Political Science

After reading the article, Democracy and the Threat of Authoritarianism Politics Beyond Barack Obama. Henry Giroux, the author gives a very disturbing look at what he thinks is an emergent authoritarianism in the United States.  This began under the administration of George W. Bush following the events of the September 11.  The previous administration used undemocratic measures such as military commissions and the implementation of the Patriot Act, a law which allows the government, through its security and intelligence agencies, to carry out near-extreme measures such as wiretapping, accessing confidential information like bank accounts and the detention and deportation of any foreign national suspected of being a terrorist.  The departure of the Bush administration and entry of the Obama administration was thought to be promising but to the surprise of Giroux and his ilk, it seems as though nothing has changed much as Obama is allegedly continuing the same policies of the Bush administration as mentioned earlier (Giroux, 2010).

My critique of this article is that when national security issues are at stake, this is no time to be overly concerned about our individual rights.  The problem with liberals, especially those leaning along the left is they tend to be too antagonistic towards any move by the government to curtail rights even if it is for the good of society.  This harks back to the ideas of the English political philosopher Thomas Hobbes and even as early as Plato who soundly criticized the Sophists for espousing that notion that individual rights are absolute.  If one were to look at what Plato and Hobbes would say, this is a bad idea.  No government is perfect.  There has to be an entity or institution that should safeguard the welfare of the people and necessitates regulating and to some extent curtailing rights to ensure order.  Vigilance is probably the best measure to fight terrorism.  If the citizens can do this, such authoritarian measures would not be necessary.