#SOPA/PIPA vs #NDAA Part Two: Chasing the Phantom Menace (I'm NOT talking Star Wars)

Yesterday, I posted part one of my 3-part SOPA/PIPA Vs NDAA series (read it) in which I suggest that all these sites going dark to protest SOPA/PIPA was just misplaced efforts and energy (the indefinite-detention-legalizing NDAA of 2012 is much more worthy of protest, harms more of our core human rights, and is already a law!). Last night over at Mandommag.com, my third post for them went into more detail explaining just how the NDAA is much more of a threat than the SOPA/PIPA bills (read it). But in my post, here on thepete.com yesterday, I also suggested that the reason this movement had gotten so big was not because of how much a threat SOPA or PIPA are (they haven't even passed either house of Congress yet) but because big Internet companies stand to lose a lot of money if they get blocked in the US (aka they're only doing it for the money).  Today I'm going to suggest that protesting SOPA/PIPA actually helps the bad guys.

#Obama signs HR 1540 (aka the #NDAA for 2012) into law on New Year's Eve

Well, I was about a week off. Instead of signing HR 1540 (aka the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012) on Christmas, as I expected, he signed it on New Year's Eve while everyone was gearing up (or already taking part in) their New Year celebrations. What's even better is that he included one of those signing statements which I'm pretty sure he said he would not do.

Of course none of those concerns comes close to those I have about HR 1540, itself. Mainly, I'll cite a couple points from the USA Today article screencapped above. First:

President Obama ended 2011 by signing a major defense bill, despite what he called "serious reservations" about provisions regarding interrogations of terrorist suspects, sanctions against Iran, and relations with Russia.

"Serious reservations" would seem to suggest he should veto the damn thing. Instead, he signs it and adds on a signing statement that says he's not going to follow parts of the law that he feels will stop him from doing his job as president. That's wonderfully vague and also seems like an abuse of power. Doesn't he know how checks and balances work? A president really has one thing he can do to "check and balance" the Legislative Branch of the USG, and that is veto bills. Instead, as Bush did before him, he cherry picks the parts of the laws he likes, allowing him to effectively have a sort of kingly power.

Here's a bit more from that USA Today article, this bit is quoted from an AP report:

The administration also pushed Congress to change a provision that would have denied U.S. citizens suspected of terrorism the right to trial and could have subjected them to indefinite detention. Lawmakers eventually dropped the military custody requirement for U.S. citizens or lawful U.S. residents.

Now this part really bugs me because it is actually a form of bigotry--in the Declaration of Independence we put forth the idea that all people are entitled to certain human rights. Not just American citizens, but all humans. HR 1540 essentially says that non-Americans aren't entitled to the same human rights as Americans, in a way, saying that non-Americans aren't human. We say in our DoI that all humans are entitled to these rights, so if we don't guaranty them for all humans, aren't we saying that some humans aren't human?

The AP report goes on to include a quote from Obama:

"My administration will not authorize the indefinite military detention without trial of American citizens," Obama said in the signing statement. "Indeed, I believe that doing so would break with our most important traditions and values as a nation." ...

The depressing thing is that Obama has already done the "without trial" thing by ordering a drone strike on American-born Islamist Anwar al-Awlaki. Al-Awlaki may have said bad things and may have want to kill Americans, but he was an American and didn't actually kill any Americans before he, himself, was killed in an American drone strike in Yemen last year. He got no trial, got no lawyer, did not have his rights read to him before his arrest, he wasn't arrested, but he did get sentenced to death by the Commander-in-Chief, aka, President Obama.

What good are rules if you're just going to ignore them? What good are laws if you're just going to violate them? Is our entire concept of freedom and justice in America just an illusion that can be tossed aside when our leaders feel like it?

Happy New Year!