Naomi Wolf's new book is The End of America: A Letter of Warning To A Young Patriot:

In a stunning indictment of the Bush administration and Congress, best-selling author Naomi Wolf lays out her case for saving American democracy. In authoritative research and documentation Wolf explains how events of the last six years parallel steps taken in the early years of the 20th century’s worst dictatorships such as Germany, Russia, China, and Chile.

From the introduction:

I have written this warning because our country -- the democracy our young patriots expect to inherit -- is in the process of being altered forever.

Americans expect to have freedom around us just as we expect to have air to breathe, so we have only limited understanding of the furnaces of repression that the Founders knew intimately.

There are ten steps that are taken in order to close down a democracy or crush a prodemocratic movement, whether by capitalists, communists, or right-wing fascists. These ten steps, together, are more than the sum of their parts. Once all ten have been put in place, each magnifies the power of the others and of the whole. Impossible as it may seem, we are seeing each of these ten steps taking hold in the United States today.

But America is different! I can hear you saying.

Stephen Colbert Interviews Naomi Wolf

In this short essay, written for a symposium in the San Diego Law Review, Professor Daniel Solove examines the nothing to hide argument. When asked about government surveillance and data mining, many people respond by declaring: I've got nothing to hide. According to the nothing to hide argument, there is no threat to privacy unless the government uncovers unlawful activity, in which case a person has no legitimate justification to claim that it remain private. The nothing to hide argument and its variants are quite prevalent, and thus are worth addressing. In this essay, Solove critiques the nothing to hide argument and exposes its faulty underpinnings.

'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy

Opinion polls, both in the US and Britain, say that about 75% of us want more, not less, surveillance.

How fortunate we are:

Is more what we really need?

In my opinion not.

But running spies is not the NSA's job. Listening is, and more listening is what the NSA knows how to organize, more is what Congress is ready to support and fund, more is what the President wants, and more is what we are going to get.

Yay!

Big Brother is watching us all | BBC

Al Gore's latest book opens with a rumination on the sad state of our body politic. "More and more people are trying to figure out what has gone wrong in our democracy," Gore writes, "and how we can fix it."

He offers a list of explanations that have also been put forward by others, from the increasing power of interest groups to voter apathy to excessive partisanship; but Gore sees those concerns, however real, as symptoms of the problem and not causes. More than any other public figure today, he fixes the blame on the power of television. His lament is not the standard one about the medium's superficiality. He argues that a discourse dominated by television — it is, he notes, now almost half a century since television replaced newspapers as Americans' chief source of information — inherently corrupts the Founders' notion of the reasoned deliberation in the civic forum that they judged essential to a republic's survival:

The present threat...is based on several serious problems that stem from the dramatic and fundamental change in the way we communicate among ourselves....

Consider the rules by which our present public forum now operates and how different they are from the norms our Founders knew during the age of print. Today's massive flows of information are largely in only one direction. The world of television makes it virtually impossible for individuals to take part in what passes for a national conversation.

Individuals receive, but they cannot send. They absorb, but they cannot share. They hear, but they do not speak. They see constant motion, but they do not move themselves. The "well-informed citizenry" is in danger of becoming the "well-amused audience."

MemeStreams: Send. Share. Speak. Move.

Citizen Gore

As insurgent threats evolve and assume new forms, the United States must also evolve in its ability to counter potentially prolonged threats in several parts of the world.

Because of the potential for global reach in contemporary insurgencies, the ability to draw on lessons learned from past counterinsurgency (COIN) campaigns using different historical cases can be valuable, helping current and future leaders prevent a repetition of mistakes and building a foundation on which to build contemporary responses.

To this end, six historic COIN operations from the 19th and 20th centuries are examined to determine which tactics, techniques, and procedures led to success and which to failure. The Philippines, Algeria, Vietnam, El Salvador, Jammu and Kashmir, and Colombia were chosen for their varied characteristics relating to geography, historical era, outcome, type of insurgency faced, and level of US involvement.

Specific issues examined include the counterinsurgents’ ability to innovate and adapt, the need to find a way to recognize the threat, and tactics for confronting it.

Click through for links to other papers in the series, as well.

Money in the Bank -- Lessons Learned from Past Counterinsurgency Operations | RAND

The scene, heavy with the sweet smoke of cigarillos and exploding with hip-hop’s unmistakable pounding bass, could be almost anywhere: New York, Chicago, Memphis, Oakland.

The only sign that this is Colorado Springs is that two churches sit adjacent to the club, La Zona Roja, in an empty strip mall.

The club is part of a thriving hip-hop community that has grown as Colorado Springs, known for its military installations and evangelical groups, has grown. But not everyone is happy that hip-hop has taken root here.

After a spate of shootings, and with a rising murder rate, the police here are saying gangsta rap is contributing to the violence, luring gang members and criminal activity to nightclubs. The police publicly condemned the music in a news release after a killing in July and are warning nightclub owners that their places might not be safe if they play gangsta rap.

The release mentioned an event planned at Eden, called a “Pimp, Thug and Ho Party,” as the “type of behavior that causes concern.” The club’s owners called off the party.

Colorado Police Link Rise in Violence to Music

To elucidate the impact of polarization on the daily lives of U.S. citizens, the research community may need to modify its benchmarks for what constitutes a successful public policy. The authors suggest that we need a better understanding of how polarization affects the quantity and substance of rulemaking, regulations, and judicial decisions. We also need to examine the effects of partisan polarization at the state and local levels of government, how much polarization complicates the conduct of defense and foreign policy, and precisely how polarization affects different policy areas. The publication should be of interest to members of Congress, presidential candidates, civil servants, political scientists, reporters, and stakeholders seeking to influence public policy.

Polarized Politics and Policy Consequences | RAND

An award-winning children’s book based on the true story of two male penguins who reared a baby penguin stands atop the American Library Association’s annual list of works that drew the most complaints from parents, library patrons and others, The Associated Press reported.

Published in 2005, the book, “And Tango Makes Three,” by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell, with illustrations by Henry Cole (Simon & Schuster), was named one of that year’s best by the association.

But some parents and educators complained that it advocated homosexuality.

Next week's headline: Parents complain that National Geographic documentary about lions advocates polygamy.

(I wonder if these complainants would self-classify as "educators.")

See also coverage in the LA Times.

Paternal Penguins Pique Parents

If there’s one thing we know about government, it’s that it’s much harder to dismantle programs than it is to create them in the first place.

Why George Bush’s 'Freedom Agenda' Is Here to Stay

The Internet revolution itself is not about hypertext, but the culture of participation and the sharing of knowledge.

Web 2.0 Won't Eat Your Mouse