Democracy Is Neither Natural Nor Easy; that's why we really can't do it very well
Political Society Tends To Devolve Back To Dictatorship
by JON CARROLL, SF Chronicle

Let us review. According to several sources, most notably Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez, the president has the right to arrest and hold anyone he chooses, without charge, for as long as he wants, without access to a lawyer and without any kind of public judicial proceeding -- or, in a pinch, without even a private judicial proceeding. He has the right to tap the telephone, read the e-mail and examine the financial records of anyone he chooses.

It now appears that he also has the right to selectively declassify intelligence documents to obtain political goals, even if (or perhaps particularly if) the intelligence in question is suspect. He has the right to lie to the American people in order to enter into a war of unknown intensity and duration.

The president does not yet have an ermine robe and a gold crown, but no one can say for sure that plans to obtain such trappings of state are not already under way. Heck, no one can say for sure anything at all because the quality of information is so degraded that it's hard to know what's going to happen until it happens, and sometimes not even then. We can say this: No one ever went broke not trusting George W. Bush.

Full story here.