How to destroy a nation with asymmetric power
Reducing the citizenry to a frightened puddle of passivity, hysteria and a child-like expectation of Absolute Safety is irrevocable and far more consequential than any specific new laws. Fear is always the enabling force of authoritarianism: the desire to vest unlimited power in political authority in exchange for promises of protection.
--a reader of Andrew Sullivan's blog speaks about the dangers of our nanny state reaction to the threat of terrorism, as driven by neoconservatives and neofascists
