to conduct secret reconnaissance of what books I've been reading?

Perhaps some of yo

Re:Why pass what you know is flawed? I'll tell you

Perhaps some of you don't remember 9/11
Oh, yeah, that was so long ago...
But not as long ago as the famous Ben Franklin quote [google.com]

Re:Why pass what you know is flawed? I'll tell you

Perhaps some of you don't remember 9/11. But don't you remember the March 11th train bombing in Madrid or the attacks just this last summer in London?

If you fear terrorism, you are a coward plain and simple. You are more likley to die because of a drunk driver. Even if 9/11 happened every day for a year more people would have died to car accidents, yet we don't see more laws being passed in the name of public saftey for the "War on Drunk Driving"

Secondly, you are just plain ignorant to think it requires new powers to government.

9/11 happened because the pilots didn't lock their doors like they do is Israel.

To prevent 9/11 again, we simply have to require more common sense on the airlines. We do not... I repeat... We do not need to pass more laws in order to prevent more terrorism. Killing people and conspiring to kill people is illegal right? There ya go. Go catch those terrorists. You don't need to trample on the Constitution in order to do so.

Lastly, laws will not prevent terrorism. I'm more right wing than probaly you, but I know the reason why we haven't caught Bin Laden is not because we haven't passed another Patriot act but it is our leaders or incompentant or cowards.

Or perhaps there is a reason Pakistan hasn't caught him yet. Maybe we are paying them too much money to find him and they wouldn't want a good deal to go away. Maybe they have nukes and we don't have the balls to stop terrorism once and for all.

Re:In America...

President Bush's Signing Statement: All Your Base Are Belong To Us

(His advisors advised him to leave out "You are on the way to destruction. You have no chance to survive, make your time")

Re:"Why pass what you know is flawed?"

I'm going to quote an old post [slashdot.org] from the "DMCA Abuse Widespread" [slashdot.org] article:

Whenever a controversial law is proposed, and its supporters, when confronted with an egregious abuse it would permit, use a phrase along the lines of 'Perhaps in theory, but the law would never be applied in that way' - they're lying . They intend to use the law that way as early and as often as possible.

Now for your words:

If you look at it from an idealistic viewpoint, it should not be passed until we are sure that no rights are violated.

If you look at your words realistically, you're conceding that rights will be violated.

I at a loss for words for the first part of that paragraph

it's better to pass it flaws and all because while you can always restore liberties that might be temporarily infringed upon

That mindset cannot coexist with the fundamental fact that laws in the US of A must be consistent with the Constitution and its Amendments.

I'm not sure how I can make it any clearer.

Re:"Why pass what you know is flawed?"

Looking at it from a cold and pragmatic standpoint, it's better to pass it flaws and all because while you can always restore liberties that might be temporarily infringed upon, terrorists cause permanent damage.

Unfortunately, it worked exactly the other way round in history.

Terrorists can kill people and blow stuff up, but unless they also have widespread support in the population, do not pose more of a danger to a _nation_ than any other criminals do.

However, once civil rights are taken away, they are very hard to restore. If enough rights are taken away, it becomes impossible to restore any of them by legal means, since the legal means to do so have been removed themselves.

Re:"Why pass what you know is flawed?"

Overall, both the US and Candian systems are very good conceptually -- they just both fail dismally in practice.

Both suffer from serious shortcomings in proportional representation. A party squeaks into power with barely 50% of parliament / congress / etc, and they can run the country like there is no opposition at all.

Both also suffer from serious shortcomings in letting the meritous reach the top. Both countries are starting to foster dynasties -- the law says anyone can become president / prime-minister, and while its true that any one can run -- increasingly only members from certain powerful families ever actually manage it.

And that's increasingly serving those families more and more and the citizens of either country less and less.

Its not enough for democracy that everyone can vote, and anyone can win by law, it actually has to work. Specific protections are required to ensure that everyone's vote is actually represented in the resulting government, and that being rich and connected are not the biggest factors in who forms that government.

Just as a free market doesn't work when power is concentrated in the hands of a small number of corporations who can erect barriers to entry, create cartels, and price fix -- a free country stops working when the power is concentrated in the hands of a small number of parties.

I'm not sure which country is less screwed up. The US is a 2 party system that simply flips power back and forth. Canada has several parties but most of them are irrelevant and many are the fragments of the shattered Progressive Conservative party -- fragments which are coalescing back together. And the BQ is hardly a postive force in Canadian politics -- the constant focus on Quebec is like the annoying pandering to the 'Swing states', only 10x worse.

Overall I guess Canada seems to be preserving its 'instability' better, the American balance seems very precarious -- if one party ever manages to polarize the issues enough to capture a solid 55% of the vote the US would become little more than a monarchy that is legally required to crown a new king (chosen by the party) every 8 years.

Hopefully it never comes to that, but while Orwell's 1984 didn't happen... it may just be late... it still seems to be coming.