To Dissent or Not to Dissent, is that the Question?
April 26, 2009
Salaroche

Rush Limbaugh says he would like President Obama to fail, some Republicans hold Tea Parties claiming that taxing the American people is bad for America, the Governor of Texas threatens to secede from the Union rather than abide by Obama’s “Socialist” agenda and people in California’s Central Valley are gathering signatures for a possible 2012 initiative that would split the State along an allegedly existing West-East ideological divide.

Is America going nuts or is all this just a question of exercising our First Amendment rights? And if this is only a freedom of speech issue, when does dissenting become sedition or even treason?

Dissension has been a touchy issue in America during periods of turmoil. Just consider the Red Scare of 1917-20, or McCarthy’s political Inquisition by the end of WWII or, more recently, the Bush administration’s admonishing Americans after 9/11 to “watch what they say” (Ari Fleischer, Bush's Press Secretary, September 26, 2001)

During the first Red Scare the line between dissension and sedition was often nonexistent. During McCarthy’s political Inquisition, dissension was penalized less harshly, but still carried considerable harm to the reputation of the accused and even deportation in the case of foreigners.

During the Bush years it was more a case of propaganda-induced fear of dissent. For example, to doubt the validity of the Bush Administration’s rationale for invading Iraq came to be seen by millions of Americans as “siding with the terrorists.” Bush’s statement that "you're either with us or against us” was applied by many Americans to their own fellow citizens. In that myopic view, either you agreed with whatever the Bush Administration said, or you were basically siding with the enemy.

I, for one, while working at the Santa Barbara County, was summoned one day to the Assistant Engineer’s office, the guy to whom I reported progress on my programming, to hear a short lecture on how everybody in that building was a conservative (which couldn’t have been farther from the truth) and how I was expected to behave accordingly.

And what was my sin? To have carefully read a transcript of Colin Powell’s Feb. 5, 2003, presentation to the United Nations and to have stated openly the following day at the office that I hadn’t seen any hard evidence there showing that Saddam Hussein had any WMDs in his possession.

But that happened to me while the Republicans were in power. So what happens to any guy who openly disagrees with the Government now that we have a Democrat in the White House? Well, Rush Limbaugh wishes that Obama fails, Republicans want to further cut taxes for the rich right when the US Government would have a good use for that revenue, and Governor Rick Perry recklessly threatens to secede Texas from the Union, all of it without much un-American labeling from the part of anybody.

Historically, Americans have been very patriotic people, but after the catastrophic rise and fall of European-style nationalism (Nazism and Fascism) Americans surfaced as perhaps the most openly patriotic nation in the world. As proof of this, just look at the considerable number of Star-Spangled Banners flying in house porches, parks, buildings and car-dealer lots on any regular day anytime of year. In contrast, you see national flags flying publicly in similar numbers in any European country only during national holidays.

Because of such overt patriotism, dissent has always been a touchy issue in the US, under both Republican and Democratic administrations. But, if this is so, why aren’t Limbaugh’s and Perry’s statements labeled under the sedition category? Why isn’t Rick Perry’s threat to secede denounced as an open act of sedition (i.e., openly inciting to revolt against the integrity of the United States Government) or why not even along the lines of “treason”? Is it because the Democrats are just a bunch of wimps who can’t muster the guts to stand up to these Republican loud-mouths? Or is it because the Democrats are never as eager to play the “Patriotism Card” as the Republicans usually are? Maybe both of the above, or maybe neither.

In my view, however, and regardless of whatever excuses and explanations the Republicans may give, Limbaugh’s wishing Obama to fail amounts to wishing the United States Government to fail, which, given the present dire economic circumstances, amounts to wishing the country would sink disastrously deeper into recession.

Under that lens, don’t Limbaugh’s wishes look like deeply un-American to you? Aren’t such wishes of the kind that guys like Osama bin-Laden would harbor in his most cherished dreams? Wouldn’t bin Laden enthusiastically cheer Limbaugh’s and Perry’s wishes to have the United States plunge into bankruptcy and social despair and eventually even into secession? I think bin Laden would be very happy to see that happen.

The Republicans lost this past November elections in a massive landslide, so now they’re trying to define their party’s new strategy for the future. Are Limbaugh’s wishes and Perry’s threats the “New Americanism” the Republicans would like to spread across the United States?

Defeat can make political organizations fall into disarray. It can make ideologue losers desperately look for ideas and solutions in the wrong places. It can make disillusioned partisan followers accept extreme positions as the only means to hold on to their cherished party affiliation. But do Republicans need to turn into a shameless pack of disoriented un-American loons?

We all know that Rush Limbaugh is an entertainer and that the more controversy he stokes, the higher his program ratings will go. We also know that politicians like Rick Perry thrive on speeches and applause and that Tea Parties like the ones the Republicans have been organizing are just vehicles to show the nation that they’re still alive and kicking while at the same time chanting out loud their largely-discredited mantra of more tax cuts for the corporations and the rich.

We also know that the American news business is quite happy to have such bombastic statements published on the media and that the American people are often quite happy to jump into the fray and defend their individual views on the issues. So what do we do about all this?

I’ll leave it to the legal scholars to define the line between sheer dissension and sedition and between both those terms and treason. In the meantime, even if I deeply disagree with Limbaugh’s and Perry’s statements, I'm very happy to know that both those guys, as well as any other guy in their position, are all shielded in their dissent by the United States Constitution and laws from any retaliation from the part of the United States Government, until they're legally proven to have crossed the line mentioned above.

So, if the question is whether to dissent or not to dissent, my answer is: Dissent. Even if in so doing, like in Limbaugh’s and Perry’s case, you make a perfect un-American ass of yourself.

Salaroche