Whenever a conservative attacks the ultra-liberal agenda of the ACLU, apologists inevitably surface, saying “gee, the ACLU is neither right nor left, they consistently support everybody’s civil liberties, blah blah blah.” My favorite example is their inexiplicable support in the 1970s for the right of a group of Nazis and Klansman to yell “fire” in a crowded theater “we hate Jews” in an overwhelmingly Jewish neighborhood. It’s almost as if the ACLU apologists are so far out in left field that they actually expect conservatives to identify with the Klan or the Nazis, with whom they have nothing ideologically in common.

Apparently, ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero didn’t get the memo about the allegedly apolitical ACLU. Get a load of the fundraising letter I received from him yesterday.

Dear Friend of Liberty,

I’m afraid that the “troubled times” for civil liberties in our country are going to get worse before they get better.

Why the quotes? Do they indicate that Mr. Romero recognizes that we aren’t really living in troubled times for civil liberties? Or is Mr. “Romero” one of those “people” with an annoying “habit” of using “quotation” marks where they don’t “belong?” Let’s read on, to find out.

The Bush Administration’s calculated and politically-driven anti-liberties agenda, combined with a Congress dominated by radical right-wing forces, have created the most inhospitable climate for civil liberties in decades.

Lessee – a gratuitous swipe at the Bush Administration, and at the “radical right-wing forces” that allegedly control Congress. But the ACLU is neither right nor left, I’m sure they’ll come down just as hard on the Clinton Administration and the radical left-wing forces that controlled Congress during the first two years. Right?

As to the most inhospitable climate in decades, it’s good to know that the ACLU had no problems with the status of civil liberties during the last decade, in which the Clinton/Gore Administration persecuted the author of PGP and lobbied hard for backdoor encryption of the infamous “Clipper” chip, and a couple was jailed for months solely because the wife told President Clinton to his face that he “sucked,”

And the fact that they are proposing two amendments that would radically damage our Constitution is just the latest indication of how far foes of freedom will go.

After all, real friends of freedom never amend the Constitution. That’s too hard to do. Instead, why not just rig the judicial nomination process to get judges in office who will do it formally? Also unclear is why the “foes of freedom” would have any position on gay marriage, one way or the other. Gay marriage has nothing to do with pro- or anti-freedom.

That is why I am writing you today to ask you to join the American Civil Liberties Union in standing up for fundamental American values.

I didn’t know abortion and gay marriage were fundamental American values. Guess you learn something new every day.

We need your immediate help to stop radical anti-liberty proposals from becoming laws of the land with Congress’ [sic] and the White House’s seal of approval. And, we need your help to make 2004 the year that Americans reclaim their lost freedoms.

That sounds like a very thinly veiled pitch to elect John Kerry as President. Nevertheless, I’m a bit stumped as to why. The one freedom I can think of that was actually lost over the past decade was the liberty of owning a weapon Clinton and his Congress blacklisted in 1994 as an “assault” rifle. If the ACLU is upset over George Bush’s promise to renew that law if it reaches his desk, I agree. I’m not convinced their guy Kerry would be any better in this department, however.

We are fighting legislation that will give the government even more unchecked power to snoop into your private life and activities, further limit or outright ban a woman’s right to abortion, funnel taxpayer dollars to religions schools and institution, restrict free speech on the Internet, ignore the First Amendment by cracking down on all forms of dissent and decimate the Bill of Rights in the name of fighting terrorism.

To “decimate,” of course, means “to select by lot and kill one in every ten of.” As an organization that expressly supports killing one in every ten of the Bill of Rights, I’d think the ACLU might be a little more sensitive than that about the word “decimate.” But that’s just me.

We have often relied on the courts as freedom’s final safeguard against such assaults on civil liberties. But even that bulwark is being weakened with the appointment of far-right judges to the federal bench.

Got that? Allowing parents to choose their children’s education, even if the choices might include … horrors … religious education, is an “assault on civil liberties.” I guess that real liberties are uncivil. So far, the left-right count includes two swipes at the Republican controlled White House, two at an allegedly right-wing Congress, and one at any judge who shows any danger of actually reading the Constitution rather than finding the ACLU’s agenda in its emanations and penumbras. But remember, the ACLU is neither right nor left, so I’m sure their attack on the excesses of left-liberal governments are coming Real Soon Now (“RSN”).

At times like this when our civil liberties are in great peril, it’s essential for friends of liberty like you to speak up and be heard.

Duly noted. That’s what this blog is for.

I hope you’ll take this opportunity to join the ACLU in speaking out for liberty and justice for all.

Which would be my pleasure, if only the ACLU would start speaking out for liberty and justice for all.

[Irrelevant ancient history deleted]

We stood up and spoke out in the Vietnam War era when the CIA and FBI were encouraged to illegaly spy on civil rights activists and anti-war demonstrators.

“Spy on,” of course means, “pay attention to any evidence of illegal activity by…”

And in 1987, we stood up and spoke out against Robert Bork’s appointment to the Supreme Court, based on his troubling record on civil liberties.

Translation: And in 1987, we stood up and spoke out against a distinguished law professor from Yale because he read the Constitution and found stuff that didn’t exactly gibe with our political agenda, which we also like to tout as “constitutional.” That would really hurt our credibility as a “constitutional rights” organization, so we had little choice but to turn this highly-qualified judge’s surname into a verb.

[More ancient history deleted for space.]

But 45 years [after Democrat Franklin Delano Roosevelt ordered all U.S. citizens of Japanese descent who resided in the western states to live in "happy camps"] , President Reagan signed a bill paying reparations to the Japanese-Americans who suffered that abuse. And as he did, even the deeply conservative Ronald Reagan called internment an act of “war hysteria and racism.”
[Emphasis added.]

“Even the deeply conservative” Reagan now opposed the internment. Not “even Reagan, the erstwhile liberal Democrat who twice voted for the very s.o.b. who ordered thate internment,” but “even the deeply conservative Reagan.” But remember, the ACLU is neither right nor left. So they missed one obvious opportunity to take a shot at the excesses of a liberal Democrat administraiton. I’m sure they’ll take the next opportunity.

Today, as our nation again faces determined efforts to weaken civil liberties, we are more determiend than ever not to sacrifice vital elements of our freedom…

Except maybe the Second Amendment, any economic freedoms whatsoever, or the individual freedoms secured by the First…

equality and tolerance to the current wave of hysteria and intolerance.

At this point, the letter ends midway. Apparently, Mr. Romero got arrested and detained without charge due to the current wave of hysteria and intolerance that permeates the current administration. Oh, wait, no, that didn’t really happen after all. Onward:

That’s what the enclosed NATIONAL SURVEY ON FREEDOM AND LIBERTY [sic - freedom and liberty are synonyms] is all about. It’s a chance for you – based on your understanding of what’s at stake at this very moment – to speak out about what you believe our country must or must not do as we strive to balance the need for security with the demands of liberty.

Yeah, we all know the ACLU is all about balance. As to the phony survey/sales pitch, you’ve received those before. I may blog about their loaded questions later, but I’m going to skip that issue for now.

[Sales pitch deleted for space.]

You see, the ACLU has been engaged in a struggle with the Bush Administration as it pursues policies with reckless disregard for fundamental freedoms, all the while inflicting possibly irrevocable damage on the Constitution and the Bill of Rights [sic, the Bill of Rights is part of the Constitution].

Nine-tenths of which the ACLU supports, more or less. But it would be nice if they’d elborate as to which parts of the Bill of Rights the Bush Administration has supposedly danged, revocably or otherwise.

The USA PATRIOT Act – passed hastily by a Congress afraid to appear “unpatriotic”….

See above re air quotes. No one actually accused anybody of being unpatriotic, but never mind that.

… not only expanded the government’s power to invade our privacy…

Who’s “we?” The Patriot Act didn’t give the government any new power to invade my privacy, only that of criminal and/or terrorist suspects. Does this mean the ACLU itself is run by criminal suspects who have lost privacy under the PATRIOT Act? I’ve often heard them referred to as the American Criminal Liberties Union, but it never occured to me that they might actually be a union of American criminals seeking more liberty. Then again, I’m also one of those silly Americans who think that no means yes, pissed means angry, and curse word means something other than a word that is cursed. So what do I know?

…imprison people without meaningful due process…

“Meaningful” means, of course, “meaning what the ACLU wants it to mean.” Imprisoning people without actual due process – as defined by the courts – would never fly anyway. See U.S. Const. Amends. V, XIV, which the ACLU played no role in enacting.

…search homes and offices without prior notice…

Translated: search offices without prior notices, which regulators have done for years. As to searching homes, see U.S. Const. Amend IV, which the ACLU played no role in enacting.

…and punish dissent…

How? By discouraging individuals from buying Linda Ronstadt’s Greatest Harangues, or by persauding Babies ‘R’ Us not to stock it in the first place?

…but also deliberately and dangerously undercuts the ability of judges to check and balance the potential abuses of these sweeping new powers.

Good God, you’d think the federal government were about to impose any checks and balances on judges. OK, so they did try that with the Marriage Protection Act, but that bill is mentioned nowhere in the letter.

Attorney General John Ashcroft introduced new rules that allow the FBI to spy on Americans in their house of worship, on the Internet, in bookstores and in libraries – without evidence that a crime might be committed.

Translation: Attorney General John Ashcroft introduced new rules that allow the FBI to pay attention to what people do in public and, worse still, to actually do something about it if evidence of a serious crime emerges.

He even browbeat Congress into granting him the power to criminally charge [sic, to charge criminally] librarians if they inform their patrons that the governmetn has been investigating their reading habits.

What? Y’all mean to say you cain’t tip a criminal suspect off to the fact that the gummit is watching him? Gawd dang. Next thing you know, they’ll be saying you cain’t provide them wif a getaway car, either.

Meanwhile, the ACLU neglected to mention the number of librarians actually charged under that provision. Hint: geese have been known to lay them.

And now, President Bush and Attorney General Ashcroft are pressing hard to make freedom-stealing provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act permanent, rather than letting them “sunset” out of existence.

Yet, for some reason the ACLU still has enough freedom left to send me this letter without fear of repercussions. Looks like George Bush and his freedom-burglars may have some unfinished business there.

I’m hoping you are willing to join us and help resist these unneeded and unwarranted encroachments on freedom before our democracy is altered permanently.

Democracy? Since when did the ACLU support that? Aren’t these the guys who sued to undo Prop 209, the L.A. County Seal, and even the very existence of a recall election last fall?

Now, on to page 4 of 4:

And we aren’t just facing a rollback of civil liberties in the name of fighting terrorism. The Bush Administration and opponents of freedom on both sides of the aisle…

See, I told you the ACLU was neither left nor right. So maybe they waited until page four before acknowledging that it is even possible for someone on the Democrat side of the aisle to be an Opponent Of Freedom. I’m sure they’ll start railing against left-wing excesses now.

… are fueling an extremist agenda that threatens to destroy fundamental rights such as separation of church and state, freedom of speech, the right to choose [sic, abort] and equal rights for lesbians and gay men.

Translation: Bush might appoint judges who adopt a more flexible approach toward the Establishment Clause, which has nothing to do with no individual rights, “fundamental” or otherwise, and who are so damned “radical” that they actually want to maintain the status quo on gay rights. Freedom of speech? OK, maybe we made that one up. You see, we thought it would be cute to use our freedom of speech to complain that we supposedly don’t have any freedom of speech. It was just a harmless joke, dammit.

If we don’t mount a spirited ,effective defense of liberty’s principles on all of these fronts, it will only encourage our political opponents…

…who, never forget, are equally represented on the left and the right, even if we did a really crappy job of reminding you of that in this letter …

…to press ahead with their full radical agenda, including amendng the Constitution to make flag burning a crime

… which it has been for most of America’s radical history…

and to ban marriage and government benefits for same-sex couples…

… which have been “banned” (denied) for almost all of our radical history..

censoring free speech on the Internet…

…OK, so we made that part up, too, except for that part about the Communications Decency Act, which President Clinton signed into law. You didn’t expect the ACLU to actually say something bad about a Democrat administration, did you? Just because they’re neither right nor left, doesn’t mean they don’t know how their bread gets buttered.

…squelching dissent…

Whose, again?

and overturning Roe v. Wade.

Ah, so that’s what they meant about democracy being “altered permanently.” If those Repubs get their way with democracy, we might actuall end up having one.

Defending liberty under such conditions – taking on controversial and volatile issues in a politically difficult time – is what the ACLU does best.

Great. I’ll consider donating just as soon as they stop suing to prevent elections, leave county seals alone, and take on the blatantly unconstitutional, freedom-stealing “assault” weapons ban. Until then, the ACLU is welcome to waste as much of its money as it likes sending me silly sales pitches like this one.

An American civil liberties union strikes me as an excellent idea. Too bad the name’s taken.